36997wrh

James put all the elements of the...

10:43, 2010-Feb-3 .. Link

James put all the elements of the campaignpolitics, press, and researchinto a big open space in the old newsroom of the Arkansas Gazette buildingIt broke down barriers and built a sense of camaraderieHillary said it was like a war room, and the name stuckCarville put a sign on the wall as a constant reminder of what the campaign was aboutIt had just three lines: Change vsMore of the Same The Economy, stupid Dont forget health care Carville also captured his main battle tactic in a slogan he had printed on a T-shirt: Speed Kills The War Room held meetings every day at 7 ato assess Stan Greenbergs overnight polls, Frank Greers latest ads, the news, and the attacks from Bush, and to formulate responses to the attacks and unfolding eventsMeanwhile, young volunteers worked around the clock, pulling in whatever information they could get from our satellite dish, tracking the news and the opposition on their computersIts all routine stuff now, but then it was new, and our use of technology was essential to the campaigns ability to meet Carvilles goal of being focused and fast Once we knew what we wanted to say, we got the message out, not only to the media but to our rapid-response teams fake chloe bag in every state, whose job it was to transmit it to our supporters and local news outletsWe sent pins with Rapid-Response Team on them to those who agreed to do daily dutyBy the end of the campaign, thousands of people were wearing them By the time I got my morning briefing from Carville, Stephanopoulos, and whoever else needed to be on call that day, they could lay out exactly where we were and what we needed to doIf I disagreed, we arguedIf there was a close policy or strategic call, I made itBut mostly I just listened in amazementSometimes I complained about what wasnt going well, like speeches I thought were long on rhetoric and short on argument and substance, or the backbreaking schedule that was more my fault than theirsBecause of allergies and exhaustion, I griped too much in the morningsLuckily, Carville and I were on the same wavelength, and he always knew when I was serious and when I was just blowing off steamI think the others on call came to understand it too The Republicans held their convention in Houston in the third week of AugustNormally, the opposition goes underground during the other partys conventionThough I would follow the usual practice and keep a low profile, our chanel black bucket tote bag rapid-response operation would be out in forceThe Republicans had no choice but to throw the kitchen sink at meThey were way behind, and their slash-and-burn approach had worked in every election since 1968, except for President Carters two-point victory in the aftermath of WatergateWe were determined to use the rapid-response team to turn the Republican attacks back on them On August 17, as their convention opened, I still had a twenty-point lead, and we rained on their parade a little when eighteen corporate chief executives endorsed meIt was a good story, but it didnt divert the Republicans from their game planThey started off by calling me a skirt chaser and a draft dodger, and accused Hillary of wanting to destroy the American family by allowing children to sue their parents whenever they disagreed with parental disciplinary decisionsMarilyn Quayle, the vice presidents wife, was particularly critical of Hillarys alleged assault on family valuesThe criticisms were based on a wildly distorted reading of an article Hillary had written when she was in law school, arguing that, in circumstances of abuse or severe neglect, minor children had legal rights independent of their parentsAlmost all Americans wholesale gucci messenger bag would agree with a fair reading of her words, but, of course, since so few people had seen her article, hardly anyone who heard the charges knew whether they were true or not The main attraction on the Republicans opening night was Pat Buchanan, who sent the delegates into a frenzy with his attacks on meMy favorite lines included his assertion that, while President Bush had presided over the liberation of Eastern Europe, my foreign policy experience was pretty much confined to having had breakfast once at the International House of Pancakes and his characterization of the Democratic convention as radicals and liberals dressed up as moderates and centrists in the greatest single exhibition of cross-dressing in American political historyThe polls showed Buchanan hadnt helped Bush, but I disagreedHis job was to stop the hemorrhaging on the right by telling conservatives who wanted change that they couldnt vote for me, and he did it well The Clinton-bashing continued throughout the convention, with our rapid-response operation firing backThe Reverend Pat Robertson referred to me as Slick Willie and said I had a radical plan to destroy the American familySince I had been for welfare reform before louis vuitton denim pleaty bag Robertson figured out that God was a right-wing Republican, the charge was laughableOur rapid-response team beat it backThey were also especially good at defending Hillary from the anti-family attacks, comparing the Republicans treatment of her to their Willie Horton tactics against Dukakis four years earlier To reinforce our claim that the Republicans were attacking me because all they cared about was holding on to power, while we wanted power to attack Americas problems, Al, Tipper, Hillary, and I had dinner with President and MrsThen we all spent the next dayboth Tippers and my birthdaybuilding a house with members of Habitat for HumanityJimmy and Rosalynn Carter had supported Habitat for yearsThe brainchild of Millard Fuller, a friend of ours from Renaissance Weekend, Habitat uses volunteers to build houses for and with poor people, who then pay for the cost of the materialsThe organization had already become one of Americas largest home builders and was expanding into other countriesOur work presented a perfect contrast to the shrill attacks of the Republicans President Bush made a surprise visit to the convention on the night he was nominated, as I had, bringing his entire all-American-looking chanel denim handbag famil

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