Hillary dodges question about pardoning Scooter from Tweety at AFSCME forum Live now on MSNBC

[flpoljunkie]

Mark Penn not finishing polling on Scooter--or something else?

[Kingstree]

1. She will not anwer a real question - figures

[Sonicmedusa]

2. Hillary: The Artful Dodger

[TechBear_Seattle]

3. When has Clinton *ever* given a straight answer?

She would equivocate if asked what time it was, fearful that if it was a different time somewhere else, she might offend a potential supporter.

[msongs]

4. must be taking lessons from that other dem candidate... nt

[papau]

5. The media game is to get Clinton into a lose/lose position - and she refuses. If she says

pardon (unlikely as that is), she gets most of the nation upset except the far right.

If she says no pardon, she starts a great summer roll of stories on Clinton pardons and Clinton wrongs that maybe should have been charge (something the media will assert with no evidence) and hypotheticals of whether if there had been such charges, would Bill have issued pardons.

Hillary ducked - it is nice having a candidate that is smart enough to not play the right wing media whores - like NBC - game.

[Tellurian]

7. Exactly...cornering a candidate w/a loaded question?

The naysayers should feel fortunate Tweety didn't ask her, "it's been rumored recently you've been the target of smearing?".. Any ideas on the perpetrators?

[flpoljunkie]

8. Wouldn't want any focus on husband Bill's pardon of Marc Rich, now would we?

[Tellurian]

9. wouldn't want her to answer, anything exciting happen over the weekend?

[papau]

10. The rich case is actually a justified pardon given that the exact same tax avoidance was not a crime

under Reagan for the 60 or so others (all major corporate players for the GOP) that also did the same accounting. Only Rich paid the fine only to find himself under a criminal charge.

International and nation tax was my thing back then (I ran the Sun Life of Canada US tax operation) and the talk was how could the courts allow such discrimination as to outcome.

[ShortnFiery]

20. What about Bill Clinton's pardoning of his half-brother, Roger?

Oh Brother! :eyes: That was not a stellar moment of The Big Dog's Presidency either. :thumbsdown:

[papau]

41. Roger had done the time and was done the time and was repentent and had stayed out of trouble - he

also had Bill's mother endorsing the pardon!

I am not big on pardons except when there has been a miscarriage of justice as in the Rich case, or there is a lifetime of doing good post the doing bad - Clinton's brother doesn't fit my criteria - but the semi-official criteria is as I stated - "done the time and was repentant and had stayed out of trouble" - and the only judge that these criteria had been adequately met is the President.

The Bush 41 pardons of the Iran-Contra war criminals so that they would not testify against Mr Bush should have caused an up-roar - but it didn't with our right wing media.

[shain from kane]

13. One of Rich's lawyers was --- "Scooter" Libby.

[Tellurian]

17. yeah, we discussed it 10 yrs ago...old news!

[flpoljunkie]

19. Apparently not old enough!

[Tellurian]

26. sure it is...you just done want to let go of that "old" bone..

:rofl:

[NewYorkerfromMass]

36. Laugh all you want

Hill is seriously compromised due to the Clinton's pardon of Rich.
She really has to avoid this subject as much as possible.

[Tellurian]

40. Wiki Rich's Pardon...

the explanation is he was never guilty of a crime in the first place.

Why? Do you think the Republican smear machine is stupid. This would have been mainstream news, if they thought it couldn't be debunked!

Turn your game up a notch or we'll be waving bub-bye to you!

[papau]

42. avoiding discussion is indeed required - but only because of our RW media - not because Rich

should have had a criminal charge against him for an accounting procedure that was practiced by the industry as a whole - over 60 companies - and those companies only paid fines - as did Rich.

[jefferson_dem]

28. Dayum! I didn't know that...and i like to think of myself as informed on such issues.

Here's a tidbit from CNN (2001) that highlights the shrewd irony --

...

House Government Reform Committee Begins Marc Rich Pardon Hearing
Aired March 1, 2001 - 11:58 a.m. ET

<SNIP>

The committee hearing will conclude sometime this evening with Republican lawyers, including a man whose nickname is Scooter Libby. He is now chief of staff to Dick Cheney. At one time, he represented Marc Rich. And at one time, Bill Clinton argued that he was among those who advocated the pardon, something that Libby has denied. It probably will be a quick panel.

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0103/01/se.07.html

[ccpup]

11. thank you!

