And Hillary Steps Into The Ring Swinging.

[DonRedwood]

Hillary Clinton is retired. Resting her weary bones. Sitting on a lounge chair reading a book and getting some sun.

"Hill, can I get you some tea?"

"Sure, Bill, green please."

And she is throwing wicked knock-out political punches from the sidelines.

Welcome to Presidential Politics Hillary Clinton style. For your discussion peeps, I offer this: We are about to see an entirely new type of Presidential Run. Nobody like Hillary Clinton has ever run before. Not even Hillary Clinton when she ran the first time. After the election, McCain settled down on the front porch like an angry old man with nothing better to do than yell at all the passing young whippersnappers, but Hillary seemed to have decided, "Well, what's the next hardest job then?"

Hillary Clinton applied for the job of President. We hired Obama instead. So Hillary looked at her resume and spent the last four years beefing it up. Now, it could be, she was just bored and is the type of person who likes a hard job. Or she could have been thinking ahead to, once again, being the country's first woman President. She is certainly going to be one of the most internationally connected people to run for President. She is certainly, one of our most skilled politicians on the world stage.

So Hillary Clinton isn't even in the race yet. But that doesn't mean she isn't in the ring. Her just released video for gay marriage is a prime example of the race that Hillary is starting to run. Hillary Clinton is so well-known, so respected and just so damned smart and interesting that people stop and listen when she talks.

And so she can and will throw these huge social statements out into the mix that nobody else can compare to. She is the wisest woman of the land in some way. She does not compare to other First Ladies. She does not compare to other Senators. She does not compare to other Secretaries of State. She is unique.

So watch her gay marriage video. Stunningly shot. Her points are not debatable. She just won the argument hands down. Gay people have equal rights of citizenship. What republican message will hold up well to that? Prebus might come out and make a statement-"Uhm, gay people shouldn't get full rights?" Woo hoo. Consider that a punch to the face Republicans... Hillary style.

She's too old says McConnell...but look at the video. Dang man, Hillary Clinton looks beautiful, fresh, ready to take on the world. The Turtle just told us she was a little old grey lady didn't he? Another swing and a miss by the Republicans and a roundhouse punch to the face from Hillary.

Stay tuned ladies and gentleman. From her lounge chair on her vacation, Hillary Clinton is about to run one of the most interesting, amazing and brutal Presidential campaigns in history. Her statements on Gay Marriage alone are groundbreaking in many ways. Love her or leave her, this is going to be one hell of a show. And, as we watch the viewer numbers of this video ratchet up into the millions, let it be known. Hillary Clinton just answered the GOP's attack on her. She is in the ring. She just kicked their asses in round one and didn't even chip a nail.

Bring the lady her tea...she's on vacation.

[Little Star]

1. I LOVE Hillary Clinton. That is all.

[DonRedwood]

14. I want a woman president.

It is long overdue.

[Little Star]

19. I'm 66 and would love to see one before I kick the bucket.....

But the first one being Hillary would make my day! I admire her so much.

Yet, I'll settle for any good Dem woman and be happy about it. Just no Repub woman, please dear god, I'm not that good of a feminist, lol.

[Cracklin Charlie]

29. I love her, too.

As far as I'm concerned, she can be President if she wants it, or she can be whatever she wants to be. But bless her, for making this video. Bless her for telling us how she feels about the issue, and bless her for also telling us WHY she feels the way she does.

It never hurts to remind people what liberty really means, and how liberty for all makes us stronger as a nation.

[Little Star]

30. +1

[IdaBriggs]

2. I love her, but not as President. She already lived in the White House.

This is a deal breaker for me: No Immediate Family of Presidents.

No Bushes. No Clintons. No Obamas. Etc.

I love her. Put her on the Supreme Court, please.

Just not in the White House.

[DonRedwood]

5. Not very democratic of you!

But, generally I don't like it either. Too easy for the first one to twist the system to support the next one... as we saw with bush bush.

In this case, I feel the benefit of finally having a woman president far outweighs the risks. The men's club works very hard to keep women out of politics so, in this case, those connections might be necessary to facilitate change.

She is certainly competent as well...that helps.

[IdaBriggs]

13. How is this "not very democratic" -- ?

We have over One Hundred MILLION qualified people - and the only candidate we can come up with is a former First Lady?

We have other good qualified women in this country; as I said, I *love* Hillary, and am proud of her *MANY* accomplishments.

But I do not approve of "Immediate Family" running for President as I feel it sets us up terribly for nepotism and the problems that come with not getting "fresh faces" involved in the process.

This is my stance, and I will stick with it.

