I don't know what's wrong with Blogger. It won't let me enter a blog title on the previous post.
So, I DVR'd CNN's "Faith and Politics" special from...oh, weeks ago...with Soledad O'Brien facilitating a discussion with Barack Obama, John Edwards and Hillary Clinton, and only tonight did I finally get around to watching it.
There's much I could say, but I'll focus on Senator Clinton.
Regular readers of my blog know I'm not a fan. I'll say this, though, about a potential Clinton presidency: we could do worse.
Watching her speak, even on topics where I'd take issue with some of her positions, I can't help but notice that she is smart. It's not even worth discussing potential Republican opponents; there isn't a one that can hold an intellectual candle to Hillary Clinton. Comparing her to the current president is practically unfair, like betting on who'd do better on the SAT, an MIT grad or a homeschooled kindergartner. And yes, I think she's even sharper and more eloquent than any of her Democratic rivals.
I'm pulling for someone else (Obama), for a variety of reasons, but I felt obliged to state: we could do worse.
arise, shine, for your light has come
About Me
- Andy
- City of Roses, Cascadia, United States
- Meditations on life and scripture, based on the daily lectionary of the Book of Common Prayer of the Episcopal Church.
Blog Archive
-
▼
2007
(241)
-
▼
July
(18)
- Seeding Armageddon
- Open Mike Mondays
- Open Thread: Are We Ruled By Our Government?
- Book Review: The Case for Christ
- Salute to a Patriot
- Thanks For Playing
- Bonus: Monday Photo Blogging!
- Sunday Photo Blogging: [Redacted]
- Random Friday Cat Blogging
- Madman
- Starbuck is a Star! (But She Already Knew That)
- Hillary
- Last night I had this really disturbing dream wher...
- The Roll of a Lifetime
- The Hal Lindsey Report Report
- Happy 4th!
- Beverly Sills, 1929 - 2007
- Pay Attention to Those Who Pay Attention
-
▼
July
(18)
Blogroll
- Already Fooled Once
- An Inch at a Time
- And She Was...
- Andrew Sullivan
- Ben Smith
- Box Turtle Bulletin
- Brevity is...Wit
- Citizen Crain
- CNN Political Ticker
- Computer Zen
- Crash and Byrne
- Daily Kos
- Deep South Mark
- FiveThirtyEight
- From Every Corner
- Gay Rights Watch
- Glennalicious
- Go Fug Yourself
- Hit or Miss
- Hot Toddy's Toaster Oven
- I Can Has Cheezburger
- JustOut Blog
- Kevin Drum
- Law Fairy
- Lelo in Nopo
- Mark's Rants & Raves
- Mountains of Madness
- Notes from the Underground
- Obliquity
- Obsidian Wings
- Opera Tattler
- Pam's House Blend
- Parterre Box
- Pentimento
- Pundit Kitchen
- QPDX
- Quinn the Brain
- Random Thoughts
- Recovering Straight Girl
- Search for Love
- Slacktivist
- Splenda in the Grass
- Stuff I Do
- Such is Life
- TalkingPointsMemo
- The Home Blog
- Thunder Jones
- til the cows come home
- Tin Man
- Towleroad
- Useless! Worthless! Insipid!
