Recent Campaign Posts from Liberal Values

[Dr Ron]

Following are some recent posts from Liberal Values related to the nomination battle. As DU uses non-standard html codes, see the original posts for links (and often better formating). I'll post each as a reply to this post.

[Dr Ron]

1. John Kerry on Obama’s Health Care Plan

John Kerry on Obama’s Health Care Plan

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3089

On one of today’s battles of the surrogates John Kerry backed Barack Obama while Ed Rendell backed Hillary Clinton on This Week. Kerry made many good points in favor of Obama. On health care, Kerry noted that “Hillary Clinton’s plan in the United States Senate is a non-starter because it starts with a mandate which is unachievable in the United States Senate.” Kerry had also rejected mandates when developing his 2004 health care plan. The video is available here.

[Dr Ron]

2. Richard Scaife, Another Conservative Hillary Fan?

Richard Scaife, Another Conservative Hillary Fan?

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3088


Hillary Clinton is sure getting along better with the “vast right wing conspiracy.” Despite all the conflict she has had with them, she is not above working with Rush Limbaugh, Matt Drudge, and more recently Richard Mellon Scaife. It isn’t necessarily bad to mend fences with one’s political enemies and find ways to work together. The problem in Hillary’s case is that her views are far closer to theirs than many realize. I was not at all surprised to see today’s columnfrom Richard Scaife in which he reassesses Clinton and found many more areas of agreement than anticipated.

In some cases this is because Scaife agrees with virtually everyone but the extreme right that remaining in Iraq is contrary to our national interests, as well as the interests of the Iraqis. In other cases this may because of how conservative Clinton is on social issues (with the exception of abortion). I’ve noted her association with social conservatives in recent posts (here and here) and how this can be seen in many of her political positions.

It is not surprising that Scaife still finds areas of disagreement with Clinton on domestic issues. Her economic populism, along with her views on abortion, will prevent most conservatives from realizing how close she actually is to their views. From my perspective, while her populist economic views might be labeled as “liberal”I do not support such views any more than many conservatives do.

Someone like Clinton who is conservative on social issues, civil liberties, church/state issues, reversing the flow of power to the Executive Branch, and foreign policy, while populist on economic issues, is in many ways the worst of all possible choices in American politics and why, while I still have far too many areas of disagreement to vote for him, I’m not so sure that John McCain would be any worse (or more conservative) than Hillary Clinton as president.

Both Hillary Clinton and John McCain are similar in that they demonstrate the limits of our political labels which divide up most people as liberals or conservatives. Both Clinton and McCain actually support a set of positions which are contrary to the views of large numbers of both liberals and conservatives. I would classify both Clinton and McCain as conservatives, but in doing so also understand that neither fit in with the views of the bulk of conservative writers and bloggers. There are also many conservatives who would label both Clinton and McCain as liberals. That is fine with me in light of the limitations of political labels, as long as they also understand that this does not mean their views coincide with my views or the views of a number of other liberals.

More importantly, I hope that during this primary campaign more liberals are realizing that Hillary Clinton is not a liberal. While some still accept the incorrect conventional wisdom that Obama and Clinton are similar on the issues, a growing number of those in the liberal blogosphere are finding reason to oppose Clinton.

As I said at the beginning, if this was a case of Clinton making conservatives more willing to listen to liberal views, as Barack Obama has accomplished, then this would be a favorable thing. The problem remains that Clinton is promoting an essentially conservative agenda and continuation of Bush style politics and government. Instead of getting conservatives to consider liberal ideas, all Clinton is accomplishing is getting conservatives to realize to what degree she is really one of them.

[Dr Ron]

3. Professor Obama

Professor Obama

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3084

Clinton supporters, in their never ending attempts to behave exactly like Republican Clinton bashers have since the 1990’s, have been raising an endless stream of bogus attacks on Barack Obama. While many aspects of Clinton’s biography have been exposed as fiction some Clinton supporters have been claiming that it is untrue that Obama has been a Professor of Constitutional Law.

Having her claims on Bosnia exposed as fiction has harmed Hillary Clinton as it undermines her now debunked claims of greater experience on foreign policy. Gerard Baker has pointed out how Clinton has a habit of lying about even minor matters such as claiming she was named after Sir Edmund Hillary even though she was born about five years before he climbed Everest when he was unknown outside of New Zealand.

Strangely, the Clinton camp has a much higher standard for truth with regards to Barack Obama’s biography. Obama’s experience in teaching Constitutional law does provide him with an advantage in experience over Hillary Clinton, making it understandable that they would like to pretend it wasn’t so. What matters is not so much the line on the resume but the results of the experience, and Obama’s experience can be seen in comparing their views on issues such as civil liberties, limiting presidential power, and separation of church and state.

Clinton supporters and some Republicans have concentrated on a distinction which most people have no concern with between a lecturer and a full professor. The Clinton camp has been distributing this blog post but, as with most of their attacks, it simply does not hold up factually. The University of Chicago released this statement verifying that Obama has been a professor (emphasis mine):

From 1992 until his election to the U.S. Senate in 2004, Barack Obama served as a professor in the Law School. He was a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996. He was a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004, during which time he taught three courses per year. Senior Lecturers are considered to be members of the Law School faculty and are regarded as professors, although not full-time or tenure-track. The title of Senior Lecturer is distinct from the title of Lecturer, which signifies adjunct status. Like Obama, each of the Law School’s Senior Lecturers have high-demand careers in politics or public service, which prevent full-time teaching. Several times during his 12 years as a professor in the Law School, Obama was invited to join the faculty in a full-time tenure-track position, but he declined.

