Supreme Court Needs to Send Message: No One Is Above the Law

Time and time again Donald Trump has claimed to be above the law by virtue of the office he unfortunately holds.  Indeed, Trump seems to believe he is equivalent to an absolute monarch of centuries past who can ignore court rulings and provisions of the U.S. Constitution that make Congress a co-equal branch of the federal government with supervision powers over the executive branch - basic concepts once taught in high school government classes. Trump's claims have now reached the U.S. Supreme Court after the lower federal courts have allowed the State of New York to investigate the Trump Organization and its tax returns for possible tax fraud and other state law crimes.  Trump has consistently ignored the behavior of those who are innocent and instead has consistently acted as if he has something to hide - which he likely does given the reality that his business practices are more akin to that of a crime syndicate than an above board business enterprise.  In a column in the Washington Post George Conway - ever Trump's nemesis - lays out why the Supreme Court should reject Trump's claims of unlimited immunity and underscore that no one, not even the occupant of the White House - is above the law.  Here are column excerpts:

Twenty-six years ago, I published my first op-ed. Entitled “‘No Man in This Country … Is Above the Law,’” it addressed news reports that President Bill Clinton planned to claim an immunity from having to respond to Paula Jones’s sexual harassment suit. “In a case involving his private conduct,” I wrote, “a President should be treated like any private citizen. The rule of law requires no more — and no less.”

The piece led to my ghostwriting briefs for Jones, including a Supreme Court brief two years later. The Supreme Court agreed unanimously that Jones could proceed, and, like the op-ed, quoted from the Founders’ debates about the status of the president: “Far from being above the laws, he is amenable to them in his private character as a citizen, and in his public character by impeachment.” Which meant that while a president could be impeached for official misconduct, he “is otherwise subject to the laws” — and therefore could be sued — “for his purely private acts.”

I couldn’t have imagined then that another president would challenge that proposition. Then again, I couldn’t have imagined President Donald Trump.

But here we are. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court will hear telephonic arguments in three cases addressing whether Trump can keep his tax and financial information from being disclosed, whether from Congress or criminal prosecutors. In Trump v. Vance, which involves a New York state grand jury investigation, Trump’s lawyers argue that, even when it comes to purely private conduct, the presidency insulates him from the legal process.

The case arises from a criminal investigation into the Trump Organization, and it seems there’s plenty worth examining: whether, as suggested by extensive reporting in this newspaper and other outlets, Trump’s businesses may have dodged taxes. And whether Trump’s hush-money payments, made through his lawyer Michael Cohen to porn star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal, violated state law.

The state grand jury subpoenaed the Trump Organization and Trump’s accounting firm, Mazars, seeking tax returns and financial records. Trump sued to block the subpoena to Mazars — on the ground that he’s president. The lower federal courts rejected his pleas, and now he’s in the Supreme Court. Where he will lose — or should.

To say Trump’s argument is frivolous demeans frivolity. Clinton v. Jones dictates the result: The subpoenaed documents have nothing to do with Trump’s presidential duties — zip. That alone does it.

But Trump’s case is even weaker than Clinton’s. At least Clinton was being sued personally. He ultimately had to give evidence himself, which he did (infamously) at a deposition. But because the suit had nothing to do with presidential duties, the Supreme Court said it could proceed.

Here, Trump hasn’t been charged with or sued for anything. He’s not being required to do anything. The subpoenas have been directed at his company and his accountants. They don’t require his time or attention.

Trump’s position stupefies. In essence: Authorities can’t investigate anything touching his personal affairs — including, ahem, payments to pornographic actresses — because he’s president. Think of the logic: Not only does the president enjoy a personal constitutional immunity — his businesses do, too.

[P]residents have given evidence in criminal matters many times — including ones touching them personally. Chief Justice John Marshall ordered President Thomas Jefferson to produce documents in Aaron Burr’s treason case. A unanimous Supreme Court ordered President Richard Nixon to turn over the Watergate tapes, and rejected a claim of presidential privilege — in a case in which Nixon was named an unindicted co-conspirator. Clinton provided grand jury and criminal trial testimony in the Whitewater and Lewinsky investigations — matters in which he was potentially a target.

A short answer is one the court gave in Jones, where Clinton raised the specter of countless private plaintiffs bringing meritless suits: Courts can address vexatious litigation case by case, and if that doesn’t suffice, Congress can legislate a fix.

A more fundamental answer, though, may be found in an amicus curiae brief in the Vance case, a brief submitted by the Protect Democracy Project and joined by me and 36 other conservatives: “The Constitution is concerned with the supremacy of federal law, not the supremacy of federal officials.”

Likewise, the Constitution is concerned with protecting the presidency, not the person who happens to be the president. That’s because no one in this country is above the law. The Supreme Court is now called upon to teach that lesson once again — even if Trump will likely never learn it.

Erick Erickson: Republicans Owe Bill Clinton an Apology

There are few websites more right wing and anti-Obama than Red State -  generally never agree with its position on anything.  Yet it is amazing to see that wild reaction at Red State to Donald Trump's position as the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party. Select headlines for today include the following:

RUBIO COMPARES TRUMPTO 3RD WORLD STRONGMAN - Rubio’s comments may seem like the words of an angry former foe, but the accuracy of them should worry you.

LYIN’ DON: TRUMP JUST TOTALLY MADE UP THE STORY THAT HE TALKED TO MARCO RUBIO RECENTLY - Late Friday night, Marco Rubio advisers not only denied that he was supportive, but flat out stated that no such conversation took place at all.

And no one is more vocal about his horror of a potential Trump presidency than the site's editor, Erick Erickson, who despite his extremism on many issues, seems to recognize that the Trump candidacy reveals the utter hypocrisy of those in the GOP supporting him.  In a piece on another blog, Erickson lets loose and make the statement that, if the GOP will support Trump, then the party owes Bill Clinton a major apology for what it did during the Monica Lewinsky witch hunt and impeachment spectacle.  This indictment applies in particular to "family values" crowd who are now embracing a thrice married, serial adulterer as the GOP standard bearer.  Here are column highlights:

The predicate act to Bill Clinton’s impeachment was his affair with an intern and his lying to cover it up. Republicans said the President of the United States is not above the law and lying under oath to obstruct justice is an impeachable offense.

Seventeen years after Republicans impeached Bill Clinton for covering up an affair, they are handing their party over to a man who has openly bragged about his affairs. On the day the Republicans first meet in Cleveland, Donald Trump will be taken to court for allegedly defrauding hard working Americans through Trump University.

What voters have already learned about Donald Trump during the primaries should give them pause. Many of his business dealings have left others worse off while he has played the bankruptcy courts to keep going. While investors in various Trump enterprises lost money, Trump made fortunes.

On the campaign trail, Trump was more a pathological liar than Bill Clinton ever was. He smeared his opponents, their wives, and their families. He embraced 9/11 trutherisms that George Bush was to blame for the attacks, he peddled malignant, false stories about Ted Cruz’s father, and few Republicans ever called on him to account. Many gave him passes on the lies they would never give to Bill Clinton.

