2012 republican presidential nominee III: can romney get santorum out of his hair?

well, I guess there had to be a scatty title to compensate for the absence of Dexfool.

intrade odds for iowa atm:
romney 43.7%
santorum 28.0%
paul 26.5%

I have passed through the seven stages of grief and faced grim reality: from Romney's perspective, it probably doesn't matter what order those three finish in, provided he's somewhere in the top three.

(Rejected thread titles): Is that a Santorum surge in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?

my krazy theory is the paul dudes are gonna coordinate their game so heavily that they win Iowa. then they're gonna be really super-pissed when it doesn't work in New Hampshire etc.

^^ imo, Paul's got a good shot at a top two finish in Iowa, because of how caucuses fit well with his campaign. If Santorum makes the top three it will make me giddy. Plz, god, give us Santorum, RuPaul and Newt, in that order.

yeah I voted paul, I wouldn't put money on it or anything but paul or santorum seems slightly more likely than romney

yeah I voted paul, I wouldn't put money on it or anything but paul or santorum seems slightly more likely than romney

Paul, but with Santorum a close second or gnawing Paul's head like Ugolino in the Inferno.

I think this a good explanation of why the easy explanation for what appears to be inevitable at his point is not necessarily the right explanation.

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/98942/kilgore-iowa

I love this!

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2012/01/the_iowa_horse_race_an_animation_of_the_republican_caucuses_as_a_horse_race_.html

(I just wish they'd stuck four or five women at the bottom of the screen, and had Herman's horse suddenly veer off the track in their direction.)

hahaha

I just think they all should be locked in a cage and let them fight it out thunderdome style. I personally might bet on Bachmann if they went that way.

U.S.A., your long national nightmare is about to be over--let the healing begin! I'm putting out an APB for Daniel, Esq. I don't think I can suffer the slings and arrows of other ILX'ers alone as I...giddily take an interest in this.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/click/2012/01/santorum-wears-vests-to-look-a-little-older-109416.html

I just really really need Paul to win tonight, pray the universe doent take this from me

has anyone compared him to tim tebow yet?

its a quality concept

I don't know, but my limited knowledge of football notwithstanding, Rick Perry's right out of North Dallas Forty.

nice people http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57350990-503544/santorum-targets-blacks-in-entitlement-reform

on the one hand, quelle surpise

on the other hand, this dude really does not want to actually be President, huh

all signs point to him being an extremely clueless guy

I don't care for his sweater look AT ALL.

http://media.salon.com/2011/12/santy3-460x307.jpg

dude looks like Prince Charles

hah he does

kinda lol, mostly sad <--- Santorum 2012 campaign slogan

Mmmmmmmmm....feral.

http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/01/newt-romneys-a-liar-but-hes-still-better-than-obama.php?ref=fpnewsfeed

it's weird, like he was clearly the last kid picked on the team for this game, but that just happened to be well timed w/ the iowa caucus

Really need Mittens to wrap this up quickly so that 10 months of two near-identical corporatists "debating" completely delegitimizes the Republicrat oligarchy.

I thought we tried that approach in 2000 and 2004.

newts abt to let bad newt out, you know its been killing him

HAY HAY NOW MORBS dont try to take this from us

also lol @ yr whole theory

only have to get another 5% to notice to fuck some shit up

lagoon better not be dexneb

fuck shit up, noble goal, v inspiring, brimming w/insight

I think today should be about positivity. Mitt, and Rick, and most of all the people of Iowa would want it that way. (Newt gets a pass.)

please for my sanity, stop using variants of the "dex" appellation to refer to gabbneb

"nobility, inspiration, insight" is what the War Criminal in Chief is for.

David Atkins on detestable Ron Paul; refutes Glenn Greenwald, Matt Stoller.

what dones dex refer to?

the sandbox name used by the DNC apologist

it's been kinda funny to see all these people who have liked the tip of paul's minarchism finally take a look at the rest of the black-helicopter iceberg

xp uh also a name used by DJP in the mists of time

^^^ this

ppl need to separate issues from individuals, esp when the individuals under discussion will never be elected

ie, Politicians Are Lower Than Whaleshit, All of Them

God Santorum is like the absolute nadir of that unique ignorance that poses as wisdom:

"I was at a debate with Howard Dean and we were asked what was the most imp quality of America and he said diversity. Diversity? Have you ever heard of e pluribus unum?....The greatness of America is people who are diverse coming together to be one," Santorum said. "If we celebrate diversity, we lay the groundwork for that conflict. We need to celebrate common values and have a president that lays out those common values."

dude Rick. the "e pluribus" part: that's a celebration of diversity. It's not "e pluribus, and fuck the pluribus now that we're unum, unum." the whole fucking point of the motto is that diversity means strength. you dumb cocksucker, you.

I think you meant "you dumb anal froth, you"

newts abt to let bad newt out, you know its been killing him

lol

"Newt to Iowa: 'You Stupid Motherfuckers, I'm Clearly Your Best Choice'"

god that Atkins post is mostly idiotic

the initial matt stoller post is worth reading but it does have some problems

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/12/matt-stoller-why-ron-paul-challenges-liberals.html

But this obscures the real question, of why Paul disdains the Fed (and implicitly, why liberals do not), and the relationship between the Federal Reserve and American empire. If you go back and look at some of libertarian allies, like Fox News’s Judge Napolitano, they will answer that question for you. Napolitano hates, absolutely hates, Abraham Lincoln. He sometimes slyly refers to Lincoln as America’s first dictator. Libertarians also detest Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

What connects all three of these Presidents is one thing – big ass wars, and specifically, war financing. If you think today’s deficits are bad, well, Abraham Lincoln financed the Civil War pretty much entirely by money printing and debt creation, taking America off the gold standard.

yeah, boo fuckin hoo

Politicians Are Lower Than Whaleshit, All of Them

― Dr Morbois de Bologne (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, January 3, 2012 11:27 AM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol you are exactly the average american voter

god that Atkins post is mostly idiotic

I disagree – he's mostly correct about liberalism.

so who is lagoon? seems 'worthy' of being pundneb

you seem worthy of googling ron paul

u r a bigger asshole than the average american voter

lol ultimate morbs zing alert, compare him to an american

Santorum on African-Americans:

"What President Obama wants to do, his economic plan is to make more people dependent upon government. To grow the government, To make sure we have more food stamps, and more SSI and more Medicaid. Four in 10 children are now on government-provided health care. It just keeps expanding," Santorum said.

