Audio: Obama talks about Iowa, Hillary, Sanders and 2016

The full audio:

The Story via Politico:

Barack Obama, that prematurely gray elder statesman, is laboring mightily to remain neutral during Hillary Clinton’s battle with Bernie Sanders in Iowa, the state that cemented his political legend and secured his path to the presidency.

But in a candid 40-minute interview for POLITICO’s Off Message podcast as the first flakes of the blizzard fell outside the Oval Office, he couldn’t hide his obvious affection for Clinton or his implicit feeling that she, not Sanders, best understands the unpalatable pragmatic demands of a presidency he likens to the world’s most challenging walk-and-chew-gum exercise.

“[The] one thing everybody understands is that this job right here, you don’t have the luxury of just focusing on one thing,” a relaxed and reflective Obama told me in his most expansive discussion of the 2016 race to date.

Iowa isn’t just a state on the map for Obama. It’s the birthplace of his hope-and-change phenomenon, “the most satisfying political period in my career,” he says — “what politics should be” — and a bittersweet reminder of how far from the garden he’s gotten after seven bruising years in the White House.

The caucuses have a fierce-urgency-of-now quality as Obama reckons with the end of his presidency — the kickoff of a process of choosing a Democratic successor he hopes can secure his as-yet unsecured legacy, to keep Donald Trump or Ted Cruz or somebody else from undoing much of what he has done. And he was convinced Clinton was that candidate, prior to the emergence of Sanders, friends and associates have told me over the past 18 months.

“Bernie came in with the luxury of being a complete long shot and just letting loose,” he said. “I think Hillary came in with the both privilege — and burden — of being perceived as the front-runner. … You’re always looking at the bright, shiny object that people haven’t seen before — that’s a disadvantage to her.”

He also spoke of Bernie Sanders:

Obama didn’t utter an unkind word about Sanders, who has been respectfully critical of his administration’s reluctance to prosecute Wall Street executives and his decision to abandon a single-payer health care system as politically impractical. But he was kinder to Clinton. When I asked Obama whether he thought Sanders needed to expand his horizons, if the Vermont senator was too much a one-issue candidate too narrowly focused on income inequality, the presidente didn’t dispute the assertion.

Gesturing toward the Resolute Desk, with its spread-winged eagle seal, first brought into the Oval Office by John F. Kennedy, Obama said of Sanders: “Well, I don’t want to play political consultant, because obviously what he’s doing is working. I will say that the longer you go in the process, the more you’re going to have to pass a series of hurdles that the voters are going to put in front of you.”

Then he added: “As you’ll recall, I was sitting at my desk there just a little over a week ago … writing my State of the Union speech, and somebody walks in and says, ‘A couple of our sailors wandered into Iranian waters’” — and here he stopped to chuckle in disbelief — “that’s maybe a dramatic example, but not an unusual example of the job.”

As much as I hate to say it; President Obama is correct about that one. The office of the President of the United States is a very difficult job and it requires someone who can handle the job. While Bernie Sanders might be a respectable person and all; if I were voting in a Democratic Primary, there is no way that I would vote for Bernie Sanders, I would most likely vote for Hillary Clinton. Because she has already been there and she seems, for a Democrat, a bit more reasonable, than Bernie Sanders.

Needless to say, being an ideologue is great; if you are an activist or even maybe a Senator. However, when you are the commander and chief, that is a whole other ballgame and there is a certain amount of pragmatism is required in that office, if you actually want to succeed at the job. You have to remember, when you are President; you are President of the people of the United States of America, not just the President of the people who voted for you. You have to take into account everyone, not just those who voted for you. This is why I am not too keen on Ted Cruz; he is an extreme ideologue on the right, where Bernie Sander is an extreme ideologue on the left.

This is where I think Donald Trump might just be the more pragmatic candidate, who might just be able to get things done in DC and put aside some of this partisan rancor that has become so terrible under Bush and Obama. Now, if we could just work on his humility and get him to stop retweeting stuff like this here.

Other Bloggers: Vox, The Daily Beast, USA Today, Yahoo Politics, John Hawkins’ Right Wing News, Mother Jones, Talking Points Memo, Hot Air, The Daily Caller, Washington Post, ABC News, Shakesville, Slantpoint and The Week – Via Memeorandum

Kudos to Charles Lane

For standing for those who wish to love thier children and not have to be subject to these sort of attacks.

