Newt & RPGs

Steady readers may know that I have a fondness for Xbox360 Role Playing Games. I prefer first person (screen is view from eyes) and I insist that the game give me enough story that I feel like I have a reason to spend the kind of time it takes - and the aggravation that comes with playing at high difficulty levels. Good RPGs let the player build a character from a lot of different attributes and allow forks in the story depending on the choices the character makes and those base attributes.

The latest polling from Florida points to Newt having forgotten what is going on in the GOP RPG. Now I may be a compassionate man who tries to treat other people well, but I have taken roles in RPGs where I've been female or particularly amoral to down right nasty just to see where the story would go. A good Xbox game may let you go, in virtually the same breath, from cold blooded ruthless to kind without exploding the story. The GOP RPG is a bit different.

Newt may, despite a lot of evidence, see himself as a big idea guy - some sort of intellectual heavy weight in the GOP ring, laughably as a historian. He might think that, but the story line he's laid out for the GOP voters is something else entirely - he's the hard ass, they guy who'll stomp a mud hole in the back of the President, unlike that weaselly Mitt guy. To go out on the space coast and talk about putting a permanent colony on the moon in eight years is pretty damn big, but sure invites even a Mitt to talk about firing somebody in private industry who thought it was a profit maker. Florida GOPers didn't want a moon colony - they wanted to hear about the "food stamp President" and weasel Mitt's Obamneycare and maybe something about rapist economics (GOPers??).

I get to set up attributes like weaponry and clothing which may range from magic users wearing robes to warriors wearing heavy armor and excelling at close up hack and slash with big swords. I can tell you that when one of my warriors gets up and close to a mage - it is all over; and by the same token, if that warrior doesn't close the the mage will blow him away from safety. Newt won South Carolina as a heavy hitting warrior, even thoroughly beating Mitt on the electability question. He got up close and whaled away at the President and threw some sharp edged whacks at Mitt who was busy playing the mage - no fancy fooling about, just plain old hack and slash. Mitt is stuck playing the mage, a nasty natured one, but staying away from the brawling that requires heavy armor, the armor provided by resentment, ignorance, and even hate; and Mitt stood off and lobbed fireballs at Newt who obliged by waving his sword around from a distance.

RPGs are just exactly that, playing a role and you ignore your role at the almost sure risk of failure because that is the design of the game. GOPers have designed their game over the course of decades and the roles are pretty clear and players don't get to suddenly switch up mid-stream. I might not like any of these characters but it sure is a lot more fun to watch when it's competitive...

GOPer Governor Shows What He Knows, Gays

Wednesday Gov Chris Christie had this to say about Civil Rights while referring to Gay Marriage,

“People would have been happy to have referendum on civil rights rather than fighting and dying in the streets in the South.”

I think there was a referendum at the time, Chris, and it involved little things like three kids in a dike, Medger Evers gunned down, fire hoses, German Shepards, and National Guard troops at a goddam school. So what the Governor is saying is that those black folks should have waited until when for their Rights? I mean it's not as though the South didn't demonstrate some rather strong feelings about the issue or anything. Maybe the Governor doesn't know much of anything about his own Party's history in regards to that area?

Ding Ding
LBJ's line about Democrats losing the South for a generation?

Brewer Photo-Op

YOU'RE GOING TO SIT THERE UNTIL YOU EAT YOUR SHIT SANDWICH



Now I have to admit that if I had GWB (the never to be mentioned GOPer) in front of me I might have had a finger up, a different digit to be sure. There is also the minor issue that I'm not a Governor.

But that gets to a point, what exactly is it that this President has done that is sooooo damn offensive. I get that he is a Democrat and all... I've even noticed that he's a bit darker than other Presidents. I don't remember this guy starting an optional war that lasted quite a few years, or crashing an economy, or signing a Patriot Act, or really being particularly divisive - I haven't heard them call the opposition "traitors" or such. The 'usual suspects' are gleeful over this ecounter...

Yep, Mitt figures this guy is dividing America...

BTW, Arizona is a real pretty place from the saddle of a Harley in May... Brewere is a bit of a drawback, though.

State of the Union As WWF

Last time around one of the GOPers in the House lost track of what show he was watching and turned Congress into his couch in front of the TV playing WWF silliness. "You Lie!" he shouted as he imagined himself doing some folding chair smashing. A lot of people pointed out the incivility of that behavior... as though that Party doesn't breed for it.

Tonight the President is going to play to pretty much the same audience in house - and a segment that is considerably more pissed-off out in TV land. Given the President's disinclination to rile people up; it is a pretty safe bet that we'll get some soft proposals surrounded by pretty words. Liar Mitch Daniels is up as the GOPer rebuttal operative and he can speak in complete sentences without seeming embarrassed by it. You can expect a bunch of "real America" kind of stupidity from Mitch with maybe even a touch of heat.

