Hillary Cancels Attendance At Event:
Complains Palin Appearance Makes It "Partisan"

Update: Sarah disinvited, huge controversy, below.

The Associated Press has reported that Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-NY, abruptly canceled her planned attendance at a New York City rally outside of the United Nations Headquarters set for this coming Monday, September 22nd, when she found out that Governor Sarah Palin, R-AK, might also appear.

Palin is the first Republican woman candidate on a presidential ticket. Clinton lost her bid to become the first woman presidential candidate this year, and she was passed over for any consideration as the Vice Presidential nominee by this year's Democrat nominee, Senator Barack Obama, D-IL.

The planned protest rally is aimed at Iran's highly controversial leader, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The event sponsors had apparently also extended an invitation to the Republicans, and the name of the Alaska governor was tentatively submitted. Palin is the Republican nominee for Vice President this year. According to the AP report, written by Devlin Barrett, several American Jewish groups, including the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the National Coalition to Stop Iran Now, United Jewish Communities and the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, had planned this

"major rally outside the United Nations on Sept. 22 to protest against Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad."

Ahmadinejad, who attended a UN Session last year at about this time, is set to attend another UN session in New York next week at the opening of the new General Assembly session. Other protests are also planned for next, including another human rights protest set for Wednesday entitled the "Ahmadinejad Wall of Shame" protesting the executions of children in Iran.

Mr. Ahmadinejad, who was the first non-cleric elected President of Iran in 24 years in a run-off election held back on June 24, 2005, has made a series of virulent anti-Semitic and anti-Israel comments in speeches over the years, including ones denying the historical fact of the Nazi Holocaust, and an expressed threat to "wipe Israel off the map."Just this past summer, on June 3rd, USA Today reported that Ahmadinejad said:

that Israel will soon be "erased" and that the "satanic power of the United States" will be "annihilated."

He reportedly made those latest hate-filled comments, according to the story, "at a ceremony marking the 19th anniversary of Ayatollah Khomeini's death."

Khomeini was the "spiritual" leader of Iran during the violent 1979 over-running of the United States Embassy in Teheran by radical Islamic terrorist students -- of which Ahmadinejad was one -- during the former Presidency of Jimmy Carter, and the subsequent holding of 52 American embassy personnel as hostages for a total of 444 days. The hostages were released on January 20th, 1981, the day Ronald Reagan was sworn in as President. Reagan had defeated Carter in the 1980 presidential election. The Reagan election was won in a landslide, and was, in part, seen as a referendum on Carter's mishandling of that hostage crisis. In addition, the nation's economy had experienced years of considerable disruption under Carter.

Under Ahmadinejad's rule, Iran has been actively pursuing the development of nuclear weapons, as well as delivery systems, in violation of U.N mandates.

The planned New York rally sponsors said yesterday that both Clinton and Palin would likely be attending the rally. It was so reported by several news services, including Fox. The news that Palin would likely be attending apparently then prompted the abrupt cancellation by Clinton.

Clinton's official excuse for canceling, flatly stated that the mere attendance by Sarah Palin would somehow make it a partisan political event, and that the New York politician would therefore not attend. As reported in the AP story:

"Her attendance was news to us, and this was never billed to us as a partisan political event," said Clinton spokesman Philippe Reines. "Sen. Clinton will therefore not be attending."

There was no indication in the AP story why the Clinton camp believes the mere attendance of the Republican nominee at an event in New York would somehow turn it into a "partisan political event." Just last week on September 11th, for example, Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama both appeared together, and even walked together, during a 9/11 anniversary ceremony in New York at ground zero. It was billed as nonpartisan.

Moreover, the rally on Monday will also feature other public luminaries, including religious figures who are clearly not associated with partisan politics. According to a post by Colum Lynch on the Washington Post political blog, The Trail, the list of expected attendees also

includes prominent political and religious leaders, including Nobel Peace Prize laureate Elie Wiesel . . .

And the fact is that Senator Clinton herself is an active political partisan, having unsuccessfully battled for the Democrat nomination for president earlier this year. She conceded her loss to Obama at the beginning of the summer, and is currently a political surrogate for the Democrat nominee. She has made political several political campaign appearances, including joint appearances, on behalf of his campaign for president.

A response from the Palin camp to the Clinton claim of political partisanship, was reported today on the New York Times political blog, The Caucus earlier this morning:

A spokeswoman for the McCain-Palin campaign swiftly replied that the rally should not be seen as a partisan event.

"Governor Palin believes that the danger of a nuclear Iran is greater than party or politics. She hopes that all parties can rally together in opposition to this grave threat," said the spokeswoman, Tracey Schmitt.

