Hillary’s Inevitability? Maybe Not!

Hillary’s Inevitability by Robert Novak Old pro Democrats who had been in awe of Sen. Hillary Clinton’s perfect campaign believe she made her first serious blunder last Monday by indicating to CBS’s Katie Couric that her election as president is inevitable.

When Couric inquired “how disappointed will you be” if she does not win, Clinton replied: “Well, it will be me.” “Clearly,” the CBS anchor persisted, “you have considered” the “possibility of losing”? “No, I haven’t,” said the senator. “So you never even consider the possibility?” “I don’t. I don’t.”

A footnote: Bill Clinton, campaigning for his wife in Iowa the next day, stunned Democratic insiders when he claimed he had opposed the Iraq war “from the beginning.” In fact, shortly after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the former president declared: “I supported the president [George W. Bush] when he asked the Congress for authority to stand up against weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.” 

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=23718

Clinton News Network Plants Questions for Hillary

The Save the Debate coalition — a group founded by conservative bloggers Patrick Ruffini, David All, Soren Dayton, and Robert Bluey which sought to encourage the GOP candidates to participate in the CNN/YouTube debate — issued a statement harshly criticizing CNN:“CNN’s flawed editorial process in choosing the questions asked of the candidates marred an otherwise lively debate and betrayed the trust of the Republican candidates and the YouTube user community. In the most glaring example, a questioner affiliated with the Hillary Clinton campaign was given a soapbox to berate the Republican candidates at the debate — when even a cursory web search of the individual would have revealed his clear conflict of interest.
A YouTube debate should strive to minimize the media filter rather than highlight it. Instead the selection of questions for the Republican CNN/YouTube debate highlighted CNN’s selection bias.
We strongly encourage YouTube and other new media platforms to refrain from working with CNN on future debates.” RedState‘s Directors also issued a harsh statement: “This debate was not about Republicans asking the Republican candidates questions. This was about CNN abusing its position to push a Democratic agenda. This has all the markings of a set up and heads should roll at CNN.In the meantime:1.) Republican candidates for President should boycott CNN.2) Republican viewers should boycott CNN until they fire Sam Feist, their political director; and David Bohrman, Senior Vice President and Executive Producer of the debate.3) One or more of the Republican candidates should demand a do over wherein we can have a substantive debate about substantive issues that exclude CNN’s agenda, which is clearly out of touch with the Republican party, and the drivel we saw from YouTube.” Michelle Malkin sees a double-standard: “Had GOP candidates somehow been able to insert their operatives and supporters into a Democratic debate, and had, say, Fox News failed to vet the questioners and presented them as average citizens, both Fox and the GOP would be treated as the century’s worst media sinners.”Hugh Hewitt: “CNN is of course going to the mattresses, just as every MSMer does when the collision with their own bias and/or incompetence arrives. But like Rathergate, the YouTube/BoobTube debate is already a major milestone in the accelerating collapse of credibility of the MSM.”Human Events‘ Jennifer Rubin: “Not that many years ago, CNN was known widely as the ‘Clinton News Network.’ They apparently want to renew their credentials — or expand their services to the entire Democratic Party. This debate placed CNN in the role of director of Democratic media operations. Simply put, it is propaganda to represent the questioners as unbiased and unaffiliated voters when they are not.”Other conservative bloggers think that people are overreacting:Townhall‘s Matt Lewis: “Although conservatives are rightly outraged by the biased questions, I also believe some of the consternation is overwrought…Bad questions sometimes tell us more about the candidates than good ones do. For example, we learned that Mike Huckabee can take a bad question and still make lemonade (if he can do it now, imagine what he could do to the press corps).”Captain’s Quarters‘ Ed Morrissey: “CNN’s main failure, and the only real ‘plant’, was General Keith Kerr. They didn’t just allow his question, they flew him to the debate, and then allowed him almost as much screen time as Duncan Hunter to make a speech. Kerr serves on Hillary Clinton’s steering committee on GLBT issues, a fact that he apparently failed to disclose to CNN, who didn’t bother to use Google and spend ten minutes vetting him…The other questioners had ulterior motives in asking their questions…[but] the questions themselves weren’t outrageous and certainly can be expected from the campaign trail, especially in the general election. In this loose format, questions can come from anyone — just like a real town-hall forum — and candidates should be prepared to answer them.”Power Line‘s Paul Mirengoff: “I watched the debate last night and frankly didn’t have a serious problem with CNN except with respect to Gen. Kerr. The fact that a questioner once interned for Rep. [Jane] Harman or for CAIR seems immaterial. The questions reflected a cross section of points of view, some liberal and some conservative, and it was helpful for Republican voters to see how the candidates dealt with them (I thought they did well).”Meanwhile, NRO‘s Ramesh Ponnuru thinks that the controversy over questioners benefits [Rudy] Giuliani: “I said that yesterday was a good day for Giuliani, appearances to the contrary notwithstanding. I think today is another one. The buzz among conservatives is about CNN’s perfidy — and not about his answers on abortion and guns. If I were Giuliani, I’d make sure to denounce CNN myself.”http://blogometer.nationaljournal.com/archives/2007/11/1130_the_least.html

Hillary & Huma – A Dan Rather Moment?

If Dan Rather had reported the Hillary & Huma lesbian lover affair, it would sound something like this, “The facts are false, but the story is true”, sort of like his story on Bush’s National Guard service.Is there a Democratic sex “scandal”–no matter how bogus–that Mickey Kaus won’t promote? Today he’s plugging (albeit in a somewhat passive aggressive fashion) the ridiculous rumor that Hillary Clinton is the lesbian lover of her aide Huma Abedin. Here’s my favorite bit of Kausian sophistry:Let’s assume what is likely to be the case–that the Huma rumor is a) unprovable if true and b) un-disprovable if untrue. Under the old rules that means it would never be proved and would probably never surface. If it did surface –say because it was the subject of vicious campaign push-polling–a simple denial by both parties and it would be semi-officially “false.” In the new Webby post-Lewinsky world it’s more likely to surface, which makes the subsequent denial all the more important. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not impossible to issue a denial so convincing that even gossip-addicted bloggers drop a juicy rumor. (Here’s an example.) The trouble for Hillary is that when it comes to sex rumors she and her husband (unlike, say, John Edwards and his wife) have no credibility. They threw that away when the philandering charges they righteously denounced in 1992 and 1998 turned out to be basically true. 

The Iowa Debate Fix Is In?? Will Hillary Deny??

As Saturday night’s Brown and Black Presidential Forum in Des Moines draws near, concerns have emerged about the way it is being organized. The forum, which is the oldest minority-focused presidential debate in the country, is one of the great traditions of the Iowa Caucuses, but local activists and campaigns have been frustrated by this year’s planning and execution.The core group helping to organize the forum has been shrunk from previous years, according to Des Moines Realtor and Latino activist Joe Henry, who was involved with the forum in its early years during the 1980s and became involved again during the 2000 election cycle. Henry, who supports Sen. Barack Obama, was not invited to participate in the planning this year.“It’s pretty evident at this point that both Wayne Ford and Mary Campos — both old friends of mine — have undoubtedly aligned themselves with the Clinton campaign,” he said, “and the smaller, the better, for that.” Campos and Ford, both respected and long-standing activists, founded the forum together in 1984 and continue to operate it as co-chairs. Ford also serves in the Iowa House.http://www.hillaryproject.com/index.php?/en/story-details/reports_accusations_that_clinton_campaign_has_fixed_upcoming_iowa_debate/