Apparently the University of Chicago regarded Obama as a professor but the Clinton campaign does not. I’ll go with the statement from the University of Chicago. It is certainly true that there are differences between professors, which most voters probably do not care about at all.

It is common for universities to give titles of professor to professionals which differ from the actual full time faculty on a tenure-track. I have a title which I believe is officially labeled Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine from Michigan State University (which has no bearing on my loyalties to my alma mater, the University of Michigan, and I take no responsibility for their basketball performance last night.) While placing me about as low as one could be on the professorship totem pole, this contributes to my understanding of Obama being labeled a professor when he taught law while in private practice. I never assumed he was more than he was, and see no evidence that he made any attempts to exaggerate his position.

Obama never claimed to be anything other than what he was at the University of Chicago, and their statement verifies the validity of referring to this as being a professor. Seeing the University of Chicago write of “his 12 years as a professor in the Law School” trumps any of the distortions being distributed by the Clinton campaign when they claim he was not a professor.

This entry was posted



Clinton supporters, in their never ending attempts to behave exactly like Republican Clinton bashers have since the 1990’s, have been raising an endless stream of bogus attacks on Barack Obama. While many aspects of Clinton’s biography have been exposed as fiction some Clinton supporters have been claiming that it is untrue that Obama has been a Professor of Constitutional Law.

Having her claims on Bosnia exposed as fiction has harmed Hillary Clinton as it undermines her now debunked claims of greater experience on foreign policy. Gerard Baker has pointed out how Clinton has a habit of lying about even minor matters such as claiming she was named after Sir Edmund Hillary even though she was born about five years before he climbed Everest when he was unknown outside of New Zealand.

Strangely, the Clinton camp has a much higher standard for truth with regards to Barack Obama’s biography. Obama’s experience in teaching Constitutional law does provide him with an advantage in experience over Hillary Clinton, making it understandable that they would like to pretend it wasn’t so. What matters is not so much the line on the resume but the results of the experience, and Obama’s experience can be seen in comparing their views on issues such as civil liberties, limiting presidential power, and separation of church and state.

Clinton supporters and some Republicans have concentrated on a distinction which most people have no concern with between a lecturer and a full professor. The Clinton camp has been distributing this blog post but, as with most of their attacks, it simply does not hold up factually. The University of Chicago released this statement verifying that Obama has been a professor (emphasis mine):

From 1992 until his election to the U.S. Senate in 2004, Barack Obama served as a professor in the Law School. He was a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996. He was a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004, during which time he taught three courses per year. Senior Lecturers are considered to be members of the Law School faculty and are regarded as professors, although not full-time or tenure-track. The title of Senior Lecturer is distinct from the title of Lecturer, which signifies adjunct status. Like Obama, each of the Law School’s Senior Lecturers have high-demand careers in politics or public service, which prevent full-time teaching. Several times during his 12 years as a professor in the Law School, Obama was invited to join the faculty in a full-time tenure-track position, but he declined.

Apparently the University of Chicago regarded Obama as a professor but the Clinton campaign does not. I’ll go with the statement from the University of Chicago. It is certainly true that there are differences between professors, which most voters probably do not care about at all.

It is common for universities to give titles of professor to professionals which differ from the actual full time faculty on a tenure-track. I have a title which I believe is officially labeled Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine from Michigan State University (which has no bearing on my loyalties to my alma mater, the University of Michigan, and I take no responsibility for their basketball performance last night.) While placing me about as low as one could be on the professorship totem pole, this contributes to my understanding of Obama being labeled a professor when he taught law while in private practice. I never assumed he was more than he was, and see no evidence that he made any attempts to exaggerate his position.

Obama never claimed to be anything other than what he was at the University of Chicago, and their statement verifies the validity of referring to this as being a professor. Seeing the University of Chicago write of “his 12 years as a professor in the Law School” trumps any of the distortions being distributed by the Clinton campaign when they claim he was not a professor.

[Dr Ron]

4. More Senators Back Obama, Including Key Endorsement in Pennsylvania

More Senators Back Obama, Including Key Endorsement in Pennsylvania

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3082

Endorsements have not had much of an impact in the nomination battle, but this one might be a sign that more Senators are fed up with Hillary Clinton, and possibly that Obama might be able to narrow the gap in Pennsylvania:

Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey plans to endorse Sen. Barack Obama for president today in Pittsburgh, sending a message both to the state’s primary voters and to undecided superdelegates who might decide the close race for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Dan Pfeiffer, deputy communications director for the Obama campaign, confirmed that Casey would announce his support during a rally at the Soldiers and Sailors Military Museum and Memorial and that he would then set out with the Illinois senator on part of a six-day bus trip across the state.

The endorsement comes as something of a surprise. Casey, a deliberative and cautious politician, had been adamant about remaining neutral until after the April 22 primary. He had said he wanted to help unify the party after the intensifying fight between Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

This could be a sign that party leaders are deciding to rally around Obama as presumptive nominee. Yesterday Chris Dodd virtually declared Obama to be the nominee. Another Senator, Patrick Leahy, has now made a similar statement and urged her to withdraw:

There is no way that Senator Clinton is going to win enough delegates to get the nomination. She ought to withdraw and she ought to be backing Senator Obama. Now, obviously that’s a decision that only she can make frankly I feel that she would have a tremendous career in the Senate.

