Category: The Dish

Clinton’s losing it – so far as I know.

McCain promises to release his full medical records. Where are his tax returns, by the way? Or do you not need to release them if you have a "lifetime of experience," dodging the press.

The negative ads are getting out of control:

I figure we should all do our bit to get the Clintons to behave like normal politicians. Every day. What are they hiding? And don’t the voters have a right to know before they vote?

I still don’t get it. I can see lesbian support – on gender grounds alone and, alas, identity politics is very potent in lesbian political culture. But why gay men should seek more Clintonism escapes me. A reader proffers a theory:

At a cocktail party this weekend I was talking to a friend and his boyfriend  – both are rabid Clintonites – and I’m asking questions like Why did she attack Rick Lazio for not releasing his taxes, yet now she is doing the same? Why did Bill refuse to release his medical records when he ran even though Dole did, is this a pattern with them? If she takes credit for Bill’s presidency then shouldn’t she be tarred with DOMA? 

And listening to his defense I realized what it reminded me of. It wasn’t the defense of a politician whom he admired, he sounded like somebody 40 years older defending Judy Garland or Liza Minelli: "Oh, life has been so cruel to them, but didn’t they come through it with fire and glamour?!".

Perhaps Hillary constantly playing the victim has worked somewhat.  Apparently my gay brethern don’t feel like they are defending a politics, they feel that they are sticking up for a tragic aging Diva whoes life and glamour is fading but who can always count on her shrinking gay fan club to buy up every ticket to her "Comeback Concert".

It reminds me of the line out of Absolutely Fabulous, Eddie says to her gay ex husband when he comments on how fabulous Patsy’s older sister is. "A bitch with a drug habit and you’re anybody’s aren’t you."

Not that Hillary has a drug habit. If you don’t count Bill.

St. Louis, Missouri, 9 am.

A reader writes:

She just went there. Hillary said to Newsweek that "even elected and caucus delegates are not required to stay with whomever they are pledged to." Funny, a couple of weeks ago when Politico reported that a senior Hillary campaign person said they might try to peel pledged delegates from Obama, there were furious denials and suggestions that the notion was simply outrageous.  Could you perform a public service and collect a bullet point list of Clinton campaign contradictions and reversals?

Four more immediately leap to mind:

HIllary telling a New Hampshire reporter back in October ’07 that New Hampshirites should not be upset that she chose to leave her name on Michigan ballot because "clearly" the Michigan votes won’t count.  Hillary dissin’ Mississippi in Iowa when she could not imagine Mississippi would matter. Hillary telling Stephanopoulos in December of 2007 that the race will be over on February 5 and telling Texans that she "always knew" Texas would be a big battle.  Penn saying that the race is about acquiring delegates until it became clear Obama was winning more delegates. 

There must be another dozen obvious statements made on one day that, within a short time, were "no longer operative." You should challenge your readers to send in more. Then we can ask the question: how can she get away with it?  Will the press vet her absolute lack of concern over consistency?

 

Alas, they won’t. But the pattern is exactly the same as it was in the 1990s. They will say anything to anyone any time it suits their interests. When their interests change, so do their statements. Hitch’s useful little monograph on the Clintons had a title that sums up their exhaustive and exhausting shamelessness: no one left to lie to. And yet, as the Clintons know, there always is.

You may have missed it – almost everyone missed it – but Bill Clinton was on Rush Limbaugh’s show the day of the Texas primary. You can hear the radio here. Limbaugh himself was sick that day, apparently, but he had already urged Republicans to cross over to keep Hillary Clinton in the race. Bill saw an opening – and went there.

Now just wrap your mind around this: the Clintons were happy to support a cynical, partisan Republican campaign to wound the Democratic front-runner, and they were brazen enough to go on the Limbaugh show to do so.

There also seems little doubt that Republican mischief played a real role in affecting the results. And they call Obama’s call for them to release their tax returns a tactic worthy of Ken Starr. I repeat: the chutzpah and the cynicism just leave you speechless. And as you find it impossible to do much but splutter, the Clintons plow on with new self-serving lies.

You know how I realized this? I saw first hand the way they dealt with gay issues in their first term. They didn’t just wimp out on our push for marriage equality, they actively pivoted off homophobia to get a few points (ask Dick Morris; it’s one of the things he’s actually ashamed of in retrospect). The Clintons even put anti-gay ads on Christianist radio stations in the South to build support for the 1996 re-election. And they continue to show up at gay events claiming to be avatars for our civil rights. And the stupid gays still believe them!

A reader writes:

I found out about Samantha Power when I was flipping through one of my girlfriend’s girl magazines (Cosmo or Glamour or some such thing), while taking a dump at her house. She was very impressive. I wish I could remember which mag and which month is was. Anyway…

The great tragedy of "Monster"-gate is that a woman who betrayed the ideals of the feminist movement exclusively for political gain secured a political victory at the expense of a woman who only owed herself for her achievements. A few days before International Women’s Day, no less. It is absurd that women can say, with a straight face, that they support Hillary Clinton because "she’s a strong woman". If we couldn’t before, we can now and in the future chalk this up as – exclusively – identity politics in its purest form.

Amen. And this primary is also a decisive moment in the history of identity politics. One candidate relies on it as a crutch when necessary. The other has made every possible effort to transcend it.