About that, I could only say good.  It looks like the democratic base is resisting her "inevitable" nomination, no matter what the money says.  The base is finally mobilized.

I don't like Hillary Clinton, I don't like her opportunism or support for the war.  She might have been kick-ass as a lawyer, but she looks even more mediocre than her husband as a politician and statesman.  (Although Bill looks like Marcus Aerelius compared to the guys before and after him.)

Barrak Obama?  The guy has only had two years of experience in national government.  If there's anything we should have learned from the latest Bush, you can't put an unseasoned person in the presidency and expect good results.  

Besides the obvious problems with our electoral system, a major problem with it recently is the manner of choosing candidates, and that people don't pay enough attention to it.  Much more attention needs to go into selecting the candidates who run against each other.  For as long as I remember, by the time the candidates are chosen, nobody feels they're really right for the job.  

We can't afford another mediocre or poor president.  Period.  

I'll vote before the general election in the primaries.  I'll give money to my candidate (yet to be chosen).   But if either HC or BO are the presidential candidates, I might just not vote for president in the general race.  I think I'll write the DNC on that.

If I don't like the leaders, there's 6-8 others behind them.

president.
We'll just have to hang on for the ride.  She's not that smart. And she was a corrupt lawyer rather than a kickass lawyer.
If you think we have bad foreign policy now, just wait till she's president.

When Lincoln got elected he had only two terms in the House and he did damn well!

I think many people can step up to the plate. Lincoln did, I think Obama can too.

If Obama stays between Hillary and the White House, he's dead meat. She and her band of cutthroats will do anything to anyone who stands in her way to the White House. Hillary with her band of cutthroats play rough and play for keeps.

Infact, lacking experence is a HUGE PLUS in politics!

Having little or no experence is even better yet, then the coruption of special intrest, and "old-boys networks" haven't had a chance to get imbedded!

If Obamaha ends up being the cantidate with the least political-experence on election day, he'll get my vote (regardless of what stupid things he might say between then and now, lol!)

I'm hoping, praying for someone, ANYONE for that job who might have a FRESH or UNIQUE thought about ANYTHING!!

(Could we just randomly choose our next prez out of small town phone-books in the middle of Iowa or Oklahoma?? PLEASE?)

Bush did that to McCain?

Put a total greenhorn into the White House and he turns into another Abraham Lincoln.  What's wrong with this thinking?  We got damn lucky with Lincoln, and were damn stupid if we think we could make it into plan.  

If we want to write an inspirational story, I can't think of a better plot, but when it comes to guiding the country, face the fact that there's nothing magical about the Presidency that's going to turn anyone elected into a master statesmen.  

Anybody who was skeptical about the romance of it could have seen that Dubya was terribly under-qualified.  Let's not make that mistake again.    

Obama?  I like him, but I'm not voting for him before 2016.

Why not call a temporary service?  

I know you don't like Washington, but this "outsider" stuff is getting delusional, not to mention desperate.  It won't work.  Governing professionally takes skills.  

I think there are other ways to do what you want here.  

I hate to point out that we have had a few Washington outsiders in office since 1972.  I'm not mentioning any names, but let's just say the results were-- less than totally successful.

All I am saying is don't exclude someone because that have had less experience in Congress  of in a statehouse, than say.... Bush!  

The trouble with your theory on "outsiders" is that the few that made it to power got their boost to office from special-intrest or one-issue-grass-roots movements... I think that Carter proved that any fool could sit in that chair and be refered to as "Mr. President"... (I realize Carter is a nuke-phi, but so what?? He had NO common sense what so ever, and did more damage than good to our country, the EPA, foreign affairs, Israel, Iran/Iraq, Crude oil dependancy, ect, ect... A baboon in a clown's hat could have done better!

(I won't even start with the miserable Kennedy crisis that we're still paying for as he was high on meth and off-shore-drilling every 19yo. girl he could get his hands on! And America still worships him like he was a god!)

