But that's the thing, isn't it? Where is her record of "fighting" in the Senate these past few years? Has she ever gone toe-to-toe against the GOP for some major legislation? If so, let me know.

Rewind to December and wasn't she criticizing Obama's anti-gun positions from his Illinois days as a weakness in terms of "electability"? Something about some questionnaire that he filled out and how that showed he was too anti-gun?

Fast-forward to February, and apparently now he's not anti enough.

Which is it, Hillary?

Or are you just glad to have the chance to put 'Obama', 'guns' and 'gangs' together in the same paragraph?

Hillary should stick to positive comments that make the case as to why she is the best candidate to be the Democratic nominee.

Given her terrible news cycle this past week, in addition to tomorrows NYT article about her conference call to allay superdelegates and supporters fears that her campaign is on the verge of collapse, she begins to sound and appear desperate by throwing punches and going negative. Hillary cannot afford to push her negatives any higher, and she might risk alienating a Democratic base that is clearly yearning for a change in the manner and substance of our political discourse and policies if she is appears to be taking the low road to win the nomination.

Don't forget the cluster bombs. Obama was on the side that fought to ban them. She wasn't!

I just saw a show on HBO about the torture at Abu Ghraib. Completely, absolutely sickening and 100% indefensible. Also obviously condoned at management level.

I would like to know from both Democratic candidates for president:

Will you, or will you not, prosecute the criminals in the Bush administration?

Please, no namby-pamby, can't-we-all-get-along, let-bygones-be-bygones bullshit. Will the officials who greenlighted torture be prosecuted or not?

Hillary, here's your chance to turn this election around RIGHT NOW. Announce that you will prosecute the Bush criminals and I will switch my vote from Obama to you.

Simple enough?

Hillary thinks everything is a fight. That's why Hillarycare failed the first time around: because she made it into a fight instead of a negotiation. She's constantly talking about being "battle-tested" and about how she carries the "scars" from her previous "battles" against the Republicans in Congress. There's a theme here. Hillary will be a fighter and an incredibly divisive figure. I don't want four more years of partisan bickering. That's part of the reason I'm supporting Obama.

"but I will also stand my ground, because there are fights worth having."

Like Iraq?

Or Kyl/Lieberman?

1) Just because he doesn't attack you with lies doesn't mean he isn't a fighter, it is called he doesn't try to eat his own and shit all over his own party in order to get ahead.

2) Yeah, weren't you trying to scare people about his gun-control policies? And now he isn't strong enough and doesn't have specifics? Tisk tisk Hillary, you flip flop more than a pancake. Although it is apparently national pancake day, so, I guess you have an excuse this time.

3) We actually do hear specifics, you are just hoping that if you repeat "no specifics" enough time it will be true. Bush did the same shit against Kerry, is that where you learned it? Really Hillary, if you don't know what Obama's specifics are I distrust your ability to make informed decisions in the White House. Is this kinda like that time when you voted to let Bush invade Iraq without even reading the NIE...?

4) You are shameless.

Off topic, or maybe not, regardless of who you support, everyone in maryland, virginia and dc, get out there and vote today. This election is too important for our country and is the most important election in 50 plus years. GET OUT AND VOTE!!!!!!!!!!!

"I just want to say, you know, can we all get along? Can we get along?" - Rodney King

"You never hear the specifics. It's all this kind of abstract, general talk about how we all need to get along." - Hillary

Is this a chance choice of words, or a phrase that was chosen to trigger subconscious associations with the LA riots? Maybe reading too much into this, but given recent history in SC, may not be a stretch.

I am struck with how Hillary handles a bad news patch. She never just straight talks but tries to con us into believing that we have the facts wrong. Look at how she is now explaining how the Caucus wins by Senator Obama are not worth much, after she fought like hell to win them starting in Iowa, and up to the last minute in Maine. Or was that a Hillery impersonator that held a town hall meeting in Maine just before their caucuses.

Watching Hillary twisting, shifting, spinning, and changing her positions, such as on Florida and Michigan, it occurred to me that she is actually the Democrats' Mitt Romney.

