"Easter worshippers" and other Democrat denials

Unless you have been living on the moon, you know that on Easter morning,

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka—A series of blasts tore through churches and luxury hotels in Sri Lanka on Easter morning, killing at least 290 people and wounding more than 400 in coordinated attacks on tourists and the country’s minority Christian community.

At least eight explosions, most blamed on suicide bombers, took place across the country. Restaurants and houses of worship that moments earlier were hosting holiday feasts and joyful services were plunged into chaos, filled with rubble, broken furniture, shards of glass and the wounded and dead.

Remains of a church in Sri Lanka, bombed during worship on Easter morning

Let's see whether we can identify who was targeted by the bombers:

1. The targeted buildings were churches. Only the Christian religion refers to its houses of worship as churches.
2. It happened during worship on Easter morning. Easter is a religious occasion of significance to no one in the world except Christians.
3. Easter is always on the Sunday following the Jewish day of Passover. Passover can be any day of the week, but Easter is only on a Sunday. 
4. Therefore, it stands to reason that the killed and wounded were "Easter worshippers" gathered during a "holy weekend for many faiths." But should we identify them as "Christians"? Of course not. 

Think I jest? Well, here you go (click image to enlarge):

You can't make this stuff up. Do Democrats text each other to set the approved phrases and use of boldface before making public statements? Or is there some secret "message controL web site they consult first? Or is groupthink so deeply embedded in them that they automatically come up with the exact same euphemisms? As Martin G. commented elsewhere, "You've got to admire the message discipline. There was more message diversity at Stalin's 1936 party congress. A Rockette kickline has more individuality. They move through the political landscape with the single mindedness of army ants."

Gosh, as Harry K. tweeted, if only there existed a single word they could have used instead of "Easter worshippers." (I will also add that they unanimously misspelled "worshipers.")

I focus on Hillary's truly insulting tweet, since she is at least nominally a Methodist like me.

First, as I indicated above, this was not a "holy weekend for many faiths." Easter weekend is a holy weekend for exactly one faith: Christianity. This particular year, the Jewish holy day of Passover happened to have begun Friday evening and ended Saturday evening. But that is coincidental since Passover can occur on any day of the week. In 2014, Passover began on Monday evening. But Easter always occurs only on a Sunday. ("Easter Sunday" is repetitive.)

If Hillary had tweeted, "holy this year for two faiths" I would have no complaints except calling the victims "worshippers" instead of Christians. At least she acknowledged that hotels were also targeted because of their foreign guests, so not all the killed were "worshippers." (Three of the four children of Denmark's richest man were killed, for example.)

But the tweet that she sent proves positively that she simply refuses to identify Christian victims of terrorism as Christians because - oh, who the heck knows why? There is no rational basis for such evasions, by her or the other lockstep-language tweeters. (Update: Dennis Prager explains why.)

However, compare Hillary's Sri Lanka tweet to the one she sent out after a gunman attacked Muslims inside their mosques in New Zealand in March:

Note the specificity of the victims, the perpetrator, and the ideology behind the shooter:

• Victims? Muslims.
• Perp? A white supremacist
• Ideology? Islamophobia. 

After New Zealand, Hillary's heart broke for New Zealand and Muslims everywhere in the world. But after Sri Lanka? No heartbreak, only prayers for "everyone affected." The bombers' ideology? Gosh, she has no idea even though the Sri Lankan government knew almost immediately that the bombers were belonged to "Nations Thawahid Jaman (NTJ), a little-known local Islamist group which has previously defaced Buddhist statues" and which "was likely to have been inspired by ISIS," with connections to a "a wider international network" (link). 

Remains of St. Sebastian's Church, north of Colombo.

From CNN web site

 But at least the New York Times was not afraid to name names in the headline: "Blasts Targeting Christians Kill Hundreds in Sri Lanka."

 a few hours on Sunday, suicide bombings hit three Catholic churches and three upscale hotels in the Indian Ocean island nation of Sri Lanka, still recovering from a quarter-century civil war in which the suicide bomb was pioneered. ...

The bombings were the deadliest attack on Christians in South Asia in recent memory and punctuated a rising trend of religious-based violence in the region.

But for Democrat politicos, Newspeak is the order of the day.

Update: Mark Steyn dissects some other media coverage. "Taqiyya for Easter."

