I think Hillary Clinton really torpedoed her likability tonight.

In my rather biased opinion, Obama's pre-Iowa surge was due to Clinton's progressively-nasty tone; people rejected that and turned towards Obama. Clinton's NH turnaround was due to her turn as an empathetic figure.

Frankly, I think that she's starting to feel inevitable again--and she's going back to her cool arrogance. If anything could cost her Super Tuesday, it would be that.

me knocking on her about that at any time. I thought that her strong-negative tone was the reason she lost Iowa. I still do. And I think that her nastiness in this debate is going to be counterproductive.

She came of shrill and unlikeable.

I don't want to have a beer with my president.

but she does has a voice that reminds me of fingernails scraping on a blackboard.

:eyes:

I'm tired of old hill politics. time for a change. Edwards or Obama.

28 years of bush/clinton/bush/clinton. I lived in SE Asia for 20 years and that is how its done there.

IE .. She countered very effectively that she's (Pick one ...cold, calculating, shrill, manipulative, unfeeling) in that coffee shop in NH.

Unfortunately, she's decided to go back to tactics as usual...the ones that were sinking her before her BFF tour and the choking up over her cup.

Thing is, I'm actually dissapointed she's done this. NOT because I support her (Go EDWARDS!) but because there's a chance she'll be our nominee and this will TOTALLY sink us in the GE.

That 'bout made me spit tortilla chips.

a walk for every batter!!!!

whatever Bill says is ok with her

she found her voice in NH and lost it in SC

If he can retain some of the info you have spoken the better he'll be. He sure isn't very impressive now. When you listen to Hillary you can learn. The obamabots will dispute this but they have so many stars in their eyes they can't see the forest for the trees.

As someone who never liked her at all, I don't see it.

Likeability wasn't at the top of her priority list tonight.

It's the only thing that brought her back from the brink after Iowa.

Hillary doesn't do things by mistake.

Sorry.

but that doesn't mean she can't miscalculate.

Hillary doesn't care of people see her as "unlikable" because nobody is voting on her likability. They do, however, care that she made Sen Obama look unlikable, and his likability is a big part of his campaign. She wins because she sullied him and got him into the mud with her.

But she left the impression that she's the one who'd control a debate with a Republican, and that may be what she set out to do. That and, yes, get Obama to lose his cool a bit.

She sets herself apart when she does that. I've almost made up my mind.

She's no fool, and neither was EVITA. But will she do right by "the people?" No. Neither did Evita. :shrug:

to often tonight that I hated. But she and Bill are considered policy wonks so that isn't unexpected.

you are suggesting 'shrewish?' a sexist term?

Where every criticism of Hillary, no matter why the person feels that way, is because they're an open sexist. No one can ever comment on how she comes across, lest her supporters accuse them of sexism, as a tool to silence opposition.

Lemme guess, you completely read that last line as "get back in the kitchen and make me some pie"...

Katherine Harris ! Holy Shiites! Get a stake!

Edwards had a good night but Hillary really got something accomplished. She didn't have to nail Edwards. She had to nail Obama and she really worked him over.

Obama looked dazed for most of the debate.

The squiggly line meter consistently showed higher marks for Hillary than Obama was getting. The audience was reacting to Obama's choppy ineffective answers.

She didn't bring up Rezko before but now if anybody says anything about it she can just point to Obama and his Walmart crack. Obama went into tonight vowing to take the fight back to the Clintons and he's walking out of it beaten and with genuine fear of how the papers will cover Rezko tomorrow. Obama really shines in a polite debate but he's no street fighter.

Edwards might have scored even better than Hillary but I don't see how it will gain him many votes.

Edwards won the debate, and they would vote for Obama.

consistently scored around 5 points higher than Obama.

I don't know how well focus groups measure this race. Participants may be worried about how it would look for them to criticize Obama. It also takes some stones to say anything positive about Hillary with all the Hillary haters there are in the world. The anonymous squiggly line meter is a better barometer.

Focus groups were murder on Hillary after previous debates but when the votes came in it turned out Hillary won what counted.

don't matter when the focus group doesn't agree with you.

I'm not sure if there was a talking one on TV afterward. I'm not sure if they are the same people who voted on the squiggly line meter.