Now if the President were to give a State of the Union speech that reflected the political and economic and social realities of The Union the House seats would look just like a WWF cage fight. There'd be chairs uprooted and thrown at the podium and Democrats body slammed. The hooting, catcalls, and racial epithets (how long to you think they can do socialist and food stamp President before the nigger word breaks out?) would shatter the media's sound meters. The media follow up would then include the words "both sides do it."

No, the President is not going to tell the Union that we've been in a class warfare for over three decades, he's not going to tell the Union that un-regulated near criminals crashed the economy and made out like bandits for doing it. He is not going to tel the Union that one Party has dedicated itself to the failure of the Union in a bid to replace the speaking President. He is not going to tell the Union that one of the Parties sustains itself on hate and resentment while inflating the plutocracy. Nah, you'll get a pretty speech and the GOPers will play hyenas anyhow.

The only people who'll get satisfaction will be that amorphous "why can't they all get along" middle. Yes, they'll wonder "why" while the President doesn't bother to tell them exactly "why." Sure, I'll watch it - just to see what it takes to get called a socialist while that person's base, which is miles from socialistic, tears its hair out in light of the plutocratic agenda of its President. Cynical? Yeah, and...?

SC Primary

On the basis of exit polling the media started calling the South Carolina Primary for Newt a couple minutes after the polls closed. With a third of the vote in it looks like 41 Newt, 26 Mitt, 18 Rick, 13 Ron. (50% in 40,27)

So, in ascending order the GOP has:
The Last Confederate Standing
Frothy Blah People (Google is your friend, with a strong stomach)
MultipleMitt
The Slimy Amphibian

And from this stellar field they propose to beat President Obama like a cheap drum with whoever is erect (sort of) after this Primary. Honestly, I was kinda hoping the GOP would give America a pretty clear choice between the fakery of a Plutocrat versus the Middle Black Guy (sure I'd like left versus their crazed right but you've got the President).

Exit polls showed Mr Multiple losing the electability issue, geewhiz - that's been almost his entire play, "at least I can run with Obama."

Now I'd like to point out to the Ron Paul cultists, you might be impressed with your 13% in a GOP Primary, but here's the reality - that is your possible vote, not one of the other GOPer's supporters would go your way and any other Party voters already did. Generously speaking, in a two Party system that means you all are at best 6% in South Carolina where your flag is still flown on the State House grounds. Contrast that with the rate of serious insanity in the US...6%.

Rick Santorum... who the hell knows what that is about or would go. Maybe he wants to be a VP or maybe God told him to save the cretins in this country from themselves. If it was God, not many other than Rick were listening.

I think the biggest question is what Mitt Romney does about the results from South Carolina. Both he and Newt Gingrich are fakes of improbably degree, but Newt is a hell of a lot better actor. Without saying much of anything of consequence Newt has scorched Mitt, taking him from over a ten point lead to maybe a seventeen point deficit and that would be a twenty seven point drop against Newt. Mitt is going to have to do something about that and what Newt has is tough to top by a Romney. Mitt is going to out dog whistle and out mean Newt? Mitt cannot "fire" Newt and his smug dismissal isn't going to work with that dog. Added to that Mitt has some idea that he can appeal to the not crazy part of the General Election and he cannot get there by trying to out-Newt Newt. Maybe Mitt's best course is to wait for Newt to pull the pin on a grenade and then drop it.

That gets to the point of people looking for Newt to implode in the Primary. If Newt doesn't say something "socialistic" it is hard for me to see where Newt loses votes from the ABMs. The GOP establishment can't stand Newt and will do what it can and their problem is that the ABMs do not give a damn or they'd not be ABMs. The South Carolina voters think Newt is more electable than Mitt and that is a pipe dream worthy of Ron Paul sponsorship. Newt's negatives nation wide are horrific and short of an economic implosion or other national catastrophe he'd be smashed.

This GOP Primary may be way more fun than the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy. (well, there is the part where they're competing to be Sauron) Buy lots of popcorn, this show may be pretty long.

Where's The Truth?

I wish I could have written this, but Charlie Pierce did it:

The lies are also bone-deep in Romney's campaign. His wife, of all people, told a complete fairy tale here on Friday night about how, "a year ago," she and Willard "were talking and had the same conversation so many of you have had out there, and we said we thought the country was going in the wrong direction, and I turned to Mitt and asked, 'Can you save the country?'"

Okay, now Ann Romney is a very nice lady, and a very brave one, but, honest to god, is there anyone not playing with their toes who believes that Willard Romney stepped into the fray a year ago out of patriotic altruism? Is there anyone not playing with their toes who believes that he he ever stopped running for president after 2008? Hell, the hardcover edition of his campaign book, No Apologies — the book he barbered to make its contents more palatable to a Republican primary audience as a paperback — is almost two years old. The truth simply has ceased to matter in this campaign.

