The 2012 Elections Thread - Page 88

Honesty is seldom valued in politicians. Mondale blew it in '84 when he said "President Reagan will raise taxes. So will I. He won't tell you that. I just did."

I agree with you, Spook.  His administration and policies were not without their issues, but Carter is probably one of the more underrated presidents of recent memory.  He doesn't get nearly as much appreciation as he deserves, even from within his own party.  I suppose that unwillingness to be completely associated with his legacy is understandable, because Carter didn't quite have the appeal of Reagan that has allowed the latter to be safely hailed and essentially turned into a deity by Republicans, but Carter was the better president and deserves a somewhat more respectful reputation.

 

The militarism of the Reagan years was, at absolute best, lighting a furnace to burn a hair. The USSR was a crumbling joke by then. Reagan could have sat back and done nothing and it still would have collapsed--maybe a little later than it did, but even with that it's hard to say. He fixed on a strategy that JUST HAPPENED to involve an orgy of payoffs for the military-industrial complex, pursued policies (like funding the muhajideen) that have come back to bite the world in the ass since, and allowed the right to push through their agenda something fierce. Anyone who thinks there was ever any intention of rolling back military spending after the Berlin Wall came down simply hasn't been paying attention for the last century of American history, and particularly not the last decade or so. It was absolutely the equivalent of today's "9/11, therefore we need warrantless wiretapping and Guantanamo Bay and to throw money at Blackwater and Halliburton." It took the hawks a decade to come up with a new enemy, but it's exactly the same principle.

Well people forget that Carter experienced a Hype Bubble not dissimilar to Obama. Running for office he was touted as an Evangelical Christian who was going to sweep out all the older (Read: Watergate era) corrupt politicians, and sweep in an new era of honestly etc etc. And he did what he promised: he brought in a group of people into his Administration who had no experience in Washington, with the results you'd expect. By the end of his term, his honesty was perceived as arrogance and narrowness of mind.

 

And that "Honest" talk while wearing sweaters was the worst possible way to frame Green Power. The worst. Instead of telling people to turn down their thermostats in the dead of winter and wearing a sweater, how about encouraging people to INSULATE THEIR FRIGGING HOUSES! And while they were at it, put up some Solar Panels too (though I'll admit solar panel efficiency was no where near what it is today). Both statements would encourage people to act in a positive manner, rather than cower under their beds.

 

<oh and if you think the above is unrealistic, just look at the current state of alternative energy: cost per kw for solar is going down every year, Wind Farms are producing more power, Natural Gas (once we deal with Frakking issues) could make the US energy independant), etc etc All of that could have started in the 70's. It's great Carter put Solar Panels on the roof of the White House: too bad he didn't follow it up with anything substantive)>

 

And I think both Carter and Reagan were honest about what they thought of America and were willing to communicate their opinion. 

I'd like to take a break from Carter Vs. Reagan CHUD Rematch #1,024 and remind people of why they should vote for Obama this Fall:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3PuHGKnboNY&feature=PlayList&p=426831BC08A165DC&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=3

I'm casting my vote for Obama because, as strongly critical as I've been of quite a number of his policies (pertaining to foreign policy in particular) and as much as I would love to be in the position to vote for a better, more substantive and principled progressive candidate who doesn't seem to be a more centrist Bush-lite at times, a Mitt Romney victory would by far be worse.  There are going to be enough challenges this election cycle, and the results may be too uncomfortably close in the end, to risk helping the Republicans win by not casting a vote due to indifference or giving it to a candidate who has no chance to be competitive, as much as I'd love to see some changes in the system and have the option to vote against both of the main candidates without feeling like tossing away my vote.

Lord Mittens of Romney is totes going to win it because there are secret polling results from 600 people:

 

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2012/08/06/the_real_numbers.html

 

600 people each in 13 states though!  So that's ... still less than 8,000 people.  Yep, it's over.

 

Also, it's Dick Morris. His relationship to the truth could be called mercurial, at best.

This just in: reporting on Romney makes him look bad (wonderful comments too).

