Rumor has it

POSTED BY: dreamtrove
UPDATED: Friday, March 3, 2006 06:10
VIEWED: 3492
PAGE 2 of 3

FIRST PAGE PREV PAGE 1 2 3 NEXT PAGE LAST PAGE

DREAMTROVE

Wednesday, March 1, 2006 11:43 PM

I'm updating my presidential preferences for what it's worth, which isn't much, after watching speeches by just about all of them.

1. Cheney vs. Kerry is just shoot me.
2. Hillary vs. Cheney is Hillary.
3. Hillary vs. Condi is Condi.
4. Condi vs. Biden is *hmm*. Depends.
5. Biden vs. McCain is McCain
6. McCain vs. Feingold is Feingold. *
7. Hagel vs. Feingold is still Hagel.

* This was a *Hmm* before, now it's a definite Feingold. Still like McCain, but Feingold's position on constitutional rights is much stronger. Gotta respect that.

CARTOON

Thursday, March 2, 2006 12:49 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Oh, I so disagree. Cheney should have to pay upfront for the chance to be in the same sentence as Nixon

I agree, but we're talking about their roles as VP, not as a person, politician in the general sense, or whatever, right?

Whatever one thinks of Cheney's politics, he is practically indespensible to Bush, and Bush highly respects him. Ike couldn't be bothered with Nixon -- who was never let in on what was going on during the Eisenhower administration, much less consulted for his opinion. And let's not forget that Ike didn't even want to endorse his own VP for President in the 1960 election (of which Nixon was robbed).

And no one can accuse me of not liking Nixon. As I've stated previously, I actually worked the polls for him in his 1972 re-election bid (passing out cards all day long at 5 different polling stations in my neighborhood). I was also priviledged to attend Nixon's send-off from Stewart AFB in New York after he died in April 1994. (I couldn't travel to CA, but Stewart AFB was only a 2 hour drive east of me, and I fortunately knew someone who worked for one of our U.S. Senators, who got me a pass to attend.)

KAYNA

Thursday, March 2, 2006 1:04 AM

Of the three pictured, I've got to go with McCain. He seems more honest than most pliticians.
Notice that I say more honest, not totally honest. We'll see what happens.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Op: You're fighting a war you've already lost.
Mal: Yeah, well I'm known for that.

SIGNYM

Thursday, March 2, 2006 1:32 AM

Just remember- "cluster" is only half 'a word.

---------------------------------
Free as in freedom, not beer.

DREAMTROVE

Thursday, March 2, 2006 4:29 AM

It was my impression that Nixon was a power player VP, maybe even Eisenhowers better half. Um, not in a gay way. But Nixon spent a lot of time making US foreign policy much the way Bush Sr. did as VP to Reagan.

The problem with Cheney is not that he doesn't do the job, I'll give him that. And it's not that he doesn't care, or work hard, he's 3 for 3 on all that. But he just has the 'minus' touch. Not a single g0d d4mn3d thing turns out like he plans. He cooks up this grand scheme of a master plan for everything and then pfft! we fly smack into the surface of Mars. The thing is, I think Cheney is still thinking like a socialist, Plan first, then put into action. There's no flexibility there, no evolving self-repairing plan. The world just doesn't work like that. Unexpected things happen.

But back to past VPs. I think in just potent VP power:

Truman was mega-hawk, and powerful
Nixon was diplomat and powerful
Johnson was mega-hawk and powerul, and probably had Kennedy killed *
Humphrey was weak
Agnew was weak
Rockafeller and Mondale were really not there long enough.
Bush Sr. was diplomat and powerful
Quayle was weak and dumb
Gore was weak, not dumb, but real weak
Cheney is mega-hawk and powerful

I don't know if there's a pattern there, except that powerful VPs become president whereas weak ones lose elections. I guess I'd say there are a few VP models that I think they fall into:

1. Hawk behind the throne, controls things, plays war games. Jafaar.
2. Mr. Fixit goes around and makes deals, prevents the president from fumbling. The Djini.
3. The total lack of power behind the throne. Iago the Parrot.

If your VP is Iago the Parrot, you shoudn't run him as a candidate.

Anyway, I hadn't heard that about Nixon, sounds like you know more than me, but if that's so, then maybe he took matters into his own hands. I remember reading about him having a fair amount of involvement in foreign affairs.

I agree Bush would be lost without Cheney, but he could have someone else to guide him. McCain maybe. Cheney is too gung ho for my tastes, not at all cautious or reserved, and it doesn't help that he seems to fail perpetually. I also am familiar with the whole agenda thing, and it's really not pretty. And then there's the whole Clinton thing.

