I haven’t commented on the Hillary Clinton email brouhaha and don’t plan to until we see if the story has legs. We should know that within a week or two.
Meanwhile for entertainment value you might want to read John Kass’s column on it. He’s in rare form.
I took a lot of flack at the Outside the Beltway for suggesting that Bill Clinton’s involvement with this Jeffery Epstein/Prince Andrew/underage girls thing could hurt her. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. But my main point was that the Clintons used their brand to generate a ton of income and enter the stratosphere. Once you do that, you aren’t coming back. It’s like not having to follow State Department protocol or having your dull daughter getting a job at NBC for 700K. What’s being paid to you is duty paid to royalty. I remember reading that one of the Rockefellers (I think Nelson) never carried anything in his pockets, no wallet, no keys, no lighter. That’s basically the entire world the Clintons haved lived in since 2000. You get in a black Suburban, you go to a restaurant, order 5K in wine for lunch and maybe you don’t have pay for it. Two hours later, you’re reminded of something and so you catch a ride on a private jet to London. You get a new suit when you get there, because you don’t have luggage. Some bespoke place has a couple with your measurements in reserve for you. You stay at a house of a friend and take an Ambien and wake up and put your new suit on and give a speech and then meet with two people for ten minutes and then fly back to America and resolve to have a better grasp of your schedule.
The only part of Modulo’s comment I mildly disagree with is that I don’t know that Chelsea is dull. I just don’t think she’s particularly bright, either. In other words, I’m sure she wouldn’t have the resume she has, not one bit of it, if not for her parents.
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I meant dull in the sense that she’s not TV material. Or seemingly that remarkable or interesting.
The problem for the Republicans is that dangling Jeb Bush as an alternative is hard to swallow. ‘I belong to the same club but am both less admired and less famous,’ is a work in progress.
The summation of Kass’s opinion piece is priceless irony, and yes, very entertaining. However, oftentimes humor is the best conveyer belt for the stark reality of truth.
Okay, in that case I agree with everything in your first comment, and most of your second. I hope neither Hillary nor Jeb get nominated.
Incidentally, if I could if vote for Jeb for a third term as governor in a heartbeat. I think most of the electorate would in Florida, as he was a helluva governor. But I’ve heard a lot of republicans that have reservations about his presidential run, both on policy grounds & for dynastic dread. Jeb wouldn’t be a lock to carry Florida in 2016, especially up against Warren or O’Malley.
Funny thing, I think the best hope Hillary & Jeb have of winning the White House is if they run against each other. In a general election against some non-dynastic opponent I think either would be have difficulties beyond the usual.
Seriously, all O’Malley would need to do in a debate is make a point of not looking like a Bush and he’d win against Jeb, on the gut level where it matters. A generic Republican would have a slightly tougher time against Clinton, as he’d have to not look mean in a debate or the women would get upset, but mostly he’d have to just let Hillary be Hillary.
My spelling checker auto complete is doing strange things again.
Ice, I think it’s far too early to predict who will be on either the R or D ticket — especially when it comes to the former. So far, in the R camp, Jeb has the money contacts and is systematically locking in the best staff. Walker, though, has the OTB appeal, state accomplishments that enthuse many segments of the republican party, and a disarmingly consistent roll-up-your-sleeves attitude that seems to have the MSM in a tizzy, causing them to pursue a distractive sideshow of controversial but shallow questioning. So, as of today, the nomination contest seems to be mainly between those two camps, with Rubio hovering on the fringe.
Hillary, IMO, still seems to be the anointed one for democrats — despite all her ethical missteps and blah personality. Her gender is a key attraction, as well as her last name — engendering fond memories of a bygone era in which there was prosperity under a R Congress, while the executive branch took most of the glorious credit. As for other dems, O’Malley, IMO, is a superficial candidate, and Elizabeth Warren (much like Ted Cruz) is just too stridently extreme for the mainstream population’s taste buds to seriously consider, in mass, as POTUS.
“is systematically locking in the best staff. ”
Yup, locking in Wolfowitz as a defense advisor. What could possibly go wrong with that?
” there was prosperity under a R Congress, while the executive branch took most of the glorious credit.”
And when we have a Dem POTUS with an R Congress we blame the POTUS for the bad economy. Heads I win, tails you lose.
Steve
“Funny thing, I think the best hope Hillary & Jeb have of winning the White House is if they run against each other. In a general election against some non-dynastic opponent I think either would be have difficulties beyond the usual.”
Sadly true, Ice, a joyous consequence of our two-party system.
“but mostly he’d have to just let Hillary be Hillary.”
Down in FL without the family. Lots of time on my hands. Watched “One Flew” for the first time in a long time. I’m tellin ya…..It is impossible to not think of Hillary when you watch Nurse Rachett.
Steve,
However you spin it, Clinton under a Republican-led Congress was able to reconcile a good economy under the fiscal discipline of a republican congress and the luck of a dot com explosion.
Obama, on the other hand, inherited a fiscal collapse, in which his main remedies were to pass a wasted economical stimulus and a highly flawed, controversial health care policy. The first two years were all his, in terms of power and control. The second 4 years brought in a Republican House to confront and obstruct some of his executive dominance. And, now, with less than 3 months logged in, the two branches of Congress are in the hands of Republicans.
So far republicans have shown little leadership. But, in the wake of Obama now being the obstructive, finger-in-the-eye of the separation of powers restraints of the Constitution, it’s hardly a “heads I win, tails you lose” scenario playing out for the foolish republicans. Rather, that little phrase belongs more to Obama’s action than the Congress’s struggle to become relevant.