Last edited Mon Feb 24, 2014, 01:34 PM - Edit history (1)
John Quincy Adams (one term president) and George W. Bush (if he had to be president should have served only one term).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Quincy_Adams
We overturned a monarchy at the outset of our nation. We don't want or need another dynasty, another step on the path to monarchy. The French already made the mistake of trying to return to monarchy. It did not work. This is not an age, not a historical time and place for playing kings and queens, dynasties if you will. Segolene Royal may run, but whether she has the political following to win remains to be seen. I certainly hope not.
I note that Chelsea Clinton who has no particular claim to anything other than being a nice, well educated and intelligent person (like so many of her generation) married to a rich man (as very few in any generation) as far as I can tell, is now out giving speeches. Giving speeches is no biggie, no proof of excessive political ambition or of much of anything, certainly not of dynastic tendencies. Except that when Chelsea Clinton gives a speech somewhere, certain elements in the press report it as if it was a big deal, as if she were someone especially important and as if she too could become a contender for the American throne.
Hillary is experienced and has quite a following. But in 2008, the public, especially the younger voters chose Obama, a neophyte with what appeared to be little D.C. experience instead of her.
The country voted for change in 2008. Obama was elected on change and on a vow to change D.C. He has had to deal with partisanship and a lack of cooperation that is arguably greater than any president has faced since Lincoln. We need a figure who will really talk about and lead us to major changes in the way we govern ourselves. We need a figure who will right the relationship between the majority of voters, giving them more real power and representation in D.C., someone who will lessen the corruption of big money and its representation in our government.
The Clintons wallowed in the corruption of their close relationship with Wall Street and the powerful clique that has formed a shadow government. The Clintons developed a dependency and servitude to the major and well organized banks, corporations and hedge funds that are running our government. Hillary dragged her husband's corrupt buddies into the Obama administration. That has caused major problems for the American people. We have what is called financial reform. But the Obama years have seen economic recovery on Wall Street that far outpaces the recovery on Main Street. And that shows where the political will and power reside.
Hillary Clinton is in no position to wrest power from that insider clique, that shadow government than was Bush. Why? Because she is a part of it.
Hillary probably will run. She alone has the money to run. Whether she can win will depend on how bad the Republican candidate is. Will she get my vote? No.
I feel great sorrow to see my country going down the path to entrenched corruption worse than any we have known since the Gilded Age. To some extent that corruption is already the rule in D.C. (If you don't want to take my word for it, read Greg Palast's Vultures Picnic, and as it applies to the Clintons, especially chapter 6, The Wizard of OOzie. It's a fun read. More like a mystery novel than a political book.) If we Democrats nominate Hillary, it will be difficult, perhaps impossible to ever achieve a government that answers at least to a greater extent than now to the people.
The Tea-Baggers think that the stupidity and religiosity of their nutty spokespeople will end the corruption. It won't. We need someone with the integrity of Elizabeth Warren to change the culture of D.C. at least to the point that we can learn the truth from our government without quite so much propaganda from Wall Street, the oligarchs and our military. And without so much secrecy. How can an oil deal that benefits big corporations that pay almost no taxes if any at all and what look like government-sanctioned bribes to a foreign nation be considered state secrets? (See Palast's book Vulture's Picnic, chapter 6, especially pages 200-201.)
One of our biggest problems is that money is trickling up at an every faster pace while jail and prison time continue to trickle down. America's wealth, much of our industry and many of our jobs have been shipped overseas on the yachts that the rich have built themselves so that they can securely go everywhere and grab everything -- they call them "free trade" agreements.
No wonder more and more Americans are resorting to the one source of a sense of power and self-government that many of them feel they will ever know -- their guns. We cannot change our gun culture until we change the culture in D.C. that makes so many Americans feel powerless and used.
Hillary Clinton would likely be a more divisive candidate than we have ever had in my lifetime of 70 years. Those who like her adore her; those who don't will make up lies about her just to be able to hate her. Regardless of her good qualities, her experience and her brilliance, she will never be able to unite the country or change the minds of the many ordinary people who have been repeatedly lied to about her. This is my opinion, but I doubt that, in spite of polls showing she could win today, she can overcome all the vitriol that has been implanted in the minds of frustrated Americans about her and Bill Clinton. And then there is the truth about the mistakes made during the Clinton era. A lot of people on DU don't realize that the Republican lies have succeeded in shifting the blame for 9/11 onto the Clinton presidency. That the Clinton administration failed to strongly respond to the threat of Bin Laden and Al Qaeda is one of those negatives that is very difficult to disprove in spite of all the evidence that it is false.
And then there is her vote for the Iraq War which suggests that even after so many years sleeping in the same bed (presumably) as her husband president and commander-in-chief, in spite of all the lies she must have heard and debunked during Clinton's presidency, she could not tell lies from the truth or speak out in favor of caution when it came to reviewing the evidence provided for that war.
God save America from Hillary Clinton and the division her nomination and presidency would bring us. There is quite a push toward a Hillary run. I just think it is misguided and sad. And I have not even started on her persona as a candidate. It isn't strong. It just isn't. She reminds everyone of the know-it-all tattle-tale in the first grade. Not good. That is why Obama so readily beat her in 2008. Everything in politics depends on how voters respond to you as a person. Hillary is probably very effective in small groups, but seems strident when she gives speeches.
Could someone post some portions of Hillary's speeches in which she tells good jokes? Something that proves her sense of humor? I haven't seen much of that side of her, and what I have seen seems cold. Bill Clinton exuded warmth. We felt that he felt our pain. He didn't even have to say it. That is what won him elections. Hillary is the opposite even though she may feel our pain, we sure don't feel that she feels it. It is a matter of the ability to convey the emotion of love and caring. Hillary exudes confidence and competence, but she does not communicate that she really cares about us as individuals. Obama, just to contrast, really does even though he is quite and studious.
We need a candidate who does not give the impression that she thinks overly highly of herself. We need a client who has our interests not just on the table but in her heart. We need Elizabeth Warren.
Revised to add supporting details, correct grammar (hopefully caught all the mistakes) and improve style.
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She's turning 67 this year - and I would really love for the baby boomer women to get that in their lifetime.
