Buckeye State Blog - '93 NAFTA Congressional Opponent: "She Never Offered Criticism" - Comments

Thanks!

Portsmouth — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 21:02:38 -0700

Thanks for saving me the trouble of breaking the badnews to Joey. Tuesday better get here fast. Hillz is leaking.

What's Hillary ever done for Ohio?

Portsmouth — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 20:32:43 -0700

Our current economic situation is the result of the Walmart/Clinton/China syndrome. NAFTA is a much less serious job killer. Hillz was in Walmart's pocket from "day one". Ohio, don't be fooled!

Re: I see what the problem is

tessellated — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:50:46 -0700

No, I'm decidely not fixated on that sort of analysis. I think it's useful but only in a most myopic sense. It was you who brought up marketing and branding, that's the only reason I've humored this conversation.

The product that is being marketed is the candidate and his policies. Image is the very essence of surface analysis. Message is a rather ambiguous word in this context. I suppose you mean slogans. Slogans are the verbal equivalent to visual cues like logos; they are spoken images, if you will. I don't find the minutiae of sloganeering terribly fascinating or enlightening either: it's useful but, again, only narrowly so.

Look, this is an example of where I am at in my thinking on this campaign. It's a Dean comparison, but this time on a completely different level. It discusses strategic thinking of the campaigns. Their different approaches to organization. I find this interesting because it speaks to the candidate's philosophy regarding power and how to use it. It sheds light on their management styles. This is why I think your original dismissal of the notion that the campaign can be separated from governance is wrong. I don't think the proposition that campaign = governance is true, but your inversion that campaign != governance is false for similar reasons. It's a gross oversimplification.

You Should Look at the Big Picture and Hillary Will Win Ohio

joeybullboy03 — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:49:38 -0700

There are no attacks on education or cluster bombs. 54 people were killed today in the Gaza strip. Israel is constantly attacked by suicide bombers or Hezbollah terrorists. Both sides should work toward peace. It would be very hard to achieve that if Obama had a leading advisor that has such an anti-Israel sentiment. I am completely insulted that you would even infer that I would defend cluster bombing of innocent children. None of my arguments are slanted but used to show factual events and direct quotes from people in the political spectrum.

I listened to Hillary today while she was in an airplane flying to a campaign rally and as I do with all my responses, I took notes and gave the facts. One of the issues she brought up was that Obama has not even chaired on committee on Afghanistan and he was too busy campaigning to vote yet he boasts how he will "Focus on Afghanistan." Give me a break! He has missed 14 votes trying to be the candidate of "Change" but can't even take the time to do the job as Senator that he is being paid and elected to do. He has no credible foreign policy experience. He is brazen in his claims that he would rather sit with the world's dangerous leaders, and now is trying to interfere with the Israel-Hezbollah conflict without even being elected into office. How presumptious of him.

And to all you bloggers who continue to insult, deride, demean, and bastardize us for wanting to encourage people to vote for Hillary, all you do is express your contrite outrage and derision without discussing the issues at hand. You act no different than the pundits who offer their political expertise and continually assail and criticize Hillary and put Obama on some pedestal that he does not deserve. He is liberal to the core. He is the leading senator to vote 95.5% liberal. And I would love to hear all the wonder legislation that he has helped pass. From what I understand, is that he only was able to get Ethics Reform done.

Obama has been chomping at the bit to be President since he arrived in Washington. All his popularity right now stems from the media, African American outrage and racial sentiment, Anti-Clinton supporters who learn Republican, people making over 100.000 a year so they can avoid paying new taxes.

Hillary will win Ohio. I took the time today to call on my own 100 people in the sample I reached 56 and only 2 people said they would definitely vote for Obama. Hillary is smart. She is going from town to town all over Ohio just like President Bush did to defeat John Kerry. She will take all these little towns because she took the time to meet with the voters and address their concerns. Ohio is very similar to New Hampshire. They both have the forgotten middle class.

So all you smart-asses, who love to blog on and insult, get on your sanctimonous soap box, use all your buzz words, and your so-called intellect better start reading, listening, call and speaking to the voters, instead of spewing your ill-advised egomanical inflated, self congratulatory opinions.

This process is far from over. If you really believe that Obama will be nominee then you should not fall victim to the overconfidence you all seem to possess. Take the time to be on the trenches, go canvassing, speak to your neighbors have real cogent discussions with Hillary supporters, call the residents of Ohio and see what they are thinking instead of contiinuously massaging your own egos.

