Obama's arm-twisting on Honduras

O'Grady investigates the lengths to which our administration will go in pressuring Honduras to take back their would-be dictator.

One thing I'm curious about: Honduras has presidential elections coming up this November. Once they elect and inaugurate a new president, will our sanctions and threats against them cease? If any of these measures last a day past the beginning of their new administration, I'll have to believe it is purely punishment for having ousted a favored leftist. I think it is, anyway, but there won't be any pretext for maintaining these sanctions after the next Honduran administration takes office. Let's see how that goes...

The Obama Doctrine

Joshua Muravchik has a masterful article at the Wall Street Journal analyzing the Obama Doctrine in foreign policy, such that there is. It's an eye-opener. Obama and his administration are apparently downplaying the promotion of democracy and, to some extent, human rights. These are at the expense of laudable (but, in my mind, secondary) issues that promote a livable, civil society, once you've actually got liberty and democracy.

What was surprising was to see the quotations in which Obama or Sec. State Clinton actually denigrate or minimize democracy. It's long, but check out the whole thing.

More on Honduras vs. Iran

Hillary Clinton, speaking about the Iranian elections:

Obviously, they have a huge credibility gap with their own people as to the election process...And I don't think that's going to disappear by any finding of a limited review of a relatively-small number of ballots. But clearly, these internal matters are for Iranians themselves to address. And we hope that they will be given the opportunity to do so in a peaceful way that respects the right of expression. And it has been my position and that of our administration that we support the fundamental values of peoples' voices being heard, their votes being counted. And we'll have to see how this unfolds.

(Emphasis mine)

Compare with her statements on Honduras' kicking out of its president--a process done through constitutional channels, and intended to stop him from becoming a strong-man:

The action taken against Honduran President Mel Zelaya violates the precepts of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, and thus should be condemned by all. We call on all parties in Honduras to respect the constitutional order and the rule of law, to reaffirm their democratic vocation, and to commit themselves to resolve political disputes peacefully and through dialogue. Honduras must embrace the very principles of democracy we reaffirmed at the OAS meeting it hosted less than one month ago.

(Emphasis mine)

Notice a difference in tone between how our administration treats an oppressive, anti-American, terrorist-supporting, vote-rigging (we believe) theocracy on the one hand, and a democracy that's going through legal means to preserve its democracy, on the other? Hmph.

Democratic unity

This is the kind of Democratic Party unity I love to see. These are the guys who are trying to force a floor vote on nominating Clinton at the Democratic convention this fall. According to XM Radio's "P.O.T.U.S. '08" channel yesterday, they have 2/3 of the signatures they need.

Love the acronym...I can't believe they actually titled their group this way.

Clinton's awkward backtracking on Mississippi insult

"[T]he former first lady said the comments she made about the state in the run up to the Iowa caucuses "were not exactly what I said," even though they came directly from an interview she gave to the Des Moines Register in October. Let's review those comments, shall we?

The newspaper quoted the New York senator discussing Iowa and Mississippi being the only states that have never elected a woman governor or sent a woman to Congress.

"How can Iowa be ranked with Mississippi? That's not what I see. That's not the quality. That's not the communitarianism; that's not the openness I see in Iowa."

And how does she slither out of this one?

"What I said is what I learned is that neither Iowa or Mississippi had ever elected a woman statewide and I referenced the fact that I was the first woman elected statewide in New York and I told the Iowans that they had a chance to try to change that and now in Mississippi giving Mississippi voters a chance to change that."

Awww, how noble of her! Offering her humble services to lift the benighted Mississippians out of their backwardness.

Obviously, though, her original comment was insulting precisely because she was praising Iowa at the expense of Mississippi--using the latter state as the standard of backwardness. It does no good to say that Mississippi and Iowa both have opportunities with her candidacy. "How can Iowa be ranked with Mississippi?" She was flat-out slamming Mississippi.

Damn yankee. (And my apologies to nice yankees out there.)

Hillary pulls through

Well, I didn't expect this to happen last night: Clinton won both the Ohio and Texas primaries. The Democrats had both a primary (2/3 of the delegates) and a caucus (1/3) in Texas, and while Obama's ahead in the caucus delegates right now, they've not counted all of those, yet.

Now, I want McCain to win the general election, but I'm pulling for Hillary to get the Democratic nomination, since I think she'll be easier to beat. And I agree with Limbaugh's desire to see the Democrats stretch out their primary fight as long as possible. The longer they're beating up on each other, the less we need to do it. The best outcome would be a brokered convention, even. Besides causing more havoc on their side, it would simply be fun to watch. I haven't seen one of those in my lifetime.

Still, I wonder if an extended Democratic primary season is wholly good for our side. The longer their season goes on, the longer the press will be giving them the bulk of the attention. I've been listening to XM Radio's P. O. T. U. S. '08 channel, which is devoted to Presidential campain coverage, and the discussion is mostly about the Democrats, because they're the ones still debating amongst themselves. POTUS '08 has great coverage--I'm not complaining about them; it's inevitable the Democrats will attract more attention as long as there's an actual contest on their side.

