A NYT article about the age gap between Hillary's supporters and Barack's. As one lovely Pennsylvanian explained:
“Barack Obama has no experience and no plans. He just works on emotions, and this is why young people like him,” said Kimberly Romm, 44, who is self-employed and heard Mrs. Clinton speak at Haverford College. “People who are more mature analyze things. They’re wiser.”
(Note: some of the other old people in this article are supporting Hillary because 'the world is not ready for a black president' (85 yr old); because 'Hillary's a woman' (67 yr old); and because they like Bill Clinton (72 yr old).
Yeah, maturity seems to be a strong suit of the older generation.
This sounds less mature than my high school's student council elections. At least people voted for whomever gave the funniest speech, or said the most curse words. I mean, Jesus Christ! If you're seriously supporting Hillary because she's a woman, than just be super up-front about it: "I'm voting for the one with the post-menopausal dried up vagina." Simple as that.
But back to my friend Kimberly Romm, the self-professed mature and wise voter. Hillary's old and used up. She preys on the stupidity of Alzheimer's victims who think that it's 1992 and how could they be delusional-- Clinton's on the ballot!
People who are younger are better equiped to consider new ways to solve old problems that Kimberly's mature (i.e. soon to be dead) generation has failed to fix, like, uh, a healthy planet, a peaceful world, a fair and just set of laws that fully embraces civil rights for all. I must be really immature for caring about shit like that.
UGH! It just irks me so much that today's election is in the hands of people like Kimberly Romm.
Kimberly, wherever you are right now, I am vomiting on your face and hoping the stench never leaves you and you smell like my barf for the next 50 years. How's that for mature, bitch?
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
Dorothy Parker
Today we read 2 short love poems by Dorothy Parker, one of the great Jazz age poets.
Experience
Some men break your heart in two,
Some men fawn and flatter,
Some men never look at you;
And that cleans up the matter.
Incurable
And if my heart be scarred and burned,
The safer, I, for all I learned;
The calmer, I, to see it true
That ways of love are never new-
The love that sets you daft and dazed
Is every love that ever blazed;
The happier, I, to fathom this:
A kiss is every other kiss.
The reckless vow, the lovely name,
When Helen walked, were spoke the same;
The weighted breast, the grinding woe,
When Phaon fled, were ever so.
Oh, it is sure as it is sad
That any lad is every lad,
And what's a girl, to dare implore
Her dear be hers forevermore?
Though he be tried and he be bold,
And swearing death should he be cold,
He'll run the path the others went....
But you, my sweet, are different.
Experience
Some men break your heart in two,
Some men fawn and flatter,
Some men never look at you;
And that cleans up the matter.
Incurable
And if my heart be scarred and burned,
The safer, I, for all I learned;
The calmer, I, to see it true
That ways of love are never new-
The love that sets you daft and dazed
Is every love that ever blazed;
The happier, I, to fathom this:
A kiss is every other kiss.
The reckless vow, the lovely name,
When Helen walked, were spoke the same;
The weighted breast, the grinding woe,
When Phaon fled, were ever so.
Oh, it is sure as it is sad
That any lad is every lad,
And what's a girl, to dare implore
Her dear be hers forevermore?
Though he be tried and he be bold,
And swearing death should he be cold,
He'll run the path the others went....
But you, my sweet, are different.
Big Drudge Update
OY!
"Controlled excitement is building inside of Clinton's inner circle as closely guarded internal polling shows the former first lady with an 11-point lead in Pennsylvania!
Clinton is polling near to nearly 2 to 1 over Obama in many regions of the state, a top insider explained to the DRUDGE REPORT.
A strong coalition of middle-class and religious voters has all but secured a Clinton victory Tuesday, with headline-making margins, the campaign believes.
"It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of how much," a senior campaign source said Monday morning. When pressed if the dramatic internal polling numbers could somehow be flawed in a state as demographically complex as Pennsylvania, and with new voter registration surging to unseen levels, the campaign insider held firm. "Senator Obama would be wise not to unpack his bags quite yet."
MORE
With less than 24 hours to go until the beginning of the end of primary season voting, Obama has handedly captured Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, but has failed to dominate suburban sprawl, the campaign's polling reveals. An 11-point victory in Pennsylvania for Clinton would expand on margins scored in Ohio. Clinton will quickly move to feverishly focus on Indiana starting Tuesday night, hoping to somehow convince superdelegates that she not only has superior stamina but has crucial swing state appeal. Without superdelegate intervention, Clinton still faces impossible math to nomination.
Developing..."
-Drudge Report
"Controlled excitement is building inside of Clinton's inner circle as closely guarded internal polling shows the former first lady with an 11-point lead in Pennsylvania!
Clinton is polling near to nearly 2 to 1 over Obama in many regions of the state, a top insider explained to the DRUDGE REPORT.
