Patterico's Pontifications

Is this the part where we start making Baldwinesque declarations of intended emigration if that occurs?

My reasoning thus far is that she can’t make it because too many liberal men will not vote for her even if they agree with her politics and too many conservative women will not vote for her because they disagree with her politics. I can only hope it turns out that way.

Anwyn (01a5cc) — 6/1/2006 @ 7:16 pm

Is this the part where we start making Baldwinesque declarations of intended emigration if that occurs?

No. We’re not idiots.

Patterico (50c3cd) — 6/1/2006 @ 7:25 pm

Only if all the reports of how much she’s disliked by Democrats are a vast disinformation conspiracy. She’s not nearly radical enough for the Kossacks and their ilk to vote for her under any circumstances, and that could blow her chances.

Jim C. (d8e20a) — 6/1/2006 @ 7:26 pm

I think she is the only Democrat who will not have to take positions during the primary campaign that will cost her the general election. But the only way she will win the presidency is if McCain feels he has been cheated out of the GOP nomination and runs on a 3rd party ticket.

Stu707 (18fdc8) — 6/1/2006 @ 7:28 pm

Of course if it comes down to Hillary vs McCain many people probably wont even bother. It’s like having to decide if you prefer hanging or the chair.

Stephen Macklin (4ea65b) — 6/1/2006 @ 7:49 pm

Hillary will not gain a single state below the Mason-Dixon line, including Arkansas. She’s doomed, therefore I hope she gets the nomination.

Eric Lindholm (9c8e71) — 6/1/2006 @ 7:53 pm

I thought I heard rumblings of John McCain potentially running as a third party candidate. If that happens, Hillary wins. Not good.

Andy (6feefb) — 6/1/2006 @ 8:01 pm

Only if New York is the only state allowed to send electors to the electoral college.

Having said that, Stu707 makes a good point. Serendipity has been her ally in the past. Her Republican opponent could be a jerk who dumps his wife in public and then drops out of the race to have enough time to feel sorry for himself about his prostate cancer or some poor draftee forced to debate someone who is a bigger (if that’s possible) pathological liar than her husband.

nk (956ea1) — 6/1/2006 @ 8:04 pm

Maybe President of the Association of Shrewish Democrat Gasbag Senators. Sure, she will have stiff competition from Boxer, Durbin, Leahy, et al., but I have faith she can pull through.

JVW (d667c9) — 6/1/2006 @ 8:14 pm

Is this the part where we start making Baldwinesque declarations of intended emigration if that occurs?

No. We’re not idiots.

My comment was meant facetiously.

Anwyn (01a5cc) — 6/1/2006 @ 8:48 pm

Have you gone crazy Patterico? No one has more negatives than Hillary. I would vote for just about anyone over her. The thought of her as President makes me physically ill.

Lou P. (0294dc) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:01 pm

Hillary loses if the GOP splits in two, or if Markos endorses her.

heh.

Darleen (81f712) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:03 pm

I’m hoping she keeps people like Al Gonzales on in her cabinet.

He’s been great.

steve (f8c5a5) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:08 pm

My comment was meant facetiously.

I enjoy responding seriously to facetious comments from time to time. Keeps people on their toes.

Patterico (50c3cd) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:28 pm

She will have to deal with several issues that really haven’t been examined in the burning light of a presidential campaign, not the least of which is the resurfacing of Whitewater. And before you shout me down, read on.

The first time around, the investigation centered on illegalities committed; it what she did legally that is damning. What did she do?

Imagine that you purchase a house. You make mortgagae payments for years, but before it is paid off, you run into trouble, miss a few payments and the house is repossessed. Normally in this instance, after the loan company extracted their expenses, the equity you built up is returned to you.

But imagine there is fine print buried in the mortgage that says you don’t take legal possession of the house until the last payment is made. It also says if one payment is thirty days late, the house, the equity, everything belongs to the loan company–in other words, you lose everything if you run into any financial trouble even through no fault of your own. The loan company then turns around and sells it to the next buyer that comes along.

Mortgages with that provision are illegal in most states. But not in Arkansas before 1992.