He talked about how Iowa is going to get fined if more people don’t sign up for Medicaid and then said, "They're pushing harder and harder to get more and more of you dependent upon them so they can get your vote. That's what the bottom line is. So I don't want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else's money. I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn the money and provide for themselves and their families."

http://www.nationaljournal.com/2012-presidential-campaign/santorum-singles-out-black-people-as-dependent-on-government-20120102

yeah we talked about that a little an hour and a half ago (where "talked" should be interpreted as "shook our heads and had a rueful, slightly incredulous chuckle")

uh i don't think i even understand how the caucuses work on the gop side

http://caucuses.desmoinesregister.com/how-to-caucus/

go to a room, eat cookies, yell abt stuff

black people should under no circumstances be given anybody's money, is what i'm taking away here

i guess it is more like a straight vote. no weird group cutoff jawboning stuff, like the democrats do. haha.

xp

"they are giving you healthcare in order to buy your votes! get off the plantation!!!"

"you know rick that's actually a pretty good deal"

http://i.imgur.com/cxNBF.png

this graphic is somehow hilarious

when will these fucking government types stop saying dumb shit like "grow the government" like it's a hydrangea

why do the republicans not have a flag in their room do they hate america

re: that Atkins piece, his characterization of liberalism is pretty accurate, which is why i said it was only 'mostly' idiotic, but he evades greenwald and stoller's main points

"they are giving you healthcare in order to buy your votes! get off the plantation!!!"

sounds slightly better than the GOP deal where they take your vote and give you nothing

srsly if people actually got stuff for their votes the country would be a better place

lol otm

Youtube comments on that Santorum clip are mindboggling:

He didn't say the word "black," he stumbled over the wordd "people's lives." Listen very closely with your ears, not your imagination. If anything, it sounds like "balite" or "palite." Very definitely not "black."

So glad he wants to make polite peoples' lives better.

If anything, it sounds like "balite" or "palite."

haha wut

polite guys finish last again

re: that atkin's piece -- characterizing liberalism as being about "intervention" is so broad as to be useless.

When Abraham Lincoln and the North decided not to allow the nation of the Confederacy--and make no mistake, it was a separate nation with separate laws and an entirely separate culture--to secede from the Union, in large part because the North had an interest in ending slavery in the South and in striking down a competing agrarian economic system, that too was intervention by a superior force against a lesser force attempting to exploit the weak and powerless. To this day, many Southerners feel that their land is being occupied by an illegitimate and invading power, and theirs a Lost Cause that will rise again.

i mean there are about a dozen things wrong with this.

his whole deal is setting up a dumb duality: some bad state of affairs exists and liberalism in favor of "intervening" to stop it. and then ron paul doesn't like 'intervening' in anything which is why he is bad. this just isn't the right way to think about anything.

lol did the homie really just argue that the north "intervened" in the south

To this day, many Southerners feel that their land is being occupied by an illegitimate and invading power, and theirs a Lost Cause that will rise again.

The End.

Joel Perkins, Age 10.

can we go back to how Rick Santorum now magically never said "black people" in that video where is clearly saying "black people"

I love the comments saying he said "a lot" or "BLIGHT" because you know, there's a big problem in America's blight community

to this day many people believe many things

theirs a Lost Cause that will rise again

... how exactly does this work

it just come on

in large part because the North had an interest in ending slavery in the South and in striking down a competing agrarian economic system

yes this is er not quite acurate

"this ideology is hopeless, one day it will reign supreme"

Listen very closely with your ears, not your imagination

I think I heard the narrator for a Disney attraction use this line.

did we talk about Santorum's followup:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwYdXOAGXlc&feature=related

I see only one black guy in the original clip: the sound man. There appear to be a few polite people, and a couple who are blighted. So I'm pretty sure he says "polite" or "blight," zeroing in on the people who are in the room listening.

'ive seen that quote and i havent seen the context in which it was made' lol man you realize youre talking abt something you said

This man is a traet.

i mean you were THERE

it's weird, he does stumble over the word, as if he knows it's a stupid thing to say even as he's saying it

that's the normalness trying to contain the hosebeast within

Santorum and his campaign manager confer privately moments later:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2RKmVqnNdw

His kids are all growed up now or something:

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-waK_APFgTsk/TkbrAzzGCSI/AAAAAAAAIto/56p5FzqxLHA/s400/104.JPG

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-e6rdqhtvRTM/Tj3d4DzWhVI/AAAAAAAAIoQ/NC5c3g6jlvI/s400/053.JPG

From this, which includes this:

“Our prayers are paying off,” said 13-year-old Sarah Maria Santorum, whose father soon emerged from the throng, stood on a chair and addressed the crowd. …

“Our prayers are paying off.”

Understand that I wasn’t “interviewing” Sarah Santorum. We were just talking, and I made some remark about how huge the crowd was, and then she just said that sentence clear out of the blue. It made such an impression that I immediately jotted it down on a scrap of paper.