You know, one of the things that is absolutely impressive is how many Democratic activists seemed to have turned on a dime on the issue of whether fighting the Republicans is important.

How many of the activists who are now ga-ga for Obama supported Dean in 2000? I'd guess a very good majority of them. What was Dean's signature claim? That the thing we needed most was someone who would fight against the Republicans, and that he was that fighter. Dean supporters simply couldn't stand establishment Democrats like John Kerry because he seemed not to be up to a fight. John Kerry, listening to the criticism, adopted a far more aggressive posture. And when Kerry lost, many of these same netroots supporters immediately launched into recriminations over how Kerry had failed to "fight back", how he had managed to be Swift-Boated because he couldn't take up the battle when it was most urgent. That criticism lasted for years since.

But where are we now? What do these same activists, most of whom, I'm sure, now are attached to Obama, say about the "fighting back" issue? How is it that suddenly that point seems to have been made inoperative? Why is there no concern for having a candidate who can "stand up" to would be Swift-Boaters?

If you want a sign of how deeply into a personality cult many Obama supporters are, their ability to take one of their most deeply held convictions -- that we need someone who can take the fight to the Republicans -- and act as if that belief is just fundamentally and even obviously wrong, based on nothing more than the mere say-so of their hero, is as perfect an index of their abject submission to someone else's personality as one is likely to see. This miraculous transformation in belief is like something straight out of standard brainwashing cult. Scientologists are scarcely more slavish in their beliefs.

I'd really like to know from the many, many fervent Obama supporters who were once fervent Dean supporters, how do you make out that obvious contradiction?

Anyone? Anyone?

I swear, sometimes Sen. Clinton can't seem to get out of her own way. Her tactics are classic Clintonian tactics of listing battles that occurred while she was on the scene while not exactly taking credit for them in an attempt to insulate herself from being attacked on them. She claims those issues as experience even though they happened on Bill's watch, yet turns around and says she's her own candidate. She rolls out Chelsea to campaign for her yet gets mad when people question that.

I can't get over the fact that the Clinton campaign always seems to want their cake and eat it too.

Tired of losing elections? Tired of the Clintons who gave us NAFTA, welfare reform, Dont Ask, Don’t Tell, The Communications Decency Act, Easing media ownership laws, and Defense of Marriage Act. Even her current campaign manager Maggie Williams called her "very conservative" in 1999 when she was trying to ply upstate NY state voters. And of course she totally botched healthcare. Under the Clintons we lost both Houses of Congress; governorships and state houses all over the country.

The Republicans have one chance in the fall. There's nothing that rallies indies and disaffected Repubs to their cause like Clinton hatred. If we nominate her they'll immediately make a big story about Bill's favors for dictators
and the scummy investments and partnerships they've cashed out of the last few years. This stuff is all relegated to the back pages of the NY Times right now but then no one ever heard of the Swiftboaters in February 2004 either. They'll have ready accomplices in the media and it fits in with their meme that McCain is the independent porkbuster and Hillary is the tool of Wall St. There will be no defense because it's appallingly true.

Tired of the drama? Vote for Obama.

Oh, by the way, why is Hillary invoking the 22 million jobs, assault weapons ban (did I also hear welfare reform and NAFTA) etc. etc.?? I thought she said in the last debate that she wasn't running on her husband's record.

The assault weapon ban died in 2004, I think.

Sen. Clinton apparently did not fight successfully to reauthorize it.

Even when it was in existence, it didn't do a lot of good and had a lot of loopholes.

"I'm sure that any Scientologist will gladly follow your example in stopping their ears too."

Well, like a true Scientologist, you seem to believe that anybody gives a rat's ass what you have to say.

Your unhinged ranting has grown tiresome. All I needed to read was about three posts of yours to realzie that your incoherent flailing around for a stick with which to beat Obama was not in any illuminative. Any of your posts I've accidentally failed to pass over ever since have only reinforced that conclusion.

To say that Barack might not fight hard enough mischaracterizes the essential point of his candidacy. There's much evidence that he will be able to re-align the political landscape, forging the way for a new mandate for progressive change. He's one of those rare transformational figures who can actually change the way we Americans think about ourselves, culture, and politics.

