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Tag(s): Assassination; Barack Obama; Bitter; Catholic; Hillary Clinton; Hillary Clinton; McCain-John; McCain-John; Nazism; Obama-Barack; (more...) Policy; Politics; Scandal; Surrogates (less...)
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May 25, 2008 at 01:17:34

What Hillary's Kennedy Assassination Misstatement Really Means

by Steven Leser Page 1 of 1 page(s)

www.opednews.com

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Let’s dispense with the silly stuff straight away. Hillary Clinton did not intend to suggest she was staying in the race just in case Obama was assassinated. Of course, just mentioning the assassination of RFK or any other popular figure in the context of staying in the race is creepy, and the timing as far as current unfortunate news for the Kennedy family is about as bad as it gets but we can give Hillary a pass on all of that. What is really going to do in Senator Clinton, and John McCain is the fact that they gave their stamp of approval for the use of gotcha politics and guilt by association and other sleazy tactics in this current race for the White House.

Both Hillary Clinton and John McCain have a lot more skeletons in their closet than Barack Obama. Both have said and continue to say more silly or crazy things than Obama does/has. Both Hillary and McCain have more serious personal issues than Obama has. Hillary has a serial problem with the truth and that is about as nice as I can put it, while McCain has a temper like a super volcano and his outbursts remind me of descriptions of the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa (the island volcano blew itself apart and in so doing generated the loudest sound in historical record, reportedly being heard over 3000 miles away). Their big hope against Barack was to keep the race focused on the issues and perhaps finesse him on some of the finer points of policymaking. Since both McCain and Hillary have championed policies or made votes that turned out to be unmitigated disasters, they would lose that kind of a race too, but they had a better chance of keeping it from being a complete blowout if they focused on the issues.

That is not what Hillary and McCain have chosen to do. They have fed the media a diet of scandal and innuendo and kept feeding it to the point where it has become a monster that will consume them both. Hillary and her campaign knew better about Obama’s bitter statement. They know he did not mean what Hillary and her surrogates told voters in West Virginia and Pennsylvania as well as other places. Now, this assassination misstatement is going to be an ugly epilogue (some might say epitaph) to one of the worst managed Presidential campaigns in history. McCain and his campaign knew very well that having a crazy pastor around doesn’t reflect at all who Barack Obama is. Now, McCain has a pastor that has demonized Catholics and made inflammatory remarks regarding Nazism being part of God’s plan for Jews and the press is just starting to go over the public record of his temper tantrums. Hillary has been hoisted by her own petard and McCain will enjoy the same fate.

The worst part about gotcha politics and guilt by association is that for however many news cycles one of those incidents dominates the news, the public loses that time to get to know how the candidates would govern. Any politician, group or ordinary person that tries to get the press to spend time on these distractions is doing the entire country a huge disservice. Whether Al Gore did or didn’t invent the internet, how Michael Dukakis looked in a tank and whether George H. W. Bush looked at his watch during a debate did not contribute to better decision-making by voters, just the opposite. It is an insult to the voters’ intelligence and a waste of their time. Voters should not forget how much of an insult this is. Voters should also remember that when one candidate uses these tactics against another it means that the attacking candidate believes they cannot win on the issues and their policy proposals.

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9 comments

Award winning poet, writer and refugee from the educational testing industry. Richard agitates, supports and motivates activists of all kinds, the most well-known being Cindy Sheehan. Web developer and designer by day, writer by night, Richard has the disposition of an observer and essayist. Richard has fallen in love, one day at a time, with the writing of Raymond Carver, while sparring, verbally, with the flying monkey right since 1998. Richard built his first computer from scratch in 1977...

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Richard VolaarAward winning poet, writer and refugee from the educational testing industry. Richard agitates, supports and motivates activists of all kinds, the most well-known being Cindy Sheehan. Web developer and designer by day, writer by night, Richard has the disposition of an observer and essayist. Richard has fallen in love, one day at a time, with the writing of Raymond Carver, while sparring, verbally, with the flying monkey right since 1998. Richard built his first computer from scratch in 1977...

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Sorry, Steven...

...if you listen closely to the videotaped play-by-play of JFK's trip to and through Dallas on November 22, 1963, you will hear all sorts of references to assassination and the assassinations of former Presidents of the US.

This is psyop-level stuff designed to create a context that makes accepting the assassination of Barak Obama less shocking and, therefore, less likely to cause a mass uprising among the population at large.

This is stuff the Nazis figured out about mass media and the managing of mass traumatization long before you were even born.

It's basically simple, though. If I am standing in a group of people and I just poke a person in the nose without warning, they're much more likely to retaliate in kind than if I tell them, up front, that I'm going to poke one of them, specifically, in the nose. But, in the end, it's not about how any one individual responds, but how the whole group responds, to an attack on one of their members.

Repeatedly telling a group of people that you're going to attack them in a very specific manner makes the act more acceptable to the group as a whole than if you just attack them outright.

By jumping out in front of the psyop, Hillary is accomplishing two things. One, she is broadcasting the fact that she knows the event is in its planning stages to the power brokers throughout the country; her acceptance of its inevitability with an almost nonchalant disregard for the horror of speaking of such an event in the first place is psychologically abusive. Especially towards the Kennedy and Obama families.