That is how Hillary Clinton worked Whitewater. Was it legal? Yes. Was what she did unfair and morally wrong? It makes Ken Lay and the rest of the Enron convicts look like pikers. They only took peoples’ retirement plans; they didn’t take the money of teachers, firemen or police officers and throw them out of their homes.

Also consider that those burned had no recourse since Hillary was married to the state Attorney General and later to the Governor.

These acts were committed by the same woman who is now championing the cause of Joe Six-Pack; the same Joe Six-Pack that she stepped on while making a fortune in real estate. Think this stuff won’t be examined?

Just ask John Kerry about Vietnam.

Paul (c169e9) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:35 pm

The Republicans appear to be in disarray. A viable Hillary candidacy would unite and energize them.

aunursa (8a10a6) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:36 pm

Warner ’08.

Greg (51b069) — 6/1/2006 @ 9:39 pm

“Hillary will be elected President in 2008.”

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

clark smith (1a59ba) — 6/2/2006 @ 12:10 am

One woman; one vote. One time.

Len (ab9696) — 6/2/2006 @ 12:12 am

Aaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Veeshir (dfa2bf) — 6/2/2006 @ 4:04 am

I think it would be a wonderful thing for the Republicans. Four years of the Hildebeest would cleanse the party of all its ideological impurities, and then we’d go on winning election after election as pure conservatives.

I don’t really think that, of course, but do fear that too many of my fellow Repubs might.

Xrlq (061a15) — 6/2/2006 @ 4:05 am

I’ll have to agree with Veeshir on comment 20.

HD Wanderer (dc60da) — 6/2/2006 @ 5:19 am

With the usual caveat that it’s still early, and anything can happen, I think Hillary is by far the most likely person to be elected President in ’08.

And without getting too far into the debate with X (with whom I’ve had this argument many times), I think it’s hard to argue that a Hillary presidency wouldn’t be good for Republicans. Now, it’s also possible to argue that the negatives would outweigh that, but that’s a more nuanced argument.

Look at it this way: would we have anything resembling the current catastrophic immigration bill if we had a President Hillary (or President Kerry)? Not a chance: the Republicans in Congress would never let it happen without a Republican President pushing it.

Spoons (5d4c76) — 6/2/2006 @ 5:40 am

O.K. ….. I haven’t read all the comments in the thread (why start now Elmo!). But isn’t the Dear blog host trolling his own site? Sure, it felt a while back like the Shrill could do it. Call it vibrations in the ether. But between her spoken words against our leaders/country, as relates the war, while standing on foreign soil.

And her transparent two faced effort to appear/reinvent herself as a hawk. It just ain’t gunna happen. A winning majority of voting Americans are not That stupid. I know, there is whole lotta evidence to the contrary. But to quote everyone’s favorite Whamster:

‘Cause I gotta have faith…
Mmm, I gotta have faith
‘Cause I gotta have faith, faith,
Mm ’cause I gotta have faith-a-faith-a-faith

Elmo (04aa1a) — 6/2/2006 @ 6:05 am

Say it ain’t so Joe!

Mike Myers (3a4363) — 6/2/2006 @ 6:14 am

Don’t buy any lottery tickets and if you place any bets on sports teams, let us know so we can bet the opposing team.

Ain’t.Gonna.Happen

RLS (0516f0) — 6/2/2006 @ 6:44 am

Not a hope in hell, unless it’s Hillary vs. Jeb, in which case who knows. Bush may be the uniter or the decider or whatever, but Hillary is the Polarizer.

Bobby (194852) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:00 am

To me it is simple.
I keep hearing, “She doesn’t stand a chance.”
I heard that about Bill. TWICE!

Paul Albers (8a5011) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:05 am

Bush may be the uniter or the decider or whatever, but Hillary is the Polarizer.

But she’s a CENTRIST! And she’s HARD TO DEFINE!

Patterico (50c3cd) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:07 am

Hillary’s chances have been improved since it looks like Frist needs a paddle for the creek he’s in.

This Federal Government fish is rotten from the head on down, and it really STINKS.