A strong coalition of middle-class and religious voters has all but secured a Clinton victory Tuesday, with headline-making margins, the campaign believes.
"It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of how much," a senior campaign source said Monday morning. When pressed if the dramatic internal polling numbers could somehow be flawed in a state as demographically complex as Pennsylvania, and with new voter registration surging to unseen levels, the campaign insider held firm. "Senator Obama would be wise not to unpack his bags quite yet."
MORE
With less than 24 hours to go until the beginning of the end of primary season voting, Obama has handedly captured Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, but has failed to dominate suburban sprawl, the campaign's polling reveals. An 11-point victory in Pennsylvania for Clinton would expand on margins scored in Ohio. Clinton will quickly move to feverishly focus on Indiana starting Tuesday night, hoping to somehow convince superdelegates that she not only has superior stamina but has crucial swing state appeal. Without superdelegate intervention, Clinton still faces impossible math to nomination.
Developing..."
-Drudge Report
Her Path to Victory
"To overtake Barack Obama in the nationwide popular vote, Hillary Clinton needs a bigger win in tomorrow's Pennsylvania primary than she has had in any major contest so far. And that's just for starters.
After more than 40 Democratic primaries and caucuses, Obama, the Illinois senator, leads Clinton by more than 800,000 votes. Even if the New York senator wins by more than 20 percentage points tomorrow -- a landslide few experts expect -- she would still have a hard time catching him."
-Catherine Dodge and Kristin Jensen, Bloomberg.com
After more than 40 Democratic primaries and caucuses, Obama, the Illinois senator, leads Clinton by more than 800,000 votes. Even if the New York senator wins by more than 20 percentage points tomorrow -- a landslide few experts expect -- she would still have a hard time catching him."
-Catherine Dodge and Kristin Jensen, Bloomberg.com
Friday, April 18, 2008
Emma Lazarus
I read a biography of Emma Lazarus this summer. She's a seriously interesting character in the world of American poetry, and her most famous work, which is featured below, is not only powerful and beautiful, but also a timely reminder about the enduring promise America has always offered to those in need.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
The New Colossus
by Emma Lazarus
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Some Perspectives on Last Night's Debate
"Let's stop pretending: it's over. Done. Nice run, but time to hit the showers. Last night's debate -- in which Clinton, to her credit, generally refrained from the kind of egregious negative campaigning her campaign focused on before the departure of Mark Penn -- eliminated any possible remaining doubt, not because Obama "won" but simply because he didn't destroy himself.
Clinton's only real chance to win the nomination was for Obama to make a tremendous gaffe - so tremendous that he self-destructed and all the remaining Superdelegates turned to Clinton as the savior of the party - and the only place a hyper-intelligent guy like Obama would possibly slip up is in a highly public, unscripted setting like a debate. But he didn't slip up, and it's starting to look like there won't even be any more debates. At this point the entire endgame is predictable. Clinton, like a good chess player, can easily see that the remaining moves inevitably lead to checkmate; it's time for her to tip over her King and concede defeat."
-M.S. Bellows, Jr., Huffington Post
"Obama and Clinton were completely irresponsible. As the first President Bush discovered, it is simply irresponsible statesmanship (and stupid politics) to make blanket pledges to win votes. Both candidates did that on vital issues.
Both promised to not raise taxes on those making less than $200,000 or $250,000 a year. They both just emasculated their domestic programs. Returning the rich to their Clinton-era tax rates will yield, at best, $40 billion a year in revenue. It’s impossible to fund a health care plan, let alone anything else, with that kind of money. The consequences are clear: if elected they will have to break their pledge, and thus destroy their credibility, or run a minimalist administration.
The second pledge was just as bad. Nobody knows what the situation in Iraq will be like. To pledge an automatic withdrawal is just insane. A mature politician would’ve been honest and said: I fully intend to withdraw, but I want to know what the reality is at that moment...
Final grades:
ABC: A
Clinton: B
Obama: D+ "
-David Brooks, NYT
"Why in the world George Stephanopoulos felt compelled to ask Barack Obama if Reverend Wright "loved America" after he had already been made to give another recitation of his repudiation of Wright's remarks is a question that simply defies the imagination. What sort of sensible answer can be given to that question? It would require astral projection to properly gauge another man's emotional state. And if you want to ask Hillary Clinton to account for the odd contortions she advanced on the matter of her Bosnia recollections, just sack up and ask. Don't hide behind the additional, pointless cruelty of a random voter's scoldings that Clinton lost their vote. What a wholly superfluous pile on!
And the flag lapel pin question came with this admonishment from Charles Gibson: "It keeps coming up, again and again." Well, no shit, Charlie! It keeps "coming up, again and again" because the media resolutely refuses to obtain the necessary courage to stop doing so."