Republicans owe Bill Clinton an apology for impeaching him over lies and affairs while now embracing a pathological liar and womanizer. That apology will not be forthcoming. In fact, for years Republicans have accused the Democrats of gutter politics and shamelessness. Now the Republicans themselves have lost their sense of shame.

As Marco Rubio withdrew from the Republican primary in Florida, Trump supporters showed up to heckle him as he was giving his withdrawal speech. In South Carolina, a Trump supporter refused to help a disabled woman who had been in a car wreck because the woman had a Bernie Sanders sticker on her car. The man actually said he thought the Lord came to him. But these people have learned this behavior from their party’s new political leader.

If so much were not on the line, it would be somewhat humorous to watch. But the Supreme Court hangs in the balance; the relationship between the states and federal government hangs in the balance; and our relationship with our allies hangs in the balance. All of these things are at stake and the party that fancies itself as the grown up party has handed itself over to a huckster with a cult of ill behaved children.

Angry voters made a terrible miscalculation in the Republican primary. They presumed that the rest of the nation shared their anger. They were wrong and now, with so much on the line, the Republicans will field as their Presidential nominee the least popular Presidential candidate in American history. God save the republic.

Those deserving the harshest condemnation, of course, are the supposed "godly Christians" who, like the modern day Pharisee cited by Erickson, who have taken hypocrisy to new heights and revealed the utter moral bankruptcy of the Christofascist base of the Republican Party.  Their support of Trump makes it clear that they are nothing more than animus filled racists and zealots.  I sincerely hope that Trump's candidacy once and for all makes it clear that fundamentalist Christians deserve no deference or respect! 

The Men Who Led The Impeachment Of Bill Clinton

In follow up to the last post and the "quote of the day," a piece in Think Progress looks at what is now known about the Republican Party leadership in the House of Representatives that led the effort to impeach Bill Clinton.  All, of course, once claimed to support "family values" and to support the "sanctity of marriage."  All turned out to be complete hypocrites.  Frankly, its to the point that when I hear a Republican blathering about "family values," I figure it's only a matter of time before they are caught having an adulterous affair or cruising for gay sex on the sly.  Of course, self-loathing closet cases Rick Santorum and Ken Cuccinelli are in a league of their own when it comes to being utterly obsessed with gay sex.  Here are article highlights:

On December 19, 1998, the House of Representatives impeached Bill Clinton on two charges related to his extramarital affair with Monica Lewinsky. (The charges were for perjury and obstruction of justice.) The historic vote, and subsequent trial in the Senate, involved the work of three men who were elected Speaker of the House Of Representatives by the Republican majority, Newt Gingrich, Bob Livingston and Dennis Hastert. 

Almost 17 years later, with the federal indictment of Hastert for illegally concealing up to $3.5 million in hush-money, we finally have a more complete understanding of the men who led this effort.

Newt Gingrich

Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) led the push for Bill Clinton’s impeachment. Following a disappointing election in November 1998, he announced he was stepping down as Speaker and resigning from Congress.

Gingrich later admitted that, while he was pushing for Clinton’s impeachment, he was engaged in an affair with a Congressional aide. “There were times when I was praying and when I felt I was doing things that were wrong. But I was still doing them,” Gingrich said in 2007. He later said the situation was “complex and, obviously, I wasn’t doing things to be proud of.”

Bob Livingston

After Gingrich announced his resignation, Republicans unanimously selected Rep. Bob Livingston (R-LA) to succeed him. 

On the day of the impeachment vote, Livingston announced he was resigning following revelations that he had engaged in an extramarital affair. According to Hustler Magazine Publisher Larry Flint, who offered a reward for information about the sex lives of members of Congress, he “found four women who said they had been involved with Mr. Livingston over the last 10 years.”

Dennis Hastert

Following Livingston’s resignation, which occurred on the same day the House voted on impeachment, Rep. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) quickly gained support of the Republican leadership to succeed him as Speaker-designate. He began formally serving as speaker in January 1999, and held that role while the Senate conducted their trial on the articles of impeachment.

On Thursday, Hastert was indicted on charges that he illegally structured $1.7 million in payments to an individual in an attempt to cover up prior misconduct. According to reports, the payments were allegedly intended to “conceal sexual abuse against a former male student he knew during his days as a teacher in Yorkville, Ill.” The LA Times also reported that “investigators also spoke with a second man who raised similar allegations that corroborated what the former student said.”

The bigger question, of course, is why anyone sane believes anything these  "family values" politicians have to say.

 

Quote of the Day: The GOP's Tawdry Sex Scandals

As noted frequently on this blog, today's Republican Party claims to be the party of "family values" yet when one looks at political sex scandals, its the GOP that leads the way at least three to one against Democrats.  A short quip in the Washington Post s sums it up well in the wake of Dennis Hastert's indictment:

If I understand the history correctly, in the late 1990s, the President was impeached for lying about a sexual affair by a House of Representatives led by a man who was also then hiding a sexual affair, who was supposed to be replaced by another Congressman who stepped down when forced to reveal that he too was having a sexual affair, which led to the election of a new Speaker of the House who now has been indicted for lying about payments covering up his sexual contact with a boy. 

You can't make stuff up this good!

2016 Presidential Candidate Family Members Likely To Make Trouble

Most of us do not get to pick our family members other than perhaps who we choose to be our spouse.  Even then, in the world of politics, typically family members are supposedly "off limits" - at least until they do something or say something that is over the top.  In the line up of of would be Republican presidential candidates, Talking Points Memo looks at three who have family members who may rock the boat and cause headaches.  Here are highlights:

It is a cardinal rule of politics that families ought to be off-limits for attacks in campaigns, no matter how heated things get. But sometimes family members have a way of making trouble own their own for candidates.

When it comes to family members of presidential candidates, the 2016 election is shaping up to feature an unusually colorful cast of characters who could make plenty of trouble for their son, spouse or brother.  Here they are.

Rafael Cruz  The father-son resemblance is strong between Rafael Cruz and Rafael Jr. — better known as Ted — when it comes to being a conservative flamethrower. An evangelical pastor from Texas, the elder Cruz has logged a variety of incendiary remarks about President Barack Obama that surpass his son's rhetoric. Highlights include saying the president should go "back to Kenya," accusing him of wanting to "destroy all concept of God," describing his views as "classical Marxist philosophy" and comparing him to Fidel Castro. . . . . One of his [Ted Cruz's] chief obstacles to the nomination is his lack of support among party elites and big donors, precisely because of the rabble-rousing ways for which Rafael Sr. serves as an unhelpful reminder.

Ron Paul The former Texas congressman and father of Rand Paul had a proclivity for toying with conspiracy theories during his 35 years in office, and that tendency has kicked into high gear since his retirement in 2013. Just in 2015, his organization, the Ron Paul Institute, has suggested that the massacre of Charlie Hebdo by Islamic militants was a "false flag" and even called into question the "official story" of the 9/11 attacks.  His son, a Kentucky senator and presidential hopeful, more in tune with political reality and working to shed the outside-the-mainstream image he inherited. If his father keeps at it, that won't be an easy task.

