But... Clinton shouldn’t rely on inspiration for her candidacy. There is, after all, another way to win. Perhaps she can’t run a campaign modeled on the Obama 2008 movement. The alternative is Obama 2012 — a boring, grinding affair that sold a nascent economic recovery, scorched the Republican, and plodded to the White House.I'm sick of inspiration and claims of historiosity. We should all be perfectly jaded by now. Inoculated. It's healthful and wholesome. And so what if watching the campaign day by day is "a boring, grinding affair"? That's a problem for Smith, running his buzz-dependent website, but it's a nonproblem for the rest of us. Think of the time you can save not reading the websites that try to make something out of the presidential campaign every damned day. What will you do with all that time? Instead of thinking about how what happened in the last hour might be history, you could, for example, read history. May I recommend the Amity Shlaes biography of Calvin Coolidge?
Coolidge was boring. Good boring. Let's be boring for a change.
I want a boring President. Stop trying to excite me.
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70 comments:
There will be no boring Presidents so long as women vote.
In the King's Speech, King George V says:
"In the past all a King had to do was look respectable in uniform and not fall off his horse. Now we must invade people's homes and ingratiate ourselves with them. This family is reduced to those lowest, basest of all creatures, we've become actors!"
I think that today too many political figures are actors and not statesmen. We could use another Coolidge, but we'd probably never elect one.
Coolidge was boring. Good boring. Let's be boring for a change.
Some of his brief speeches on Constitutional governance were anything BUT boring.
Would that our current blatherskite-in-chief had even ten percent of Coolidge's wisdom.
Hillary was considered boring compared to the shiny penny Obama in 2008. Yeah, bring back the boring and the competent and let me add one more requirement of one who is not a crook.
Hillary is tainted by what they did to her in 2008 and then what is happening now with the Obama administration. I don't have a lot of hope for her candidacy in 2016.
One Democrat got so mad at him he cursed him. "You can go to hell!"
Calvin Coolidge: "Senator, I've looked up the law on that and I don't have to go."
Coolidge was only boring because what he was doing worked. The "Roaring Twenties" were not inevitable. That era was similar to the Clinton era after the 1994 election. Not before. There was a reason why it happened.
"You must talk to me Mr. Coolidge. I made a bet today that I could get more than two words out of you."
"You lose."
"I'm sick of inspiration and claims of historiosity. We should all be perfectly jaded by now. Inoculated."
It's a little late for that now. A lot of us saw that in 2007/2008.
Cal Jr. had to work on a farm when his dad was President. One of the other workers couldn't believe it.
"If my father were President, I wouldn't be working in a tobacco field."
Calvin Jr: "If my father were your father you would."
Coolidge appeals to me, too. He was flinty. But this amounts to nothing more than nostalgia. (Plymouth Notch, VT.?) Today, there are too many deceitful smart asses in close contact with each other for a president like Coolidge to survive.
I would settle for a candidate at this point that will actually act in a semi-lawful manner and wasn't actively trying to undermine freedoms we used to take for granted much less a basic level of humanity.
Hillary already failed the basic humanity test.
For some reason I can't fathom, many found Obama likable.
I don't think Hillary has that.
Obama was someone new and something different. Americans like new and different. If Obama was the latest, high-tech, stand up, work-out desk, Hillary is the earthworm colored sofa in your grandma's assisted living facility.
The biggest obstacle for a female candidate isn't men. Its other women.
I agree with Althouse, bring on boring. Silent Cal is my hero.
We need an administratively efficient President who can work with both parties to effect compromises.
We don't need egocentric politicos, e.g. BH0 and HC.
Nothing about "competence"? I don't mind "inspirational"; nothing wrong with "historic." No reason to reject those qualities in a president, Professor.
When this country gets past the great canard that the Obama Administration was held back by "racism," and in fact represents the high water mark of national affirmative action, the eight years of Obama will be seen as a frankly incompetent presidency.
Let's assume Hillary was a republican with her resume. No way is she a frontrunner for the nomination or leading any horserace polls. She would have already been painted as an incompetent gaffe machine. Which she is . . .
"... authentic excitement among American women at her historic candidacy."
Uh, what's historic about it? There have been women heads-of-state in democratic nations for decades now. Some of whom even make their political careers their own selves, not on the coattails of a male relative.
Yes and no.