 

http://www.cjr.org/swing_states_project/mitt_romney_new_al_gore.php?page=all

 

And in case you needed a reason not to eat at Papa John's (apart from their pizza):

 

http://gawker.com/5932557/papa-john-warns-pizza-prices-will-rise-under-obamacare

Edited by MrBananaGrabber - 8/7/12 at 1:38pm

 

Wait a minute.  Why is it the responsibility of the press to break the cycle the article talks about?  Romney's the one making goofs and then being too embarrassed to just laugh and nod and accept the jibes before moving on....

Edited by teledork - 8/7/12 at 2:32pm

I think it's that it's coming from a place of vindictiveness on the part of the reporters rather than pure journalism.

Still, it is the story.  What else is there to talk about if he's shutting down access?

I wouldn't argue that.  But the press will turn on people for lots of different reasons, right?  In this case, the article mentions (specifically) that the feeling is he's inauthentic.  If I were a reporter on this tour I'd likely buy into that, as well.  But that doesn't mean it wouldn't be in his best interest to court the 5th Estate a bit and do some damage control.  

 

I think back to Bob Dole, and how he managed the press.  Or, more accurately, didn't manage the press.  He was so uptight and vicious that they eventually settled on a "Dracula" motif for him.  Then he did SNL afterwards and managed to show a little humor and a little charm and a modicum of grace and there were LOTS of quotes along the lines of "If he'd have been more like that in the campaign, he'd have come off looking much better."  We know the good governor has the best handlers money can buy, right?  Is there no one there who can say "Hey, Mr Romney?  Talk to them.  Fess up if you have to.  Your peoples out there will eat it up."?

 

Maybe he's being inauthentic.  Maybe he really is a Borg and is terrified of what people in the goddamned heartland will think of him calling himself "Locutus".  But he could spin that in his favor so easily if he'd just quit being a moron and start letting the press, and by extension their readers/viewers/listeners, know him a bit more.

I think the press corps picked up that Romney is an ass:

 

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/413073/april-23-2012/mitt-romney-s-picnic-gaffe

 

I laughed hard, but then my eye kept being drawn back to this gif. That intense flair up in his face is creeping me the hell out. If it isn't animating, click on it.

 

Romney doesn't need assistance from the press in coming across as an ass. Just days after insulting every living Palestinian by crediting Israel's relative economic success to its cultural superiority (as opposed to generations of brutal oppression of the Palestinian people), Romney today used Israel's economic model as an example of precisely the sort of socialism that would be beneath America.

The guy was wearing a yarmulke a week ago, doing his best to imitate a mournful, contemplative expression at the Waling Wall for the benefit of the press photographers, and now he's flip-flopping on Israel. Israel served its purpose to Romney. It provided a stage for him to tell Bible Belt voters that the black muslim in the White House isn't doing as much as he could to accelerate Armageddon, because that's what those crackers like to hear. The trip is forgotten now, save for how the sight of functioning, sustainable collectivism in a foreign country stuck in Romney's craw. He hasn't got a sincere bone in his body. He believes in nothing. Of course the press on the campaign trail have picked up on it, they have more exposure to the guy than I would be able to stand.

Rafalca out of the Olympics.  Ann Romney continues to back the wrong horse.

 

I always read that as the Doctor Who character:

 

 

Sigh.  Mitt.

 

You just want this too badly and will say anything to get it.  It's like dating a girl.  You can't let her know you want her so badly that you'll do or say anything to get all up in there.  You have to romance her while playing hard to get. If she smells desperation, she's out.

 

And Mitt, you stink.

 

I'm not saying Obama wants to be President any less than Romney, I'm sure Obama wants to be elected just as badly as Mitt does.  But all successful Presidential candidates take a page from George Washington and act reluctant when it comes to running.  You're only doing this because your country "needs you."  You don't want to leave your life on the farm; you have to do it because you're needed.  If Mitt eased up a bit and developed a little more game, he wouldn't have such trouble with the press.

 

Perhaps this is why all of our Presidents have been ladies men, to some extent?  Mitt's been with the same girl since high school; he never had time to develop that game.

 

 

You know, that is actually a great insight.

Are the fellow Democrats in this thread having as hard of a time defending our party lately as I am? First, Harry Reid should shut the fuck up about those ten-years tax returns bullshit. Then we've got this pro-Obama Super PAC ad that (horribly, eroneously) lays the blame of a woman's death on Romney's feet. You even have assholes like this guy going into Chick Fill-A to brow beat the $5 an hour cashier, making himself look like an incredible self-righteous dickbag.

