Matthews purports to channel Dem party "grandee[]" in suggesting Obama pick Jewish running mate for "ethnic balance" to his middle name
On the noon edition of MSNBC Live on April 22, MSNBC host Chris Matthews -- purporting to channel Robert Strauss, former Democratic National Committee chairman, chairman of Jimmy Carter's 1976 presidential campaign, and ambassador under former President George H.W. Bush -- suggested that Sen. Barack Obama could provide "ethnic balance" to the "interesting, sort of Middle Eastern Hussein in his name" by selecting a Jewish running mate in the 2008 presidential election. According to Matthews, Strauss -- whom Matthews called "one of the grandees of the party"-- "would sit there and say: 'You know what we need? We need a Clinton person on this Barack ticket. We need some ethnic balance. He's got that interesting, sort of Middle Eastern Hussein in his name. Let's put a Jewish running mate with this guy. Put [Pennsylvania Gov.] Eddie Rendell on the ticket with him.' "
From the noon ET hour of the April 22 edition of MSNBC Live:
BRIAN WILLIAMS (NBC News anchor): You put anything behind this New York Times thumb-sucker this morning about them being each other's running mate? This is more than Kennedy-Johnson, Chris.
MATTHEWS: Oh no, this is more than Johnson saying Kennedy had Addison's disease, because Kennedy did have Addison's disease. This is more like: "You're bad news." And I think the Clintons believe deep in their souls -- I know this is perhaps self- -- you know -- justifying, but they do believe he can't win the general. They believe he can't win. I don't think they necessarily want him to win, but they don't believe he can win. They think he's a bad candidate for the party. On the other hand, I think the Barack people feel that the Clintons are out to destroy him. So it's very serious. This is not just a little tiff here.
WILLIAMS: You don't see them getting together --
MATTHEWS: No, but I do think something clever could be done. If I were -- you mentioned [former Democratic National Committee chairman] Bob Strauss, one of the grandees of the party. He didn't smoke a cigar but he could have. Adolphe Menjou from the old movies, you know. He would sit there and say: "You know what we need? We need a Clinton person on this Barack ticket. We need some ethnic balance. He's got that interesting, sort of Middle Eastern Hussein in his name. Let's put a Jewish running mate with this guy. Put Eddie Rendell on the ticket with him." Something clever, a Clinton person who could lock down Pennsylvania, help in Florida, help in California, maybe help in Ohio. He's going to need one hell of a Clintonite running mate, I think, to seal this deal.
This time it's poor Eddie.
I Hope Eddie remembers the fate of Chris's other guys.
Well that puts a least one course of action into the dumper.
What size population are we talking here? How many jewish clintonites are in the position of being a possible legitimate vice presidential candidate?
I can dig that the jewish part of the catagory is pretty easy. Unless the media wants to question the legitimacy or amount of jewishness. This person is probably doomed at this point anyway. The deffintion of a clintonite is where I'm stumbling.
He'll help Obama overcome the latter's pro-"Palestine" sympathies and his troubling connections to known anti-Semites like Rev. Wright, Calypso Louie, and Malik Shabazz. Sen. Lieberman could also help mitigate negative perceptions re: Obama's patriotism.
I doubt that Sen. Liberman would want to be associated with the Obama campaign though. And that's a pity.
Your comments make me laugh.
The only person who is a bigger joke than you is Joe Lieberman.
In any case, a significant amount of antipathy that Sen. Lieberman has been facing recently appears to be directly connected to his Jewish faith. Hence, these constant attempts to abuse and minimize him. Sadly, there's a virtual Krystallnacht going on in certain left-wing Democrat blogs.
Lanny Davis, a card-carrying Democrat Party member, said it best - "I came to believe that we liberals couldn't possibly be so intolerant and hateful, because our ideology was famous for ACLU-type commitments to free speech, dissent and, especially, tolerance for those who differed with us. Now in the closing days of the Lieberman primary campaign, I have reluctantly concluded that I was wrong."