There has been an increasing sense this week that Democrats realize that Hillary Clinton might continue to harm Obama but cannot win the nomination. Howard Dean is also giving indications that he wants this to be wrapped up by the beginning of July:

I think the superdelegates have already been weighing in. I think that there’s 800 of them and 450 of them have already said who they’re for. I’d like the other 350 to say who they’re at some point between now and the first of July so we don’t have to take this into the convention.

[Dr Ron]

5. Clinton Threatens Convention Floor Fight

Clinton Threatens Convention Floor Fight

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3077

Hillary Clinton, who has felt much more comfortable among conservatives lately, has discussed her intentions on Fox News, warning she will take the fight all the way to the convention, showing no regard for what damage she might cause:

“You know, you can always go to the convention. That’s what credential fights are for,” she said. “Let’s have the Democratic party go on record against seating the Michigan and Florida delegations three months before the general election? I don’t think that will happen. I think they will be seated. So that’s where we’re headed if we don’t get this worked out.”

The superdelegates need to step up and commit to Obama in the near future to demonstrate to Clinton that it is pointless to remain in the race. NBC News reports that more superdelegates are getting fed up with her tactics:

At a time when Sen. Hillary Clinton is increasingly relying on superdelegates to vault her to the Democratic Party’s nomination, a handful of undecided and pledged superdelegates are coming forward to say her campaign’s tactics in recent weeks are doing more harm than good.

The Democratic Party insiders say they believe Clinton’s direct attacks against Sen. Barack Obama in recent days are hurting the party and its chances in November, and also say it is showing a calculated, desperate-to-win side of Clinton that they dislike.

There have not gotten to the point yet of trying to get Clinton to leave the race, but sooner or later they might realize that this is necessary if they want to win in November. The Democrats cannot afford to have Clinton continue her divisive tactics through August, leaving Obama little time to recover.

[Dr Ron]

6. More On Hillary’s Choice and The Vast Right Wing Conspiracy

More On Hillary’s Choice and The Vast Right Wing Conspiracy

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3076

I’ve known about Hillary Clinton’s association with the religious right for a long time but considered it more of a personal matter until she attacked Barack Obama for his choice of affiliating with Jeremiah Wright. While I have criticized her conservative positions which grew out of this association, such as her support for a ban on flag burning and her crusade against video games, I didn’t consider comment on her personal associations, which I detailed in this post yesterday, relevant until she launched her personal attack on Obama.

Others have thought along similar lines and there is now more discussion of Clinton’s associations. Joshua Green has written about this today and refers back to this article he wrote back in 2006. His post today also provides links to additional articles on the subject:

If you’ve never heard of The Fellowship (also known as The Family), it will sound like some shadowy organization in a John Grisham novel. (Indeed, as a Google search will demonstrate, critics consider it a cult.) The group was formed in the 1930s to minister to political and business leaders throughout the world, modeling itself as a kind of Christian Trilateral Commission. Several members of Congress are affiliated with the group, mostly Republicans, but some Democrats, too. To the extent The Fellowship is known beyond its members it is probably for founding the annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington.

Like Jeremiah Wright’s Trinity Baptist Church, The Fellowship is run by its own mysterious and controversial figure, Douglas Coe, although temperamentally Coe is Wright’s opposite. He eschews the spotlight and has never made a controversial public utterance that I’m aware of — mainly because he rarely speaks publicly at all. (You won’t find him on YouTube.) But like Wright, Coe has ministered to a Democratic frontrunner. He personally leads a private Senate prayer group that Clinton has been a part of.

In my piece, I chose to focus on the Senate prayer group, but others have written extensively about the strangeness and secrecy of The Fellowship. As this Los Angeles Times story and this exquisitely reported Harper’s piece make clear, there is something deeply strange about the group. They certainly do not like press coverage, so in that regard Clinton’s attraction might make sense. Reporters hoping to look into the group might want to think again. A few years ago, The Fellowship’s archives, which are held at Wheaton College, the evangelical school in Illinos, were reclassified as “restricted” and placed under lock and key.

The Clintons have had a very strange association with the “vast right wing conspiracy.” They sometimes attack each other, and at other times work together, but they have worked to ensure that for the last generation our choices have been limited to one or the other. Finally this year we have a chance to change this.

[Dr Ron]

7. Samantha Power, Tonya Harding, Monster-Gate, And Clinton’s “Jewish Problem”

Samantha Power, Tonya Harding, Monster-Gate, And Clinton’s “Jewish Problem”

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3075

Just this morning I was thinking that there was a growing consensus that Samanta Power was right, even if politically indiscrete, in calling Hillary Clinton a monster and therefore it may be time for her to return. As I mentioned yesterday,Clinton is now being compared to Tonya Harding. After alienating many black voters with the race-baiting strategy engaged by her campaign earlier she is now alienating many Jews as well as some previously neutral Democrats with her campaign’s latest dirty stunt. As a consequence, this is the right day for there to be a story about the Samantha Power’s possible return.