Stop it. STOP IT. STOP IT!

 

We're better than this, Democrats. And if we're not, we should be. This is frankly disgusting and is adding nothing to the already vanishing level of quality political discourse in this country. Stop arguing conservative ideas with lazy memes, with self-righteous protests, and "Birth Certificate" levels of meaningless hearsay and slander. Fight them with ideas and ideals, with facts, with thought out arguments and reason. We might not win, but this isn't fucking Monday night football. What good is winning if we're ultimately going to compromise the value and morality of our argument with horrible, misleading nonsense? 

 

I feel you here, I really do, but I'm put in mind of Sam Elliott's rejoinder to the exact same words in The Contender: "No, we're not better than that."

 

I wish fighting them with ideas and ideals worked. But the high ground is a good place to get bulldozed. Believe me, I agree with you. But you can't bring a knife to a gun fight. That's not the Chicago way.

 

There's bringing a knife to a gun fight and then there's bringing a nuke. Fighting like like is going to have fallout. Trying to convince a voter who is one the fence to vote for Obama because Romney killed a woman is not going to convince them, especially since all the media can talk about right now is how pathetic and untrue an ad that is. And the Chick Fil-A guy? Look, I hate that fucking company, but did you watch that video? Do you really think that's how we're supposed to combat corporate homophobia? If there aren't better ways then that than we deserve to lose.

 

I feel that the democratic political philosophy is morally, ethically, economically superior to the modern conservative movement. That might not be how you win elections, and I understand there has to be a level of fighting dirty when it comes to politics. This isn't fighting dirty, it's fighting stupid. 

The Daily Show quite rightly eviscerated that guy last night.  

 

That Priorities USA super-pac ad will could very well end up doing more harm than good. I hope the people behind that ad are aware of their fuckup.

 

We can't have "dumb" political ads...

 

While I don't necessarily have a problem with 'attack' ads, they have to be 'smart' and 100% accurate in order to withstand the microscopes they are put under these days. 

The Chick Fil A guy I'm with you on but the other stuff?   I for one love (LOVE) that Harry Reid is doing what he's doing.   The Republicans and not the Democrats opened the door to conspiracy theories being fair game in politics.   I'm enjoying the GOP party establishment going apeshit over Harry Reid and how he's a "Dirty Liar".   I'm sure Reid's source lives somewhere between here and there and up his ass but it's still fun political theater and it keeps the issue alive.

 

Keep in mind that Romney has more money than the GDP of a small nation on hand for the general so while it's unsavory, it's absolutely important to define Romney negatively now before he can unleash the same deluge of ads that sunk Bachman, Gingrich, and Santorum.   If there's anything that disappoints me about the leadership in the Left is that it's taken them 12 years to start playing hardball.

You realize we spend a good majority of this thread talking shit about a conservative population that kisses the ass of their party no matter what type of bullshit they feed them, right? If that's hardball, you can leave me out and if Harry Reid's baseless bullshit is your idea of  "fun political theater" then it already seems our party is going that route.  You can attack Romney for a lot of things. Yes, he has a lot of money. Possibly if people saw ten years of his tax returns, saw that he pays less taxes than most of us, puts his money into foreign savings accounts, etc,  that would damage his reputation (somewhat --- plenty on the right would champion his sound businesses decisions). But insisting that he didn't pay taxes for ten years? Who in their right fucking mind would run for President without paying taxes for ten years? Come on. 

The reason the tax return thing is still an issue and that Harry Reid is able to exploit it so much is because Romney refuses to release them.   Chances are there's nothing there or if there is something there, it might occupy 1 or two news cycles and then the press would get bored with it.   Unless it's something really scandalous like Romney not paying any taxes through loopholes in the tax system.   Even that would die down after a week or so and is easily countered by Romney extoling all the charitable work he does.   My guess is that he's not releasing them because he just doesn't want to.

 

The reality is that for the last 12 years or so, Democrats have been taking the high road and eschewing what they see as tactics that are below them.   Guess what?   They tend to lose.   Also, just because Dems are using the tactics of the GOP doesn't mean they are moral equals.   It just means they are using the strategy to expose truths instead of telling lies like the other side.   This is how the game is played today.   I would rather have my side win by nefarious means and govern well than just be noble, beatiful losers.

