"I do think it's weird and unfair how his new media image is one of some bitter, crazed hit man."

I feel for him-- he's just a bitter, crazed hit man part of the time.  It's like some Republicans, for example, complain that their party's popular image is that of a race-baiting, war-mongering gang of kleptocrats, when this totally ignores the one time they voted to pay for a nice park bench in Peoria.

ejbenjamin: lol, very true.

Bill was saying: "90s Peace + Prosperity = Bill + Hillary. Everyone else can just shut up."

That may not qualify as an "angry outburst."  But it still betrays a deep anger at anyone who dares to not sign on with him and his wife.

Bill's sounding a bit off-message, isn't he?  What ever happened to trying to frame Hillary as the candidate for change?  

I actually thought that comment falls more in line with what Obama is saying than Hillary. I dont think there is anything wrong with the comment but it just crystallize my problems with the Clintons.  We are not in the 90's anymore the Clintons would like to take us back to the past. I wish Hillary had distance herself more from Bill's presidency. It makes it easier for Obama's message that she is the past and he is the future.  We can't go back we have had 8 years of Bush that has pretty obliterated any good things that happened in the past. Going back to the old ways of using this dragged out fighting to get anything done is a risk we may not be able to take because there are a lot of challenges out there. It requires a new approach.

Carol

Oberman is windsocking.  

If I remember correctly, MSNBC stuck Keith Olberman on white house duty during the Lewinsky matter. He had to live through all of that crap.

query.nytimes.com/.../fullpage.html

harriscrl3,

Couldn't agree with you more.  This, combined with Ickes phone call reported this morning on The Stump (A New Clinton Electability Argument) show that the Clintons only feel comfortable in the incredibly partisan 50.1/49.9 politics of the past.  We're coming off the most disastorous presidency in history  and the Party should be looking at this election as a chance to create a major realignment in American Politics.  

Look at how Reagan and the GOP were able to capitalize on the nation's dissatisfaction with Jimmy Carter.  That's the opportunity we have in front of us.  

Nkocz:  The thing is, Obama resembles Carter 1976:  in the wake of bitter partisanship (Watergate/Nixon pardon), an "outside the beltway" figure preaching a "new kind of politics", highly intelligent (nuclear engineer if not Harvard law), vague religious aura.  It didn't work out too well. And Obama is bringing back his foreign policy architect to boot.  

Lymon1, I think you've got it backwards. Hillary is the policy wonk in the Carter mold, not Obama. Also, Carter was hardly an inspiring speaker. To the contrary, his speeches were a lot like Hillary's in that there was a nannyish, I-know-better-than-you-do quality. Only the call to "change," which is hardly a new theme, bears any resemblance to Obama.

BHL -- not arguing, but the main thrust of Obama's campaign is the same as Carter's: I'm outside the beltway, my inexperience is a good thing, and I'm moral.  And unless that's some other person named Zbigniew Brzezinski in Obama's foreign policy braintrust...  That's not to say Obama doesn't have his good points, but a lot of Obama's supporters seem to have blinders on, which leads to my generally pro-Clinton posts here.

To wit:   www.washingtonpost.com/.../AR2008021503193_pf.html

Bill has been angling -  hail mary style - for Hillary to be considered for VP for awhile now.

lymon, stop the historical revisionism. Obama is not Carter, and Carter was not that bad of a President. He inherited a country in the midst of stagflation, a major oil shock due to the fall of the Shah (or was that his fault) the profound stupidity of the Soviets invading Afghanistan, and the hostage crisis. In addition Volcker chose the Carter Presidency as the time to wring inflation out of the economy. In the end, history will judge his Presidency as a C. Stop pretending it was an F. And please stop comparing Carter to Obama. Why not compare him to Bill in 92 since they are the same age and are both black.

To Mr. Crowley's point about the media narrative of Bill Clinton being a "bitter, crazed hit man" all the time, echoing ejbenjamin - the media, and many Democrats, assumed that the Clintons were skilled but sneaky politicians who were under attack by the crazed Gingrich-led GOP.  However, when Bill turned his anger and falsehoods on a fellow Democrat, people started to think that maybe the GOP was right... maybe he just can't ever tell the truth... maybe he's so selfish that he'll do anything for himself.

