Did sexist press coverage sink Hillary Clinton? I’ll be a guest on KUOW’s The Conservation this afternoon, sometime during the 1PM hour, to discuss this and possibly other issues.
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Rog & GBS–
Kind of glad to be out of the market…except I wish I would have held on to NOV.
I know you took 1/3 off the table Rog.
Hindsight is 20-20…but good move at the time.
Today might be another good day to take another 1/3 off the table.
Your pal O-blah-blah wants that 28% Capital Gains Tax!!
My Broker has recommended a couple of BlackRock Funds that I have some of my Retirement Fund Money in.
I may do it on this pullback.
Lots of choices.
Anyway…I got a report from a firm of Investment Consultants who work on a fee-only basis (NO COMMISSIONS EVER) for folks with over $5 million of liquid funds to invest.
Among other things…they look for ongoing high volatility in terms of 200-point swing days in the DOW.
For several years…we had no 200-point swing days. Last year was quite a few…this year even more.
What is your take??
Mr. Cynical.
I’ve been riding a couple of coal stocks: ICO which I rode up from $9.50 – $10.01. I’m still in JRCC which has been on a freaking tear.
The market will be volitale to say the least. AMR CEO gave a sobering outlook on the domestic airline industry. They are sheeding 12-15% of their fleet.
The weak dollar is not helping the cost of oil, and we need regulations placed on oil traders. Specifically, higher margin calls to take the speculation out of the market.
Fiscal responsibility and a better regulated market leads to predictable market conditions.
Today I bought 100 shrs of TSL @ $51.06 and sold one contract of June $55 covered call (.tslfk)for $3.30 a share. So my cost basis as of tomorrow when the covered call cash hits my account will be $47.76.
“…and other issues…”
Okay, I’ll take that as an invitation to treat this as an “open thread”.
Lots in the news today. $133 p/barrell oil, yet the experts can’t explain the continued price rise based on inventory levels or demand. Either there is manipulation involved, or just a lot of commodities speculation, or a little of both. I can’t imagine it can keep going up at this rate for long, I expect it to fall back down to the $100 p/bbl mark at some point in the comming months (remember when we reacted to projections of $100 p/bbl oil with horror?).
Stock market (DJIA) down 227.49, to 12601.19. It keeps reacting to oil prices, bumping along between 12,500 and 12,800. I expect it to go up a bit when oil stabilizes, eventually.
Did I hear right? Congress passed an anti-trust law against OPEC? Stupid idea, political grand-standing, unenforceable. I can’t imagine the Bush administration bringing a case against the Saudis, and Iran or Venzuella would just laugh. If any serious enforcement was threatened, all they have to do is turn off the oil for a few weeks, until we cry “Uncle!”
Even while oil prices reached record levels and the stock market reacted predictably, oil company executives were called in to testify before the Senate Judicary Committee. It’s not the first time in recent years oil company executives have testified, but there was a big change this time. Previously, the Republicans refused to put them under oath, arguing it would be “discourtious” and “insulting”. Since virtually every other witness in Congressional proceedings routinely raises their right hand and swears to tell the truth, you have to wonder why the oil executives were so resistent to following this practice. And why were the Republicans so eager to accomodate them? But this time, they had to testify under oath.
And in what has to be a warning to Washington taxpayers, a report on the Minnesota bridge collapse finds that pervasive under-funding transportation infrastructure did play a role in the bridge collapse.
“”Financial considerations, we believe, did play a part in the decision-making” on bridge maintenance, Robert Stein, one of the attorneys, told lawmakers during a briefing. “Sometimes it’s easier just to take the least expensive alternative or just commission another study.””
Did sexist press coverage sink Hillary Clinton?
There’s no doubt it hurt her at times, but she dealt with it well, turning it into a positive at other times (it probably helped her win NH, for example). So on the whole I’d say it was a wash.
I can’t see Smirky doing anything but making nice with the Saudis, even after they handed him his hat last week. His old man would take him out behind the woodshed.
Iran and Venezuela…now that’s another matter. He and Cheney have real hard-ons to start another war with Iran, and their lack of fondness for Hugo Chavez is no secret. Perhaps they’re out to kill two birds with one stone–deflect the blame for the pinch most Americans are feeling on these other “furriners” and soften up public tolerance for when the bombs start falling on Tehran…and maybe Caracas.
