Maybe what we need are better referees for the “job creators”?
For over a day now, the top story on many news sites has been outrage over bad calls made by substitute referees during an NFL game. It is ironic that this situation mirrors our upcoming election.
UPDATE: Ezra Klein on “low information” voters, and why they won’t be deciding this election.
“It’s Fall. Unless you’re Mitt Romney, and then it’s freefall.” – David Letterman
“Romney said he doesn’t watch ‘Keeping up with the Kardashians’ because if Romney wants to see rich people say dumb things on camera he can watch that fundraiser video.” – Jimmy Fallon
“What are they talking about? Romney has given some very specific figures. For instance, he is willing to piss off exactly 47% of the voters.” – Stephen Colbert
“He attacks the 47 percent of the American people who he says pay no federal taxes. And he attacks, he, Romney? Attacking someone on taxes? I mean, Woah! That’s like me attacking someone for being passionate in politics.” – VP Joe Biden (using himself as part of the punchline of a joke)
“Mitt Romney says that about half the country are freeloaders. And freeloaders – that includes wealthy politicians who only pay 13 percent in tax.” – David Letterman
“I like Mitt. Listen to this. He has alienated the young people, alienated the old people, alienated women, alienated minorities, alienated gays. I’m telling you, this takes talent.” – David Letterman
“Yes, President Romney will not take God off our coins. And that is so important because right now, just like God, the value of our currency really has to be taken on faith.” – Stephen Colbert
“As part of the strategy for the upcoming presidential debates, the Obama campaign is attempting to lower expectations. And believe, if there’s one thing that President Obama is good at lately, it’s lowering expectations.” – Jay Leno
In general, I try to ignore media whores (which I define as people who say things to get attention, regardless of whether or not what they say is true). But who can resist a comic that uses the phrase “fallopian fists of fury”?
Yes, Limbaugh really did bring up an Italian study that found that penises are on average roughly 10% smaller today than they were 50 years ago. The study cites people’s heavier weight, pollution, stress, and smoking as possible factors explaining the shrinkage. But Rush instead blamed it on feminists, saying:
I don’t buy this. I think it’s feminism. I think if it’s tied to the last 50 years, the average size of a member is 10 percent smaller than 50 years, it has to be the feminazis, the chickification and everything else.
Robert Reich has two interesting new articles in his blog that you should read.
The first one is an analysis of why Romney is losing the election. The conservatives are already trying to spin this as Romney’s fault. He is a bad politician running a poor campaign, and most of all, he isn’t conservative enough. He shouldn’t run from his statements about 47% of Americans being slackers, he should double down!
But that explanation doesn’t hold much water. If Romney is the problem, then why are other Republican candidates also dropping in the polls? Just a few months ago, Republicans were set to take over the Senate and increase their hold on the House. Now it looks like Democrats can hold the Senate, and some wishful thinkers are even talking about taking back the House.
Instead Reich argues that the Republican Party is the problem:
Americans are finally beginning to see how radical the GOP has become, and are repudiating it.
The Republican primaries, and then the Republican convention, have shown America a party far removed from the “compassionate conservatism” the GOP tried to sell in 2000. Instead, we have a party that’s been taken over by Tea Partiers, nativists, social Darwinists, homophobes, right-wing evangelicals, and a few rich people whose only interest is to become even wealthier.
These regressives were there in 2000, to be sure. They lurked in the GOP in the 1990s, when Newt Gingrich took over the House. They were there in the 1980s, too, although Ronald Reagan’s sunny disposition gave them cover. In truth, they’ve been part of the GOP for more than half a century — but never before have they held so much sway in the party, never before have they called the shots.
Romney’s failing isn’t that he’s a bad candidate. To the contrary, he’s giving this GOP exactly what it wants in a candidate. And that’s exactly the problem for Romney — as it is for every other Republican candidate — because what the GOP wants is not at all what the rest of America wants.
The second article gives four compelling reasons why Romney still might win the election.
First, who knows what will happen with the economy. Did anyone predict that the economy was about to crater just before the 2008 election? Would Obama have won if it hadn’t?