Contrast this to Hillary who, history shows, will fight for an agenda on the same old playing field, and will then complain about the same old enemies who block her agenda -- all leading to, at best, extremely watered-down compromises. Barack is not just the inspirational choice, he is also the pragmatic choice.

On the other hand, we have this from the husband of the self Proclaimed Warrior Princess who wages perpetual war against all Republicans.

January 25, 2008
Bill Clinton: John McCain and Hillary are 'very close'
Posted: 06:45 PM ET
Hillary Clinton and John McCain are very close, Bill Clinton says.
Hillary Clinton and John McCain are very close, Bill Clinton says.

(CNN) — If Hillary Clinton and John McCain become their party's presidential nominees, the general election race is likely to be a love-fest.

At least according to Bill Clinton.

Campaigning in Spartanburg, South Carolina, Friday, the former president brushed aside suggestions his wife would prove to be a divisive nominee for the Democratic Party, pointing out how she has successfully worked with Republicans in the Senate — including one of the current GOP presidential candidates.

"She and John McCain are very close," Clinton said. "They always laugh that if they wound up being the nominees of their party, it would be the most civilized election in American history, and they're afraid they'd put the voters to sleep because they like and respect each other."

The comments may not be welcome by the McCain camp — which yesterday faced fire from several of its rivals for winning the backing of the New York Times — a longtime archenemy of conservatives.

Sens. McCain and Clinton last met publicly at an ABC debate earlier January, when presidential candidates of both parties shared the same stage. The two were seen exchanging pleasantries, and a Clinton side said she told the Arizona senator he’d done a “good job” staging a comeback in New Hampshire. He asked that she say hello to Bill Clinton for him.

Frankly0,

Having the ability to win the fight against the Republicans is something I looked at for all of the Dem candidates. And it is becoming obvious that both candidates remaining have the ability to win that fight.

Just because Barack has a different style of fighting doesn't mean he isn't fighting or can't win. If it was true that "Obama Is So Friendly, He Won't Fight," then he would be sitting at home right now watching Hillary.

But not only is he fighting for the nomination, he will probably be in the lead by this evening. I have a lot of respect for the Clintons, and if he can beat them, he could beat anybody.

The primaries are now being run on his terms. But when they started, that role belonged to Hillary. You don't wrestle that away from her without a fight. Hillary is looking desperate. Look at the grassroots money and her recent leadership shakeup. And her looking toward Texas and Ohio sounds a bit like Rudy and Florida. You don't do that to the Clintons without the ability to fight tough.

Plus her pressure on Shuster and NBC is looking too much like Bush/Dan Rather for me.

I vote next week. In a race so close and having had so many excellent candidates to choose from, one of the things I have been watching is how the candidates fight, both is ability and style. I will be voting for Barack next week, partly because I strongly feel that he can fight and I like his style. If I didn't feel that way, Hillary would be my gal.

Hillary is right and her comments embody the reason I supported Edwards.

Unfortunately, even though I'm deeply suspicious of Obama's apparent lack of fight and lack of confrontational-ness, even though Hillary is exactly right that she was confronted with a vast right wing conspiracy, even though she's right about her health care policy and Obama is wrong...

I'm still voting for Obama because he can win the Presidency with his more right wing positions, and Hillary will lose the Presidency ... because she is right on the issues. Sad but true. Go Obama, because the alternative, a Republican President, is so much worse.

It is totally bizarre that Hillary is saying "I wonder which fights he wouldn't fight" when he is giving her the fight of her life and doing a pretty fair job at it. Hillarious!

So, in addition to the racial reason we shouldn't vote for him (because racists won't vote for him in the general), now we shouldn't vote for him because he is too nice, too likeable, too weak. Isn't she running to be the first female Pres, or is she saying Obama is too stereo-typically feminine and not enough of a warrior?

If she is the real he-man in the race, I suppose her high negative ratings are actually a good thing because she likes to fight.

Of course, fighting in and of itself is still at least one step away from actually getting anything done. But she enjoyed the distracting fights of the 90s and is rarin' to go to bring us more of the same.