Scheduled for 28 minutes, former President Bill Clinton spoke for 48 at the Democratic National Convention last night. And, by all accounts, he knocked it out of the park. Afterward, even Republicans were conceding that Obama would likely win reelection… Here’s the video.
And, here, thanks to a Redditor by the name of TheRealTK421, is a bit of the transcript.
…”One of the greatest Chairmen the Democratic party ever had, Bob Strauss, used to say… that every politician wants every voter to believe he was born in a log cabin he built himself. But… Strauss then admitted, it ain’t so.”
…”And here’s what I want the people at home to think about – When times are tough and people are frustrated and angry and hurting and uncertain…. the politics of constant conflict may be good. But what is good politics does not necessarily work in the real world. What works in the real world is cooperation.”
…”In those 52 years, our private economy has produced… 66 million private sector jobs. So, what’s the job score? Republicans – 24 million, Democrats – 42!”
…”In 2010, as the President’s recovery program kicked in, the job loses stopped. And things began to turn around. The Recovery Act saved or created millions of jobs and cut taxes – lemme say this again – cut taxes for 95% of the American people. In the last 29 months, our economy has produced about 4.5 million private sector jobs. We coulda done better, but last year the Republicans blocked the President’s job plan – costing the economy more than a million new jobs. So, here’s another job score: President Obama – plus 4.5 million. Congressional Republicans – ZEE-RO”
…”So, what’s happened? There are now 250,000 more people working in the auto industry than on the day the companies were restructured. So, now we all know that Governor Romney opposed the plan to save GM and Chrysler. So, here’s another job score – are you listening in Michigan and Ohio and across the country? – here’s another job score. Obama – 250,00… Romney? ZEE-RO.”
…”Now, finally… listen to this. For the last 2 years, after going up at 3 times the rate of inflation for a decade… for the last 2 years, health care costs have been under 4% in both years for the first time in 50 years… Now, when Congressman Ryan looked into that TV camera and attacked President Obama’s Medicare savings as quote ‘the biggest, coldest power play’ – I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Because… that 716 billion dollars is exactly, to the dollar, the same amount of Medicare savings that he has in his… own… budget! You gotta gi’ him one thing – it takes some brass to attack a guy for doin’ what you did…”
…”And, the administration agreed to give waivers to those Governors, and others, only if they had a credible plan to increase employment by 20% – and they could keep the waivers only if they did increase employment. Now – did I make myself clear? – the requirement was for more work, not less. So… this is personal to me… we moved millions of people off welfare. It was one of the reasons that, in the 8 years I was President, we had 100 times as many people move out of poverty into the middle class than happened under the previous 12 years. A hundred times as many – it’s a big deal. But I am telling you, the claim that President Obama weakened welfare reform’s work requirement is just… not… true. But, they keep on running ads claiming it. You wanna know why? Their campaign pollster said, ‘We are not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers.’ Now, finally I can say – that IS true.”
…”People ask me all the time how we delivered four surplus budgets. What new ideas did we bring? I always give a one-word answer: arithmetic.”
…”We simply cannot afford to give the reigns of government to someone who will double-down on trickle-down.”
23 Comments
That guy deserves a blowjob.
I don’t count myself as a Clinton fan. The passage of NAFTA and the repeal of the Glass–Steagall Act have done irreparable harm to our country. But he’s a force of nature, and he hit all the right notes in what was probably the most substantive convention speech I’ve ever seen. He set the frame for the rest of the campaign and did it brilliantly.
This was also about laying the groundwork for Hillary in 2016.
“Associated Press ‘Fact Checks’ Clinton’s Speech By Bringing Up Monica Lewinsky”
http://thinkprogress.org/election/2012/09/06/804811/associated-press-fact-checks-clintons-speech-by-bringing-up-monica-lewinsky/
This come from Bloomburg:
Read more:
http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-06/bill-clinton-asserts-democrats-create-more-jobs-reality-check.html
More impressive than the Clinton speech, the new private sector jobs report has come out, and 201k jobs have been added. Romney isn’t going to win this one.
bit.ly/Re0xvO
Putting Clinton in context. From Gawker.
……School uniforms. V-Chips. Y2K preparation. The “Initiative on Race,” whatever the hell that was. After being walloped by the Republicans in 1994, and again after being walloped by Matt Drudge and Michael Isikoff in January 1998, Clinton collapsed into a protective crouch and championed meaningless, small-bore, “small-government” throwaways that Newt Gingrich thought were OK. He was an utterly paralyzed president. His personal popularity (and economic prosperity) notwithstanding, Clinton huddled at the center of a relentless maelstrom of rancor and rage for his last two years in office and accomplished next to nothing. Then he handed things off to Al Gore and started greasing the palms of Central Asian tyrants for money.
That’s after beating an unpopular Republican candidate who never captured the enthusiasm of his party’s base. Kind of like Romney.
