After New Hampshire

Well, here's my obligatory post-New Hampshire primary post.

For me, the salient moment of the New Hampshire campaign had to be Hillary's "tears on demand" faux-emotional moment in the Q&A session.

I think Glenn Beck's take on that moment was correct- Hillary, if being truly emotional, was bemoaning the 'falling back' of her and Bill's crusade to remake America in their liberal image. Not for the country 'falling back.' That would involve too much genuine caring for the welfare of others, rather than Hillary's more simple brand of blind ambition to rule.

Fox News had a commentator who opined,

"The Clintons don't have an unplanned bone in their collective bodies,"

or words very close to that effect.

Hillary accomplished two things with her faux-crying act. First, she dared people to criticize her for finally appearing to show emotion. This alone bought her nearly hours of free analysis time and endless replays of the clip, shown here on YouTube.



Second, she evidently duped a large number of Granite state voters, allegedly including many single women, into now believing she really does have genuine emotions.

Crazy? Yeah, like the proverbial fox. Imagine Obama Bim Baden outmaneuvered by something as old as a woman's tears.

Well, that's politics for you.

Meanwhile, Edwards and Richardson sank even lower.

Hillary's win, coming as it did after a solid day of erroneous predictions of Obama's anticipated double-digit trampling of the Ice Queen, was all the more attention-getting. If Hillary had been predicted to win, it would have been largely a yawner. As it was, the result seemed that much more remarkable.

Still, as one Sean Hannity pointed out, Hillary winning the state by only a few points margin, seen from a pre-Iowa perspective, is like losing twice in a row.

To his credit, though, Hannity's co-host, Alan Colmes, complained that if Hillary won, critics say it wasn't by enough. If she lost, they pile on her for losing. She can't win either way.

And that's true. That's what generally happens to frontrunners. Romney and Giuliani have experienced that on the Republican side.

I listened to Obama's defeat speech, with the idea that one should get better acquainted with the enemy. Boy, is he scary, too. Like Edwards. He positively oozes this faux-unity theme, when you know, below a shallow surface, he's going to bludgeon the beJezzus out of American business if he ever gets into the Oval Office.

All he really has going for him is two things- he's relatively youthful and energetic, and he's black. As I wrote here,

"The same is true for Obama. He has nothing remotely resembling the experience one would like to see in a President. Again, the Journal article made it seem as if a vote against, or not for, Obama, is a racist vote.

But that's not true. It totally overlooks Obama's nearly-total absence of any legitimate experience which would prepare him to lead this country. He's had only two years in the Senate- which is composed of largely do-nothing legislators. Prior to that, he served in the Illinois state legislature, and was an aide to former Illinois Senator Paul Simon. The guy with the braying voice and funny bow ties.

You wonder if Obama knows how to do anything- anything at all.

As with Hillary, I'm not against Obama because he's black. I don't think he's qualified a qualified person, no conditionality, to be President.

To reject Obama is not to reject minority candidates. Only that minority candidate. Jesse Jackson wasn't elected, either. And not because he is black. He was totally ill prepared to be President- and still is."

Let's be honest- if Obama wasn't black, his campaign wouldn't be happening at all. Back in the spring of last year, very senior Hawaiian Senator Dan Inouye bemoaned the fact that Obama hadn't even made it through one term in the Senate yet. He voiced the opinion that the very junior Illinois Senator had no business even contemplating running for President.

Nobody would seriously entertain any other similarly-inexperienced, two-year Senator running for President. Kennedy had seen combat in WWII and served several terms as a US Representative before running as a sitting Senator. And, as a Senator, he had received a fair amount of public exposure by participating in hearings on organized crime.

Obama is just a very young, naive, fresh-faced windbag in the tradition of Senatorial windbags from Illinois- Simon, Percy, and Durbin, to name a few.

On the Republican side, Romney is now being jumped on by the media as nearly finished. I think the reality is closer to his simply now being in a competitive foot race with McCain for the next month.

With luck, Hickabee will simply run out of gas and money. McCain probably will receive a lot of funding after last night's showing. And Giuliani has his big shot as the primaries come to the larger states.

One comment I found thought-provoking last night on Fox was that New Hampshire is no longer the Republican bellwether it once was. Many of its governmental positions have gone blue since the Reagan and Sunnunu days. It's not the tight-fisted, conservative bastion of old. Thus, the pundit's view was that results out of both Iowa and New Hampshire are more telling for Democrats than for Republicans.

On a final note, I find myself torn over McCain. Lately, he seems to have 'gotten religion' on conservative fiscal policies. And he talks a good game about his character. Plus, he did a good job supporting successful evolution of tactics and strategy in Iraq, which has led to its successful progress during 2007.

As I wrote here last March, though, McCain in many ways reminds me of Bob Dole. And not in a good way. He seems to have an enduring sense of entitlement regarding the Presidency. As with Dole, he's horse-traded his way through the Senate, making him suspect at leading change through that chamber. McCain is, without question, a veteran combat aviator and brave man. He's undergone far more suffering for his country than anyone could ever ask.

That doesn't mean he deserves to lead us as President.

I remain deeply distrustful of McCain for one very large reason. As co-author of McCain-Feingold, the campaign finance 'reform' bill, he has shown himself to be a naive idiot. And willing to gut the First Amendment free speech provisions in the name of incumbent protection.

That anyone would think more 'campaign finance reform legislation' can ever do more than hopelessly complicate an already unworkable situation shows they lack the fundamental brainpower, common sense and perspective to lead this nation as President.

All McCain's bill did was try to rob voters of their right to speak freely about candidates, on their own, and provide new ways for the always-smart campaign managers to outmaneuver the latest legal nonsense that poses as campaign finance 'law.'

This low-water mark of McCain's legislative career, dating from almost a decade ago, troubled me then. And still does.

On to Michigan and the south!