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Did any of the retired generals or admirals have political ambition?
What kind of tear in the space-time continuum would that cause? 
What about Wes Clark? He ran for president in 04.
He is a Clinton guy. At this point, not sure what affect that has.
Yep, he is pretty much identical to Dukakis and John Kerry and Gore, who you supported in the past.Quick question - who comes closer to Hillary's plan for healthcare - McCain or Obama?
I will agree Obama is very similar to Dukakis, not so much Kerry and Gore.If Hillary is offered the v.p. position and turns it down, I would feel better about Obama, and would problility support him. If Hillary doesn't want Obama should make the offer it would smooth over the two camps.
It sounds like you would be making a decision based on emotion, and not policy.
I agree some emotion, I can name several posters around here who show a high level of emotion for Obama, nothing wrong with that, If you have faith in your candiate their has to be some emotion shown. I don't agree 100 percent with Obama's policy or 100 percent with McCain's. But theirs more to being president then just your policies. Their was a lot of people who voted for Hillary, I just hope Obama and the Dem leaders don't forget about us.
Classy post G State
I think once you see McCain stumble through the campaign, you'll come around to the Dem side for sure, regardless of who's the VP choice.
Superb.Obama Works A Tough Room at AIPAC
Robert Dreyfuss
Wed Jun 4, 2:24 PM ET
The Nation -- Two days after John McCain paraded his tough-guy image in front of 7,000 supporters at the annual meeting of the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), Barack Obama delivered his own version of the Israeli national anthem this morning. For Obama, the AIPAC conference seemed like a tough room to work. But, by all indications, he wowed 'em.
He started out by citing "provocative e-mails" circulating in the Jewish community. (He didn't provide details, but people in the AIPAC audience did, when I asked: that Obama is captive of Palestinian ideology, that Obama is a secret Muslim, and so on.) "Let me know if you see this guy Barack Obama," said Barack Obama, "because he sounds like a scary guy."
Virtually every speech ever delivered to an AIPAC conference, going back 54 years to the first AIPAC conclave, is a litany of pro-Israeli shibboleths. Obama didn't disappoint. He learned about the Holocaust from a camp counselor at age 11, he said, and his great-uncle helped to liberate Buchenwald. Check. "As president I will never compromise when it comes to Israeli security." Check. He advocates strengthening US-Israeli military ties, and wants to sign a memorandum of understanding to provide Israel with $30 billion in military aid over the next ten years to "ensure Israel's qualitative military advantage." Check. No negotiations with Hamas and Hezbollah. Check. And while he will talk to Iran, it will be "tough and principled diplomacy with the appropriate Iranian leader at a time and place of my choosing--if, and only if--it can advance the interests of the United States." Check. And just in case AIPAC thinks that he won't act, Obama added: "I will always keep the threat of military action on the table."
In case anyone missed the point, Obama added: "I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon." He repeated that sentence twice, for emphasis. And for additional emphasis, he said again: "Everything."
Before the speech I wandered around, speaking to a couple of dozen AIPAC attendees. What I heard was uncertainty, nervousness, anxiety--and almost none of it was based on Obama's actual views. It was just, you know, a feeling. "I don't trust him," said Menachem, from Illinois. "I don't go according to what people say. I am using my intuition." Said Alan, "We went to lobby him last year, and he seemed, well, I don't know. It's his body language." Many AIPAC'ers said Obama would talk to terrorists. Diba, from California, said: "I don't think Obama has taken a strong stand for Israel. He is saying all the right things, but I don't think that he means it."
After the speech, it was a different story. "Did he make the sale? Oh, absolutely!" said Abe. "He addressed the rumors. He spoke from the heart. For me, he settled it," Lisa, from Michigan,said. Said Jay, from Washington, "Obama had to describe himself for this crowd. And I think he came across well. People were listening very carefully, and I think they believed him." A young man from Los Angeles, still undecided between Obama and McCain, said: "He really made me think. He surprised me. He made the point that Israel is weaker and less safe after eight years of the Bush Administration's policies."
That latter point was central to Obama's address at AIPAC, which was interrupted numerous times by standing ovations, cheers and thunderous applause. Obama blasted McCain for his fealty to the "failure" of Bush's bull-in-a-falafel-shop approach to the Middle East, which, he said, (1) allowed Hamas to take power in the occupied territories, (2) allowed Hezbollah to make major gains in Lebanon, (3) strengthened Iran's power in the region, (4) turned Iraq into an unstable state, and (5) isolated the United States from its friends and allies in the region, especially among the Arabs. By proposing a "responsible, phased redeployment of our troops from Iraq" ("we will get out as carefully as we were careless getting in") and by offering incentives to Iran if they abandon their nuclear program, Obama said that he will make Israel safer and more secure.
If you were listening for Obama to say anything about the suffering of the Palestinian people, well, that will be in a different speech.
Obama, of course, pledged that he will work for a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine speech. In a slap at the White House, which launched a half-hearted, way-too-late peace effort at the end of 2007, Obama added: "And I won't wait until the waning days of my presidency."