According to analysis in the earlier AP story, however, the appearance of both Clinton and Palin:

"would have set up a closely scrutinized and potentially explosive pairing in the midst of a presidential campaign, one in which the New York senator is campaigning for Democratic nominee Barack Obama while Palin actively courts disappointed Clinton supporters."

But as reported, there was no further indication at all of what was meant in the report meant by "potentially explosive pairing."

The AP-suggested headline for the story underscoring another possible explanation for the Clinton camp cancellation: "Clinton blindsided by scheduled event with Palin." Nothing in that story, however, indicated why Hillary Clinton would feel "blindsided" by merely appearing at the same event with the Republican Vice Presidential nominee.

The New York Times post at The Caucus today did raise that question -- why the event organizers themselves had not previously informed Clinton that Palin had been invited.

It was not immediately clear this morning why or when Ms. Palin was invited to the rally, and why the organizers did not inform Mrs. Clinton that the Alaska governor would be among the line-up of speakers. Phone messages for organizers of the event were not immediately returned.

But why would they? And, why is that an issue? Surely the Times is not suggesting that the organizers had a special obligation to help protect Hillary Clinton's political sensibilities, are they?

Even if they had given her a "heads-up," would she not have canceled regardless? Otherwise, the only other possible explanation for her canceling would be her fit of pique at the organizers over their failure to warn Clinton in advance of the invitation to Palin.

So, perhaps what it really comes down to is that Hillary Clinton has suddenly became concerned with appearances -- such as that the presence of Palin would lead to speculation about who ultimately attracted the larger number of spectators, or drew the most media attention at the event.

Maybe Hillary Clinton was simply unwilling to risk being perceived as coming in second again, this time in her own backyard!

Update: Unbelievable! Sarah Palin has been inexplicably "disinvited" from speaking at the rally by the sponsors. As reported by Marcia Kramer at CBS TV in New York, the uncorroborated rumor was that the tax status of the sponsoring groups would have been "threatened" if she attended! Local New York Democrats are even quoted in her story jumping ship on this one!

The question being asked by critics is, was that from a real opinion, or from a real threat?

Allahpundit at HotAir is all over this one!

When Did You Stop Beating the Economy, Mr. Carter?

He's back in the news, Jimmy Carter is, this time accusing the President of torture and lying. Might be interesting to interview a guy like him, who now says he has no regrets - none. If a real, crusty, hard-hitting reporter – not anyone like the obsequious Chris Matthews -- but if a real reporter were to ask the former President some tough questions, just imagine how that discussion might go. Below, is our guess.

Of course, that will not ever happen. Writers have made the case that the mass media largely created Carter, who then turned out to be one of the most disastrous of American Presidents, clearly the worst in our lifetime.

That fact should be a bit instructive to us all as we begin to give serious consideration to our choices in the fall of 2008!

The Wikipedia link for Jimmy Carter, for example, notes the 1980 biography of the former President by Lawrence Shoup, The Carter Presidency and Beyond, in which Shoup argued that Carter was truly a creation of the mass media:

The media discovered and promoted Carter. As Lawrence Shoup noted in his 1980 book The Carter Presidency and Beyond:

"What Carter had that his opponents did not was the acceptance and support of elite sectors of the mass communications media. It was their favorable coverage of Carter and his campaign that gave him an edge, propelling him rocket-like to the top of the opinion polls. This helped Carter win key primary election victories, enabling him to rise from an obscure public figure to President-elect in the short space of 9 months."

As late as January 26, 1976, Carter was the first choice of only 4% of Democratic voters, according to the Gallup Poll. Yet "by mid-March 1976 Carter was not only far ahead of the active contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, he also led President Ford by a few percentage points," according to Shoup.

Some of that attitude still persists today. So, the following parody interview article will not appear in the paper, nor will anything like it -- though it would be nice to imagine, even if just for a few minutes!

Carter Denies He "Tortured" Americans, Others, with Disastrous Policies
His explanations falter though when pressed on the economy, Mugabe --

10/10/2007 -- Smarting from news that the United States’s trade deficit had again improved, and that unemployment was dropping to record levels, former President Jimmy Carter testily denied the suggestion that, while President, he had, in effect, tortured large segments of the American public with his economic policies.

In an interview, he was pointedly asked,

"Mr. Carter, given the fact that your economic policies, and arguably your foreign policy, caused so much dislocation and pain, why should the American people not simply conclude that, to that extent, you indeed tortured them?"

"Just because unemployment was at a record high while we were in office, was not my fault," he insisted.

"And, this current President," he added, immediately trying to change the subject, "he has tortured people, and he denied 1 million minority people in Florida the right to vote in 2000, too," he added. Carter, however, once again could not offer evidence of either accusation -- and not even a scintilla of evidence that one person was ever denied the right to vote, let alone a million as he has frequently claimed over the years.