George W. Bush  The most recent former president left office as one of the most unpopular in history, and — almost as troubling for his aspiring younger brother Jeb — was subsequently cast by the conservative base as an emblem of spendthrift Republicanism gone wrong. The Bush name is a liability with most constituencies other than evangelicals and wealthy GOP donors. Although George W. Bush has actively avoided the limelight since he left office, he recently resurfaced in the public eye to attend a fundraiser for his brother. And it's a safe bet that Democrats will seek to paint Jeb as the second coming of his brother.

The piece also makes note of the challenges Hillary Clinton may face as she tries to keep husband Bill reined in. 

Can Obama Get His Mojo Back In the State of the Union?

With the Republicans controlling Congress many believe little constructive will be accomplished over the next two years.  Any progressive measures will die either in the House of Representatives or the Senate.  On the positive side, Obama's veto pen may be able to block the worse elements of the GOP's agenda.  Some have said that Obama needs to study Bill Clinton to formulate how to get back on his agenda and to make at least some progress despite Republican obstruction.  Here are highlights from a piece in The Daily Beast:

This weekend, President Barack Obama is perfecting his State of the Union address, to be delivered on Tuesday. Just as basketball players watch clips of old stars like Dr. J. or Julius Erving—Obama’s boyhood hero—the president might want to download President Bill Clinton’s addresses. I would particularly recommend Clinton’s 1998 and 1999 speeches. Perhaps by watching this political virtuoso, Obama can get his speechmaking mojo back.

As a rare president who enjoyed both politicking and policy-making, Clinton loved delivering the State of the Union Address. Watching him speak to a packed Congress was like watching Barbra Streisand sing, Michael Jackson moonwalk, Tiger Woods golf, or Steve Jobs pitch a product. For Clinton it was New Year’s Day, Thanksgiving Day, Commencement Day, and the Fourth of July all wrapped in one. Each January, he framed a new agenda. He catalogued—and boasted about—the old year’s accomplishments. He charted a detailed path infused with a broader purpose. And he celebrated America in the reddest, whitest, and bluest terms.

Clinton’s rock-solid resilience, his insistence on sticking to the public’s business, amazed staffers. His late mother Virginia Clinton Kelley had taught him well: never quit and never show weakness to your enemies.

Clinton conquered Capitol Hill that night. He was a little subdued, but the 71-minute speech was characteristically lengthy, meaty, and just occasionally preachy. He reported that “the Federal deficit, once so incomprehensibly large that it had 11 zeros, will be simply zero.” He balanced between Great Society liberalism and Reaganism, saying, “We have the smallest government in 35 years, but a more progressive one.” He vowed to submit “the first balanced budget in 30 years.” And he had a big bipartisan mission: “save Social Security.”

[M]ost viewers approved of the speech, along with the president’s commitment to doing his job.
A year later, Clinton triumphed again, dismissing the distractions of a Senate trial after the House of Representatives impeached him in December. This exhaustive, sometimes exhausting, 78-minute speech showcased the president at the helm, engaging, commanding, enjoying.

Clinton spoke over the Republicans’ heads directly to the American people, emphasizing the bipartisanship most Americans want but both parties frequently fail to provide. . . . shortly after the 1999 speech, as in 1998, 69 percent of Americans polled approved the president’s job performance.

Since his first inaugural address, Obama has failed to wow Americans with his speeches, as he did so effectively during his 2008 campaign. The weight of actually being president seems to have blocked him from trying to raise Americans expectations through inspiration. Moreover, his cautious, distant, Mr. Spock hyper-intellectual mode and flashes of a surlier Mr. Hyde mode have dispirited even many Democrats. Many yearn for the hipper, happier “Yes-we-candidate” who dazzled in 2008, let alone the people-loving charmer from the 1990s.

Obama can copy some Clinton tactics. . . . Obama can flummox Republicans and appeal to the public by seizing the center rather than lurching left, acting as president of all the people, not a partisan leader of the opposition-to-the-opposition. He can mix sweeping big-picture reforms with more easily achieved, small-bore adjustments that improve Americans’ quality of life. 

I think the article's author is on to something.  Will Obama follow through?

Has Hillary Clinton Signaled a 2016 Campaign Theme?

Certainly as most Virginians are aware, Bill and Hillary Clinton have become involved in the 2013 Virginia elections as they have barnstormed for gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe and, to a lesser extent, the rest of the Democrat statewide ticket.  Pundits and prognosticators have tried to read other motivations into the Clintons' support for McAuliffe and the Democrats which have ranged from seeking to make Virginia a friendly state in 2016 to signalling possible campaign themes for Hillary's 2016 run.  Here are excerpts from a piece in the Washington Post that looks at the later aspect of the phenomenon:

NORFOLK — In recent stump speeches and policy remarks, Bill and Hillary Clinton have offered sharp criticisms of the partisan gridlock paralyzing Washington, signaling a potential 2016 campaign theme if Hillary Clinton chooses to run for president.

The Clintons’ critiques in recent days have been explicitly aimed at congressional Republicans, who helped spur a 16-day government shutdown and potential debt default in October. But their remarks also seem to contain an implicit rebuke of President Obama’s failure to change Washington as he pledged when first running for the White House.

The arguments suggest a way that Hillary Clinton could attempt to run in 2016 as an agent of change — potentially putting her at odds with the two-term Democrat she would be seeking to replace.
At campaign rallies and other recent appearances, both Clintons have called for soothing partisan tensions and have espoused a vision of governing by compromise. Barnstorming Virginia this week with longtime friend and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe, Bill Clinton repeatedly assailed ideological politics on both sides of the aisle.


“When people sneeringly say, ‘McAuliffe is a dealmaker,’ I say, ‘Oh, if we only had one in Washington during that shutdown,’ ” the former president said at a rally here in Norfolk on Monday. “It’s exhausting seeing politicians waste time with all these arguments. It is exhausting. People deserve somebody who will get this show on the road.”

Such themes of change and comity are particularly ironic for the Clintons considering that one or the other has held public office in Washington for the past two decades. Bill Clinton’s tenure in office was also marked by fierce partisan battles that roiled the nation, including an impeachment fight and two government shutdowns.

In the 2008 Democratic primaries, Hillary Clinton dismissed Obama’s message of post-partisanship as woefully naive. But since stepping down as Obama’s secretary of state earlier this year, she has adopted a similar theme, repeatedly berating lawmakers for choosing “scorched earth over common ground.”

The Clintons have been careful to distinguish between promoting bipartisanship and ceding ground on core values. Hillary Clinton, for example, has been busy advocating for traditionally liberal issues such as minority voting rights, gay marriage equality and women’s rights.

