I hope Obama and Hillary really are cheating like some claim

Geez...all these numerous post titles about all the supposedly nefarious activities being perpetrated by our two front runners in Iowa.

I hope they are both doing all these underhanded rovarian things that some of you guys are claiming--hell, if they are that masterful we may actually win a general election for a change (or should I say avoid having one stolen from us AGAIN)

Are people cranky today or what?

under-handed tactics against her opponents. It will be more appreciated when she is using them against the republican nominee.

You think if somebody uses these dirty smears to get into office they aren't going to turn around and use them against you?

think back 4 years.

Who headed up that smear campaign?

It's politics!

It doesn't have to be, if we put people in place with some resemblance of a moral compass.

it was always this bad - it used to be much worse, in fact.

There was never a golden age of American politics where decent, honorable men fought by the Marquis of Queensbury's rules.

Political campaigning has always been a dirty, ugly business. We've cleaned it up considerably. Stop being nostalgic for a time that never was.

Ma, Ma, where's my pa? Gone to the White House Ha Ha Ha!

And know that the tone has gotten much more hateful over the last 20 years. Pretending that isn't true to justify current campaign tactics is part of the problem.

and I'm not talking about 20 years - I'm talking 230 years.

The problem is that these things are REPORTED and widely talked about now. But dirty tricks, smears, innuendo, lies.... they've ALWAYS been part of politics.

You're imagining a time that never was.

in order to justify today's vile campaigns, because you know they weren't like this 20 and 30 years ago. I don't care what happened to Jefferson. I know that I am sick of politicians bold-faced lying to me.

Sorry, but they always have. Things are actually BETTER today than in the past.

Today's Republican liars and haters are better than they were 20-50 years ago? Are you really trying to say that? Bullshit. And the Clintons are exactly the same.

And a poor sense of how to debate. I never compared Bush to past Republican Presidents. I'm comparing the nature of politics today to the past - and it's not worse today.

Do you know how Nixon first got elected to the Senate? Google Helen Gahagan Douglas and find out. Do you know about the racial politics played in the South... oh from 1865 to about 1975?

I can find you scores of horrid examples. You're just really uninformed about history if you think we're at some sort of political nadir.

Nixon, protege of Prescott Bush. And? Politics still weren't as bad then as it is now. And racism isn't the issue here, so don't drag that into it. You can't call Bush the worst President in history, the biggest liar and most incompetent, and then turn around and say it's the same as it always was.

this has nothing to do with Bush's merits as President. We're talking about the nature of politics.

Politics in America has always had a very dirty, seamy underside.

These days, it's en vogue to publicize it, and ALL campaigns try to play it up to appear victimized.

But nonetheless, politics has always been a dirty game, and it was, undeniably, much dirtier in the past.

And it's the politics that will make Hillary a shitty President. The lying, the distorting, the corruption, the money. You cannot be appalled by it in the Bush Administration and applaud it with Hillary.

you're just off on some anti-Bush/anti-Clinton rant and don't want to discuss this rationally.

Good luck with that.

and you can't handle it.

I'm trying to have a reasonable discussion about the topic at hand, and you just keep jumping off on tangents.

Historically, you are wrong. Politics is not dirtier today than in the past. In fact, it is cleaner. But you don't want to discuss that - you just want to make crazy, flailing accusations against Clinton. I'm not interested in that discussion.

So you can have the last word - go crazy.

Not justified as normal routine politics.

Can you provide any evidence that the creators of those pieces were ever charged with corruption? Can you provide any evidence that the public thought it was a criminal issue?

I'll save you the googling time - no, you can't.

Those are just a mere handful of evidence that politics in the past was way dirtier than it is today.

Seriously, you really need to learn more history.

were not treated as politics as usual. These were considered real and scandalous and controversial, much like election 2000. It is not the same to say there were scandals in the past, and the scandals were condoned by the people in the past. I am not referring to political scandals. I'm referring to the mudslinging lies and hatred that is worse than it's been in decades, and at least as bad as it's ever been. If you accept this as normal, then you deserve the lying shitty government you get.

just your ill-informed opinion.

read some history.