Yet throughout Sunday the UK, Aussie, Danish and the rest of the world's media saw their job as thorough obfuscation of the truth. I heard about yesterday's attack from the BBC, which had extensive rolling coverage with correspondents on the ground - and yet seemed mainly to be trying to tell us as little as possible. A lady think-tanker from Chatham House was keen to focus on the brutality with which the Sri Lankan government had ended the Tamil insurgency a decade ago: a fascinating topic no doubt, but utterly irrelevant to the mound of Christian corpses in Colombo that morning. In the entire hour, hers was the only mention of Islam - when she cautioned that it would be grossly irresponsible and "Islam-phobic" even to bring up the subject.

She didn't really need to spell that out, did she? It used to be said that ninety per cent of news is announcing Lord Jones is dead to people who were entirely unaware that Lord Jones was ever alive. Now the trick is to announce Lord Jones is dead and ensure that people remain entirely unaware of why he is no longer alive. One senses that a line was crossed in yesterday's coverage. As one of our Oz Steyn Club members, Kate Smyth, put it, the media have advanced from dhimmitude to full-blown taqiyya.

And if you are The But if you are the Washington Post, the real problem with the Sri Lanka mass murder of Christians is this: "Sri Lanka church bombings stoke far-right anger in the West." Gratefully, the comments left there are fantastic. Australian Arthur Chrenkoff, who was born and raised in Communist Poland, responds:

This effort to use language as a cudgel has several sinister implications. It delegitimises perfectly normal political ideas through guilt by association. It also creates the impression that the (genuine) far right is much bigger, more influential and more threatening and dangerous than it actually is. This in turn is used to downplay and minimise the dangers of Islamist and far-left extremism and terrorism. But perhaps the scariest aspect of it all is that the left, by manufacturing the far right monster, are actually genuinely contributing to the growth of far-right extremism. The relentless flood of identity politics, grievance and victimhood, and shaming and guilting entire sections of population based on their skin colour and culture is genuinely radicalising some misfits into fascism, like the Christchurch terrorist, for example. For every action there is eventually an equal and opposite reaction. The left might think it’s courageously
defanging the fascist dragon but instead it’s just sowing its teeth.

Another response to the WaPo:

Two thousand words of politics photos

Too good to pass up

"The fate of the world is teetering."

So saith President Obama on the stakes of next week's election.

"We don't win this election, potentially, if we don't win North Carolina," he said during a campaign rally for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. "I hate to put a little pressure on you, but the fate of the republic rests on your shoulders. The fate of the world is teetering."

Well, Green Party candidate Jill Stein would certainly agree. She said a few weeks ago that a President Hillary Clinton will just continue to attack and bomb other countries: " Under Hillary Clinton, we could slide into nuclear war very quickly from her declared policy in Syria."

Even the UK's The Independent chimed in: "Could Hillary Clinton start a World War? Sure as [snip] she could – and here’s how."

And then there is this: "Don't trust Clinton to avoid stupid wars: The world she had a big hand in making as secretary of State doesn't look very peaceful."

The world today, which Clinton as Obama’s secretary of state had a big hand in making,  doesn't look very peaceful. In 2010, things in Iraq were so peaceful that Joe Biden was bragging that the administration’s Iraq policy would be “one of the great achievements of this administration.” In 2012, with Clinton still serving as secretary of State, President Obama bragged about “ending” the war in Iraq, which would be news to the thousands of U.S. troops fighting there today.

Then there’s Libya. According to The New York Times, Clinton played a "critical” role in persuading Obama to topple Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhafi. This led to what The Atlantic''s Conor Friedersdorf calls her ”failed war in Libya.” Despite her pronouncement that "We came, we saw, he died” after Gadhafi's death, the Libya intervention has been a debacle, and one that Clinton has refused to acknowledge as such.

The fate of the world may indeed be teetering, just as Obama says, but it is teetering all the more because of the last eight years of his administration and very much because of Hillary Clinton's role in it.

But Gennifer Flowers will vote for Hillary

Hillary is bringing former Trump supporter Mark Cuban to sit on the front row in the debate hall tonight. Cuban is now a dedicated anti-Trump "troll," in ABC News' characterization.