Does the truth come out of Willard's mouth other than when he says, "Hi, I'm Mitt Romney and I want to be President?" Except of course that his name isn't Mitt...

Balanced Media...

Why in the name of whatever deity it is you like is Ramesh Ponnuru doing on my goddam TV when it is tuned to something other than goddam FauxNews, not to mention on with Chuck Todd, Andrea Mitchell, and Chris Cilliza on goddam MSNBC? Thank that same deity that they couldn't or didn't find somebody as crazy and as big a liar to represent their idea of some nutty leftism to balance that dirt bag with. What information am I supposed to come away from this with? That he doesn't drool in public?

Gee, I wonder why politics in this country is such an exercise in goddam stupidity.

goddam

Rah, Rah, Mitt... oh sure...uhuh

This morning I watched a TV clip from a Romney rally, and considering the time difference it must have been mid-morning or so in South Carolina. The crowd started chanting, "We need Mitt," and MultipleMitt responded, "You're going to get me." OK, so far pretty standard election morning stirp the team stuff, right? Wellllll...

I didn't listen to the volume because I don't trust audio levels or mic placement. What I did listen to and for was the mix of voices, the varying tones and sexes and differences in volume. What my ear told me was that this chant involved very few people, I don't mean around a hundred - I'd say not much more than twenty. There's a point to this...

What is there about Mitt Romney beyond Mormon and wealthy that would inspire you to jump up and chant? Well, that or even jump up and smack you hands together and holler, "Yahoo," or whatever? Maybe repeating applause lines like, "apologize for America," or some such... well... other actual lie. I'm not even sure, "let GM die," would work in a Mitsubishi assembly plant.

It is to be sure, true that I don't like MultipleMitt, that I think, by evidence, that he is a two faced lying sack of ... poo; who will say anything to anyone in order to further his own ends and that there isn't anyone outside his immediate family and immediate friends he wouldn't throw in front of a train for extreme profit or his political desires. You have to look at the Bain profits to understand exactly how disconnected this guy is from anything other than himself. Bain wrecked companies to make 200-300% profits, keeping a company alive and people working might have meant returns like ordinary investors salivate for... 15%. Bain was not in the business of creating or salvaging businesses - it was in the business of making great whacking piles of money for a couple people, anything else that happened was entirely secondary. In that world humans are no more than an integer on a spreadsheet and long term considerations are entirely trumped by short term profit taking. If you think you count to that guy, just watch him around "regular" people. What? You thought that picture was just some prank sort of thing, a damned joke?

Oh hell, in a General Election straight up tribalism and hate will get him that good old 27% plus another nearly 15% of who'd hold their noses just for the (R).

Dividing America

Mitt thinks the President is dividing America and that the alternative to the current plutocracy is ... North Korea??? Can we please harken back to the GOP mantra of class warfare? And, maybe, just who is actually waging it?

Regarding taxes, SS/FICA on median income is nearly 16% total employee/employer and 15% as the bracket which would be 31% and if you want to get picky and dismiss the employer end you'd still get to over 22% on every bit of wage. Without any monkey business Mittens pays 15% and no SS/FICA on the immaterial at his wealth cut-off because that income is not wage/salary and is exempt from SS/FICA. (this neglects the temporary cut)

We could get into the division between income gains by the top 1% versus the bottom 20% would be somewhat informing and you will please note that whether or not the bottom 1/5th pays a nickle of Fed Tax, every cent of wage is subject to SS/FICA.

One could point out to Mitt that while the vast majority of us were growing up in families that had to pay real attention to finances his Daddy was CEO of AMC and later Gov of MI. Maybe there are divides that you were insulated from, maybe there are outcomes of performance that you flatly never had to worry about. Maybe while you were busy raping companies the warfare aspect didn't dawn on you, something like that awareness might have cut into your returns, obscene returns by the standards of most investments.

Mr Romney, it is not the President and the Democratic Party that are using falsehoods and dog-whistles and code words to stir hate and resentment. Mr Romney, the President may be one of the best friends your particular version of wealth has. He may be the guy offering you a really good deal compared to what almost all Americans get. But then, anything other than the bootlicking you're used to is class warfare.

The Mitt Juggernaut

To listen to the media of late, you'd have to be really impressed by Mitt's strangle-hold on the GOP Primary. He's racking up the victories and that's really something. So, how's this impressive machine functioning today?

Mitt Romney got about three quarters of Iowan primary caucusers to vote for somebody else. That's right, he tied or lost or something real close with Rick Santorum. He got to New Hampshire and managed to get three fifths of their electorate to support someone else. Looking at the polling in South Carolina he's got over two thirds of that electorate looking elsewhere. Yep, and Newt is moving up.

