She just gave the Republicans the "gift that will keep on giving."  One would not expect this type of absurdity from a candidate who claims to have 35 years of experience.  Like GW Bush, Hillary is pushing to politics of fear to bolster her candidacy.  It's about time to turn the page...Go Obama!

jerry why do you want to be Monica?  You are obsessed with her.  We will gladly call you Monica. jerry's new moniker is Monica. Forget the DC part she is not fully wired. Slander jerry, untruths, slander.

Hillary talks out of both sides of her mouth.  Barack shouldn't speak to hypotheticals, but it's okay if she does.  She is using the GOP "fear" tactic to get people to believe that somehow she can handle a terrorist attack better than her opponents.  Hillary is no different than Bush, she doesn't represent change and she sure doesn't sound like a leader.

When you're all through flailing and gnashing teeth, try to think all the way back to the 2004 Presidential campaign. Some here seem to have come to the party just this past year or month, or week. Do you remember how many terror alerts there were before election day? Do you remember the Osama tape from the WEEK of the election? John Kerry does;

“US Democratic Senator John Kerry says a video message from Osama Bin Laden sealed his defeat in a presidential race dominated by the 9/11 attacks.

Mr Kerry told NBC TV his opinion poll lead over President George W Bush fell away after the tape was broadcast.

He said national security was the decisive issue in the November 2004 poll, won eventually by President Bush.

Osama Bin Laden’s video, shown days before the vote, urged Americans to back neither Mr Bush nor Mr Kerry.

“I believe that 9/11 was the central deciding issue in this race,” he said.

He said the impact of Bin Laden’s message was evident by the dent in his ratings that followed its appearance.

“We were rising in the polls up until the last day when the tape appeared. We flat-lined the day the tape appeared and went down on Monday.”

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4222647.stm

The opposition WILL play the terror card. They have to, as it is really their only issue, and whoever the republican nominee is, will hit the issue and hit it hard.

Clinton has been talking about this topic, in terms of the republicans using the terror card, for the entire campaign, and frankly, it shows again why she is the only one of the current contenders who can win against the tactics that are sure to be employed against the democratic nominee.

From the Washington Post;

"As it happens, Clinton herself has warned in the past about Republican attempts to use the terror threat as a cudgel against Democrats. At a labor convention in February 2006, she said that Rove's strategy boiled down to this: "'Here's your game plan, folks. Here's how we're going to win. We're going to win by getting everybody scared again.' Contrary to Franklin Roosevelt, we have nothing to fear but fear itself. This crowd is, 'All we're got is fear, and we're going to keep playing the fear card.'"

In now predicting an inherent "advantage" for Republicans in the event of another attack, Clinton may just have been keeping up on the latest academic literature. A group of psychologists has been making waves with extensive research suggesting that the Sept. 11 attacks, and subsequent evocations of the attacks by Bush and other Republican candidates, provoked in many voters a subconscious fear of their own mortality and a "worldview defense" that made them more likely to vote Republican in 2002 and 2004."

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2007/08/24/clintons_terror_talk_has_rival.html

Rudy has been leading the republicans all year and if he is the nominee, he will be RUNNING on 9/11. It will be a, "fear-based" campaign that will attempt to paint the democratic candidate as, "weak", on terror. The other leading republicans will have to run on the terror issue too, because it's the only thing that the American people trust them on as much or more, than the democrats, in the polls.
Who would like to bet that there WON'T, be some terror related news and scares coming from the DHS in the months and weeks leading up to the election?
How many here are even thinking about what the opposition will do to the democratic nominee during the campaign? Do you think it will be the first campaign in political history that won't come down to negative ads aimed at the electorate's biggest fears?

Can you see Senator Obama, in the first televised debate, answering that question about what he would do  if al qeda attacked TWO cities, talking about 1st responders, and NOT talking about responding to the attack itself? it would be one of the more damaging TV ads, as the republican candidate's face takes up the screen, saying,"If we're attacked again, THIS PRESIDENT, will do more than make sure we can carry away our dead."

Van

I am one with a small brain capacity.  Yet, I am offended by the campaigners not addressing our more serious issues:  the instability of the global economy and how American is going to survive an upcoming depression, the overwhelming rising birth rate of American-born muslims (3 times that of Americans) and it's impact on our society/future, the up coming federally mandated universal healthcare plans (recently implemented in MASS and to follow in California) and its social impact of differential between the rich and poor or, in short,
 The reason(s) why after Bush went into office I have been jobless, starved, homeless and after I apply myself my state enacts law to include my family in healthcare--only to be recently shot down by my (awful) president of the United States?  I see no hope for our American future except that born of a revolution.

It seems that Hillary is imploding.
I don't think she ever anticipated not being the clear front runner.  And it seems that Obama is surpassing her.

What new gaffers will she give this week?