Austin Bay says, probably correctly, that bringing him to the debate is a play to the media:

Cuban hasn’t said he intends to disrupt Trump but the touts are meant to suggest he might. Team Hillary has calculated Cuban serves a propaganda purpose even if he behaves and remains silent, Giving Cuban a ticket and having him sit in a seat tv camera’s can’t miss give media commentators ready-made anti-Trump story lines. For example, at one time Cuban supported Trump, now he doesn’t. Talk that one up, Anderson Cooper. Cuban thinks Trump is a weak candidate, etc. Now repeat Cuban’s assessment of Trump 30 times, CBS News. Yup, Team Hillary’s Cuban Gambit — how clever.

So in response, Trump tweeted this:

If you read the follow-up tweet-responses from others you will see that they pretty much made mockery of this idea. (Today the Trump campaign said that Trump's tweet was made to mock Hillary's invitation of Cuban.)

Both vice presidential candidate Mike Pence and Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway said on separate shows Sunday morning that Trump had not seriously extended an invitation to Flowers.

“Gennifer Flowers will not be attending the debate tomorrow night,” Pence told Fox News Sunday. ...

Flowers, via Twitter and a spokeswoman, responded that she’d be happy to attend.

Hi Donald. You know I'm in your corner and will definitely be at the debate!...💋
— Gennifer Flowers (@gennflowers) September 24, 2016

Which is interesting because Flowers has already told UK reporters that she will vote for Hillary this November. (She has gotten more press attention in Britain than here.)

Flowers is a woman who came forward during Bill Clinton's first campaign in 1992 to claim that she and Bill had a 12-year sexual affair. The controversy therefrom caused Bill and Hillary to appear on CBS' 60 Minutes news show in which Hillary offered her famous "stand by your man" commentary.

Hillary Clinton: You know, I'm not sitting here – some little woman standing by my man like Tammy Wynette. I'm sitting here because I love him, and I respect him, and I honor what he's been through and what we've been through together. And you know, if that's not enough for people, then heck, don't vote for him.

Video here. Throughout this interview, both Clintons denied any hint of an inappropriate relationship of Bill with Flowers. In 1998, though, Bill Clinton stated under oath that he and Flowers did have a sexual affair after all.

Flowers, however, was not and remains no towering figure of virtue and admiration. After her claim of the affair, she "posed nude for Penthouse magazine" and later was a failed TV actress and cabaret singer in New Orleans until Hurricane Katrina ended that gig. In the last few years she has claimed to be a sex-advice columnist.

Flowers in 1992:

Flowers present day:

So while I understand the optics, bringing up Flowers as joke or not, did not strike me as a very smart counter-move to Cuban's appearance.

• First, the media will ignore her, doubly so now that she's been officially uninvited. 
• Second, if they do not ignore her, it will be only to point out that Flowers is already on record as telling interviewers that she will vote for Hillary in November. 
• Third, Flowers remains a devoted Clintonista to this day and has never spoken harshly against either Bill or Hillary.
• Fourth, Cuban is 58 but looks younger and fitter, while Flowers is 66. One could argue she looks great to be 66, I suppose, but most people watching would know who Cuban is and not who Flowers is, nor will they care. Cuban would have a much greater "stage presence" than Flowers, and he is in the prime of his career while Flowers never had a career to begin with. Her only claim to fame is that she was once was well known. Who cares? Not voters. 

So what was the point of Trump's tweet? It can only have been directed against Hillary with the hope of unnerving her significantly. I don't think it did, though, because Hillary is so beyond caring about Bill's infamous and numerous "bimbo eruptions" that dragging one up from 24 years ago is trivial. Altogether, this is not a winning gambit to Trump, IMO.

All this said, however, "Trump could win the debate simply by bluffing," although this headline does not really explain what the writer is saying.

And this is the party that runs the country, and wants to keep on doing so

Words simply fail:

And this the the one to whom they want us to entrust the country:

No, Hillary's emails were not "beyond Top Secret"

Emails from Hillary Clinton's home server contained information classified at levels higher than previously known, including a level meant to protect some of the most sensitive U.S. intelligence, according to a document obtained by NBC News.

In a letter to lawmakers, the intelligence community's internal watchdog says some of Clinton's emails contained information classified Top Secret/Special Access Program, a secrecy designation that includes some of the most closely held U.S. intelligence matters.

Story here.

No, Hillary's SAP emails were not "beyond Top Secret."

Let me explain how the US information-classification system works and what the labels mean.

There are three classification labels. From lowest to highest they are Confidential, Secret and Top Secret.