This is the GOP version of the annointed, presumptive nominee. Wow, that's one hell of a machine.

Newt, It Was Predictable

Going after another Republican was going to cause some heartburn in the GOP. Going after their presumptive nominee was going to cause some heartburn. Going after a Republican as a greed head plutocrat was going to cause apoplexy. The mental derangement has extended all the way to John Sununu making not so veiled economic threats to those funding the attacks and people fuming about Communism. Yes, really.

Now it is true that Ronnie Reagan made some references to some sort of Eleventh Commandment regarding fellow Republicans. That has been kept mostly in a theoretical sort of way as John McCain might note regarding a South Carolina Primary involving GW Bush. In fact, a bit more recently - like Iowa Caucuses - a certain Newt Gingrich got eviscerated by fellow GOPers without so much as a peep by anyone other than Newt.

You could be forgiven for scoffing at the idea that the GOP problem is with attacks on the front runner, especially since Newt was that guy in Iowa when he got whacked. You'd hurt yourself laughing trying to make the case that attacking Mitt hit the purity of the Party message.

Whew. That leaves the money issue. Not the personal money, money issue - the how I got my personal money issue. Outside of making big piles of money from Drugs and Hookers making big piles of money is the entire good for the GOP. (not so sure about the Hookers if it is Nevada) To the GOP it doesn't matter if you got your piles from gutting companies or making trades every two minutes or off taxpayers or from building an enterprise. The methodology is trumped completely by the big pile not the outcomes as long as it doesn't involve handcuffs. (you could make the case that if the handcuffs result from violating regulations... crickets chirping)

The sin being committed against Mitt is that somebody has the temerity to question the methodology from within the GOP. That is just not done. If you were to stop and think about it for even a moment it might raise questions regarding the "Job Creators" and some of the other themes. That cannot be done. Making big piles of money is the engine and it doesn't matter that those big piles of money are resulting in the impoverishment of our economy... or wrecking the environment or...

"Roof, Roof," Said The Dog

Maybe Mitten's ability to translate doggisms to patricianisms made for a misunderstanding of "Woof" and resulted in Seamus the Irish Setter diarrhea-ing all over the roof of the Romney family station wagon during a 12 hour drive. If you're a bit worried about your economic status the idea of handing it over to someone who'd hose off the dog and car and continue on his way in the face of the dog's obvious distress may cause pause. If you throw that on the balance with Bain or some of Mitten's prescriptions for the nation, you could get to feeling like a distressed and dismissed dog.

If you'd do that to a dog...

I'd bet clever commenters could come up with "dog themes"

"Morning In America" to be followed by "Dog Day Afternoon" or something really a lot more clever?

When You Listen To The GOP...

The latest stuff out of the GOP "elite" (names - not money) is that attacks on the MultipleMitt come from the left and worse are damaging to the "front runner". Now the really odd thing about that argument is that they weren't making it when Newt led in Iowa and Mittens' surrogates gutted him. Now I don't really care which one of these outfits nails the other to their reactionary right wing cross and I could care less if they hit them from the left or populist side.

The huge difficulty every one of these GOPers faces is that what they stand for has driven what they've done and exposed to the light of day, starts to rot - like the gutted fish they ought to be. You really have to ask why Confederate Ron Paul has racist tripe newsletters? You really have to ask why Silver Spoon Plutocrat Mitt has a Bain in his past? You have to ask why... oh hell.

Really?

The Conservative "Return To The Values..."

Just to make what ought to be a self-evident statement, when Romney talks about returning the US to the values that made us great what he is talking about is The Gilded Age, or more properly, The Robber Baron Era. If you look at the tax structures, the regulatory structures, labor policies, and social "norms" he advocates in total, the time you've aped is pre - Teddy Roosevelt.

It is a part of the conservative mind set to promote the status quo; or a previous status quo if the current one is ... out of line with their kindergarten understanding of history. This ought to create some kind of cognitive revolt when the period you're trying to ape is so generally counted as ... sucky?

News Or Stenography

I guess some questions would seem jaw dropping in another era of media, but the NYT actually asks Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante?. I wonder if the name Judith Miller has dropped out of institutional memory? I wonder if the appellation, paper of record, has any meaning?

There are some things that take awhile to dig out, especially if they've just suddenly popped up. Most political issues aren't in the least like that, particularly with the GOP. Any reporter that is anything more than a stenographer knows about most of the GOP hobby-horses and from a simple understanding ought to know what can be quickly analysed and what is going to take some time. Some things have been around long enough that if the reporter gave a rat's patoot about facts they'd already have gone over that ground and there would be an institutional archive.

Mitt Romney is scarcely a new phenomenon and neither is his bragging about Bain Capitol. If something like Bain Capitol has not already been researched by the NYT you'd have reason to question their competence and if it is already there, for it to not appear in direct juxtaposition to a candidate's claims is a source of question. That would be any candidate's claims regarding Bain. If a politician is going to make claims about "death panels" on whatever side they shouldn't be able to do it without any question by someone who purports to provide news.