Basically I think Bush is a trained monkey, which is neither good nor bad, and I beat up on him too much, when I really should be beating up on Cheney :) or someone. There's about 10,000 things I don't care for in this administration, not the least of which is the USA Patriot Act, not to mention the deficit spending, the war, er, wars. The Dubai port deal is just like item number 27 on reasons I think this admin has to go.

Up until to the Dubai deal, I think my position was 'has to go as long as it can be replaced with another admin.' Now I'm willing to accept libertarian leaning democrats as a replacement. Not up to 'we would be better off with Kerry,' I feel quite certain we wouldn't, and ditto for Hillary. Probably 1/2 the democratic party. Okay, I should stop now, don't want to step on any toes. But I think Cheney should take some time off, go fishing. Let someone else take on the pressure. We have a civil war in Iraq to deal with, Al Qaeda in afghanistan seizing prisons, debt so large it is equal to the entire wealth of the world. That's the new stunner. The long term liability of the US govt. is about to exceed the GDP of the Earth. And finally, and this is really about where I'm getting to, I don't think we're going to make it.

Not in Iraq, I mean the USA, a country. Clinton screwed things up, but Bush has really done a number on us, and I don't think it's coming back. It used to be USA!USA! But now the local feeling here is increasing, USA, who needs it. And I agree. If a candidate runs locally on the platform of the independent nation state of New York, it wouldn't matter which ticket they were on, they'd just win.

MATTEBLACK

Thursday, March 2, 2006 5:07 AM

I am a pretty consistent democrat/liberal voter who has recently registered Republican just to vote for McCain in the primaries.

It'll be nice to vote for someone other than "not Bush" next time around.

DREAMTROVE

Thursday, March 2, 2006 5:21 AM

Good move. I think that they primaries are the only real election we have. the 80% or so of people who give them a miss are subjecting all of us to bad or worse. Which is which is really subjective, (I see Kerry as Bush plus a draft) but in the end, does it matter which one you get? It's much better to have decent, okay and good, and maybe the rare excellent to vote for, without having to end up in 3rd party looney land with 0/9% of the vote.

CARTOON

Thursday, March 2, 2006 3:04 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Truman was mega-hawk, and powerful

Not to be argumentative, but Truman was only VP for about 9 or 10 weeks, and so out-out-of-the-loop that the first time he found out about the bomb was after FDR died. As a matter-of-fact, from the way I heard it, on the day FDR died, Truman was told #1) that FDR was dead, then #2) there was a bomb (in that order). He had no clue prior to that.

After he became President, yes, he was tough as nails (and my Dad's favorite President), but as VP he was left in the dark about most things (as seemingly most VPs were prior to Cheney).

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Nixon was diplomat and powerful

Again, Nixon was a great diplomat, but Ike never confided in him. As I said, Ike held off on endorsing Nixon in his run for the Presidency in 1960 -- much to everyone in the Republican party's embarrassment. How much could Ike have liked or trusted Nixon if he didn't want to even endorse him (his own VP from his own party, against that playboy upstart Kennedy)?

(I remember hearing how this had hurt Nixon deeply, who looked up to Ike like a father.)

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Anyway, I hadn't heard that about Nixon... (snip) I remember reading about him having a fair amount of involvement in foreign affairs.

Nixon was heavily involved in foreign affairs, but more as an ambassador than a policy-maker. He was Ike's frontman on trips abroad -- much like the Secy of State does these days (Ike traveled abroad infrequently compared to his VP).

I can't say, but I would guess that Ike sent Nixon abroad to keep him out of his hair (Nixon had an unfortunate habit of drawing bad press. In my opinion, Nixon was the poster-boy for the liberal press's hatred of the Republican party, and had been since his debut election to congress in the late 40's.)

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Johnson was mega-hawk and powerul, and probably had Kennedy killed *

I loathed LBJ, but I have admit he was the consumate politician. No one wheeled and dealed in the 20th century like he did. I mean, he would physically grab you and make you come around to his way of thinking. But, again, he didn't get to exercise many of these traits under Kennedy's heel. RFK was more of a confidant to JFK than LBJ was (and LBJ always resented that).

(I still think my Dad should've arrested Senator Johnson in 1959 when he had the chance, but that's another story.)

Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Rockafeller and Mondale were really not there long enough.

