Monday, April 14, 2008

Bittergate II

I second Angus' motion.

An excerpt from an article in TIME this week, with a little Munger quote:

"Mistakes become "gaffes" when they play to an underlying stereotype," said Michael Munger, a polticial science professor at Duke University in North Carolina, which is scheduled to hold its primary May 6. "If Bill Clinton had said this thing about some white people being bitter and using guns, it would have been fine, since he grew up a poor white guy. But the Obama stereotype is a wealthy ivy-league elitist. He's a little too well-spoken; his suits are a little too expensive. From him, the comment comes off as condescending."

But if Clinton, and McCain for that matter, are going to use these comments to cast Obama as an arrogant elitist, they better be prepared to deal with the blowback. As Jamal Simmons, a Democratic consultant and Obama supporter, put it in an email exchange with TIME, "Hillary Clinton calls Barack Obama elitist? Really? Hillary Clinton was a corporate lawyer who sat on the Wal Mart board before becoming First Lady and is now worth over $100 million. Barack Obama is the child of a single mother raised in part by his grandparents who went to school on a scholarship and was a community organizer making $12,000 a year before becoming a law professor, lawyer and state senator. Five years ago he was still paying off student loans. It's a bogus charge."


Let me see if I understand: this would also have been condescending if Hillary had said it. Two things. (1) Yes, that's right. (2) But Hillary DIDN'T say it.

ATSRTWT

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ah, but according to Theda Skocpol, Hillary DID say it. She's just lying now by saying/implying that she would never think such a thing. That's a difference:

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/188673.php

You guys can hate Obama for being a liberal, but he is more in the Wellstone mold of honest and open dialogue. I think both Wellstone and Obama are something special and that HRC isn't so much.

Anonymous said...

Meh.

He said it. He's 100% right. PA voters know that.

If there's a statistically - indistinguishable - from - zero downward blip in Obama's PA numbers this week, the MSM (and yes, I'm looking at you, too, Fox) will continue to make a big deal out of the comments. But next Tuesday, it will still be 53-47 Hillary, BarryO will still be comfortably in the lead, and everyone will forget the whole thing.

Anonymous said...

BO's campaign is "honest and open," AND he's being treated unfairly by the media.

I didn't realize this blog had such crossover appeal to Huffposters.

Mungowitz said...

I think it is settled that Hillary hates the middle class, and has no respect for the poor. No one is doubting that.

It is a little surprising that Obama has the same reaction. But I guess that you have to think you are WAY smarter than the common folk in order to be a liberal in the first place.

And, PR does make the obvious point: so what? Obama wins anyway. This is a tiny blip. Hillary has no chance. It's just math.

Anonymous said...

"I think it is settled that Hillary hates the middle class, and has no respect for the poor. No one is doubting that."

I doubt that.

We all do things that we regret from time to time. We all make decisions that we would later like to change. When HRC makes the What's the Matter with Kansas argument, I don't think she's saying that everybody is like that or that nobody else makes bad decisions. Just enough to tip some elections.

If she or Obama hated the middle class or the poor, why would they go through all this hell to work for us?

They may have different ideas about how best to help, but that doesn't make them evil. I think that some of Munger's policy ideas would do more harm than good, but I don't then go on to know that he's trying to hurt people. Why on earth would we think that of Hillary or Barack?

Obama is farther from thinking this. He did community organizing to help people help themselves. His campaign is a bottom-up operation.

"But I guess that you have to think you are WAY smarter than the common folk in order to be a liberal in the first place."

Does whatever you're insinuating here do anything to distinguish among the presidential candidates? Does McCain think he's below average? Do you? Is there even a single answer to that question.

I think that Barack Obama is aware that he's a below average bowler, but he believes he's an above average organizer. So what? As we learned from Stealth Democracy most people don't want to run the government themselves, but they want somebody else to do it.

Anonymous said...

IMO what makes HRC, BO and JMc evil is that they know their policies are in the worst interest of the public (maybe not McCain, he just does what his evil bosses tell him will get him elected). They have extraordinary IQs. They have Ivy League educations. They've studied History, Politics and Economics extensively. And, they know what they have to say/do to get elected (or come close), and that is all that matters. The US Presidency is the ultimate accomplishment. To them, their mistakes aren't about being right or wrong or telling the truth or lying, but purely about whether the message being sent will cost them votes.

You simply can't go that far in politics without being able to readily anticipate the secondary and tertiary effects of your actions. Our demise will not be because our leaders are incompetent, but because they are evil.

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