Monday, 10/21/13, Public Square

Enemies or Frienemies?

This fascinationg video esamines the relationship between Obama and Hillary Clinton.  She has been a good and faithful servant for the Obana team.  She was instrumental in sending Bill Clinton to North Korea to help win the release of a couple of women detained by them.

She does not see herself staying an 8 years for Obama, should that be possible.  My hope is that she will be named as a Supreme Court Justice.  What are your thoughts on this possibility?

PERCEPTIONS AND REALITY OF A PRESIDENT

I really hated President Bill Clinton, no really I had a hatred for him. I would have believed him capable of any ill and most certainly guilty of every allegation.  That was over a decade ago.  Now he was not that bad, looking back. My perception at the time was not supported by the reality of the time.  But that seems to happen a lot more then I realized, watching a program on the History channel really brought that home.

L.B.J., whenever I thought of him during his administration, he had Vietnam hanging around his neck.  It was the only thing I actually associated him with: the expansion of the war and the bombing.  Perhaps it was because I was coming up on 18 years of age and would face the draft.  It could have been the nightly news of the war and it being fresh in my mind.

But there was far more going on involving Lyndon B. Johnson.  The Civil Rights bill, the Fair Housing bill and the Voting Rights bill, along with Medicare.   Years later after finally realizing all he had done, he [Johnson] was a far greater President than I would have imagined, or realized at the time.  Bad on me, for what he did far and away outweighed his association with a war he had inherited.  It took a toll on him too, as he put it, to “give the South to the Republicans ” which also meant it took a toll on the Democratic Party. But at the time I did not notice it or think about it.

FDR, foresaw the threat of the Nazis to the point he pulled a G. W. Bush or perhaps Bush pulled an FDR. Roosevelt wanted the American Nazis and those expressing either sympathies or anti war ideologies to be wire-tapped. This was at a time when we were not at war and did not look to be going to war against the Nazis.  The Supreme Court refused to allow FDR’s wiretap,  so FDR simply told his A.G. to go ahead and order the wire-tapping on the authority of the Office of the President.

Who does not think of FDR as a great President or knew at the time he willfully violated the orders of the Supreme Court and the Constitution? As it turned out, he was right in his suspicion of the Nazis and otherwise was justified in his actions. But still it is alarming to find out he did not hold up to the law.

As of yet I am not so willing to give G.W. Bush the benefit of the doubt as to his presidency.  But it does give me pause, to wonder what will come out in ten or more years that will give far more insight then I had during his administration?

Perception and reality of a Presidency often are not the same, it would seem.

Barack Obama as the 2nd Bill Clinton…

E.J. Dionne, Jr.

E.J. Dionne is one of my favorite editorial writers and I like hearing him on NPR.  In the WashPo he wrote an editorial about how much Obama could learn from Bill, commented on their similarities, and the challenges they have respectively faced.

On the shared challenges, Dionne says:  “And they share a major weakness: Both believe so devoutly in their capacity to convert adversaries and to get lions and lambs to lie down together that they spend more energy trying to win over their enemies than rallying their friends. This leaves them helpless when the lions continue to devour the lambs.”

I can’t recall where I read it, but my understanding is that the Obama group has been loathe to accept Bill into their camp because they don’t trust him and fear he will have an undue influence.  Hillary they trust implicitly and she is one of theirs.

If what I’ve read is true, it is unrealistic to think  that Obama will accept, or get, any tutoring from Bill Clinton.

iggydonnelly

Politics Can Do Some Good

I happened to have watched the interview with David Gregory and I hate to admit it, but I  felt kinda sorry for GWB.  He sounded like a man with regrets when asked about Katrina.   But I do have to give Bush credit where it’s due – he did say that working with Bill Clinton was an honor.  He also said something about his mother calls Bill Clinton her 4th son.  Have you ever heard that before?

Lilac

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/17/bush-pushes-back-against_n_426248.html

The Argument Clinic.

What's wrong with this picture? Not a damned thing.

This morning, I had the opportunity to sleep in. I woke to the sound of my wife getting ready for work and watching the news. She passed on the news that Laura Ling and Euna Lee are on their way home from being captive in North Korea. It is a good day. What could be bad about that?

Well, apparently it can be bad, because according to the Republicans, sending Bill Clinton to speak to the North Koreans was wrong because it gives that countries leaders opportunities to use the release and photos of Kim Jong Il and the former president  as propaganda tools.