I have yet to meet a Hillary support that is being paid to do it. We do it because we CARE and we want to see her carry OHIO and give OBAMA the run for his political life. She is tough and determined. And so are we. So continue to attack us, ridicules us, extrapolation our comments and put some kind of spin like a lobbyist or insider as Hillary has been accused. She IS READY ON DAY ONE. AND SHE IS GONNA KICK SOME ASS.

Joeybulboy03

Stay tuned!

rivervices.blogspot.com The

RFORR — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:40:59 -0700

rivervices.blogspot.com The politics of Portsmouth and Scioto County, in "Strickland Country"

Dude

Susan — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:37:57 -0700

Candidates are not campaign executives. Their campaigns are managed by campaign professionals. Candidates are the product that is being sold. It's like if I need to sell a house, I hire a real estate company. If a candidate needs to sell himself, he hires campaign consultants to run things. His expertise is presumably in another field entirely. At least, I hope to hell it is, or we're in a whole lot of trouble.

Scioto County

RFORR — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:35:16 -0700

OOPS! That should be Scioto County, though pronounced Sciota.

I see what the problem is

Susan — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:31:44 -0700

You're fixated on logos, materials and website design, use of the internet, and stuff--marketing tools--and I'm talking about the product that is being marketed. The message, the image, etc. I'm not talking about surface analysis at all. My professional training is in the field of psychology. So we're coming at this from quite different places.

This post seems very uninformed.

erik22233 — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:26:23 -0700

Sheer volume of prose does not indicate sheer volume of good ideas.

You don't focus on a single one of Clinton's negatives.

1. She refuses to release her tax returns. She says she will release them when she is the nominee, nor will she release the details of her experience as first lady. "Tested and vetted" falls apart under this fact.

2. To assume that HRC can get a universal health care plan implemented is insanity due to the looming shadow of prima facie history. She couldn't get this same plan passed in the 90s' and it was a huge embarrassment. Why would this instance be different?

3. Her campaign has been woefully mismanaged. Obama was launched into prominence by giving an amazing speech. He has gone on to be the executive of an extremely successful campaign. Hillary has mismanaged every aspect of her campaign (just like she did in her second senate race). If she is the best executive, why has the campaign been such a mess?

Re: I'm sorry, but...

tessellated — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 18:15:05 -0700

Go back and review your own links. Some of what is discussed there is Obama's use of the internet and social networking (sloganeering aside). Only much later in the game has Hillary caught onto this. Compare and contrast her web site with his -- I make web site's for a living, so I am sensitive to this sort of thing. Notice how similar they are in look and feel? That didn't happen by accident. She's been poaching off his campaign for a long time now.

The latest CW (hence my earlier reference to late trends in reporting on the campaign) has been to marvel at Obama's brand control. Particular emphasis has been given to things like font selection, typeface enforcement across all campaign material, the useability of his site, his site's visually appealing design, and his smart use of social networking tools.

My point in bringing up Paul and Dean had nothing (obviously) to do with comparisons on substance. You seem rather obsessed with surface analysis of campaigns and at this level the comparisons are quite natural: internet-fueled, brand-sensitive, insurgent campaigns that rely heavily on social-networking tools to drive activist participation and funding. So the natural question becomes why is Obama succeeding where they failed? Marketing doesn't explain it. God knows their competitors (Kerry and McCain) did not beat them through some sort of Apple-like brand management kung fu. This is all the more obvious when you account for the comparatively higher hill Obama has had to climb (Clinton has vastly more advantages than either Kerry or McCain).

I'm sorry, but...

Susan — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:51:52 -0700

I don't understand what you're saying or how it relates to what I'm talking about. We seem to have a failure to communicate here. What the heck did you just say, and how did those other guys get into this discussion?

Re: Keep thinking that, then

tessellated — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:38:50 -0700

It doesn't "remain to be seen". The very obvious counterexamples to your construction are the the Dean and Paul campaigns. Both relied heavily on the "new" media of the internet and social networking. Both imploded. Why do you think that is? Because McCain or Kerry is a marketing genius? Thanks for the laugh! :)

Keep thinking that, then

Susan — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:27:53 -0700

Don't look behind the curtain.

