Just Be Glad You're Not Dead Yet

FISA expired. Consider every second since a personal gift from that Judeo-Christian God you probably don't believe in. The Heritage Foundation had an overtime clock going, but it seems to have disappeared from their website. No doubt a result of AQ or NOW or some other sinister acronym. So I've made one of my own. It's not quite up to par with the original, but it gets the job done and sends the same important message...

In Defense of Clinton - Part II

I wasn't interested in politics around the time that this famous commercial was aired. Most of what I remember in terms of significant public events from the 1990s was the OJ Simpson trial and the emergence of Pokemon.

Yet as national politics begins to slowly and methodically become America's favorite pastime I am becoming more and more interested in the discourse of the Clinton era. French philosopher Henry Bergson once said "the present contains nothing more than the past." And Hillary Clinton is a shining example of that.

Arguably the most aggravating thing about following politics is the general public's complete inability to recall any history past the last episode of Lost. That goes for us conservatives as well as our liberal counterparts. Those of us who pride ourselves in digging through campaign contributions and reading up on past policy implosions often see our hours of painstaking research and analysis go unheeded, as people inevitably flock towards the candidate who will whisper sweet nothings in their ear.

This has also been the case with me. While many in the Republican party are disenchanted with the prospect of running a McCain ticket, most if not all will, without a doubt in my mind, bow down and vote for him regardless. Even the Dobsons of the world, despite their bawling and moaning, will fill in the bubble next to the Mad Dog when November rolls around.

But I am here to offer up a different path, perhaps one thought of as unorthodox to some. For a staunch conservative to toss his support behind a Democrat seems unreasonable, but I have devoted myself to explaining just why this is a step in the right direction for our nation. It is important that Americans, especially conservatives who are seeing their party wane and begin to crumble, vote for the candidate who shares their ideology, regardless of what party they affiliate themselves with.

A letter is a letter, and there are many prominent examples of people for whom the letter "D" means absolutely nothing.

Am I suggesting that Clinton is equitable to Lieberman? Certainly not. We can't wish for the impossible. But she is certainly not someone deserving of the vilification she is often exposed to. Especially on issues such as health care.


The American Health Choices Plan (in pdf format here) is about as moderate and pro-corporation as any platform you'll find. And that pleases me in ways I'm not allowed to describe on this page. What we have here is a reconfiguring of the insurance industry, though fundamentally nothing drastic is being done, certainly nothing on the Conyers/Kucinich level. It's a lot like turning the living room couch to face the other direction, then calling up your friends and telling them you bought a new house.

Easily the most appealing part of this whole plan is the portion entitled Shared Responsibility. Essentially what happens under a Clinton health care system is that everyone is ordered, for fear of punishment, to purchase health insurance, while insurance and pharmaceutical companies have to compete to to provide high-quality, affordable health care.

In short: companies do what they're doing now, but now everyone is required by law to do business with them. If that's not capitalism at its finest, someone tell me what is!

As you read on, you also see some very comforting statistical information from our friends at the RAND Corporation. And let me tell you, nothing woos me quite like an endorsement from the RAND Corporation. This research group has a board of trustees that exemplifies what it means to be "pro-business". Nothing says, "I'm here to provide independent research" quite like a board of trustees that boasts the President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank in New York, the former Senior VP of Dow Jones, a former Secretary of the USAF, and a number of former White House secretaries.

That's not to mention my main man, Mr. Frank Carlucci, former Secretary of Defense for Ronald Reagan, who has been a signatory on a number of pro-Iraq war statements made by Project for a New American Century, or PNAC. If you don't know who they are by now, you watch too much MTV.

Some of you will undoubtedly ask, "But Matt, you Irish stallion, this is nothing like what the Republicans are offering. And we all know that big business is in bed with the Republicans." At which point I will flash a devilishly-handsome smile and hand you a copy of a NY Times article by Raymond Hernandez and Robert Pear entitled "Once an Enemy, Health Industry Warms to Clinton". I will leave you with this excerpt, and remind you that for the good of American conservatism and American business interests, I urge you to support Senator Hillary Clinton for President.