Not because they weren't controversies at the time. :eyes:

You're seriously saying I have to go through federal and university archives to dig up news stories about these elections in order to prove there were scandals and controversies?

to a public outcry. They were source material.

You really ought to learn some history before you embarrass yourself more.

and you seem not to have an understanding of the role of political cartooning in the past.

You really are over your head here. Please just go learn a lot more about American political history and then come discuss this.

n/m

I never said there weren't scandals in the past. I also specifically said I was talking about the last 20-50 years. The hatred and venom is definitely worse than it's been for decades, and as bad as it's ever been. If you like to be lied to by a bunch of corrupt dirty slimeballs, then keep pretending this is always the way it is and that's what you'll get.

and their publisher who was usually allied with a candidate or party. You really need to stop attacking me. Slander is a shitty political strategy, whether in politics or personal life.

and have tried, gently, to point out that you're just misinformed, historically.

You keep attacking ME and my candidate - that makes rational discussion more difficult.

Can you tell me exactly what the political golden age was? Because then I can point out out to you where you're wrong.

:shrug:

"you're misinformed" is not a case.

When in the last 50 years did the public accept a continuous string of lies and slander as normal politics. When did the public accept corruption as normal politics. When did a cartoonist break a story on corruption. Prove anything you've tried to say to be true. None of it is. The Bush's are as bad as they come and Hillary's campaign is acting just like them.

the politics of the past didn't use mass media - it was low-down and dirty, underhanded.

It never reached the national media until recently. Now you're upset that the media tell us about these tricks, but that's not evidence that the tricks didn't exist before.

That's why I'm saying things are cleaner now - the media DOES report on them.

I don't mean to be disrespectful, but you really DO need to educate yourself more on the history of American politics. There was no golden age as you imagine.

You're being more then disrespectful. You're simply not listening. I have said repeatedly that I am not talking about the politics of 100 years ago. You dismiss it because that means you would have to deal with the dirty campaigning at hand, and you would then have to admit the Clintons are as bad as they come in the last 50 years.

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Politics have always been lowdown and dirty, whether it is 100 years, 50 years, 5, or 1 is irrelevant. The sooner you get a grip on reality the better.

Waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh

electability, polls and fundraising are of higher importance than integrity, principles and fair elections.

IF you are a certain type of candidate.

intends to win?

if you sacrifice integrity, principles and fair elections to accomplish it?

what have you "won", exactly?

the notion that we've ever had a "pure" president is just nonsense. Politics is a dirty game. Always has been, always will be.

If you want moral purity, join the priesthood (ha!). If you want to effect change in the modern world, you become a politician. The two fields aren't remotely similar.

is that the goal of the democratic party?

That's the biggest mistake I see here: people want a moral avatar to be a political leader. That's never going to happen - at least not in this era.

To say that if you partake of real politics, you have no moral compass at all is silly.

Lyndon Johnson was a right bastard, and a dirty fighter, and did some great things. John Kennedy was no monk, but was a great President.

Bill Clinton wasn't a moral crusader, but I think he was the best President of my lifetime.

Again, if you want moral purity, join a church or a synagogue or a temple and devote your efforts there. Politics will only disappoint you again and again and again.

you are not holding her to any sort of moral standard, then?

:shrug:

I don't know who your candidate is, but unless it's the Dalai Lama, I could find moral flaws in yours, too.

I believe Senator Clinton is plenty moral - more than enough to hold the presidency.

The notion that ANY of the dem candidates is insufficiently "moral" to have the job is just stupid.

on the one hand, you eschew moral standards in politics, and say that one will be disappointed if one looks for them. In fact, you say you gain the presidency by abandoning integrity, principles or fair elections, you win.

