It's been too long ... If you haven't read Bookworm Room's Legislating to the Fringe; you must. I guess you could say that this explains "legislative creep." How every problem becomes the business of the legislature and how laws grow kudzu-like ta...

Just remember how stupid and annoying the left has been trying to base their program on Bush hate... That’s pretty much the bottom line; let’s not get all stupid and annoying [like them].

Unfortunately, whether it's the left, the right, Republicans, or Democrats, they all seem to base their spewing on the actions of the extreme opposite fringe, but denigrating the entire group... e.g. a right-winger denouncing the Clintons, or Kerry, while proclaiming that all Dems are moonbats. A further example.. a leftie denouncing Bush or Cheney and stating that all Reps are gun-crazy fascists.

Seriously, I imagine most folks are somewhere in the middle. Most folks aren't interested in making the contest between the political parties into our own American version of the blood feuds between the Sunni & Shites. Friendly banter is one thing; however too many people regard it in this manner - Whatever I say about you is okay because it's factual, but the things you're saying about me are slanderous lies and taken out of context. Statistics can tell whatever story the teller wants to be told. Quotes can be taken out of context.

We really need a return to civility in politics and the discussion of politics, a return to playing hard but fair. Who would want to watch a football game where two teams were more or less evenly matched, but the game was decided by cheating or crooked officiating? Yeah, even if your team won through use of cheating or crooked officials, it would taint the victory. Would you enjoy it as much as if you won fair and square? If you lost, but lost fairly, you would be able to shake the other guy's hand and not feel cheated.

Bush hating, Clinton hating.. is there really any difference in the two? Or does it (the hating) start with the fact that Bush or Clinton (depending on your preference) is from that dreaded "other" party?

I can't make this stuff up. Iran Accuses US of Manufacturing Genetic Weapons TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- An Iranian official here on Monday said that the Untied States, assisted by Israel, is seeking to create a genetic and molecular bank...

On the first part, Bill and Hillary had how to smear those that had been the subjects of Bill's interest down pat: always accuse them of having 'other motives'. That is a first step in compartmentalizing damage, focusing attention on a person (usually female) rather than the activity. Anyone who had been a backer of the Clintons that stood up to try and defend such people or who simply disagreed with the Clintons were also attacked. Outside of the sexual realm, the multiple donation scandals that have popped up (1996, 2000, 2004, 2006, 2007) have each had connections to outside organizations looking to buy influence. When turning on a political backer would not suffice, the reporting, itself, was attacked as being 'biased' or part of a 'vast rightwing conspiracy' even when done by those on the left who had helped the Clintons. After *Monika* the reporting was soon about the reporters doing the reporting and not about the event itself. And those personal follies cast before the public were used to distract from the funding follies which were heavily buried due to being non-charismatic and only associated with foreign Nations, billionaires and underworld crime figures. Nothing beats a sexual scandal, it appears.

Triangulation indicates that the Clintons have no set concept of what they want to do while in office. The concept of triangulation is to take any semi-popular idea and craft a message that appears to encompass more groups than the idea actually does. The healthcare debacle was a prime example of this, and no amount of television ads or cajoling various groups could get past the fact of the staggering price tag and huge increase in bureaucracy, plus having bureaucrats get a say in individual health choices. When confronted with ideas that have a relatively cohesive majority, like NAFTA or reforming welfare, the Clintons will do everything possible to get as much credit for that, even while the work they put in is minimal. The charisma actually did work to triangulate a 'peace dividend' which was hurting the US Army by 1999 to the point where two entire divisions fell to their lowest readiness status since Vietnam. Reducing the size of the Armed Forces, reducing maintenance budgets and training budgets all came to have a high toll when multiple 'peacekeeping' missions that Congress did not authorize were being done on a long-term basis.

Anyone running in opposition to HRC must recognize this pattern and outlook by her and Bill. Be it on the R or D side, the viciousness of the attacks, accusing those blaming them of having only personal animosity to them, accepting money from anyone no matter what it is tied to, and then throwing out emotional scenes that then gain high attention due to that drama is something to be contended with without respect to party. Those on the D side have not factored that into their campaigns and it is showing. None of them are good cross-counter-punchers when it comes to politics, which is the ability to deflect a counter-attack, show it to be below the waistline and then cross-attack with the original problem.

You do not need to run *against* HRC, just redeflect any attacks to show that they are attempts to distract from the original problem. The D side doesn't have that sort of politician left in it since the clogging of the political machines: nasty, brutal local politics is the place where you grow up on that stuff. And the R side has had very few of those, or individuals who could so recast the political terrain that their opponents did not know how to counter it. That is due to the lack of having different and competing views on a wide range of outlooks... there are deep flaws in the sclerotic visions of each party that address an era now gone and those in them do not have the political flexibility to change their stances to different ground.

Although I'm not a big HC fan, It must be pointed out that 60 million dollars worth of GOP persecution prosecution yielded zero, zip , nada HC fingerprints on anything.

On the other hand, there were a lot of carefully wiped surfaces!

The Republicans real problem is that while they have a lot of (arguably) good ideas, they've already proven that they don't take them seriously. That leaves negative campaigning.

I agree. I also agree that there is little difference between "Vote for me, I'm not Hillary Clinton" and "Vote for me, I'm not George Bush." It's a significant, and hopeful, sign that the Republican candidates haven't - yet - forgotten to stand for something while they whale on HRC.