"In any case, a significant amount of antipathy that Sen. Lieberman has been facing recently appears to be directly connected to his Jewish faith."
Your link to that Bill O'Reilly article is hardly persuasive. The evidence of "significant" anti-semitism aimed at Lieberman is to quote two anonymous posters at Daily Kos and Huffington's site. Obama is not mentioned. This is a 2006 article and he also boosts Lieberman's much repeated accusation that lefty hackers had crashed his campaign site, something the FBI has now refuted.
http://www.physorg.com/news126983396.html
http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2008/04/fbi-liebermans.html?loc=interstitialskip
Lanny Davis: I have no particular beef with him, but the comments that he made regarding Lieberman were not an impartial observation on the coarsening of the political discourse. Davis was actively campaigning at the time for his longtime friend, Lieberman. Strangely, the O'Reilly article you linked to fails to mention that little tidbit.
"Sadly, there's a virtual Krystallnacht going on in certain left-wing Democrat blogs."
A comment comparing a few obnoxious posters to the horror that was the real Krystallnacht cannot be taken seriously.
This business that the hostility to Lieberman is based on anti-semetic is just delusional. Its the kind of fantasy thinking you sometimes find in the letter collumn of the Jeruselam post. Joe's problem isn't his reliegion its his politics. As Eric Alterman has rightly written, the vast majority of Jews are on the left of the spectrum, and are not represented by the conservative national Jewish organizations that pretend to speak for them. If you don't think that Wolfowitz is far more unpopular among most Jews than Obama you are delusional also. Pulling the "Jewish" card by Lieberman and his supporters is just as despicable as the way that Wolfowitz was reported to have done the same thing by Richard Clark when he wanted to get his way.
ROFLMAO The only thing Lie-berman should run for is Prime Minister of Israel. This is America. If you want to hijack the American government to fight Israel's endless wars, your best bet is one of those pro-Armageddon crystal meth smoking televangelists.
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This idea has some merit for different reasons. I recommend Sen. Joe Lieberman.
He'll help Obama overcome the latter's pro-"Palestine" sympathies and his troubling connections to known anti-Semites like Rev. Wright, Calypso Louie, and Malik Shabazz. Sen. Lieberman could also help mitigate negative perceptions re: Obama's patriotism.
I doubt that Sen. Liberman would want to be associated with the Obama campaign though. And that's a pity.
Lynn maybe Obama can find a Jewish woman for his vice president, or lets go for broke and get a gay Jewish woman, then we can insure Buchanans head exploding, make the world a better place.
What do you suppose would happen if you had a black person and a hispanic woman on the ticket?
mccain would still win.
you know, i almost mentioned that. i really think that movie captures the misery of being at the bulge. poor ricardo, dying, probably of shock under that overturned jeep. the guy with the clacking teeth is terrific.
I thought the bit where van johnson almost ran away was touching. heroes didn't do that, and he took a chance with the scene. i think of it as a groundbreaking scene, like the scene in spartacus when kirk douglas gets branded on the leg and screams. heroes didn't, until that moment, scream either.
btw, most of spartacus was shot in thousand oaks. i'm certain, without checking, that battleground was probably shot in culver city.
yeah, he had them in his helmet. they always had a bit of humor in those movies. it was three eggs, as i remember. he was also funny in that movie with the guys from hawaii, all those japanese fellows. they were in two units and then combined into one. it's a very famous unit. got more medals per man than any other unit.
i went to the smithsonian with my roommate from vietnam. we saw the display of that unit, one of the guys won the cmh. we silently read the inscription. we were both in tears.
funny story. daniel inouye, who lost an arm in europe, maybe even won the cmh, not certain, got elected to the house of representatives. went up to sam rayburn, the speaker, introduced himself. sam say, i know who you are, how many goddam one armed japs you think we got in this place. they became fast friends.