[DonRedwood]

15. Peace, peace! I agreed with you (for the most part)

The supreme court's support of little bush makes your point 100%.

[IdaBriggs]

16. Apologies! I was over-reacting!

I had some fool tell me I wasn't a liberal last week (while totally mis-characterizing a post I made a few years ago), and it is still a hot button for me.

I apologize for my reaction - for one second I thought you were saying I wasn't being "democratic" and got my feathers in an unnecessary ruffle.

So sorry!

[DonRedwood]

18. I was teasing about having an "everybody but" rule not being democratic

But, I truly believe our democracy has done as well as it has because of the rarity of familial lineage in Presidential politics.

Jeb is not acceptable because of it. I admit my double standard in my acceptance of Hillary Clinton despite Bill.

Lol...see, I'm the one who should be mad! You are pointing out I'm a bit of hypocrite!

[DonRedwood]

23. I should also get better about using the

sarcasm tag.... hard to tell when peeps are teasing on here sometimes.



(though I don't mean sarcasm this time.... just using it as an example!)

[Voice for Peace]

39. so refreshing here to see misunderstanding resolved peacefully by two sane people

so often it goes the other way, sigh..

[DonRedwood]

42. Hey waita minute!! Who are you calling sane?

[Voice for Peace]

50. you're implying I'm not an honest person?

[DonRedwood]

52. I think the ice you tread on is thin

But, since I'm the sanest of my family, I'll let it slide.

[Voice for Peace]

54. Sanity is relative, and such an interesting study.

A sign of sanity in my opinion is people communicating
respectfully and resolving misunderstanding without
doing harm.

[demwing]

21. She is uniquely qualified for the office

and that - not her family name - is the deal sealer for me.

[DonRedwood]

22. I can think of no candidate in my lifetime who is as qualified.

Not even her husband.

[amuse bouche]

28. Oh well

guess you will have to get over your prejudice

[JDPriestly]

34. Also, she is a huge supporter of "free" trade

and served on the Board of Directors of Walmart.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

35. Well then, in the words of Curly Bill Brocius...

...Bye.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

3. Better late than never. Of course, she wasn't so tardy in supporting Bush's wars.

[forestpath]

9. +1

[DonRedwood]

17. When I was in high school republicans were saying AIDS people should be put on an island.

So, for a Presidential candidate to be saying I should be able to get married, to me, is a huge change during my lifetime. I can see the big picture and I've been working hard this entire time for equal rights.

Do I wish it was faster? Hell yes. But the big issues in the 70s are ALL still a big battle. Women's rights, clean air and water, nuclear proliferation....none of those big issues have been fixed yet.

Gay rights, have come a LONG way in comparison to other social issues. Um, citizenship? voting issues? gun control?

I at least have a domestic partnership. They still have assault rifles, pollution, coal, no ERA, nuclear power...

The gay people are finally winning and I am grateful for every politician who uses their platform to ask for my equal rights.

So, for me, thank you Hillary Clinton.

[NYC Liberal]

31. AMEN!

[DonRedwood]

45. I thought that comment deserved a few AMENS!!!

[hughee99]

4. While her last for years may have "beefed up her resume", I don't think the objection

of those who didn't like her last time (on BOTH sides of the aisle) was her foreign policy experience.

[TwilightGardener]

6. Yeah, she's getting her little State Department lackeys to try to blame Afghanistan on Obama.

She of the troop surge, her and Bob Gates and Gen P.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

36. Link, PLEASE?!

[TwilightGardener]

37. Read Vali Nasr's article on Holbrooke and Afghanistan in Foreign Policy online magazine.

Google it, because it's got a registration wall if I link to it.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

38. Thank you.

[Beacool]

40. Lackey????

Nasr has a right to write anything he wants. You may agree or disagree with his book, but do not invent facts by implying that Hillary had anything to do with what he wrote.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

41. You should dig a bit deeper...

...start with "What Vali Nasr Gets Wrong", by Sarah Chayes, and on from there, in the democratic shared spirit of fairness, of course.

[TwilightGardener]

43. I read that as well. But Nasr was on Hillary's 2008 campaign team.

His whole point was that if Obama had only listened to her and Holbrooke, we somehow would be winning or whatever in Afghanistan--because Holbrooke thought we should be negotiating directly with the Taliban at the same time that we surged in troops and then maintainted them indefinitely so we looked "committed" for the long haul. In fact, we have talked with the Taliban (multilaterally) and it went nowhere. We can't even get Karzai to cooperate with us, and he's our guy! So that's moot. And now we have to deal with the fact that we escalated, which prolongs drawdown (and there is no question that staying indefinitely is crazy). Obama is responsible for the decisions he made, but it would have helped to have had higher-quality advice in 2009-2010, let's put it that way.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

47. So you're saying Mrs. Clinton is so pissed that Obama didn't heed her advice...

...that she, and her "state dept. lackeys" are blaming....YGBFSMe?! What grand extrapolation powers you possess. Meh!

