Clinton booed in Iowa, Rudy drowned out in GA Posted by: McQ
on Monday, December 03, 2007
Things are heating up in cold, cold Iowa.
Hillary Clinton phoned in to the Heartland Forum in Des Moines, IA because she was unable to attend due to weather difficulties. She answered a range of questions. However, on one, she was booed:
Clinton was asked if she would "make a decision to give undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship" during her first 100 days in office.
Clinton said, "I have been favoring a plan to citizenship for years. I voted for it in the Senate, I have spoke out about it around Iowa and the country and in my campaign. And as president comprehensive immigration reform will be a high priority for me."
This answer elicited booing from the audience.
The man repeated his question about the first 100 days. Clinton replied, "Well you've to get congress to pass the legislation and the president to do as much as possible, which I will do."
Louder boos came from the crowd.
It's not clear why the crowd was booing (was it because they don't favors such legislation or they wanted a definitive "yes" (or "no") about the first 100 days?). But what is clear is they aren't particularly happy that Clinton continues to be evasive when questioned (and for those of you who doubt it, tell me again why immigration won't be a major issue in '08?).
Meanwhile, in GA, Rudy Giuliani, otoh, ran into a gaggle of Ron Paul supporters who were determined to make their presence known and apparently were somewhat successful in drowning him out:
It was Rudy Giuliani campaigning for president on the Marietta Square on Sunday afternoon, but anyone listening may well have thought the candidate's name was Ron Paul.
"RON PAUL! RON PAUL! RON PAUL!" — a crowd chanted from Glover Park, effectively drowning out comments from the former New York mayor and occasionally changing the chant to "FREEDOM! FREEDOM! FREEDOM!"
In this case, it obviously irritated many of those there to hear Giuliani:
"You're being very inconsiderate," an elderly woman, aghast at the lack of Southern manners, told three young female Paul acolytes.
"You're not helping your candidate with this," a middle-aged man told a 20-something man toting a blue-and-white Paul campaign sign.
"This is a Republican rally," a testy older man snapped, apparently forgetting that Paul, a physician and Libertarian by philosophy, is an elected Republican and running in the GOP primary for president.
Yes indeed. And the Paul supporters are not particularly impressed with Giuliani by any stretch:
But a Paul supporter, Craig Hatcher, a 33-year-old Navy veteran who lives in Powder Springs, said of Giuliani, "I wouldn't necessarily say he is a liberal. I'd say he is more of a statist who wants the government to run our lives."
Can't say I have a huge argument with his conclusion, however, if the intent of the Paul supporters was to gather more than attention for their candidate, I'd say they missed the mark. GA is one of the more active states for libertarians, but drowning out other candidates and making it difficult for them to speak seems the antithesis of "libertarian" conduct (and no, I don't have any use for Rudy Giuliani, so this isn't a defense of him).
Well, considering how this does reflect badly on your candidate and those supporters, I was curious as to what you would think on the matter. After all, this does reflect negatively on your group, so I assumed you’d either want to disavow it.
Kinda like how I know Rep. Paul isn’t a racist, but he should have disavowed behavior that made him look bad. Ya know. History repeating itself, etc, etc.
This isn’t to play ’gotcha’, it’s to show that while Perception is NOT Truth, Perception can help or hurt you.
Firstly, I’m not apart of any “group”. Secondly, I nor Ron Paul or his fellow supporters, nor any candidate or their supporters, should be asked to disavow or otherwise respond every time some bonehead supporters chooses to make asses out of themselves. If all candidates were asked to do so, they’d be doing nothing but. If the offenders had some direct affiliation with whatever candidate, then certainly they should do so.
Kinda like how I know Rep. Paul isn’t a racist, but he should have disavowed behavior that made him look bad. Ya know. History repeating itself, etc, etc.
This has credibility only in the sensory deprived blogosphere. Only because a few participants have decided to dig up a few distant and sparse cow chips and sling it at Paul to try and make it stick. And of course, it hasn’t.
Trust me, … somewhere… out there… all candidates have supporters who are ripe assh*les.
If all candidates were asked to do so, they’d be doing nothing but.
and yet any time a campaign staff or supporter goes a bit too crazy they automatically disavow them.
Kinda like the Clinton campaign tried to do damage control after the CNN fixed ’debates’? They do it all the time...except him.
And it isn’t just in the blogosphere, it was covered ad nauseum. But, since people believe Paul to be a non issue, they ignore it unless it affects a major candidate.