Marc Ambinder first wrote on the Clinton campaign’s attempt to fabricate a story that Obama has a Jewish problem. James Fallows has more. Ambinder notes that at present polls show fairly equal support among Jewish voters between Clinton and Obama but don’t be surprised if this backfires against Clinton and her Jewish support nose dives. This is also yet another case in which we see an alliance between Clinton and the vast right wing conspiracy as she has been circulating a hit job from The American Spectator. Similarly her attacks on Obama’s present votes began as a right wing attack and her attacks based upon his association with Jeremiah Wright came from a collaboration with Richard Mellon Scaife. Add to that her recent affiliation with Matt Drudge and Rush Limbaugh and her compliments of John McCain. No wonder the Bush White House sees her as the one to carry on their legacy.

In response to her latest actions Kevin Drum, who has often defended Clinton, writes, “There are already an awful lot of reasons for me not to bother defending Hillary even tepidly, and I hardly need another one. She’s been voted off the island. It’s time for her to go.” He links to Atrios who wants to “just make it stop.” Steve Benen tries to write in a more neutral fashion as he reports on these items and concludes, “It’s fair to say that Atrios and Kevin are not sycophantic Obama cheerleaders. When they’ve reached this conclusion, the ‘Tonya Harding option’ is probably doing more harm than good.”

Now that virtually everyone realizes that Hillary Clinton really is a monster, it might be time for Samantha Power to return (although perhaps not yet as a formal member of the campaign). Sam Stein reports on a discussion Power held over her book in which the ”monster-gate” came up:

The two-plus hour discussion at Columbia was held to promote Power’s new book “Chasing the Flame.” And while a good portion of the talk centered on the book’s content (as well as several apologies for the “monster” remark) much was devoted to a detailed and surprisingly honest look at Obama, his position on the issues, and even the type of White House cabinet he would appoint.

Power called Obama’s willingness to meet, without preconditions, world leaders with whom America did not always see eye-to-eye, one of the turning points of the Democratic primary: “I can tell you about the conference call the day ,” she recalled. “People were like, ‘Did you need to say that?’ And he was like ‘yeah, definitely.’”

She emphasized that, unlike President Bush, Obama would put greater focus on the general welfare of the Iraqi people (looking at population displacements, health conditions, economic insecurities), when considering U.S. policy in that country. She also drew a picture of an Obama administration that was filled with different viewpoints and congenial debate.

And, to the delight of many in the crowd, she even hinted that she could be part of that hypothetical cabinet. “Because of the kind of campaign that Senator Obama has run,” Power said, “it seemed appropriate for someone of my Irish temper to step aside, at least for a while. We will see what happens there.”

[Dr Ron]

8. Hillary! Stop the attacks! Love, Obama Girl

Hillary! Stop the attacks! Love, Obama Girl

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3074

Obama Girl is back with a plea for Hillary Clinton to stop attacking Obama.

(Video in post)

[Dr Ron]

9. A Bad Week For Hillary Clinton

A Bad Week For Hillary Clinton

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3073

Not long ago the talk was about how Obama was having a bad month, but things certainly began to turn around as I noted a few days ago. Suddenly the news is all coming out looking bad for Clinton, often because of foolish moves on her part.

I’ve already mentioned how she has resorted to taking advantage of the Jeremiah Wright issue by attacking Obama here and here. Having been caught in a big lie over Bosnia certainly didn’t help either. As a result of this and other bad news David Brooks has changed the odds on Clinton:

Last week, an important Clinton adviser told Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen (also of Politico) that Clinton had no more than a 10 percent chance of getting the nomination. Now, she’s probably down to a 5 percent chance.

Five percent.

Let’s take a look at what she’s going to put her party through for the sake of that 5 percent chance: The Democratic Party is probably going to have to endure another three months of daily sniping. For another three months, we’ll have the Carvilles likening the Obamaites to Judas and former generals accusing Clintonites of McCarthyism. For three months, we’ll have the daily round of résumé padding and sulfurous conference calls. We’ll have campaign aides blurting “blue dress” and only-because-he’s-black references as they let slip their private contempt.

For three more months (maybe more!) the campaign will proceed along in its Verdun-like pattern. There will be a steady rifle fire of character assassination from the underlings, interrupted by the occasional firestorm of artillery when the contest touches upon race, gender or patriotism. The policy debates between the two have been long exhausted, so the only way to get the public really engaged is by poking some raw national wound.

Five percent. Chuck Todd looks at the math. First he makes his projections on the remainder of the elected delegates and then estimates how many of the super delegates each candidate would have to pick up to still manage to win. He estimates that “Obama would need 34% of the uncommitted superdelegates to hit the magic 2024 number, while Clinton would need 72% of the uncommitted Supers to hit 2024.”

If Clinton can’t even win this with the super delegates any more, it looks like she is going back to the idea of going after the pledged delegates:

I just don’t think this is over yet, and I don’t think that it is smart for us to take a position that might disadvantage us in November. And also remember that pledged delegates in most states are not pledged. You know, there is no requirement that anybody vote for anybody. They’re just like superdelegates.

Most people realize that Clinton has lost the opportunity to win the nomination cleanly, but that will not stop her. Her strategy is now being referred to as the Tonya Harding strategy:

l just spoke with a Democratic Party official, who asked for anonymity so as to speak candidly, who said we in the media are all missing the point of this Democratic fight.