Two, she is setting up the pretext through which a third party candidacy becomes explicable for her. Certainly there is no VP possibility now, and there will be no cabinet post, either. An ambassadorship to Senegal or Sri Lanka is not out of the question, but that's about it.

By being so crass, morose and abusive as to bring the topic of assassination up at this point in time she is signally people like Scaife, the Hunt brothers and the whole neoconservative intelligence establishment that she is a "player." She will either get the funding now, or they will let her candidacy die a natural death. She is banking on the racism of the elitists, plain and simple.

by Richard Volaar (20 articles, 0 quicklinks, 78 diaries, 246 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 2:27:30 AM

Steven Leser specializes in Politics, Science & Health, and Entertainment topics. He has held positions within the Democratic Party including District Chair and Public Relations Chair within county organizations.

Steven Leser writes for www.opednews.com, an internet only media site that has grown to become one of the highest traffic news sites in America, reaching more traffic, according to alexa.com, than all but the thirty largest daily newspapers in the US. Mr. Leser is one of t...

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Steven LeserSteven Leser specializes in Politics, Science & Health, and Entertainment topics. He has held positions within the Democratic Party including District Chair and Public Relations Chair within county organizations.

Steven Leser writes for www.opednews.com, an internet only media site that has grown to become one of the highest traffic news sites in America, reaching more traffic, according to alexa.com, than all but the thirty largest daily newspapers in the US. Mr. Leser is one of t...

to see more of bio, click on member name

No, this is not psyop stuff.

I've known people in various intelligence capacities. When I was in the USAF, I had an acquaintance in Air Force Intelligence. I also knew a guy high up in the National Guard's intelligence arm. From talking to those kinds of people, as well as reading descriptions available on the internet of past acknowledged intelligence missions by various organizations, I can confidently conclude that what Hillary said is not part of any organized intelligence campaign.

In fact, the whole bruhaha is decidedly the result of a lack of ANY kind of intelligence used in making the comment.

by Steven Leser (209 articles, 44 quicklinks, 32 diaries, 1367 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 9:40:58 AM

Gregg Gordon is a writer, musician, activist, and otherwise ne'er-do-well in Columbus, Ohio.

"Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little." - Edmund Burke
Gregg GordonGregg Gordon is a writer, musician, activist, and otherwise ne'er-do-well in Columbus, Ohio.

"Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little." - Edmund Burke

Senegal and Sri Lanka are non-starters

Slovenia maybe. Some country with hard-working white people.

by Gregg Gordon (26 articles, 47 quicklinks, 15 diaries, 199 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 7:01:53 PM

Retired university professor.
francineRetired university professor.

what it really means...

Hillary is hoping against all hope that an unexpected event will rescue her nomination; she might not consciously wish for Obama's assassination, but a part of her must have envisioned this possibility--as a miraculous solution to her problem. And who hasn't? Unfortunately, assassination of progressive leaders is as American as apple pie, racism remains virulent in a (small?) part of the American population, and the risks run by a black/progressive presidential candidate are therefore distinctly higher.

Her gaffe is a classic Freudian slip. it reveals her cynicism, it shows she is desperate and ready to do anything to get what she wants. The Clinton motto has always been : ''whatever it takes''...

by francine (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 326 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 3:33:35 AM

That is plausible...

... but unproveable. Unless we get her on the couch with a competent psychiatrist or psychologist and she is willing to be completely truthful about her feelings.

by Steven Leser (209 articles, 44 quicklinks, 32 diaries, 1367 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 9:42:23 AM

Midwesterner, veteran of VietNam era naval service, I still feel an obligation to defend the Constitution against "all enemies, foreign and domestic."
John Sanchez Jr.Midwesterner, veteran of VietNam era naval service, I still feel an obligation to defend the Constitution against "all enemies, foreign and domestic."

With Hillary "tired" enough to make these "misstatements"...

you may get her on the couch, but I submit that to get her to be entirely truthful is beyond the capacity of any force in this universe.

by John Sanchez Jr. (5 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 1155 comments) on Monday, May 26, 2008 at 7:46:44 AM

I am a college graduate, a loyal patriot of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, a person whose convictions and pessimism drive my thought invoking others to think, and enjoy some politcal debate. I like truth even if it doesn't set you "free" in this US of A any longer. I am a liberal.
I do a bit of painting mostly in Acrylic. I do a bit of poetry writng mostly inspired by tragic thought. I do a ton of reading, mostly online. I speak straightforwardly and don't plan on changing. It's wor...

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shirley reeseI am a college graduate, a loyal patriot of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, a person whose convictions and pessimism drive my thought invoking others to think, and enjoy some politcal debate. I like truth even if it doesn't set you "free" in this US of A any longer. I am a liberal.
I do a bit of painting mostly in Acrylic. I do a bit of poetry writng mostly inspired by tragic thought. I do a ton of reading, mostly online. I speak straightforwardly and don't plan on changing. It's wor...

to see more of bio, click on member name

lipstick on a pig

I disagree with you Steven. She said it in Indiana, California and South Dakota. You don't "slip up" 3 X's. Besides, the Clintons are notorious for all the dead ppl around them. Here's a list of some.......