This appears to be an effort by Clinton, following a four-year hiatus from domestic politics, to cement ties to the Democratic Party’s progressive wing. If she runs, Clinton would want to avoid a repeat of the 2008 campaign, when Obama built support among liberal activists by running to her left on the Iraq war.

The Clintons’ message is one that Democrats across the country could carry into the 2014 midterm elections, where the battle for control of the Senate could come down to a handful of hotly contested races in states that lean Republican.

“This economic thing, it’s terrible,” Clinton said in Hampton. “Median family income — after you adjust for inflation, is lower than it was the day I left office. That was a long time ago. And we need somebody who wants to do something about it.”  Many voters attending the rallies said they longed for a return to the Clinton era.

This is the sentiment that both Clintons have been channeling. At his Virginia stops, Bill Clinton repeatedly said the Founding Fathers wanted elected officials to be practical above all else, designing a system of governing that would force them to negotiate with each other.  “Read the Constitution of the United States of America,” Clinton said Sunday in Richmond. “It might as well have been subtitled, ‘Let’s Make a Deal.’ ”

Bill Clinton Warns Virginia Democrats Not to Get Complacent

While I am encouraged by the polls that show GOP extremist Ken Cuccinelli losing to Terry McAuliffe, my feat is that some who oppose Cuccinelli's extreme agenda will become complacent and fail to vote out of a false sense of security.  I also fear that even if McAuliffe wins, the margin of victory could be eroded.  To fully repudiate Cuccinelli's vision, and just as importantly, his backers at The Family Foundation, Cuccinelli needs to lose big.  He also needs to drag down "Bishop" Jackson and Mark Obenshain with him.  The is the message that former president Bill Clinton has been sending on the campaign trail with the McAuliffe and the rest of the Democratic ticket.  Democrats must turn out in high numbers to send the needed message to the Virginia GOP.  Politico looks at Clinton's remarks.  Here are story highlights:

Bill Clinton warned Sunday that Democrats cannot take Terry McAuliffe’s lead in the polls for granted.   Kicking off a three-day tour of Virginia at a VFW Hall in this outer D.C. suburb, the former president explained that Republicans turn out at higher rates in off-year elections.

“Will you care as much as they do and show up and vote?” said Clinton. “A big reason for the incredible political division in this country is that in the non-presidential years, a whole different America shows up than in the presidential years.”

In an 18-minute speech, Clinton presented McAuliffe as someone who will not govern ideologically like Republican Ken Cuccinelli, whom he never cited by name.

“Those of us who want the country to come together and move forward … have got to care as much about this election as you did the election in 2012,” he said. “They’ll be there on Election Day. I’ve dealt with it all my life … But there are more of us who believe that working together is better than constant conflict.”

Clinton will travel to every media market between Sunday and Tuesday, one week ahead of the Nov. 5 gubernatorial election. Next up is Richmond. The rallies are designed to fire up Democratic base voters, and campaign advisers hope Clinton will have some crossover appeal with independents as well.

The Kool-Aid drinkers who support the scary GOP ticket will turn out.  It is absolutely critical that those opposed to their plan to take Virginia backward in time turn out and send the entire GOP statewide slate to defeat.  I also believe it is important to defeat Cuccinelli so badly that his political career is effectively ended. 

Bill Clinton: It’s Time to Overturn DOMA

One of the blights on President Bill Clinton's legacy is that he signed the Defense of Marriage Act ("DOMA") into law back in 1996.  To be candid, he displayed cowardice and put equality under the U.S. Constitution beneath what he perceived to be political expediency at the time.  Fortunately, and unlike bigots in the Republican Party who continue to prostitute themselves to the Christofascists, Clinton has recognized his error and has authored an op-ed in the Washington Post calling for DOMA to be Overturned.  Here are column excerpts:

In 1996, I signed the Defense of Marriage Act. Although that was only 17 years ago, it was a very different time. In no state in the union was same-sex marriage recognized, much less available as a legal right, but some were moving in that direction. Washington, as a result, was swirling with all manner of possible responses, some quite draconian. As a bipartisan group of former senators stated in their March 1 amicus brief to the Supreme Court, many supporters of the bill known as DOMA believed that its passage “would defuse a movement to enact a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, which would have ended the debate for a generation or more.” It was under these circumstances that DOMA came to my desk, opposed by only 81 of the 535 members of Congress.

On March 27, DOMA will come before the Supreme Court, and the justices must decide whether it is consistent with the principles of a nation that honors freedom, equality and justice above all, and is therefore constitutional. As the president who signed the act into law, I have come to believe that DOMA is contrary to those principles and, in fact, incompatible with our Constitution.

Because Section 3 of the act defines marriage as being between a man and a woman, same-sex couples who are legally married in nine states and the District of Columbia are denied the benefits of more than a thousand federal statutes and programs available to other married couples. Among other things, these couples cannot file their taxes jointly, take unpaid leave to care for a sick or injured spouse or receive equal family health and pension benefits as federal civilian employees. Yet they pay taxes, contribute to their communities and, like all couples, aspire to live in committed, loving relationships, recognized and respected by our laws.

When I signed the bill, I included a statement with the admonition that “enactment of this legislation should not, despite the fierce and at times divisive rhetoric surrounding it, be understood to provide an excuse for discrimination.” Reading those words today, I know now that, even worse than providing an excuse for discrimination, the law is itself discriminatory. It should be overturned.

Americans have been at this sort of a crossroads often enough to recognize the right path. We understand that, while our laws may at times lag behind our best natures, in the end they catch up to our core values. One hundred fifty years ago, in the midst of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln concluded a message to Congress by posing the very question we face today: “It is not ‘Can any of us imagine better?’ but ‘Can we all do better?’ ”

The answer is of course and always yes. In that spirit, I join with the Obama administration, the petitioner Edith Windsor, and the many other dedicated men and women who have engaged in this struggle for decades in urging the Supreme Court to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act.

Quote of the Day: Bill Clinton on Romney's Lie Filled Debate Performance

I have not endeavored to hide my view that Mitt Romney lied through his teeth during last week's presidential debate. The man will say and do anything to win - probably even sell Ann Romney into prostitution if it would guarantee that he secured 50.1% of the vote on election day. Apparently, former president Bill Clinton likewise views Mr. Romney as a lying piece of shit and took some shots at the ever flip flopping, chameleon like Romney. Here are some highlights of Clinton's comments via Towleroad: 

Said Clinton:

I had a different reaction to that first debate than a lot of people did. I mean, I thought, “Wow! Here’s old Moderate Mitt. Where you been, boy, I missed you all these last two years!” But I was paying attention these past two years. And it was like one of these Bain Capital deals where, you know, he’s the closer. So he shows up, doesn’t really know much about the deal and says, “tell me what I’m supposed to say to close.”

Now the problem with this deal is, the deal was made by Severe Conservative Mitt. That was how he described himself for two whole years. Until three or four days before the debate they all got together and said, “hey Mitt, this ship is sinkin’ faster than the Titanic…but people are still frustrated about the economy, they want it fixed yesterday, so just show up with a sunny face and say I didn’t say all that stuff I said for the last two years. I don’t have that tax plan I’ve had for the last two years, you gonna believe me or your lyin’ eyes here? Come on. What are you doin’?” And if I’d been the President, I might have said, “well, I hate to get in the way of this, I missed you.” 