David,
I love you man, but jeeezzz.
OF COURSE there is a recognition of sex, race, religion and ethnicity in politics. Do you remember the Yidish term “voo denn?”
Sex, gender, ethnicity (as opposed to race), and religion are major factors that shape all of our lives and the way a candidate deals with these aspects is as reasonable a part of the public’s evaluation as her record of service in the government, military, academic achievement, choice of occupation … etc etc. BTW .. Bill got shit as a draft dodger ..did anybody raise that issue in re Hillary? Couldn’t she have volunteered for duty in Nam?
Has there been racism is this campaign?? Yes, the MSM have treated us to of endless reruns of the absurd outakes from Rev. Wright. Is there anybody who does NOT understand these as an attack on Obama’s “race” and his realtionship to the black community??
Where is the ocmparable meme in regard to Clinton? I can cite one. She, has made the arguemtn that her gender is a qualification for office. Don’t you remember that you and I were present here in Seattle when Sen. Clinton celebrated being in a state where the top three pols are female. She repeatedly(and IMHO foolishly) talks about her gender and achievements as a wonderful story. MNY hero Steve matin has a grat line .. “Pardooon meee!”
Hillary has some achievements but even in her own generation I do not see her as important a figure as Barbara Jordan. Molly Ives, Pelosi, or the dozens of similar era women who have risen to be University Presidents or heads of major corporations totally independently of their success as a pair with their husbands.
My bottom line is that Hillary evaluated independent of Bill is not terribly impressive. This is esp. true when it comes to woman’s issues. Curiously, she rarely talks about any actual achievements to promote woman’s rights. And even the childen’s issues ahe talkes credit for, are far overstated since she completed only 11 months of her experience with the Children’s defense Fund,
WADR, Hillary ain’t Pat NIxon, Barb Bush, Eleanor, Rosalind or Jackie.
So yeh .. SHE has made gender an issue.
What about the media?
Seems to me there are three media worlds here ..Fox, the MSM and the blogs. To call Fox sexist would be simplistic. The foxies are all purpose abusers.
But .. the MSM? Other than Chris Mathews, an over eager Obamist and Obama era run-for-office pol, I would challenge you to find anything in the MSM that rivals the crap thrown by the MSM at Obama. The worst of this, as fas as I can see, is the usaul stuff asking what “role” she is playing today .. the defenseless little woman,m the wortnged wife etc. As dumb as that may be, it is no worse than the discussions as to whether Barack is articulate, looks like curious George, is to elite to be really black, can bowl, or has adequate respect for his (white) grand mother.
I guess to be fair and balanced, the mida could have challenged her to throw a few baskets and him to get a perm.
Finally, the blogoshere. Here I need to defer to you. Other than HA , Drudge, and Huffington the only blogs I read regularly are Skeptical Brotha and Andrew Sullivan. Certainly the Brother has, if anything, been antagonostoc to bama as not being Black enough. Does Sullivan display gender bias???? Has there been any gender bias in KOS or FDL or TPM?
So, in the spirit of this blog, I call horse turds on this meme. The callers who saw bias and you never came up with examples. Nor, AFIK could they tell us WHY they prefered Hillary in any way that did not suggest to my bigotted ears a loyalty to genitalia rather than to olicies.
So is there sexism in 2008 Yep! And the worst of ity is PRO female. Howsa about this bet .. a dollar signed by the loser to the winner, on the choice of a running nmate by McCain. I will bet that he choosaes a femme and the Reps try to make gender bias an issue.
Wanna take the bet?
If McCain were to pick someone like Olympia Snowe, Liddy Dole or (if only we could hope!) Christie Whitman, it would make for a ticket with much broader appeal. Most likely it’s going to be some hard-over neocon idealogue, because the present party leadership, incredibly, sees McCain as “too liberal”.
Puddy, Mark and any other Conservative:
Just exactly who got the economy into this mess? Just who is responsible for the price of gas skyrocketing? Just who is responsible for the recession we are in and barreling toward depression? Just who is responsible for the quagmire that is Iraq?
I don’t want ad hominem attacks. I want you to seriously tell me where to place the responsibility for the above mess. Then I want you to tell me why on earth I would support the continuation of the policies that brought us to the brink of ruin?