The delegate math is difficult for Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, the official said. But it’s not a question of CAN she achieve it. Of course she can, the official said.

The question is — what will Clinton have to do in order to achieve it?

What will she have to do to Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, in order to eke out her improbable victory?

She will have to “break his back,” the official said. She will have to destroy Obama, make Obama completely unacceptable.

“Her securing the nomination is certainly possible - but it will require exercising the ‘Tonya Harding option.’” the official said. “Is that really what we Democrats want?”

At least there is hope that the Democratic Party leadership might not let her continue this indefinitely. Harry Reid has suggested that the race will be resolved before the election:

No, it will be done. I had a conversation with Governor Dean (Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean) today. Things are being done.

Unfortunately it is doubtful that anything will be done until after the last states vote, giving John McCain the advantage for several more weeks.

[Dr Ron]

10. Hillary Clinton Teams Up With Fellow Conservatives To Attack Obama

Hillary Clinton Teams Up With Fellow Conservatives To Attack Obama

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3072

Clinton apologists have tried to excuse Clinton’s attacks on Obama yesterday for his affiliation with Jeremiah Wright by claiming Clinton was just answering a question. Josh Marshall presents a couple of arguments to debunk this defense. First he notes that Clinton repeated the attack later in the day and goes on to write:

Now obviously, Hillary’s been in the political big leagues for a while. She knows how to deflect a question. But it’s actually much richer than this. This afternoon Greg Sargent and I were talking this over and one of us realized that this wasn’t just any Pittsburgh paper. It was the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, the money-losing, vanity, fringe sheet of Richard Mellon Scaife, funder of the Arkansas Project, the American Spectator during its prime Clinton-hunting years and virtually every right-wing operation of note at one point or another over the last twenty years or more.

In fact, what I only discovered late this evening, when Eric Kleefeld sent me this link at National Review Online, is that not only was it Scaife’s paper. Scaife himself was there sitting just to Clinton’s right apparently taking part in the questioning.

This alone has to amount to some sort cosmic encounter like something out of a Wagner opera. Remember, this is the guy who spent millions of dollars puffing up wingnut fantasies about Hillary’s having Vince Foster whacked and lots of other curdled and ugly nonsense. Scaife was the nerve center of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. Those of us who spent years defending the Clintons from all that malarkey learned this point on day one.

But there’s more.

Let’s game this out. Hillary’s saying this wasn’t some planned thing. She just got hit with this question and she answered it. But here’s my question. You think Richard Mellon Scaife might want to dig into the Jeremiah Wright story? This is sort of like, ‘Hey, I go on Hannity and next thing you know he’s asking me about Wright and Farrakhan. How was I supposed to see that coming?’

I don’t know just how this went down. But the idea Sen. Clinton and her staff went into an editorial board meeting with Scaife and his lackey reporters without a clear sense that they were going to get at least one choice Jeremiah Wright question just somehow doesn’t ring true to me.

None of this should come as much of a surprise. If people would only look beyond the letter after one’s name they would see that Hillary Clinton has become part of the vast right wing conspiracy to impose their social views upon America.

[Dr Ron]

11. Clinton and Obama’s Religious Choices

Clinton and Obama’s Religious Choices

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3070

Initially Hillary Clinton tried to use surrogates to attack Obama over his association with Wright. Now that Obama has not only survived but has turned this to his advantage, Clinton is getting involved personally. In an interview with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Clinton said:

“He would not have been my pastor,” Clinton said. “You don’t choose your family, but you choose what church you want to attend.”

Yes, this is true. I would count Obama’s association with Wright as a negative–but a very minor one considering that it is clear that Obama does not share Wright’s more controversial views.

Everyone has a choice in who they associate with and if we are going to criticize Obama’s choice we should also look at who Hillary Clinton has chosen to affiliate with. Last September Mother Jones took a look at the choice Hillary Clinton made, reporting that “For 15 years, Hillary Clinton has been part of a secretive religious group that seeks to bring Jesus back to Capitol Hill.” They note who Clinton has associated with:

Through all of her years in Washington, Clinton has been an active participant in conservative Bible study and prayer circles that are part of a secretive Capitol Hill group known as the Fellowship. Her collaborations with right-wingers such as Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) and former Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) grow in part from that connection.

If you are concerned about who Obama has associated with, then also look at her association with Doug Coe, as well as who he associates with:

Coe’s friends include former Attorney General John Ashcroft, Reaganite Edwin Meese III, and ultraconservative Rep. Joe Pitts (R-Pa.). Under Coe’s guidance, Meese has hosted weekly prayer breakfasts for politicians, businesspeople, and diplomats, and Pitts rose from obscurity to head the House Values Action Team, an off-the-record network of religious right groups and members of Congress created by Tom DeLay. The corresponding Senate Values Action Team is guided by another Coe protégé, Brownback, who also claims to have recruited King Abdullah of Jordan into a regular study of Jesus’ teachings.

This group is interested in pushing a conservative social agenda which Hillary Clinton has become a backer of:

The Fellowship isn’t out to turn liberals into conservatives; rather, it convinces politicians they can transcend left and right with an ecumenical faith that rises above politics. Only the faith is always evangelical, and the politics always move rightward.

