Senator Obama has failed to demonstrate leadership in crisis when given the opportunity.  He completely abdicated his role as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Subcommittee on European Affairs - by his own admission - because he has been running for President.  He ignored that call - but wants to be able to answer the White House phone.

I guess the Bush administration needs no oversight.

Seems to me that there are multiple crises right now that could be aired and investigated in that committee - NATO's role in Afghanistan, Kosovo, Russian influence in former Soviet bloc countries....

That is why congressional hearings matter, and why a subcommittee chairmanship represents a significant responsibility. Knowledge is not just power but the fundamental requirement for either house of Congress to act as an equal of the executive branch in government.

http://www.salon.com/...

No, I won't stand for the dismissal of Joe Wilson on this site.  In the current zeal to eradicate the Hillary Clinton campaign on this site, Joe Wilson's thoughtful endorsement of Hillary Clinton has been twisted into a bizarre psychological screed devoid of political analysis:

The yearning to return to one's Faithful and Forgiving Loved One will be overwhelming as our mind slowly returns to think of Her, haloed in soft amber light, waiting patiently but unbowed for us to return to sanity and the hearth.

http://www.dailykos.com/...

What the hell?

Joseph Wilson has endorsed Hillary Clinton.  Deal with it.  I'm reporting this directly in this diary, and posting some excerpts, and I'm not going to portray Joe Wilson - who has earned my deepest respect for being one of the few to take on the Bush administration at great personal and professional cost - as anything but a true American patriot.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

It is quite a scene.  The rapid flight of high-profile, celebrity women to Barack Obama has been so breathless that Maria Shriver showed up in riding clothes, having just leapt off a horse to join the lineup.  As Obama basked in the soft glow of collective female embrace, the image was very familiarly, well, old.  All the soft hands on deck to make sure a savior rises. Male, of course.  

We’re free to vote for anyone, since 1920.  We’ve won something.  But why am I seeing a very faded, retro picture when I look at these adoring women?

Is this the election where change will trump revolution?  Possibly.  But what about revolution?  Well, who’s a revolutionary in this field?  Both Clinton and Obama hold very similar positions on major issues.  Life stories?  Both attest to the dead weight that femaleness or blackness imposes on any aspiring citizen, still, in 21st century America.  Both have thrown off much of these limitations, at cost, but also as benefit.  Both can truly speak from the other side.

This morning:

For Democrats, it has to be Hil: The Daily News endorses Hillary Clinton

The New York Daily News, NYC's hometown newpaper of just regular and working folks, a long-time Democratic leaning newspaper, has endorsed Hillary.

http://www.nydailynews.com/...

Her celebrity status notwithstanding, Clinton is at heart a worker in the trenches. She has an encyclopedic knowledge of the issues, and her success in the Senate on behalf of New Yorkers attests to both relentless attention to detail and skill at working the levers of power.

It’s folly to write a diary that doesn’t fit with the anti-Clinton hysteria sweeping this site as well as the MSM.  For once, I can’t tell the difference.

I wonder why there was little outcry when Obama launched his attack on Clinton during the debate, calling her out as a corporate lawyer working for Walmart.  In return, she raised his Rezko ties in Chicago.  Did Obama launch a personal attack here?  And first?  This is hardly mentioned anywhere.  Had Clinton first raised his Chicago dealings, there would not be enough bandwidth to contain the fury.

Why did you raise that kind of question, Senator Obama?

Gloria Steinem nails it in today's New York Times.  A skillful dissection of the strands of gender and race that underlie this primary fight.  White woman?  Black man?  Does any of that matter?

I've posted here that I think having a female President will be a radical act with transforming ripples around the globe.  Not any female President, mind you.  One who holds progressive views, of course, and actually will fight for women around the world and at home.