8 Footsie,
What do you really expect to get for a response, other than “Chappaquiddick!!!!!!” and “Monica!!!!!!!”?
We had a thread just yesterday in which Mark the Bet Welsher repeated the same bullshit about “health care rationing” about eight times. He must have been having trouble thinking up anything else. The entire right-wing nonsense machine is running down like an old grandfather clock.
Oh, holy Moses!!!!! The folks at Moody’s are trying to tell us that the reason they assigned AAA ratings to all those billions of dollars of sketchy mortage-backed derivatives was a “computer glitch”.
Standard and Poor’s are yet to come up with their excuse.
9
artfart:
I don’t expect a cogent answer. I just wanted to tongue tie them. It just struck me how simple to put the questions.
3 rhp
My theory is that the speculators who fucked up the financial and housing markets have now moved into the oil speculation business. Really.
9 AF
Didn’t you know that “making health care available to everyone” is “rationing?”
It’s Republican logic, and it makes perfect sense.
That’s what I’ve heard, speculators have moved on to Food and Oil. That’s unrestrained capitalism for you. They give it a bad name.
Did sexist press coverage sink Hillary Clinton?
No.
And by the way, she didn’t “sink,” but instead ran an incredibly competitive campaign that has to date outlasted most every other primary campaign in recent memory.
What “sank” her, to use your term, were two things:
1. She ran (at least initially) as the establishment candidate in a change election.
2. She voted for the AUMF, and Barack Obama voted against it. Had she voted against it I am pretty sure she’d be our candidate now.
AUMF??
Maybe it’s obvious, but I’ve had a long day.
#6 got it right.
17 There may be an element of truth to that. Might contradict the old urban myth that Bill was always the smartest guy around, but that Hillary was his brains.
16:
Authorization to Use Military Force. Took me a while too.
@19
Thanks!
@15 Daddy
I would add to your comment.
Hillary, entirelaside form her agenda, had three real problmes in this run:
1. Her record of achievement is mostly hype. She rally has very lttle, including legislative productivity to point to. Asx a Senator she has been effective a s Junior SDenator, perhjpas in the same league as Cantwell.
2. She suffers wrom WLR. That stands ofr white liberal racism. I DO NOT mean she is a KKK or citizens council racist. But she has not grwon out of the era where white folks helped ppor black folks. Both she and Bill come across as cndescending rather than collegial. To make it worse, rather than supprting PObama’s struggl;e with the racist MSM in re the Wright affair, she backed the media! ^That was at best stuid and at worst really racist.
3. She seems to be inept at organization. Other than Ickes, her inner circle of advisers seems to be poorly led and poorly chosen. Wolfson and Penn qualify for the Democratic version of the Lee Atwater award ..only they are in t3e wrong party to act that way. The lack of leadeship and some amazingly dumb moves .. e.g. the Iowa sandwich scandal, leave an impression of rish folks on a politicla excusion amongst the Hoi Polloi.
4. She is now indelibly tainted as a Clinton, “ita depends on your deinition of “is.” has now been relaced by Hillary’s bizar version fo electoral math.
What is left is respect for the personna that seems to have finally emerged. If this is (finally) the real Hillary, thyen she nmaybe an exciting candiate for VEEP or Seante leader. All that depnds, however, on gettng rid of some really incompet4nt hangers on (not inlcuding the guy wiht the nose) and dfemonstrating that she can bring the same level of commitment to helping others that she piut into getting herself elected.
Can’t help but wonder how much of the “animosity and bitterness” we keep hearing about between the Obama and Clinton camps is really of their making and how much is due to Republican ratfucking.
@22
Reporters have to report something and since the Democratic side has two interesting people and the Republican side has zero interesting people they dish dirt on Democrats.
I can’t wait to see what happens when the Democrats have one interesting person and the Republicans have zero interesting people.
MLF@8: I answered your question in the original thread you asked it. You then answered Hannah’s response but you skipped over mine.
Come on Carl, you can do better than that.
Finally rhp6033 and GBS have woken up to the NYMEX donkey blue state living oil speculators in a previous PuddyFact. They are driving up the price of oil. And then you have nevercorrectstillnottobright who continues to rail on the oil companies who do not set the oil price, but benefit with 9.5 cent profit for each $ gas is sold.