I remember the d.i. with jack webb, vaguely. i don't think it was a war movie, at least in my memory it isn't. a military movie, but not a war movie. i could be wrong.
he was good in sunset boulevard, and of course in his tv series dragnet. reportedly he was a bear to work for.
you remember, at the end, when they are marching out. van johnson asks stuart whitman if he remembers jody. well, that's a marching thing. and they all fall back in line, start marching like soldiers.
well, i remembered that all my life. do your job, don't let them see you sweat.
when i practiced law, pulled all nighters, i always cleaned up the conference room. the people that left the conference rooms looking like crap got the glory. screw them.
oh, you said woman. what hispanic woman with national stature is there? the only names that come to mind are the sanchez girls of orange county. hardly vp material. i think the last person to run for veep from the house of reps was miller in '64 with goldwater. didn't work out so well, but his daughter has a nice gig.
i think the representative from guam might be hispanic/latino. she's very nice, but probably not a big vote getter.
well, certainly you have someone in mind.
i went to a panel discussion at a conference. loretta sanchez was a panel member. she was funny, and quite charming. too bad she's on the wrong side of the aisle. After she had served a term, she got her sister into it, and she won in the adjoining district. Now that's a great family story.
They share an apartment. she said some congressmen, whom she wouldn't name, sleep in their offices. she was particularly upset that they slept right on the sofa where visitors sit. So unhygenic. She was appalled.
If you're just going based on party affiliation, you are making the same gross error you see made by some lefties. I'm liberal but am most interested in a person's policies based on what subjects are of most important to me. I used to vote for dems, repubs, libs, conservatives, moderates, you name it. I'm only pushing libs right now because I think the right wing has poisoned the republican message. As long as republicans only offer right wing tools who value abortion, moving the burden of debt to the middle class and anti gay messages over the price of fuel, manufacturing moving overseas and secure national infrastructure there is no reason to consider them. All the righties do is give lip service to those issues and then once elected continue doing nothing about them.
oh, come on. i like the sanchez girls. i wouldn't vote fot them, but they are emblematic of what people can do in this country.
i just wish they would vote the right way. but they are cool.
Look at you two chumming it up. That's nice. Rump, I'm just a couple miles outside of Loretta's district, and she doesn't vote the right way,she votes the correct way. If it makes you happy, I'm in right wing nut and terrorist sympathizer Dana Rohrabacher's realm of evil.
Now break it up, Siskel and Ebert.
Were American heroes Omar Bradley, George Joulwan, and John Abizaid ever run through the ringer over their Arabic names?
Oh, silly me, I almost forgot, they're white.
Since this middle name nonsense won't go away, I'll post my fun facts again:
Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. was born and named after his father in 1961.
This was 18 years before Saddam Hussein assumed power in Iraq and began his maniacal dictatorship,
26 years before the founding of Hamas,
27 years before the founding of al Qaeda,
25 years before the founding of Hezbollah,
10 years before the founding of Palestinian Islamic Jihad,
and 33 years before the Taliban inflicted its reign upon Afghanistan.
During the same year that Barack Obama was born, Osama bin Laden was 4 years old, and Ayman al-Zawahiri was 10.
Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. was born and named after his father in 1961.
6 years BEFORE King Hussein of Jordan went to war in 1967.
[There, happy now?]
As a child of devout muslim parents, it follows that he must have been named after the founder of the Shia branch if Islam.
Were King Hussein or the prophet's grandson terrorists?
Were they maniacal dictators?
Please, let me tell you about the Evangelical Church.
My parent were married in an Assemblies of God (Evangelical/Penticostal) chrurch, and they still go to one. From a baby, until I was 16, I felt the fire, smelled the brimstone, and saw people dance in the aisles, some danced until they pee'd their pants. I heard them speak in tongues brought on by the presence of the Holy Spirit, and shortly thereafter someone else would interpret what that person just said. I've been to their tent revivals where on-the-spot healings took place.
As I got older, I realized that those who danced in the aisles and spoke in tongues were always the same ones as a couple of weeks ago. Yet, for some reason, the other 300 (or so) never were touched by the Lord to do such a thing--including anyone in my family. At age 16, I rebelled, and never went again. If I had the time, I could write volumes about this sham.