 

What a bunch of cowardly, defeatist nonsense.  "All our lies are for good and noble ends, while theirs are sick and twisted and smell like farts."  "We may have stolen the election, but we'll make up for it when we're in office."  Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.  If we aren't going to hold ourselves to basic standards of behavior, we don't deserve to win shit, much less govern shit.

 

Oh, and the Democrat is the incumbent in this election, and got there by running an unusually idealistic, high-minded campaign.  At least save the weak ass, we-can't-afford-to-have-standards excuses for when we're actually losing.

It's not defeatist, it's pragmatic.   And who says I endorse lying like the Republicans?   You can use tactics like "swift boating" and "whisper campaigns" and still be truthful.   The fact is that these tactics work.  I haven't seen the ad about Romney killing a woman by laying her off (wouldn't support that if that's the assertion the ad is making) and I don't condone browbeating a Chick Fil A employee but guilty as charged in keeping the tax return issue alive if only because it puts Romney on defense.   And who's to say that Harry Reid doesn't have a credible source or if you want to play a deeper game that the source isn't a plant from the Romney campaign?

 

I will admit that the fact Obama won last time gave me hope but let's keep things in perspective.   A few things happened that swept Obama into power....

 

1.  McCain was not a strong candidate.

2.  Palin, while she gave the top of her ticket some heat for a bit, imploded spectacularily in the home stretch and weakened McCain.

3.  The economy self destructed in September and McCain botched it.

4.  We had 8 years of Bush.

 

If only one of those things didn't happen, you might have a different president today.   The Hope and Change thing helped and energized people but this could have easily gone another way.

 

EDIT:   I will add that I would LOVE to have a campaign based on who has the best ideas and who would govern best.   I thought for sure we would have an election like that last time with McCain vs. Obama but then the Celebrity Ad and then Palin and then the Tea Party showed up and that dream was dashed for a generation.   I'm just saying that there's no harm in using the same tactics Republicans use to dissemenate information and define the opposition if it's above the belt and is truthful.   It's a different game today and Dems need to sack up.

Edited by dynamotv - 8/8/12 at 2:34pm

 

Like how Obama "refused to release his birth certificate" you mean?

One is a time honored tradition started by George Romney and embraced by both parties, the other is the product of racist conspiracy theories.   I wish I could join in and slap Harry Reid's wrist for bringing himself low by adopting the same tactics as the birthers but I take a little joy in seeing the GOP get a taste of their own medicine.  

Nobody releases ten years of tax returns. Nobody. 

Obama released 11 years.   Kerry released 20 years.   George Romney released 12 years.   I'm sure there's some I'm missing.  

I'm fine with Reid's attacks.  Perfectly fine with them.  If Romney wants to be childish and whine and prevent the public from seeing the same documents he let McCain see 4 years ago, then hit him and hit him hard.  Use the Lyndon B Johnson playbook and make him deny left and right if he doesn't release the documents.  Be mean, be ruthless.  He wants to lie about you?  Then paint him as untrustworthy and conniving.

 

Reid is forcing Romney into looking like someone with something to hide, and Romney can't release the documents now because the braindead American public treats "evolving with the times and circumstances like an adult does" as "flip-flopping" and the GOP understands that.  Hell, they've been trumpeting that ideal for years, and now it's come to bite them on the ass.

 

That said, that Super PAC ad is fucking dumb, but really that's part for the course because all Super PAC ads are completely awful.  It's not awful on the level of running ads in the south accusing your opponent of siring an illegitimate bi-racial child, but still awful.

 

Also fuck that Chik-Fil-A guy.  Hey, douchebag.  Stop harassing the clerk at the drive-thru.

One of the fascinating aspects of the Reid story is that Reid is a Mormon, himself. If his confidential source at Bain Capital really exists, then that someone is likely a Mormon as well. This is pressure coming from within his religious community to disclose the docs. Mormons are expected to give a tenth of their incomes to the church, which means that you should be able to look at the amounts Romney has been tithing over the years, add a zero, and you'd have his true, total income. So would the IRS. That's if he's not hiding money, which he definitely has been.