Here's the video clip. Clinton's delivery makes the comments quoted above even more cutting:

Bill Clinton's Speech Taking Down Romney

Bill Clinton just did a masterful job of calling Mitt Romney (and Paul Ryan) a liar.  No mincing of words, simply calling him out for telling deliberate lies.  It gets directly to the issues of the hypocrisy and betrayal of the Gospel message by the Republicans that drives me crazy.  Andrew Sullivan has some good bullet points in his live blogging.  Here is a sampling:

[B]y being a former president and exposing the shameless lies perpetrated by Romney, especially on welfare reform, he was able to say things no one else could. I don't buy the argument that Obama is more liberal than Clinton and never have. But for those who do, tonight was a brilliant reminder of the things that unite them. 

11.18 pm. Republicanism today is failed arithmetic. Clinton is really bringing this home - intellectually. It is not a series of platitudes; it is a series of arguments rebutting last week's entire convention arguments. It has far more policy substance than Romney's or Ryan's speeches. And it has the added benefit of being true.

11.15 pm. Clinton is now equating Obama's plan with Bowles-Simpson. And when you spell out the Romney plan as it exists, it does not add up. And it's perverse. Cutting revenues as a way to cut debt when revenues are at 50 year lows is not a policy. It's madness.

11.11 pm. Now the important passage on Romney's massive welfare lie. The requirement was for more work, not less. Bill Clinton is the perfect man to rebut this lie. I wonder if it will have some serious blowback for Romney. A former president has called him out on a clear lie.

11.10 pm. Now he's telling seniors that slashing Medicaid means slashing home-care for the elderly.

10.51 pm. Clinton's summary of Republican malfeasance these past four years is simply liberating. Liberating because it is true: their moral and intellectual and political degeneracy is our biggest challenge. And he is directly comparing his re-election to Obama's. And he's being as honest as he can: no one could have repaired the full damage of the 2008 crash in four years - but the green shoots are there.

10.49 pm. Genius: "We left him a total mess and he hasn't cleaned it up fast enough so we should get back into power".

 
I haven't always liked Bill Clinton, but he did a wonderful job of exposing the abject lives that are the norm in today's GOP and the Romney-Ryan campaign.

Bill Clinton Robo Calls North Carolina As the Haters Pull out the Stops

During the National Equality March, the boyfriend and I met this couple who coincidentally were from North Carolina.  The sign they exemplifies the type of legacy that North Carolina will be returning to if Amendment One passes on this coming Tuesday.  The hate and vitriol being unleashed in a final push by the Christianists is truly sickening.  Particularly heinous are the claims of North Carolina pastor Tim Rabon who claims that gay marriage will lead to "man and Beast marriage."  I suspect that in Rabon's eyes, the boyfriend and I are not even fully human.  It speaks to the ugliness that is Christianity under the Christofascists.  And it's not just the Protestants who are piling on the hatred.  The two Catholic bishops in North Carolina - you know, the guys who belong to the club that protect child rapists - are sending a letter to every registered Catholic in their dioceses urging a vote for hate and bigotry.  Would that they showed as much concern when it comes to stopping the rape and sexual abuse of children and youths.  It truly is enough to make one want to vomit.

 

On the positive side, former President Bill Clinton is robo calling North Carolina residents in a recorded message urging them to vote against Amendment One.  Details can be found here.  Here's the text of the message:

 

"Hello, this is President Bill Clinton.  I’m calling to urge you to vote against Amendment One on Tuesday May 8.  If it passes, it won’t change North Carolina’s law on marriage.  What it will change is North Carolina’s ability to keep good businesses, attract new jobs, and attract and keep talented entrepreneurs.  If it passes, your ability to keep those businesses, get those jobs, and get those talented entrepreneurs will be weakened.  And losing even one job to Amendment One is too big of a risk.  Its passage will also take away health insurance from children and could even take away domestic violence protections from women.  So the real effect of the law is not to keep the traditional definition of marriage, you’ve already done that.  The real effect of the law will be to hurt families and drive away jobs.  North Carolina can do better.  Again, this is Bill Clinton asking you to please vote against Amendment One.  Thanks."

I have not always been a Bill Clinton fan, but in this action, he is truly on the side of religious freedom, common decency and the concept of equality under the civil laws.  Thanks Bill!

President Obama's Campaign Whisperer

Love him or hate him, most people will concede that Bill Clinton was/is one slick and savvy politician.  Now, according to a story in Politico, Clinton is working with Barack Obama to fine tune the line of attack on Mitt Romney for the general election.  The plan?  To use Romney's own words against him, including in particular his claim that he's a "severe conservative," with a goal of driving  Hispanics, women and moderate independents away from Romney and making it difficult for Romney to "Etch A Sketch" a tilt toward the middle.  Throughout the GOP primary clown car circus, I could not help but believe that Romney was leaving lots of campaign material for Obama's future use.   I'm glad that Romney's disgusting pandering to extremists may yet severely bit him in the ass.  Here are highlights from Politico:

Barack Obama’s top advisers are making a mid-“core” correction in their attacks on Mitt Romney — with a little nudge from Bill Clinton, who is finding a niche as an Obama campaign whisperer and fundraiser.

Late last year, as Romney galloped to the right, Obama’s messaging team hit on what it assumed would be a durable bumper-sticker attack: Romney, senior advisers David Plouffe and David Axelrod intoned time and again, was a political shape-shifter who lacked any real moral or political “core.”

 But Clinton, echoing survey data presented by Obama’s own pollster Joel Benenson, quietly argued that the empty-core approach failed to capitalize on what they see as Romney’s greatest vulnerability: An embrace of a brand of tea party conservatism that turns off Hispanics, women and moderate independents.

A more effective strategy, Clinton has told anyone who would listen, would be to focus almost exclusively on Romney’s description of himself as a “severe conservative,” to deny him any chance to tack back to the center,

Clinton’s advice, buttressed by Benenson’s polling, has clearly gained traction internally since the end of Romney’s four-month primary ordeal. “The decision here is that if you are going to pin a tail on the donkey,” says a top Democratic strategist who supported the Clinton view, “let’s make it the conservative tail.”

“He’s [Romney's] actually proposing, more massive tax cuts for the wealthy, fewer rules for Wall Street, deep cuts in the thing we need to grow, education, research and development, energy,” said Axelrod on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” showing delight in a recent claim by a junior Republican National Committee aide that the Romney campaign’s policies were “just-updated” versions of Bush-era programs.