I’m not defending Rick Santorum the presidential candidate. From what little I know about him, he seems to have his own issues with moralizing and judging. To the extent he has used his family’s experience to make a point about abortion, I object.

But I am defending the right of the Santorums and all families to grieve an infant’s death in accordance with their personal needs and beliefs. My plea is for a little more respect regarding the way people deal with loss, and a little more maturity about physical contact with the dead. If that puts me in sympathy, for a moment, with this right-wing politician, so be it.

Jonathan’s death was probably the hardest moment of my life. But actually touching his body was a source of comfort and the first step in going on with life. Not weird — Via Rick Santorum’s baby–and mine. – PostPartisan – The Washington Post

I would recommend you to go read that whole thing; a very touchy story about a Father who also lost his child as well. Charles Lane is a brave man for standing up to his fellow liberals and objecting to the idea that loving a dead child is “Weird.”

Kudo’s to him. 🙂

Others: CatholicVote.org and National Review

Ha! Newt says he is “not rich”

Man, this is bad.

AllahPundit calls it “laying it on with a trowel”. I was thinking more of a 12 horse motor pump into a 10 inch hose fitting myself. I’m talking about a cement pump.

What am I talking about?

This:

CONCORD, N.H. — Less than 12 hours after finishing in fourth place in the Iowa caucuses, Newt Gingrich opened a new, more aggressive chapter in his campaign, taking pointed shots at rivals Mitt Romney and Ron Paul, who both finished ahead of Gingrich. At one point, Gingrich hinted he would make Romney’s personal wealth an issue, telling a reporter “I’m not rich.”

Speaking to reporters shortly after arriving in New Hampshire, Gingrich dismissed Romney’s razor-thin victory—the former Massachusetts governor ended the night with 25 percent of the vote and only eight more votes than Rick Santorum. “The fact is, three out of four Republicans rejected him,” Gingrich said.

When asked why he chose to congratulate Santorum and not Romney on his caucus success, the former House speaker said, “I find it amazing the news media continues to say [Romney’s] the most electable Republican when he can’t even break out of his own party.… The fact is, Gov. Romney in the end has a very limited appeal in conservative party.”

Later, in a campaign stop in Laconia, Gingrich’s kept up his attack – and it got personal. Asked by a local reporter if he would buy a home in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire, where Romney has a summer home, Gingrich replied, “No, I can’t afford things like that, I’m not rich.” His wife, Callista, added a jab at Romney as well. “We have one home,” she demurred. The Romneys own two summer homes, including one in California.

This coming from a dude who made 1.6 million from Freddie Mac . 🙄

Over to you AllahPundit:

Surely a man eligible for a six-figure line of credit at Tiffany’s has the means to buy himself a cottage in the sticks. Or maybe more: I’ll bet $1.6 million from Freddie Mac would get you something nice and airy in Hanover. This is the second time that Gingrich has taken a dig at Romney’s wealth, do note, but the first time came with caveats: Romney had already taken a dig at his Freddie earnings in that case, and Gingrich wasn’t sniffing then at the fact that Romney’s rich but rather what he did to become that way. Tonight’s little aside is more of a pure class pander, which is yet more evidence of just how bitter Newt is about that beating he took on the air in Iowa.

Indeed.

My question is simply this — if Newt is poor, what the heck am I?!? 😯

Oh and also; pandering?!? That doesn’t even begin to describe it. The dude is flinging poo at Romney desperately hoping something — anything will stick.

Thus another reason why I am not very big on Newt. Him, the heir to the Reagan mantle — yeah right! 🙄

Honestly why does anyone care what this stupid woman thinks?

No, No… I don’t mean Tina Korbe.

I mean this woman, Megan McCain…:

Ugh, it’s like listening to a valley girl talk about politics. Like gag me with a spoon man. 🙄

This is why I am not that big on Newt

Because of silly stuff like this right here:

Newt Gingrich still won’t congratulate Mitt Romney for winning the Iowa caucuses.

At a news conference in Concord, N.H., Gingrich was asked by CBS correspondent Dean Reynolds why he congratulated Rick Santorum but not Romney.

Gingrich stared at the reporter and raised his eyebrows in silence, eventually drawing laughter from some of the reporters.

“Because I know you would be a man of great professionalism, I know that’s a rhetorical question. And a good one,” Gingrich said.

During his speech in Des Moines last night, Gingrich visibly seethed at mention of Romney, who along with his supporters ran a barrage of attack ads against the former speaker.