So, I ask if that means you do not look for moral standards in your own candidate, and then you claim your candidate is "plenty moral" and say that its stupid to think any candidate is not moral.

as I say, those are conflicting signals. You seem to say you applaud winning at any cost, no matter the moral decline, then you become offended if anyone asks if that is what your candidate is actually doing.

:shrug:

I can barely speak.

I didn't say anything of the sort.

You're just being so ridiculously over-the-top that my common sense tells me I shouldn't continue arguing with you. But...

Yes, my candidate has a moral compass that I'm fine with. She also knows how politics works, and she's doing very well in playing that game: which is a dirty, ugly game, and not a game virgins like you should concern themselves with, lest they get the vapors.

Nonetheless, this argument isn't about my candidate or your candidate - it's about the nature of politics. I wish you would have the decency to stay on topic. It's very frustrating to try to discuss the myriad tangents you're throwing out.

Now, in response - who is your candidate? Please tell me so I can rip apart his/her morality - not because I want to do so, but to demonstrate to you that it's all relative.

I'm asking you questions, and then pointing out your conflicting positions. You are free to clarify at any point.

If you will but peruse our exchange, you'll see that is the case.

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You can reply to all my other posts here but not this one?


I'm done dealing with you in this thread. You can't stay on-topic, you lie, you don't have the honor or decency to admit when you're proven wrong. Enjoy your flailing.

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I don't find that an appropriate position for a democrat.
I did not start the thread, I'm trying to figure out how any democrat can support that position.
I"m asking questions to find out to what extent persons like yourself and the OP approve of cheating to win.

I happen to know your candidate, and that is why I mentioned her by name. If you had another candidate, I would still ask the same question.

and to be precise, I'm trying to divine where YOUR standards are for judging a candidate, that is no reflection on the candidate themselves.

if the real issue is NOT cheating to win and election, then can you explain what the OP is about?

and, you're being overly defensive needlessly. Unlike you, not every utterance I make is about Hillary Clinton.

I said you were putting words in my mouth.

You said you weren't.

I posted a quote from you that begins "you say..."

then you still act all prickish? Anyway, I'm done with this sub-thread, too, because you've shown yourself to be a dishonorable debater.

me, "dishonorable"?

have you even been reading our exchange?

Uh yeah--RIGHT....NOT!

This thread was started (by me) in support of getting all the whiny assed people to shut up who CONSTANTLY come on here with the Hillary vs Edwards vs Obama bullshit.

Ever hear of sarcasm? The point of the OP...was that the two front runners are probably NOT that nefarious, underhanded etc and all the negative posts infighting here IMO play right into the hands of the right.

THAT was my fucking point.

I'm quite frankly SICK OF ALL THIS SNIPING--I don't have a particular horse in the race as long as the freaking horse doesn't have a big honking *R* after it's name when they are sworn in in 09.

Don't have the nerve to state what this thread was started in support of and who in the hell are you to say what is undemocratic to post?

I think the attitude is that it's OK to cheat and steal from Republicans, since they never had any intention of playing fair in the first place.

I don't necessarily approve, but I understand.

you become your enemy.

If we embrace unfair elections in order to win, then are we not exactly what the republicans have been?

no party is more important than fair elections in a democracy.

and no, I don't approve.

Nor the OP, who was being sarcastic, thank Fuck.

But I'm trying to be realistic here. This administration had to pull off a coup d'etat to get into power. They might have to leave the same way.

I'm very sorry if that offends you. It hurts that things have gotten this bad, but we cannot. play. nice. with. fascists. Ever.

I was referring to the OP, which as you say, was being thankfully sarcastic (apparently), but other poster(s) were not being sarcastic at all. They were applauding the idea of cheating in the election, which I found repugnant, which is different from being offended personally.

It doesn't seem like applauding as much as cynicism. In this political climate, it's real hard not to be cynical.

And from where I sit, which is to say DC, it's necessary because if you don't get cynical you lose your damn mind. I've seen it happen to way too many people, including myself.