Earlier today [Published: Thursday June 1, 2006], Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) received notice from the Federal Election Commission (FEC) indicating that in response to a complaint filed by CREW, the FEC found that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s 2000 Senate campaign committee, Frist 2000, Inc. violated federal campaign finance laws, RAW STORY can report. …
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/FEC_finds_Frist_violated_law_by_0601.html

Psyberian (dd13d6) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:11 am

Three words, Patterico:

Hillary. Health. Care.

Any cursory examination of her socialistic mid-90s plan would be a national career-ender.

Otherwise the idea that the public would go for the following succession is mind-boggling:
Bush-Clinton-Clinton-Bush-Bush-Clinton

Really, aren’t there any other people in politics…?

Feingold has a better chance. Either way look for Obama as the VP candidate.

If Bush does the right thing and secures the border, look for another republican administration.

Kathy (c02b80) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:16 am

I disagree. Her negatives are too high, and her transparent attempts to shape herself as a “moderate” fall flat. With Hillary you either love or hate her there is no middle ground. If you thought the Dean Scream was a killer, wait till the commercials come out with her shrill harpy voice ranting about the evils of “rethuglicans” start playing.

Every man who has ever been divorced will refuse to vote for her, because she will remind them of that nagging bitch that stole half their money and screwed them out of their best years.

Gabriel Chapman (6d7447) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:33 am

When’s the last time a Senator won POTUS? Do you really think she’s got enough mojo to buck that trend?

Darkmage (c20107) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:41 am

Could Bill Clinton have been elected had the Internet been around in ’92? I don’t think it will be Hillary because the relative power of the MSM will have declined still further in a couple of years and it will be harder to protect her. Has she ever had to answer questions other than softballs by a sympathetic press? Her ex tempore moments have been uniformly ugly. Won’t there be more of these as she becomes the entire focus of the news media?

Morowbie Jukes (0dfa66) — 6/2/2006 @ 9:01 am

Psyberian wrote:

Hillary’s chances have been improved since it looks like Frist needs a paddle for the creek he’s in.

This Federal Government fish is rotten from the head on down, and it really STINKS.

I’m not sure how that necessarily helps Hillary. If anything, it reminds everyone of her own campaign funding problems. Since Psy linked to a left-wing site for the news on Frist (even though it was adequately covered in the LA Times today), I’ll link to a right-wing site for news on Hillary: http://newsbusters.org/node/2065

JVW (d667c9) — 6/2/2006 @ 9:22 am

My two cents worth:

Hillary won’t win a presidential election, she would only take the largest states with the exception of Florida (Elian Gonzalez, anyone?) but the combination of smaller states and Florida would tip the election to her opponent. In fact, no democrat other than Lieberman would win the election, ether for president or vice president. Hillary could be VP, but only with Lieberman as her running mate.

Edwards/Clinton could win the primaries and would look good in the polls, but like in most elections the polls would be wrong.

The democrat’s best hope for an all-democratic ticket would be a Lieberman/Edwards ticket, but we all know that the fringe will never allow Lieberman on any presidential ticket. Even if the democrats ran with this ticket, the republicans only have to run Giuliani for president and the democrats would loose.

These are the only two scenarios that I can think of that would get a democrat back in the Whitehouse:

Giuliani /Lieberman would win in a landslide, taking all 50 states (but not D.C.) with the largest popular vote in history even though the party loyalists would be screaming “turncoat” and “traitor” about both men.

McCain/Lieberman would win, but it would be a very ugly race with lots of “disenfranchised” voters screaming fraud from both parties even before any votes were counted. A Supreme Court challenge would ensue.

In any case, it will be a Republican President in 2008.

That’s my two cents worth. You get a lot for two cents!

Ray (be81f9) — 6/2/2006 @ 9:34 am

Anwyn asked:

Is this the part where we start making Baldwinesque declarations of intended emigration if that occurs?

Emigration won’t be necessary, since she’d destroy the country in which we already live.

Dana (3e4784) — 6/2/2006 @ 1:24 pm

Two things would be required. An extremely weak republican candidate and extraordinarily widespread voter fraud. Unfortunately, both seem possible.