The meeting at AIPAC, largest in its history, is a grand affair, filling a cavernous hall at the Washington Convention Center, with fully a dozen wall-sized monitors set up to display speakers' images. Everyone who's anyone spoke: Obama, McCain, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, John Boehner, Condi Rice, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and--hmm, someone else, someone else--oh, right: Hillary Clinton. Clinton rushed through her speech, tromping on her own applause lines, as if she couldn't wait to get out of there. (No, she didn't concede this morning, either. But she did say: "I know Senator Obama understands what it is at stake here. ... I know that Senator Obama will be a good friend to Israel.")
McCain, speaking on Monday morning, didn't break any new ground. He attacked Obama for not supporting the Senate resolution introduced by Senators Joe Lieberman and Jon Kyl that would have designated the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. "Over three-quarters of the Senate supported this obvious step, but not Senator Obama," said McCain. He criticized Obama for wanting to try something as radical as diplomacy. And of course he warned that there would be a "catastrophe, ... all-out civil war, genocide, and a failed state in the heart of the Middle East" if America does what Obama proposes, and leaves Iraq. That, he said, would embolden Iran.
Obama wasn't letting McCain get away with that one. "He [McCain] criticizes my willingness to use strong diplomacy, but offers only an alternate reality--one where the war in Iraq has somehow put Iran on its heels," said Obama. "The truth is the opposite. Iran has strengthened its position."
An AIPAC meeting, of course, is hardly the place to look for enlightened speech about the Middle East, and there was precious little of it to be found anywhere on the speakers' rostrum this week. But Barack Obama, who entered the lion's den an unknown quantity, won more than a few converts.
For me, the highlight of Obama's speech came at the end, when he spoke movingly, and passionately, about the alliance of Jews and African-Americans who led the civil rights movement in the '50s and '60s.
In the great social movements in our country's history, Jewish and African Americans have stood shoulder to shoulder. They took buses down south together. They marched together. They bled together. And Jewish Americans like Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner were willing to die alongside a black man--James Chaney--on behalf of freedom and equality.
Their legacy is our inheritance. We must not allow the relationship between Jews and African Americans to suffer. This is a bond that must be strengthened. Together, we can rededicate ourselves to end prejudice and combat hatred in all of its forms. Together, we can renew our commitment to justice. Together, we can join our voices together, and in doing so make even the mightiest of walls fall down.
He said that in a rising crescendo, during a standing ovation, that went on and on. It was a powerful moment.
Come on. You're better than this.
This may be the best news Obama has gotten in a long time.
I am all for a balanced approach in the Middle East, but the fact of the matter is Israel is one of our best and closest friends in the world, let alone the Middle East, and is a democracy in a sea of fiacist dictatorships and banana republics. More important, though, is Israel's symbolism. If the Middle East detects even the slightest inkling that we are lessening our support for Israel, it will be trouble.That said, I do not agree with Israel's indiscriminate bombing campaign a year or so ago in Lebanon. They were basically killing civilians at random. That seems awfully close to terrorism to me. That is not productive, and in private we need to have strong words for Israel about such things. But in public we cannot be seen to waiver in our support for Israel.
One less talking point for McCain.I watched both speeches on CNN.com yesterday morning. Obama was great as was Hillary. I was actually about to post on here how she hadnt even mentioned Obama more than 5 minutes (it seemed to me) into her speech, but just as I was about to hit "add reply" she made it clear that Obama was a friend of Israel.
That is awesome.This may be the best news Obama has gotten in a long time.
I got the same imprassion. I have a feeling that when she eventually does get on board she'll be an asset to his campaign.One less talking point for McCain.I watched both speeches on CNN.com yesterday morning. Obama was great as was Hillary. I was actually about to post on here how she hadnt even mentioned Obama more than 5 minutes (it seemed to me) into her speech, but just as I was about to hit "add reply" she made it clear that Obama was a friend of Israel.
NorvilleBarnes said:when she eventually does get on board she'll be an asset to his campaign.Leeroy Jenkins said:One less talking point for McCain.I watched both speeches on CNN.com yesterday morning. Obama was great as was Hillary. I was actually about to post on here how she hadnt even mentioned Obama more than 5 minutes (it seemed to me) into her speech, but just as I was about to hit "add reply" she made it clear that Obama was a friend of Israel.Mr. Superunkn0wn said:
I honestly think she can do alot more good on the sidelines than as VP. Not sure how much being a VP would help her most ardent supporters. "Hey, here's a concilation prize - take another backseat to a man in an all but meaningless position."
As long as McCain gives a speech on the same day, he should be fine.
Agreed - but I was referring to Tuesday nights speech.
I'd really like Webb and I think he would add some real bonafides to the ticket. But I don't think it will happen. Pretty sure I read Warner is running for the other senate seat this cycle.
All women polled? So that would include the republican women. If thats the case it wouldnt be surprising to me.NorvilleBarnes said:
This is fantastic!!! It deserves its own thread.urbanhack said:
Imagine it is January 21st 2009. You are President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is your vice-president.
