Tuesday’s political round-up

June 19, 2007

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:

* The Brownback-Romney brouhaha, caused by a Brownback staffer who went after Romney’s faith, seems to have ended well. Brownback called Romney personally to apologize yesterday, and Romney accepted it. For what it’s worth, the Brownback campaign aide was not fired, but she was reprimanded.

* Speaking of apologies, Barack Obama called several prominent Indian Americans to apologize for the staff memo that criticized Hillary Clinton for her business interests in India. Obama has taken responsibility for the error, and has explained that he expects more from his staff in the future.

* NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg spoke before a crowd of Google employees in California yesterday, “sounding every inch the presidential candidate he insists he is not.” Bloomberg reportedly said, “I am not a candidate” for the presidency. He did not, however, speak to whether he might become a candidate.

* The suspense is over. Hillary Clinton’s campaign has picked an official song — Celine Dion’s “You And I.” (Let the jokes begin.) More importantly, though, you really have to watch the video the campaign put together on this. If you don’t watch The Sopranos, you may not get the whole joke, but watch it anyway. The campaign did an amazing job on this.

* And there will be a special election in Georgia’s 10th congressional district today to replace the late Rep. Charlie Norwood (R). Former state Sen. Jim Whitehead (R) is considered the clear front-runner in this extremely conservative district.

Clinton’s video had all the substance of Gravel’s. At least it got you to go to her website?

I’ll never get that time back.

  • Anyone who thinks the average wingnut can override their religious programming with their political programming has been smoking too many of Karl Rove’s Numbers. No matter how many people make nice with Mittens, das base will not actively support a presidential candidate who they have been programmed from birth to believe is a cult member.

    So I say… GO ROMNEY!

  • I was really hoping “The Bitch is Back” would pull it out. But figures Our Lady of Perpetual Triangulation would go with something as craptastic as Celine.

  • adding to #4: maybe the fact that he apologized to prominent Indian Americans but not to Clinton makes it clear what he really regrets?

  • I like the Clinton video but how much do things like that cost? Is that what peoples’ campaign contributions go toward?

    To answer my own question — yes. What a waste.

  • Reading the report about Whitehead, who claims that 90 out of 100 people in his Georgia district are mostly concerned about the immigration issue, I’m very sure now that the GOP is deliberately fearmongering the issue in hopes of taking the voters’ minds off the war in Iraq. That it backfires on them with the most conservative of their conservative base isn’t really a minus, as they’re still going to vote Republican anyway when it comes down to it. But what it does for them otherwise is something only Karl Rove seems to see, as I sure can’t tell how driving away more and more Hispanic voters is going to help Republicans in 2008.

  • Just when I was starting to think I could lean Clinton, she uses Celine Dion. Yeesh. And Dion isn’t even an American singer. What would Lou Dobbs say (I am sure we will find out).

  • Yeah, I thought the video was amusing, but what’s with outsourcing her campaign song to a Canadian?

    Still, clever of her to use the choice as a way of responding to critics who call her “shrill.” It’s like she’s saying, “You want shrill, I’ll show you shrill!”

    “And You and I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I,
    Were meant to Fly-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y

    I shudder to think how that piercing voice will reverberate in echo-y ballrooms and auditoriums.

    Your mileage may vary. We now return you to your important political issues, already in progress.

  • Clinton chooses Celine Dion? Maybe it’s a very subtle message. She did do that “Titanic” song, y’know. It plays pretty well with the current state-of-affairs regarding the entire cadre of GOP candidates:

    “Big fat boat with not enough rudder to steer a canoe gets smacked down by humongous ice cube. Many deaths ensue.”

    Sounds pretty “GOP-ish” to me….

  • An Official Song?

    These are the milestones we’re going to have to endure in political campaigns these days…?

    Maybe I’ve just never been aware of “official songs” in the past, but this strikes me as an utter waste of time, effort, bandwidth and campaign dollars.

    Meh.

  • What ever happened to “Happy Days Are Here Again”?

    I love that song, ‘specially when LaStreisand sings it.

    Celine Dion is so, so, simpy.

  • Barack Obama called several prominent Indian Americans to apologize for the staff memo […] — CB

    Obama’s statement reminded me of Gonzales’ testimony: “I know nothing about it, but take full responsibility for it.” For the birds.

    The Punjab joke got blown out of proportion and I don’t particularly like Hillary but that “apology” has me very disappointed in Obama. Esp. on top of another staffer (and another case of “I know nothing about it”) talking about a pardon for Libby that same week. If you can’t handle the reins of your own campaign, how are you going to handle running th whole country, as big and as unruly — and as troubled, due to the past years of Rethug misrule — as US?

  • I haven’t yet paid my membership dues in the Hillary Clinton fan club, but I have to say that video did more to make her seem human than anything else I’ve seen. And, yeah, when I saw Johnnie Sack (back from the dead), I burst out laughing.

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