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Neville
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
Spain
1590 Posts |
 Posted - 03/29/2008 : 1:25:31 PM
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RossM
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
427 Posts |
Posted - 03/31/2008 : 10:18:14 PM
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I don't understand Hillary's tall tale on many levels:
I fail to see how spending a few hours on an army base gives anyone any experience doing anything. Why brag about it?
If the tale she told was true then why did she bring her 16 year old daughter along and put her in harm's way? This says a lot about her character and judgement.
But the story she told, and told several times is pure fantasy. Is Hillary delusional? Is she a liar or plain stupid? She knew full well that the whole affair was video taped and she told an accurate account of the trip in her book. Did she think that she could lie and not get caught? What arrogance! All politicians puff up their resume. Obama claims to have once been a law professor. He really was a lecturer. Not such a big deal. Hillary claims that she misremembered. Claptrap. Misremembering details is not the same thing as remembering things that simply didn't happen. All in all it does not bode well for Hillary's chances. She is either a liar, delusional, stupid, or gifted with horrible judgement. |
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Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
Posted - 04/01/2008 : 05:54:41 AM
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quote:
She is either a liar, delusional, stupid, or gifted with horrible judgement.
Which doesn't mean the Democrats won't nominate her:
http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/2007/12/17/tomo/
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
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BT
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
168 Posts |
Posted - 04/01/2008 : 12:32:25 PM
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Hillary's embellishments were stupid, to be sure, but I think ALL of us tend to take stuff like this, from a candidate we are predisposed to dislike, and blow it out of proportion. Ross, you are correct that even if things had transpired as she said they did, it really wouldn't amount to much as far as "experience" goes. But I don't see how her tall tale differs greatly from McCain claiming he was taking a safe leisurely stroll through the markets of Baghdad, when in reality he was being guarded by half the troops in Iraq. To me, it seemed like he was lying to the American Peoples faces. To a McCain supporter, it probably wasn't that big of a deal.
In short, I think that both sides believe the opposing candidate is capable of doing things that the candidate we support would NEVER do. But, of course, that's bunk.
And by the way, the University of Chicago has issued a statement saying Obama WAS a professor at their law school. [url]http://www.law.uchicago.edu/media/index.html[/url] |
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Pip
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
333 Posts |
Posted - 04/01/2008 : 1:43:01 PM
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I think they are anything but the same. Where's the lie in what you said? It *was* a safe leisurely stroll...because of the soldiers. Hillary just flat-out told a big, fat four-Pinocchio lie. McCain's was, at worst, one Pinocchio puffery.
Of course, what a "leisurely stroll" is to a man with McCain's solder experience is probably different than what it is to me. Although somebody once threw a bottle right at me at a football game.
Pip
"These five fingers: individually they're nothing, but when I curl them together like this into a single unit, they form a weapon that is terrible to behold!" - Lucy Van Pelt |
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BT
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
168 Posts |
Posted - 04/01/2008 : 2:25:09 PM
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Pip, the idea that McCain was trying to sell was that the conditions were improving in Baghdad. His "proof" was that he was able to walk the streets of Baghdad "safely". Unsaid was that he had helicopters following him, and masses of troops encircling him. That is, to me, pretty blatantly lying (unless of course your argument is that it wasn't a lie because of the specific words he used, which seems a bit, well, Clinton-esque to me). Lies of omission if you will. McCain was not confident enough of his safety to wander around without this protection (or certainly those in the know in Baghdad were not). However he wanted people to assume he was. A trip like this has the almost exclusive purpose of swaying public opinion toward a specific policy goal of those making the trip. Certainly that has FAR greater consequences than the results of Hillary lying about sniper fire from 1996.