Romney said he’d spoken with every GOP rival last night except Gingrich.

Because when you do stuff like this; you come off as an old bitter curmudgeon. Last night, while watching Newt’s speech, I was not impressed at all. Because instead of being gracious, he came off as angry. Newt starting punching up, and attacking Romney and attacking Ron Paul. Whatever happened to just thanking your supporters and the others who also competed with you in the caucases?

Either way, this will not go over well for those in New Hampshire. Because it makes him sound ungratful, not to mention the fact that Newt is a bomb thrower, who is not good at thinking on his feet. All of this will flush itself out during the caucas process — hopefully.

Nate Silver explains it.

This pretty much sums it up…:

I don’t care if you call it a win or a tie. In Iowa on Tuesday, Mitt Romney had a performance that looks ugly on the stat sheet , but which accomplished quite a bit when you consider it in its broader context.

The two most important things that Mr. Romney accomplished are as follows:

First, Mr. Romney eliminated Rick Perry from the nomination contest. Of course, Mr. Romney got a lot of help from Mr. Perry himself. Maybe we should use the passive voice — Mr. Perry was eliminated from the nomination contest. The conclusion is the same: the man who once looked like Mr. Romney’s most formidable rival has suspended his campaign.

The result was not unexpected based on late-stage polling — in fact, the polling average nailed Mr. Perry’s share of the vote almost to the decimal point.

But it was not long ago that Mr. Perry looked like he might finish in a solid third place, at a bare minimum, in Iowa; a poll conducted as recently as Dec. 12 actually had Mr. Perry ahead of Mr. Romney. And there was some chance that Mr. Perry might have done quite a bit better than third place. I’m not convinced that there was anything that happened to Rick Santorum that couldn’t have happened to Mr. Perry, if only Mr. Perry had received the right injection of momentum — say, an endorsement from the Family Leader, a conservative group — at the right time. — via Winning Ugly, but Winning – NYTimes.com

I think is pretty mcu spot on, read the rest, it is very interesting. A little wonkish, but very interesting.

This is a mememorandum thread.

Bachmann bails with the Longest….speech….ever

I can see why she left, but man, was that long rambling speech really necessary? 🙄

Via CNN:

The Video:

The Story:

(CNN) – Michele Bachmann ended her bid for the Republican presidential nomination Wednesday, hours after a disappointing sixth-place finish in the Iowa caucuses.

The Minnesota congresswoman suspended her campaign, a legal technicality that will allow her to continue to raise and spend campaign funds.

Ed Morrissey was not very impressed with her, like me. Stacy McCain was actually there, the lucky old bastard. 😛

Anyhow, you know who this helps, right? Perry, of course.

It’s getting ugly between Gingrich and Romney

…and Gingrich does not disappoint with this shot across Romney’s bow: (Via CBS News)

Video:

Of course, the bad part was that Gingrich sort of stuck his own foot in his mouth, when he called Romney a liar and then turned right around and said he would support him if he were the GOP nominee. D’oh! 🙄

Lord Edward Morrissey, who knows this stuff better than anyone, I think, saith the following:

Hey, not to rain on Gingrich’s parade, but how is that different than any other PAC or super-PAC? I’m pretty sure that Gingrich-supporting PACs aren’t run by disinterested strangers, nor are those for Rick Perry or any of the other candidates in the race. That’s a problem in the structure of the campaign finance regulations that impose artificial divisions on contributions. If those were removed, the same money would flow into these races, but the candidates themselves would be responsible for its use instead of hiding behind PACs and super-PACs — and that includes Newt Gingrich.

As I’ve written earlier, there is nothing wrong with so-called “negative” campaigning. Candidates should draw contrasts between their positions and those of their opponents, and their records as well. As long as that is being done honestly, there is nothing wrong or dishonorable about it; in fact, that’s why we have primaries. Gingrich chose to eschew that strategy and now wants to claim some kind of victimization because the rest of the field chose not to follow in his footsteps. On top of that, Gingrich has descended to name-calling, which looks more like a dog-in-the-manger ploy than a way to gather support in the few short hours before Iowa voters trudge to precincts tonight. A confident candidate wouldn’t have sunk to the level of this conversation the morning of a caucus.

Indeed.