This is in line with the Christian right’s long-term strategy. Francis Schaeffer, late guru of the movement, coined the term “cobelligerency” to describe the alliances evangelicals must forge with conservative Catholics. Colson, his most influential disciple, has refined the concept of cobelligerency to deal with less-than-pure politicians. In this application, conservatives sit pretty and wait for liberals looking for common ground to come to them. Clinton, Colson told us, “has a lot of history” to overcome, but he sees her making the right moves.

These days, Clinton has graduated from the political wives’ group into what may be Coe’s most elite cell, the weekly Senate Prayer Breakfast. Though weighted Republican, the breakfast—regularly attended by about 40 members—is a bipartisan opportunity for politicians to burnish their reputations, giving Clinton the chance to profess her faith with men such as Brownback as well as the twin terrors of Oklahoma, James Inhofe and Tom Coburn, and, until recently, former Senator George Allen (R-Va.). Democrats in the group include Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor, who told us that the separation of church and state has gone too far; Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) is also a regular.

Unlikely partnerships have become a Clinton trademark. Some are symbolic, such as her support for a ban on flag burning with Senator Bob Bennett (R-Utah) and funding for research on the dangers of video games with Brownback and Santorum. But Clinton has also joined the gop on legislation that redefines social justice issues in terms of conservative morality, such as an anti-human-trafficking law that withheld funding from groups working on the sex trade if they didn’t condemn prostitution in the proper terms. With Santorum, Clinton co-sponsored the Workplace Religious Freedom Act; she didn’t back off even after Republican senators such as Pennsylvania’s Arlen Specter pulled their names from the bill citing concerns that the measure would protect those refusing to perform key aspects of their jobs—say, pharmacists who won’t fill birth control prescriptions, or police officers who won’t guard abortion clinics.

Clinton has championed federal funding of faith-based social services, which she embraced years before George W. Bush did; Marci Hamilton, author of God vs. the Gavel, says that the Clintons’ approach to faith-based initiatives “set the stage for Bush.” Clinton has also long supported the Defense of Marriage Act, a measure that has become a purity test for any candidate wishing to avoid war with the Christian right.

Liberal rabbi Michael Lerner, whose “politics of meaning” Clinton made famous in a speech early in her White House tenure, sees the senator’s ambivalence as both more and less than calculated opportunism. He believes she has genuine sympathy for liberal causes—rights for women, gays, immigrants—but often will not follow through. “There is something in her that pushes her toward caring about others, as long as there’s no price to pay. But in politics, there is a price to pay.”

In politics, those who pay tribute to the powerful also reap rewards. When Ed Klein’s attack bio, The Truth About Hillary, came out in 2005, some of her most prominent defenders were Christian conservatives, among them Southern Baptist Theological Seminary President Albert Mohler. “Christians,” he declared, “should repudiate this book and determine to take no pleasure in it.”

Clinton’s conservative social views have been noticed by others such as the Cato Institute:

The libertarian Cato Institute recently observed that Clinton is “adding the paternalistic agenda of the religious right to her old-fashioned liberal paternalism.” Clinton suggests as much herself in her 1996 book, It Takes a Village, where she writes approvingly of religious groups’ access to schools, lessons in Scripture, and “virtue” making a return to the classroom.

Then, as now, Clinton confounded secularists who recognize public faith only when it comes wrapped in a cornpone accent. Clinton speaks instead the language of nondenominationalism—a sober, eloquent appreciation of “values,” the importance of prayer, and “heart” convictions—which liberals, unfamiliar with the history of evangelical coalition building, mistake for a tidy, apolitical accommodation, a personal separation of church and state. Nor do skeptical voters looking for political opportunism recognize that, when Clinton seeks guidance among prayer partners such as Coe and Brownback, she is not so much triangulating—much as that may have become second nature—as honoring her convictions. In her own way, she is a true believer.

There are things to be concerned about with regards to who both Obama and Clinton have associated with. The difference is that Obama does not share in many of Wright’s views and has been a strong defender of separation of church and state. While Clinton does sometimes disagree with the members of the religious right which she associates with, primarily on abortion, Clinton’s public policy views are very much influenced by the religious right and she is an opponent of separation of church and state. With all these ties to conservatives and their views I might remind readers that Hillary Clinton was an old Goldwater Girl but that would be an insult to Barry Goldwater who opposed the influence of the religious right.

Update: Hillary Clinton Teams Up With Fellow Conservatives To Attack Obama

Update II: More On Hillary’s Choice and The Vast Rightwing Conspiracy

[Dr Ron]

12. Conservatives and Obama

Conservatives and Obama

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3069

There are some conservatives who practice a knee jerk opposition to Obama, believing that labels like “liberal” and “conservative” mean far more than they do. As I’ve noted many times before, such labels can be misleading, and will often artificially separate people who agree on more matters than they might realize and can also lump together people who disagree on a number of issues. Some conservatives who have actually paid attention to what Obama believes, as opposed to assuming that every liberal Democrat believes the same things, have actually come to support Obama. One example was in the recent endorsement of Obama by Douglas Kmiec.