There is a very serious difference between being partisan and being objective and there is also a very real difference between objective and being a stenographer. That a politician has something to say is not news, the content my be news. It is immaterial to buy the NYT (or other) to find out what any campaign will be happy to provide - a transcript or their talking points around it. What is meant and its relationship to facts is what actually counts and it is exactly what is not provided.

I'm happy to say that in my contacts with local papers of whatever stripe their questions almost always were directed at illumination rather than obfuscation - the sole offender in that regard was The Oregonian, which also purports to be a "paper of record." I'd see it as hopeful that the NYT asks the question, but I find it too distressing that they'd be in a position to find it necessary. I guess that's the result of a generation's worth of screaming "LIBERAL MEDIA !!!"

The Bane of Bain or Mitt's Ba(i)ne?

I'm sorry to take such delight in the (mis)fortune of others. It's true I've poked away at poor mis-used Mitt over his unemployment difficulties and even his pink slip worries. I've had mean things to say about corporate raiders and maybe even meaner things to say about some lying wealthy SOBs.

All that just doesn't begin to cover my delight in watching Mitt get attacked from his right on the left. Uh, yes I did say his Right. I'll bet you thought (I did) he'd get creamed for being a "secret" liberal. I'll be go to hell, he's getting it in the neck for being a plutocrat from GOPers.

Don't worry too much, they aren't going all socialist on us, no fears they'll out left President Obama. This will all sort itself out before the General Election and all plutocrat all the time will be back into GOP songs.

I do get great joy out of almost 2/3 of GOPers being ABMs. You can pretty much figure there are going to be hard feelings.

What Is Too Stupid For NYT OpEd?

It seems from campaigning that maybe Mittens wishes that NYT had said his attack on the auto industry government deal wasn't good enough and wasn't out there to haunt him. Well, sure that's one thing but maybe Bill Keller's Hillary VP OpEd should have gotten the spike. You can read the thing for yourself to see what sort of silliness this thing gets up to in order to make its case, but I'd suggest saving your time and just laughing.

I'm not going to go into it, I read it to see if it was nearly as stupid as it sounded - it was (edit) worse. (h/t JG -BJ)

Who Gets To Have Nice Things?

DAVID GREGORY: All right. We're gonna come back to the question of obstacles to the nomination, but let me get to policy, Governor Huntsman. This is, by all accounts, an age of austerity for this country. A jobs crisis. Also a spending crisis in Washington. I wonder what specifically you would do to say to Americans, "These are cuts I'm going to make in federal spending that cause pain, that will require sacrifice?"

From the MTP "debate" transcript.

By all accounts... Age Of Austerity... Jobs Crisis... Spending Crisis... Sacrifice.

Hmmm. You know, if you took all those themes and addressed them as regarding working and poor Americans you might really have something. They are not, of course, regarding working/poor Americans other than the SACRIFICE. Every one of the people this horseshit question was addressed to has a tax plan up that would cut the taxes on wealth and increase the taxes on work and cut programs designed to keep people out of abject poverty.

If you were to read the comments on the MTP Debate transcript you'd find a whole lot of them attacking Gregory for being a LIBERAL trying to stir up trouble and - by the way - shorting Ron Paul's time to be a Confederate.

You would think that from the time of St Ronnie the Raygun there'd be enough data laying around to make something like a coherent case for something in regard to tax policy and the state of the economy. Well - it happens there is. The really big problem is that it doesn't support Clinton era tax rates much less StRR or GWB. The case that gets made in regard to the overall economic health is that StRR screwed things up and pretty much everybody made things worse and Bill Clinton only managed to mildly stem the tide in some regards.

Working/poor Americans have been sacrificing every damn day from StRR on in one way or another. Some of them tried to avoid that sacrifice and used their houses as a credit card or profit center but most just kept working harder for less while watching their betters rake in more of the scraps that might have fallen off the banquet table.

Now you have - no shit - the kid of Geo Romney talking about being "unemployed" and having to worry "about getting a pink slip," as if he had a worry about falling into the lap of luxury instead of off the face of the freaking earth. This is the kind of crap that gets served up as a goddam question by the goddam liberal elite media by talking head that has about as much to worry about or goddam sacrifice as Willard Mitt Romney does.

Mittens seems to make about $15M per year for doing nothing for Bain Capital (numbers vary - mostly up) which sounds like a bit of money, but probably ought to get taken in the context of $43K/yr median income family of four which works out to be 349 of them. Yes you suckers, Mittens makes that much money being un-damned-employed. Taken another way, he virtually makes DAILY that median income.