Doug Book (8585ea) — 6/2/2006 @ 1:43 pm

Clinton will win all the states that Kerry won in addition to New Mexico (5-think Bill Richardson) and Ohio (20) due to the black vote and the scandals involving the R party. Remember Bush barely won there and there is a good chance that they will have a D govenor as of this year. The press will do everything in their power to put her over the top and will ignore (even more so than they did with Kerry) any “old” scandals or issues. JUst wait and see.

btorrez (bbda7f) — 6/2/2006 @ 2:20 pm

Hillary won’t win if McCain is the Republican nominee. Of course, she would beat Frist like a drum in the event that the Republican party decides it wants as its nominee someone who’s already been pegged as a “weak leader.”

As much as I detest some of McCain’s positions (especially the abominable McCain-Feingold Free Speech Impairment and Incumbent Protection Act), a Hillary-McCain presidential contest holds much potential for restoring some dignity (or at least the appearance of it) to the process of presidential political campaigning.

Hillary has improved as a politician. I say that not because she’s now viewed as a centrist by all but those elephants with the longest memories (that’s not saying much — being a centrist in a party that prefers Nancy Pelosi to Steny Hoyer and Harry Reid to former VP nominee Joe Lieberman — well, you get the picture), but because she has learned not to step in the dog-turds that are the positions and statements of most of the rest of her party. She’s playing to win in the general election, while the rest of her party is sucking up to a radical fringe base. That means she’s not going to bring up the sexual orientation of the opposing party’s nominee, for example, nor will she obviously (and un-presidentially) jump on board a forgery-based campaign to smear her opponent. She’s likely to stick to discussions of issues where her positions (or at least her rhetoric) have been stronger than her opponent’s — that probably will include illegal immigration, btw. Importantly, unlike every other likely Dem candidate, her national security positions aren’t a glaring weakness. McCain, for his part, will probably understand that his strength is his appeal to the center and, to some extent, to the centrists in the other party, so he’s not likely to play to the base to the extent it requires giving up his biggest edge, and that’s what going negative will mean for him.

McCain also represents the Republicans’ best hope to neutralize the blatant Democrat partisanship of most of the MSM, which to a great degree is just unacknowledged Bush Derangement Syndrome (the MSM will never forgive W for being the nominee who benefitted from the thwarting of the 2000-hanging chad-military-absentee-ballot-trashing-election-stealing-effort, thereby denying the US a president capable of outsmarting himself into supporting the Kyoto economic stagnation treaty). Although it’s largely unfair, our centrist, traditional Liberal president (W’s foreign policy resembles JFK’s more than Ronald Reagan’s, and his federal government-expanding domestic policies seek to accomplish traditionally Liberal objectives by means intended to be palatable to self-described conservatives) is a lightning rod for the hatred of self-described liberals whose policy preferences bear little resemblance to anything that might be called Liberal, except in the sense of the word as an empty label. A McCain candidacy won’t draw the same vitriol, at least not from any source that matters (sure, the Nation-istas and the Kossacks will hate his guts, but who cares? — the Washington Post will be in his corner and the NYTimes will be mildly critical of him, as will the Washington Times, for that matter).

So, I’d say that a McCain-Hillary race would would be interesting, but I’d be lying. It’ll probably be boring – issue-based politics without gross oversimplification and distortion. In other words, a race unlike anything the Dems, other than Hillary, are prepared for. It’s probably just what we need.

TNugent (6128b4) — 6/2/2006 @ 2:23 pm

She is going to get a lot of votes based on nothing more than her gender and that she is a Democrat.

She is dangerous. That is why we must be sure that any powers we give to the government today are ones that we don’t mind Hillary having tomorrow. Scary, huh.

