People need to lighten up.

It's only a President - one elected for 4 years.

Whether Hillary is likeable is not the question. She isn't being chosen for marriage, or even house mate.

For people who like Bill, how far can the apple fall from the tree in a marriage of 30 years?

I don't know why several of you criticize the author of the column. But I guess that's the risk you take for being in the middle of the road in our polarized society. You get run down, because no one agrees with you.

I enjoy the column and say, "Keep it up."

Ah yes ModernHigh. It's never about substance. It's always about persona. Forget about a thoughtful, intelligent response to an intellegent question. With Neolibs it's all about how I feel. God forbid you use your brain!

Too funny. Thanks for the laugh!

JBE, you have a far more optimistic view of the American populace than I do....Unfortunate though it may be, there are a great many Democrats who will NOT vote for Obama -- regardless of what they say in publicly to a pollster. Nooses tied on schoolyard trees and draped across university professors' desks over the past couple months should make that painfully clear to all of us.

I can envision whole towns (like the one I was born in) full of white, rural to semi-rural, blue-collar (and Democratic because they are union folks or because their family has always bee), high-school grad folks who will bite the bullet and vote for a Republican white man rather than ANY black man.

AND MOST IMPORTANTLY:

ALL democratic party members and some independents will vote for Obama -

About HALF will NEVER vote for hillary, AND REPUBLICANS WILL TURN OUT IN FORCE TO VOTE AGAINST HER!

hillary is UNELECTABLE!

I votyed for Bill and wish I could again!

BUT..

I'LL NEVER, EVER, NEVER IN A MILLION YEARS VOTE FOR hillary.

Its the lack of clarity, the secrecy, the paranoia, the shiftine hair plitting, the parsing, and the inability to stand up and say when she really believes in a transparent way... regardless of who gets pissed off!

People who say I'm a bigot are idiots themselves.

I'm voting Obama or Giulianni. Yes, I'm sure that DOES confuse you.

Almost everyone is talking about the electability issue for the Democrat candidates (Clinton vs Obama). I think that's missing the point. The point is, in a general election, who can beat the Republican attack machine, Clinton or Obama? So far, all indications point to Clinton. She has been in politics much longer than Obama and had gone through Bill's campaign. She is a master politician. If the Democrats want to win this election at all cost, choose the candidate who wants to win the election at all cost - Clinton. Obama is too mild and too inexperienced to withstand the onslaught of the Republican attack machine. He should just wait another 8 years for his turn.

I didn't know the writer's strike had hit the Washington Post too.

I recommend that Mr. Martinez not give up his day job of editor/attorney - comedy apparently isn't his thing.

I grew up in the Bronx, several blocks from Yankee Stadium. I have been and still am a dedicated Yankee fan since 1946. However, I too, like Rudy rooted for the hated Red Sox. There is a sort of intense love=hate relationship for the Sox by Yankee fans and I rooted for them because of the familiarity we have with the Sox and I too, would root, as Rudy did for the American League team. Plus Boston is sorta in our "hood" It all makes perfect sense to me.

Whenever I read or hear these words: Hillary's not for me (or similiar anti Hillary comments), I immediately translate those words into:

"I'm a bigot who thinks women should be kept in the kitchen."

Posted by: John Kirk | November 6, 2007 12:14 AM

==========

Time to work on your translation skills, Mr. Kirk. I am a 50 year old woman with a PhD and an MBA; I run my own biotech company and have not been "in the kitchen" since I became an adult. AND Hillary's not for me.

Wow, tough room.

Arrrrrrrrrrrgh... stop... stop... stop... you're killing me... Please WaPo, no more... I can't take it... this is visual waterboarding... sheer torture... Please make it stop... I don't know what super-secret intelligence agency Andres used to work for... but please, no more...

WOW! The Washington Post has reached a new low with this column. How stupid can one get and doesn't refer to the writer of the column but the people at the Post who hired him to write it.

Another Washington Post feature lacking a single redeeming quality!

Innovators, all of you.

In my observation, the only one of the Democratic candidates who can reasonably be called a leader is John Edwards. The guy isn't afraid to take a stance and tell you exactly why he does so. While I may not agree with all of them -- and am certain that some of them aren't "winners" -- for some reason it makes me feel good to hear a guy take a stance and go to the trouble of explaining it. I'm sick to death of being told in one way or another that:

1) I shouldn't feel entitled to answers from candidates.

2) I'm too stupid to understand the complexities.

3) It's somehow more important to "preserve options" than to participate in the marketplace of ideas even if it means you might have to go a different way later on (whatever happened to good old campaign-promise breaking?)

