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Bill Clinton Is Right
On the “Late Show” last night, host Stephen Colbert asked The Big Dog why Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump have proven so popular on the campaign trail.
I’ve never been accused of being a Bill Clinton fan, but is analysis sounds right on the money. Do you agree?
(PS: Wow, does Bill look and sound old these days.)
Published in Entertainment
Yes, politics is a pretty simple thing.
For all of his baggage, Clinton has always shown a shrewd understanding of the electorate.
You know what they say about a stopped clock. Even one disassembled and placed in a pencil box.
Seawriter
He’s a political genius.
Regarding your P.S. – No kidding.
Living with Hilary will do that to a man.
Bill’s response was so quick and so coherent, I assume these were prepared talking points (that reinforce the Dem mythos) and the questions were pre-arranged with Colbert. Political performance art. Does not mean untrue, of course, just emphasizes reasons useful to the left: Life is unfair, there are political solutions, Republicans don’t get things done, the Left emphasis is just a mirror of the Right extremism.
He’s spot on I think.
He looks worn out.
Or, Bill is just the most naturally gifted politician since Reagan.
He looks a lot older than I remember.
Nothing about Sanders benefitting from dissatisfaction with Clinton-Obama crony capitalism.
All topics are prearranged on talk shows. That’s how they work. Producers conduct pre-interviews with the guests. (Though in Bill’s case, the pre-interview was probably conducted between a producer and one of Bill’s minions.)
Yes. I do agree. Bill Clinton answered honestly and cogently for a change.
I say that to my mirror every morning.
Dead on. Regardless of what one thinks of Bill, the man is the best politician of the last 50 years or so. I saw him give a commencement address once (Syracuse, my brother went there) and even when he was ‘mailing it in’ he had the whole audience in his palm. I’m not a big fan of the guy, but I’d love to sit with him for a few hours and just chat and pick his brain.
He’s a country boy who’s done too many miles of city driving.
(If you know what I mean and I think you do.)
To talk about Trump’s success and not even mention the immigration issue is to totally miss the point. The Republican Party has painted itself into the Chamber of Commerce corner and the wily Trump took advantage of that. With competition on that issue he would be gone already. He was made and puffed up by those that don’t wish to discuss immigration. That is the establishment who pulls in big money to be pro-immigration and libertarians who only have a theoretical understanding of what a country is. I don’t see any way out of this. It will have one redeeming effect and that is there will be more discretionary time around elections for conservatives and libertarians. The irrelevant don’t need to work so hard.
A.B. H. – Anyone But Hillary
I’m at work so I didn’t watch the video, but is that not what he said?
Jon,
Didn’t he leave out the part where HRC is guilty of 4 Federal Felonies, has perjured herself before Congress and he & Hillary are guilty of a massive multi-billion dollar fraudulent scheme using their phony charity.
Funny how he skipped over that part.
Regards,
Jim
Possible, but I would also guess that he gets asked that question a lot, so he’s had some practice.
It’d do you no good at all. You’d hear a lot that sounded perceptive, and you’d rightly gather there’s a quick and intelligent mind behind it. You’d never be able to integrate any of what you heard, however, let alone make use of it.
Bill Clinton is a sociopath. Only another sociopath would possess the background and capabilities to benefit from such a conversation. Ironically, sociopathy tends to generate narcissism, a real roadblock for one sociopath attempting learn from another. Don’t feel good about that, tho’ – the double irony is that they don’t need to learn from each other. The special capabilities of social perception and manipulation that catch your attention, Michael, are not transmitted. Each sociopath develops them independently – and none of us with functioning amygdalae will ever do that one tenth as well as ol’ Slick.
Jon,
Gosh I don’t want to rain on Bubba’s parade (not much) but it looks like HRC’s silver cloud has a very dark lining.
FBI EXAMINING ONLINE ‘CLOUD’ BACKUPS OF HILLARY CLINTON’S EMAIL
I’ve looked at Clouds that way.
It’s life’s illusions that I recall.
Regards,
Jim
Yes, all the conservative columnists and Republican politicians studiously avoid this subject. It blows my mind. This is why what Trump has done is a kind of a hostile takeover but the company is controlled by people who won’t discuss anything but what Trump says rather than what he has done in this election season. He’s made fools of them.