I have to give credit where credit is due. Sometimes rhp6033 posts some real turds and other times he researches and figgers it out.
GBS is usually on his game. I like him cuz he’ll show up anywhere for lunch!
Daddy N. Love: Heilary was the inevitable candidate. Many HAers were singing her praises. Then they abandoned ship.
TDF. Too damn funny!
Also I think the Saudis are looking at their oil reserves and saying why should we pump more when the world consumes more. OPEC isn’t driving the price of oil up. NYMEX is.
Again, where do the NYMEX people live? Red states?
Seattle Jew you missed a fact – Lanny Davis on Hannity and Colmes said they gave the Dr Wright factoid to the Media. I posted the quote in a PuddyFact. So how can she agree with the media when she created the original firestorm? Someone should check with Rolling Stone who ran a hit piece in Feb 2008. Or maybe the Chicago Tribune who reported it in Jan 2007. I never expected you to forget these facts?
Wolfson and Penn acting like Atwater? Wait a minute here. Al Gorebasm brought us Willie Horton. Lee Atwater abused it. You need to thank the world’s caretaker of carbon credits for Willie Horton.
Then you discount the famed Clinton War Machine. Come on SJ, you forget the scorched earth campaign over the pre-Clinton White House peccadilloes found out by the press? You forget Heilary’s Tammy Wynette moment? Puddy Remembers.
Puddles,
Again, where do the NYMEX people live?
I think we’re going to have to add a new category along side the Puddy Parade of Partial Punditry: Puddy Pearls of Preposterous Predicates. The syllogism in that question is beyond inane.
So, here’s a question fer ya, and, please, try to come up with an answer that doesn’t cause everyone with half a brain to spill coffee all over their keyboards: what’s the supply mechanism that translates an increase in the price of oil to an increase in the pump price of gas? (Hint: google “opportunity cost”.)
Hey John Doh, rhp6033 and GBS figgered it out above. And these NYMEX guys live in strong donkey locations. Just look at a political map and see how dark blue those counties around NYC are.
Come back once you wipe the hot coffee from your crotch and the brain engages.
Tell us oh wizard all about this opportunity cost.
Puddles,
That I think your syllogism to be inanely stupid does not mean that I don’t understand it. To paraphrase a comment my mother has often made in similar situations: I don’t quite know which bothers me most, your twisted thought processes or the fact that I can figure out where the hell you’re headed.
By your logic, all of Wall Street would be populated with Democrats too, which would certainly explain the political slant of the Wall Street Journal, or, for that matter, why NYMEX would issue this press release.
You really are working out a brand new category of stupidity that is uniquely yours. For that, I must commend you.
Yeah, I saw that.
Let’s see: “geopolitical issues, refinery shutdowns and increasing global usage, as well as devaluation of the U.S. dollar”
Puddy first brought you the increased usage of Korea, China and India along with other Pac-Rim countries
GBS first talked about the effect of the dollar devaluation here when he brought up the saber-rattling of potential petro-euros, which the Iranians are trying to do now.
Geopolitical issues – What’s new here? The price of oil went up in the early 80s only to come down to $14 and this was during the Iraq-Iran WAR.
Refinery shutdowns – When this article was composed, I looked up on Google to see what refinery was shutdown. http://www.coking.com/forum/tm.asp?m=1979 gives this information. But the amount of shutdowns and the fact they were temporary and only partial ones tells me this is a smoke screen.
Kind of like your use of Kenneth Pollack to make your failed WMD argument where he wrote in his 2002 book we needed to take out Saddam.
Try again John DOH!
And John DOH!, what I thought was telling in the article was this statement: “However, with regard to the current Senate energy bill, NYMEX believes the subsection dealing with margins is misguided in at least four respects.”
I fail to see why some group of people would come out and kiss the Senate’s ASS when they are the ones making the money in the speculation.
Speculation issues. Where have I seen HAers complain about that before?
Puddles,
I’m taking issue with your claim that NYMEX is, somehow, loaded with Democrats based solely on the fact that NYMEX is located somewhere in the vicinity of New York City. Your persistent attempts to find ways to blame Democrats for everything under the sun are where your stupidity shines brightest.
But, I would note that, on the geopolitical front, the fact that the “surge” has not succeeded and that there is now no effective plan in place to achieve political stability in Iraq might just have a little bit to do with oil speculation. Of course, you’ll come up with some other idiotic means of trying to blame Democrats for this too.
