I’m sure there are legions of Obama supporters and voters gritting their teeth at his decision to offer Hillary Clinton appointment as secretary of state.

This is from Richard Reeves‘ column for the UPS. The Economist was also peddling this nonsense this week too, in addition to some ideas as to why Hillary shouldn’t be SoS that I’ve already debunked. This is fantasy folks. Most vitriol after the primary was from a very small number of Hillaryites. I have been an Obama supporter since the beginning of his campaign. Everyone I know supported Obama. No one hated Hillary. All my friends & family would have gladly supported Hillary if she was the nominee. Yes there were some Obama supporters who hated Hillary & vice versa, but in my extensive experience around liberal blogosphere, during the primary & the GE, they were mostly people who hated her before Barack came along.

The traditional media insists upon telling stories of Democratic intra-party strife. During the GE all we heard about was the hurt felt by all these Clinton supporters & whether or not they would “come home” to the Democratic party. That was overblown & now this non-existent teeth gritting of Obama supporters over Hillary’s nod for SoS. With Samantha Power back on board with Obama’s transition team, we’ve been getting a spate of stories that make it seem as if it’s a surprise. Even though Obama is close to her & she’s a brilliant woman.

The traditional media loves to peddle drama not matter which party it comes from, but to me it seems they especially love it when it involves Democrats. So take stories & proclamations about Obama supporters “teeth gritting” with about 10 grains of salt.

Hehehe:
Ann Coulter, …broke her jaw and the mouth…has been wired shut

No shit Sherlock.

Please make it stop now. Golly gee, I can’t figure out why Obama the Magic Negro hasn’t solved all of teh Blacks problems yet. He hasn’t even taken power yet & he’s already a failure. Why can’t he close the deal?

Someone please tell Stephen Ohlemacher, the AP & any other writers and/or reporters who want to write about this nonsense to cease & desist. You have to be as dumb as Isaiah Thomas after an overdose to even entertain the idea that Obama’s election would bring racism & Black/American problems to an end.

Greenwald gives us all a lesson on how to rhapsodize about potential cabinet appointments. No wild accusations, just a point by point & fact by fact overview of Eric Holder’s pros & cons as he understands them to be. He also explicitly states that this is probably not his final word on Holder:

this choice, as a preliminary matter, seems like a step in the right direction.

I feel like this should be obvious but I have read too many people who seem to think whatever they have to say on a matter is the be all to end all. As if people & choices can only be properly understood through their way of thinking. We all will make snap judgements of course, we are human but there has been an off putting lack of true consideration in a lot of liberal quarters for potential Obama appointees.

Same as Greenwald, I’m just so weary already of all the endless specula1tion & bashing that has gone on. Obviously we need to make our voices heard but we should do so armed with facts, not just with anger. Let’s make sure what we think we know is actually reality.

Updated below.

I have to jump into this argument because I keep reading that Hillary will undermine Obama & not be a team player. I have read this numerous places but most recently from Ken Silverstein over at Harper’s (via Hill Rat).

This just doesn’t make any sense to me for a few reasons. I want to address Silverstein’s points:

1. If Hillary wants the job, she wants it to be a large part of her legacy and/or she wants to use it as a jumping off point for another future white house run. Now where in either of those goals does it make sense for her to undermine Obama? She already has a bad reputation for being being underhanded & untrustworthy, why would she want to feed those kinds storylines? From such a high profile post, where you are expected to totally put your ego aside for the greater good, it would utterly destroy her reputation, legacy & future aspirations. Hillary has never shown that level of self-destruction. TPM is reporting that some Obama people think she will be a team player. This is a judgement call & right now I trust Obama to make it.

2. This is the most farcical of all. He couldn’t fire her under any circumstances because of political considerations? That’s ridiculous. Worse yet Silverstein doesn’t even give any reasons for why he thinks that. Memo to Ken: Obama won the election handily. This is in the same neighborhood of all the right-wingers who talk about Obama being controlled by Dems in congress. Despite all Obama has done there seem to be a lot of people out there who think he has no power. I just don’t get this.