It's true that his personality did not compensate for that, but really the "Washington establishment" did it's best to undercut Carter in every way it could.  Especially in the CIA and the military.  Whatever you say about what Carter did to the military, the military-industrial complex did a hatchet job on him.  

I didn't have in mind Kennedy.  He was in no way a Washington outsider.  His family ties were very well connected to it.  But Kennedy was an amateur.

It perfectly makes sense to me that some insiders at the time probably had him shot.  I don't like the idea, of course.  However, I could see where people who saw his blundering of the Bay of Pigs, his bringing us to the edge of nuclear, who knew about his womanizing, his terrible health problems, and his drug use might have become-- a bit desperate.  

Of course, there's not any evidence of this. If killing him was a government operation, though, I think the motive might have been something other than what's often presumed.  

Kennedy is more like Dubya.  The difference is I'm certain that people inside the government felt the same way citizens do about Bush now.

I can't even imagine the damage he'd have done if he been allowed to govern unopposed...

Maybe I need a drink...

If I now find myself agreeing with Jeremy Bender in the next 24hrs, I'm going to check myself in for suiside-watch, lol!

Kennedy had the misfortune of being shot at the wrong time for the country.  We've never really healed from that.  And while I agree that he was much closer to "w" than any other democrat since... what I remember was the movement of missles to Cuba... and I grew up on the Gulf Coast - and the reality was, we were gonners.... if and when.  People forget that a major portion of our oil (and thereby capacity for fueling a war effort) production is in the region between Baton Rouge LA and Baytown Texas.  

Kennedy though wished to see a nation of "can do's" rather than "can't or won't" do's..... It is for that that I praise him.  Not for the blunders he made - we all make 'em!  Often leadership inspires people to do the possible.  Kennedy was actually pretty good at that.  Biggest blunder - our involvement in SE Asia... was initiated under Eisenhower, but Kennedy started the escalation.  Bad move, very bad move.

And who undercut him even now.  But you also have to judge a leader by how well he was able to get people behind him.  Besides that, he came in at a very bad time economically and for foreign affairs.  

History is not fair, yet.  In all truth, Carter was much better than Kennedy, Bush I and Bush II.  
He was hardly as bad as one could get.

For one thing, the guy was very unhealthy.  He had his back injury, and he had Addison's Disease.  So, he had a very low energy level.  Now, I don't begrudge anybody any health problems, but to compensate for it he was taking amphetamines, painkillers and maybe other drugs.  I could forgive this too, except with all his low energy and the fact that it was so hard for him to even walk without excruciating pain, how is it that he then found the energy to womanize?  

He apparently had a very slight amount of quality time available.  When I look at the inattention he gave to the Bay of Pigs (and yes, I could only call it negligence) and the fact that he still found time to bang Marilyn, among several other women . . . if the government could have only divorced Kennedy.

Now, something that I heard Clark Clifford say on NPR years ago really underscored something, and this is before I found out about Kennedy's health troubles.  Clifford said that in the week that followed the Bay of Pigs, Washington was in a total panic, and it felt like nobody was in control.  

Now, why would that be?  What was Kennedy doing during that time?  Nobody has ever said.  From the little I could put together, the guy went into some sort of seclusion.  

Now, only the people who were really on the inside knew what Kennedy did and how he acted.  From what Clifford said though, the news on the inside had to have been something that panicked them.  The few clues there are not good.  

Remember also the shame of it.  The nation then had really never had a total military defeat, and one where we betrayed allies.  

Follow that with the Cuban Missile Crisis, where Kennedy, wanting to regain his political mojo, pushed the crisis swiftly all the way to the brink of nuclear war.  

Now, think of this: all the time the guy is hiding serious health problems, he's using both amphetamines and painkillers and he's womanizing compulsively.  

And then there was Vietnam, not so much the escalation, which was bad, but the fact that he ordered Diem's murder, and that Vietnam was just beginning to look like a fiasco, probably it was perceived that Kennedy did not give it enough attention.  Probably it wouldn't have mattered, but the betrayal of Diem was faithless, and I am certain Diem was very well regarded in the US Government, most especially in the intelligence service which had to carry out the assassination.    