Well, Mondale had four years -- which was more than Truman and LBJ had in that office combined. Still, Carter was so bad on his own, he didn't need ole' Fritz to help him gum up the works.

Rockefeller was a disaster. Don't know what possessed Gerry to pick that lunatic. (I still remember the photo of Nelson on the front of page of the newspaper throwing the finger at someone. I don't remember the context, but I sort of recall that he was letting someone in Congress know what he thought of them in no uncertain terms.)

I still maintain that throughout history, most U.S. VPs did practically nothing (while in that capacity). That has also historically been a reason a lot of people have given as to why they refused to go on the ticket as VP -- because they felt they could be far more effective in the job they already had than they could've been as VP.

In that capacity, Cheney has broken the mold. Bush probably confides more in him than any President has in their VP prior to this.

Will this redefine the role of all future VP's? I don't know. I imagine that would depend on the President, and the confidence/rapport they have with their running mate.

Most Presidents are power-hungry and egotistical. That type of person doesn't like to share power (or the limelight).

And that's one thing you can't say about Bush Jr. -- he isn't there for the power trip, and he's wil

DREAMTROVE

Thursday, March 2, 2006 6:18 PM

Quote:
Ike never confided in him.

Not arguing. I think Nixon was a powerful VP, a go-getter, regardless of what Ike thought of him.

Quote:
my Dad should've arrested Senator Johnson in 1959 when he had the chance

No he shouldn't have. People who sought legal action against LBJ wound up dead. That includes JFK who actually passed a constitutional amendment to allow him to sack LBJ. No Kennedy death, LBJ gets sacked, Death of JFK, LBJ is president. JFK dies. Just circumstantial evidence, like an excess of motive.

Quote:
Don't know what possessed Gerry to pick that lunatic.

I do. He was a party favorite like McCain is now, or Biden is to the democrats. It was a nod.

Quote:
And that's one thing you can't say about Bush Jr.

Sure I can, it's a free country. I think Bush is the underachiever who always disappointed his dad and never came close to matching his brother's success. To his this go ride is pure egotrip. But he's just a trained monkey, so it doesn't matter. Today I say Fox propping him up in a voice clip from the Katrina video. I haven't seen the vidoe yet, but I hear he was barely responsive. He's still Theoden under Wormtongue Cheney.

Quote:
he's willing to bow to the advice of people he trusts.

Willing? The man is Forrest Gump. He has no choice. They tell him which way the Earth rotates and he can't rub two braincells together nor does he care to.

Quote:
she couldn't help but "like" him as a person

I know people who know him personally. He's perfectly nice if you don't get into his weird death obsession. What he isn't is a leader. Or a genius.

Quote:
Praise from one's admitted enemy is indeed a high thing.

Hey, I've said a positive thing or two about Osama Bin Laden, awfully big of me. I have even said some positive things about Bush. But I really don't have any use for either one. I can't put one above the other anymore. If you were to ask me, give me a choice, to get rid of one of them, I would probably say Bush. It took me a long time to get to this point, but honestly, I think Bush is more of a threat to America. Without Bush, we coudl easily handly Osama Bin Laden. Without Osama Bin Laden, Bush would still be a menace.

Given a choice between Bush and Cheney, I would get rid of Cheney. I guess for me that makes Osama Bin Laden Public enemy #3. I agree with the ideology's co-founder Francis Fukuyama: "Neoconservatism is a failure."

Bring me an old time republican. Every republican seantor over 70 should be elevated automatically to the executive, and the current executive should go to jail. If Condi wants to bargain her way out she can. But I've had it with these guys. I'm not interested it working it out with them, coming to terms with their agenda. Now I just want them gone. They're almost as bad as the democrats, but in a way they're worse, because they're our problem, they're on my side fo the fence, and I'm not just going to jump the fence and let them have the right. Old style get the rhetorrical shotgun. I aim to kick them out.

SIGNYM

Thursday, March 2, 2006 9:11 PM

To comment on the original topic- probably Condi:

Quote:
Rice shows off her fitness regimen
Condoleezza Rice, the nation's top diplomat, is appearing in a three-part TV interview in which she rides a bike, works on her abs, pumps iron and talks about her weight.

Public figures usually do not go public when they work on their figures, though when they do, it can help humanize their images. President Bush is sometimes photographed trying to stay fit on his bike, and President Clinton took some high-profile jogs.

www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/03/02/rice.workout.ap/index.html

---------------------------------
Free as in freedom, not beer.

FIRST PAGE PREV PAGE 1 2 3 NEXT PAGE LAST PAGE