Second, Romney has an advantage in the debates. Obama’s strength in the 2008 election was not at the debates, where he could come off as slow and ponderous. He also has not been in a debate in four years, while the Republicans had more primary debates than anyone cares to remember, providing Romney lots of experience. Plus Romney has had plenty of time to practice recently, while Obama has a more-than-fulltime job.
Third, the Republicans still have LOTS of money to throw at this election. Seriously.
And finally, the Republicans have repeatedly shown that they will do anything to win an election. Have we already forgotten what happened to Gore in Florida? Eleven states have enacted voter ID laws specifically designed to suppress the turnout of Democratic turnout. And there are still plenty of Diebold voting machines in use.
Sarah Silverman on Voter Suppression Laws. Caution, contains quite a few obscenities.
Romney once said that he always pays the taxes that the law requires — no more, no less — and “if I had paid more [taxes] than are legally due I don’t think I’d be qualified to become president.” But in his newly released tax returns, Romney deducted only $2.25 million of his $4 million in charitable donations. Why did he do that? Because if he had deducted all that he was entitled to, his effective tax rate would have been under ten percent.
Meanwhile, even Paul Ryan in 2010 called the Cayman Islands “the place you hide your money” even though Romney claims that the money he has there is not hidden. So why did he put it there?
After Citizens United opened the floodgates for political money, will Romney’s presidential campaign go down in history as proving that you can’t buy any election just by throwing unlimited amounts of money at it?
UPDATE: The Wall Street Journal has an article “Super PAC Influence Falls Short of Aims“. Their conclusion is “So far, these super PACs are looking less than super.”
“Mitt Romney said the 47 percent of people who don’t pay taxes are going to vote for Obama. You know what that means? He’s going to vote for Obama.” – Jay Leno
“If you take the 47 percent that Mitt Romney says pay no taxes and add that to the people who Obama says cling to their guns and religion, that’s the whole country right there.” – Jay Leno
“Mitt Romney said if he had Mexican parents, he’d have a better shot of winning… But unfortunately Romney was tragically held back by being born of rich white people.” – Conan O’Brien
“All of these political strategists are trying to explain why Mitt Romney can’t seem to get his message out. I’m no strategist but it’s hard to talk with both a silver spoon and a foot in your mouth.” – Jay Leno
“Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan told the crowd at the Values Voter Summit that if President Obama wins, there’s no going back. So basically what he said was, once you go black, you can’t go back.” – Jay Leno
“It is high time that the GOP stop trying to appeal to smart people – and letting Rick Santorum in front of a microphone is a great place to start.” – Stephen Colbert (on Santorum’s remarks that “smart people will never be on our side”)
“A Pakistani man died yesterday after inhaling fumes from burning an American flag. Good! Thank you. See, let me show you how incredible that is. We don’t have to defend the American flag. It can defend itself.” – Jay Leno
Saturday Night Live asks a very important question, and they want answers!
I’m off camping for the weekend and won’t have any internet access. Back Sunday night. Besides, I need a break from the longest, most annoying presidential race in history.
God commanded “Thou shalt not kill”. Four words, each of one syllable. Could he spell it out any clearer?
Jon Stewart on Fox News defending Romney’s video comments calling 47% of Americans “freeloaders”:
I know they believe that the best defense is a (good?) offense, but um, seriously? “This is factually accurate, what Romney is saying.” ??? “I don’t understand what the controversy is. I think Mr. Romney should campaign on this point.” ??? “If I’m governor Romney, I run with this all day long!” ??? “It was the truth!” ??? “He’s a boss who says the truth, but the truth often hurts.” ??? “I think this will be seen as a win for Romney.”
It appears that Romney has the decency to not actually believe his own bullshit. But Fox News?