Mitch Daniels would be great, but on the other hand, the government needs a house-cleaning, and that will cause an uproar.
An excellent biography of a honest man.
It is true that when he learned that government workers were being issued more than one pencil at a time, he ordered that their extra writing implements be confiscated and that they only be allowed one pencil at a time.
And what is "historic" about Hillary Clinton's candidacy? She's not the first woman to run for president or the first female senator to do so. She just wants her ticket punched.
If Hillary Clinton were male, would she be electable? I don't think so.
Coolidge? Really? What good, will reading about that fuck, do you today? Why don't you try reading something that tells you about this country - beyond just what happened? Read about slavery. Learn what parts of this nation are lifted wholesale from the experience and determined what it is today. What speeches of "wisdom" come straight from the slaveholder's mouth to whites today? Hearing a white man talk to an overseer about a captured runaway slave, then is no different than how whites talk today if we don't follow their standards:
"Tell him that you will never dwell on old quarrels with him - that he has a clear track record ahead of him - and all depends on himself,…"
How many times have I heard that speech, of being told - in order to be in good standing with whites - blacks have to focus on WHITE'S needs and outlook? And, if we do, we have a "clean slate" and all is forgiven? (Whites don't consider that blacks never cleaned white's slate, for them, but see white's actions as compounding,…)
Why is the context of such remarks - on a blog with such an interest in words - left out of discussions about right and wrong here? (How many times have whites, here, wondered - a la Cliven Bundy - why whites would be treated differently? Why don't they know? Why don't they encourage it?)
Where's the interest - in yourselves as Americans - also schooled in this horrible ideology that stretches beyond the centuries?
It's trapped reading about "Silent Cal" and ignoring the world he made - a world of lynching, discrimination, prejudice, and - as always with whites - so much greed (spurred by insecurity) no life is safe, no matter what they say.
Whites stay silent, themselves, because damning others to their machinations equals maintaining the status quo, of racist white's in charge, as long as humanly possible:
This future, too, has been explained by America's white supremacist leaders, many times, in the past.
400 years of the most vile white history is being deliberately ignored for white myths about a fictional normalcy Calvin Coolidge ruled over.
Read about lynching during his day and discover how admirable he was - and how worthless his life was to those Americans who needed him - and then get back to me about how little excitement you need.
I betcha, if you had one foot in the street and trillions owed to you and yours from theft, you'd think differently,...
The "All In The Family" theme song had a line that "we sure could use a man like Herbert Hoover again", but it really is Calvin Coolidge that we could use another of.
I don't see any possibility of EITHER party nominating a Coolidge, or even a Hoover. More's the pity. The Democrats are likely to nominate a Nixon (in a pants suit) or a McGovern (in granny glasses). The Republicans will probably nominate another Romney or another Bush.
Any privilege that can be abused, will be abused.
The bureaucracy has forgotten that their protections against political reprisal were conditioned on their refraining from partisan political activity.
They have been, and are, engaging in such activity, and there will be retribution.
This is not going away.
Some of whom even make their political careers their own selves, not on the coattails of a male relative.
Hey, after she passed so much important legislation as a Senator and managed our foreign relations (with Russia and Libya especially) so adroitly, who can doubt Hillary Clinton's qualifications to be President?
The only way Hillary can be made into an attractive candidate is by diminishing the opponent: War on Women, rich, etc. The media will cooperate.
Coolidge as president helped put down Klan riots in Omaha.
As head of the Mass. Senate, he helped ban "Birth of a Nation."
He gave a commencement address at Howard University while president and supported the candidacy of at least one black Republican Congressional candidate while president.
You could look it up, Crack.
I don't think there will ever be "authentic excitement among American women" at the thought of a female candidate.
We've had hundreds of female candidates for all sorts of offices by now. The voting patterns aren't that different than they are for male vs male elections. American women vote their convictions, not their ladyparts.
Any historic aspect to Hillary's campaign would have run out in 2008, along with Palin's candidacy. We all know how both of those went. You can't fake that kind of thing.
Coolidge wasn't always as reserved and boring. Early in his presidency his 16-year-old son died a truly bizarre death (he got a blister on his toe playing tennis, it became infected, and he died), and Coolidge became deeply depressed. Much of the "Silent Cal" image may actually have been depression.