Clinton on Clinton

So Hillary's campaign is having to back away from some of Bill's comments on her rivals. Interesting. I remember that Hillary was occasionally an albatross around Bill's neck during his campaigns, and they'd have to hide her for a few months until the election was over. I'm a little surprised that Bill is now the one making comments they've got to repudiate.

Well, maybe that's too strong a word. Folks on the conservative side had wondered how helpful Bill would be to her campaign, but for different reasons. Which would have the stronger effect on people--his charisma and personal popularity, or memories of his behavior and the scandals?

Now Bill's compared Hillary's rivals' criticisms of her "candor" (they noted that she's been contradicting herself, so which of her statements are we to believe?) to the Swift Boat Veterans' ads against John F. Kerry. I'd like to say that that's an outrageous comparison...because it insults the Swift Boat Vets, but really, both were honest criticisms.

The AP article I've linked to (via Drudge) says that the swift boat ads "questioned John Kerry's patriotism," but I don't remember that at all. They certainly reminded people of his wild and apparently baseless accusations of war crimes against his compatriots and of the way in which he puffed up his war record, maybe dishonestly (the ads flat out said much of it was a lie).

Now, that's still a tough criticism, and Hillary's opponents haven't been that hard on her. If her campaign, Bill included, is going to make out that she's beyond any criticism, that criticism is beyond the pale, they're going to have a tough time selling that to the public.

Still, back when she ran for the Senate, she was at her most popular when she played up her victim status, wasn't she?

The Clinton Tapes

Have you ever asked yourself, "What's in Bill Clinton's sock drawer"? Well, ask no more.

Are we back to the '90s?!

Should I really believe that the Clintons had a henchman break into Kathleen Willey's house to steal her book manuscript about the Clintons? I mean, would they really do something dirty like that?

Well, considering that I've heard similar stories coming from around them for a decade and a half, now, any surprise or resistance I'd naturally have to that kind of theory is pretty much broken down, now. Hmmm...actually, I don't remember if I ever had any resistance to that. But I sure don't now.

I'm trying, though, not to believe any crazy idea that puts the Clintons in a bad light, but to use some critical thinking about them. But this still seems plausible. And considering the threats made against Mrs. Willey back in the 90s, when she was providing testimony unflattering to the Clintons, I'd almost expect something like this.

Let's see if this story gets picked up, or if it's ignored.

Hillary's back onto the VRWC; Bush fires eight US Attorneys

Hillary Clinton has trotted out her dead horse, the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. This one is a little different from the old one. This was a case of Republican party employees in New Hampshire trying to mess up the Democrats' get-out-the-vote calls at the last election. They got convicted, thankfully. This sort of thing can't be tolerated from either side.

But perhaps we ought to think about Mrs. Clinton's previous conspiracy theory. She's pulling at straws to make any connection here with Republican opposition to Whitewater and her associated scandals—it was just a rhetorical trick when she used the VRWC term. But her cohorts, like the state Democratic Party Chairman, Kathy Sullivan, seem to be trying to make a real connection:

"People think we're paranoid when we talk about the vast, right-wing conspiracy, but there is a real connection of these groups - the same names keep popping up," Sullivan said.

Really? Was Richard Mellon Scaife funding these two guys? Did Ken Starr poke his head up? Yes, I do think you're paranoid, if you believe that Mrs. Clinton's original claim of a VRWC has anything to do with this.

But she probably doesn't. It's just a way of rousing up the Left.

But let's do make a connection with the events of this week. As you may know, President Bush fired eight U.S. Attorneys, which is his prerogative. Their performance was cited. Now, the Democrats have shouted, "Politics!" and launched a Congressional investigation of some kind. The eight who were fired were Democrats or appointed by Clinton. The performance issues apparently relate to their failure to investigate election fraud cases from the 2006 elections. There were a number of local cases of stolen ballots, voting by the dead and departed, improper voter registration practices, and so on. Some of these were in close elections, and yet these eight did little or nothing to follow up on such illegal acts allegedly done by their fellow Democrats.

Yes, there's apparently politics involved—these U.S. Attorneys appear to have been letting their political allegiances get in the way of their duties. Bush has every right to fire them, and while a President can abuse powers he legally has, this isn't a case of it.


Now, how does this connect to Mrs. Clinton? Do you remember the scandal that broke out around the U.S. Attorneys at the beginning of Mr. Clinton's first term? He fired them all. All 93! While he can do that, it was certainly unprecedented, and it left a number of active cases hanging. Shouldn't the damage to Justice have bothered Mr. Clinton? Well, there's one case in particular that Mr. Clinton was only too happy to see disrupted: Whitewater.

The U.S. Attorney looking into the Clintons' Whitewater scandal (I think it was W. Hickman Ewing, Jr., but I haven't been able to look this up) was fired with the rest, of course. It is widely thought by those of us on the Right that the blanket firing was a cover for getting rid of him and disrupting or stopping the investigation.

Now that was cause for scandal. But firing eight who weren't zealous in the pursuit of their duties? Come on.