Obama should not appoint any Repug to ANYTHING who is anti choice or anti GLBT rights

This basically rules out Chuck Hagel and Sam Nunn (faux Democrat).

If he wants some bipartisanship, there are plenty of Republicans he could appoint to Defense, State and AG (or preferably lesser cabinet positions) who are not reactionaries on civil rights.

Lincoln Chaffee and Bill Weld are two good examples.

If you think picking Hagel as Veep will garner Obama more votes, you don't quite get how pissed off and betrayed people would feel.

I find it really bizarre that some of the very same people who oppose Hillary vehementy for Veep, because she would destroy Obama's message of "change" (a valid consideration), think that Hagel and Nunn wouldn't destroy it even quicker.

Some things are deal breakers. People who are against human rights and civil rights fit the bill.

What difference does it make?

Dont exclude some valuable people who's personal opinions wont be of importance to their position.

and it is contrary to what Obama has said in the campaign.

:shrug:

Hagel is a fucknutlican. However if Hagel wants to support Obama and bring some fucknutlican voters with him, I welcome his fucknutlican support - and no vp for him either, duh.

If he had been born but ten years later, he would have been a Republican.

It is mind boggling that someone who supports a policy of discharging people with valuable language skills from the military because of their sexual orientation can be called strong on national defense.

Not only that, it was Clinton's first big political battle and because he lost it (thanks to Sam Nunn) it really hurt him going into the fight for tax increases on the wealthy and health care. Sam Nunn's actions were a serious help to Newt Gingrich and the Republicans in retaking congress in 1994.

If Obama takes office and a Democratic Senator derails a major policy initiative of his in the first year, I guarantee you that person will be trashed by some of the same people that are touting Sam Nunn right now.

Obama can do much better than Sam Nunn.

Personally, I don't think Obamam would appoint Hagel to anything. I'm surprised so many here support the idea, though.

Allow me to put you back on track in this conversation.

You have no reason to believe ANY Democrat would appoint anti-choice, anti-LGBT people, particularly to an office they would oversee.

This is just another not too subtle dig at Barack.

and on television almost every day.

It's neither "Clintonian" nor a dig at Obama to express the belief that he should not betray core constituencies.

And get control of your anger, you have a very big problem.

The mind-numbing nonstop harangue posted here day after day regarding a certain gospel singer dispels your claim of absolute innocence in suggesting yet again that Barack is to be feared by the LGBT community, his clear record to the contrary notwithstanding.

I also realize being called on your not too clever attempt yet again to undermine Barack by suggesting he would consider appointing inappropriate people to inappropriate positions is uncomfortable for you, but projecting your own anger or whatever icky feeling you may have over it pretty much punctuates the silliness of this entire episode.

as were literally thousands of others across the nation, including many Obama supporters right here, pissed off about the "preacher" episode, as I was about Colburn and the Newsom stories. I wrote about it at the time. Six months ago.

I'm supporting our likely nominee despite those reservations, and have not criticized Obama or his supporters in the way you have continuously tried to demean those who disagreed with you. I did not call his supporters stupid names, even though I was continually amazed at the hostility and the venom that flew out of your keyboard and the keyboards of others.

I felt Clinton lost the nomination after Wisconsin and have not attacked Obama in the last few months, as a matter of fact, I have found more that I like about him, many of his supporters notwithstanding. I have continued defending Clinton against pointless and harsh attacks and will continue to do so, because I don't think they serve any purpose other than to rip this party apart.

It is perfectly legitimate to express my thoughts on Republicans in a Democratic administration. If you actually feel, in some bizarre thought process, that I'm attacking Obama by saying so, then I have nothing in common with you whatsoever.

Obama himself, in his last Advocate interview, said explicitly that he wanted gay people to keep his feet to the fire on these issues. He said it is OUR JOB to continually press him and push him, as we are the movement and he is the politician. He made a comparison to Dr. King and Lyndon Johnson.

I'm sorry you're so inexplicably paranoid to think that this was a jab at Obama, motivated by partisan nominating season politics. I've been pretty clear where I stand, and, as you say, if you read the internets, you couldn't have written what you have. I've written numerous posts indicating that I am voting for Obama in the general and urging other Clinton supporters to do the same. The nomination season is over. I've moved on. It seems you haven't.

I know you're aware of how many times I've defended you in the past when you've gotten into little dust ups with numerous people accusing you of being homophobic.

I don't know you, so I will refrain from making a judgement. But I do know that you're very angry and paranoid, and your posts to me in this thread reaffirm that.

Which makes your mindless yet protracted assault on Obama over McClurkin hypocritical, and yet you still expect people to just absorb it and not factor that into the equation.