As she runs for re-election to the Senate from New York this year and lays the groundwork for a possible presidential bid in 2008, Mrs. Clinton is receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from doctors, hospitals, drug manufacturers and insurers. Nationwide, she is the No. 2 recipient of donations from the industry, trailing only Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, a member of the Republican leadership.

Some of the same interests that tried to derail Mrs. Clinton’s health care overhaul are providing support for her Senate re-election bid. The Health Insurance Association of America ran the famous “Harry and Louise” commercials mocking the Clinton health care plan as impenetrably complex. Some companies that were members of that group are now donating to Mrs. Clinton.

Charles N. Kahn III, a Republican who was executive vice president of the Health Insurance Association in 1993 and 1994, now works with the senator on some issues as president of the Federation of American Hospitals, a lobby for hospital companies like HCA and Tenet. He describes his battles with the first lady as “ancient history,” and he said health care executives were contributing to her now because “she is extremely knowledgeable about health care and has become a Congressional leader on the issue.”

Senator Clinton has received $150,600 in contributions from insurance and pharmaceutical companies, which she accused in 1993 of “price gouging” and “unconscionable profiteering.”

(Author's note: Senator Rick Santorum lost his seat in 2006 to Democrat Bob Casey, Jr. This makes Senator Clinton the No. 1 recipient of health insurance donations.)

In Defense of Clinton - Part I

After the stunning defeat of Hillary Clinton at the hands of her opponent, Barack Obama (and an opponent is what he is, despite the friendly rhetoric) in the Potomac primaries, us Clintonoids were feeling a little despondent. The significant lead which the Clinton campaign had been enjoying was finally eroded, the race becoming a dead heat despite her commanding lead in superdelegates. It was time for a shift, and Hillary made the right move by shaking up her staff and ejecting unneeded support.

Not Goldman Sachs or Time Warner, of course. She has enough experience to know that, thankfully, business interests are the one thing you don't want to tinker with, despite what your constituency may think.

But more than issues with staff, I feel that the Clinton campaign has had too difficult a time trying to pander to the "far left" by explaining away Clinton's war record. I will address this sentiment in the Daily 49er soon, but I wanted to take a moment to outline some of the key details here.

The piece that brought my attention to Hillary Clinton's war record blundering was a clip from Countdown. Take a look:

Others have expressed similar sentiment about Clinton's position on the war, feeling that while she expresses a desire to end it eventually and routinely criticizes the current administration, they feel that there hasn't been much of an official apology. When asked to officially apologize for her Iraq vote by Roger Tilton at a New Hampshire campaign stop, Clinton replied that "Knowing what I know now I would never have voted for it."

Valid. Certainly a few of our minor assumptions about the war were a bit misguided, but it's not like anyone knew any better at the time. Cut her some slack, libs! Your poster-boy in 2004 said that he "agree[d] completely with this Administration's goal of regime change in Iraq." You were smart enough to want to put him in the White House, so why not someone like Hillary?

I have said this many times before, but it bears repeating: Hillary is strong when it comes to foreign policy. Not McCain strong; not "Bomb-bomb-Iran" strong. But that's to be expected from the Democrats. It's sort of like when a boy pretends to shave with his dad and uses a tongue depressor to peel the shaving cream off his face. He's got the right idea, but he's not quite ready for the multi-blade. Or, in McCain's case, the K-bar sharpened against the jawbones of his enemies.

Hillary Clinton refuses to back away from her war vote, sticking to her husband's mantra of "strong and wrong beats weak and right." Despite the wail of the moonbats, she remains unwavering. And that is the kind of resolve I love to see in a President. In reality, I believe all Americans, Democrat or Republican, admire someone who will intentionally defy the will of his own people and the restraints of Constitutional law in order to advance his/her own ideological goals.