Whitewashing the Democrats' History on Gay Rights

While today's Republican Party has made it easy to picture that party as the party of anti-gay bigotry and intolerance in general, the Democrats have a less than pretty history of their attitude towards LGBT citizens if one looks back not all that far back in time. Indeed, some of the laws that continue to deny LGBT Americans full equality such as DOMA were put in place under a Democrat President and for cynical and calculating political purposes. Yes, the Democrats have improved and 21 U.S. Senators support making marriage equality part of the Democratic Party plank. But we need to ever mindful that politicians often do things for perceived political expediency as opposed to because it's the right thing to do. Many who now are viewed as champions of LGBT equality have a less than pretty past record and have shown that political expediency is their true god. Frank Rich has a long piece in New York Magazine that reminds us of the convenient amnesia that some Democrats like to exhibit. Here are some highlights:

When the news came last June that the New York State Senate had voted to legalize same-sex marriage, I was at a dinner party that felt like New Year’s Eve, only with genuine emotions. Everyone at the table—straight, gay, young, old—was elated. Later, as my wife and I headed home past an Empire State Building ablaze in the rainbow colors of Pride Week, we were still euphoric at having witnessed one of those rare nights when history is made. Same-sex-marriage adversaries constantly proclaim that gay unions threaten “traditional” marriage.

[T]he dawning of marital equality and the demise of “don’t ask, don’t tell” are twin peaks in the checkered cavalcade of American social justice. Since that night, the good news on gay civil rights has kept coming. This month alone, legislative and judicial actions have made same-sex marriage the law in Washington State and Maryland and nudged it closer to reality in California and, Chris Christie notwithstanding, New Jersey. A Valentine’s week New York Times–CBS News poll, echoing others over the past year, found that Americans now favor marriage over separate-and-unequal civil unions as the legal option for gay couples; less than a third of the public believes that gay families should be denied both.

Compared with the other civil-rights battles in America, especially the epic struggle over race that has stained and hobbled the nation since its birth, the fight over gay equality is remarkable for its relative ease, compact chronology, and the happiness of its pending resolution. There’s no happier ending to any plot than a wedding. But, as last June’s celebration has gradually given way to morning-after sobriety, it’s also clear that something is wrong with this cheery picture. Two things, actually.

The first is obvious: Full equality for gay Americans is nowhere near at hand. One of America’s two major political parties is still hell-bent on thwarting and even rolling back gay rights much as Goldwater Republicans and Dixie Democrats (on their way to joining the GOP) resisted civil-rights legislation and enforcement in the sixties. In most states, sexual orientation can still be used to deny not only marriage but also jobs and housing, as well as to curtail adoption rights. America’s dominant religions remain largely hostile to homosexuality, and America’s most cherished secular pastime, professional sports, is essentially a no-gay zone. The bullying of gay and transgendered children remains a national crisis.

The second thing that’s wrong with the picture is far less obvious because it has been willfully obscured. In the outpouring of provincial self-congratulation that greeted the legalization of same-sex marriage in New York, some of the discomforting history that preceded that joyous day has been rewritten, whitewashed, or tossed into a memory hole. We—and by we, I mean liberal New Yorkers like me, whether straight or gay, and their fellow travelers throughout America—would like to believe that the sole obstacles to gay civil rights have been the usual suspects: hidebound religious leaders both white and black, conservative politicians (mostly Republican), fundamentalist Christian and Muslim zealots, and unreconstructed bigots. What’s been lost in this morality play is the role that many liberal politicians and institutions have also played in slowing and at some junctures halting gay civil rights in recent decades.

It was, after all, the trustees of the Smithsonian Institution, not a Bible Belt cultural outpost, who bowed to pressure from the militant Catholic League just fifteen months ago to censor the work of a gay American artist who had already been silenced, long ago, by AIDS. It was a Democratic president, with wide support from Democrats on Capitol Hill, who in 1996 signed the Defense of Marriage Act, one of the most discriminatory laws ever to come out of Washington. It’s precisely because of DOMA that to this day same-sex marriages cannot be more than what you might call placebo marriages in the eight states (plus the District of Columbia) that have legalized them.

The history of liberal culpability in such government-mandated discrimination should not be locked in a closet now. To forget any history is to risk repeating it. To forget this particular history is to minimize or erase the struggles of gay men and lesbians whose lives and fundamental rights were trampled routinely for decades in America, with cruel and sometimes deadly results.

Remembering what happened is essential if politicians, particularly liberal politicians, are to be prodded or, if need be, shamed into bringing the unfinished tasks of equality to the finish line.

One relevant chapter of this often-obscured past unfolded during the not-so-distant year of 1977. . . . It was also in 1977 that Anita Bryant, a pop singer and onetime Miss America runner-up, mounted her “Save Our Children” campaign to repeal a Miami ordinance protecting homosexuals from discrimination in jobs and housing. Bryant called gay people “an abomination,” but such invective didn’t prevent her cause from winning the endorsement of the Dade County Democratic Party—or of Florida’s governor, Reubin Askew, a Democrat so progressive that George McGovern had offered him the vice-presidential slot on the 1972 ticket. The anti-gay rage whipped up around Miami by this crusade inspired the bumper sticker KILL A QUEER FOR CHRIST and the beating and hospitalization of a gay man.

What most New Yorkers did not know about gay people in 1977 could — and did—fill a five - column article in the Times (albeit relegated to page 41). It breathlessly reported that “increasingly, the homosexual community is very much one of lawyers, physicians, teachers, politicians, clergymen, and other upper-class professional men and women,” many of whom “tend to live like their heterosexual counterparts.”

In 1978, The Village Voice published a front-page polemic arguing that gay civil rights shouldn’t be a matter of public concern.

It’s this atmosphere that explains why another woman of Miss America fame—Bess Myerson, who, unlike Anita Bryant, had won the crown—was dragged into a New York mayoral contest between two liberals. Koch was a Greenwich Village bachelor, at the time a scarlet letter of assumed homosexuality second only to being a hairdresser. Myerson was drafted as his steady campaign companion—if not a girlfriend, exactly, a hand-holding BFF—to stave off the accusation that dare not speak its name except in below-the-radar whispers. . . . As Election Day approached, posters of mysterious provenance reading VOTE FOR CUOMO, NOT THE HOMO appeared in Brooklyn and Queens.

Both Cuomos have long denied having anything to do with those posters. They could not, however, deny their ostentatious playing of the “family man” card. Whatever went down in 1977 was enough to move Andrew Cuomo to later apologize privately to Koch for the tone of the race.

What we do know is that Andrew Cuomo deserves every bit of credit he has received for making same-sex marriage a top priority of his young governorship and for moving heaven and earth—deep-pocketed donors, recalcitrant Albany politicians, and sometimes-disorganized gay activists—to get the job done. If that feat of governance, among others, makes Cuomo a likely presidential prospect for the post-Obama Democratic Party, it’s well earned. But it doesn’t obliterate the record of what came before, including his standoffish relationship to gay-civil-rights battles for much of his preceding three-decade public career.

By the time Cuomo could act as governor, the issue was a win-win for him in Democratic politics, locally and nationally, the path having been paved by other fighters before him and by fast-moving polls confirming an ever more gay-friendly America. Yet even the preeminent gay magazine The Advocate failed to confront him on his record in its worshipful cover story marking New York’s marriage law; that past was journalistically Photoshopped out of existence.

