Amy, I Think I Could Stay With You

Em Carpenter

Em was one of those argumentative children who was sarcastically encouraged to become a lawyer, so she did. She is a proud life-long West Virginian, and, paradoxically, a liberal. In addition to writing about society, politics and culture, she enjoys cooking, podcasts, reading, and pretending to be a runner. She will correct your grammar. You can find her on Twitter.

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13 Responses

  1. North says:

    Well she’s doing well enough in money and polling that she’ll make it to the next debate at least and it soothes my discomfort to know she’s there. If Joe implodes then there’ll be at least one rock solid candidate for moderates to rally to and maybe if the winnowing starts soon she can pick up support. She’d also make a pretty damn good VP choice.
    The job toughness allegations don’t move me a lot. Two anonymous people levied accusations and then over 60 current and former staffers put their names to the record to contradict it. I’ll go with the public majority over the anonymous griping personally.

    Great analysis Em.Report

  2. Klobuchar is one of the Dems I could maybe vote for. Her record as a prosecutor is a bit bothersome but other parts are good. Wonder if she’ll be on the list of VP candidates to shore up the Midwestern flank.Report

  3. Jaybird says:

    As former waitstaff, I hear a number of the anecdotes of how Klobuchar treated her staff and I don’t hear “high expectations for herself” when I hear them.

    I hear the Dave Barry line: “A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person.”

    Eh, it’s President. You don’t need to be nice anymore. Why would you want someone nice in that position? What about Trump?

    But, still. One of the lenses I see people through is how they treat the help. There aren’t a whole lot of anecdotes about the quality of bossness flowing through the Democratic hopefuls which means that, on this particular toggle, I’ve still got an open mind on them.

    On Klobuchar, the toggle is down.Report

    • North in reply to Jaybird says:

      Fair enuff, I’m a former server myself- hotel front desk; and the anonymous accusations of Klobuchar’s abuse don’t seem to have set off the geyser of follow up “me too” responses that I would expect if this was some big expansive habit of hers.

      Now that could just be that she’s simply not high enough profile in the race for anyone to bother or it could be that the anonymous hit simply was designed to puncture her “nice” public face and provide an excuse for people not to vote for her; if so it served its purpose.Report

    • Fish in reply to Jaybird says:

      I was never a server either, nor hotel front desk staff, but I was an airman. We could always tell the difference between “this flag officer is a very busy, very serious person who has a lot of stuff on her plate and doesn’t really have time to make nice with we enlisted folks” and “this guy not only doesn’t have time for us, but he probably wouldn’t MAKE time for us, and he might very likely hold us all in contempt.” I don’t know enough about Klobuchar to tell which one she is, but stories about rudeness to the help aren’t positive.

      And that quote! If that isn’t an answer to the interview question, “Tell me about your biggest weakness,” then I don’t know what it is. I do like the “Senator of small things” nickname, though. Indicates that she’s willing to focus on the possible instead of trying to Thanos her way to big changes.Report

    • George Turner in reply to Jaybird says:

      Laura Ingraham is reportedly horrible with her staff. Several long, pre-air clips are on Youtube and she is pretty demanding, but maybe it only looks that way because she was pretending to be a horrible person for the camera that she probably didn’t realize was recording everything as she did her show prep.

      With Klobuchar, I think it goes even deeper. She had an abusive, alcoholic father and some think she internalized his behavior, lashing out at those around her because that’s what he did, too. In parallel with that, she avoids confrontation (ironic, isn’t it) because to her, a confrontation is a fight. So she hurls abuse at underlings or others but is ineffective in really personally confronting anything important because that creates friction.

      These would be horrible traits in an executive official because the emotional bullying and abuse shut down outside input as everyone ducks, and very important executive decisions would be the result of pissing contests and assertions of dominance rather than from logic. In a crisis situation that would be a disaster. For example, if she was in “one of those moods”, a general telling her she’s badly misreading a situation would get shouted down, if not fired on the spot. The rest would learn to keep their mouth’s shut.Report

      • Jaybird in reply to George Turner says:

        Oh, I’m not qualified to make statements about what she’s like and why.

        I just know that, as a former waiter, I recognize the stories told about her and her own explanations for those stories. And it turns my toggle to the “no thanks”, setting.Report

        • George Turner in reply to Jaybird says:

          Back in college (in the early 1980’s) one of my brother’s roommates was a waiter at one of the top restaurants in town. One evening Mitch McConnell was there and my brother’s roommate was a bit slow getting the butter out to his table. McConnell got very testy over it and said “Do you know who I am?!” My brother’s roommate said “Yes, but do you know who I am?” McConnell said “No, who are you?” And he replied “I am the man with the butter!”Report

      • Marchmaine in reply to George Turner says:

        Dude…

        “These would be horrible traits in an executive official because the emotional bullying and abuse shut down outside input as everyone ducks, and very important executive decisions would be the result of pissing contests and assertions of dominance rather than from logic. In a crisis situation that would be a disaster.”

        Said I to all the people I knew were conflicted about voting for Trump.Report

    • Mike Dwyer in reply to Jaybird says:

      I agree with the OP that she could probably be a good president, but I’m also shocked how quickly not just the author but Dems in general dismiss her behavior. Al Franken was run out of the senate for frankly a lot less. For shame…Report