Here is a list of DEAD CLINTON BODYGUARDS: Maj. Gen. William Robertson,Deputy Commanding General, V Corps, Europe. Col William Densberger,V Corps Chief of Operations and Plan. Col. Robert Kelly,V Corps Chief of Intelligence. Spec. Gary Rhodes, Crew Chief died: 2/23/93 - All were killed when their Army UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter crashed in Wiesbaden, Germany. No cause was ever determined. - V Corps figured prominently in the US Bosnia-Serbia peacekeeping operations, along with the carrier Roosevelt. These men, and 8 others associated with Clinton's visit to the Roosevelt all died within 4 months of each other. *** Steve Willis, Clinton bodyguard Robert Williams, Clinton bodyguard Conway LeBleu, Clinton bodyguard Todd McKeehan, Clinton bodyguard died: 2/28/93 - "executed" by gunfire in the Waco, Texas assault on the Branch Davidians. - All four were examined by a "private doctor" and died from nearly identical wounds to the left temple, so-called execution style. According to Linda Thompson, videotapes and other evidence indicates that none died from guns fired by Branch Davidians. In his address to employees of the Treasury Department in the Cash Room on March 18, 1993, Clinton said: "My prayers and I'm sure yours are still with the families of all four of the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents who were killed in WACO *** Todd McKeehan and Conway Le Bleu of New Orleans; Steve Willis of Houston, and Robert Williams from my hometown of Little Rock. Three of those four were assigned to my security during the course of the primary or general election." However, the Little Rock, Arkansas office of the ATF confirmed that all four had at one point been bodyguards for Bill Clinton, three while he was campaigning for President, and while he had been governor of Arkansas. In the videotape by the American Justice Federation, "WACO II, the Big Lie Continues," Linda Thompson demonstrates that 15 shots were fired from six separate weapons into and out of a room into which three of the four agents had entered through a window. Four of these shots were fired from an overhead helicopter, an agent outside the window, firing an MP5 submachine gun, who also threw in a concussion grenade, fired at least two shots into the room. In the autopsies of these agents, three had virtually identical wounds to the left temple that exited through the rear of the head, execution-style. A "private physician" treated all four. ***Alan G. Whicher Oversaw Clinton's Secret Service detail. In October 1994 Whicher was transferred to the Secret Service field office in the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City. Whatever warning was given to the BATF agents in that building did not reach Alan Whicher, whom died in the bomb blast of April 19th 1995. *** Cpl Eric S. Fox. Died 3/22/99. Crewman for Marine One, the Presidential Helicopter. Shot in the head, and declared a suicide. *** Five Navy aviators, Clinton bodyguards/escorts (names not determined) died: 3/26/93 - all died in a crash of an E-2C Hawkeye in Italy. The crash occurred shortly after the plane was "waved off" from a landing attempt on the Carrier Roosevelt, due to a "foul deck". - All five men had been Clinton's escorts during Clinton's visit to the Roosevelt 2 weeks prior. Three other men, who had flown Clinton to the Roosevelt for that visit also died later in a helicopter crash. *** A more complete list of "Arkancides" is available at - www.whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/BODIES.html

by shirley reese (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 308 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 12:30:44 PM

Richard Mynick is a US citizen who, despite the best efforts of the corporate media, noticed something disturbing about how the 2000 election was decided, & felt it augured poorly for democracy.
Richard MynickRichard Mynick is a US citizen who, despite the best efforts of the corporate media, noticed something disturbing about how the 2000 election was decided, & felt it augured poorly for democracy.

I agree that it was an attempt to make the contest be about

something other than policy & ideas. On the other hand, American political campaigns are almost never about policy & ideas. They're image competitions, like advertising, in which each camp vies to create a largely mythical & subjective lens for viewing their candidate.

My guess is that Hillary was deliberately trying to encourage subjective feelings that would lurk in the back of people's minds, hoping this might come to influence their decisions in some quasi-subliminal way. She was "planting seeds of doubt (or hesitation)," rather than trying to score a rational or well-defined objective point. It was an appeal to emotional rather than to rational processes.

by Richard Mynick (2 articles, 3 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1162 comments) on Sunday, May 25, 2008 at 1:04:32 PM

I live in the capital city of a major blue state.
MaxwellI live in the capital city of a major blue state.

Clear to me what she meant

When I finally read the quote within a meaningful context it was pretty clear what she meant. But I couldn't help feeling some Schadenfreud at how bad this sounded. I'm no Hillary hater, but I would rather not see her on the ticket.

The issues? Simple, I cannot abide her "triangulation" on the Iraq invasion. I would prefer almost anyone who didn't do that over someone who did. At least Edwards apologized for it later. Call it a single issue if you will, but I don't consider the willingness to stand up against something that is clearly wrong to be of minor importance.

by Maxwell (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 235 comments) on Tuesday, May 27, 2008 at 9:08:40 AM