Peter
Silent Cal was a xenophobic man, and he didn’t care. He thought Anglo-Saxons were superior, and did nothing to help the plight of minorities. During the Tulsa Race Riots in 1923 he didn’t send in the National Guard to restore order, and he never called for the Congress to act on President Harding’s civil rights programs. In 1925 he cut off much immigration by signing the Immigration Act of 1925 which set quotas to all immigration to the United States. Coolidge viewed most foreigners as detriments to the American way, so he stopped them from coming to America all together.
What Coolidge is known most for is being tight with both a word and a dollar,...
Another cheap, coldhearted, ethnic cleanser - that's what whites want in a leader now.
Enlighten me - How, exactly, does this indicate whites have changed over the years?
Y'all don't even recognize what it means - that white Americans, specifically, need laws in place to stop them from randomly killing others - do you?
It means you don't understand the culture you came from, or the one you're in, or - obviously - the one you'd prefer in the future. The "boring" future where blacks are inferior and their deaths and other concerns are ignored for the sake of celebrating whites making money.
For years after I was born, a white person could legally gouge out a black's eyes for something as trivial as dropping something, yet you pretend this world we're in - with whites so clearly on top and blacks so clearly on the bottom - is the result of white's efforts, and civilization, and not those that were forced on blacks at gunpoint.
Calvin Coolidge.
One reason I want reparations is for the blood stained Twight Zone you "good guys" force us in,….
I suppose Hillary is preferable to Fauxcohontas Warren.
Peter
"Read about slavery."
Hilarious. Do you read about anything else, Crack ? Just hilarious. You are the perfect example of affirmative action here.
Hmmm. By your own standards (a frontpage attack on me because I said I was bored with gay threads) you must be a misogynist who lives in "fear" of Hillary or somesuch bullshit.
Apologies to everyone else in advance for responding to this person.
"Tell him that you will never dwell on old quarrels with him ..."
How many times have I heard that speech, ...
Google tells me that you've never heard it.
During the Tulsa Race Riots in 1923 [sic]
If you're going parrot someone else's lies*, you should at least parrot lies that get the year right. (*I'm guessing they were your own lies, posted in a different forum).
Andy : Well, as Mark Twain said, everybody complains about the weather but nobody does anything about it.
Floyd: Did he say that?
Andy : Mm-hmm.
Floyd: I thought Calvin Coolidge said that.
Andy : No, no Floyd, Calvin Coolidge didn't say that.
Floyd: What'd Calvin Coolidge say?
I just read, and agree with your recommendation of, the Shlaes biography of Calvin Coolidge. True to its subject, it is terse and substantive, and occasionally wryly funny. The book also taught me a lot I didn't know, but was glad to learn, about Coolidge's predecessor and successor, Warren G. Harding and Herbert Hoover.
Cracked:
"...xenophobic...didn’t care...thought Anglo-Saxons were superior...did nothing to help the plight of minorities...viewed most foreigners as detriments to the American way...stopped them from coming to America all together."
Coolidge, thou shouldst be living in this hour, eh?
...cheap, coldhearted, ethnic cleanser...
...white Americans...need laws in place to stop them from randomly killing others...
...don't understand the culture you came from, or the one you're in, or - obviously - the one you'd prefer in the future. The "boring" future where blacks are inferior and their deaths and other concerns are ignored for the sake of celebrating whites making money.
...a white person could legally gouge out a black's eyes for something as trivial as dropping something...pretend this world we're in - with whites so clearly on top and blacks so clearly on the bottom - is the result of white's efforts, and civilization, and not those that were forced on blacks at gunpoint.
True Crack, true. Every word blazing truth. And eloquent. Verily, you are the Gibbon of our age.
Enlighten me - How, exactly, does this indicate whites have changed over the years?
Changed? We haven't changed. It's exceedingly pleasant feeling (and being!) so superior and important. Why on earth should we change?
One reason I want reparations....
You seriously think people like the ones you've described above are going to give you reparations? What the fuck is wrong with you?
Maybe people are growing wary about historic firsts. If a "first" is truly significant, you should want the person who is "first" to be effective. Is there any believable evidence that Hillary Clinton will be effective?
Nothing wrong with exciting if paired with competency.
Crack, you seem to be so unhappy as an American, with our intractable history of slavery and racism.
You might want to try Liberia. They speak English there, and their own ancient history with slavery will keep you interested for years to come.