Each label is a notice as to what level of physical (think, "lock and key") security the document or material is required to receive. That is, a TS document must be maintained under stricter physical security than a Secret document, which in turn must be maintained under stricter physical security than a Confidential document. And the same applies for electronic security.

And that is really all that classification labels do: require certain levels of physical or electronic security.

What the media are doing is confusing access authorization with classification label. When I began active duty I was granted a Secret clearance. That meant I could not view or handle or have access to material under the Top Secret label. Later, I was given a TS clearance, so I was authorized to view, handle, and have access to TS material. However, if the TS material was further categorized (not further "classified") as, say, SCI (Special Compartmented Information) then I could not have access to it. Later, the SCI access was added to my clearance and I could (referred to as TS/SCI in parlance).

However, the physical or electronic security requirements of TS/SCI material was the same as plain-label TS material. Only the need-to-know access was different. Need-to-know access for TS material is always more tightly controlled than for Secret and Confidential. A common such label is NOFORN, which simply means, "No Foreign Nationals" may have access to it.

That's what Hillary's SAP emails are - a category of access that is defined in US government regs, that is, TS/SAP.

When I worked in the Army Operations Center in the Pentagon, we had many such access categories attached to TS stuff. One I remember was called Polar Flight. I didn't have access so I have no idea what it was about. All Polar Flight materials were kept together but their "lock and key" protection was the same as plain-label TS materials.

There is a label called For Official Use Only, FOUO, but this is only a handling instruction, not a classification - that is, there is no such thing as a FOUO "clearance." FOUO material is definitionally unclassified.

I was told by someone I trust that there is a classification label called "Presidential" that is above TS, but my guess is that it is really an access-control category stricter than even SAP. The lock and key requirements of TS are so strict that it's hard to imagine making them stricter. But maybe it really is above TS, I dunno.

In NATO, Top Secret is called Cosmic Top Secret. Our label Secret is called NATO Secret, then NATO Confidential below that. NATO also uses NATO Restricted as a security classification, but it corresponds to our unclassified FOUO label.

As of 2014, the British government used three classification levels, Official, Secret and Top Secret (from low to high). This replaced an older, cumbersome five-level system.

The silence of Benghazi

FOFB

The Hillary controversy baloney

Presumptive automatic Democrat nominee Hillary Clinton has been keeping a very low profile in recent weeks - since the first of the year, at least - and the political rumor mill is that she is ducking answering tough questions about taking millions of dollars from foreign governments and donors to the Clinton Foundation, or about her private email server handling all her official email while she was secretary of state.

So the commentati are trying to figure out just who is behind all this bad news coming out rapid fire about Hillary. For sure reporters aren't taking credit for originating the stories. So who did?

The Elizabeth Warren camp is one answer, since Warren is the darling of the Marxist wing of the Democrat party (which is pretty much the whole party).

Here's my answer. The person behind all this bad news is coming out about Hillary Clinton is ... (drum roll, please) .. Hillary Clinton.

I wrote in 2011 that if she was to reach for the presidency again it would have to be in 2012.

2012 is, effectively, Hillary's last chance. In 2016 she'll turn 69 just before election day. Only Ronald Reagan has been elected at that age level; Hillary surely recalls that Bob Dole and John McCain, each with extensive government experience and both bona fide war heroes and only a little older, were rejected by the electorate. 

I was not the only pundit who predicted Hillary would run in 2012; a number of Democrat figures said so, too. Well, we were all wrong, obviously. But I stand by my original rationale that she will not run in 2016, for the same reasons I said then.

And she is leaking all these controversies to give herself cover when she declares her non-candidacy, with which the left-wing media are feverishly cooperating.

So what's her plan instead of elective politics? Same as it has always been: money. She has opened her coffers to foreign donations for one simple reason: she wants the money, the more the better.

Hillary will not run for president in 2016 and never intended to. And when she surveys the rubble and wreckage President Obama and she have wrought in his first term, worsened since then, she is glad to have millions of dollars to retire from elective politics and get on with the senior stateswoman act, which will have it's own financial rewards.

Hillary's private server

ABC News blog:

This week, we asked Amy Chozick, national political reporter for the The New York Times, who covers Hillary Clinton, about when the former secretary of state might announce her 2016 intentions, her possible competition and one thing that surprised Chozick about Clinton.