[MoonRiver]

7. Great post!

[DonRedwood]

8. Thank you!

I'm getting prepared to get laid into by the Hillary haters...

Even if she doesn't end up running, she may be the person who sets the tone of the race with these type of social commentaries.

[Dryvinwhileblind]

48. They're heeeeeeeeeeeeere.

[Arkansas Granny]

10. When she was in the Senate, I heard Senators from both sides of the aisle say how

hardworking she is. She has been a fantastic SOS and if she decides to enter the 2016 Presidential race I will support her wholeheartedly. She's smart, she's tough and she knows how politics works.

[DonRedwood]

11. She is an overachiever, that's for sure

She could be doing the lecture circuit, writing books, making gazillions. Instead, she just might offer more public service.

You have to respect that she would do that instead of going for the money. Fox dangled money (small change for Hillary Clinton) in front of Palin and she dropped her job as Governor and RAN to the bank.

[Deep13]

12. #45. nt

[DonRedwood]

20. ?

[Deep13]

24. Omama is #44. nt

[retired rooster]

25. Clinton & Warren in '16

or Hill & Liz

[Little Star]

26. I'm there!

[DonRedwood]

46. I made a post saying just that back a few months ago and got chewed up!

even here it is love her or hate her, it seems.

[graham4anything]

27. Reelect President HilllaryClinton45/Janet NapolitanoVP in 2020

and the biggest revenge on the haters of President Obama and the Clintons is to elect Hillary45 in 2016.

Nothing spits in the faces of their haters more than that.

I myself am 100% FOR Hillary for President 2016 and 2020.
for all the correct reasons, not against anyone else.

[FreeBC]

32. Won't mean a thing if we don't take back Congress!

[Beacool]

33. very nicely stated.

I have admired Hillary since she arrived at the national scene in 1992 as Bill's outspoken, brilliant and funny wife. She took no crap from anyone. The media and the DC critters didn't know what to make of her. The RW was apoplectic. I thought that she was terrific then and I haven't changed my mind.

I don't know whether she'll run or not, but she would make one terrific president.

[DonRedwood]

49. Thank you kindly and I agree whole-heartedly!

[RILib]

44. two big problems

I have two big problems with Hillary, and that's her willingness to jump right into new wars or beef up the U.S. presence in old ones and her to the right of the Likud support of Israel. It just turns my stomach to think of wasting trillions of dollars and thousands of lives on more wars.

Biden would make a much better President, and he can even accomplish things with a hostile House, while Hillary has a record of failure in dealing with Congress.

[Auntie Bush]

55. "Hillary has a record of failure in dealing with Congress.' I don't think that is true.

Why do you say such a thing? I thought she was an excellent senator...at least that's what everyone said. I believed them!

[karynnj]

58. The truth is likely between the extremes

It is clear from the behind the scenes accounts of 2008, that most of the Democratic establishment were behind the effort to get Obama to run. In what had to be one of the sneakiest back stabbings I have heard of, this included CHUCK SCHUMER, who in public was 100% behind Hillary.

I remember one article - from 2006 - where Hillary - who was not wanted by the others - added herself to the Levin alternative to Kerry/Feingold. There were stories - especially in the NYT - of Hillary taking a back bench role at the beginning of her Senate career that then changed to how she was almost the informal Democratic leader - whichever suited the claim being made. It is likely that neither extreme were true.

That said, Hillary spent 8 years in the Senate - the last two mostly running for President. Biden spent 36 years - and chaired both SFRC and the Judiciary committee (obviously at different times.) Hillary never chaired a committee. Biden knows the other Senators better and has far more insight into how the Senate works.

[Agschmid]

53. She has my vote. We are a few years away however... n/t

[William769]

56. Happily recorded.

[Auntie Bush]

57. There is NO ONE that would make a better president!

I'm ALL for Hillary! She'll make a fabulous Liberal president! Mark my words!

[magical thyme]

59. she is way too hawkish for me.

I will support her if she is the candidate, but I really don't want another hawk in the white house. Enough with the wars, please.

[Ruby the Liberal]

60. I backed Obama in 08 because I feared "Clinton fatigue"

Bush - Clinton - Bush - Clinton - etc..

She has my 110% support in 2016 if she chooses to run.

[MadHound]

61. No way in hell will I vote for Hillary Clinton,

Never, ever.