There will be no boring Presidents so long as women vote.
Amen Brother....no ugly ones either.
American women vote their convictions, not their ladyparts.
You forgot the sarcasm tag. besides Most American women have no convictions, only wants.
"Read about slavery"
Crack, I would doubt if you have read ten books, front to back, on slavery. Two years ago you did not give one shit about this topic and here you are today an expert, lecturing us as though you were a real freedom rider instead of a doped up ranter on a blog.
Lay off the dope. Get a fucking job. Forget reparations. You are wasting the little bit of life left. The very few commenters here who respond to you are laughing in your face. The rest have given up.
By the way, the following is untrue:
"For years after I was born, a white person could legally gouge out a black's eyes for something as trivial as dropping something…"
As evidence of Coolidge's inhumanity, Crack Emcee posts a quote from a comment section of some website. From the typewriter of some unknown blog commenter to your ears, as the saying goes, sorta...
Nineteenth Amendment: Mistake or Disastrous Error? Discuss.
I have paid much attention to these elections in the past, and I see no difference that my attention has made. I therefore plan to devote very little attention to this election until it is time to vote. At that time, I will select the most boring, competent person who aligns with what I'd like to see done.
The End.
Why don't you try reading something that tells you about this country - beyond just what happened? Read about slavery.
Man, who saw THIS coming?
How many times have I heard that speech, of being told - in order to be in good standing with whites - blacks have to focus on WHITE'S needs and outlook?
What's the cubed root of never?
Read about lynching during his day and discover how admirable he was - and how worthless his life was to those Americans who needed him - and then get back to me about how little excitement you need.
I'll bite: Can you explain any way the FEDERAL government would have any oversight of a crime that was committed inside a state's borders and didn't impact other states?
You've done a lot to make people not give a damn about black history.
Y'all don't even recognize what it means - that white Americans, specifically, need laws in place to stop them from randomly killing others - do you?
Aren't you obsessed over the killing of black kids, which is overwhelmingly done by blacks?
How about Chicago, that hellhole where blacks have made a sport of killing other blacks?
Yes, WHITES have the problem. Of course, chuckles.
Crack's point about the klan was at it's height of influence during the Coolidge administration is valid but correlation does not equal causation. He forgets that the klan crumbled under it's own hypocrisy. Having a boring president won't lead to a rise of the klan again.
I also don't understand why Crack is a fan of open borders. That concept would not work to his best interest. Anti-black racism doesn't just come from white people.
Maybe the Democratic nominee should be someone who may not be the most exciting politician...
Y'all don't even recognize what it means - that white Americans, specifically, need laws in place to stop them from randomly killing others - do you?
Well what in the hell do Black people need in place to stop killing each other, let alone others? The biggest problem Black people face today is each other.
"I'm sick of inspiration and claims of historiosity."
Romney, an opportunity missed.
Crack said...Read about lynching during his day and discover how admirable he was - and how worthless his life was to those Americans who needed him - and then get back to me about how little excitement you need.
You paint Coolidge as unconcerned, heartless, do-nothing, etc., about this but historical fact says otherwise -- he actually advocated the passage of anti-lynching legislation at the national level. From his first annual message on December 6, 1923:
"Numbered among our population are some 12,000,000 colored people. Under our Constitution their rights are just as sacred as those of any other citizen. It is both a public and a private duty to protect those rights. The Congress ought to exercise all its powers of prevention and punishment against the hideous crime of lynching, of which the negroes are by no means the sole sufferers, but for which they furnish a majority of the victims."
Coolidge was a lazy asshole who refused to do any work he could avoid doing. Not that there is anything wrong with getting in the way of progress.
How did prohibition work out, anyway. Cal didn't care. He was asleep.
I want a boring President. Stop trying to excite me."
I could be wrong but it seems you are hoping for Scott Walker for president. No one ever called him Mister Excitement and he does appear to be reasonably competent and law abiding notwithstanding Garage's dark fantasies.
Tradguy, do not mistake an image for reality.
Walker excited the hell out of people around here.
I think Romney is nicely boring. Bring him back. That would be especially boring.
Blogger mishu said...
Crack's point about the klan was at it's height of influence during the Coolidge administration is valid
No, completely wrong. When Coolidge took office, Klan membership numbered 6 Million. When he left office that number had declined to less than 60 thousand.