Also too, I say this as a kid, who grew up in the inner city of Detroit; there is nothing funnier than watch to rich, white old guys fighting it out like school kids. I find it quite amusing. 😉 😛

Again, as it is has been written many times over in the right-wing political blogosphere and also said by others on Fox News; Gingrich is a thinker, a Conservative intellectual, if you will — but he is also a bomb thrower, who is not apt to thinking on his feet. This video above proves that. In other words, it is okay to be a bomb thrower, you just have to be able to run from the bomb, in the right direction! 😯 😛 😉 😀

Some thoughts on attacks on Republicans

Last night as I sat and watched the video of Alan Colmes attacking Rick Santorum something came to my mind and I thought I would write about it. Folks, I believe that we should prepare ourselves for this sort of a thing. The reason I say this is that the Democratic Party establishment knows that they are in a very bad way. After all, their President has failed in every manner imaginable; his attempts to save the economy failed, his attempts to create more jobs failed, even his idiotic attempts to kick start green energy failed. Therefore, seeing that their President is more vulnerable than Joe Louis on a bad night, the Democratic Party is going to go straight for the jugular and pull every dirty pool trick in the book.

Now, because I am not a hyper-partisan and because I do tend to like to deal in the truth, I will say this: Republicans and Conservatives should not be shocked when this happens. Now why would I say this? Because it just so happens that “Right” media in this Country did some of the very same things to President Obama when he was being elected. What am I referring? Well, there is Birther nonsense, the accusation that President Obama is gay, that he is a Muslim or even more libel — a terrorist, that he is a communist —- all of that stuff.

The problem is that the things that I mentioned above are usually done under the banner of “all is fair in love and war.” The problem is that Conservatives and Republican do not mind doing to Democrats, because in their minds, the lies and half-truths are being done because of a love for the Country and because they want their candidate in the White House. The problem is that when these sort of nasty attacks happen to Conservatives at the behest of the Democratic Party; the first thing that Conservatives do is hoist the red flag and cry, “Foul!”

The reason why I say this is that politics as AllahPundit so very well put it is a blood sport with much bloodlust involved. Again, the attack on Santorum was an extreme example of Democratic Party bloodlust, which surprisingly now has had some blowback effect, which is a good thing. However, my fellow Conservatives, do not think that this is the end of it. More of this sort of stuff is coming, so be prepared for it. This is, after all just the primary season. Wait till the general election comes, that is going to be mess.

Put simply, my point is this; “those who fling poo, should not be shocked or surprised when it is flung back at them.”

Romney Leading Paul in Paul in Iowa Poll

It is starting to look like Romney might just be the man who gets the GOP nod. It is early, but I have that feeling.

Via the Des Moines Register:

The Des Moines Register’s latest Iowa Poll shows a surprise three-way match-up in contention to win the Iowa Republican caucuses: Mitt Romney, Ron Paul and Rick Santorum.

Santorum, who has been largely invisible in the polls throughout the campaign season, is now beating the other evangelical choices and has a clear shot at victory Tuesday night.

But political analysts note there’s little time for Santorum to cash in and regroup before New Hampshire, where voters weigh in nine days from now, while Romney is positioned to replicate what he’s done in Iowa in all the early states.

In four days of polling, Romney leads at 24 percent, Paul has 22 percent and Rick Santorum, 15 percent.

But if the final two days of polling stand alone, the order reshuffles: Santorum elbows out Paul for second.

“Few saw this bombshell coming,” GOP strategist David Polyansky said. “In an already unpredictable race this is another stunning turn of political fortune.”

The piece goes on to talk about Santorum; who I utterly despise as a human being. The only reason that Santorum is getting traction at all, is because of the collapse of Bachmann’s campaign. Of course, polls mean nothing, they are simple snapshots into the minds of those taking the poll. What honestly counts is the actual caucuses themselves.

Either way, it should be very interesting.

Other sites covering this subject, right and left — via Memeorandum: CNN, The Politico, Iowa Caucuses, Washington Post, Hot Air, FiveThirtyEight, The Moderate Voice, msnbc.com, Patterico’s Pontifications, Washington Monthly, 2012 Decoded, New York Times, Outside the Beltway, Daily Kos, Business Insider, americanthinker.com, The Iowa Republican, ABCNEWS, The Huffington Post, Big Government, The Caucus, Guardian, Ballot Box, The Daily Caller, The Atlantic Online, Catholic Bandita, A plain blog about politics, Campaign 2012, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Talking Points Memo, The Spectacle Blog, Mediaite, The Page, State of the Union, Balloon Juice, GOP 12, Riehl World View, Politisite, Associated Press, Saint Petersblog and Yahoo! News