Posted on 05/16/2014 8:41:22 AM PDT by Kaslin
WASHINGTON - It is a sign of Barack Obama's receding presidency that Hillary Clinton is drawing more attention from the national news media and political power brokers.
As the president goes through the speech-making and ceremonial motions of what is left in his second term, most of the talk here is about her carefully-calculated, emerging bid for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination.
The Washington press corps can become quickly bored by a presidency that seldom makes news anymore, and Obama now rarely makes the front pages of our big city daily newspapers. At least not lately.
The Washington Post's front page, lead story Thursday is a case in point. The headline: "Clintons take on critics in GOP," followed by two subheads about the larger story at play here: "Clearer Signs of a Candidacy," and "Next, a book tour that could be a rehearsal."
Obama was trying to make news of his own Wednesday, but not the kind that lands on the front page, or leads the nightly news.
He was in Tarrytown, N.Y., talking about spending more money on the nation's infrastructure and creating jobs that are in short supply nowadays. He's talked about it before, with little effect. The Post buried the story on page 2.
Hillary's politically hot right now and clearly getting more attention -- from Democrats, who see her as the only hope of holding the White House, and from Republicans who say we can't afford eight more years of Democratic rule.
The former secretary of State, who stepped down from her post in February, 2013, has been on a whirlwind tour ever since, hitting her party's key special interest groups. Womens' organizations one day, and the Israeli lobby the next.
Her husband, former President Bill Clinton, has been making the rounds, too, talking up her credentials and defending her from Republican attacks, like the one GOP strategist Karl Rove fired this week that raised questions about the state of her health.
While Obama was out of town for a couple of days, the Clintons were speaking to major venues, and well, clearly campaigning for Obama's job.
Bill Clinton was here touting Hillary's work on boosting educational opportunities for low-income children. And talking up his own job-growth record in his second term -- a not so veiled reminder of Obama's failure to strengthen economic growth.
Hillary was addressing the pro-Israel American Jewish Committee, struggling to make the case that as secretary of State, she worked to slow Iran's nuclear development.
But her record or accomplishments on that score, and as the nation's chief diplomat, is pretty thin.
"When I left as secretary and passed the baton on to Secretary [John] Kerry, we were positioned to explore whether we had set the table well enough to see changes that were sufficient to meet out legitimate objections to Iran's behavior," she said.
Israel may beg to differ with her recollections on this. We are nowhere near meeting our or Israel's key objections to nuclear threat that Iran still poses.
This week, Rove was the first high profile GOP critic to raise questions about what he termed "a serious health episode" -- he never used the term "rain damage" -- in December 2012 when Clinton suffered a concussion after a fainting spell.
She was hospitalized for three days, but details of her illness have remained a mystery. She will be 69 years old in 2016, and 70 if she were to become president in 2017.
But she faces bigger obstacles in her quest to become the nation's first woman president that go to the heart of her meager experience, flawed by a history of multiple public policy failures.
She cannot point to any major achievements during the four years she spent as secretary of State. She traveled widely, gave many speeches, but her record is a limited one.
If her years at State are remembered for anything, it will be the deadly and preventable terrorist attack in the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012, when U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed.
There have been numerous investigations and hearings by House Republicans who have charged that the State Department tried to coverup the fact this was a terrorist attack. Their initial explanation was that it started as a spontaneous Islamist "protest"
against a YouTube video.
Not true. But Obama was seeking re-election at this time, on a platform that he had al-Qaeda terrorists "on the run" and that their ranks were "decimated."
Stevens sent repeated requests to the State Department for added security but they were denied or ignored on her watch.
House Republicans formed a select committee just last week to dig further into the scandal and Clinton will be a major target of their inquiry.
Clinton has had a checkered past here, starting with her role as First Lady in designing a national federal health care program that was bitterly branded by GOP leaders as "Hillarycare."
It was so complex that even some of her allies said they didn't fully understand how it worked. And in the end, was so unpopular, Democratic congressional leaders refused to bring it up for a vote.
She served for eight years as the senator from New York, with no significant accomplishments to speak of. She left behind a record of voting for every big tax and spend Democratic bill that came before the chamber.
But there's another bigger issue that may well prevent Hillary from moving back into the White House. After eight years of Obama's failed, leftist, jobless policies, will voters want another eight under Hillary?
If a Marxist like BHO without proper identification records can get elected POTUS, ANYONE can IMHO.