As for Kenneth Pollack, my argument succeeded quite spectacularly in proving the existence of the Puddy Parade of Partial Punditry. You only want us to pay attention to Pollack’s book, The Threatening Storm, but you don’t want us to pay attention to what Pollack said after he wrote that book yet before the Iraq war actually started. See here for details.
Lastly, I’m not at all surprised that you will decline to take a stab at explaining the supply mechanisms that translate an increase in the price of oil into an increase in the pump price of gas. If you ask nicely, I might explain it for you, but that will have to wait until some time tomorrow. I need to head out fairly soon for a trip to Canada, and I really don’t have time to write it all up for you.
Nevertheless, you could try exercising that brain of yours, and think about how the concept of opportunity cost applies to oil company decisions in light of an increasing price for light sweet crude. See if you can figure it out between now and tomorrow morning.
Hey John Doh, this I forgot in watching all those Kenneth Pollack interviews on CNN and other leftist stations.
“In interviews and op-ed articles, Pollack himself still supports the war, saying that now is better than never.”
I rest my case!
And John DOH – you wrote:”NYMEX is located somewhere in the vicinity of New York City.”
NYMEX is located in NYC. Land of the Donk.
Address is:
One North End Avenue
New York, NY 10282-1101.
Puddles,
And, I rest my case regarding the Puddy Parade of Partial Punditry.
As for the location of the NYMEX, I do believe the sarcasm was lost on you.
So, Puddy, I guess since Chevron has it’s historical base near San Francisco & L.A., that the company is predominately composed of Democrats and that it contributes heavily toward the election of Democrats for Congress and the Presidency?
You started off on the right track, then made an unjustified leap of logic. Geography as an explanation for political behavior is a refuge of lazy media reporters. You can do better than that.
Everything is going to plan.
Are there still people out there too stupid to understand what was happening at Cheney’s closed-door “energy summit” in 2001? He and his industry cronies weren’t trying how to prevent the crisis–they were planning to manipulate and exploit it for maximum profit.
ArtFart: So you are saying Cheney and his cronies knew of the faster than anticipated uptick in China, Korea and India for their oil use?
John 32 DOHs http://www.rpi.edu/~markhn/sounds/32dohs.wav: Yeah, so he didn’t agree with the path to the Iraq WAR.
Since you brought him up: “The 36-year-old Pollack—whose government experience includes stints at the CIA and the National Security Council during the Clinton administration, and who now works at the Brookings Institution—has been consistent as to why he believes the United States must invade Iraq: There’s no other way to be certain that Saddam will not acquire nuclear weapons.”
1) He still felt Saddam was a madman
2) Thought he had WMDs
3) Felt it was the right thing to do.
Thanks for playing…
For the 10th time Vedi, vini, vici.
Ahhhhh yes John Doh when caught – “Puddy doesn’t know I was being sarcastic”. Well Mr Sarcasm, who did NYC and the environment swing for in 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006?
So John DOH, why not tell rhp6033 and GBS they are misguided in their comments above?
41 Why not? What the hell did you expect the folks in those countries were going to do with all the money they’ve been making off of us?
So by your reckoning Artfart, in 2001, “What the hell did you expect the folks in those countries were going to do with all the money they’ve been making off of us?”
Well isn’t this an interesting comment. GWB was barely in power and Artfart, through his reminiscing, told us these other countries were making all these bucks off of us before Bush was in power.
Well ArtFart welcome to conservatism.
Really!
Uhhh, Puddy…I was trying to answer your question at face value. How hopelessly naive of me. Outsourcing of jobs had indeed been going on through the Clinton years, and well before that. Cheney and his industry pals knew that, and that it was going to provide them with a windfall anyway, but that evidently wasn’t enough. What better way to make even more money than to kick off a war that would put one of the world’s major oil-producing countries offline for years (and that was always in the plan, they just didn’t yet know exactly what the “Pearl Harbor type event” would be) so as to reduce supply even further and favor their dear friends (and supporters of American values), the Saudis.
ArtFart: You missed my sarcasm… Where did I just read that…?
I placed article after article as PuddyFacts here on how outsourcing happened in the Clinton years. Yet most of your 16%er friends told me on this blog how wrong I was. Curious to me you were mute back then. Now for you to deliver an epiphany and tell us this really occurred is heartening.