And the thing that surprised Chozick about Clinton:

5] Covering Clinton, what is one thing that has surprised you about her? Amy Chozick: Hmm. She likes to drink. We were on the campaign trail in 2008 and the press thought she was just taking shots to pander to voters in Pennsylvania. Um, no.

Leading to this comment on FB: 

When they told her they were putting a private server in her basement, she thought they meant a bartender ...

America is adopting the Middle East model, and it's not Islam

The Nile could not be managed by independent satrapies

In his book Cannibals and Kings, anthropologist Marvin Harris explains the difference in the development of nation-state governments in the "hydraulic kingdoms" of the Middle East and the "rainfall economies" of northern Europe.

In both cases the issue affecting formation of government was water and the creation of wealth. These were agricultural economies, with agricultural production being the foundation of all wealth. In the Middle East, water meant rivers since there was little rainfall, and management of rivers required a strong central-planning agency. In the case of Egypt's Nile, that led to an all-powerful pharoahite government, a pattern mostly duplicated elsewhere in the ancient Middle East. Therefore, wealth became concentrated in the central government because the rulers controlled the means of production and the water resources production required.

In northern Europe, rivers were hardly necessary to agriculture at all because of reliable, year-round precipitation. Because wealth creation was therefore dispersed, so was political power. Nowhere in the hydraulic kingdoms was there the equivalent of European systems of kings, dukes, barons, counts or marquis, all of whom did not depend on the king or the king's government to till the land and grow its wealth. They therefore had the means to resist the near-total centralization of power found in the Middle East. When such centralization did occur, it was an aberration and short-lived.

When the means to create wealth is dispersed, political power is dispersed along with it. Wealth gains political power, but political power is not needed just to create wealth.

In the Middle East, however, wealth came from political power because there was no means to create wealth of significance apart of political power. So for centuries, nay millennia, the way to become wealthy there was first to gain political power. This pattern survives to this day. Saddam Hussein, for example, was a nobody of limited material means until he literally murdered his way into power in Iraq in 1979. It was after gaining control of Iraq's government that Saddam became wealthy beyond all avarice.

Now the point of this little history lesson is this: In the United States, the means to create wealth and the exercise of political power in public office are being steadily unified. We are already well along to adopting a Middle East model. Since the Obama administration came into being, the wealthiest counties of America and the most politically-powerful counties of America have for the first tome become the one and same - all concentrated in and around Washington, D.C.

Through minute regulation of economic activity, America's political class is deliberately suppressing wealth creation over the broad expanse of the country, while funneling tax dollars to favored cronies. Remember, for example, Solyndra?

At the same time, the political figures are using their offices to gain personal wealth. Consider Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader and hence one of the most powerful figures in Washington. He was born into poverty, growing up in a home that had no running hot water or indoor toilet. His first job in D.C. was working the night shift as one of the Capitol Hill Police. Yet after entering national office, his personal wealth has arisen to as much as $10 million.

But what sent me into writing this post was today's report that the champion rent seekers of all time, Bill and Hillary Clinton, "turned the State Department into a racket to line their own pockets" while she was secretary of state.

“These documents are a bombshell and show how the Clintons turned the State Department into a racket to line their own pockets,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. Judicial Watch and the Washington Examiner teamed to seek and publish those documents today.

“How the Obama State Department waived hundreds of ethical conflicts that allowed the Clintons and their businesses to accept money from foreign entities and corporations seeking influence boggles the mind,” said Fitton, adding, “That former President Clinton trotted the globe collecting huge speaking fees while his wife presided over U.S. foreign policy is an outrage."

The Examiner reported that the former president gave 215 speeches and earned $48 million while Hillary Clinton was at State.

Welcome to the potentate kingdom of the United States.

Update, Dec. 2017: And the beat goes on: "Census Bureau: 5 Richest Counties Are D.C. Suburbs"

Terrorism deniers exposed - The Washington Post

Terrorism deniers exposed - The Washington Post

The Rand Corporation’s National Defense Research Institute put out a lengthy report in June that documents the extent to which terrorist groups have grown in numbers, strength and controlled territory at their disposal for operations. It is a damning indictment of the failure of the Obama administration to stem the tide of al-Qaeda and related groups and makes clear that the notion that al-Qaeda was damaged or on its heels was utterly untrue.