Before South Carolina, Bill was a good man brought low by a partisan vendetta.  When Bill attacked Obama with sleaze and lies, he showed that he was willing to be a vengeful partisan in his own right.

It was at that point that the non-Hillary Democrats - and the press - started treating Bill in the same way that the GOP has - as someone who can never be trusted, never believed, and whose every action must be presumed to be for selfish, even destructive gain.  

It was a sad occurrence.  I am disgusted by his behavior in this election and I think that's why its actually legitimate to doubt his intention and his words.  When someone commits the crime he committed (the racist sleaze) against a *friend* (Obama is a friend to every Democrat), then Bill lost all benefit of the doubt.

Blackton, your points about what Carter faced during his term are accurate. The problem with Carter was that his every response to those problems were ineffectual. I say 'D.'

I think the best comparison for Obama is the title character in the Music Man.

Actually it was Reagan who inherited the fall of the Shah -- indeed it may be that Reagan benefited from same (although I don't generally buy into conspiracy theories) as the failure of the rescue mission and the hostages were parlayed into a kind of metaphor for how America was especially weak under Carter (= the argument was in the area of magical thinking:  the accident in the desert with the helicopters wouldn't have happened if a Republican had been president).

Carter was not responsible, however, for the 35 years of pretending that the Shah was a legitimate ruler and indeed a benevolent father of his nation adored by ordinary Iranians.  To this day, Iranian-American dialog is haunted by our refusal to understand that we toppled a democratically elected government in the case of Mossadeq in 1953 that was not, repeat not, even particularly friendly to the Soviet Union.

But back to the matter at hand:  Obama is not Carter in 1976.  He is a bit Clinton in '92, and a touch of JFK in 1960, and somewhat startlingly maybe also a splash of Roosevelt in 1932.  Clinton is Clinton in 2008 pretending it's 1996.  But McCain isn't Bob Dole.

blackton: please note that I wrote "Carter 76"  and was mostly talking about his first campaign, not saying Obama is identical to Carter.  I only partially agree with your evaluation of his presidency (his Iran policy was a "worst of both worlds" but definitely energy prices are an under-valued factor in evaluating a President -- low oil prices were a boon to Reagan and Bill Clinton).  I'll split hairs and give him a C- (saved from a D+ by his CAFE rules, which Reagan overturned).  But given this flipflop on campaign financing, I'll consider adding the Clinton comparison.

Yeah, I remember Olbermann putting out lots of public angst over the whole Lewinsky business, now that you mention it.  I half-expected him to pull some sort of hara-kiri ritual on the air before it was all said and done.  

Then Olbermann gets to come back on the air and be the public face of outrage through the BushHell years.  If we ever had a reasonable, even semi-functioning presidency Olbermann wouldn't be able to function on the air, would he?

On the subject of insider/outsider/who-does-Obama-resemble: exactly who was the last successful presidential candidate (running for a first term--i.e. non-incumbent, which lets LBJ and Truman out) to campaign in the role of Washington insider in any way?  Bush I, maybe?  And before him, who?  One could argue Herbert Hoover, which turned out wonderfully, or maybe even Taft??  Harold Hill (the title character in The Music Man, in case you missed it) was arguably more successful than any of them.

The twentieth century is chock full of Presidents who campaigned on some variation of the change/outsider theme, or otherwise fit the bill described here.  If anything, a McCain win would be a bit of a reversal of a fairly long trend.  

Peter:  Do you really mean that -- that Obama is a con man?

Let's assume you don't, and just think that he's all talk.  This is the "law of conservation of virtues" fallacy I've recently read about.  The ability to make a great speech isn't actually a bad thing, nor is it sign that that's all you can do.

That fallacy really is the only basis of this "all-hat-no-cattle" charge.  Any fair look at Obama's campaign reveals that he is proposing numerous specific plans just as detailed as anyone else's, and that he speaks knowledgeably about those plans and the problems that they seek to address.  Any fair look at Obama's record reveals that he is a capable politician and legislator who has shown a pronounced ability to win over skeptical constituencies and colleagues.  Any fair look at Obama himself reveals a formidable intellect uncommon in politics.

But, alas, he's also in a class by himself on the stump.  Ergo, he must be a lightweight selling snake oil.  Just like all those other Henry Hills who gave a great speech -- Lincoln, FDR, MLK, etc.