So while Clinton’s speech had a slightly underminery, “this-kid-hasn’t-done-as-well-as-me-but-it’s-not-his-fault-because-times-is-hard” vibe to it, we should all hope past isn’t prologue when it comes to Democratic presidents who get re-elected to a second term. By pure force of staying power and charisma, Clinton has managed to convince Americans that his years in office were halcyon days, with a slight distraction from that awful Lewinsky matter. They were not. The very first hard policy proposal Clinton pitched in his 1996 State of the Union speech was a V-Chip. One hopes Obama—who will continue to face the same sort of partisan onslaught—could do better.
Why exactly are there limits on presidential terms? If the people want to vote for a candidate, why shouldnt they be eligible.
Slick Willy ’16
I think the Big Dog is a mangy mutt, but damn he’s good.
The very first hard policy proposal Clinton pitched in his 1996 State of the Union speech was a V-Chip.
God, I forgot all about that. I think I owe G.W.Bush an apology.
@ Eel – you’re hilar….!
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/09/06/turn-your-back-on-the-democrats-in-charlotte
September 06, 2012
Dead Country Walking
Turn Your Back on the Democrats in Charlotte
by MICHAEL DOLINER
Our leaders are mass murderers. It is not appropriate to protest them. A protest is a complaint. You do not complain to a murderer and say, “Now don’t you do that again.” Nor do you ask him to save your behind. Would you vote for Hannibal Lecter if he had a good health plan? They are not only murderous, they are also insane. The wars could not have succeeded. There is no plan to their actions, no real hope of retaining hegemony through force. They launch wars without purpose, and pursue them with vigorous incoherence. They lose them all. Nor can they build. American can-do is do-do. They are too inept, simply too stupid. Vicious, insane, stupid, and paralysed, the American elite has come to the end of its rule. If others go along with their blind stumble, the end will be nuclear war, and if others wake up and don’t go along, their rule will end. For war with Iran, with the fifth fleet as sitting ducks, will be nuclear war, and power exists only because the population is in the habit of going along. But some habits are just plain bad habits. Some are very, very bad.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/17/meet-barack-obama/
Weekend Edition August 17-19, 2012
Delusions and Disappointments
Meet Barack Obama
by ROB URIE
Mitt Romney’s Vice Presidential pick, Paul Ryan, as with himself, is an uninformed opportunist who was born into wealth and privilege and whose proposed policies aim to perpetuate that privilege at the expense of the rest of the population with whom he nominally shares a national identity. Barack Obama is a cynical opportunist who serves the interests of wealth and privilege and whose policies more effectively promote those interests than Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan could ever hope to. Those circling the wagons to get Mr. Obama re-elected should spend a bit of time getting to know their guy.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/30/change-you-can-believe-in-comes-to-the-arms-market
August 30, 2012
Change You Can Believe in Comes to the Arms Market
Arms Sales: Obama’s Only Growth Industry?
by PIERRE SPREY
[snip]
Adding $42 billion dollars of export arms sales in just one year doesn’t happen by accident. That tripling of sales means the Obama Administration mounted a huge State/Pentagon push to persuade or muscle developing countries into buying US arms, then mounted a full court press to whisk the ensuing contracts through the normally lengthy State/DoD approval process.
On the U.S. industry side, our corporations didn’t increase their share of the developing country arms market from 20% or so in 2005-6 to 79% in 2011 (as shown in Table 5) by simply printing more attractive sales brochures. Inevitably, given the seamy history of ubiquitous corruption in developing country arms purchases, our arms makers must have massively increased their political contributions and bribes. And, beyond the shadow of a doubt, the Obama Administration, like previous administrations all the way back to Nixon, knew about and enabled these massive increases, through both coordinated military-diplomatic sales pressures and high level quashing of investigations and prosecutions.
Weekend Edition August 24-26, 2012
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Getting Beyond Red Herring Politics
Jill Stein and the 99 Percent
by BART GRUZALSKI
[snip]
Were Obama’s Hands Tied by Republicans from the Beginning?
It is crucial to know for certain whether the Republicans prevented Obama from moving ahead on his promised progressive agenda or whether he betrayed us.
[snip]
In the honeymoon of his presidency, Obama could have pushed for a significant job stimulus program. All Obama had to do was to follow the play-book that FDR had put together to help pull America out of the Great Depression. Our nation’s infrastructure desperately needed repairing. Across the nation people have the equipment and personnel to fix our roads and bridges. An infrastructure job stimulus program only needed an influx of federal dollars and a streamlining of all relevant federal permitting processes. The result would have been millions of working Americans repairing our infrastructure and, as a result, our sick economy.