“Mitt Romney said if he had Mexican parents, he’d have a better shot of winning… But unfortunately Romney was tragically held back by being born of rich white people.” – Conan O’Brien
“Mitt Romney was here meeting with the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. He’s looking for a housekeeper for his place in La Jolla.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Mitt Romney is in Los Angeles today for a fundraiser. So that’s one more handsome guy in L.A. auditioning for a role he probably won’t get.” – Conan O’Brien
“Mitt Romney was on ‘Live With Kelly and Michael.’ At one point Mitt was asked what he wears to bed. He said as little as possible. It’s the same philosophy that Mitt has in regard to paying taxes.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Mitt also admitted on the show that his guilty pleasures are peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and chocolate milk. Even his guilty pleasures are boring.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Mitt Romney is trailing in the polls. After being accused of being too vague, Romney’s campaign team says they will start being more specific. When asked when, they said, ‘Soon-ish’.” – Conan O’Brien
“On Saturday, Mitt Romney took some time off from campaigning to watch his grandson’s soccer game. Though it got awkward when one team pulled their goalie and Romney was like, ‘Look at that – another job lost under President Obama.'” – Jimmy Fallon
“According to the Labor Department, unemployment fell from 8.3 percent to 8.1 percent last month. But that’s because 368,000 Americans gave up looking for work. Today, President Obama said that’s a step in the right direction, and he is encouraging more Americans to give up looking for work.” – Jay Leno
“President Obama is attending a fundraiser in New York hosted by Jay-Z and Beyonce. Michelle is hoping Beyonce will sing ‘All the Single Ladies,’ while Obama is worried Biden will get up and sing ‘Bootylicious'” – Jimmy Fallon
“Today is the one-year anniversary of occupying Wall Street protests. Remember those? They stomped out greed forever.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“It’s Opening Day of the U.N in New York… Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is here. He says he hates gay people and he hates Jews. Boy is he in the wrong town.” – David Letterman
“I’m watching the news, and I see these protesters in countries like Egypt, Afghanistan, Tunisia. They’re all burning American flags. Where are they getting all these flags? If you hate us so much, how do you have a large supply of flags on hand?” – Jay Leno
“Anti-American crowds have been protesting and burning American flags over that anti-Islamic film. And the U.S. is now bracing for more protests next week when the film comes out on Blu-ray.” – Jay Leno
“All over the world people are chanting, ‘Death to America.’ Except in China, where they’re chanting, ‘Not until we get our money back’.” – Jay Leno
“Arnold Schwarzenegger has written a new book about his affair with his Hispanic housekeeper, and the book is actually called ‘Total Recall.’ In response, she’s written a book about their affair called ‘Alien vs. Predator.'” – Conan O’Brien
I keep thinking about something David Brooks said about Romney — “Personally, I think he’s a kind, decent man who says stupid things because he is pretending to be something he is not — some sort of cartoonish government-hater.” I think part of the reason Romney is turning out to be such a inept politician is because — even though he is clearly willing to say whatever people want him to say — the level of scrutiny that is applied to presidential candidates has made it painfully obvious to everyone that he doesn’t really believe most of the stuff he is saying, and he can’t hide that. He could get away with not believing what he was saying as a businessman, and even most of the time as a governor. Not just because the level of scrutiny was lower, but the demands required of him by today’s Republican party to toe the crazy party line is so much higher.
A key is the way Romney phrased it in the video: “My job is is not to worry about those people.” He justifies it as a job. It is a role he is playing, like an actor in a TV show. It’s not about what he himself believes. It is just a job and his boss is the Republican party. And if they believe that “All Democrats are moochers, and all moochers are Democrats” he’ll say his lines and tell them what they want to hear.
Michael Tomasky put it this way in a really interesting article:
In a way, it’s not even mostly Romney’s fault. It’s the fault of the party and movement that introduced and spread this toxic propaganda in the first place. When Romney is licking his wounds on Nov. 7, that party and movement will fire all its arrows at him. He’ll deserve a lot of them. But they will have buried him with the ignorance and rage they demanded he adopt. His chief crime will have been his weakness in failing to confront them.
Of course, Etch-a-sketch Romney would never have confronted them, which is why the right finally gave in and nominated Romney even though they definitely do not like him. Because they thought he was their tool — they could pull his strings and he would say whatever they wanted him to say. They did the same thing with Dubya.
And that’s what’s really sad. The movement conservatives are already trying to convince themselves that the reason Romney is losing is because he isn’t conservative enough. The National Review even applauded Romney’s comments in the video as the most expressly conservative thing he has said since entering the race. It is unclear if they will ever figure out that being hard-line hateful ideologues is not the solution, it is the problem.
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