Steinem analyzes the context in which a female candidacy develops, against the backdrop of resistance which makes a female a candidate of gender, while the male is not.  That original sin already puts her candidacy into a frenzy of psychodramatic analysis and spin which often reveal more about the commenter than the candidate.  Angry.  Bitch.   Weepy.  Cold.  Sentimental.   Human.   Human??????

http://www.nytimes.com/...

I don’t think that you guys are really ready for an election.

What’s with the "attack" theme on this site and in the media today?  When Hillary asks some questions, she is "attacking"?

Obama gets no hard look from the press.  They just show pictures and speeches.  Where will his scrutiny come from?

A nearly hypnotic trance has descended on the Obama supporters - to the great detriment of producing a candidate well-positioned to win in November.  "Hope" la la "Change" la la "Happy" la la etc..........

Folks, we’re looking for someone to take on the GOP machine and knock em dead.  We’re looking for a fighter.  

Hillary hit the home run that the pundits were screaming for.  

1. Specifics about her work on health benefits for NH residents.  That "changed" lives.

2. Specifics about her work on health benefits for National Guard personnel over Pentagon objections.  That "changed" lives.

3. Specific demonstration of the political courage needed for change evidenced by the Clinton rescue of the disastrous Bush deficits.

4. Specific recitation of a vote against the 2005 energy bill (unlike Obama) which included tax breaks for the oil companies.

5. A female President would be....uh, change.

She was unruffled by any of the personality comparisons between her and Obama - not liked?  Well, that's deeply hurting :) - and refused to elevate likability to an art form:

6. In 2000, everyone wanted to have a beer with W.  Nuff said.  We're not voting for homecoming queen or king.

I'm reading and I'm not weeping.

Tonight Hillary Clinton has won the endorsement of the Des Moines Register, after every candidate has courted the newspaper for months.  An extended audition, and Clinton has come out on top.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/...

It's not hard to discern how much her seasoning and battle record are regarded as strengths, not weaknesses:

Tested by rough politics and personal trials, she’s demonstrated strength, resolve and resilience.

Women in American political life are recent guests at the big table.  Here’s a short tour of where we have been.

1872. Susan B. Anthony arrested for casting a vote in the Presidential election.  She was convicted, and fined $100, which she refused to pay.

1879. Belva Ann Lockwood becomes the first woman admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court.  In 1884 she accepted the nomination of the National Equal Rights Party and ran for president.

1916. Jeannette Rankin, of Montana, is the first woman to be elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.

1925. Nellie Tayloe Ross becomes the first woman to serve as governor of a state, in Wyoming.

1932. Hattie Wyatt Caraway, of Arkansas, becomes the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate.

1933. Frances Perkins is appointed secretary of labor making her the first woman member of a presidential cabinet.

A Senator who thinks that s/he has more to offer to the country than sitting in a room of 100 egos - and so decides to run for President - better be sure that the ambition doesn’t exceed the grasp.

How an elected Senator decides to actually represent their electorate is reflected in their legislative initiatives, their committee work, and their voting records.

How about actually voting?  There’s a really sharp division among the Democratic candidates who are Senators.

Of the top 5 missed-vote Senators, three of them seek the Democratic nomination for President.  

Biden, Dodd, Obama.

It’s not 1968.  The facile comparison and yearning to recapture a year of intensity, hope and rage is all too apparent in the Newsweek cover and Tweety’s laments.  Who is the RFK or MLK of 2008?  Can we rerun that once more?

I’ll never have that recipe again.
MacArthur Park, 1968

We are not stuck in some cultural loop that keeps replaying so that we never have to grieve what has been lost.  The 1960’s unleashed dormant forces in the persons of women and African-Americans who emerged into the bright sunshine of American life.  That is now behind us.  A continuing integration is underway, but the explosive burst of the civil rights and feminist movements has already happened, and even faded.

A war that posed a theoretical possibility of engagement for all economic classes enlisted many more in activism than could ever be summoned now, when war is now a job that some apply for, but most do not.