Clinton has demonstrated that she will do that, and do it she must.

Why I'm Voting for Hillary Clinton!

I bet you never expected to see that image here, did you? Perhaps there is a pang of fear, a howling, shrieking hurricane of horror tearing its way up the back of your neck and going Katrina on the very nether regions of your soul. If so, you know exactly how I felt only a few days ago.

You see, for many conservatives like myself, the mere utterance of the name "Clinton" has the same effect as shouting "Fire!" in the middle of a crowded room. The only difference being that someone is liable to actually set the building on fire in a blind rage.

I have long been of the belief that Hillary Clinton was a communist, the antichrist, or at least married to him. The guilt-by-association was undeniable proof of everything Ronald Reagan warned us about before he went senile and parked Air Force One inside his library. The Reds were infiltrating, and only the Republicans were the wiser.

In an attempt to better understand the inner workings of this sinister movement, I decided to do some research of my own. What I discovered, my friends, was nothing short of astounding. Not a hammer nor a sickle to be seen. In fact, her record...impressed me.

There was the shock, the wrench of the stomach! No, get a hold of yourself. You're falling in to their clever ruse. It must be hidden somewhere between the lines, between the pounds and pounds of lipstick and rouge. But the more I looked, the more I admired.

My friends, I am here today to tell you that I am officially endorsing Hillary Clinton for President.

Hear me out, my fellow conservatives. Sure, there are a lot of things about Clinton's record that we don't particularly like. But can you not say the same thing of McCain or Romney or Huckabee? You know the answer to that question; nobody running for President has a pure record. And Hillary has the punch where it counts. If she had cajones, I'd tell you they were huge.

First, look at these two quotes. One of them is spoken by our current President, the other by Sen. Hillary Clinton:

"Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists."

and...

"Every nation has to be either with us or against us. Those who harbor terrorists, or finance them, are going to pay a price."

I couldn't tell which was which either.

The truth is, Clinton has been with us on the most important issues of our time. We've just been too blinded by our hatred of the Clintons to recognize all the good the two have done for our nation as well as for businesses. Did you know that while Bill Clinton was President, not only did the Republicans take back both houses of Congress, but we also saw the passing of the Telecommunications Act which further consolidated major broadcast media, even surpassing the level which Reagan himself achieved?

Clinton also oversaw the creation of the World Trade Organization and NAFTA, which have allowed international businesses to bypass the industry and labor regulations of sovereign nations in the name of global commerce, as well as allow subsidized US agriculture to put Mexican farmers out of work. I cannot think of a single Republican who has done more to advance the interests of global business more than Bill Clinton. Without him, entities like Wal-Mart may not have become the local-economy-crushing juggernauts that they are today (Fun Fact: Hillary Clinton once served on the board of directors at Wal-Mart).

And even if we ignore the work of her husband, Clinton offers us one of the most trustworthy voting records when it comes to national defense. From the liberal trashcan known as Collingwood's:

YES on the Patriot Act
YES on authorizing pre-emptive war in Afghanistan and Iraq
YES on funding for both wars, up until around the time polls showed it wasn't politically viable anymore
YES on funding for a border fence along Mexico
YES on funding for the REAL ID Act
YES on declaring Iran's Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization
YES on conformation of Tom Ridge
YES on confirmation of Michael Chertoff
YES on confirmation of John Negroponte

As the moonbat says: "Right away we see a number of votes that, in all honesty, look more at home on the resume of John McCain or Rudy Giuliani than someone purporting to be a liberal." And may that be the last time the two of us agree on something.

So with this in mind, it is my distinct honor to finally offer my valuable endorsement to a presidential candidate who shares my concrete and unwavering vision for this nation. I hereby announce my support for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton for President of these United States. May she serve at least as well as her husband, and like her husband, ensure that the Republicans maintain control of the Legislative Branch for decades to come!