I just don't get these DUers who, on the one hand, don't want Candidates to play into the MSM's hands and then, on the other hand, get angry when a Candidate doesn't play into the MSM's hand. :eyes:

DU: The Home of Selective Outrage

[AtomicKitten]

18. yahtzee

DU: The Home of Selective Outrage

[Supersedeas]

34. I agree -- there is a wisdom to not answering certain questions

[monmouth]

6. I would really like to "like" her, but these evasions just turn me off.

As a potential voter for her, why doesn't she just come out and say send him to jail now!!! She certainly isn't going to disappoint her base. She better get with it, start being up front and answer a damn simple question....

[TeamJordan23]

25. Maybe she is in favor of pardons generally, like her hubby? nt.

[Dhalgren]

12. Senator Clinton assumes (rightly or wrongly) that she will be able to

win the Democratic nomination on her own merits, because of who she is, what she is, and where she has been. She has, for some time now, been actively positioning herself as a candidate for the whole country. She would like to be seen as the candidate that any voter, of any stripe, could meet with on common ground. Whether this strategy will be successful or not remains to be seen, but you can see the influence of her husband in this, I think, and she is probably better at this than he was...

[Tellurian]

16. They mentioned she sounded most presidential..and she Won the round

Hillary was strong, populist and knowledgeable about the issues!

:toast:

[jefferson_dem]

30. They = You and a few other Hillaryphiles here on DU...

:puke:

[MaineDem]

14. Why should she - or any Dem candidate - play into the MSM's hands?

This is a question to ask Bush not the Dem candidates to replace him.

[TeamJordan23]

24. It is a fair question to ask the Dems! nt

[madrchsod]

15. the problem is....what did she actually say?

how did she say it? i cannot make an opinion on something that i have not seen nor read.

[Kingstree]

21. Nothing Tweety is pushing her. Just like he did yesterday when

the other analyst disagreed with him. He asked was she going to win. One guy said he did not think so. He felt the media was pushing her. Tweety started getting upset because they did not agree with him.

[flpoljunkie]

32. Hillary: "Oh, I think there would be enough said without me adding to it."

The audience complained. Hillary responded to their complaint and suggested the questions be about them, and Tweey then remarked, "We'll leave that as a non-answer, then." More complaints from the audience and Tweety, said "you want a fight, okay" and then he moved on with another question.

There is a video here of the exchange: http://video.msn.com/v/us/fv/msnbc/fv.htm??f=00&g=92c12a9d-3a7a-498e-b67b-8e8e28f45363&p=hotvideo_m_edpicks&t=m5&rf=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19299733/&fg=

[Kingstree]

37. Priceless

[rinsd]

39. I see you mis-characterized the audience reaction. They were pissed at Tweety

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=3325812&mesg_id=3325812

[Totally Committed]

22. Does this woman ever answer a question without hearing the polling data first????

I am so sick and tired of this bullsh*t.

TC

[TeamJordan23]

23. WOW, did she really not answer the question??

I was not watching. What happened?

[Alamom]

27. Are we "NOW" letting Tweetie or any of the M$M run the campaigns for our

candidates? Just a few short months ago, they were all so far up B*sh &Cheneys asses, they didn't even know Democrats existed. Now that we have had a decent mid-term and are nearing an election, we let these same people ask any type of question and damn the candidate if they refuse to answer..... :wtf:

The media is taking over again & why? Other than political specialists & analysts, why are these news people involved in anything except reporting?

And I speak for all our candidates...not just the one I support for now. I will be voting for the Democratic Nominee in the GE and I don't like the other side (in any form) eating away at any of them.



G> BUshe's admistration gave the M$M permission to run things as long as they run it his way.

I hope our next administration does not.



Give all our candidates strength to make it through this campaign, is all I can say.
"Some" Democrats are as fickle as the media.


edgr

[Kingstree]

29. As always she dodges the questions She should have been

strong enough to answer the question.

[jefferson_dem]

31. But she's not. Even if she had the modicum of principle to answer definitively today...

she would change her position tomorrow. She's all politico...

[Kingstree]

33. True. She Flip Flops a lot depending on the way

the audience thinks.

[Bake]

35. Frankly, I thought she rang the bell except for that question.

She was strong, decisive, even passionate. What a leader NEEDS to be. I can see some wisdom from the HRC camp in ducking what was obviously a set-up type of question, but I wish she had answered it. Other than that, I think she was excellent.

And for the (apparently) necessary disclaimer, I'm not an HRC supporter, although I will be if she is our nominee. I favor Gore first of all, and beyond that leaning toward Edwards (whose performance today was also terrific).

Bake

[flpoljunkie]

38. Duplicate post.

[Imagevision]

43. What's the big deal? Even Bush dodges question about pardoning Scooter