It is definitely done intentionally. They don’t see any good that can come from the immigration issue for the Republicans (they are wrong, of course) and so, they change to subject. Krauthammer, Lowry, Will, almost every one on our side.
It’s interesting to hear Rob Long’s comments in his explanation about how upset we all are. Rob understands what’s going on better than most. But, he always seems to want to introduce the subject in an apologetic tone.
So simple a house cat can ace the predictions.
An aside:
Years ago, after the Lewinsky scandal but while Clinton was still in office, my wife and I were sitting on the couch. Clinton was on the TV talking about who knows what. My wife had leaned liberal back in those days, but I remember her saying to me: “I don’t think I’m a Democrat any more, and it’s because of Bill Clinton.” It wasn’t really because of Bill Clinton, it was because all of the people she knew who were on the left of things rallied to Clinton’s defense, in spite of his moral failings. She had come from a family in which men had used women, and she hated it. She hated seeing the moral decay on display, and the blase attitude toward it on the left.
I bring this up because even now, watching Clinton speak, I feel like I’m watching Kaa from The Jungle Book. He’s rocking back and forth, and the circles are coming out of his eyes, and I’m nodding my head and agreeing that “these are not the droids I’m looking for.” It’s bizarre.
I don’t agree with Bill Clinton’s analysis re Bernie Sanders. I think that the main reason for his support is Hillary’s unpopularity, especially in light of the email scandal. At the moment, Sanders is capturing the bulk of Dems who prefer “anyone but Hillary.”
Going only based on the folks that I know who are on the left: it’s a bit of both. They would support Hillary if they had to, but they are glad there is an alternate, and yes, a lot of folks want an outsider, on both sides of the aisle.
I never felt the power. I thought while watching that he was probably mostly right about Sanders on both points: the mob’s anger based on their relative lot, and the elites’ anger based on success of their foes.
Bubba was well off the main axis of truth regarding Trump, however, assigning his success solely to his show of disregard for manners and his familiar claims of competence.
I didn’t hear the wrap-up joke clearly, I was wondering about Slick’s motivation for that particular line. I think he wanted to avoid Trump’s substantive positions, probably especially immigration. Also, this venue was important enough that Slick wasn’t experimenting, he’d settled on a line of insinuation.
Ok, my point is the only challenge to my perception and thought under Clinton’s spell is repulsion. Long speech, short speech, TV, live, doesn’t matter. I see this guy and say “Listen carefully” since the first time I saw him. (Presidential debate with Bush and Perot. He stepped away from his podium, spread his hands, and intoned “America wants change.” Every boogieman detector in my skull screamed “Liar!“)
How does it work? How does he have the effect you describe?
(PS: Wow, does Bill look and sound old these days.)
That’s what STDs will do to you. ;)
Clinton’s answer regarding Sanders was facile. Democrats aren’t copying the republican model of going to an extreme candidate. The GOP never nominates the extreme wings of the party. It always nominates the most moderate candidate. Clinton knows that.
Secondly, the democrat center has moved left because of Obama and Pelosi and the class warfare tactics the party has been using for the last 10+ years.
Thirdly, Clinton’s take on Sanders was certainly a calculated but veiled line of attack against republicans to reinforce the notion it is a party of extremists. It also was an attack on Sanders to scare people that his is too extreme for the country.
Lastly, Clinton obviously had to deflect away from the extreme weakness of Hillary’s campaign and her skills as a candidate as well as her scandalous activities. That would have been part of a truly insightful and honest answer from Bill.
Regarding him getting the questions ahead of time, he absolutely did. He requires that he receive a list of all questions ahead of time as part of his agreement to appear anywhere. He does not let questioners go off script, either. Remember the flap he had with Chris Wallace several years ago? Everyone was kind of surprised that he got so angry over what seemed like a natural and reasonable question. Clinton wasn’t mad because the question was out of bounds. He was mad because Wallace hadn’t honored the agreement to only ask approved questions.
Could there ever be a post entitled ‘Obama Is Right’? Maybe about Steph Curry being a special basketball player, but other than that?