Now, keep in mind, I'm not against religion. But this is not about the Lord, this is about money. Their business is to keep good people feeling that they are never quite good enough to get into Heaven. They do this to keep them coming back, which keeps the offering plates full. Their Pastors tell of "getting the calling from the Lord" to go into the ministry. I find it odd how often the Lord skips right over hundreds of other good people, and calls upon the son of that Pastor to continue God's work. Sure beats working for a living.
The way good, caring people are played by this denomination (and others, I'm sure) is obscene.
okay, i believe you. it's like aimee semple mcpherson. as i say to my wife, all these demoniations, it's just about shelf space, like in a grocery store.
i don't buy any of it. i don't believe in evolution, but i don't buy any of that religious stuff either.
i've got my prepaid neptune society card in my wallet, and that's the way i'm going.
Do you use antibiotics when you're sick? Are you aware that bacteria and viruses have both EVOLVED to be resisitant to medications? Do you believe in the THEORY of gravity? Disbelieving evolution is ridiculous. If you have children, you are handicapping their understanding of the world. Figure this out.
certainly there is evolution within species, but it does not create species.
i remember hunting on Molokai for deer. they had been there about 60 years. those in the dark rainforest were darker than those in the light colored desert. i assume it was a natural selection thing for camouflage. but they were still deer. they didn't evolve into some other type of creature.
For being there only 60 years I'd sure hope not! It takes many, many thousands of years for a species to evolve to the point where we've seen them today.
Viruses on the other hand, like the rhinovirus, can actually evolve into a completely different species of virus in around 80 cycles.
That's a pretty good observation, Rumple. Some elite "scientist" type might nit-pick and say that unless your hunting trip lasted a few million years, your findings may not be too solid, but I'm with you.
I once dropped a lemon seed in the soil outside of my front door. After a few days it had produced a small green sprout. A passing child told me that it could eventually become a lemon tree. It only took a few leisurely hours of "baptism" on my home waterboard to teach that child that only God can make a tree.
The only people who could make an argument like that (or believe it) are people who don't even have a basic grasp of biology. I would fail a Bio 101 student if they weren't able to refute that idiotic argument in one page or less.
Let me just touch on it for a second, since it is not related to this thread: The only way the idiotic tornado argument would be valid would be if the situation were that a tornado went through every second of every day for a billion years, and the environment of the junk yard was such that pieces could be added incrimentally to the 747 structure, the pieces were more likely to land in that position and stay there than if they didn't. Also, you wouldn't end up with a perfect 747 in the analogy, but one that had extra engines, extra wings, etc. One of the biggest flaws in the anti-evolution crowd is the assumption that the human bosy is some sort of perfect design that has no flaws and cannot be improved upon. It is far from that.
Jawill,
Didn't you know that fossil evidence which shows direct evolutionary physical adaptation is merely a ruse by the far left to extinguish God from our lives?
Wow, and I thought the "watch" argument was convincing. (For anybody who has never had to suffer through it, I'll summarize; "look at my watch- there is a God")The 747 theory is pretty solid.
Jawill, you sound as if you may have slogged through the same discussions I have. Somebody starting with the idea that what they're familiar with is perfect and the product of a design, and trying to get them to consider otherwise. Pretty worthless to try to fix that.
rumplestilskin396408 is living proof that there should be a federal law banning people with an IQ under 25 from getting an Internet account.
So tell me, Rumpy, why do you hate America? Why do want the terrorists to win?
I notice neither of your examples were BIOLOGISTS. I know a briliant lawyer, maybe HE ought to do your next brain surgery. Your stories are inane. You THINK they have a point because you arent very bright.
well, that's a considered response. you have no answer apparetly. i don't know how it happened, but there is no proof of evolution to create all the species we have on earth. i don't know, and you don't know either. perhaps we will all learn the big secret.
man is only about 20,000-40,000 years old. where did he come from?
the oldest skeleton found in the labrea tar pits is about 8,000 years old. she was murdered, based on her crush skull.