Every Person Should NOT Support the Notion of Hillary Clinton
Politics, Presidential Race 2008 April 11th. 2008, 4:14pmAmpersand posts the converse. I disagree.
Every person should support the notion that a woman can be President just as a man can, that I can accept.
But Hillary Clinton specifically? She is grossly unqualified to be the chief executive of the country. No executive experience. No military experience. No private-sector leadership experience. A relatively insubstantial legislative career. She has great political experience and contacts – but that isn’t enough. You don’t have to have all of those things to be qualified for the Presidency, but you have to have something. ”Had sex with Bill Clinton at least once” is not a sufficient resume item; if it were, we’d have had a much larger primary field. She’s never fired a shot in anger, never met a payroll, never built a business enterprise, never led men and women in an organizational capacity. My dad is better qualified – and he isn’t even close to being qualified.
She is better qualified than Obama, that I’ll grant you – but whisper-thin-marginally and mostly due to the biographies of other people. She’s got executive experience the way Kerry had money – none of her own, some illusorily reflected by proxy.
McCain by contrast isn’t terribly well qualified for the office, but he at least has military experience and a lengthy legislative history. Historically that’s enough; I can think of decent presidents who had less. I can’t think of ANY modern President with a resume as thin as hers. Bush would be close, but he edges her across the board.
So I’d be leery of supporting Hillary Clinton’s presumptive right to run for the office. Governor, absolutely. VP, a stretch but perhaps if she were yoked to a strong Presidential candidate. The Big Chair? Hell no.

April 14th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
As a woman, I agree that women (or men, for that matter) should not support Sen. Clinton’s candidacy for reason of her gender alone.
The fact of her candidacy has made the point that a woman can run for, and be, President. But to elect her on the basis of gender only, does a disservice to women. It implies that the only reason she succeeds, is some sort of nation-wide affirmative action. History has shown that affirmative action programs sometimes work against their intended beneficiaries by fueling the perception that, but for the program, the beneficiary wouldn’t have qualified for the position.
Personally I see no record of achievement for Senator Clinton that would support my vote for her. Were she a man, I’d feel the same.
April 17th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Er, no, Ampersand does not post the converse.
The statement “Every Person Should NOT Support the Notion of Hillary Clinton” translates to “if you are a person, then you should not support the notion of Hillary Clinton.” The converse would be “If you should not support the notion of Hillary Clinton, then you are a person.” An interesting proposition in its own right, but probably not one espoused by Ampersand.
Instead, Amp said “Every woman should support the notion of Hillary Clinton,” which translates to “if you are a woman, then you should support the notion of Hillary Clinton.” The converse would be “If you support Hillary Clinton, then you are a woman.” Again an interesting proposition in its own right, but probably not one espoused by Amp.
April 17th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Nobody.really is a lawyer in real life, IIRC. In the above comment, he serves as a one-man exposition of why people hate lawyers.
What, O Wise One, should my phrasing have been, then?
April 29th, 2008 at 7:51 am
Er, no, that’s not accurate either. Some people really are lawyers in real life, so the suggestion that nobody really is a lawyer in real life can’t be true. Or are you suggesting that lawyers can’t be people? And the fact that people hate us is one of the ineffable mysteries of life. Indeed, there’s nothing F-able about it. Go figure.
What should you have said? Depends on what you meant. Amp said “Every woman should support the notion of Hillary Clinton.”
1. Maybe you meant that you didn’t find his argument persuasive. Then you might say “I’m not persuaded that every woman should support the notion of Hillary Clinton.”
2. Maybe you meant that there exists at least one woman who should not support the notion of Hillary Clinton. Then you might say “NOT every woman should support the notion of Hillary Clinton.”
3. Or maybe you meant that there exists no woman (or anyone else for that matter) who should support the notion of Hillary Clinton. In that case, your statement “Every Person Should NOT Support the Notion of Hillary Clinton” would seem to fit.
Tangentially related: According to Wiki Books, the negation of the statement “All men have hair” is “No man has hair,” rather than “Not all men have hair.” See http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Geometry/Inductive_and_Deductive_Reasoning
Yet the statements”All men have hair” and “No man has hair” are both false. This concept of negation, therefore, conflicts with classical notions of deductive logic whereby the opposite of any true statement is a false statement, and vice versa (and conflicts with the truth tables found at the bottom of that page).