Crack is a democrat now. He lies with ease.
When the Obama presidency is over, we'll have had 16 years of how not to select a president. With GWB, we allowed our anger over 9/11 to allow to start a war on faulty intelligence (take that both ways, please). Then we elected the first black president for no other reason than he was the first who sounded like a president. And then we started some new wars.
Yes - it's time for normal. Never has there been a better time for a back to basics campaign - no more "bright new day" for a while.
The Crack Emcee:
"...I want reparations..."
Bad Santa:
"Want in one hand, shit in the other, and see which one fills up first."
You mean someone who spends their effort actually doing something for the country, instead of [trying to] entertain the country?
Blogger Ann Althouse said...
Walker excited the hell out of people around here.
Through actions that excited people (to admiration or anger); otherwise he seems Midwest normal with a concrete agenda that he can articulate and advance.
Obama excited people through hot-air, faux Greek columns and dust-jacket blurbs; otherwise he seems like an empty suit, who is lost without teleprompters, straw men, and media air cover.
Anglelyne,
"You seriously think people like the ones you've described above are going to give you reparations? What the fuck is wrong with you?"
Who said "give"?
Gahrie said...
Y'all don't even recognize what it means - that white Americans, specifically, need laws in place to stop them from randomly killing others - do you?
Well what in the hell do Black people need in place to stop killing each other, let alone others? The biggest problem Black people face today is each other.
Nice way to avoid the question,...
Lydia,
"You paint Coolidge as unconcerned, heartless, do-nothing, etc., about this but historical fact says otherwise,…"
Yes, and whites loved their slaves - give me a break. Blacks were hanging from flag poles, all over the nation, and you think that speech changed things?
The last lynching of a black in America was in 1981.
You people live in a dream world - just not MLK's,...
In the old days, when blacks ran away, whites said we were lazy - a racist idea they still love to throw around.
The idea that blacks were never slaves, couldn't be made into slaves, and wouldn't stay in role, never occurred to the whites - we were lazy, and that was it.
Whites still think that way - replacing reality with their cockamamy ideas = especially about themselves. The idea, that whites have never taken responsibility for themselves, doesn't occur to them still. (It did, momentarily, when the Civil War ended,…) It's all "look at blacks" (see Gahrie's comment, above) and never "let's fix this" - because whites see nothing to fix - since they ARE the problem.
Being delusional can't be helpful,...
It's a pickle,….
Crack:
"Who said "give"?"
Ah. But it is the same answer isn't it? What makes you think the evil white devils who foisted 400 years of misery on you and who remain to this day unconcerned about their evil will allow a single penny to be taken from them by force? Do you think a people who would be so brutal, so hang-em-high-crazy, so certain of their superiority and strength will not suppress the slightest infringement of their hegemony with a retaliation that will make the Spanish Inquisition look like a picnic? You should read about the Inquisition if you are interested in what white devils are really capable of. It makes slavery, four hundred years of slavery. if you want to take your reparations I would suggest you first get the 2nd Amendment repealed.
Open borders will improve Crack's socioeconomic standing. /not
Crack says: Why don't you try reading something that tells you about this country - beyond just what happened? Read about slavery.
You keep saying that but you never have any suggestions.
Just what books should we be reading about slavery? Hopefully the books you recommend will be books you have read yourself.
I've read a number of books about slavery over the years. Some of contemporary (20th century) vintage, some from the 18th and 19th century. Perhaps we have read some of the same ones.
Let us know which ones you find valuable and maybe we can have a useful discussion.
While on the subject of slavery, have you read any books on white slavery, Crack? Perhaps more whites have been enslaved historically than blacks. Perhaps not but certainly numbers approaching the number of blacks enslaved through history.
The very word "slave" comes from "slav" as in Slavic people such as might live in places like the Caucasus.
And if you think black slavery in the American south was rough (It was) it was a picnic compared to slavery elsewhere. Black and white.
Looking forward to your suggested reading list.
John Henry
Michael,
The Spanish Inquisition was pretty horrible. The torture, exiling, the 5,000 or so killed over 400 years and so on.
The worst thing about the Spanish Inquisition is that nobody ever expected it.
John Henry
...in which Crackhead Emcee blames the failure to call out the National Guard to quell the Tulsa Race Riots on... THE GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS!!!!
Good going, Crack! How's that job search coming along?
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