The New Republic

Yeah. Well.

This morning, as is my wont, I dutifully watched all the Talking Head Shows, and the more-or-less universal wisdom being expressed by the Chattering Class is that Hillary probably can't win.

As a recent convert to Obama, that has me very worried.

- sullydog

February 17, 2008 at 1:30pm

This Pennsylvania poll sure makes it look like Rendell was blowing a lot of smoke when he said that his state was too racist to elect an African American to higher office.  What's really really neat at this stage of the game is how the Clinton hired hands have been bending over backwards to come up with newer, more zanier reasons to claim that Hillary's more electable that Obama.  It's only a matter of time before they're going to have to resort to zodiac charts to "prove" their point.  For a campaign that's been claiming that Obama's talk is cheap, they themselves sure to be coming up with their share of empty talk.

- nkocz

February 17, 2008 at 1:41pm

Yeah, but that's just a poll!  Why rely on polls to tell us who's electable, when we can rely on the figments of jmkerr's imagination?

- liebig

February 17, 2008 at 1:47pm

Yeah, well, the polls also had Gore beating Bush in 2000, Kerry beating Bush in 2004, Obama beating Clinton in New Jersey and California this month ... Ergo, the fact that Hillary trails McCain in the polls, both nationally and in key must-win swing states, proves that only she can beat McCain in November. Duh.

- rhubarbs

February 17, 2008 at 2:07pm

No one knows what is going to happen.  Of course Hillary could win.

- Wandreycer1

February 17, 2008 at 2:12pm

Hillary is O.G. as my students used to say say, surrounded by lizard-brained people even more OG.  You'd be a fool to count her out.  

She's going Daniel Plainview on Obama in the debate, you just know it:

"I want to you say that you're a false prophet .

"And that religion is a superstition..."

* Barak: check for wooden bowling pins in her lecturn.

- Wandreycer1

February 17, 2008 at 2:38pm

Hillary could have beat Romney, Huckabee, or even Rudy.

But McCain? I doubt it.

- virginiacentrist

February 17, 2008 at 2:50pm

That's a 12% undecided on the Obama-McCain matchup, 14% on Clinton-McCain.  Did I miss the margin of error, or was it not mentioned?  (I did note that the two-point margin on Clinton-McCain was called "statistically insignficant.")  Still plenty of stastical flexiblity in both sets of numbers.

- cspencef

February 17, 2008 at 3:12pm

Loved the Daniel Plainview comment wandreycer1!

I think the next debate between Clinton and Obama is going to get ugly real quick when she goes after him.  As an Obama supporter I hope he grabs the high ground and derides her attacks as the "politics as usual" that he has stated he is trying to overcome.

- woland

February 17, 2008 at 3:23pm

The polls said Gore would beat Bush?  Gore did beat Bush.  So take that one off the list of bum polls.

- roidubouloi

February 17, 2008 at 5:36pm

Will anyone get hacked off if I go OT to complain about the 'There Will Be Blood' scene that Wandrey references?

I thought 'Blood' was the best, most original film I've seen in a long, long time.  With this movie, Anderson has definitely stepped up to the big leagues, playing right up there with seventies vintage Coppola.  I actually had flashbacks to the Godfather watching 'Blood.'

But like many professional critics, I thought the final scene was a disastrous mistake.  Or actually not the final scene in its entirety, just the final 30 seconds.  It was like at the last minute, Anderson completely lost his nerve and reverted to schlockola, Hollywood literalism.  The violence was so totally unnecessary and really out of keeping with Plainview's character.  He didn't NEED to kill the preacher.  He had already destroyed him utterly.  A true misanthrope would have left him alive just to experience the continuing triumph of watching him squirm like a bug.

- aeromonas

February 17, 2008 at 5:50pm

re polls, I don't think the polls ever had Obama ahead in Cali.

Or am I wrong?

- aeromonas

February 17, 2008 at 5:51pm

I just had an idea...

A couple days ago, I read Chait's article on McCain's numerous flip-flops.  A minute ago I checked back to see whether were any worthwhile comments and found that there were 3 listed, one of which was a duplicate and another of which was off topic.  I mean, really.  ONE legitimate comment after an article in which Chait argues--persuasively--that the emperor has no clothes?  It just goes to show how much the web revamp has done to devalue TNR Talkback.

So what I was thinking was, if management and the web gurus can't or won't fix the problem with comments after articles featured in the mag, why don't you Plankista's just link to the mag's pieces here and give us loyal Talkbacker's a chance to comment upon them in the manner to which we are accustomed?

- aeromonas

February 17, 2008 at 6:25pm

Oh, Clinton and her surrogates ... Bill comes out and compares Obama to Jesse Jackson ... and Rendell argues that some Americans are too racist to elect a black man president.

So which campaign reflects a candidate ready to provide leadership?

- epackard-02

February 17, 2008 at 6:48pm

aeromonas -- I wonder if other Conde Nast publications have feedback sections on their sites and if so whether things are as screwy as here.

- epackard-02

February 17, 2008 at 6:50pm

I'd like to second aeromonas "walled garden" proposal.  Maybe there could be another blog, essentially an automated feed, so it doesn't clutter up original material here.

And while we're dreaming, let's get HTML tags working again.

- ejbenjamin

February 17, 2008 at 7:07pm

"I don't think the polls ever had Obama ahead in Cali. Am I wrong? "

Yes, some of them did. Yes, you are.

And it's really quite touching how some of you mention me before I even post. You know me! I'm touched.Alas, none of you have an original thought in your head so I can't return the favor. All of your posts all meld together like one little furry yap dog.

- jmkerr

February 17, 2008 at 9:16pm

Oooh- we're burnt!   Good one, jmkerr!