4) Anyone who disagrees with me doesn't like [fill-in-the-blank special interest group of which the candidate happens to be a member]

Hillary is emblematic of the wholesale derogation of the political dialog in this country. Like Dubya before her, her primary qualification is that she happens to be related to someone who actually gathered the political capital to get elected on his own. We all know in our hearts that if she'd had to make it on her own she might have made it to Congressman or Secretary of HHS, but no further. She just doesn't have The Right Stuff (which is a good chunk of why the right hates her so much...she's just not all that worthy).

Parties that select people with leadership qualities win elections. It's that simple. Dubya won because people WANTED to follow him (stupid people!). I want to follow John Edwards -- not because I agree with him all the time, nor because he looks like the best horse in the race, but because he connects and I believe he's earnest, thoughtful and has balls. While I can't be absolutely certain I'd end up happy that he was President, certainty is an unreasonable standard.

Hillary, on the other hand, is the Stepford candidate. I think that for the sake of the union (quaint concept, I know) we should be looking for someone with some basic character, not just an effective practitioner of the political limbo dance. As far as I can tell, John Edwards is it.

Lastly, I'm sick of the media playing for its own interest. I'd love to hear you kick it out to some real people for a change, and not just lay back and try to play the political calculus. The Washington Post has a LOT to make up for its role in cheer leading for Iraq -- how about returning to the value of Katie Graham and Walter Pincus?

Gotta get back to work.

I left the Democratic Party while living in Florida, in retirement. The reason I left? 1) Florida Democrats didn't care a fig for the thievery of votes the Republicans pulled off, including screwing the black community of Florida totally.

2) I wrote Hillary on a number of occasions and never got a response from her except for no response.

Phooey on the Democrats and Republicans alike.

/s/ Rev. Frank Halse, Delegate, Democratic
National Convention, 1972

Interesting

xxxxxxxxxxx

I am a free spirit and would not mind voting for any of the Democratic candidates; but I am leaning towards senator Clinton or Obama. I like senator Clinton's style but in the next debate in Las Vegas I want to see more fire from her. I want to see her go after the guys individually next time around; put on the gloves and come out smoking. The other candidates had her under some pressure in the last debate but she held her ground. In Vegas clever Hillary will put the guys to sleep; bring on the Repubs.

Maybe some people dislike Hillary because they don't want a doormat as president.

Response for N. Kredulous's Train Math post -
Great post. Had me lol. Most of the candidates only give 30,000 ft solutions. No details. No discussion of the costs of their proposals. It's all pie-in-the-sky. The only candidate I have heard speak honestly is Joe Biden. Even as a Dem, he admits that we can't just pull out all the troops in Iraq. The region would implode. The factions in the Middle East will always be at odds with each other. Our best hope is to get the region stabilized and then get out. I don't like how we got into Iraq, but folks, we're there now. We need true political solutions, not just "pull out all the troops". I'm a Dem and am greatly disappointed with Congress. No real solutions to todays problems. Give me a good 3rd party candidate and I'm there.

Posted by Josh:
Anti-Hillary != Bigot. Whenever I hear Hillary, I see a bad trend in American politics where presidencies remain in families, much like a royal family. I believe that this kind of trend is dangerous. If Hillary were to be president, and then most likely, for 8 years, then you are talking about 32 years of presidency dominated by 2 families. We are American, not monarchists.

***************************
There have been 4 sets of closely related presidential families, the Adams, Bushes, Roosevelts, and Harrison.

It would be a monarchy if they stayed president for life, and their son/daughter took over the reigns upon death. Hasn't happened yet. Having Hillary in the equation is no stretch, and those Republicans who say "we've had enough of Clinton" are easily countered, "We're definitely sick of Bush".

test

That's funny!

Is this is a joke?

It's sure been a long slide from Muckrakers to Mean Girls in the world of Journalism.

How about a compare contrast of all the candidates Health Insurance solutions? Or maybe how they plan on rolling back the national debt? And what to do about the rising control of China over our debt etc..

Do we really need yet another article about Hillary's electability or Guiliani rooting for the Red Sox?

God please stop the dumbing down of the political discourse. This election is about who is going to be the next leader of the free world - not prom king.

test

Is this is a joke?

It's sure been a long slide from Muckrakers to Mean Girls in the world of Journalism.

How about a compare contrast of all the candidates Health Insurance solutions? Or maybe how they plan on rolling back the national debt? And what to do about the rising control of China over our debt etc..

Do we really need yet another article about Hillary's electability or Guiliani rooting for the Red Sox?