Now to your conspiracy theory. You are trying to tell me this meeting laid out the fact we’d have >$125 barrel oil? Hmmm… Then why didn’t they think of the political consequences too?
Sorry that lead balloon doesn’t float.
14 Oh, cheese whiz…slap my wrists! I’ve been playing hooky from class.
As it happens, I was warning people about how the “engineering shortage” the high-tech companies were screaming about in the early 90’s was merely an excuse to lobby for offshoring and filling cubicles here at home with lower-paid guest workers. And I never claimed that for the Clinton administration to not only tolerate but encourage such practices was a good thing–you must be confusing me with someone else there.
It remains that despite you wingnuts’ ranting to the contrary, Bill Clinton was the most conservative Democrat to sit in the White House in maybe the last century–and far more of a true conservative than the borrow-and-spend neocons.
“Political consequences?” I dunno…may have had something to do with people like you thinking they weren’t out to bugger you along with the rest of us.
Puddles @ 42
Clearly, you weren’t paying attention to either me or Kenneth Pollack. I’ve never said that Pollack wasn’t, in general, in favor of invading Iraq. What I have said is that, while Pollack was in favor of invading Iraq, he had also clearly said that invading Iraq in March of 2003 was too soon.
As I’ve pointed out, the Puddy Parade of Partial Punditry only wants to quote some of what Kenneth Pollack said, not all of what Kenneth Pollack said.
@ 43
Do you honestly think that I have no idea what the “NY” in “NYMEX” stands for? Dang, but you’re stupid.
Even more amazing, you seem to think that, because the NYMEX is located in New York, all of he folks who buy and sell commodities on the New York Mercantile Exchange also live in New York.
RHP is completely correct. You almost had a reasonable train of thought going with that one, but took it completely off the tracks when you tried to turn it into yet another indictment of Democrats.
AF @ 49
I keep pointing out that Clinton was heavily involved in the Democratic Leadership Council–a group whose stated purpose was to seek “market solutions” to Economic issues.
Indeed, this is one of the components in Republicans’ continued self-deception about our current circumstances. Because Clinton was a Democrat, they fail to recognize the extent to which our current domestic predicament owes itself to a continuous implementation of conservative economic principles since the election of Ronald Reagan.
Fascination, however, that the one President to actually produced the most effective results during that time was Clinton.
I had promised Puddles a bit of discussion about the supply mechanism that translates increases in the price of oil into increases in the pump price of gas.
While there are a few companies that buy the oil they refine into gasoline, most of the big oil companies are “integrated”. Exxon-Mobile, Conoco, BP, Chevron/Texaco and Royal Dutch/Shell–these companies don’t buy their oil from someone else. They extract their oil from the ground.
For an integrated oil company, the spot price of oil is not a cost. Rather, the spot price of oil is an alternative source of revenue.
For these companies, how does an increase in the spot price of oil translate into an increase in the price of gasoline at the pump? The answer involves opportunity costs. An integrated oil company can either refine that oil themselves, or they can sell that oil via a futures contracts to someone else.
In order for an integrated oil company to be willing to refine a barrel of oil into gasoline, the profit they make off that gasoline must be greater than or equal to the profit they can make from selling that oil to someone else. The converse is also true: for integrated oil companies to be willing to sell their oil to someone else, the profit they can make from selling that oil must be greater than or equal to the profit they can make from refining that barrel of oil into gasoline.
Taken in conjunction with each other, these two observations translate into a maxim that’s generally always true: the profit from refining a barrel of oil into gasoline must be equal to the profit oil companies can make from selling that oil to someone else.
That, then, is the supply mechanism that translates an increase in the spot price of oil into an increase in the pump price of gasoline. With this, there are two important takeaways relevant to recent discussions here.
First, when someone tells you that oil companies made 9.5 cents on the dollar for gasoline sold at the pump back when the price of oil was, say, $30 a bbl, you can be absolutely certain that this is no longer true when the price of oil is $130 a bbl.
Second, in the things that make you go “Hm…” department, oil companies have a vested interest in seeing the price of oil rise through speculation. It’ll be interesting to see how oil company executives respond to questions before Congress (and, whether or not our congress-critters have figured out the right questions to ask).