How it could be made much clearer to the rubes that these guys want to give themselves and their pals a big break while cutting your throat is way the hell beyond me. I don't begrudge these bastards their wealth... but I'm not hot on the idea of being their human sacrifice.

Wolf Wonders

At 1:13 PM during an interview regarding the Perry campaign talking about Mitten's job destruction record Wolf wondered if after the Primary they'd talk about the "tens of thousands of jobs Bain created at Staples and..." Nothing to indicate that this was an assertion of Mittens with any questions involved about the numbers. Stated as bald fact.

Gee, would one have cause to "wonder" if Mittens is Wolf's boy?

Oh yeah, "the liberal media"

*UPDATE
About twenty minutes later Wolf has POW on and feeds him the line about job creation and then goes on the fluff Bain, himself. Correcting the record is laudable - repeating a campaign's talking points is a bit of a different horse. CNN - news? There are a lot of measures of Bain, including how many jobs under their direction and what kind of paying jobs were involved - Wolf couldn't be bothered...

Sanctimony Of What?

The GOPers all seem to have jumped on a sanctimonious train. Some how, some way sanctified has come to mean something most of us were unaware of. You know that county clerk you went to when you got your marriage license, that person has somehow become an agent of GOD.

I give you Merriam Webster online
sanctity

1: holiness of life and character : godliness
2 a: the quality or state of being holy or sacred
: inviolability bplural: sacred objects, obligations, or rights

Now back to that county clerk thing, that person would be an agent of the State, the ones drawing up the regulations regarding getting married. You may have noticed that the clerk let you get that license even though you hadn't, oh say converted. You see, Newt -et al; the clerk is following laws written by the State and isn't in the least interested in your view of religion in this regard. What that clerk is interested in and the State is interested in is that civil contract you're just about to engage in. You'd be forgiven for thinking that Newt, at the least, would be real familiar with the civil aspect of that contract considering the outcomes of trying to get out of it - in simple speak, divorce.

Now I'm not arguing that the State shouldn't set conditions on civil contracts but it is a pretty simple statement that all law-abiding citizens should have equal treatment under the law, ie: the same rights and responsibilities. I've been married for over twenty years and frankly if gays want to go there they are welcome to my club. It isn't like there aren't outcomes that aren't all rainbows and ponies... even avoiding the nastiness of divorce.

* Oh c'mon, which one of you is gonna claim you're a peach to be around day after day after day after... every day?

All Hat And No...

So, Rick Perry wants to put troops back in Iraq? Just to mangle that saying: he's now demonstrated that he's all hat and no filler between the ears.

GOPer Second Round. Can I Take Much More?

To recap, Mitt doesn't have a lot of blood in the water, but there is some pink tint. It is funny to watch Paul and Santorum joust. I hate to use the word reasonable and a GOPer in the same sentence much less next to each other, but Huntsman.

State's right to ban contraception - Mitt? No answer. Seems to ignore MS.
I can't take much more of this stuff,
if you've been amused, I'm sorry. My brain is melting away cells it can't afford to lose. I'm done.

The Sacrement of Marriage makes me want to puke. Which one of these folks got their Marriage License from a church? It is a goddam civil contract.

Screw this shit.

GOPers Cont...

Paul v spending, Santorum a big spender. Santorum - uhuh?
Perry - I'm the outsider. Get Teabaggers behind nominee. Nobody seems to be buying it. In TX we call Paul's earmarking voting against it hypocrisy - uh, yup.
Santorum - I tried to do something, did something.
uh oh, CIC
Huntsman - vision, leadership - I've got it, leadership that can be trusted. I heard that as a hit against Romney. Term limits.
Romney - Huntsman can do a lot better than Obama - one error after another. Failed Presidency. Integrity? From multiplemitt? Obama shrunk the military?
Perry - CIC in TX? WTF? Ah, money from the military to spend somewhere else.
Newt - child of vet. hmmm.
Paul - deferrments. I went. Vets messed up from undeclared war. Chickenhawk accusation.
Newt is pretty unhappy.
Uhoh - newsletters
Twenty years ago, didn't write. MLK a personal hero - pacifistic libertarianism - er, MLK Day?
first round - thank god

LIve Blog The GOPers - Masochism?

Romney, Obama has made the recession worse and longer. Obama as rooster taking credit for sun rising. Heh.

Santorum on not needing a manager - huh? OH, CEO isn't what a President is. True.

Romney wants us to connect him with entrepenures building businesses from the ground up - huh?

Newt - Romney taking apart companies.

Romney - surprised to see people on his stage taking on FREE ENTERPRISE

Huntsman - records count. My record v the rest of you.

Romney - Private sector counts - I'm the private sector.

Paul - Santorum is a big govt person, oops - lobbiests.

Santorum - CREW called me corrupt - ah Geo Soros - same stuff about PA getting its fair share back. I'm a CAUSE GUY. I'm a lobbiest - for all the right guys.