Advanced Reporting Seminar, for you newbies: You get the best quotes when you just talk to people, instead of interrogating them in a confrontational manner. Be informal and friendly, put people at ease and listen to what they say. You’ll learn a lot more that way, whether you get a quote or not, and people will say real honest stuff rather than reciting talking points.

But my memory is shaky and I’m bad with names, so when I sat down to write my column – in the deli department of the Hy-Vee grocery story, which has free WiFi – I wanted to make sure I had Sarah’s name and age right. And when I Googled her name, one of the results was that picture at the top of this post.

Yeah, it’s her: The Santorum kid who gave me that quote was the same girl who cried so helplessly on national TV that night in 2006 during her dad’s concession speech. I’d forgotten all about that, until I saw the picture. Then I remembered how the video clip had been played over and over on the news, and also on late-night comedy shows while people mocked the way Sarah and her family cried. And I remembered my wife saying how bad she felt while watching that little girl, hugging her doll, and crying for the whole world to see.

Amazing that I’d talked to her without recognizing her – a poised and cheerful young lady — as that same little girl. But even more amazing, I think she’s exactly right when she says, “our prayers are paying off.”

As I write this, the folks on “Fox and Friends” are marveling at how Santorum went from single digits in the polls to being a serious contender in the space of just a few days. Say what you will, I call it a miracle.

Aw, bless. The hangover'll be amusing.

why is she not holding a doll w/matching red eagle santorum shirt, i am confuse

why is this child, the product of an immaculate conception, wearing mini shorts?

Chance of Ron (or Rick), generally Mitt.

http://www.thestatecolumn.com/articles/iowa-weather-forecast-for-iowa-caucus-voting/

prays for sleet

Morbs, I'm sorry to say that, although the consequences of two near-identical corporatists "debating" for 10 months might be to completely delegitimize the Republicrat oligarchy, the more likely outcome is to just make most people so discouraged and unhappy that they give up and tune out politics entirely.

yes! and so it begins!

do you think it is likely that this will be a low-turnout election?

ELECT YOURSELF

(icey, I'm sorry I let you have it w/ both barrels, but enough w/ the username masquerades)

depends on the economy I think xp

lol no worries morbs

Let Herman Cain move you. Nationally.

lol

In Perry, Santorum gave his opinion that President Obama was more of a divisive figure than Richard Nixon, keeper of the enemies list: “I suspect President Nixon, although I don’t know, would talk and work with people and wouldn’t go out and demonize them as this president has done.”

Cain still claims he will endorse a candidate eventually — and in an “unconventional” manner in keeping with his “unconventional candidate” theme, to boot.

The mind reels at what this might entail.

http://www.newquaypeople.co.uk/images/localpeople/ugc-images/275722/Article/images/11027204/1825828.jpg

And yes--Nixon had a strict rule about demonizing his opponents.

do you think it is likely that this will be a low-turnout election?

Which sect is bigger, motivated haters of "the Kenyan socialist" or stayin-home 2008 Hopers whose fantasies were crushed?

Which sect is bigger, motivated haters of "the Kenyan socialist" or stayin-home 2008 Hopers whose fantasies were crushed?

in voting, positive motivations outweigh negative motivations every time, so 2008 Hopers for the win

uh, in this election they're BOTH negative, boss.

I would think that positively hating someone is a strong motivator...any chance you could take it over here for the next few hours, Morbius?

Indefinite Detention? But I Have Soccer Practice at 4: U.S. Politics 2012

no, I'm done. Enjoy your flea circus.

Hope, as they say, springs eternal. It's just another thing to drive you crzy.

uh, in this election they're BOTH negative, boss.

no. the people who want to vote for Obama will be more likely to vote than the people who want to vote against Obama. it's that simple.

ie you are vastly overestimating the number of 2008 Hopers whose fantasies have been crushed

I generally don't try to police threads. I just feel like tonight is about Rick Santorum's heroic struggle to keep black people off welfare.

interesting if true

xxp

I mean, keep slack purple off welfare.

yo, is the reason i can't just subscribe to jonathan chait's rss posts on ny mag but have to read that entire stupid blogs content bc they realize that if i could just subscribe to chait i wouldn't read the rest of the crap?

I like this:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2012/01/03/say-anything-to-take-us-out-of-this-gloom/

Especially the bits about how abortion is a subject using the same tactics and thinking that popped up during the satanic panic e.g. wild impossible unverifiable horrifying stories passed around by folks using them to backstop their own fucked belief systems, and no one is ever called on it.

Why I miss Herman Cain: he's on CNN tonight openly campaigning--not hinting, but listing his qualifications--for Secretary of Defense. Wild guess that Romney would pass.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Hmmm...better check your calendar, iatee.

haha yeah I know

nobody cheat and vote after tonight

I'm thinking the poll will be swarmed by Ron Paul supporters after midnight.

wish i could remember who i voted for

You closet WGPHF, you.

idk what that means, but i assume that's an acronym of what i called you on sandbox?

Yes--wild gossipy political horserace fiend. I must wear those words like a Scarlett Letter for the rest of my life.

oh plz. you're proud :)

It was "wild" that hurt my feelings. If you'd called me a judiciously gossipy political horserace fiend--a JGPHF--I'd have printed up business cards.

mordy i made a yahoo pipe rss thingy for chait

it is neither perfect nor particularly timely, but possibly better than nothing

(the one i tried to make for nabisco works less well)

ur objection is that your political gossip taste is more discriminating than the average gossipy political horserace fiend? fine, conceded. JGPHF it is.

xp thank u mookieproof!

I need to master the intricacies of emoticons.

_/\_\o/_/\_

Two witches and a bowling ball?

drowning in a shark-infested lake?

dingdingding ^^

Can you make it one of those little dancing gifs, with the Jaws theme overtop? That'd be cool.