God please stop the dumbing down of the political discourse. This election is about who is going to be the next leader of the free world - not prom king.

test

test

test

I would like to see a candidate that has some balls and is willing to speak from the heart and their brains and not to what they think polls or lobby groups wish to hear. I believe Hillary and McCain are two of the straiter talkers of the group, but neither has willing to put their neck out to express logical but risky ideas that the base (not mainstream) may disagree with. The rest of the candidates are all brown noises. We choose a leader not a follower, in this case, poll followers. Our problems will not be resolved until leaders are elected who can think for themselves, have values and principles (not church attendance records), and who are honest. However, I don't think americans want honesty.

These aren't real questions, correct? They're just straw men for the author to make the same tired in-jokes we already see scattered throughout this website, right?

Boy can this newspaper be incredibly stupid at times.

It's nice to see a ten year old's writing assignment given so prominent a place in the Washington Post. Your parents must be so proud!

Maybe I'm nitpicking, but Nixon only won by about a half million votes nation-wide over Humphrey, or right about the number of popular votes Gore beat Bush by. Nixon didn't clobber Humphrey.

Re John Kirk's comment at 12:14 AM: Translate as you wish, but please recognize that it may well be an extraordinarily bad translation.

By your logic, it appears that if you do not support Senator Obama, you must be a bigot who believes Blacks should be kept from power- are you comfortable with that reasoning? If so, then each of us must decide whether to be racist or sexist. If you are not comfortable with being branded a racist, why does your reasoning apply only to one candidate but not another?

Some of Senator Clinton's positions are anathema to many people, including many who have been active feminists for decades. I mean- supporting a Constitutional amendment to ban flag burning???? When someone makes the argument that the flag is a symbol, and therefore should be exempt from symbolic speech, I am appalled both by the specifics and by the muddle-headedness which passes for thought. She has staked out plenty of other positions with which I, and many others, disagree.

Yes, many who oppose Senator Clinton do so for sexist reasons. But many also are focused on her substantive positions, because they are well beyond thinking that sex is all that relevant in determining intelligence, empathy, and the other characteristics they want in a representative.

Branding all opponents as sexists is not a recipe to get them to rethink their opposition.

I get the feeling "pro-choice" has come to mean power, specifically women's power to choose, and that those who say they are "pro-life" are really against women exercising power over their own lives. People don't really care about other people's abortions, and generally favor abortion when their own pregnancy or that of their girlfriend is inconvenient, but they just want to make sure that women's freedom and power to choose is strictly limited. Seems simple to me. Anti-choice is anti-woman. But personally, I am opposed to abortion and pro-choice at the same time (pretty much in agreement with Hillary and Rudy's positions). Why can't everyone see things my way?

Problem is, NONE of the candidates are all that appealing or dissimilar from each other. Hilllary's difference is her gender, Romney's difference is his denomination, and Obama's difference is his race - remove those factors, and you have, simple put, a good old American politician - Actually Guiliani's about the only one who stands out - because he's such a slimebag - which means he'll be our next president. From the Shrub to the Sewer. Yeehaw.

It's the Economy stupid!

The Liberals left the economy with a 100 billion dollar surplus,
a Nation at peace in the world,
and it cost .90 cents to buy a Euro.

After eight years of Conservative politics,
we are $9 trillion dollars in debt,
we have two wars on our hands,
and it cost a $1.44 to buy one Euro.

You got to hand it to the Liberals
they know how to run a business.

The Conservatives?
well...
they know how to run up
a hell of a credit card debt
and to trash the value of the dollar.
You can't trust the Conservatives
with your money.

They're too hung up on sex
and what's going on in their neighbor's bedroom
then to focus their attentions on the business of running a Nation.

It's the Economy stupid!

Anti-Hillary != Bigot. Whenever I hear Hillary, I see a bad trend in American politics where presidencies remain in families, much like a royal family. I believe that this kind of trend is dangerous. If Hillary were to be president, and then most likely, for 8 years, then you are talking about 32 years of presidency dominated by 2 families. We are American, not monarchists.

Oh great, a new gimmick for more crapola, as if we don't have enough. Okay, here's my question: If Rudy Guliani was on a train leaving New York at 50 mph, and Hillary Clinton was on a train leaving LA at 30mph, how long before their trains collide and they die screaming in the aftermath, thereby saving the world from terminal boredom?

Whenever I read or hear these words: Hillary's not for me (or similiar anti Hillary comments), I immediately translate those words into:

"I'm a bigot who thinks women should be kept in the kitchen."