October 12, 2006 Clinton says right wing has hurt U.S., predicts win by Democrats By KATHLEEN HENNESSEY ASSOCIATED PRESS LAS VEGAS (AP) - The nation has been "jammed into an ideological corner" by conservative Republicans and is primed for a power shift in the November elections, former President Bill Clinton said Thursday. "This is an election unlike any other I have ever participated in," Clinton told Democratic supporters at a fundraiser in Las Vegas. "For six years this country has been totally dominated - not by the Republican Party, this is not fair to the Republican Party - by a narrow sliver of the Republican Party, its more right-wing and its most ideological element." "When the chips are down, this country has been jammed to the right, jammed into an ideological corner, alienated from its allies, and we're in a lot of trouble," he said. Clinton addressed a group of about 50 top-level donors to the Jack Carter for Senate campaign. Carter, the son of former President Jimmy Carter, is running to unseat Republican Sen. John Ensign. Clinton also attended a fundraiser for Democratic congressional candidates Jill Derby and Tessa Hafen at which the minimum contribution was $3,000. He appeared onstage with Hafen, Derby, Carter and Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., but did not take questions from the media or comment on recent criticism of his administration's policy on nuclear nonproliferation in North Korea. The former president largely stuck to politics. "The Democratic Party has become the liberal and conservative party in America. If you want to be fiscally conservative, you've got to be for us. If you want to conserve natural resources, you've got to be for us," he said. "If you want a change of course in Iraq ... you've got to be for us." Clinton also attacked Republican tax cuts, describing a repeal of the estate tax as the GOP's top legislative priority. "They may think I should be able to give Chelsea every nickel, but I don't," Clinton said. Tucker Bounds, spokesman for the Republican National Committee, returned the criticism. "It's going to take more than a Bill Clinton stopover to change the minds of the majority of Nevadans," he said. "Republicans have solid candidates on the ballot that are going to keep taxes low and continue to fight terrorism," Bounds said. He said the party had not fallen out of step with voters. "Keeping taxes low and the economy healthy is not a fringe belief. It is a popular belief in Nevada and a popular belief in most every other state." Clinton did not mention Rep. Jon Porter, Hafen's opponent, or Nevada Secretary of State Dean Heller, Derby's opponent, by name. He dismissed Ensign as "a sort of a likable fellow" with "good relations with most of the powers-that-be here in the state," perhaps a reference to Ensign's working relationship with Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. Clinton, who recently made fundraising stops for Democrats in Minnesota and New Jersey, also said he was embarrassed by the recent immigration debate. He noted that Mexico had become one of the U.S.'s top 10 creditors. "These people are our bankers," Clinton said. "Doesn't it embarrass you that these poor people are trying to sneak over the Rio Grande River to find a living in this country and we want to stop that? But we're only too happy to turn around and say, 'Don't spend your own money on those poor illegal immigrants to give them an education and get a job in Mexico. Loan it to us.'"
Peggy Noonan traces through some recent examples and then asks: It is not only about rage and resentment, and how some have come to see them as virtues, as an emblem of rightness. I feel so much, therefore my views are correct and must prevail. It is about something so obvious it is almost embarrassing to state. Free speech means hearing things you like and agree with, and it means allowing others to speak whose views you do not like or agree with. This--listening to the other person with respect and forbearance, and with an acceptance of human diversity--is the price we pay for living in a great democracy. And it is a really low price for such a great thing. We all know this, at least in the abstract. Why are so many forgetting it in the particular? Let us be more pointed. Students, stars, media movers, academics: They are always saying they want debate, but they don't. They want their vision imposed. They want to win. And if the win doesn't come quickly, they'll rush the stage, curse you out, attempt to intimidate. And they don't always recognize themselves to be bullying. So full of their righteousness are they that they have lost the ability to judge themselves and their manner. And all this continues to come more from the left than the right in America. Which is, at least in terms of timing, strange. The left in America--Democrats, liberals, Bush haters, skeptics of many sorts--seems to be poised for a significant electoral victory. Do they understand that if it comes it will be not because of Columbia, Streisand, O'Donnell, et al., but in spite of them? What is most missing from the left in America is an element of grace--of civic grace, democratic grace, the kind that assumes disagreements are part of the fabric, but we can make the fabric hold together. The Democratic Party hasn't had enough of this kind of thing since Bobby Kennedy died. What also seems missing is the courage to ask a question. Conservatives these days are asking themselves very many questions, but I wonder if the left could tolerate asking itself even a few. Such as: Why are we producing so many adherents who defy the old liberal virtues of free and open inquiry, free and open speech? Why are we producing so many bullies? And dim dullard ones, at that. ________________________________________________ To those on the left the ones on the right have no rights at all.
If you want to hear right wing venom, bile, and hate, Rush Limbaugh on for 3 hours daily... Followed by Hannity, followed by Michael Savage, followed by Laura Ingraham, etc, etc, etc,..... Or read Coulter...
We can all agree that the one thing Bill Clinton is best at is getting rich lefties to open their wallets. $3,000 a head minimum, that really sounds like the party of the middle class. LOL. The dirty little secret of modern politics is tht Democrats are almost totally dependent on fat cats and unions for financing, and of course, in Clinton's case, the Chinese government. I wonder if Harry Reid helped Clinton with some Vegas land deals while he was out there.
More crock of shit from AAAintheklannish way. Howard Dean did extremely well raising money via small amounts, but extensive in number donations on the internet during his campaign...
Every rightwing blog out there qualifies. Matt Drudge, Limbaugh, all of your icons are hate-based. My God, you people display more projection than a laser cannon! Whatever demons are crawling around inside your skulls, it's always "somebody else's demons", isn't it?
You are a perfect example of this problem of right wing ideology trumping objective rational thought. We desparately need some centrists in the government. bt