The article is correct and another, rather two is Hillary’s health and that she wants to be around for Chealsea’s grandchild or grandchildren.
“The Washington press corps can become quickly bored by a presidency that seldom makes news anymore,...”
A statement that truly illustrates the vapidness and incompetence of the libtard media. Obama SHOULD be on the front page EVERY day for the scandals and anti-Constitutional actions he is involved in.
The idiots will be told to vote for a picture of an old woman and they will march off to do so.
And here are four reasons why her chances are no worse than any other Democrats’:
1. Vote fraud.
2. Unwavering Media support
3. Low information voters
4. RINO presidential candidates (Jeb, Christie, Romney, etc.)
Looking at current videos of Hillary Clinton, I really do not think she will be alive in 2016.
She looks bad. I think we are looking at someone who is “recovering” from a stroke.
Looking back at my first sentence, am I the only one that thinks it is odd that we see so few current pictures of Hillary? Most are two or more years old.
Hillary’s only risk is from the left, as it was in 2008.
Keep your eyes on the Chicago Mob, if they get on board, she’s a lock, and if not...watch who they’re backing.
Here are the reasons why she will win if she runs...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3156646/posts
The author makes a game attempt at giving hope that voters will wake up in time to assess Hillary’s lack of quantifiable achievements, extreme vindictiveness and abandonment of the four Americans in Benghazi.
But they won’t. American voters aren’t interested in fact-based assessment. They vote on their emotions. And their emotions say they want Hillary in the White House. Facts just confuse and frustrate them.
I totally agree. The field is essentially cleared for her. Competition from her fellow democrats is minimal, and the Republicans mentioned are a mere afterthought.
If she wants the Presidency, it’s hers, unless she’s afflicted with some medical ailment her best handlers can’t cover up.
ONLY with the media, and ONLY because the Dems have no one else to offer.
Hillary's BIGGEST crime was Benghazi and her support for the Muslim Brotherhood terrorists in Egypt.
It’s the Republican’s election to loose and at this time they seem to do a good job at that.
The Presidency ages you VERY quickly. Look at how quickly Carter, Bush and Obama turned gray. Particularly true I think of Liberals who are trying to micromanage everything.
Hillary looks old, tired and sick now.
The job could likely kill her within a year or two.
She and Bill are running. He wants his third term. They are quite likely winning.
Prepare as best you can.
Not that Herself, Madame Benghazi, the Cold & Joyless, couldn’t be President, but she should not, in any sane and rational universe.
And that is the sticking point, “sane and rational”. The boat left the dock a long time ago on that one.
If you can’t make sense of the current environment , then you’re pretty much left to your own devices and are strongly urged to adopt an “urban guerrilla” approach to the challenges that arise in your life from here on out.
Survivalists that have stockpiled food, ammunition and trading stock, for the coming anarchy, might add to that preparedness the capability to treat your own health and trauma problems.
The balkanization of the territory once known as “the United States of America” may not be far off, and there will be no reliable means of communication, travel, or exchange of goods and service.
But the flame can be kept lit.
[ I totally agree. The field is essentially cleared for her. Competition from her fellow democrats is minimal, and the Republicans mentioned are a mere afterthought.
If she wants the Presidency, its hers, unless shes afflicted with some medical ailment her best handlers cant cover up. ]
I could very well see Hillary and Jeb teaming up for a “Unity Ticket” I propose we call such an abomination “The Oligarch Ticket”.....
Just imagine Hillary and Jeb Teaming up saying crap like “We need to put this polarization that is ruining this country behind us” and other finger down the throat inducing sickness and the media would LOVE it as it would fitr the “Jeb is the Smart one” and “Hillary is great” meme....
That or their would pick a duifferent RINO, but since Krispy kreme self destructed, I think Hillary is limited to Jeb....
I think the people who THINK they run everything would love to see a Hillary vs. Jeb election, if we manage to take over the GOP and swing it to the tea party they will recycle Jeb as part of a “Unity Ticket” if Jeb starts losing inthe primaries expect him to start saying stuff about how we need to “come together”....
Not sure at all.
The media is getting ready to go 24/7 with “first woman president.”
They will sugarcoat her and smooth out her wrinkles. They will find a picture of her with tons of makeup that doesn’t make her look like a bitter shriveled up old hag, and post it on the covers of all the womens’ magazines.
She will be on all the talk shows.
I’ve seen no sign that the public is taking its head out of its anal exit passageway.
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