I defend Hillary, so yes, I take her side. If the focus group said she won I'd love the focus group. I'd be surprised though. The focus groups murdered her every other time.

the looks she gave Obama?

Man, if looks could kill he would be a gonna.

Smug, self righteously looking down her nose at him.

This is one cold, calculating woman. "Likeable" isn't even on the radar screen.

It is all about whether or not you want a screeth owl in the WH for the next 4 years.

Me? I don't.

Oh -- and before aquart (or any others) jump on me for playing the gender card -- get over yourselves. I AM a female.

:hide:

Been trying SOOOO hard not to make snarky comments, but had to...just had to. I blame you Yael, I laughed my butt off at the rescue a puppy comment.

Yes, of course it is. It's all about the candidates vocal chords. :eyes:

HRC is a very polarizing character with HIGH negatives. Add her "shrill" husband misbehaving on the campaign trail ... well, BOTH Clintons are only likable to our ruling pseudo-journalists of the political elite who desire "more of the same." :shrug:

voters. Obama looked incoherent as he usually does when pressured and HRC was there cool, calm and when she laid the trap for Obama and he jumped, then she bounced......

and recovering when she stayed on the issues.

south.

That's not why people support her. However, it IS one reason that many people support Obama. Her goal tonight was to get Obama to act defensive, pissy, arrogant... and less likeable. And she may have succeeded in that.

message.

so that made it hard to judge, but I thought he was smug, arrogant and condescending in the first half of the debate, and vague and rambling in the second half.

Why should they?

She solely vacillates between arrogance and condescension. :thumbsdown:

The debate was attended by a lot of his supporters, & he'll probably win SC, but I don't think it played very well nationally. Hillary was aiming at the national audience for Super Tuesday, IMO, and her strategy probably paid off there. Obama was off-message for most of the debate, & he seemed almost dazed, defensive, petty & even pompous. Totally unable to do that whole "change" & "hope" thing. And his defenses were sometimes eye-rollers - Obama didn't vote for a cap on credit card interest rates because the cap was too high? LOL, sure. He did 5 hours of work for Rezco? More like 20 years. He looked like he couldn't handle the attacks, & Hillary was sure to mention her 16 years of responding to the Republican attack machine. Personally I've never found Obama to be very likeable, but I always felt like I'd missed something. Now a lot of his flaws became much clearer. I think Obama got out-played.

Willing to play as dirty as it takes to win.

That's a lot of votes.

At this point I'm screaming for competence. And so are a lot of Dems.

Now what happens in the GE, that's another thing... but right now, competence is what I'm looking for as opposed to likeability. I listen to HRC, I start feeling more like someone is about to be in control who can turn things around from the Bush years.

Of course I still think Edwards can do it better.

That's the kind of "corporations first and always" competence that we don't need but that we will be forced to endure with a 3rd Clintonian DLC in OUR Executive Branch.

HILLARY CLINTON: Well, you know, Senator Obama, it is very difficult having a straight-up debate with you, because you never take responsibility for any vote, and that has been a pattern.

Read the full transcript here:
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/01/21/debate.transcript/index.html

Watch the whole debate here:
www.youdecide2008.com/2008/01/22/video-cnn-democratic-debate-from-myrtle-beach-south-carolina/

But she'll LIE and do any damn thing to win more power. :eyes:

last night. Obama was JUKED ever since last Saturday by one clinton and then last night obama thought he would be cute and try to slander bill clinton but hrc handed obama his ass a couple of times and to be obama came across again when asked specific questions about his programs he muddles and stammers and when he could not clarify the credit card vote, and the 100+ missed votes and his lies about his reagan interview HRC was playing this for the national audience and those states on 2/5...just like obama buying an ad that ran on tv knowing cnn goes into florida homes, hrc knew all too well tose 2/5 states and florida would be watching...

HRC can't even hand "her husband" his ass. :evilgrin:

Don't spin such B.S. and ask us to buy into it. :crazy:

But politics is that kind of game. I wish everything could be nice between the candidates, but they are in for the fight of their lives and some blood is going to spill and some feelings are going to be hurt. I don't like it either; but that's the nature of the beast.

I'm sick of polished politicians.

Nails on a chalkboard in the best of times, can you imagine her in bad times?