"Marketing and branding is just a vehicle, if what it delivers has little to no value to the end user, then it will fall flat."--yes, and that is what remains to be seen.

Re: Well...

tessellated — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:11:25 -0700

You aren't breaking any news to me.

I just think this line of critical analysis only goes so far. I also think it's something almost any voter is aware of even if only intuitively. It's probably not the case that most people have sat around naval-gazing on the cultural implications of immersive branding, but we've all grown up swimming in that ocean nonetheless.

I think it explains how his message is spread, in part. I think it explains how he has been able to overcome some of her name recognition. That's about it. It does nothing to explain why he has a movement of activists who has over matched Hillary's campaign machine on the ground in state after state. It does nothing to explain how it is he has smashed fund raising records left and right. Marketing and branding is just a vehicle, if what it delivers has little to no value to the end user, then it will fall flat.

Well...

Susan — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 16:52:11 -0700

I wanted to give you a link to an article written BEFORE Obama decided to run about the DC consultants that were already busy at work developing his "packaging," but google is all cluttered up with the more recent articles of course, and I can't recall what publication it was in, so I'll have to dig.

This is nothing new. There have been MANY books written about the "selling" of candidates. I'm sorry to have to be the one to break the news to you. And of course all the other candidates are being marketed as well. It's just the way it's done.

'93 NAFTA Congressional Opponent: "She Never Offered Criticism"

Jerid — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:33:52 -0700

I just got off the phone with Mayor Tom Barrett of Milwaukee, a former Congressman that voted against the '93 NAFTA bill which Bill Clinton shepherded through Congress. Barrett was on the phone to announce that he has signed a letter, along with seven other Congressmen that voted against NAFTA in '93, critiquing Clinton for never taking a public stand on NAFTA prior to her bid for president [I'll post the letter as soon as I get it].This would seem to fly in the face her recent claims that she was against NAFTA from the start.

On the call Mayor Barret had stiff words:

My recollection was calls from micky cantor, the president himself, urging to support nafta. “It was absolutely a united front”

I'm not sure what Senator Clinton means when she said she was a critic from the beginning – because she never offered any criticism.

Barrett went on to describe the calls he received from President Clinton, Trade Representative Mickey Kantor, and others all urging him to support the NAFTA bill. Truly, it sounded like a difficult time to be opposing the President's will. As he put it, "It certainly would have been helpful at the time to have an ally in the Whitehouse." I'm sure it would have. It's interesting to note that those who were in the fight, standing up for regions with heavy manufacturing sectors - like Ohio or Wisconsin - don't recall Senator Clinton as an ally in their fight. They can't even find an inkling of her support for their opposition.

Here's the letter:

As members of Congress who voted against NAFTA in 1994, we were surprised to hear the Clinton campaign’s assertion that Senator Hillary Clinton was opposed to NAFTA from the start. It would have been helpful to know we had an ally in the White House back then, but at no time throughout our long fight did Hillary Clinton ever indicate publicly or privately that she was on our side.

As best we could tell, Hillary Clinton shared the Clinton administration’s view that NAFTA would create better jobs and spur faster growth, and that while it might erode workers’ rights and protections, the benefits of the deal would far outweigh its costs.

Those were the promises we heard from the Clinton administration, but as we’ve seen, those promises were not kept. Over a million jobs have been lost, wages have fallen, inequality has widened, and those who’ve been hardest hit are working folks in states like Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Since these states are holding elections in the next few weeks and months, we understand why it’s smart politics for the Clinton campaign to say that Hillary Clinton opposed NAFTA all along – but if she did, it’s news to us.

We’re supporting Senator Barack Obama because as he says, “politics didn’t lead him to working folks; working folks led him to politics.” The reason he became a community organizer more than two decades ago was to help provide job training for the jobless when the local steel plants closed. And as President, he’ll fight for American workers by amending NAFTA and supporting trade deals that work for Main Street, not just Wall Street.

It’s time we had a President who knows that standing up for working Americans isn’t a matter of politics; it’s a matter of principle. And that’s the kind of president we believe Barack Obama will be.

Signed,

John Conyers (MI-14)

George Miller (CA-07)

Bennie Thompson (MS-02)

Luis Gutierrez (IL-04)

Sanford Bishop (GA-02)

Rick Boucher (VA-09)

Bobby Scott (VA-03)