Honestly, this is riveting. There's a lady in a green sweater counting out little green pieces of paper--"68, 69, 70, 71, 72"--and the CNN reporter explains what's happening: "She's finished counting, Wolf: 72."

It's almost cute:

Tagg Romney 08:58 PM ET
Just spoke in urbandale for my dad. Lots of support, felt great. Very different feel vs 2008!

Griffin Perry 08:58 PM ET
Just finished my caucus in Ankeny, IA. Lots of support and spoke between Paul and Thune. Hope I made @GovernorPerry proud!! Love you dad!

Your names are Tagg and Griffin, and the latter of you is not Griffin Dunne. Get fucked. (With each other, then see what happens.)

everyone get ready to google ron paul ive got a good feeling!

No human is named Tagg. There is no such person.

Good lord, look at this:

http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/hannity/sites/foxnews.com.on-air.hannity/files/images/040809_taggromney.jpg

I linked to this is another thread; he's real, and he's spectacular.

http://www.solameregroup.com/bio/item/1/

Not that Griffin is much better:

http://img.coxnewsweb.com/B/09/59/22/image_5122599.jpg

jamesoliphant Name of bar at Santorum hotel: "Loose Moose Saloon."

jamesoliphant Plenty of parking still available at Santorum event.

Mitt Romney -- younger, on 'roids, and a sodomite!

ivethirtyeight Nate Silver
Paul Hits 50 Percent on Intrade nyti.ms/y7HKL3
1 minute ago

Griffin looks like kind of a Michael Cera / Jonah Hill mashup.

isnt one of the palins named tagg too

Haha holy shit:

Ron Paul @RonPaul
@JonHuntsman we found your one Iowa voter, he's in Linn precinct 5 you might want to call him and say thanks.

damnnnn

You're thinking of Tonka Palin.

Ron Paul winning 52% of voters under 30, according to entrance polls.

lmao

trapp palin

Trapper Palin, MD.

sonned by a 76-year-old racist

sry it had to happen this way john huntsman

The Corner is a hoot.

k-lo must be afroth over the santorum surge

apt metaphor

Ha:

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/287086/people-have-forfeited-confidence-government-mark-krikorian

plz god i know we dont talk much but if the final results for tonight could finish in this order id be oh so appreciative

joshtpm Josh Marshall
9:20 PM Paul 24%, Santorum 23.2%, Romney 22.6%. 18% reporting. core.talkingpointsmemo.com/election/resul…
1 minute ago

man, this santorum surge really bubbled up out of nowhere, didn't it?

No human is named Tagg.

http://i.fanpix.net/images/orig/m/y/mywfqg6ocj676gcw.jpg

and by santorum surge i mean the frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex

The Santorum surge came suddenly after bottoming out early.

is there any evidence that totally insane republican primaries will depress support from independents?

I really wish Andrew Sullivan had given some more thought to the video he's got up top.

Adding to all this sex:

TinaKorbe
Wow. The top three are SO tight.

i already lynxd this on ilx today but in light of the recent events: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/jan/12/republicans-revolution/

With 24% in, wow: Santorum, 23.2/Romney, 23.2/Paul, 23.0.

And Cain beating Roemer, 10 votes to 8.

yeah, i read that effing lilla review of the corey robin book. i guess lilla's probably right and is a lot smarter than me, but i hate him.

id like to take a moment to speak to the great state of new hampshire if i can: listen i know everyone is saying youve settled on romney, and if that is truly yr choice i respect it, but i really think you should take a second to google ron paul, hes a perfect fit for all you grumpy ass nutjobs, he IS a grumpy ass nutjob, you were made for each other, thank you

that is so otm; new hampshire is insane

why are vt and nh so dissimilar

nh is upside down

nh raised by wolves

@JonHuntsman we found your one Iowa voter, he's in Linn precinct 5 you might want to call him and say thanks.

Ice cold.

http://www.google.com/elections/ed/us/results

I dig this page. Very nice.

Tina Korbe seems only to speak in metaphor:

TinaKorbe
I'm not gonna lie ... This is very anti-climactic. I've been so eager to get this started and now it's a little ... eh.

NICE

has she met K-Lo?

I don't want to know.

Ew. The mental images, they burn.

uh

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
aaron schock is talking about ann romney's baked goods on the romney bus on @mikeallen livestream right now #iacaucus

"Oh she makes a mean pie."

LarrySabato Larry Sabato
Three-way ties are always over-interpreted. Get ready!

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
if you were in iowa tonight, what would you be doing?

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
al gore perplexed by santorum surge #notverysenatorial #liveoncurrenttv

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
there is something about promiscuous electability talk that reminds me of jurors who watch too much csi #anditshows

Read that as "#andshitshows," which, well, yes.

Rick Perry found corn in his santorum

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
fearless prediction: keep an eye out for sweater vests tonight. @FearRicksVest

Jesus god, Alfred, spare us.

This woman is pure id.

This k-lopez tweet fetish can't be good for anyone

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
LOVE when before commercial break, host lets you know you will be talking about a piece of yours so you can look and remember what you wrote

man the day unfunny people find out about comedy hash tags is always a terrible day for the rest of us XP

FearRicksVest

alfred do you even have a twitter?

but I follow twits!

@BradThor how many sweatervests in the warroom

Oh Kathryn.

host lets you know you will be talking about a piece of yours

It's not even self-aware enough to be trolling.

I should poll these.

The Sounds Coming Out of Chris Matthews’s Mouth
By Jonah Goldberg

I love the caucus so much. The republicans who either live in the middle of nowhere or are in suburbs/smaller cities who feel "repressed" by their democrat neighbors crawl out of the woodwork and choose the craziest motherfucker.

I wish Bachmann was still pulling this

JIM BOB

QED

Guys, earlier I heard some noise outside and for a minute I thought the local caucus had spilled out into the street and they were yelling, but unfortunately it was just some noisy traffic

have you been to a caucus mh? are they fun?