Bill Clinton has also worked hard to spin and skate away from his history on gay issues. His presidential record looks good only when contrasted with the literally lethal passivity of Ronald Reagan, who didn’t think AIDS warranted a speech until 1987, six years into the epidemic and his presidency. Reagan is a very low bar, and that lets Clinton off the hook for a legacy that’s had a far more lasting and egregious impact than any failings, youthful or otherwise, of Andrew Cuomo. Clinton knows it, too. In his thousand-page memoir, My Life, he somehow didn’t find the space to so much as mention the Defense of Marriage Act.

The bill was strictly a right-wing political ploy cooked up for the year of Clinton’s re-election campaign. It had no other justification. In the spring of 1996, same-sex marriage wasn’t legal anywhere in the country or a top-tier cause for many gay leaders; it was solely in play in a slow-moving court case in Hawaii. But fear and demonization of gay men was off the charts: In 1995, a record 50,877 Americans with AIDS died—a one-year count rivaling the 58,000 Americans lost in the entire Vietnam War. The Christian Coalition, under the Machiavellian guidance of the yet-to-be-disgraced Ralph Reed, saw an opening to exploit homophobia to galvanize a Republican base unenthusiastic about Bob Dole. In a consummate display of bad taste, Clinton announced that he would sign DOMA that spring just two days after the Supreme Court, in a rare national victory for gay rights, struck down a Colorado constitutional amendment that had barred anti-discrimination laws benefiting gay men and lesbians. In the months to come, Clinton’s stand on DOMA gave political permission to many nominally liberal Democrats to join Rick Santorum, Jesse Helms, and Larry Craig in voting for the bill that September—among them Charles Schumer (then in the House) and the senators Joe Biden, Tom Harkin, Frank Lautenberg, Patrick Leahy, Joe ­Lieberman, Carl Levin, Barbara Mikulski, Patty Murray, and Harry Reid. Only fourteen senators, also Democrats, had the courage to vote against it.

Two years later, Matthew Shepard would be strung up in Wyoming, and a decade later George W. Bush, in league with Karl Rove, would make a statement almost identical to Clinton’s when he endorsed a constitutional marriage amendment in a similar election-year pander. “As this debate goes forward,” Bush intoned in 2006, “every American deserves to be treated with tolerance and respect and dignity.” Like Clinton, he knew he was enabling the exact opposite.

It’s Clinton who has done the rewriting, and not slightly, claiming that DOMA was “a reasonable compromise in the environment of the time.” Reasonable for his own political calculation, yes, but hardly for the gay Americans who have paid for it ever since.

Andrew Cuomo has traveled far from the late seventies—as so many of us have—and so has Bill Clinton from the nineties. The former president came out for same-sex marriage in 2009. But words are cheap. Clinton’s lip service might actually mean something if he spent his own current financial and political capital to help undo the second-class citizenship for gay Americans that was codified on his watch. Whatever his good works overseas, it’s past time for the entrepreneur of the Clinton Global Initiative to phone home—and to galvanize the liberal Democrats who followed his lead in ratifying DOMA, many of them still in office.

We are now in another election year, and one in which both leading presidential candidates in the GOP preach the most hard-line anti-gay positions of their respective churches. Nothing is ever certain in politics and, unlikely as it may seem, one of them could win. . . . . Though a cadre of conservative financiers, at least one with a gay son, helped bankroll Cuomo’s successful strong-arming of Republican same-sex-marriage votes in Albany, there doesn’t seem to be a single major Republican donor or leader, or even a mainstream conservative pundit, with the guts to call out these candidates or the party’s congressional leadership on their corrosive anti-gay rhetoric and agenda.

The GOP is on the wrong side of history for sure, with gays no less than Hispanics and every other minority group. Generational and demographic turnover is remaking America even as the right tries to turn back the clock. But over the shorter term, the party’s hard line will continue to inflict real injustice on citizens of all stripes—not just on gay adults (whether they are seeking marriage or not), but on gay kids struggling to find a safe place for themselves in the world and straight children who love their gay parents. So uninhibited is the animus of the Republican base that it thought nothing of booing a gay Army captain serving in Iraq when he presumed to ask a polite question via YouTube during a campaign debate on Fox News. Not one of the nine presidential candidates onstage spoke up to defend the soldier.

That’s why the celebrations in New York last June, while merited, must be seen as provisional. That’s also why Democratic leaders who profess fierce advocacy of gay civil rights must be held to account. Back in a day that was only yesterday, too many of them also fell silent—and when it counted most.

Rich makes many good points and the reality s that LGBT citizens need to be vigilant and ALWAYS go out in vote. Bitching amongst themselves doesn't cut it if they've stayed home on their ass while the Christofascists have gone out in droves on a modern day anti-gay crusade. And it's important that Democrats know that we are only too aware of their past failings and we are watching their every move.

A Conservative Describes Newt Gingrich As the GOP's "Bill Clinton"

Bill Clinton certain proved to have his strengths and weakness as a president. From the conservative/GOP perspective, however, he was viewed as only having weaknesses and liabilities. Hence, it is interesting that R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr., the founder and editor in chief of The American Spectator and an adjunct scholar at the Hudson Institute, describes Gingrich as the GOP's version of Clinton and not the least bit in a positive way. Rather, he sees Gingrich as a terrible leader and a host of disasters waiting to happen. Here are highlights from his column at creators.com:

How long have I been saying it? At least for 15 years, but in private, I have been aware of it longer. Newt Gingrich is conservatism's Bill Clinton, but without the charm. He has acquired wit, but he has all the charm of barbed wire.

Newt and Bill are, of course, 1960s-generation narcissists, and they share the same problems: waywardness and deviancy. Newt, like Bill, has a proclivity for girl-hopping. It's not as egregious as Bill's, but then Newt is not as drop-dead beautiful. His public record is already besmeared with tawdry divorces, and there are private encounters with the fair sex that doubtless will come out. If I have heard of some, you can be sure the Democrats have heard of more.

Newt up against the Prophet Obama would be a painful thing to watch. He might be deft with one-liners, but it would be futile. There are independent and other uncommitted voters to be cultivated in 2012 — all would be unmoved by Newt's juggling of conservative shibboleths.

He now says Republicans in the House were exhausted with his great projects. Nonsense. I knew many of them, and they were exhausted with his atrocious leadership. He is not a leader. He is a huckster. Today Mitt Romney has 72 congressional endorsements. Newt has 11. Possibly the 11 have yet to meet him.

After Newt's and Bill's disastrous experiences in government, both went on to create empires — Bill in philanthropy and cheap thought, Newt in public policy and cheap thought. As an ex-president, Bill has wrung up an unprecedented $75.6 million since absconding from the White House with White House loot and shameless pardons. I do not know how much Newt has amassed, but he got between $1.6 million to $1.8 million from Freddie Mac, . . . Now, after a lifetime in Washington, he is promoting himself as an outsider.