- Walking With Integrity
- Washington Monthly
- Wayne Besen
- Weltanschauung
- Yearns & Groans
Tags
- photos (215)
- politics (183)
- Andy (170)
- religion (154)
- Oregon (152)
- New York (101)
- cats (99)
- gay rights (88)
- Banality (44)
- pop culture (43)
- opera (42)
- rant (39)
- travel (33)
- gay gay gay gay gay gay gay (32)
- People Who Miss the Point (24)
- bad ideas (23)
- questionable sanity (21)
- bitter (19)
- agonizing disappointment (18)
- Cats Across America Tour (17)
- Hope (17)
- wishful thinking (17)
- desperation (16)
- impending disaster (15)
- suburbia (15)
- Fox Watchers (14)
- family (11)
- oops (11)
- Battlestar Galactica (10)
- surprising turnarounds (10)
- Easter (9)
- End Times (9)
- Year 1 (9)
- driving (9)
- fail (9)
- mortification (9)
- stupid het tricks (9)
- miscellanea (8)
- Switzerland (7)
- complete dorkdom (6)
- dreams (6)
- young whippersnappers (6)
- Luke (5)
- Warning Signs that Your Child is Queer (5)
- Year 2 (5)
- bull-hockey (5)
- nudity (5)
- sex (5)
- unfortunate turns of phrase (5)
- Advent (4)
- Holy Spirit (4)
- civil disobedience (4)
- crackpottery (4)
- excellent customer service (4)
- ill-informed diplomats (4)
- polls (4)
- saints (4)
- Matthew (3)
- Wagner (3)
- fiction (3)
- kink (3)
- red-letter days (3)
- Ezekiel (2)
- Japan (2)
- Mark (2)
- Project Renaissance (2)
- YouTube (2)
- autopsies (2)
- celebrity (2)
- celtic (2)
- cooking (2)
- fans (2)
- lolcats (2)
- snark (2)
- treacle (2)
- Ascension (1)
- Christmas (1)
- Franciscan life (1)
- Genesis (1)
- Good Friday (1)
- Hildegard von Bingen (1)
- Pentecost (1)
- Year B (1)
- chant (1)
- cows (1)
- elephants (1)
- hell (1)
- pop (1)
- sports (1)
17 comments:
Other than Richardson--a nitwit, a notorious philanderer, and ugly to boot--we could do worse than any of our major candidates. I'm quite pleased.
I still want them all guillotined. And most of Congress, too. Force this shit-pot of a country to start afresh!
dj, I'm reminded of the aliens from Mars Attacks coming in to address Congress.
We'd still have 2 of our 3 branches of government... "and that ain't bad!" Of course, these days, those two branches are one and the same, and that's not a good thing.
the title issue is a "known problem" so says blogger. Move your mouse pointer slowly from the middle of he title box to the top. Your pointer should turn into an entry cursor.
Actually, Quinn, the judiciary are the only ones I don't want killed. As long as there's Ruth Bader Ginsberg, there's hope.
My problem with Hillary is that she seems as proud and stubborn as Bush. She still won't admit that vote that gave Bush the authority to PRE-EMPTIVELY wage war against Iraq was a terrible decision. She still defends it.
I've had 8 years of a stubborn president that seems unwilling to learn from mistakes, I don't want another one.
Yes, but she can speak in complete sentences! Imagine that!
i never saw much wisdom in hillary.
she might be clever and well versed, but that doesnt make for smarts. it just shows she is clever and well versed.
it just shows she is clever and well versed.
Which still puts her leaps and bounds ahead of anyone running for the GOP.
giuliani seems pretty clever.
i think he'd beat hillary with a stick in the general election.
of the whole of both parties: i think i'll go with ron paul.
Clever is not the word I'd use for Giuliani. Yes, admittedly, he can speak in complete sentences. Clever? Not sure. I'd vote for "conniving."
Ron Paul? LOL. Yeah, when I heard him decry the Iraq war I was really excited -- wow, a Republican politician who's in the same version of reality as 70% of America, that's amazing! But then in his anti-tax zeal I heard him on the Colbert Report express his desire to eliminate things like FEMA and the Department of Education and let the "free market" take care of that, as well as health care, and I thought -- no, I didn't *think* it, I YELLED IT AT THE TELEVISION SET: YOU ARE A CRACKPOT.
No, I wasn't drinking. Why do you ask?
say like it is andy: FEMA. always there when you need them. yup.
keep FEMA going cuase only the govt can do things efficiently with out fail.