BRING THE MUTHAFUCKIN CAUCUS

http://www.nodfactor.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/RZA.jpg

ps why aren't you out voting for ron paul

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lx8s4nUlaP1qhm4zto1_500.jpg

I did some caucuses in Minnesota growing up. They are fun, with the candidates' names on a whiteboard or easel paper, and voting by hand, and shifting alliances in a room of 40 or 50. Then one year I was a Harkin delegate to the next regional caucus, and all I remember is a guy dressed like Uncle Sam playing "Imagine" on a piano, and at that point I'd had enough of my peers.

Can you blame people, though? I still don't know how in the name of sanity you get Mitt out of Willard. xp

Lol gromit

on a much more trivial note, who's the brunette on cnn?

I've only been to the democrat ones. I think they're probably a little more fun than the alternative.

Santorum is my pick. He represents the common values we can all agree on as Americans of faith. Like Jesus Christ, taking your dead baby home from the hospital to show your kids, and a frothy mixture of fecal matter and lube.

Dana Loesch? Most untrivial.

September 4:

"I think, in the normal course of things, Rick Perry will be the Republican nominee. He is the three-term governor of Texas, a conservative state. He’s been a successful governor. Texas has job growth, the rest of the country’s lost jobs. He’s a populist, which is very much in the spirit of the Republican party today. Mitt Romney is the one-term governor of Massachusetts, whose health care plan isn’t popular with Republicans. So if you just have a normal race, so to speak, if neither candidate does badly in the debates, if voters just get to know them, and it looks the way I just described, Perry is the more normal victor."

Tonight:

“I just think his dignity I think will suggest to him that he get out.”

Ah, Bill Kristol. Hurts being you, doesn't it.

If you give me the out of "if neither candidate does badly in the debates," I actually think his Sept. 4th call was pretty accurate. (Conceding that he probably changed his mind 15 times between then and now.)

me = him (Too much Newt-watching.)

Yeah that actually might have been the one prescient thing he said all year. Perry's vaporware candidacy is amazing to behold.

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
al gore is interjecting something koch bros now. #givemesomethingnewmrveep!

I know who Al Gore is...and I know who the Koch brothers are...but what does that mean?!

Romney and Santorum are separated by 13 votes at the moment.

It's a tight squeeze right now, but I'm hoping Santorum rises up.

I was born to be Andy Richter.

It's a tight squeeze right now, but I'm hoping Santorum rises up.

eww, not a pleasant thought in any sense of the word "Santorum"

also, lol Gingrich

back to lurking

@anamariecox "He has to get his manhood back, go after Santorum" - Chris Matthews on Romney. I have no idea how to improve on that. #iowa

I don't know what to make of Gingrich's 13% tonight. Obviously terrible compared to where he was four weeks ago, but not the under-10% wipeout I was expecting a few days ago. I'd say he probably tread water enough to hang around past Florida, and the good news is that he's really angry and ready to go postal.

Excellent start: Gingrich just spent a minute congratulating Santorum on his excellent night and positive campaign, then said, "I wish I could say the same of every candidate--but I can't."

Newt going postal would liven things up in a most agreeable manner.

newt's entire life is an exercise in going postal innit?!?

that said, he's gonna hang on like a vampire isn't he?!?

It's large, so I'll just link to it, but here's the ad Gingrich is running in NH tomorrow:

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/newt-mitt.png

all of these guys are dicks!!

just saying

Dicks was the last Republican administration--these are Newts and Mitts and Ricks.

Alfred's hero, David Gergen, says that Gingrich is "on a crusade to bring Mitt Romney down."

robonewt!

if you were forced to share an apartment with one of these assholes for a month, who would you choose?

rick perry (best) - he's really dumb but is seems like he'd give you some space. he apparently believes that he's been chosen by god to, uh, run a terrible campaign and then exit early, but i get the feeling that he only evangelizes when other evangelists are looking. he'd probably leave me alone and pay the rent.
huntsman - almost put him at #1 but it seemed too obvious. he's a fool but at least he doesn't think scientists are evil.
mitt romney - he would be really boring and would probably think less of you for not wearing a sport coat all of the time, and he's a cold and calculating robot, but at least he seems somewhat intelligent.
michele bachman - what a sad state of affairs where this monster somehow doesn't rank last. she would yell at you about the dishes, she'd yell at you for not going to church, she'd just fucking yell at you all of the time.
newt gingrich - he only pays half the rent and tries to make you pay 150% of your own rent, justifying it by laying out a laundry list of things you have done wrong.
santorum (worst) - anything you do is wrong. you are going to hell, and he will always have his annoying, crying family over. also all of the anal froth everywhere, all over the carpet, in the cappucino

they are all rich

Fundamentally, not Newt. I'm guessing that when the cameras are off, Perry's just like one of the drunks who used to bang up power carts when I worked at a golf course 35 years ago. I think he'd probably be fun.

santorum would be the best because imagine how fun it would be to make him listen to your sex noises.

Bachmann not dropping out. The debate this weekend shall be...of interest.

can this pleaaaaase end in a tie

oh, no tie ... just getting rid of ONE of these assholes for good would be nice (apparently TOO nice).

I know this is the expectations-game that drives non-junkies crazy, but I think Romney and Santorum are in the clear either way--it seems to me that it's Paul who got dented a bit tonight.

Romney got all of 25% of the Iowa vote, and according to a source (boston.com) linked on google: "only 56 percent of Romney's backers voiced strong support for him". Good show, big fella.