Now, looking at this from the inside, I could see where this would all look just frightening.  So, I would now say that the motive for killing Kennedy looks very clear to me.  

I'm not a conspiracy buff, but I dare say I now believe that the very highest people in the government were behind it, including Johnson, including Earl Warren and others.  It had nothing to do with political ambitions.  Too many people in the government were scared shitless with the Cuban missile crisis, and Kennedy was not getting any better.  

So, I think some of the highest people in the government planned it from the very beginning to the cover-up Commission at the end.  It was all choreographed, and it took a year after the Cuban Missile Crisis to bring it all together.  They secretly enlisted Castro and the Soviets, since everyone agreed that Kennedy had to go.  Castro worked with the Soviets who sent Oswald as the trigger man.  Then of course, our agents recruited Ruby to shoot Oswald, and then some fast cancer killed Ruby . . .  

Probably the most artfully managed coup in the history of the world.  Probably, because all this is just my conjecture.

It would be interesting, though, if something about this surfaced in the Soviet Archives or in Cuba's archives after Castro died.  

-- Modified on 2/8/2007 12:32:15 AM

For one thing, the guy was very unhealthy.  He had his back injury, and he had Addison's Disease.  So, he had a very low energy level.  Now, I don't begrudge anybody any health problems, but to compensate for it he was taking amphetamines, painkillers and maybe other drugs.  I could forgive this too, except with all his low energy and the fact that it was so hard for him to even walk without excruciating pain, how is it that he then found the energy to womanize?  

He apparently had a very slight amount of quality time available.  When I look at the inattention he gave to the Bay of Pigs (and yes, I could only call it negligence) and the fact that he still found time to bang Marilyn, among several other women . . . if the government could have only divorced Kennedy.

Now, something that I heard Clark Clifford say on NPR years ago really underscored something, and this is before I found out about Kennedy's health troubles.  Clifford said that in the week that followed the Bay of Pigs, Washington was in a total panic, and it felt like nobody was in control.  

Now, why would that be?  What was Kennedy doing during that time?  Nobody has ever said.  From the little I could put together, the guy went into some sort of seclusion.  

Now, only the people who were really on the inside knew what Kennedy did and how he acted.  From what Clifford said though, the news on the inside had to have been something that panicked them.  The few clues there are not good.  

Remember also the shame of it.  The nation then had really never had a total military defeat, and one where we betrayed allies.  

Follow that with the Cuban Missile Crisis, where Kennedy, wanting to regain his political mojo, pushed the crisis swiftly all the way to the brink of nuclear war.  

Now, think of this: all the time the guy is hiding serious health problems, he's using both amphetamines and painkillers and he's womanizing compulsively.  

And then there was Vietnam, not so much the escalation, which was bad, but the fact that he ordered Diem's murder, and that Vietnam was just beginning to look like a fiasco, probably it was perceived that Kennedy did not give it enough attention.  Probably it wouldn't have mattered, but the betrayal of Diem was faithless, and I am certain Diem was very well regarded in the US Government, most especially in the intelligence service which had to carry out the assassination.    

Now, looking at this from the inside, I could see where this would all look just frightening.  So, I would now say that the motive for killing Kennedy looks very clear to me.  

I'm not a conspiracy buff, but I dare say I now believe that the very highest people in the government were behind it, including Johnson, including Earl Warren and others.  It had nothing to do with political ambitions.  Too many people in the government were scared shitless with the Cuban missile crisis, and Kennedy was not getting any better.  

So, I think some of the highest people in the government planned it from the very beginning to cover-up Commission at the end.  It was all choreographed, and it took a year after the Cuban Missile Crisis to bring it all together.  They secretly enlisted Castro and the Soviets, since everyone agreed that Kennedy had to go.  Castro worked with the Soviets who sent Oswald as the trigger man.  Then of course, our agents recruited Ruby to shoot Oswald, and then some fast cancer killed Ruby . . .  