Aeromanas, I disagree about the last scene.  I thought it was a little over the top at first, too- but I thought it redeemed itself with Plainview's last line- "I'm done"- delivered not with total resignation but with a bit of weary, drunken elan.   He was done.  The end of his humanity, his oil-soaked and misanthropic and bitter life, the end of the "competition" he had in him.   He was done.  

But you are right- he didn't have to kill Sunday.  But: so what?  I think the greatness of that scene is because it was irrational.  Things in movies don't always have to wrap up.  Plainview was increasingly bitter and angry and inhuman.  He just decided there that he was going to kill Sunday.  He didn't have to.  And in a lesser movie that kind of immediate and final twist might not have worked, but I personally think it did there.  

I went into the movie hearing about how the last scene was bad, mostly from Orr, so I was leery.  Maybe I am just an intentional contrarian, but I really liked it.

- boneill

February 17, 2008 at 10:19pm

i have one more question about 'there will be blood'

what was the deal with paul sunday?   was he meant to be a bona fide identical twin, or one half of a split personality?

- aeromonas

February 18, 2008 at 5:12am

jmkerr- Everything you write is either a personal insult or an attack on the character/positions/family of Barack Obama. You even blamed him for his father's abandonment and other remarkably insulting, utterly ignorant and truth free slights about his family.

Go ahead and be a Hillary supporter, she's an excellent candidate running an exciting campaign with a great story to tell, but leave your personality problems out of it. You do nothing but make yourself look whacked rather than making a case for Hillary Clitnon. Why do your views always have to be at the expense of someone elses? It says nothing about the other person - be it Barack Obama or another poster - zilch. Practice writing something that isn't snide, it takes more skill and thought than what you are doing, which is feet stamping in print.  

aero, bone and woland - that movie stayed with you too?  I keep thinking of Hillary and Barack metaphors, perhaps it IS time to think of other things besides this primary stuff.  

The best part about that ending scene is the coversations about film and strorytelling it inspired.  I heard excellent cases both for and against.  At the time, I thought it took away from the story, it felt forced - never end a story with a melodrama, they always told me in my short story writing group. But of course if you're as brilliant as this director, all bets are off.  If anyone could take any storytelling "rule" and successfully throw it out the window, its him.

I do think Paul Sunday was one set of a twin, but in one of those heavy handed John Steinbeck era, 1920's metaphor kind of way - get it? We're all good AND evil!

- Wandreycer1

February 18, 2008 at 7:17am

you know, re anderson, his first feature, boogie nights--a movie i liked much less than most of the critics--also had near its end a scene of extreme violence that to me at least seemed out of keeping with the preceding film.  

i appreciate y'all's defense of the killing, but i still think it represented a disheartening slide back into the ordinary.  it would have been more daring to end on the almost slapstick moment just before when plainview was pitching bowling pins at sunday.  i found that note of comedy--a nod to the silent films of the era depicted i suspect--much more eerily evocative than the murder that followed.  

- aeromonas

February 18, 2008 at 8:02am

I love the slapstick idea - that would have been wonderfully creepy.  

I also think just that shot of him asleep in the bowling alley surrounded by old food and booze would have done it too - the emptiness of his soul and the limits of his aquistions and power were pretty well taken care of with that shot alone. The violence in Daniel Plainviews enitre being was already made clear in prior scenes.  

I also didn't *quite* grasp what his problem ultimately was with poor old Eli.

But I suspected it was that Eli had made him say Daniel had abandoned his son when he was being "saved" - maybe Daniel killed him for  that alone. Remember how Daniel had threatened that oil guy who innocently suggested that he might be able to spend more time with his son? That was a terrific scene, wonderfully acted - you saw that irratonal rage in Daniel, that danger, the bizarre touchiness about his son.

Otherwise - why would he bother killing hokey old Eli?  It's not like he made Daniel feel guilty or something.  Just because he didn't believe in God? Because he was a phony?  Wah?

- Wandreycer1

February 18, 2008 at 8:28am

Clinton really does seem to attract the nastiness in humanity in appealing to her supporters.

Was I the only one who absolutely hated "there will be blood" from beginning to end?

- miceelf

February 18, 2008 at 8:29am

Sorry miccelf - loved it.  But I did feel that way about that 1:10 to Zuma movie or whatever it was called, with Russell Crowe as a cowboy? The critics liked it, I hated it from beginning to end - found it wooden and trite. So I know the feeling.

- Wandreycer1

February 18, 2008 at 8:46am

I think so, miceelf.  Sorry.  

I was confused about the Paul/eli thing, but Daniel says in the last scene that Paul is now making money with what Daniel paid him in the beginning- he was the smart one.  And this made Eli blubber even more, so it seems there was some truth to it (of course, at that point they were both greatly deluded people- I loved Eli's line like "god didn't warn me about the economic panic").  

Wandrey, I think you are a right about him hating Eli for  the "I abondoned my boy!" scene, but there was more than that.  Remember when he beat him up for not curing his boy with his "prayers".  Daniel hated people, and Eli was a snake and a liar and a fraud and a coward- Daniel was many of these things as well, and that just increased his hatred.  

- boneill

February 18, 2008 at 12:54pm

miceelf and bone:  I did not care for There Will Be Blood.  I didn't like it.  Daniel Day Lewis is a fine actor, but I couldn't get into the movie.  It insists upon itself, bone.  It insists upon itself.

Seriously though, I really didn't like it -- found it to be slow, boring, and pointless with a ridiculous ending.  (Although I was happy to see Eli get his in the end.  I really hated Eli.)

I liked 3:10 to Yuma.

And the Money Pit.

- jhildner

February 18, 2008 at 7:28pm

miceelf--you were far from alone.  The move darn near made me sick.  

- cspencef

February 19, 2008 at 5:50pm