Tuesday, August 23, 2005
An Evening With Harold Ford, Jr.
I just got back in from an evening listening and talking with Harold Ford, Jr. at his reception in Chattanooga. I left impressed as I always am when I see him speak.
There was a packed house at the Silver Ballroom at the Read House to hear him speak, and he gave an interesting address that was fairly policy-centric, though he certainly talked politics with the friendly Democratic crowd. His main theme was that Democrats in Tennessee needs to take advantage of the vacuum of positive feeling among the electorate. As Bush's numbers have utterly tanked in recent months, Democratic numbers have not increased in kind, and he honed in on the opening this creates.
Now, I pretty heartily disagree with Harold when he says that he thinks Bush's basic instinct to go into Iraq was right, but that his execution was wrong, and on some level it worries me that he feels that way. But as he expanded his thoughts, it is clear that he favors a withdrawal as soon as possible pegged to well-defined events. And I think, most importantly, he is a strong advocate for making a real and concerted effort to involve the UN and the international community in training the Iraqi police forces and army. He also underscored the need to reduce dependence on foreign oil, and tied it into the issue of producing good jobs, rather masterfully, I might add.
On the whole, he gave a good speech and was well-received. I was struck by his willingness to disagree with questioners in a very respectful way. He did a good job (with an admittedly partisan crowd) of handling the issues with his uncle a couple of times. In one-on-one conversation, he is a totally engaging guy. He is sharp as a tack, and it shows.
Do I love all of his politics? No. Do I think, on the whole, that he is the best candidate for the U.S. Senate? Hell yes.
Oh, and the highlight of the speech, by far , was his odd mannerism of acknowledging people in the audience spontaneously in his speech - In a five minute period, he recognized John Franklin, Chris Anderson, Adam Green and one other person whose name was not familiar, just throwing their names in a sentence. But the best was his unfortunately-timed recognition of Former Rep. Marilyn Lloyd - paraphrasing everything but the reference itself:
There was a packed house at the Silver Ballroom at the Read House to hear him speak, and he gave an interesting address that was fairly policy-centric, though he certainly talked politics with the friendly Democratic crowd. His main theme was that Democrats in Tennessee needs to take advantage of the vacuum of positive feeling among the electorate. As Bush's numbers have utterly tanked in recent months, Democratic numbers have not increased in kind, and he honed in on the opening this creates.
Now, I pretty heartily disagree with Harold when he says that he thinks Bush's basic instinct to go into Iraq was right, but that his execution was wrong, and on some level it worries me that he feels that way. But as he expanded his thoughts, it is clear that he favors a withdrawal as soon as possible pegged to well-defined events. And I think, most importantly, he is a strong advocate for making a real and concerted effort to involve the UN and the international community in training the Iraqi police forces and army. He also underscored the need to reduce dependence on foreign oil, and tied it into the issue of producing good jobs, rather masterfully, I might add.
On the whole, he gave a good speech and was well-received. I was struck by his willingness to disagree with questioners in a very respectful way. He did a good job (with an admittedly partisan crowd) of handling the issues with his uncle a couple of times. In one-on-one conversation, he is a totally engaging guy. He is sharp as a tack, and it shows.
Do I love all of his politics? No. Do I think, on the whole, that he is the best candidate for the U.S. Senate? Hell yes.
Oh, and the highlight of the speech, by far , was his odd mannerism of acknowledging people in the audience spontaneously in his speech - In a five minute period, he recognized John Franklin, Chris Anderson, Adam Green and one other person whose name was not familiar, just throwing their names in a sentence. But the best was his unfortunately-timed recognition of Former Rep. Marilyn Lloyd - paraphrasing everything but the reference itself:
"I think when George Bush saw Iraq, it was wise for him to she worried about the potential for Saddam Hussein - Congresswoman Lloyd - and Osama bin Laden to work together for terror."It really sounded like he was putting her in the list. It was quite hilarious.
Comments:
TL, I will set aside our differences as far as Iraq is concerned but I have to say something when the U.N. is brought up.
I am sure that I get the impression you support Ford's desire to increase U.N. involvement
in Iraq. Given their handling of Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda, Serbia, Croatia and a litiney of other failures & the all out corruption
including theft, bribery etc that goes on there do you really feel
that the honestly correct thing to do is bring them in on a larger level than they are? You have a large collection of anti-freedom, anti-democratic, anti-life, liberty and the oursuit of happiness dictators and despots
using the U.N. as a tool to atain legitemacy, funding and inluence
for whatever "crimes" to their people that they wish to do.
TL in just can't believe that in your heart you really trust and believe that the U.N. is in any way
honestly trying to achieve it's mission statement. Honestly research the current United Nations and it's behaviour and then tell me hooray for the UN.
SINCERELY, Mike D
Hanging out in hurricane Katrina...=)
I am sure that I get the impression you support Ford's desire to increase U.N. involvement
in Iraq. Given their handling of Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda, Serbia, Croatia and a litiney of other failures & the all out corruption
including theft, bribery etc that goes on there do you really feel
that the honestly correct thing to do is bring them in on a larger level than they are? You have a large collection of anti-freedom, anti-democratic, anti-life, liberty and the oursuit of happiness dictators and despots
using the U.N. as a tool to atain legitemacy, funding and inluence
for whatever "crimes" to their people that they wish to do.
TL in just can't believe that in your heart you really trust and believe that the U.N. is in any way
honestly trying to achieve it's mission statement. Honestly research the current United Nations and it's behaviour and then tell me hooray for the UN.
SINCERELY, Mike D
Hanging out in hurricane Katrina...=)
# posted by 
: 12:39 AM
: 12:39 AM
Hooray for the UN. For whatever issues it faces, the UN is still the only organization in the world that carries any weight or semblance of international legitimacy. For a while, the U.S. alone had that, but George Bush has pretty much screwed that up for years to come.
TL,
You can't be serious. Tell what the UN has achieved sucessfully in the last 30 yrs. They have ingored genocides in various african countries, they ignored the problems in the Balkans until AFTER we went in. It has to be the most corrupt international organization in existance. It is so hugely anti_american and anti_semetic and anti_any thing to do with freedom and democracy. Please TL instruct me in what good the UN now does. The only legitamcy they have lives in your mind because it sure doesn't show itself anywhere else on this planet.
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You can't be serious. Tell what the UN has achieved sucessfully in the last 30 yrs. They have ingored genocides in various african countries, they ignored the problems in the Balkans until AFTER we went in. It has to be the most corrupt international organization in existance. It is so hugely anti_american and anti_semetic and anti_any thing to do with freedom and democracy. Please TL instruct me in what good the UN now does. The only legitamcy they have lives in your mind because it sure doesn't show itself anywhere else on this planet.
# posted by : 6:30 PM
: 6:30 PM