The narrative that lies in the margins here is that if Romney has spent his adult life squirreling money away overseas in order to hide it from the tax man, it's likely that he's been shortchanging his church as well. What this would say about his character is damaging enough to GOP voters outside the LDS; but this also creates for Romney a risk that the Mormon voters he's counting on in Utah, Arizona, and California could choose a protest candidate or simply stay home on election night.

And he'd still rather weather the damage from sitting on the returns than the damage from disclosing them.
Edited by Reasor - 8/8/12 at 9:35pm

Wait... God has a flat tax?

 

And I would agree with you that if it were any election prior to the '10 cycle, Obama can just coast to victory.   Unfortunately, we live in a post-Citizens United world where a handful of Billionaires can spend as much as they'd like to get their man in office.   Make no mistake.   Obama and the Democratic Party are preparing for a media onslaught the likes of which we've never seen.   Even with a tragically horrible candidate like Romney, one still has to worry about him because he's going to have more money on hand than the incumbent and that's alot of airtime and dirty tricks that can be bought.

 

When I say "whisper campaigns" and "swiftboating", I'm referring to the tactics as they are commonly known.   What Obama is doing with Romney's business experience is make that a liability instead of an asset for Romney.   The most famous case is "Swift Boat Veterans For Truth" that did trade in lies but it doesn't need deceit to work.   It just needs a smart enough campaign manager to make your strength a weakness.   The "Celebrity" ad was an attempt at this tactic.

 

I have to think after 4 years of dealing with the Republicans, Obama has given up on his post partisanship dreams and faced reality.   It's 4 years and a watered down Health Care bill too late but better late than never.

LOL

 

it would appear that a Romney spokeswoman, Andrea Saul has not helped in de-bunking of this Super-pac commercial-

If Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal was waiting for a phone call from the Romney campaign, asking him to be their Vice Presidential nominee, he can stop waiting. His state's school voucher program has proven a taxpayer-funded godsend for private schools whose agendas have more to do with religious indoctrination than teaching actual science, history, or math.

Plenty of highlights from the Bob Jones University printed textbooks being used in these schools can be found at the link above, but here's my favorite:

"[The Ku Klux] Klan in some areas of the country tried to be a means of reform, fighting the decline in morality and using the symbol of the cross. Klan targets were bootleggers, wife-beaters, and immoral movies. In some communities it achieved a certain respectability as it worked with politicians."—United States History for Christian Schools, 3rd ed., Bob Jones University Press, 2001

 

Well that is patently false.  A quick google search would easily prove you wrong.  And as far as Obama's Super Pac ads, fine by me.  Citizen's United changed the playing field in a major way, and if Obama and his team were to wash their hands of this dirty Super Pac business and just disarm from that fight, they would get absolutely blown out of the water.  The amount of money being raised by conservative Super Pac's will/is dwarf whatever Obama's team manages to come up with, partly because many Liberals, such as yourself, find is so distasteful.  I understand that, but I'd rather see Obama win a second term and be able to appoint a few more Supreme Court Justices, and not have Medicare turned into a voucher program.  If that means embracing Super Pac's for the time being, so be it.

 

 

 

And Harry Reid is damn genius, as far as I’m concerned.  It’s hard nosed and morally questionable, but it's brilliant politics.  Romney is can either let it go unanswered, which is a win for Obama, or he can address and call Reid out, thus drawing more attention to the issue, which is also a win for Obama.

This is a great read which hits on some of the topics being discussed.  As someone who was incredibly frustrated by how easily John Kerry was defined and smeared by the GOP in 2004, Obama’s political toughness, some may call it nastiness, is a welcome sight.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/01/opinion/raines-whining-republicans/index.html

There are no unimportant elections.  If you wait for one where nothing much is at stake to try to clean up politics, you get...more or less what we have now.  

 

And man, I'm getting tired of seeing folks here pissing themselves at the mere thought of this deluge of negative ads that have been coming any day now for the last 6 months.  Guess what, the only one playing dirty right now is your guy.  Oh, I'm sure we'll see some really objectionable shit from the Romney campaign in the next few months, but something tells me that the ones most outraged by that will be the ones applauding Obama for playing hardball right now.