That 56% does surprise (and encourage) me.

ha neither is gonna drop out after losing by 50 votes - a virtual tie - especially romney

xxp

feel like there might be a big difference in the narrative if romney wins iowa and nh!! vs. comes 2nd in iowa (by 100 votes) and wins nh

until tonight, i thought that i knew the only true-blue Santorum supporter (a coworker, an otherwise wonderful chap) ... he isn't even from Pennsylvania (or, maybe that's why he likes Man-on-Dog so much).

Wouldn't a solid win for Romney in NH make Iowa more or less moot? I mean, I hope it doesn't happen, but if it does?

perry sounds like he's about to drop out

Wow--Perry seems to be dropping out.

he just said he would return to texas and "assess" the situation, or whatever.

not unexpected, i guess, but i thought he'd drag it out a bit longer

suspending his campaign

oh, shit, reassessing, not suspending. fuck you rachel maddow, i was right!

already saw the media prepping the 'romneys been hanging around Iowa for years why doesnt no one like him' narrative earlier tonight fwiw

nice knowin ya rick j/k you're ridiculous

This reassessment of Perry's will result in him bowing out of the next debate and essentially ending the campaign.

That's about the first smart thing he's done all campaign. Bachmann reportedly lives under the delusion she's in the running for VP--she needs to vacate too.

mid-debate xp

I can't but think the rest of his term as governor is going to be everyone in the Texas GOP finally getting out the knives on him.

25k caucused for Obama tonight, apparently a much larger number than anyone expected

37 votes now lol

Santorum benefitted most here from being a sanctimonious, colorless drudge. The sanctimony attracted the religious right voters and, as the colorless drudge who was stuck in the low single digits for six months, he didn't draw any fire from his opponents, so he was still standing when the rest of the flavors-of-the-month faltered.

Mr. Paul may pick up some strength among the live-free-or-die kooks, now.

Also, McCain to endorse Romney. Oh joy!

Dana Loesch? Most untrivial.

― clemenza, Tuesday, January 3, 2012 10:26 PM (Yesterday)

NO btw i think i meant the msnbc chick

CNN panel is debating where Perry stands in relation to Fred Thompson and John Connally as the worst candidate ever. (I'd also throw in Phil Gramm's war chest-heavy run.)

I don't see ron paul getting any momentum from this at all, this was his chance to shine and 3rd isn't enough

TIE TIE TIE TIE

romney's up to 80% on intrade

@BuddyRoemer
I almost have enough votes in Iowa to start a bowling league. #Roementum

Plz, god, give us Santorum, RuPaul and Newt, in that order.

^^ quoting myself. Yes, I am giddy, as promised. This result was close enough for me.

I'm thinking the santorum voters just know they're gonna get a second chane to vote for romney in November and wanted to spice up their lives a bit. I man imagine having to vote for Romney twice, sheesh.

I was hoping for Beck, Bogert, and Appice, but this is good enough.

has anyone made the joke about santorum coming from behind yet?

because he is

Nobody really wants to drop out because of the good chance they could have a lead in the polls tomorrow or the next day. This race has been nuts.

Nicole had a great Santorum line upthread.

lol that was such an awkward hug

Re: sharing an apartment

-Huntsman would be blasting prog at all hours, can't have that.
-Bachmann would probably be the worst, imagine trying to have your significant other over.
-Santorum I actually think might be ok, he'd probably be busy a lot and the bills would get paid on time. He'd probably get bitchy about little things though.
-Romney would also pay the bills but I don't want to live with that asshole, he'd probably act super ingratiating and try to befriend me.
-Perry would be a nightmare, I'd like spend no time at the place, he'd always be watching shitty TV and inviting his douchebag friends over
-Gingrich would be annoying as hell but also the most entertaining, like I could start a 77 thread called "my asshole staying at my place is being a fuckin dick again" and it would be a gold mine every day

"my asshole staying at my place" uh i mean "this asshole etc..."

97.5% on intrade

Huntsman would be blasting Beefheart. Would love to discuss that with him, as well as talking about how all such experimentation is inherently left-wing.

-Romney would also pay the bills but I don't want to live with that asshole, he'd probably act super ingratiating and try to befriend me.

no way. you make a pizza for the second time in a week and he just gives you this LOOK. he doesn't say anything, but it's clear that you're supposed to grow up and start cooking real meals.

since i assume that none of them would flush the toilet, which would have the worst best excuse for not doing so?!?

romney is a robot. he enters the restroom on occasion in an attempt to reduce the suspicions of others, but all he does is look at himself in the mirror.

As usual, the Iowa caucuses decide nothing. I swear it is all a conspiracy put together by Days Inn and pancake restaurants who make out like bandits from the whole thing.

Q: who pronounces Missouri "mizzurah"?
A: politicians and old people. that's it.

99% in, and, honest to god, they're separated by five votes.

omg

ha down to 83% on intrade. someone's nervous.

(Does Iowa cover three or four time zones? I'm always confused as to why some results come in three hours before others.)

amazing

i swear santorum sounds exactly like someone doing a nic cage impression

some parts of the state have crappy school systems and are very slow at counting

Don't get it: refresh, and CNN goes backwards to 98% in.

god this speech is just nonstop resentment f this dude

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/01/03/us/politics/20110104_IOWA-slide-55OJ/20110104_IOWA-slide-55OJ-hpMedium.jpg

fivethirtyeight Nate Silver
What if there's LITERALLY a tie?
5 minutes ago Favorite Retweet

experts weigh in

Newt's opening shot: hacking into CNN's website and putting up phony numbers for Santorum.

http://rlv.zcache.com/dirty_presidents_tshirt-p23537567210569470630w2_400.jpg

can we hope for a new #1???

Tie goes to the runner. That's when they bring in Chris Christie.

santorum's kid (?) is rocking the sweatervest

five minutes of 4-on-4 followed by a shootout

we're all rooting for santorum for the lols right?

oh, definitely.

even outside of the lols santorum's better for 'us'

It really is amazing--go back two weeks ago, and Santorum was fighting Bachmann for last place.