More to the point, OF COURSE you don't think they are the same thing. That is the entire point of my post. If your guy lies, he is clearly a psychotic who will stop at nothing in his quest for power. If my guy lies, it was a little white lie that is easily explained away. It's the nature of politics and of partisanship. |
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zombiewhacker
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1475 Posts |
Posted - 04/01/2008 : 7:25:13 PM
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Here is the Washington Post on McCain's comments:
quote:
"Never have I been able to drive from the airport, never have I been able to go out into the city as I was today," McCain said. "But I am not saying 'Mission Accomplished.' . . . It's a very difficult task ahead of us."
(snip)
At the news conference, McCain criticized Western and Iraqi journalists, including many who had covered Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, for not reporting the good news in Iraq.
One Iraqi journalist, speaking in English, asked him: "I just read on the Internet that you said there are areas in Baghdad that you can walk around freely?"
"I just came from one," McCain replied.
"Yeah, and which area would that be?" the journalist asked.
"What kind of security you had today?" asked another journalist.
"General Petraeus goes downtown almost every day," McCain said. "Of course, he has protection, and we had protection today. Things are getting better in Iraq, and I am pleased with the progress that has been made."
[url]http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/01/AR2007040100325.html[/url]
That's not quite the same thing as claiming he traveled without bodyguards.
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RossM
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
427 Posts |
Posted - 04/01/2008 : 10:17:54 PM
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| Putting words into the mouths of ones opponents is also a time honored tradition. As you can see from the Washington Post McCain is actually a pretty straight shooter. He also tells you, for better or worse, exactly what is on his mind. My point was that Obama's puffery of his teaching status is not at all a big deal. Hillary's tale about sniper fire at Bosnia is not puffery but an outright falsehood. She compounded the falsehood by claiming that she was sleep deprived when she had told that same tall tale at least three other times. This all becomes doubly weird to me because she told an accurate story of the incident in her own book. |
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BT
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
168 Posts |
Posted - 04/02/2008 : 10:30:24 AM
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Zombie, I never said he claimed to be without bodyguards, simply that he was painting a pretty inaccurate picture. Saying he had "protection" is one thing. But claiming that he was walking "freely", while being guarded by 100 soldiers, 3 Blackhawks, and 2 Apache gunships is just silly. Was it an outright lie? No. Was the true picture completely distorted? I think so (By the way, he DID lie when he earlier claimed that Petraeus would venture out in an unarmored Humvee, having to backtrack when Petraeus said it wasn't true).
Ross, I guess I disagree with your contention that McCain is a straight shooter. He's not. He's a politician. Very few politicians can tell you what's on their mind, because if they do, they won't get elected. It's the fault of the voters, to be sure, but it's pretty much true. The media (McCain himself has called them his "base") will continue to tell you he is a "maverick" and a straight talker, even as he flip flops on immigration and torture among other things. Interestingly, when he recently claimed Iran was training al-queda, despite the fact that there is a problem with one being sunni and one being shia, his statement was regarded by the press as a "brain fart", even though he had made the claim (like Hillary's asinine Bosnian adventure) on 4 separate occasions. Had Hillary or Obama made that claim, they would have been pilloried for their lack of foreign policy knowledge. In McCain's case, somehow, the idea that his foreign policy knowledge is so vast, precludes him from being wrong on such things, at least in the minds of the media. |
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zombiewhacker
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1475 Posts |
Posted - 04/02/2008 : 11:54:12 AM
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BT, you said:
"But I don't see how her tall tale differs greatly from McCain claiming he was taking a safe leisurely stroll through the markets of Baghdad, when in reality he was being guarded by half the troops in Iraq."
I leave it to our fellow Jabootubes to opine whether the phrase "safe leisurely stroll" conjures up images of being surrounded by bodyguards. Had you said this:
"But I don't see how her tall tale differs greatly from McCain claiming he was taking a safe leisurely stroll surrounded by bodyguards through the markets of Baghdad, when in reality he was being guarded by half the troops in Iraq."
then the intent of your original post would have been more clear.
You are correct, however, that McCain "misspoke" about Petraeus' humvee not being armored, a point he later conceded when interviewed on 60 Minutes. |
Edited by - zombiewhacker on 04/02/2008 12:38:11 PM |
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