I also know subtle manipulation when I see it, but I'm always amused at the projection around this place when people are confronted with their lame efforts to undermine a candidate they don't support: Deflection and personal insults, rinse and repeat. I'm not impressed.

You have never come to my defense here on any issue, and I assure you if anyone thought I was homophobic for calling bullshit on the lame and sometimes vicious spectacle of the evisceration of Obama over Donnie-Boy, I know who I am and my connection to the LGBT community here in SF, and that's really all that matters.

This particular kind of message board posturing is probably the most absurd acting out I've seen around here in a long time. Like most Clinton people, I really do think you believe people are sheep and easily manipulated.

On edit: Barack has worked as a civil rights attorney and taught Constitutional law, so you really are reaching here. But I digress.

Clinton and her supporters/bad and Obama and his supporters/good. It's a completely black and white dynamic for you. I am now your enemy, in your brain, because we supported different candidates in a primary. I work a little differently, I see all of us as Democrats, and, in the end, on the same side, though as I've noted, I've been perturbed by the visceral hate generated by some.

The Clintons were in power last decade, which was a very different time. I appreciate your concern that gays were "thrown under the bus," but a lot of actual gays and lesbians were actively involved in those years and know what happened and why. Clinton was not an ideal president on those issues, no President is, but he was groundbreaking for the time.

If you would like me to post a private email, from two years ago this month, where you, unsolicited, wrote and thanked me for stepping in and steering the conversation aside by "gently rebuking" you when you were being pilloried by a few overly enthusiastic people, I will be glad to. I have a few others from you in the same vein.

I'm sorry you're dealing with so much anger. I think you're a good person who has let the passions of this race cloud some of your good sense. Maybe when Hillary is gone from the scene, the fog will lift for you.

using every manipulation in the book to commandeer the nomination. Apparently I need to remind you that she has not conceded, not an inch, even though she has no reasonable way to win the nomination.

She hasn't given up and neither have you. The charade you and other Clinton supporters here at DU use to try to manipulate people into letting her bullshit slide is not a secret. If she had conceded, you'd have more credibility. But she hasn't and you don't, and that is what it is and all the personal insults and amateur armchair analyses you dish up don't change those logistics.

I think I speak for many here when I say we are sick and tired of Clinton and all the reindeer games played on her behalf.

put anti choice Republicans in his cabinet or as VP, as some here are advocating? You have strayed far both from my OP and your original bizarre post to me.

"She hasn't given up and neither have you."

You're out of your mind. She's lost the nomination. I've said it repeatedly. Whether she's conceded or not has zero to do with either me or my credibility. I happen to think she'll concede the week after the last primary. I felt she had lost as far back as Wisconsin and have written recently, a number of times, of my support for Obama in the fall.

Obama has won. Move on. Hillary, as a presidential prospect, is virtually irrelevant now, except in how she wraps this up and what role she plays at the convention and in supporting Obama in the fall.

Rational people understand this. Irrational people keep frothing at the mouth over her and writing wildly accusatory bullshit that bears no relation to reality.

You can keep writing your strange untruths, but repeating them over and over don't make them any more factual or any less bizarre.

Subtle, but there it is.

anyone who hates lesbians is an idiot. You fit the bill.

Sorry.

you started talking to me, twit, not the other way around.

Not you.

reading comprehension about as sharp as your worldview. Or your understanding of English literature.

when your anger subsides.

But the angry denial and passive-aggressive behavior of some of her supporters will be remembered.

that Barack has won. Yet you continue to be consumed by anger. You actually seem to revel in it. Too bad you can't be joyous that the candidate you supported won and move on to the general with a sense of renewed purpose, Instead you're wasting all this misplaced energy railing at ghosts.

Get that part straight.

me with Hillary. Last I looked, I don't have any yellow jackets hanging in my closet.

I believe you nailed it.

pissed off because you were nailed as a bigot, eh?

Sorry, didn't read it before it was deleted.

but you read them, since you wrote them.

Facts are so annoying.

both facts and bigots are annoying.

:thumbsup:

How in the world would he affect those things from inside the executive branch? That could only be done inside the legislative branch and Hagel does not have litmus tests for judicial appointments.

all are very involved in those issue. Just to name three.

Exactly what cabinet position is he fit to serve in?

And fuck Fred Phelps' golf buddy Sam Nunn too.

Is that how you wish to reach out?

if you don't, then why the fuck would you want someone who agrees with him 100% of the time?

good one! :rofl:

I respect his judgment and support him. I know he'll make the right decision.

as there would always be the possibility they could be president. OTOH, I wouldn't have a problem with a republican in the cabinet in a department that didn't deal in anything related to our civil rights. It is not uncommon, after all, to have a member of the opposite party in the cabinet. Even He-who-shall-always-be-* had one democrat in his cabinet.

