Text 19993, 105 rader
Skriven 2006-05-14 11:46:47 av Stan Hardegree (1:123/789.0)
  Kommentar till text 19991 av BOB SAKOWSKI (1:123/140)
Ärende: Iraq news
=================
SH> What's important to you is a high body count.
SH> And I think that is disgraceful.

BS> Actually Stan, what's important is that you make shit up out of thin
air,

That's nice.

BTW, as much as I hate reposts, I kind of liked this story.  A Clinton
Rumpswab raging against, well, a Clinton:
......

Dangerous liaison
By Robert Kuttner -  May 14, 2006

SHAME ON Hillary Rodham Clinton. Rupert Murdoch, the right-wing publishing
mogul, is hosting a fund-raiser in July for her Senate reelection campaign.
Her explanation is that Murdoch, based in New York, is an important
constituent: ''I'm very gratified that he thinks I'm doing a good job."

Murdoch runs Fox television, home of Bill O'Reilly and company. No far-right
media enterprise has been more relentlessly dishonest in its efforts to
destroy American liberalism in general and the Clintons in particular. Fox
was prime cheerleader for the bogus Whitewater investigation and the
impeachment campaign against Bill Clinton. Fox exists to oppose every
liberal principle that Senator Clinton is accused, perhaps falsely, of
standing for.
Murdoch also publishes the tawdry, viciously anti-Clinton New York Post and
the more sober ideological print organ the Weekly Standard. You can't
imagine the opposite kind of deal happening in American politics, because a
left-wing Murdoch doesn't exist. That's why the man is so powerful, and such
a nemesis to principled liberals.

Politics may make strange bedfellows, but for sheer cynicism and mutual
expediency it's hard to beat this alliance. Maybe the Hitler-Stalin pact.

What's in it for Hillary? First, obviously, the money. By raising mountains
of campaign cash, she hopes to make herself the inevitable 2008 nominee.

But if she hopes this latest financial alliance will also induce Murdoch's
attack dogs to lighten up, she's deluding herself. Murdoch often invests in
ideological opposites to serve his business interests, but holds fast to his
role as right-wing propagandist. When Britain's Tony Blair was a rising
star, Murdoch shifted his allegiance from the Tories to Blair's New Labor.
His own politics didn't change.

Here in the United States, the Reagan administration helped Murdoch navigate
the citizenship laws -- he was then an Australian -- so that he could become
a US citizen and acquire Metromedia. So raising money for Hillary, whose
Senate reelection is assured, is a neat hat trick: Now she owes Murdoch one,
just in case he needs regulatory help. And her acceptance of his lucre
reinforces the conclusion that the lady is, well, an opportunist, nicely
undercutting her credibility with left, right, and center.

With the Republicans in free-fall, national problems continuing to mount,
and a rising national chorus begging the Democrats to stand for something,
Senator Clinton has come to epitomize why the Democrats may yet fail to rise
to the occasion and lead.

What, ultimately, does Hillary Clinton stand for? Increasingly, it looks as
if she stands for Hillary Clinton. And where have we heard that story
before? It seems to run in the family.

What is tragic about the Clintons is to see so much promise yoked to such
opportunism. Nobody in American politics can deliver a well-informed speech
without notes better than Hillary Clinton, with the possible exception of
Bill Clinton. Nobody can be more charming in person, with the possible
exception of her faithless husband.

I watched Senator Clinton at the recent funeral of Eli Segal, a longtime
Clinton supporter, friend, and appointee who died a tragically early death.
She was the picture of grace, staying long after the service ended, talking
warmly and unpretentiously, representing the humanity that everyone seeks in
a politician.

In running for the Senate, Hillary Clinton overcame the image of a
carpetbagger, impressed many conservative voters in upstate New York and the
suburbs, as well as in liberal Manhattan. When she got to the Senate, she
overcame the caricatures and became an engaged and valued colleague of both
Republicans and Democrats.

But these days, everything she does seems calculating, poll-tested, and
money-driven. That, too, recalls another Clinton. Do sequels always bomb?

If she keeps transparently cozying up to the right, Senator Clinton could
easily lose what faltering affection she retains from Democratic voters, but
without impressing the center. Democratic operative Donna Brazile contends,
too charitably, that Murdoch's support shows that Hillary has ''crossover
appeal" (sure, as in crossing over to grab whatever isn't nailed down).

Hillary's march to the White House will not be a cakewalk under the best of
circumstances. On the right, she will be scorned both as a crazy feminist
and as a wronged woman. On the left she will be attacked for discarding her
principles. It's one thing to move to the center, but Hillary may find
there's not much of a center that admires her.

It's bad enough that Hillary Clinton trims on domestic positions and cuts
Bush so much slack on the Iraq war. Courting Rupert Murdoch's money just
doesn't pass the smell test.

Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect. His column appears
regularly in the Globe.

--- Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.2180
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