ABM And MultipleMitt.. and genetics?

You have to look at Mitt Romney and today's GOP and wonder how in hell you've got this situation where a guy like Mittens will just win, anyhow. There are a lot of ways I can laugh at the ABMs, but their dislike of Romney just isn't one of them. I understand, in ways that would offend them, just what it is they're up in arms about. It isn't about purity of view, it is about a fraud sticking the con down their throats.

It is true that what the ABMs have got to work with is pretty pathetic and there are a lot of them. Yes, that "a lot of them" does mean split votes letting pathetic Romney numbers count as victories. The recurring ABM implosions is what tells the story, those voters run away from losers once they've defined themselves as losers. They don't want MultipleMitt, but they've got nothing to work with so they will get stuck with him.

Considering the enthusiasm for ABM you have to ask why the ABM field sucks so badly. If this mess had started in '08 you could understand prospective candidates taking measure of Obama and saying, "uhuh, no way." That wasn't the case, the '10 elections had happened and the economy stinks and current Presidents get to own stinking economies. The odds of success against Obama should have measured as high when this got put together and good candidates come out in force. Instead, you have this clown car parade led by MultipleMitt.

Do you suppose I'd be going out on a limb to propose that what created this situation is the composition of the ABM electorate? In the face of Mitt they could have Huntsman, could... They don't want him even though he isn't the fraud Mittens is. What Huntsman isn't, is the brand of crazy they want. Yes, I finally got to the word "crazy." Now how the hell do you want crazy and applaud crazy and not get someone who is crazy and flawed?

Here's the thing ABMs, while you may make up the majority of the GOP Primary voters, your problem is that you're only that 27%+/- loon section of the electorate and your gene pool is pretty damned limited. You are getting what you breed.

Mittens And Taxes - On And On We Go

It has been pretty clear to anybody with two live brain cells in communication that the Federal Tax Policies proposed by the ABMs would result in great big tax breaks for the overburdened wealthy and large hits to everybody in escalating effects down scale. Now - in a huge surprise to everybody dead in the head - Mitten's plan has been shown to do the same thing.

It just goes on for-goddam-ever. Most of the voters in the country will be harmed in one way or another by this and over 40% would vote for MultipleMitt, anyhow. I know there's nothing new in this...

Blah, Blah, Blah

Well, you have to give Rick (don't google me) Santorum credit for almost covering the Republican theme honestly. You know the theme, those "blah" people stealing hard working "why" people's money. Just lacking a certain coherence in consonants.

There certainly is some epic stealing going on, the problem is that it is by the (consonantly deprived) "ri" people. It would be deficient on my part both practically and consonantly to not note that they aren't just "ri" but "why" people; they certainly aren't "poo" people indicated by Santorum.

Just to be fair about it all, "Don't Google Me" isn't alone in the talk, just the part where there was a mistake involving consonants...

(I could have a bit of fun with the consonant thing but it would render both my writing unintelligible and probably my speech as well)

Politics As A Suicide Pact

It hasn't been real unusual for Iowa GOPers to come up with some odd results, I mean historically it isn't as though Mike Huckabee happened in the Dark Ages before... well, anyhow. Here we are now with Mitt Romney and his bazillions of dollars and 2:1 PAC spending tied with little Rick Santorum - Mr Don't Even Google My Name - Catholic theocratic Abramoff/DeLay lap-dog. Given the past half decade of Catholic News stories being their alter boy ought to be a questionable public relations stunt. I can see how "blue collar parents" out plays "silver spoon in the kazoo" but somehow it seems that if Obama can get past the Kenya Daddy thing... Oh - wrong Party.

Rick Santorum is packing as much baggage the Right won't like as Mittens is. Oh it is a bit of a different variety since Rick didn't govern a state, but oooh boy does he have some reeking going on. It might be a bit difficult to reconcile his forced abortion Marianas Ils support with his conception-ism - even if there were big bucks for friends in the former. I don't think Newt shines sufficiently on this particular issue to lay a whacking on Rick.

The whopping Mitts PACs gave to Newt seems to have P-O'ed him a bit. After a moment's reflection answering the question of are you calling Mitt a liar, "Yes," is pretty ... ummm ... uncivil in political terms, even when talking about the other Party's members. Democrats don't seem to do that much at all and in regard to one's fellow Party member even when quite true will probably be pretty heavily counselled against. Maybe the ABMs braying for bloody Mittens will eat it up but I'm not so sure about how broad that sentiment is when it is their own brand name. I doubt it would offend even the most bland of Mittens' dollar men if it were about that guy currently in the White House but - whoa Nellie, Mittens wears an R. (well when convenient, anyhow)

Really, while it is pretty funny to think of any of these GOPers getting all up in the air and calling "liar" about any of the others and not having their collective noses grow; it isn't going to make coming together later all that easy. It may have been stupid for the Mittenpacs to nuke Newt considering who he is and just how much a threat he'd have been in the long haul, but if Newt's reaction to it is as telegraphed by that interview we may have reached a point where MAD (ok, mutual assured destruction) has been enacted as action rather than deterrent. The limits to that particular activity are exactly who the hell has standing.