Needless to say, many conservatives blogs have been bashing Kmiec for his endorsement of Obama. I did find one astute comment via Andrew Sullivan–another conservative who went from suspicion of Obama to support after he studied his views. Sullivan quotes this response from a comment at The Volokh Conspiracy:

I’d encourage anyone who’s interested in more than knee-jerk reactions to actually read Kmiec’s piece, and actually read The Audacity of Hope, and actually read Senator Obama’s position summaries online; and seriously ask why a prominent, intelligent conservative would endorse Obama. I’d go so far as to suggest that, for those of us interested in forward-thinking conservativism, Senator Obama provides the best hope since Reagan. He’s the only candidate that has the potential, and an expressed desire, to change the debate and actually face questions like: when should government intervene at all? when it does, how can it be useful and limited? We might not agree with all of Senator Obama’s answers, but he’s the only one that I’ve seen even express an interest in wrestling with the questions.

This is why many conservatives and even libertarians are supporting Obama. I’ve noted many times that Bill Clinton is correct that voting for Obama is a gamble. However given a choice between politicians like John McCain and Hillary Clinton who are unquestioning supporters of massive government intervention and someone like Obama who questions this philosophy I will gamble on Obama. As I’ve also noted in the past, I anticipate that if Obama is elected I’ll often disagree with what he does–but probably far less than if McCain or Clinton is elected.

[Dr Ron]

13. Clinton Admits She “Misspoke”

Clinton Admits She “Misspoke”

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3068


(Video of Olbermann reporting on Clinton's lies on Bosnia)

Hillary Clinton now admits she “misspoke” about facing sniper fire when landing in Bosnia. Keith Olbermann (above) compares the video of Clinton’s claims about sniper fire in Bosnia with actual video showing her being greeting by an eight year old girl.

Yes, Hillary Clinton misspoke, just like Bill Clinton misspoke about not having had sex with that woman, George Bush misspoke about WMD in Iraq, and Richard Nixon misspoke about that break in. Someone who has repeatedly lied about her years as First Lady, and who has repeatedly lied during this campaign, will probably continue to lie in office.

Fortunately enough voters realize that Hillary Clinton cannot be trusted to prevent her from being elected and carrying on the tradition of Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, and George Bush of destroying the credibility of the presidency. A Gallup poll from before this lie was exposed showed that only 44% felt Clinton is “honest and trustworthy.” This compares to 67% for John McCain and 63% for Barack Obama.

Hillary Clinton has based her campaign upon claims of being the more experienced candidate but much of this “experience” is based upon similarly fabricated accounts of her actions as First Lady. Her real experience is not in foreign policy but in deceiving the voters. If you want another president like Richard Nixon or George Bush then vote for Hillary Clinton. Otherwise it is time for Democrats to stop giving her a pass because she is running with a “D” after her name and reject her as being ethically unfit to be president.

[Dr Ron]

14. Obama Receiving Praise and An Endorsement From Republicans

Obama Receiving Praise and An Endorsement From Republicans

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3067

Some partisans will oppose members of the other party regardless of what they say or believe. Others are willing to consider specific statements and perhaps even support members of the other party. Obama’s speech on race provides a good litmus test. Conservatives who attack the speech are likely to attack anything said by a Democrat purely because it comes form the other party, while more open minded Republicans have found this speech worthy of praise.

One example of praise for Obama’s speech comes from Christopher Caldwell, a senior editor at The Weekly Standard, in an op-ed in the Financial Times. Normally I would post an excerpt but there are really no excerpts which would do justice to the full article.

Peggy Noonan had an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal labeling this A Thinking Man’s Speech:

The speech assumed the audience was intelligent. This was a compliment, and I suspect was received as a gift. It also assumed many in the audience were educated. I was grateful for this, as the educated are not much addressed in American politics.

Here I point out an aspect of the speech that may have a beneficial impact on current rhetoric. It is assumed now that a candidate must say a silly, boring line — “And families in Michigan matter!” or “What I stand for is affordable quality health care!” — and the audience will clap. The line and the applause make, together, the eight-second soundbite that will be used tonight on the news, and seen by the people. This has been standard politico-journalistic procedure for 20 years.

Mr. Obama subverted this in his speech. He didn’t have applause lines. He didn’t give you eight seconds of a line followed by clapping. He spoke in full and longish paragraphs that didn’t summon applause. This left TV producers having to use longer-than-usual soundbites in order to capture his meaning. And so the cuts of the speech you heard on the news were more substantial and interesting than usual, which made the coverage of the speech better. People who didn’t hear it but only saw parts on the news got a real sense of what he’d said.

If Hillary or John McCain said something interesting, they’d get more than an eight-second cut too. But it works only if you don’t write an applause-line speech. It works only if you write a thinking speech.

They should try it.

Obama also received not only praise but an out right endorsement form one Republican, Douglas W. Kmiec. Kmiec’s biography makes this an endorsement of some significance:

Douglas W. Kmiec is Caruso Family Chair and Professor of Constitutional Law, Pepperdine University. He served as head of the Office of Legal Counsel (U.S. Assistant Attorney General) for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Former Dean of the law school at The Catholic University of America, Professor Kmiec was a member of the law faculty for nearly two decades at the University of Notre Dame.

Kmiec wrote:

Today I endorse Barack Obama for president of the United States. I believe him to be a person of integrity, intelligence and genuine good will. I take him at his word that he wants to move the nation beyond its religious and racial divides and to return United States to that company of nations committed to human rights. I do not know if his earlier life experience is sufficient for the challenges of the presidency that lie ahead. I doubt we know this about any of the men or women we might select. It likely depends upon the serendipity of the events that cannot be foreseen. I do have confidence that the Senator will cast his net widely in search of men and women of diverse, open-minded views and of superior intellectual qualities to assist him in the wide range of responsibilities that he must superintend…

In various ways, Senator Barack Obama and I may disagree on aspects of these important fundamentals, but I am convinced based upon his public pronouncements and his personal writing that on each of these questions he is not closed to understanding opposing points of view, and as best as it is humanly possible, he will respect and accommodate them.