Probably the most artfully managed coup in the history of the world.  Probably, because all this is just my conjecture.  

-- Modified on 2/8/2007 12:32:56 AM

Why do you think the rocking chair was such a part of his decor?  Seriously, Kennedy was a man of vision.... and a can do attitude.... yea - before any attempt to invade another country there is a bit of panic.   But to have an issue with JFK because he had Addison's is kinda like saying you're not going to support FDR Because of polio.... next you are gonna want to euthanized these folks.

Carter is a dope and a dupe.  plain and simple.  worst pres... and now worst ex-pres ever.  My feelings for clinton are at best ambivalent... some things he did well, and some not so well.... and he will go down as a so-so pres... maybe even an ok pres... but with carter... everything was poorly planed and executed.  Amazing that they let him drive subs... just amazing....  but then that Rickover... what a nut!

I thought I made that clear.  The part that I don't think anybody knew was the full extent of any of it, nor, of course, of the drug issues.  I think he was far worse than Clinton on the womanizing in that he neglected government duties for it.  Then, one's personal life was one's personal life, but I raise questions of neglect here.  

I know that nobody knew the extent of his drug use.  Nor did they know exactly how crippling Addison's disease was.  

You're right that his main plus was that he was very motivational.  I do ask how much of that was image and how much was real.  He was the first President to really play up to television.  

Either way, his death was a tragedy.  The way it happened and the dodginess of its investigation really made the nation cynical about government.

wha?....  as I said - it was known that the guy was in pain.  serious pain... the rocking chair was almost a necessity... the "stiff" walk, was not a pretense... so wha?  some of the pain was due to war injuries... really, the great debate is not about how the country was better off without him, but how great it would have been with him.  Remember, his "brand" on the democratic party was a watershed... Johnson represented the old, and was highly resentful of having to take 2nd place to the young upstart from Mass.

Sounds like you've drunk the Kool-aid and a lot of it - at that!  I am not democratic, never have been, but I can recognize greatness in a man.  be he Truman or Kennedy.  

Kennedy wanted a can do from the US.... yea, almost everything (and I do mean EVERYTHING) he did was reckless....  but inspired.  Want evidence of that?  The space program, the soviets did it in secret - we did it in the open... no net, live for all to see... gutsy no?

Congress was loath to pass his legislation... on civil rights.... and waited until Johnson was in office to so do... wow, that must have galled LBJ to sheppard Kennedy's legislative initiatives through congress!  but hey, happens...

As far as Jackie goes?  she was hot.  but well aware of Jack's ways.  no one was fooled.... the trips she took?  they were to some extent a continual effort to stay out of the goings and comings of the likes of J. Exner....

Know?  Secret????  Z - I don't know how old you are... but as a teenage kid... I knew... much as my now teenage kid knows about lewinski - wish he didn't - wish I hadn't.... The whole freeking country knew....

We just didn't obsess about it.  then, It just was not that important.  Still isn't - but our attention span has decreased, sex sells, and well, the issues... our population is neither well enough educated to actually grasp,  nor is our media smart enough to fact find and present the really complex issues, other than the specifics of a blow job.  

Ron Jeramy for pres... cause that is about all this country can handle.  (no offense Ron)!

-- Modified on 2/8/2007 11:39:27 AM

He was in pain, but I don't think the full effect of the Addison's disease was factored into it.  Nor was the fact of his having to get through the day on drugs.  

Watershed: no, Johnson was the real watershed there.  The war ruined him.  Kennedy began to enforce civil rights, from what I could see, only reluctantly.  

I've already said that Kennedy motivated people in favor of the country, really, like nobody else since.  He was a great orator-- we haven't had anybody in office close to him in that department since.  The "Great Communicator" was a joke compared to him.  He declared we would go to the moon, and then debate about it was over.