She's already demanded her old office back in the West Wing. You've learned from CNN that Bill Clinton is on a jet with Ron Burkle heading for Kazakhstan. Drudge has a flashing siren up beside a report from a British tabloid about a mystery blonde who emerged from the former president's apartment in at his library in Little Rock just before dawn last week. The blonde is promising a full interview tomorrow.
Mark Penn, White House counselor, is busy polling whether a divorce or a brief separation from Bill might best help the former First Lady become in 2012 the first member of a president's own administration to defeat him for his party's nomination.
The new vice-president's case is bolstered because your margin of victory was barely wider than George W. Bush's in 2000. According to exit polls released after John McCain's popular vote win, 78 per cent of late deciders cited the leaked tape of Hillary calling you a "wimp" as a key factor. Some 64 per cent agreed with her.
For months, the pundits have been ridiculing the Obama-Hillary (she insisted on her first name) slogan of "Ready for Change and Experience We Can Believe In on Day One". Bill Clinton's Labor Day quip that it would be a "three-for-one" deal didn't help either.
OK, stop imagining. An exaggeration? Certainly. But you get the picture. If Obama even begins to consider whether a Vice President Clinton would loyally help him better govern the country, she's toast in the veepstakes.
Which is why the notion that Hillary will get the nod can be summed up in three words. Ain't. Gonna. Happen. She may be on anyone's short list, as Obama has stated cannily. But she's already inked in at the bottom of his.
Let's face it, the chances were never high. Underpinning Obama's campaign has been his potent argument that it's time for fundamental change in Washington - an end to triangulation, the politics of personal destruction and, by implication, an end to the dynastic rule of the Bushes and the Clintons. Oh, and an end to the Iraq war - which Hillary authorised.
Obama's top advisers believe she sought to diminish him and at best failed to rein in supporters and allies who played the race card or encouraged the ignorant and gullible to view him as some kind of Muslim fifth columnist. She even said that McCain was ready to be commander-in-chief and Obama wasn't.
Electorally, moreover, the benefits of her being on the ticket are dubious. The vast majority of her 18 million voters are likely to plump for him anyway if he runs even a half-decent general election campaign. Those Appalachian types who backed Hillary in the primaries after baulking at a black man won't vote for Obama no matter who's at the bottom of the ticket.
It's easy to forget that Hillary remains one of the most polarising figures in American politics. Naming her as running mate would mobilise the Republican base for McCain more quickly than if the angels Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley descended from heaven to anoint the Arizona senator live on C-SPAN.
In his baroque rant about Todd Purdum this week, Bill Clinton's accusations about Obama got relatively little attention. "They had all these people standing up in this church cheering, calling Hillary a white racist, and he didn't do anything about it," he vented to the Huffington Post. "The first day he [Obama] said 'Ah, ah, ah well.' Because that's what they do - he gets other people to slime her."
If those words had been uttered publicly by Frances Strickland or Susan Bayh do you think their hubbies would still be in the veepstakes reckoning? And that's even before you consider Bill's foreign financial deals and the undisclosed donors to his library.
All this is leaving aside what happened this week. Hillary didn't only display a breathtaking - though characteristically Clintonian - self-pity, delusion, sense of entitlement and blatant desire to put her own good above that of her party. She also showed an astonishing political ineptitude.
The test of a true leader is how he or she performs under the pressure of dramatic events. Her self-regarding defiance was the worst political misjudgment by a leading Democrat since Al Gore blew the 2000 election by conceding when Florida was still in the balance.
To authorize the likes of Bob Johnson (whose charming contributions to the election cycle thus far have been to call Obama a "Sidney Poitier", allude to his youthful drug use and state he would not have been beating Hillary had he been white) to lobby for the vice-presidential slot is plain stupid. And then denying it all in a press statement fooled no one.
For Obama to opt for Hillary over candidates such as Sam Nunn, Jim Webb, Tim Kaine, Mark Warner, Joe Biden and Wesley Clark would be an acknowledgement of weakness. It would also indicate a decidely uncharacteristic lack of confidence.
The Illinois senator's primary campaign was remarkably well disciplined, consistent, on message and lacking in drama. Despite Hillary's undoubted mastery of policy minutiae and her impressive fighting spirit, her campaign exhibited none of these qualities.
Obama will need to pay due deference to his vanquished rival's bruised feelings while deftly courting her angry, disappointed supporters. But he's not about to gamble everything by bowing to her presumptuous and preposterous demand.
I think he will win a close election in part because he can get many independents to vote for him.But if someone is hesitant to vote for him just because he's black, I'm not sure he can sway many of those people.
no chance, though it will be made to look like she was given a LOT of consideration.As for the Hillary supporters, i think i saw a stat (sorry no link) that the latest polls show about 20% of her supporters would vote McCain. IIRC, that number was at like 50% in the heat of the battle. It will continue to come down and all you'll be left with are the racists, feminazis, and/or angry old white jewish ladies from Manhattan (see recent video)
Yes. The VP can be just about anyone except Clinton or Rev Wright.