3. Bill’s conflict of interests. That’s what vetting is for. This is another argument made by many people. I trust Obama as his team to make the right call on this stuff. This is exactly the kind of judgement call Obama & his team earned the right to make. If Hillary becomes SoS, I will believe that one way or another the situation with Bill’s dealing has been resolved enough for Barack to take her in. Again, right now that’s enough for me & I think should be enough for most people.

4. Hillary’s management style. I think this is pretty much a moot point. The buck doesn’t stop with her, it stop with Obama. She will not be the top dog. Also, her campaign obviously had serious issues but to say that her managing style is to pit one faction against the other seems pretty ridiculous. People in her camp fought, that doesn’t mean that that’s her management style. Obama ran a campaign that was free from infighting (publicly at least). There is no good reason to believe that he would allow any of that stuff in the white house.

5. Henry Kissinger’s endorsement is a non sequitur irrelevant.

Update:

I wanted let be known that I am actually pretty neutral on Hillary becoming SoS. I don’t know enough about her or the other candidates’ foreign policy chops beyond their reps. I just think a lot of the arguments against her (specifically the ones above, a couple of which have been made by a lot of different people) just aren’t that convincing.

Update#2:

Krugman, as usual, makes a great point:

Everywhere you look, there’s stuff about Bill Clinton’s donors and all that, often with the implication that there must inherently be something dirty going on, because, well, just because.

But I guess that’s just the way things are. After all, do you remember all the grief President Bush got over his family’s questionable business ties?

Neither do I.

I barely know what to say about this story. I was born in Haiti in 1979. Baby Doc’s regime was still going strong. I was brought here by my father less than 2 years later. The country of my birth has always been a kind of mystery to me. I’ve only been back once since I left. I still feel a connection to Ayiti, as we say in Kreyol, however small & tenuous.

The school collapse is just another symptom of the poverty, corruption & general lawlessness that has gripped the country seemingly since it’s birth. It was the 1st Black republic in the world, it is the poorest country in the western hemisphere. I don’t claim to know a lot about Ayiti. All I know is what I read in the papers here in the U.S. & the little info that trickles to me from my mother. She listens to Haitian radio back in N.Y. It’s just a very sad situation.

Haiti comes from the Taino word for mountainous land Ayti. It was once full of forests & fertile soil. Massive deforestation & the erosion that followed has destroyed once fertile land. This in return contributes to poverty & widespread malnourishment. I have no idea what we can do to turn it around. A functioning & competent gov’t free of corruption seems like the best place to start. Ditto for the police force. Both of course suffer from the, well earned, low confidence the people have in them.

I don’t know folks, I’ll have to continue my thoughts on this at a later date. This is tough for me to write about.

A friend of mine is a Stoked mentor. The following video is on his facebook:

A blurb about Stoked from the Stoked Awards website:

Co-founded in 2005 by Steve Larosiliere and Sal Masekela, Stoked Mentoring is a unique non-profit organization based in New York and Los Angeles that provides innovative mentoring programs exposing “at risk” youth and their mentors to action sports. These activities are used as a means to develop and foster resiliency, determination and success. Through hands-on partnerships with social service agencies, Stoked presents and oversees several programs annually including Snow Mentor, Skate Mentor and Surf Mentor. For further information about our programs, events and sponsorship opportunities, please visit the Stoked website at www.stoked.org.

I don’t know about you but this is pretty dope stuff. Especially if we’re talking about “inner city youth”. One of the problems some kids who grow up in the “hood” have is not being able to see beyond their block or neighborhood. Exposing them to these sports, which are not associated with inner cities for the most part, is a great way to help them get gain some perspective in my opinion. Of course if you have been in say NY recently you may have noticed a decent amount of young Black & Latino kids riding skateboards. So in a lot of ways the founders were very prescient with Stoked. This is a great a organization & Obama doesn’t need your money anymore so why don’t you drop ‘em a little something. I will.

Still I Rise

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Maya Angelou

I think this is such a good post title for this moment that I have to steal it from a friend.