 

And I actually think Reid's initial comment was, if not noble, at least a savvy attempt to goad Romney into releasing information that at the very least feed into the negative narrative about him.  But citing the rumor you started as proof of the innuendo involved is just sleazy and frankly insulting to the national intelligence.

Maybe this has been mentioned here before (perhaps even by me?) but does anyone else find it angering/amusing that many of the donors that are spending millions...MILLIONS! of dollars supporting the GOP and it's minions, are usually the ones bitching about the tax rates being too high? Is the irony lost on them?

 

Okay, I was wrong about the tax returns. 

 

So, you guys are all cool with Super Pacs all of a sudden. Cool. Great. It's shitty when the other guys do it, but once it's introduced, "fair ball!" Gotcha. Wonderful ethics, around here. I hope you're all that comfortable with the level of hypocrisy. It's going to be difficult to listen to you when you cite examples of it that you don't like in the future. 

 

Look, please stop schooling me on how politics and elections work. I'm not naive. I'm not twelve. But I'm frankly shocked and disgusted that you guys are all good with this stuff. It makes all the railing you do when conservatives do it so much more meaningless. 

 

Harry Red a genius. Hahahaha. Lets see if Romney's tax returns ever come out. 

I'm not crazy about some of the shit team Obama is pulling, and I'd like to think taking the high road would win the election. But this handwringing over "if we fight dirty, we don't deserve to win" is nonsense. Of course the Democrats deserve to win. For all their problems, they're a party of tolerance made up of a healthy, vast array of viewpoints, devoted to functional government, with people in their midst (maybe only a few, but enough) devoted to stemming the tide of unchecked corporatism and environmental pillaging. They're the only bastion of progressive politics in the US. They're, in short, less evil. A little "swift boating" doesn't fucking change that. (Let's bear in mind that the Republicans, who are getting a pass in this thread for not running violently negative ads, are all the while trying to subvert democracy through voting registration laws, and they have an array of propaganda channels who can make up whatever horrible shit they want about Obama and the left without consequences. I'm not sure where we're getting the idea that they're not fighting dirty this cycle.)

 

The problem with the Republicans isn't that they "fight dirty". It's that they use these dirty-fighting techniques to advance a horrifically awful agenda that is actively destroying the US. Fighting dirty to advance a positive agenda is a whole other kettle of fish.

For all this talk about people being fine with that Super Pac ad and how the Dem's have to "fight dirty", nobody is owning up to the blow-back that ad could have. It's one thing if you have this "anything to win" mentality, but do you guys really think that ad is going to help Obama win? Everyone in the media is talking about how distasteful it is. And people aren't going to think it matters if Obama is directly related to it or not. Democratic agenda=Obama at this point. That includes Super Pac ads. Lying about other candidates is one thing, but lying about what something a candidate doing leading to a woman's death? With that much false equivalency going on? That's a huge fuck up and is only going to lose points for Obama and the Dem's in the long run. Mark my words. 

 

Again, there is fighting dirty (a natural aspect of politics in general) and there is fighting stupid (the strategy the Democrats seem to be up to lately). 

 

Reid can lie all he wants about Romney's taxes. The first story might keep the tax question in the headlines, but the rest of the stories are going to be about how Reid has no proof other than his baseless accusations. That's going to hurt the democrats, and Romney is nowhere near closer to releasing his tax returns.

That Super-Pac ad? Have you guys even seen it? I'm not talking about all Super Pac ads I'm talking about THAT Super Pac ad. Watch it and tell me with a straight face that you think it's a good idea and I'll say it again; you're a fool. 

 

I didn't buy this line of argument from Dick Cheney, and I don't buy it from the rest of you.

 

 

Still voting for Obama, btw.  

It's kind of weird to say "oh well the Republicans haven't been running negative stuff yet so we look like real shitheels" when the right has spent the last FOUR YEARS running negative stuff. Birth certificates, death panels, "don't retreat, reload", the continued existence of Joe Arpaio as an elected official...and yet, Harry Reid, an admitted buffoon, makes a few pointedly nasty remarks about Romney dodging the kind of scrutiny that *every candidate faces*, and the Democrats deserve to lose. I mean, come ON. Reid's being a confrontational dick about it, but this isn't even on the same page as the ridiculous birther witchhunt. Call me when Dem lawmakers start making allusions to the eight wives Mittens has stashed in the family barn.