[Dr Ron]

15. Teresa Heinz Kerry: Vote For Obama

Teresa Heinz Kerry: Vote For Obama

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3091

Teresa Heinz Kerry had an op-ed in The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette last week backing Barack Obama:

Election days are always special to me. I grew up in a land where there were no election days.

The Mozambique of my childhood was governed by a right-wing dictatorship in far-away Portugal. My father, a wise and good man, was 71 years old when he voted for the first time. I never cast a ballot until I became a citizen of the United States. But when I did, it was for a young man who spent years teaching me about the needs of Pennsylvania’s working families and the good our government can do for them — my late husband, Sen. John Heinz. He helped me learn how precious a right suffrage is — as a weapon against tyranny; as an instrument of hope, progress and change.

That is why, this year, I will cast my vote in the April 22 Pennsylvania primary for Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.

Pennsylvania needs a president like Barack Obama, someone who understands the tough times Pennsylvanians are facing. Raised with much love but in challenging circumstances by a single mom and grandparents, he knows firsthand the stress and financial pressures families face. When he beat the odds and put himself through college, he could have made good money with a big-name law firm anywhere in the country, but he chose the gritty streets of Chicago’s South Side where, as a community organizer, he worked helping families like his build better lives.

Mr. Obama’s work taught him what happens to families and communities when factories shut down and jobs go overseas. He knows firsthand the devastation and despair the global economy can bring — and how important hope is in overcoming setbacks and getting lives and neighborhoods back on track.

But there’s more to Mr. Obama than hope. There’s a practical approach to economic recovery. It starts with a tax cut of up to $1,000 — for middle-class families, not for millionaires. And Mr. Obama believes that there can be no “free” trade without fair trade. He’s committed to fixing NAFTA, so that it works for American workers. For those whose jobs are threatened by foreign trade, Mr. Obama supports reforms to the Trade Adjustment Assistance program so that workers can be retrained before they lose their jobs.

Mr. Obama’s health-care plan will cover every child in America, and help families afford the same kind of insurance he and I both have, by giving them access to the same plan that covers Congress. He’ll simplify paperwork and ensure no family can be turned down, regardless of pre-existing conditions. As I saw in Sen. Heinz, and as I see in my husband, Sen. John Kerry, a personal connection to working families drives Mr. Obama in his passion to get working Americans and seniors access to affordable insurance.

But Mr. Obama wants more; he wants the United States to win the race to the next economic era by increasing federal investment in research and development, in education and training and workforce development so we can pioneer the green technologies that will lessen our dependence on foreign oil, slow global warming and create not only high-tech, high-wage jobs but also all the good jobs that follow.

Mr. Obama’s background and passion make him the right choice for all of us worried about bringing a broader prosperity back to Western Pennsylvania; he will lead a surge of voters next November and then build coalitions across party lines to put people back to work. When I think of the problems facing working mothers waiting tables or stocking shelves in Pittsburgh, I think of how much we need a president who can unite us across race and region to fight for economic security for these women and their families.

I am also eager for a leader who will keep our homeland secure while upholding the high ideals on which this country was founded. After eight years of a president who twisted evidence and manipulated our fears to goad this nation into an unnecessary war, and a vice president who seems never to have read the Constitution; after seeing our moral authority blurred by torture, rendition and Abu Ghraib, I am excited about a candidate who knows that we can safeguard our security and still preserve our civil liberties.

In Sen. Barack Obama I see not just a president but a transformative leader, a candidate with a unique gift. He is a man who has drawn the disinterested and dispirited into his campaign, challenging them to become bigger than themselves.

Pennsylvania needs a president who knows that our hopes, not our fears, make America strong. And above all, we need a president who will give us our optimism back, who believes in us enough to ask us to do our part, to sacrifice and to dream together.

Barack Obama will be that president. I believe he stands apart from others not just as a capable politician, but as an American of true vision. Thousands of Pennsylvanians, tired of the divisive politics, have already switched registration so they can vote for change and for hope — for Barack Obama. At a moment when so much needs to be done, Mr. Obama’s ability to bring us together, to inspire us and challenge us makes him uniquely qualified to hold the most powerful office in the world.

In the bicentennial year of 1976, Pennsylvania took a chance on a smart, hard-working and optimistic young congressman named John Heinz and made him their senator. They made a wise choice. He worked across the aisle to tackle the tough problems of the 1970s and 1980s — saving Social Security, reforming nursing home care, demanding fair trade, offering new solutions to environmental problems. He proved that, when you love people and put their interest ahead of politics you can make a real difference.

That is the spirit I see in Barack Obama and why I look forward to voting to make him our 44th president.

The “audacity of hope” means a vote for change. Vote for Barack.

[Kukesa]

16. Good stuff and good work, Dr. Ron. Thanx. n/t

[beachmom]

17. Thanks, Dr. Ron. Liberal Values is a must read for a Democrat and an Obama supporter. nt