-Jason Linkins, Huffington Post
"In the summer of 1969, when Hillary was just entering Yale Law School, she went to work for the foremost radical law firm in, yes, Berkeley... Every one deserves the best legal defense possible, and I have no problem with Hillary having worked for a law firm run by Communists and engaged in defending Huey Newton and other radicals accused of killing cops and other violent acts.
But the hypocrisy by Clinton on this matter and the acrobatic cherry-picking by Stephanopoulos are simply staggering."
-Marc Cooper, Huffington Post
Clinton's only real chance to win the nomination was for Obama to make a tremendous gaffe - so tremendous that he self-destructed and all the remaining Superdelegates turned to Clinton as the savior of the party - and the only place a hyper-intelligent guy like Obama would possibly slip up is in a highly public, unscripted setting like a debate. But he didn't slip up, and it's starting to look like there won't even be any more debates. At this point the entire endgame is predictable. Clinton, like a good chess player, can easily see that the remaining moves inevitably lead to checkmate; it's time for her to tip over her King and concede defeat."
-M.S. Bellows, Jr., Huffington Post
"Obama and Clinton were completely irresponsible. As the first President Bush discovered, it is simply irresponsible statesmanship (and stupid politics) to make blanket pledges to win votes. Both candidates did that on vital issues.
Both promised to not raise taxes on those making less than $200,000 or $250,000 a year. They both just emasculated their domestic programs. Returning the rich to their Clinton-era tax rates will yield, at best, $40 billion a year in revenue. It’s impossible to fund a health care plan, let alone anything else, with that kind of money. The consequences are clear: if elected they will have to break their pledge, and thus destroy their credibility, or run a minimalist administration.
The second pledge was just as bad. Nobody knows what the situation in Iraq will be like. To pledge an automatic withdrawal is just insane. A mature politician would’ve been honest and said: I fully intend to withdraw, but I want to know what the reality is at that moment...
Final grades:
ABC: A
Clinton: B
Obama: D+ "
-David Brooks, NYT
"Why in the world George Stephanopoulos felt compelled to ask Barack Obama if Reverend Wright "loved America" after he had already been made to give another recitation of his repudiation of Wright's remarks is a question that simply defies the imagination. What sort of sensible answer can be given to that question? It would require astral projection to properly gauge another man's emotional state. And if you want to ask Hillary Clinton to account for the odd contortions she advanced on the matter of her Bosnia recollections, just sack up and ask. Don't hide behind the additional, pointless cruelty of a random voter's scoldings that Clinton lost their vote. What a wholly superfluous pile on!
And the flag lapel pin question came with this admonishment from Charles Gibson: "It keeps coming up, again and again." Well, no shit, Charlie! It keeps "coming up, again and again" because the media resolutely refuses to obtain the necessary courage to stop doing so."
-Jason Linkins, Huffington Post
"In the summer of 1969, when Hillary was just entering Yale Law School, she went to work for the foremost radical law firm in, yes, Berkeley... Every one deserves the best legal defense possible, and I have no problem with Hillary having worked for a law firm run by Communists and engaged in defending Huey Newton and other radicals accused of killing cops and other violent acts.
But the hypocrisy by Clinton on this matter and the acrobatic cherry-picking by Stephanopoulos are simply staggering."
-Marc Cooper, Huffington Post
Anna Margolin
Today I give you a poem that, with the help of wikipedia, I just discovered myself. I was looking for a new poem by a poet I'd never read before. Anna Margolin, nee Rona Harning Levensbaum was born in Belarus in 1887, and moved to America when she was 26. She wrote in Yiddish, so this is a translation of the original, but the power of her words is felt nonetheless.
Seated at a table in the gray hall,
Idle and anxious, wrapping myself in my shawl,
I don't look at you, do I?
I don't call you to me, do I?
But my mouth is redder now,
And my half-shut eyes
Are smoky.
But I am flooded with sound and light,
And I see your face through fog and flame,
And on my lips the taste
Of sun and wind is sharp.
But I pull myself up with a choked cry,
I grow trembling, feverish,
And this growing hurts.
Removed to a corner of the gray hall,
In the long flaming folds of my shawl,
I don't look at you, do I?
I don't call you to me, do I?
But a little painfully and deeply and blindly,
With half-shut eyes
I have taken you into myself.
With Half-Shut Eyes
by Anna Margolin
Seated at a table in the gray hall,
Idle and anxious, wrapping myself in my shawl,
I don't look at you, do I?
I don't call you to me, do I?
But my mouth is redder now,
And my half-shut eyes
Are smoky.
But I am flooded with sound and light,
And I see your face through fog and flame,
And on my lips the taste
Of sun and wind is sharp.
But I pull myself up with a choked cry,
I grow trembling, feverish,
And this growing hurts.
Removed to a corner of the gray hall,
In the long flaming folds of my shawl,
I don't look at you, do I?
I don't call you to me, do I?
But a little painfully and deeply and blindly,
With half-shut eyes
I have taken you into myself.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)