Did the Republicans block Obama from instituting a Manhattan-project job stimulus program that would put millions of Americans back to work fixing the infrastructure? They didn’t need to. Obama never tried.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/23/the-2012-politics-of-fantasy
August 23, 2012
Party Down
The 2012 Politics of Fantasy
by BEN SCHREINER
[snip]
even leftist supporters of Obama admit there is no discernible difference between the two candidates. As Obama backers Bill Fletcher and Carl Davidson instead argue, “November 2012 becomes not a statement about the Obama presidency, but a defensive move by progressive forces to hold back the ‘Caligulas’ on the political right.” Such bankrupt arguments inevitably rear their ugly head every four years in the now tired attempt to send the fractured American Left scurrying straight into death vise of the “Party of the people.”
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/30/when-obama-whitewashed-rape
August 30, 2012
Rape is Rape … Except When You’re a Female Detainee
When Obama Whitewashed Rape
by RILEY WAGGAMAN
Hello friends! Have you heard the terrific news? President Obama stands up for women, and speaks out against rape! “Rape is rape!” Except when the U.S. Military is doing the raping, of course, in which case political expediency requires Barack Obama to whitewash and completely ignore rape, forever.
In May 2009, Barack Obama announced he would not comply with a court order that would have brought hundreds of meticulously documented cases of rape and sexual assault from prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan to the forefront of public debate and scrutiny.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/09/04/obamas-secret-plan-to-prop-up-housing-prices
September 04, 2012
Discounts for Speculators, Foreclosures for Mom and Pop!
Obama’s Secret Plan to Prop Up Housing Prices
by MIKE WHITNEY
Private Equity firms are piling in to the housing market to take advantage of bargain basement prices on distressed inventory. The Obama administration is stealthily selling homes to big investors who are required to sign non-disclosure agreements to ensure that the public remains in the dark as to the magnitude of the giveaway. Aside from the steep discounts on the homes themselves, the government is also providing “synthetic financing to reduce the up-front capital required if they agree to form a joint venture with Fannie Mae and share proceeds from the rental or sale of properties.” (Businessweek)
In other words, US-taxpayers are providing extravagant financing for deep-pocket speculators who want to reduce their risk while maximizing their profits via additional leverage. The plan resembles Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s Public-Private Partnership Investment Program, (PPIP) which Columbia University professor Joseph Stiglitz denounced in an op-ed in the New York Times. Here’s what he said:
“The Obama administration’s $500 billion or more proposal to deal with America’s ailing banks has been described by some in the financial markets as a win-win-win proposal. Actually, it is a win-win-lose proposal: the banks win, investors win — and taxpayers lose.”
The same rule applies here. Speculators are getting lavish incentives (gov financing, low rates, and severe discounts) in secret deals to buy distressed inventory which should be available to the public at market prices.
If that’s not a ripoff, then what is?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article32326.htm
Putin Is Demonized While Democracy Fails In Amerika
By Paul Craig Roberts
August 31, 2012
[snip]
Obama is a despicable patsy, a front man for powerful private interests, and Democrats should be totally ashamed to have elevated such a cowardly lowlife. But as awful as Obama is, a vote for Republicans is a vote for Hitler or Stalin. Indeed, the election of Romney and Ryan would be worse than either.
Interesting discussion among Republicans who are now identifying as Democrats.
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/zh8rg/dear_all_politicians_involved_this_season_i_am/
So if even the Republicans say Obama will win, can’t all the groups just save their money for next election cycle and spare us all the phony bullshit until we vote?
After all, the next election begins before inauguration anyway. We need a rest.
Neoliberalism Neoliberalism Neoliberalism Neoliberalism Neoliberalism Neoliberalism
But trickle down works.. He even benefited from it. He had a great tenure in office, low unemployment, low inflation, growing economy.. WHY? Because he didn’t mess with it!!
Reagan took over a huge economic mess, had the economy recovered in less than four years (despite how impossible it apparently it is for a Dem to do it in one term) and we celebrated with a GREAT economy for almost 20 years.
Then the Dems take control of both the House and Senate and they can’t leave well enough alone.. the economy goes into the dump..
So now they insist they don’t want to go back because it doesn’t work.. BUT IT DID, and it did FOR CLINTON!!
4.5M new jobs?? Look at the timeline.. tell me what happened that was significant about 4 months prior to the bleeding of jobs stopping and job creation starting.. the ad the Dems use says April 2010.. why is that significant?? That’s 4 months AFTER the Republicans took the house and took the checkbook away from Obama..
The Unemployment rate started going down, job creation started going up.. and it wasn’t based on Obama or the Dems winning an election, but the REPUBLICANS.. and them shutting down the “spend our way out of trouble” strategy.
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[…] pay off the way that the Republican strategists had hoped. And it probably didn’t help that Bill Clinton came along and reminded everyone just how much better they were off before the Republic…. So, it didn’t come as much of a surprise to me today, when I read that Romney, who had said […]