I whole heartedly approve of the self-destruction of what the GOP has become. It is well past the time for lunacy and destruction of governance to stop being a political platform. I don't know how many pieces they'd splinter into, don't care, but it is not at all good to have a party of crazed plutocrats/theocrats opposed by the not quite crazed plutocrat party. Maybe three parties, crazed plutocrat, crazed theocrat, and crazed people's party would work. I don't know, but the result of the two theo/pluto - crat versus a not really opposition party isn't good. (you will notice that I said not spit about a mythical "crazed middle party") You get voters with a choice between dangerously deranged and "not as bad as" and big money busily buying anything not nailed down and valueless.

Republicans took the dominance engendered by the Civil War and let it become the recipient of the influence of big business and big money and later the resentment of the logical outcome of the War - Civil Rights - combine. It may be the politics of resentment that brought along the theocrats or possibly their native turf being home to its hotbed, but somehow you have a political Party that is the champion of unbridled wealth, melted together with the un-natural bed-fellows of race resentment and biblical governance and that, my friends, is a suicide pact and Iowa is the prophet.

The Democratic tent holds a large and frequently squabbling crowd, but their differences primarily involve who is in the front seats rather than diametrically opposed combatants. Mittens and Santorum are supposedly two faces of that with Newt's meanness thrown in for leavening. What may save Mitt is that while he really is that corporate raiding silver spoon unprincipled plutocrat, all his attackers have is the illusion that they aren't the same things. Hell, that may be what keeps the Republican Party intact - every one of them is a lying sack lying to people who want to be lied to.

What will ruin the Democratic Party is that the GOP is so damned crazy that they look sane despite where they follow the GOP.

*Edit
No, I am aware that I didn't bring up Ron Paul. That is because they are only GOP by default, not enthusiasm. I know their racism and 'fuck you I got mine' seems GOPer, but only on the fringes. They truly are the heirs of ole Jeff Davis rather than the panderers to him that the GOP is - other than the hangers on with their momentary enthusiasms for what they think "Drug War" and "Military Adventurisms" means in Paul-speak.

Reading Assignment - Charles Pierce

I read Charles Pierce over at Esquire's Daily Politics Blog regularly, partly for the politics but mostly for the writing. Charles Pierce does what I aspire to, and what I know how short I fall from doing. Pierce isn't for the fan of equivocation, but does use splendid language. If You haven't already, go check him out.

Twas A Dark And Stormy Night

Out in GOPland and especially the ABM faction, it has to be that sort of feeling. What you've got is the hard core Ron Paul faux-libertarian bunch who really, really like the standard bearer of The Confederate Party of Republicanism but once you get past that bunch ... Wow, the Romney PACs sure did a job on our favorite salamander which has left not so much other than late comer Santorum. (you make the jokes - Google) Paul will be around all the way to the end, the question is who else will.

Now if you look at the others beyond Ron Paul you see momentary poll enthusiasm followed by disregard. That isn't the behavior of a happy electorate. It sure isn't the behavior of a happy electorate for the presumptive nominee to be hanging around 27%; regardless of the size of the current field.

I have no idea how this parade of clown cars is going to play itself out. It is silly to ignore what Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan, ad infinitum actually were but I won't propose that today's GOP is the same Party rather than an out-growth and maybe natural consequence of its century long history. That makes predicting where the current GOP will jump a pretty iffy proposition. It is starting to look as though the enthusiasm will be composed of not much more than getting rid of the guy currently in the White House. It will be difficult to get much going with those not deep into the hate Obama camp if the GOP itself just tolerates its own candidate.

Six months ago this might have been the GOP's election to win, it now looks as though it might just not be.

Newt - Mitt Is A Liar

So Newt shocks an interviewer by saying that MultipleMitt is a liar. That is a shock? It sure is shocking that the word actually got used, but in relation to Mittens it had to be coming but when lobbed by Newt it does seem a bit odd. Actually, I'm pretty sure damn near every GOPer should avoid the word like a plague if they don't want it freely applied to themselves.

I pretty much forgive exaggeration, a candidate for freshmean House seat sure isn't going to get far by being realistic about the impact of freshman Reps. There are some things like the Mittens ad using Obama quoting the McCain campaign as Obama's own words that isn't exaggeration but an out and out lie. If you're a Democrat looking at the GOP and expect anything different, you're ... being silly. If there is a question about the regard such things are held in, it applies to the un-affiliated. Don't hold your breath.