In one of the state's largest single deployments since World War II, about half of the New Jersey Army National Guard's 6,200 troops are expected to be mobilized for duty in Iraq or Afghanistan by early 2009, state and Guard officials said yesterday.

http://www.philly.com/...

Governor Corzine blasted the callup, which was scheduled for 2010 and has been "accelerated" to 2009:

``I think it is undermining of the basic purpose of the National Guard, which is to protect local and state elements and floods and fires and whatever problems that we can have,'' Corzine said, ``and reduces our ability and it strains us on equipment.''

"The fact that we continue to have the kind of overuse of our National Guard is just a mistake," said Corzine, who voted against the Iraq war when he was a U.S. senator.

http://www.nj.com/...

Hillary would not endorse the divide and conquer tactics of the GOP today.  She voted against the shameful "action" by the Senate to register fear over an ad, rather than impatience with the war.

For those that doubt whether she will stand with us against the right-wing smear monster, she will.  Today she stared down the bully efforts of Mitch McConnell and his thugs who think they can bait our candidates and get them to turn against us.

Wrong.  At least for Hillary.

Chris Dodd voted against also.

Obama and Biden skipped the vote.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/...

This is Hillary acting as a leader, unafraid of fighting back – grabbing the helm against the newest swiftboat aimed at us.

I’m not surprised, because Hillary is battle-scarred and ready to fight back.  That’s what gives her an edge over the other candidates.  She’ll be damned if GOP Slime, Inc. is going to distract or steal this election and cheat America of its well-earned Democratic takeover.

 

Stupid America just got a new TV channel.

CNN International is the one hour on CNN where we can get BBC-type coverage of the day's news.  Both in length and content, one can expect to get a report on the serious international crises that are affecting us here, whether we know it or not.

Today:

I begin to watch the top story on storming of the Red Mosque in Islamabad - is this story already getting too complicated?  Not for readers here - who surely know that Musharraf made a decision to take on the radical Islamist siege of the mosque, affirmatively confronting the Taliban-like regime that is trying to sneak into power in Pakistan.  Musharraf could be vulnerable to more uprisings, which would topple his regime.  Some of would like to know....

Isn't that news, America?

NO.

CSPAN now.

This is the first appearance of Hillary with Bill on the stump in Iowa.  Big crowd, and both are decked out in bright colors, suggesting optimism - not a bad sight on a night when Bush has overtaken Nixon in the thug department.  But back to substance - this is an interesting event and a strategic decision to exploit the good will that Bill enjoys to help Hillary's campaign

Here they go.

Just starting now - the opening of the hearing at the House Judciciary Committee on the oversight - or lack of - or outright negligence of the EPA in the days and months following the air quality disaster at 9/11. Christine Todd Whitman has finally been brought to Congress to testify.  Brilliant opening charge by Chair Jerry Nadler of NYC and now by Chairman Conyers.  He repeated the charge of direct White House suppression of safety info which was necessary for residents and first responders to know.

To be clear on jurisdiction: the Judiciary Committee is investigating whether government negligence on these issues amounted to a constitutional violation of civil rights.  Hence where we are.

It's now on CSPAN.  Please post comments and remarks.

This is a historic hearing - 6 years too late, unfortunately.

It's a good start, or should I say continuation of moving away from a miserable go-ahead given to Bush in Oct. 2002.

Hillary voted NO.

Finally, we're seeing some effect on the Presidential race; true, we will not win the vote but we will have changed the standards for what is acceptable in an out of control administration.

Some of the enablers are not available any more.  Finally.

Have we begun to stare down the frame of "traitor" or "treason"?  Is it possible that the GOP will not be able to bait any more over the decaying foreign policy known as the Iraq war?

Good for Hillary.  Time to start voting FOR the troops, and not against them. Leadership when it mattered - on a day when Bush was in full bully mode, daring the Dems to rebel - some did, and we will remember.