Correction:  I meant Harold Hill, not Henry Hill, who is the wiseguy played by Ray Liotta in Goodfellas.

Crowley writes, "I do think it's weird and unfair how his new media image is one of some bitter, crazed hit man."

It's the way of the world, Michael.  Call it karma, justice, whatever.  

Bill got away with murder for his entire career.  (Or, perhaps it was just rape.)  Now, that he's going for  the big score, for the ratification of his legacy, now maybe Bill's getting some unfair treatment.

I'm trying to feel badly about that, Michael.  But, maybe there is a God.

By the way, it's not just the Clinton's who want to go back to the 90s.  It's virtually all Democrats.  

They want to live in that nice easy time when we had won the Cold War, kicked Saddam out of Iraq, and were enjoying the tech and later the dot.com prosperity.  (All the work of Republican administrations, which Clinton, thanks to Perot and an ambivalent G. Bush the First got the free ride on.)

And like all Democrats, Bill Clinton would like to forget 9/11, Al Qaeda, Militant Islam, Jihad.  None of which did the current G. Bush create, all of which he has had to deal with and make the tough decisions about.

But, Bill, and the Democrats, they want to stop the world, get off, and go back and party like it's 1996.

Guess when this is all over, Bill will have to work twice as hard, getting only $50k a speech instead of $100k.  And, maybe fewer of those cushy money deals with supermarket barons and in the former Soviet Central Asian republics.

cypess, your analysis of Bill-disillusion is perfect.

And believe me, he did not suddenly become like this because he and Hillary found themselves cornered in South Carolina by Obama.

They've always been like this.  Only it took their racist attacks on Obama finally to remove the scales from the eyes of Democrats not irretrievably in the thrall of the Clintons.

ironyroad, the truth is, only in his ability to give a moving speech is Obama anyway akin to either FDR or JFK, Kennedy family making the analogy notwithstanding.

Jack Kennedy was young.  But he had been on the national scene going back to his Harvard days writing a thesis that as the book, "While England Slept" gained national attention.

Jack Kennedy served honorably, probably heroically as a Naval officer in WW2.  Upon his return from that war he was soon sent (1946) to the U.S. House of Representatives.  Then he was elected in 1950 to the Senate.  In 1956, he was a serious contender at the Democratic Convention for the vice presidential nomination.  In 1957, he won a Pulitzer Prize for "Profiles in Courage".

So by 1960, when he was at last nominated, Jack Kennedy had been on the national scene as an elected member of Congress for almost a decade and a half.  Big dif in "experience" from Obama.

FDR, no comparison.  Assistant Secretary of the Navy in WWI.  (Founder of the US Navy Reserve, by the way.)  And then, in 1928 he became governor of NY, then the largest state.  

I'm as charmed as anyone by Obama for his relatively self-made status, his running of his campaign, and his impressive rhetorical skills.

But, seriously folks, there are movies stars who could deliver the speeches even better.  The ability to inspire is important in a president.  But, we're going to need more than that to face what the next decade has in store for us.

the truth is, neither Obama nor Hillary Clinton has the kind of experience we used to expect of a President of the United States.

And one thing I've yet to see pointed out anywhere, except by yours truly here, the very charismatic John F. Kennedy, in his only national race, won the election by a tiny margin of about 100,000 votes.  (Which may have been stolen for him in Chicago.)  And this in facing a not so charming Richard Nixon.

Charisma without other attributes may not be as decisive as we imagine.

actually Hillary is more like Evita

Don't cry for me America

I will cry myself instead

It won't be easy, I have no tear ducts

The truth is I never left you

All through Bill's wild days

Our mad existence

I kept my promise

Although he didn't

And as for fortune, and as for fame

Of course I invited them in

Though it seemed to the world they were all I desired

In truth I wanted power more

They're not the solutions they promised to be

The answer was here all the time

I love me and hope you love me

Have I said too much?

There's nothing more I can think of to say to you

But all you have to do is look at me to know that

Every word is true, even when they are lies!

Just listen to that! The voice of America!

We are adored! We are loved!