Back in 1992, I appeared with Chris Matthews on some gasbag's television show. Was it Donohue? At any rate, I said candidate Clinton had more skeletons in his closet than a body snatcher. It was a prescient line then, and I always got a laugh. I can apply the same line today to Newt, though he has skeletons both inside and outside his closet. Conservatives should not be surprised by the scandals that lie ahead if they stick with him.

Ouch!!! However, what Tyrrell says is all true. Obama must relish the tought of Newt Gingrich as his opponent.

Bill Clinton Delivers on Proposition 8

I will confess - maybe it's the former Republican in me - I have never liked Bill Clinton. The man is obviously a great political talent, but sadly he never accomplished what might have been done for this country largely because he is too undisciplined much of the time and has a real problem keeping his zipper in a closed position. Nonetheless, I am impressed with what he has done to support the "No on 8" effort in California. Like him or not, he has come through and put his own standing behind defeating the Christianist/Mormon effort to amend the California Constitution via calls going out to California voters. Here's what he says in the call:

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“This is Bill Clinton calling to ask you to vote NO on Proposition 8 on Tuesday, November 4th. Proposition 8 would use state law to single out one group of Californians to be treated differently — discriminating against members of our family, our friends and our co-workers. “If I know one thing about California, I know that is not what you’re about. That is not what America is about. Please vote NO on 8. It’s unfair and it’s wrong. Thank you.”

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The calls from President Clinton went to millions of registered California voters overnight. Thank you Bill. I might not trust you around my daughters, but you did a wonderful thing.

A Cavernous Narcissism

That term sums up, in my opinion, both of the Clintons. I am truly suffering from Clinton fatigue. As Hillary, a/k/a Akasha, continues to refuse to embrace reality and accept that she's lost the nomination she acts increasingly like a delusional female version of the Chimperator. Thinking she has won somehow is like believing that Iraq had WMD's immediately before the ill-fated invasion or that she's on some quasi-Joan of Arc divinely directed crusade against the infidel (much like the Chimperator has let slip out on occasion while speaking about Iraq). After eight years of George W. Bush and Emperor Cheney, I truly want someone in touch with reality in the White House. Here are some highlights from Politico.com:

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A Clinton donor tells me that on a conference call today with major fundraisers this afternoon, Harold Ickes told them Clinton isn't planning to drop out. He pressed donors to stay unified, and reviewed tactical options, including challenging the Michigan delegation.

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State finance committees are also circulating letters to deliver to Clinton tomorrow in New York, and I've obtained a draft of the Illinois finance committee's letter, being circulated by a Clinton fundraising aide, Rafi Jafri, which stresses a fight until the convention, and a resolution in "August, and no earlier." We, the Illinois Finance Committee, want to show our full commitment to and support for Senator Hillary Clinton, in the fight for her rightful appointment as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee at the convention this August.

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As I have said before, will someone PLEASE get a wooden stake and some silver bullets and end this lunacy? Or at least a straight jacket so she can be carted away. Of course, then there's Bill: Mr. Narcissim himself. Vanity Fair has a new eight page article on Slick Willie which in and of itself should prove to Democrats that allowing Hillary to be the nominee would open a possible Pandora's box of dirt on Bill. Here are a few highlights:

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But among the not-so-small cadre of Clinton friends and former aides, concern about the company the boss keeps is persistent, palpable, and pained. No former president of the United States has ever traveled with such a fast crowd, and most 61-year-old American men of Clinton’s generation don’t, either. “I just think those guys are radioactive,” one former aide to Clinton who is still in occasional affectionate touch with him told me recently, referring to Burkle and (to a lesser extent) Bing. “I stay far away from them.”

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This winter, as Clinton moved with seeming abandon to stain his wife’s presidential campaign in the name of saving it, as disclosures about his dubious associates piled up, as his refusal to disclose the names of donors to his presidential library and foundation and his and his wife’s reluctance to release their income-tax returns created crippling and completely avoidable distractions for Hillary Clinton’s own long-suffering ambition, I found myself asking again and again, What’s the matter with him?

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There is reason to believe that Clinton, who never made more than $35,000 a year as governor of Arkansas and left the White House about $12 million in debt, has had his head turned by his ability to enjoy his post-presidential status; that the world of rich friends, adoring fans, and borrowed jets in which he travels has skewed his judgment or, at a minimum, created uncomfortable appearances of impropriety.

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None of these wisps of smoke have produced a public fire. But four former Clinton aides told me that, about 18 months ago, one of the president’s former assistants, who still advises him on political matters, had heard so many complaints about such reports from Clinton supporters around the country that he felt compelled to try to conduct what one of these aides called an “intervention,” because, the aide believed, “Clinton was apparently seeing a lot of women on the road.”

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Whatever the facts of Clinton’s personal life, it is beyond dispute that he has associated with some decidedly unpresidential company. In 2002, Clinton flew to Africa with the New York investor Jeffrey Epstein on his private Boeing 727 on an anti-aids and economic-development mission. (Others on the mission included Kevin Spacey and the comedian Chris Tucker.) In 2006, Epstein was indicted on state charges of soliciting prostitution in Palm Beach, Florida, and he later came under investigation by federal authorities amid allegations that he hired under-age girls for massages and more in a house stocked with sex toys and genitalia-shaped soaps. He remains the subject of at least four pending civil lawsuits from young women and is reportedly expected to accept a plea deal on a state charge that would give him 18 months in prison, followed by house arrest, in lieu of a trial now set to begin this month.

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One person, who has worked at the highest levels for both Clintons, told me that Clinton’s association with such people “just shows poor judgment, for someone who understands political calculations the way he does, and the subtleties as he does, that he puts himself in that position.” Whatever the explanation, much of Clinton’s behavior on the campaign trail this year has been so maladroit as to constitute malpractice: his blowups at television reporters, his derisive dismissal of Obama’s unwavering anti-war stance as a “fairy tale,” and most of all his denigrating comparison of Obama’s performance in the South Carolina primary to Jesse Jackson’s victories there two decades ago (which even one of his closest former aides described to me as insensitive at best). Perhaps no figure in modern American politics has less standing to say “Shame on you!” than Bill Clinton.

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But it is also beyond dispute that Clinton has blended the altruistic efforts of his philanthropy with the private business interests of some of his biggest donors in ways that are surpassingly sloppy, if not unseemly, for any former president. . . . Since 2001, Clinton has received more in almost every category—pension, staff salaries, supplies—than any of his colleagues in that smallest of clubs. Before Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford died, Clinton’s telephone and rent expenses came close to exceeding the comparable expenses for all four then living former presidents combined.

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In the end, this is Clinton’s most grievous sin, his steady refusal to take grown-up responsibility for the consequences of his own actions. In the White House, on the day of his last sexual encounter with Monica Lewinsky, Clinton told her that he was worried that a foreign embassy might be listening in on their calls, and that if she were ever questioned, she should say they were just friends.