Oh, come on, Gino -- you're going to privatize DISASTER RELIEF??? Hurricane Katrina was a MESS because Bush staffed FEMA with idiots -- under Clinton, it was a globally respected government operation. You think the "free market" should be the one to respond to the next big quake to hit Orange County? You think we should just send the clean-up bill to the people who had to abandon their homes because they were no longer structurally sound and are now living somewhere else in the country? Should we charge them for the bus tickets to get them out of harm's way? You want to wait around until a hurricane or an earthquake or a terrorist attack is over and then have corporations like Bechtel or Halliburton (who've done such a bang-up, bargain job in Iraq) submit bids to the local government (or private individuals)? Come on, Gino. Seriously. There are a few things that the federal government is uniquely poised to do, and disaster relief is one of them. As Americans, we should all share the bill for restoring New Orleans and rescuing our fellow citizens. If you think Katrina exposed the ugly reality of America's attitude toward the poor, wait until we only decide to rescue those who can pay for the service.
why was walmart there first?
walmart has capital and materiel and people and good business contacts
walmart actually cares about the American poor
Walmart specializes in efficiency
was Walmart there first? good for Walmart. maybe I'll wince less when I drive by.
Bet Walmart did a better job than FEMA ever did, anyhow.
-----
FEMA mostly hires private contractors, anyhow, doesn't it?
So you think Wal*Mart should develop a nation-wide master disaster relief strategy? What about locales that don't have a Wal*Mart -- like MANHATTAN?
Of course the government uses contractors and partners with private companies. Nothing wrong with that. But don't you feel that disaster management should be centrally, nationally coordinated? And don't you think, in the wake of a terrorist attack, for example, that the agency overseeing the relief efforts should be in contact with and coordinating with the FBI and the Pentagon? You think Wal*Mart should hire a Homeland Security liaison, hmm?
And again, the bill? If the government wants to use Wal*Mart for aspects of disaster relief, I say great. But that should be paid for out of tax money -- I believe as Americans we all share a collective burden for repairing and rebuilding New Orleans. The private sector? Let's say Greyhound sends a fleet of buses to evacuate an area after a tragedy and they want to charge $25 or $50 or $100 to board the bus out of town. Who can tell them they can't?
nah, now, Andy, I wasn't saying WalMart was the appropriate choice to coordinate national disaster relief
(although since Gino mentioned it, WalMart would probably be more effective almost everywhere than the last few rounds of federal efforts--not least because the Walmart higherups seem to still believe in strong concepts of "America" and "Americans." Although, the disaster had better not involve Portland, or Vermont, or any other uppity place that has done everything it can to make Walmart's local existence miserable or impossible ;). )
no, I was tweaking you because you were being so lefty: 'are you SUGGESTING ... we PRIVATIZE ... DISASTER ... RELIEF?????' (my ridiculous emphasis ;) )
really, largely, it is privatized. those buses et al, they do get to charge whatever they want--we pay for it in taxes, or FEMA denies it and the providers cry foul and various lawyers make much moolah ... and lots of free stuff/services were provided by private citizens and NGOs and non-government corporations
dammit, now I'm having all sorts of good revamp the system ideas again, that are totally pointless because not only will I never be President, noone who has any useful authority will ever listen to me (not least because I am such a political nutter)
perhaps I should (in all my free time) start an underground campaign website, and hope people don't realize how very unelectable I am until some of my ideas have percolated into the national conversation ... (eeville Mr Burns voice: "Yes ... yes ... exxxxcellent ... " ;) )
(it is always good to be told by one's number-savvy political studies buddy that you are "so unelectable" that "being from Portland" is only the top of the barrel ... that was a laugh last Christmas ;) ... )
ok, THAT was off-topic, sorry ;)
but anyhow, yes disaster relief should have wise overall coordination, and include if necessary branches of the government such as the National Guard
I'm working on a new political theory ... I think it will work out to be some sort of privatized socialism ... which should really tweak LC, perhaps I'll take it over there to try it out ;). It's been percolating for several years now; I think it's a clean application of Catholicism to modern political life ... (Catholics, you might know, were specifically forbidden from taking part in secular governments for a while, so the whole political-system argument got away from us.) Anyhow, it deeply informs my opinions of how involved govt should be (minimally, with maximum efficiency and a trust of the people) and how involved private citizens should be (maximally, with generosity and responsibility as the renewed old American values which we expect of ourselves and each other).
Post a Comment