Statesmanship is more than entertaining peasants

We shall see little man

Chan, yes, agreed -- there are major differences, and the suspect numbers in JFK's victory are worth bearing in mind.  But I have to say that there are other parallels than charisma going on here -- there's the sense of a new psychological configuration, a generational-cultural change in national politics.  With JFK it wasn't just youth and age, a choice he deployed very effectively and Obama will too, but it was also the Catholic thing that was going to put to bed some old paranoias in the U.S. about who can be permitted to become president (btw Romney's speech to the Evangelicals was just about the most perversely misplayed hand in American politics for a generation -- he manged the exact opposite of what JFK achieved).  Obama is facing the same mental barriers as Kennedy faced regarding the unspoken but assumed dynamics of presidential politics (can't be Catholic, can't be Jewish, can't be non-white).

In any case, I was just piling on lymon1 for his bizarre Obama=Carter comment.

Would it not be for more worthwhile to focus on the problems of today? The major issues and concerns the next president is going to actually need to resolve?

It does seem like a kind of "never never" land--this great new "lovey-dovey" bi partisan world that is supposed to come about according to Obama supporters because of his leadership. Had neither Hillary Clinton nor Bill never thought that building bi-partisan across-the-aisle coalitions and expanding our politics would be a good strategy to achieve their aims? Of course they did--but it was stymied.

But now what needs to be considered are how to achieve bi-partisanship on the issues of today. What is our grand new foreign policy around which we will unite the American people? Achieving a massive consensus to stop global warming or to provide health care for all? Or how about on appointing judges to the Supreme Court? The Obama followership has come quite a long way on what seem like atmospherics--and so little actual factual plans. It is almost as if to say that having actual "real world" concrete and step-by-step processes is beneath them, and beneath Obama's approach. It is as if they are saying "trust us."

This will not work in the general election, and, if elected, it will not last two weeks into an Obama administration.

It's time to get serious.

Come on Tullius.  You don't really believe that specifics are what got anyone elected in the past 40 years do you?  Quick -- what were the major policy specifics set forth in Bush's campaigns ('stay the course,"  "Compassionate conservatism") or Clinton"s ("I feel your pain") or Bush 1 ("no new taxes") or Reagan ("it's morning in America."  "Let's get the government off the backs of the people.")  Is that what you mean by "specfic/"

Electoral politics is about "atmospherics" if you want to call it that.  Campaign rhetoric is intended to signal the candidates' priorities, the interests that concern them, the groups they will protect and defend.  That's it.  What is Hillary signaling?  Who knows?  Any message about us, rather than about her (a clear statement of her priorities in and of itself), is lost n myriad of policy details.  What is Obama signalling?  "A house divided against itself cannot stand."  Gee, is that specific enough for you?  It was compelling the first time around.  If Lincoln were running for president, would you be criticizing him for his lack of specific, step-by-step processes?  Methinks you might.

Come to think of it, this really is the problem with Hillary in a nutshell.  Mostly she likes to talk about herself -- I'm vetted; I'm tested; I'm ready Day 1; I'm experienced.   No, Hill.  This thing called an election isn't supposed to be about you, it is supposed to be about us.  We elect you.  You don't elect yourself as you seem to be trying to do.  When she does get around to talking about us, it is all "specific, step-by-step processes" and nothing that makes me or a lot of other people believe she gives a crap about anything other than the glory of being president.

On Obama giving a speech: he's obviously much better than Hillary at delivering the big address. However, on a routine day-in, day-out basis a president communicates with the country not with rousing oratory but with a few quick questions and answers on the nightly news -- similar to the debate format at which Hillary has proved superior. For me, it's been the debates that've kept me from surrendering to Obama-mania so far. I find her capable of delivering a coherent message succinctly. In everyday life, I associate that quality with a person's firm grasp of the material.

Mr. Crowley,

You're dealing with a false dichotomy. Nobody serious believes Obama can "put an end to" partisanship. We worry that Billary will *ignite* partisanship more (much, much more) than Obama, and thus make her much less effective. My guess is her approval ratings would sink below 50% within a couple months. She'd never recover, and her one term would resurrect an otherwise dying GOP and sink an otherwise resurgent democratic party. In short, she = a nightmare for progressives.

Second, this "the media killed the Clintons" argument was tired way back on January 4th. She was the inevitable one all summer. Obama was the newbie who couldn't throw a punch. Let's be real: since October 30th, the day she confronted her very first real challenge (the driver's license dilemma) Penn and Co. have run one of the worst campaigns, and maybe the worst, in the new century...