... that we have no discernible strategy along these lines speaks volumes about the incompetency and irresponsibility of the Obama/Hillary Clinton/John Kerry foreign policy. And this data should serve as a test for 2016 candidates: Do they comprehend the threats we face? Are they willing to do what is necessary to prevent a far more potent strike than 9/11?

No and no.

Get ready for President Hillary

Here's why:

Obama and his minions claimed victory for Obamacare, trumpeting their fudged sign-up numbers for the Affordable Care Act. ...

Republicans reacted with predictable confusion and outrage. They suggested – rightly – that Obama had “cooked the books.” They complained that sign-up numbers did not justify the entire overthrow of the health insurance system. And Obama, the man who canceled plans, doctors and drugs for millions of Americans, responded thusly: “Why are folks working so hard for people not to have health insurance?”

This is why Republicans will lose in 2016.

Democrats understand the art of narrative. Republicans do not. Republicans would rather have Ryan wave around a 100-page budget backed by all the stats. Democrats would rather point at Ryan and say he hates children.

See, "The Permanent Sunset of the Republican Party"

Hillary too ill, too old - what a coincidence

The Daily Caller:

If you listen to the chattering class in Washington, D.C., Hillary Clinton is a virtual certainty for the 2016 Democratic nomination, and the front-runner in the next presidential race.

But in private, rumors persist that the former Secretary of State may not even be capable of making it to Iowa and New Hampshire. Clinton, these skeptics often say, will not run for president again because of health concerns.

These ubiquitous rumors of her health have been fueled in part by the supermarket tabloids. The National Enquirer wrote in 2012 that Clinton had brain cancer, something a spokesman dismissed then as “absolute nonsense.” In January of this year, the Globe claimed that Clinton secretly had a brain tumor.

Asked about her health on Thursday, Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill said in an email to The Daily Caller: ”To your question, very caring of you to ask. She’s 100%.”

But the rumors suggesting otherwise date back to the end of 2012, when Clinton’s health made headlines as she finished her term as secretary of state: aides explained then that she developed a stomach virus, hit her head, suffered a concussion and subsequently developed a blood clot in her brain but was being medicated and was expected to recover.

But skeptics say there is much more to the story of her health, which has recently been the subject of increased speculation in Washington.

Yes, but why have these reports and rumors been recent "subject of increased speculation in Washington?" Funny how this speculation and rumormonging popped up in multiple media at the same time. As Yogi Berra said about another topic, "It's too coincidental to be a coincidence."

Politics ain't pattycake. Someone is already trying to torpedo Hillary2016. Who would want to do that?

Hillary campaign poster revealed

FOFB

What difference at this point does it make?

Clinton breaks silence to endorse Syria strikes

Hillary Clinton's support jibes with her long-held view that the U.S. should play a greater role in Syria's conflict. 

Hillary Clinton broke her days-long silence and endorsed President Obama's call for a 
punitive military strike against Syria on Tuesday.

I wonder whether it occurs to Ms. Clinton that at this point, no one is likely to care what she thinks about Syria intervention.

Hillary VP slot? Not a chance

Instapundit » Blog Archive » NOBODY SAID SHE WAS STUPID: Foreign Policy: Hillary Clinton staying as far away from Charlotte as …:

One of Glenn's readers is skeptical of reports that SecState Hillary Clinton will be visiting the Cook Islands and other distant locales during the DNC next week. The reader writes that Hillary will surreptitiously make her way to Charlotte to - surprise! - be presented as Obama's new running mate for  November.

Not a chance.

There was a lot of talk about Hillary displacing Biden on the ticket as long ago as 2010, especially after the 2010 midterm-election shellacking the Dems took. I even made up a post category called HillaryBuzz. But Hillary insisted throughout the buzz, most of which came from other Democrats, that she was not interested in the veep slot and that such talk was without substance.

I said at the time that instead of accepting second fiddle to Obama on the 2012 ticket, she was more likely to challenge him in the 2012 primaries, a position echoed by a number of prominent Democrat politicians and operatives. But I also said her window to depart the administration was very small, basically between the 2010 mid-terms and 2011's New Year.

It didn't happen. Today, for all the rumor mongering that Valerie Jarrett and others have sent feelers to Hillary about the veep slot, rumors they merely are.