Huey (81c03e) — 6/2/2006 @ 4:44 pm

I’m not sure which I find more insulting: the idea that people would vote against Hillary because she’s a woman or the people who would vote for her for the same reason.

sharon (fecb65) — 6/2/2006 @ 6:16 pm

If she puts Obama on the ticket with her,
she may and probably will win no matter who we put up against them. Most blacks and Democrats
think Hillary and Obama are the best thing since…well, Bill and Hillary!
If you think spending is bad now, wait until those two get in. Reach for your pocketbooks.
IF that happens, we will have elected two Socialists (I’m not kidding on that comment) for the two highest offices in the land. As Dylan says at the end of his song Cat’s In The Well,
“Good night, my God have mercy on us all.”

tomk (6dc308) — 6/2/2006 @ 6:54 pm

I think Hillary is likely to be faced with an interesting choice. If she runs and wins she will be, of course, right where she wants to be. But Hillary has a tin ear for the Public, the arrogance of a Bourbon, and she won’t be running against Bush (something I sometimes think her Liberal fans tend to forget). If she runs for the Presidency, wins the nomination, and then loses the general election she will be just another Democrat failure; a female Walter Mondale. But if she loses the primary and then the Democrats lose the general election, she could easily rest on her laurels as The Great Might Have Been for the rest of her unnatural existence.

I doubts she really wants to get a job at her time of life.

The Democrats’ chances in ’08 depend on a number of things. They could win IF:

1) The Republicans don’t straighten themselves out in the next two years.

2) The Radical Left, which serves as her base, does not throw off one or two ‘third party’ candidates to split the vote. This is entirely possible; these people value doctrinal purity far more than political sense.

3) The Radical Left (her base) doesn’t get caught out in a number of unwise connections with active terrorists. I don’t think it makes me a conspiracy theorist to suggest that this is all too possible. The Left has a fascination for violent thugs, and historically hasn’t been any too cautious in cozying up to them. I half think that this is the real reason behind the hysteria over Bush’s ‘domestic spying’; that some of the more sensible folks on the Left are at least dimly aware that connections that looked very chic BEFORE 9/11, look very bad after.

4) The Iranians don’t do something unusually stupid.

5) Her husband doesn’t let his ego loose during her campaign.

6) The mainstream media doesn’t get caught in another Rathergate scandal. Personally I wouldn’t bet a plugged nickel that they won’t, in both 2006 AND 2008. They haven’t learned a damned thing from the first one.

I shall be watching Hillary with some interest. I don’t think she’s ‘the smartest woman in the world’, but she does have a certain animal cunning. i really think that if she doesn’t like the odds for the general election, she might throw the primary to a ‘moderate’.

I also think that her best chance of getting elected would be if Bill was ‘assassinated’. Seeing how ambitious she is – and considering how much she has to pay him back for – if I were Bill I’d live the next three years in a bunker.

C. S. P. Schofield (c1cf21) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:22 pm

Isn’t there something in the constitution that forbids a president with cankles?

Old Coot (caf903) — 6/2/2006 @ 7:35 pm

hillary will never be president. too many people hate her for one thing or another. some voters of both genders and parties resent strong women/strident bitches. there are the people who hated both clintons from day one, and she doesn’t have the genial, ingratiating bubba aura. there are the people who didn’t like her trying to redesign our healthcare system in secret, didn’t like her embracing yasser arafat’s wife on camera, didn’t like her blaming her husband’s trouble on a “vast, right-wing conspiracy.” too many negatives. the demos need to bring a fresh face in here. no lieberman (i sure don’t want a whiny moralist whose voice sounds like a eunuch). somebody i’ve never heard of before.

assistant devil's advocate (8f35fb) — 6/2/2006 @ 9:08 pm

But how will she treat the White House interns? That’s the burning question.

sharon (fecb65) — 6/3/2006 @ 5:43 am

Superbly, I’m sure. She’ll offer the second most ethical administration in history.

Xrlq (f8b526) — 6/3/2006 @ 10:15 am

All I want to hear is what red states will all of a sudden go blue for her. The only possibility I can think of is New Mexico, and that would still not be enough for the old bag to win.

Brian (c8e1da) — 6/4/2006 @ 12:20 pm

There is only one way this pathological liar can win the Presidency and that is if Nixon comes back from the dead and runs against her. On second thought Nixon will win.

Sal (14c93a) — 7/1/2006 @ 9:23 pm

6/1/2006

Prediction

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