The real story here is Penn's ongoing employment. Not sure why nobody's cracked that nut.

Talk about 'piling on' .... apparently, a disturbed heckler confronted Bill Clinton face to face after Bill gave a speech, and for about the last 24 hours the Drudge headline has been "Bill Clinton Lashes Out At Obama Supporter", complete with a red-faced, vein popping photo.

On the other hand, Bill Clinton must have read the words yesterday in the NYT that GW Bush dreamed the Iraqis would be saying about him:

"In an outpouring of adulation for the United States, the architect of NATO’s 1999 bombing campaign against Serbian forces under President Slobodan Milosevic, revelers unfurled giant American flags, carried posters of former President Bill Clinton and chanted, “Thank you, U.S.A.” and “God bless America.”"

That's the first bit of good press Bill Clinton has gotten in months. It took a revolution.

There is a very good CURRENT example of the media giving Obama a pass. On Friday (Feb 15), Obama made a sexist remark:  that 'periodically' when Hillary is "feeling down" she attacks to make herself feel better.  I happen to catch it on MSNBC about 4:15 at which time Andrea Mitchell, who was being interviewed at the time, commented, "That's very, very personal."  This was never mentioned nor discussed on any of MSNBC program subsequently.  There is a blog by Karen Stabiner on Huffington Post (www.huffingtonpost.com) that discusses the video.  To quote her: The change candidate had embraced one of the oldest cliches in the book -- that women are held hostage by emotion, that we can't be trusted with the big decisions because, depending on our age, we're either on the rag or having a hot flash."  It's not likely that MSNBC or any other media will show or discuss Obama's remarks.      

I think the Clintons are mad that they have to work this hard. Remember entitlement? Inevitability?

Iowa was a slap in the face that they still haven't recovered from.

If the Clintons hadn't been in the race - imagine Biden, Richardson, Edwards, etc.making up the entire field - and Obama had emerged, the Democratic Party would be ecstatic. While there is a genuine euphoria and "coming together" around Obama, there is an unnecessary hostility aimed his way because of his ability to inspire, anger born of the Clintons' frustration at coming up with their own magic.

So they need to convince us that magic is bullshit, oratory is bullshit, and idealism is bullshit.

Can the Clintons win by fostering disillusionment? Sounds awful to me.

Come on, pawlowski-  He obviously meant that when she was down in the campaign and feeling bad about her chances.  Then she goes negative.  Like every politician.  Just because he said "periodically" doesn't mean he was talking about her period.   Let's not get too over-the-top here with deconstructionism.

Beside, as pccostello told us incessantly, HRC is post-menapausal.  

roi - I think Tully's point is well taken. Inspiration-- cool, got it, like it, fine. Now could Obama's supporters tell us whether his view of taxing and spending inclines toward the Kucinich wing or the DLC wing? Ditto for foreign policy. A candidate who is enthhusiastically supported by the former doesn't make me comfortable. I need to see some real distance between him and the far left, and no, I don't want to read some verbiage buried on Page 5 of the website.

Dukakis was supposed to win in a cakewalk too (up by 20 points in late 1988), remember?

tep:  I think you will find enough policy by and by to satisfy you.  The general rap is that Obama is a bit right of Hillary, but of course that may just be his campaign posture.

Yes, Dukakis was supposed to win in a cakewalk.  Show's you just how vulnerable policy wonks are in a real campaign.  Many of the Dem wonk candidates of the past 40 years, of which Hillary is but the latest, were supposed to win or in Carter's case were actually in office.  They didn't.  Hillary is flaming out just the way Dukakis did.  Until the Dems can re-learn the difference between politics and policy -- for which purpose Obama presents a singular opportunity -- they remain doomed.  The last wonky Republican, Bush I, lost to a charismatic Dem, Clinton I.  Wonky incumbent Carter lost to charismatic Reagan.

Notice a pattern here?

I think the reason Bush 1 lost to Clinton was

a) he seemed ambivalent about wanting the job.

b) He, too, seemed to resent having to work so hard for a second term against some governor out of where--Arkansas?  

c)  Perot sucked off a lot of conservative votes whether GOP or independent that he otherwise woulda had.