Barack Obama will never permit anyone to occupy the ticket with him whose intellect is at peer level or better. And get real: Hillary Clinton's intellect is leagues beyond Obama's. He knows it and more importantly, she knows it, too. Obama is not about to take a chance on being overshadowed by Ms. Clinton, who absolutely would exploit the chance to do so if Obama won another term.

Moreover, despite her protestations that the SecState office is her final office of public service, few people who breathe Democrat politics think that she is not highly interested in the 2016 race. Being the junior partner of a failed reelection ticket in 2012 would be potentially lethal for her in 2016.

The SecState office is one of only two cabinet positions that is traditionally non-political in performance. Historically, only the SecState and the SecDef do not go on the campaign stump for an incumbent's campaign. This is excellent cover for Hillary for 2016 and she is not about to blow it if she is leaving 2016 open in her own mind.

However, it is far from as certain as talking heads say that Hillary really is interested in seeking the Oval Office in 2016. She is notorious for playing her cards very closely, of course, but all successful politicians do. As I wrote in September 2010, speculating on the talk of her challenging Obama this year,

2012 is, effectively, Hillary's last chance [for the White House]. In 2016 she'll turn 69 just before election day. Only Ronald Reagan has been elected at that age level; Hillary surely recalls that Bob Dole and John McCain, each with extensive government experience and both bona fide war heroes and only a little older, were rejected by the electorate.

So my prediction:

1. No Hillary veep slot.

2. If Obama wins in November, Hillary will resign the office of SecState and return to private life. (She has already said she would, so this is not exactly a prediction.)

3. Democrat operatives will push her hard to run in 2016, but she won't.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Hillary is Dems' last chance - or not...

The latest of the HillaryBuzz 2012:

Hillary Clinton is the Democrats; "only hope" in 2012, says Reese Palley of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

It looks as if Republican hopes that Obama will be a one-term president are going to be fulfilled. And those of us for whom hope failed must now look about for something and someone else. ...

... who better than Hillary? ... Hillary for president: It sounds pretty good.

But there's just one problem.

At a town hall meeting appearance in Manama, Bahrain on Friday, Clinton denied intentions to run for either president or vice president on the ticket with President Obama, who defeated her in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary. ...

"I think I will serve as secretary of state as my last public position," she said. Clinton's career has included not only her current position as secretary of state, but also eight years in the Senate representing New York.

Somehow I don't think that's the last word.

Three reasons Hillary won't run

Okay, I've been assessing the odds of Hillary mounting a challenge to Obama for the 2012 nomination for awhile. I even have a whole category devoted to the posts, HillaryBuzz.

Now Bob Shrum explains the three main reasons he thinks Hillary will not challenge Obama, but will bide her time to 2016. His three reasons are:

First, she already lost to Obama once; why do it again? ...

Second, there are the inescapable realities of cost and the political calendar. To raise the money and put an effective structure in place, Clinton would have to resign early next year and go into all-out campaign mode. ...

Third, even if she somehow won the nomination, it wouldn't be worth having. If Hillary Clinton, or anyone else for that matter, overthrew Barack Obama inside the Democratic Party, many African-Americans would "vote with their feet," refusing to walk to the polls. If the Republicans had the improbably good sense to put forward a mainstream conservative, they could even capture an unprecedented share of the minority vote.

Well, wait and see. I think Shrum's reasons are well considered, but overall not decisive:

First, that she already lost once to Obama, is pretty weak. She wouldn't be the first contender to lose a primary and come back to win a nomination. Reagan did it in 1980 after losing two primary attempts. True, the incumbent that year was of the other party, which does put a cerain wrinkle on a Hillary challenge. If there is any strength to Shrum's first objection, it's linked closely to his third objection, that challenging the first black president would alienate African-Americans so much that they would never vote for her if she won the nomination.

As for Shrum's second objection, that she'd have to get a campaign gojng very soon (even if at a low elvel), I don't think that's an obstacle at all. I explained that in my Right Network column, "The Once and Future Hillary," which also explains some reasons in Hillary's favor for making a run in 2012.

And Hillary ain't even running

The latest installment of HillaryBuzz 2012:

Obama 52%, Clinton 37% for 2012 Democratic Nomination

Clinton's support highest among conservative, less well-educated Democrats

Fortunately for Mrs. Clinton, there are a lot more "less well-educated Democrats" than any other kind. Her hat is not even in the arena, much less in the ring, and she's only 15 points behind. Don't you just love it when a plan comes together?