"that will automatically give the Republicans an advantage again,"

Nuanced,

What you are ignoring is that implicit in that statement is her belief that the American electorate is stupid or gullable.  It's interesting, no laughable, that she wants us to forget her war vote, but she's still living in the past.  The '06 mid-term elections was clear evidence that the American public is no longer willing to be blinded by GOP fear-mongering.  Talk about out of touch with today's reality!

Gee I wish I had all the money spent on these campaigns. All the canidates talk about education and helping the less fortunate but in the past it all comes down to "Big Talk" and very little action. The millions of dollars spent on TV adds and fundraiser dinners could really be put to good use in these areas and many more.

Van once again a great post. When those planes flew into the twin towers it saddened us all with one exception KARL ROVE who was elated because just as "Soft on communism" was losing its effectiveness he now had another bugaboo to scare the sheep.
We have survived for hundreds of year without Universal Fear and we will survive this also.

Michael James would you want someone in the white house who wasn't worried about a terrorist attack?
Bush was not worried even when warned it could happened.

Tuck - you assume that because there's Hillary bashing afoot, it must be from Republicans. So you don't see the possibility of independents and Democrats not liking her?

Why do we never hear of somebody being Gomoroized..J. Leno

No. Here YOU go, www.barackobama.com. No hypocrisy, flip-flopping, or pandering like Clinton. Obama is truth, straight up and honest. It's what America needs after eight years of Executive dysfunction.

Well, Van, the Pugs are raising the specter of terrorist attacks, and y'all are raising the specter of Pugs raising the specter of terrorist attacks  --  and both of you are trying to scare us out of our votes.

Clinton has been no more specific about what she'd do in case of attack than has anyone else, Republican or Democrat, since any response depends on specifics about where and when the attack would take place; the nature and size of the attack; the actual initiators of the attack and where they initiate the attack from, etc., etc., etc. You would like us to assume that he or she who talks toughest about retaliatory attacks would indeed mount the toughest AND MOST EFFECTIVE armed response to another 9/11  --  the same line, exactly, that we've been asked to swallow since Bush got behind the wheel. And what we've learned about that line is that those who use it are trapped by their own rhetoric into making a quick response at all costs that bears not one resemblance in hell to an effective counter-measure, and in fact makes an effective counter-measure impossible.

Ever since her vote for replacing Congressional initiations of war with Presidential ones, Sen. Clinton has simply played the standard game that the present crop of Republican candidates is playing: To appear to out-Bush Bush in the balls department. Thanks, but no thanks  --  one Shrub per millenium is my absolute limit; and in my experience, those who flaunt their "balls" generally have none to speak of, which dovetails nicely with their chronic lack of common sense.

As for tape that can be run by the Pugs to cripple a Dem campaign, all the front-runners are vulnerable on that score  --  and Clinton's vote for the Iraqi debacle more than cancels out any gaffes the others have made: It will be an albatross she will be forced to address again and again and again.

Now, I'll say this once and y'all can beat me with it four years hence if I'm wrong: If Sen. Clinton wins the Democratic nomination, and the subsequent presidential election, she will have done so using methods that will make effective governance of the nation as a whole after that election impossible.

She is not a leader. Just another prospective puppet-in-chief. Inevitable? God, I hope not ...  

Van, great analysis of the fear tactic.  I believe it will be used before the next election.  What can be to done to combat it?

GET THE """DUCK TAPE"""! This painted paper hanging clown is drifting out of control!!!!   She voted for these war efforts and now has fliped and flopped!!! Her remarks are now effecting the daily combat operations and our troops are the ones who shall pay the price!!!  

We do not want to change the cluture of Iraq!!!  She has opened her dumb A@@ mouth and now made a situation which has many wanting to duck tape her big mouth!!!  

Lets just clean house and get rid of this goose stepping fool!!  Your right she is a radical painted like a clown!!!  Dangerious is not the word!!!! insane of power!!!!!!!  

There is no ""RIGHT""  OR  """WRONG""" manner to end this war, A full cut and run would open the borders and all surrounding would jump in to take as much as they could!

The Iraqi wants a full blown civil war, as it will attest to who is the most powerful in the end!!  We consider this inhuman, but by their laws and culture , this will be the real answer!!

Time is not kind and the battle field will flow with the blood of all!  The Victor will be the American troops,, But we will have not achieved anything more but killing thousands!!!

I see a gradual pullout and this will see where all sides assume power. We have accomplished destroying a tyrant and have given billions to start a new elected government!! our troops are no longer need nor do they have a mission of battle!!!  We do not want nor shall we be a common police department!!!

It is not the right of those who seek to be our next President to undermine the office of the setting President! Many times this Senators have destroyed the efforts which are paid for in American armed forces lives!!!  

Someone please place a mussle on this fool for her directly attacking and making this situation much worse!!!  

Van, I think Obama had the question RIGHT on what to do if two US cities were attacked. His answers about 1st responders was a good one.  Remember, rushing to attack someon is exactly the type of thinking that got us into this quagmire with Iraq!  Also, 2008 won't be 2004. I personally don't think Americans feel the same way about things as they did in then.

VAN , getting weak.

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