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
newt congratulates @ricksantorum right now. #itisawinforrickwhatevertheorderatthispoint
1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

romney is like having a conversation with someone in the audience or something wt hell is he doing

kathrynlopez Kathryn Jean Lopez
.@ricksantorum just about never reads from notes. he's overwhelmed that hard work has indeed paid off. #littleenginethatcouldhesaidformonths
23 minutes ago Favorite Retweet Reply

I do love when they start blaming Obama for divorces and depression.

Those k-lo hashtags make me #dieinsideeverytime

"A bunch of fellow rightwingers have been depressed since he got elected and now their spouses are divorcing them because they've become emotionally isolated and utterly monomaniacal. This must stop!"

This has been Romney's schtick all week--quoting from "America the Beautiful." Wait until Newt unleashes "You Should Never Have Opened That Door" starting tomorrow.

romney down to 40 on in trade! I know I'm the only one who cares about intrade but 97.5 to 40 in like 10 mins is pretty lol

A Romneybot would hearken unto such lines as "Thine alabaster cities gleam, undimmed by human tears", now wouldn't it?

romney down to 40 on in trade! I know I'm the only one who cares about intrade but 97.5 to 40 in like 10 mins is pretty lol

― iatee, Wednesday, January 4, 2012 12:57 AM (58 seconds ago)

percent chance of winning?

those intrade bounces/plummets are fascinating.

I remember looking around there last year, and there was a totally inexplicable one day bump for romney where all of a sudden he was in the 90s.

toddstarnes toddstarnes
Santorum spent about $1.65 per vote; Romney spent around $113 per vote. bit.ly/yYdPBq
2 minutes ago

Perry and his PACs spent $6,000,000 for 12,500 votes -- %480 per vote.

$480...

lead down to 18

NEWT: We can't wait. I don't care what David Gergen says about inevitability, Romney's weak, that's it. That's the key for us. Gotta get Romney.

CALLISTA: Lemme ask you something, Professor. I mean--what about Paul and Santorum, huh? What do we do with these...nuisances?

NEWT: They wanna have a debate with me, right? It will be me, Santorum, Paul, and Romney. Let's set the debate. Get our Twitter people to find out where it's gonna be held. Now, we insist it's a public place--an auditorium, a town hall, some place where there's people so I feel safe.
They're gonna shake hands with me when I first meet them, right, so I can't be frothing at the mouth then. But if Bill Kristol can figure a way to have opposition research planted there for me--then I'll kill 'em all.

debates are for sissies. newt will only settle for lincoln-douglas debates

ONE VOTE

Rick Santorum seen that shit and said: "Fuck it, imma run too, fuck it"

i see these dudes going, "You can win Rick, coz you're bigger than motherfucking Mitt Romney. Fuck Mitt Romney. Fuck him man, run for president." And Rick going: "Yeah, fuck that shit."

You know he got a chance he can win. White dudes like to do shit like that...vote for the wrong dude as a goof. They get drunk and shit and go like, "Let's vote for Rick Santorum!" *pulls lever* "haha I just voted for Rick Santorum!" And next day would be like this: "He fuckin' won?"

ricky 'the body' santorum

http://img839.imageshack.us/img839/3140/30121529301225611cerebu.jpg

shame that this isn't a contest that matters

Romney wins by 8.

damn

was it good for all of you/

would looooove for 8 votes to decide the Obamney election in Nov.

For this I got up? The only good thing that may come out of this is that the salt has been rubbed into the wound a little deeper.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/04/politics/gop-iowa-gingrich/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

"Lying in wait"--sounds good to me.

you really need baseball to start soon. you know, something significant.

Go Newt! I mean, go Jays!

On the one hand this is pretty easy to spin for Romney, he can just point out that it's a marathon not a sprint. For him. For Santorum, it's a sprint.

On the other hand, nearly exactly 30,000 out of 120,000* does look like there are actual occult forces pinning him to 25%.

*Yeah, I know, 120,000 is not the exact figure, just the one being thrown around.

romney down to 40 on in trade! I know I'm the only one who cares about intrade but 97.5 to 40 in like 10 mins is pretty lol

i think this says everything you need to know about how much attention to pay to intrade

he won by 5 votes!

intrade is a pretty useful marker of public expectations, but yeah, bad at predicting elections w/ an 8 vote margin

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/01/03/us/politics/20110104_IOWA-slide-C37Z/20110104_IOWA-slide-C37Z-hpLarge-v2.jpg
guuys

the one on the far right (heh) is cute

waht abt the one in the middle HUBBA HUBBA

iatee i'd say it's worse than that - with romney at 97.5 intrade wasn't even remotely accurate as to how tight the outcome would be

both those numbers were reactions to nearly finished vote counting totals no

if you want to evaluate its predictive powers its prob better to look before the voting started

before the caucuses intrade had them romney->santorum->paul

when the votes were being counted it was just people trying to be the first ones to play on public information. it's not really a prediction market in the same sense during moments like those.

xp right

Sincere question: between now and New Hampshire, will there be people from this whispered-about Republican Establishment contacting Gingrich--either directly or through intermediaries--and asking him to back off for the sake of getting Romney elected, and also to secure whatever future he has as a party eminence?

man i'm so glad this whole thing is over!

no xp

assume thats been going on the whole time, the gop establishment has been in a frothy panic for the last month that gingrich might win, the other anti romneys they dont really take serious

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/01/republican-nomination

in this and other stories like it i'm always a little struck that the people they talk to (esp those who are explaining why they are voting for romney) seem a lot less crazy than the aggregate shitshow. maybe it's an iowa thing...