Asked about the fact that during his one-term presidency the country was beset by runaway inflation, alarmingly high interest rates, extremely high unemployment, massive oil and other fuel shortages, and an overall stagnant economy, and that, in addition, we struggled through several major world crises, including the humiliating Islamist student invasion of the American Embassy in Tehran, which he failed to resolve, Carter countered by blaming it all on the attitude of the public.

"Look, people just couldn’t get used to the idea that we had a crisis of confidence in this country. It wasn’t my fault – it was the country’s fault," he said, raising his eyebrows and licking his lips for emphasis, both signature Carter gestures of contempt.

He also quickly pointed out that he made that abundantly clear at the time by giving the American people a good old-fashioned "kick ‘em when they’re down" speech (called the "malaise" speech) during which he bluntly told the American people, in part:

The threat is nearly invisible in ordinary ways. It is a crisis of confidence. It is a crisis that strikes at the very heart and soul and spirit of our national will. We can see this crisis in the growing doubt about the meaning of our own lives and in the loss of a unity of purpose for our nation.

"So don’t try and blame me," Carter added, with the indignant flash of anger visibly showing in his face. "They tortured themselves!" he insisted.

"I’ll remind you that I asked my young daughter Amy what we should do, and she gave me good, sound advice. But the country made fun of that. And they made fun when that rabbit viciously attacked me in the canoe that time, too!"

Then he added, "Just because the prime interest rate rose to 21.5% in my Presidency," effectively dashing the economic hopes of millions of Americans to own their own homes, or to start their own businesses, "does not mean I tortured them. Again, I remind you that I raised taxes through staggered increases while on my watch." And, then, almost as an afterthought, he added, "and I would also point out that I substantially increased payroll taxes for Social Security, too! Okay? And, I cut the heart out of portions of the defense budget, as well. And I tried to get the Salt II Treaty approved." (Even the Democrat-controlled Senate balked at ratifying that accord.)

The one-term President who lost in a landslide to Ronald Reagan in 1980, was reminded that his successor, had solved the Carter economic crisis, restored and even increased the defense budget, and dramatically increased our standing on the world stage through substantially reduced tax rates.

"How do you respond to those who say that Ronald Reagan thus induced a complete turn around in the economy, ushering in the then-largest post war expansion of the nation’s economy, and thus laid the foundation for the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union, and our victory in the Cold War?"

Carter shook his head derisively, waiving off any such suggestion. "Wrong. Everyone knows it was all because I insisted that everyone live up to impossible or largely unachievable standards on the world stage that we are where we are today," he asserted, again without offering any specific proof for his claims whatsoever.

"I solved the problems in the Middle East – they gave me the Nobel Prize . . . me! And now, with just a little bit more name-calling and open hostility toward Israel, I believe we will win."

Asked exactly what we would "win" Carter became a little vague. "The respect of our former adversaries, for one thing," he suggested.

"Like Iran?" he was asked. "We should negotiate with them," he said. "But didn’t you try and fail at that, sir?" "These things take time," he responded, again with raised eyebrows.

"You forget, I personally intervened in Africa and Central America to help bring a new generation of leaders to the fore," he offered.

Setting aside the obvious questions about the former President’s role in aiding the Marxist Sandinistas in Nicaragua, the interviewer probed on the lesser-known subject of African political leaders.

"You gave a start to leaders ... like, Robert Mugabe?" Carter was asked. The questioner then noted that as President, Jimmy Carter personally intervened in Zimbabwe back in 1979 to electorally promote the eventual accession to power as Prime Minister of openly Marxist Robert Mugabe, whose continuing regime today as President is beset with massive corruption, suppression of any political opposition, totalitarian social policies, mismanagement of both land reform and the economy, and the complete deterioration of human rights. Mugabe’s policies have caused an economic collapse and massive starvation over the past decade in Zimbabwe, with an inflation rate that is indisputably the highest in world history – predicted to run to 1.5 million % by the end of this year.

And as a follow up, Carter was asked, "So, should the people of Zimbabwe – that is, those who have managed to survive -- also lay some of the blame for their on-going tortured lives at your feet as well, Mr. Carter?" The questioner pointed out as a basis for his question, the fact that the life expectancy rate for women in Zimbabwe now stands at 34, having been 63 just a few years ago. The life expectancy for men is 37.

"Dick Cheney is a disaster," the former President icily intoned, choosing to ignore the question completely. "And," he added, waiving his finger at the interviewer, "you can take that to the bank!"

"Which bank," the questioner retorted, "Bert Lance's bank?"

# # # # #

(At this point, the former President, suddenly recalling a prior commitment, abruptly terminated the interview.)