Posted on 10/30/2007 11:18:38 PM PDT by Jet Jaguar
Republican loathing for Hillary Clinton used to be viewed as her Achilles' heel.
But Tuesday night in Philadelphia, she wore Republican hate as a badge of honor, fending off her Democratic rivals' sharpest attacks yet by casting herself as a kind of partisan warrior queen.
Barack Obama, pressed for weeks by his donors and by the media to take on Clinton more directly, came out swinging against her, moving from uncertainty to a more confident criticism.
She parried an early blow from him, an accusation that she is too close to President Bush and his party on Iran.
"I don’t think the Republicans got the message that I’m voting and sounding like them," she told the Illinois senator.
"If you watched their debate last week, I seemed to be the topic of great conversation and consternation – for a reason."
The heart of Clinton’s case was that if Republicans hate her, she must be doing something right.
"The Republicans, in their constant obsession with me, they obviously think I am communicating effectively," she said later in the debate.
But Obama came back sharper.
"Part of the reason Republicans are obsessed with you, Hillary, is I think that’s a fight they’re very comfortable having," he responded, adding that "what we don’t need is another eight years of bickering."
Skillful attacks
John Edwards kept up the pressure most skillfully on Clinton, putting his courtroom skills to use to build a case, at times mockingly, against the New York senator.
After almost two hours of largely fruitless sparring with Clinton, accusing her of “double-talk,” Edwards drove his point home when she refused to say whether she supports New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s plan to give drivers’ licenses to illegal immigrants.
“Do I think this is the best thing for any governor to do? No," Clinton said.
"But do I understand the sense of real desperation of trying to get a handle on this? Remember, in New York, we want to know who is in New York, we want people to come out of the shadows."
Edwards pounced.
“Unless I missed something, Sen. Clinton said two different things in the course of two minutes,” he said.
Obama said he supports the plan. An Edwards aide, Mark Kornblau, said after the debate that Edwards also supported the plan.
Keeping cool
Clinton, positioned in the middle of the stage with a row of men in suits on each side, turned to her left to listen to Edwards and her right to hear Obama.
She largely responded calmly, diminishing the policy differences between the candidates.
When Edwards tried to draw a difference between his plan to fight terror in the Middle East and hers to run combat missions against Al Qaeda in Iraq, she dismissed the gap as “semantic.”
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, for his part, came to Clinton’s defense.
"You know what I’m hearing here — I’m hearing this holier-than-thou attitude toward Sen. Clinton ... close to personal attacks that we don’t need," he said. "I think it’s important that we save the ammunition for the Republicans."
The debate later took a turn to the weird, with Rep. Dennis Kucinich confirming that he had seen an unidentified flying object in the company of the actress and spiritualist Shirley MacLaine.
(Immediately after the debate, Richardson offered more ammunition to UFO fanciers in an MSNBC interview: "The federal government has not come clean" on UFOs, he said.
Later, he seemed to backtrack. "I don't believe there are UFOs but the government has not handled this well over the years.")
The UFO exchange also gave Obama, finally fully relaxed, his clearest line of the night.
"What I know is there's life here on Earth, and we're not attending to life here on Earth," he said.
The evil one earns every ounce of hatred.
A Boedica Her Heinous is not..
physically
mentally
politically
fiscally
What the hell is that suppose to mean? This bozo is such a pathetic jerk. "Feed the kids" "Save the earth" "Stop the war" "Eat the cow" "Plant trees" Shut. Up. Clintoon. eesh.....let's take it all away from everyone and distribute it "for the common good". Let's start with the Clintoons.
Well, one thing is for certain:If we do “hate” her, it isn’t because she is beautiful.
It was an embarrassment to anybody with half a brain.
Maybe there's something to that VP talk.
I hate that her and Bill get a free pass in every scandal - does that count?
I was able to listen, but not watch, the program.
I was following the live thread here.
There were many mentions of her double eyebrows in the thread.
Weird.
Anyway, I am out for the night.
Debate available on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbPgGnNsnbk&eurl
There will be a transcript of the Philadelphia debate.
bookmark
I have news for you Hillary - the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy still hates you and every evil thing you’ve “accomplished” in your time as First Lady of Arkansas (”I believe Juanita”) and then First Lady in the White House - starting with Travelgate.
You know; you think we are confused at what these people are saying; I’ll bet they don’t even know what they are saying.
Well, one thing you have to hand Edwards on; he got rich being a lawyer. She didn’t. That’s another knock against her.
I would like question her and Booba about Mena, Arkansas
They just take these global analogies and parade them in front of, no, feed them to, their following and they swallow it! It doesn’t even make any sense! What the hell does “”What I know is there’s life here on Earth, and we’re not attending to life here on Earth,” he said.” mean? Maybe his life on earth ended when Monica quit giving him *^%^jobs. But the rest of us are attending it just fine, thank you.
We hate Hillary because she hates America. She hates this country so much, she’s now actually bragging about the intense partisan bickering that will continue if she’s elected president. BRAGGING!
“Maybe there’s something to that VP talk.”
BINGO!
I been feeling that way for a while; the Dems could generate some Hispanic base and flip NM on the electoral map.
Richardson never goes directly after Clinton and always tries to deflect criticism. I believe his whole candidacy is a red herring and that he is doing it at the Clintons’ bidding.
Finally, while Hilary and Obama ain’t exactly beating up on each other, I very seriously doubt that she would consider putting him on the ticket with her after the race is over. In fact, if it’s close I might half expect that we find some things out about the senator from Illinois that might disqualify him altogether?
I’m just sayin’....!
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