People have asked me for years how to get a diary on that Rec List. They wonder aloud if there is a 'key word' list or some set of 'tags' which will ensure that their piece of prose will end up on that greatly desired diary destination.
Sometimes, it's the author. When US Senator Barack Obama posted a diary here way back in 2005, I'm pretty sure it made the Rec List, with 843 comments. Even though the diary tags don't show "Recommended", I think that is because it's before the system started dropping them in. Maybe before we used tags here?
I know for a fact, if Hillary Clinton herself posted a diary here, it would hit the Rec List and stay there for at least two days.
So why would I title this piece "Want a "Rec List" Diary? Put 'Hillary Clinton did something bad' in the title"?
Because, sadly, it's true.
You know why?
Kossacks are already in a fucking tizzy about the upcoming presidential campaign of 2016, that's why.
We're political junkies, most of us. It's why we came here in the first place, isn't it?
Came for the politics, stayed for the Community
We care about things political, and
who is President is as about as political as it gets.
I'm not immune. A bit earlier today, after reading some tweets about how Hillary Clinton is going to destroy the Democracy of America (I shit you not), how she was a failure (a failure, I tell you!) as Secretary of State, how she is the eeeevil....
I came here and read the former candidate for US Senator from NY, (Jonathan) Tasini's screed "Hillary Clinton's Dishonest Ploy to Wash The Blood Of War From Her Hands".
Now, first off, Hillary Clinton is far from my favorite politician. I went for Obama early, and I've said so about a bazillion times around here in the comments. Some of you may have read some of them over the years.
I was aghast when she, like far too many others in the US Congress at the time, voted for that AUMF which enabled the war-mongering Bush-Cheney team to invade a nation which had neither attacked us nor was any serious threat to our nation. Of course that nation did (and still does) sit above what is reputed to be the second largest under-land (as opposed to under-ocean) reserve of petroleum accessible today. Which begs the question, did we invade Iraq because George W Bush and Richard Cheney are delusional lunatics who believe in the book of Revelations and thought bombing Iraq into the stone age might accelerate the timeline towards their physical redemption into their Christian Heaven OR was all of that 'fluff talk' designed to make invisible to all their true reason for invading Iraq, which is that we wanted their oil and had the Military Might to take it?
None-the-less, for that, and for a host of other reasons, Hillary Clinton has never been on my top ten list of politicians I'd like to meet or have dinner and drinks with. Never.
I have disagreed with her public policy statements on a lot of things over the years. I thought her foray into politics as the FLOTUS in a manner more like that of a paid lobbyist was in large part why the healthcare initiative failed back in the 90s. No one elected her to office, and people resented that she was acting as though they had when it came to Hillarycare.
I found the entire Monica Lewinsky situation to be demeaning to the presidency and to the nation. For smart people, the Clintons both did and said some really stupid shit during this period. Of course, historically speaking, in these United States, whenever a pol gets caught with their pants down it's delay, deny, distract and then 'let's move on to more civil subjects'.
As you can probably tell by now, you'd never find me doing a Late Night Top Ten List of "Why I <3 Hillary".
But what you will find me doing is wondering why in the hell would a former Democratic candidate for the US Senate would doing a scandalicious, hit-piece on the former Secretary of State who by all appearances is indeed running for the Oval Office in 2016.
Yes, I agree that it would be best if candidate for president Hillary Clinton owned up and said out loud on air
"I voted 'Yes' on the AUMF. I made a bad mistake there, just like a lot of the rest of the Congress did at the time. I'm so very sorry that I cast that vote and I wish that I could take it back. But I cannot. I was wrong, they were wrong, President Bush was wrong. But we cannot re-write history. I will do my best to ensure that such an ill-conceived strategy, based on facts which were either fabricated or known to the purveyors to be already debunked, will never again happen in the United States of America."
Will she?
I rather doubt it. That is not how politics in America works, now is it?
Let us say she did make such a statement.
What would it gain her? The respect of some on the Left? Yes, that it would. But would it make a rat's ass of difference to anyone else on the planet? No, it would not. It would most likely merely set off a shit-storm of Right Wing tv and radio hate, which we would all have to endure for however long it took their vitriol to wane. And two years later they are still beating the Benghazi Bullshit Bureau drum for all they are worth, which includes US House investigation number EIGHT, just convened.
So she can't apologize for her vote in the AUMF, not literally. There's no political capital in it for her to do so. Just an unbelievable loud outpouring of conservative poutrage. And a bunch of the Left likely calling her a 'johnnie come lately' apologist.
But she has to say something when the press asks her outright about that vote, now doesn't she? So she does what every politician does when asked a hard question. She fudges and dodges and sidesteps and says as little as possible which can be viewed in light of her former comments on the issue at hand.
Does that make her dishonest? I don't think so.
It makes her an American Politician in the age of electronic media and recorded video.
It makes her a nuanced speaker in public venues.
But I'd still be a lot happier if she would make that public statement I wrote for her, above. And then she'd lose the goddamned presidential election to one of the clown car Republicans who are going to be in it to win it starting next year.
Is THAT what we really want?
How about we just ask her to not play the "politics as usual' game and tell us now if she's just promoting a book and heading into Grammahood, or if she wants to be 45.