His work on the Boren Group keeps me wondering if we are going
to wake up the day after the election and find out. Surprise Folks,
the Unity Agenda is going to be implemented.

On some earlier Charlie Rose shows, they said our candidates were
out making promises they could never keep.

...so I don't think The Party can afford to offend us.

Hagel and Nunn aren't viable.

There's a reason Richardson met with a gay group in the last few weeks.

appoint moves a Repub out of the House or Senate or significant statewide office.

very few posts. Maybe Ambassador to a few small island nations.

that view is irrelevant to the role of secretary of the interior.

is ideologically identical. The point of a good VP pick is to expand your appeal to a different group that may not be in your constituency.

If they do, they need to reexamine that.

If they felt comfortable pursuing pro choice policies in their sphere (education, justice, defense, etc) then great. Do you think a pro life individual would feel comfortable pursuing a strongly pro choice agenda?

After all, the party is a big tent. We cannot win if we don't have a broad based party.

As long as the position didn't have anything to do with abortion, or let's say even health care, to give it a wider range (I don't know what his position is on birth control) then what harm would there be in him serving in that other cabinet position.

Not that I'm nominating Bob Casey for anything, or even suggesting Obama would pick him, but that was the first example of a "pro-life" Democrat I could think of.

And that's saying something.

who are progressives through and through on social issues and civil rights.

Heh heh.

Seriously, if "strong national security" is really such a big deal (I don't necessarily agree) then I would say Clark or Webb.

And I don't think we "need" someone like Hagel in any position.

I would make a distinction between a cabinet position that doesn't involve domestic policy and one that does; but that said, we also have plenty of strong Democrats with national security credentials for positions like SoD.

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Just because you DISAGREE with someone on one position, doesn't mean they aren't the best qualified for a job in which the particular thing you disagree with them on HAS NO BEARING ON THE POSITION.

would you support a Veep who thought that blacks were inferior and that desegregation was a mistake?

It's not just "one issue." You're trivializing core Democratic beliefs.

Nor would I support anyone who I don't want ot be president.


HOWEVER, I would support him for Sec of Defense or other related cabinet position and yes, even if he was prejudice.

without having to resort to dipping into the pool of people who don't believe in the concept of equality.

Sorry, but not really.

For Obama to fulfill the promise he has been making in this campaign, for a NEW TYPE OF POLITICS... he needs to reach across the aisle and put prominent, good thinking republicans in positions where their voices can be heard.

Obama is about changing the Tit for Tat of Washington.. (bush shut us out for 8 years, so now we have to shut them out for 8 years... whine.. whine.. whine..)

Chuck Hagel is qualified to speak on foreign policy issues and could be given a position where his voice is prominent on these matters.

Frankly, I would like to see a cabinent made up of 50% republicans and 50% democrats.

Winning the presidency shouldn't be about rewarding the winning party, but instead about getting the freaking job done and the most important thing to getting the job done is getting FACTS and OPINIONS from ALL SIDES... you know, that thing bush didn't do for the last 8 years?

and Tom Colburn can be Sec'y of State. Inhofe can run Justice.

Sorry, but I draw the line at bigots. There are good Republicans out there, if Obama wants to put one or two in the cabinet, there are plenty to choose from who don't have 100% scorecards from the freaking Christian Coalition.

However, Hagel is qualified for Sec of Defense.

And I wouldn't mind seeing Christie Todd Whitman in the EPA again.

Someone's religion (which I see as a mental illness) does not disqualify them from a position where their religiousness has nothing to do with the position.

we're talking about BIGOTS.

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there are the odd anti choice democrats, but pro choice means just that: you are valuing a woman's rights to make her own medical decisions over the right of the government to make it for her.

Read our platform. I realize it's just a political document, but it is voted on every four years and we have been a strongly pro choice party for decades.

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IMO at the end of the day it's gonna be Bill Richardson. They are going to look at the map and realize that the west is their best opportunity to get 270. The Hispanic vote is crucial to winning the west.

Obama/Hagel is less plausible than Kerry/McCain which was really pushing it. Kerry/McCain (assuming that McCain was willing to side with the Democrats on issues) could have arguably put Kerry over the top. Nobody knows who the hell Chuck Hagel is. If Obama picks him people will say "why the hell is he picking a Republican from Nebraska."

And Sam Nunn is a has-been who is older than McCain.

Obama isn't going to win white votes in Kentucky and West Virginia because he puts a Republican or a pseudo Republican on the ticket. He knows this full well and that's why he's going to compete in the west instead. Someone like Sam Nunn or Chuck Hagel won't help him there.