lol i can only pray http://motherjones.com/politics/2012/01/newt-gingrich-romney-gop-destroyer

what do they have to offer him? what does he have to lose? if he doesn't want to play the GOP spoiler it'll be because he doesn't want to play the GOP spoiler.

xp

It's definitely been going on in full public view--in editorials, on Sunday morning shows, etc.--I'm just curious as to how much (or whether) it goes on in earnest out of public view.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2012/01/04/rickrolled_three_lessons_from_iowa.html

dave weigel thinks that the numbers say enthusiasm is way down but idk if his interp is right

thats prob m/l true, but it doesnt mean they arent trying, and of course theyve done everything else they can to marginalize him xp iatee

im sure its been going on behind closed doors too, i mean its polotics, we only see the tip of the iceberg, and there are no doubt things they can offer him, all sorts lucrative think tank jobs tv appearances publishing deals etc, its just whether its worth it to him to give up his last few moments in the spotlight

They don't have cabinet appointments to offer him, I'm sure, but they'd be hitting him up on whatever traces of party loyalty are left, and, more important, reminding him that it's better to be inside the fold than out if you want to continue giving lucrative speeches.

lol newt you h8 everyone so bad just say fuck it go newtclear you know you want to come on you invented that shit

http://mjcdn.motherjones.com/preset_12/newt_1-4.jpg
DESTROY ROMNEY DESTROY ROMNEY BLIP BLOOP BEEP

they dont respect you theyve never respected you after all youve done for them after all these years show them show them what you can do

I was just about to post how much I loved the photo in that Mother Jones link!

ha it really captures something

U Got the Look, Newt.

http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Nixon.jpg

god damn newt's got a big head

Erick Erickson vents, his commenters are somewhat vexed.

Wait just one cotton-pickin' minute!

vangoghssister Wednesday, January 4th at 10:12AM EST

I’ll be darned if I’m going to let 123,000 people, in Iowa of all places (or anywhere else for that matter) tell me who I am allowed to vote for in this Presidential election. I am a Perry supporter and pray for him to stay in the race. I watched the first debate. I heard the in-state tuition argument from whoever brought it up (don’t remember now). No one and I mean NO ONE, not moderators, not talking heads on television or radio ever mentioned what he actually said, standing right there on the stage, outlining briefly the process for being allowed to pay in-state tuition. From there, the falsehoods took hold about that and the stupid Gardisil thing, etc. And YOU, Mr. Erick Erickson (God bless you for all the good work you do), have only made me angry one time in all the months I’ve been lurking around here. When you interviewed Gov. Perry in California and brought the tuition issue up, you called it SCHOLARSHIPS. You see, the words we use do matter when trying to convey the truth, even if it is an accidental GAFFE. If that interview had been broadcast on the MSM or even on Fox, once the masses heard that word ‘scholarships’, they would have tuned out and turned off right then, never listening to Gov. Perry patiently explain how it really works. His team should have done more to get the truth out there and I can’t fathom why they did not. There must be a way to get the stellar accomplishments of this fine Governor out where the most people will see them, especially those who do not take the time to research a candidates platform and past performance in office.

Rats! Now I have to go to work. Keep the faith Perry Posse.

Keep the faith Perry Posse.

I want to sign all of my emails with this

"in Iowa of all places"

I like how indignant he is over the tuition issue, yet somehow he never actually says anything about what Perry actually said

ha it really captures something

Kelsey Grammer Newt Gingrich looks like a motherfucker with some dark secrets.

Romney got less votes in 2012 than he got in 2008

"it was the same number of votes, but each individual vote was smaller"

the gop establishment has been in a frothy panic

thakig u

For starters, the media would have you believe that the 123,000 people who turned out for the Hawkeye Caucii was a record. This is simply not true except superficially. If you take out the non-Republicans who came into the caucuses last night for Ron Paul, the Republican turn out was less than 2008 — even considering the ratio of independents to Republicans who turned out in 2008.

oh jesus

This is simply not true except superficially

Bachmann's qui--"suspending." Supposedly she'll endorse craziness.

Ames Straw Poll selling for $0.39 on e-Bay.

It's kind of true, though. If Ron Paul isn't the candidate, a handful of his followers will vote Republican, but a bunch will either not vote or will vote for a third party or still write him in.

And more than a few will vote for Obama

pareene tweet:

RT @michaelbarthel: "Ron Paul Takes Unexpected Fourth Place on Pazz & Jop Albums List"

"Absolutely...of course."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czBDm7qIOW0&feature=youtu.be

o man newty sounds like hes in a dark place

man this thing is over

if we're talking about how newt gingrich is in his dangerous wounded underdog phase, that means it's just done. i mean, look at that sentence.

i just need it to drag on for a. little. more.

plz dont take this away from me

I already know you're not Daniel, lag∞n, but sometimes I swear you are.

From Rick Perryland:

And the next leg of the marathon is the Palmetto State...Here we come South Carolina!!! yfrog.com/odz8ujrj

you guys can really make Democratic hypocrisy fun if you try

And if you really wanted that photo...

http://desmond.yfrog.com/Himg877/scaled.php?tn=0&server=877&filename=z8ujr.jpg&xsize=640&ysize=640

you guys can really make Democratic hypocrisy fun if you try

Cee-Lo's other alternate lyrics to "Imagine"

and no Joe Biden too

I already know you're not Daniel, lag∞n, but sometimes I swear you are.

― clemenza, Wednesday, January 4, 2012 11:28 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

sb

oh jesus

― Much Ado About Nuttin (DJP), Wednesday, January 4, 2012 3:57 PM (32 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

it's really blown my mind following the back-and-forth on twitter from rightists who say paul ISN'T A REAL REPUBLICAN

Meant as a compliment--I'm a fan!

w/e man

it's really blown my mind following the back-and-forth on twitter from rightists who say paul ISN'T A REAL REPUBLICAN

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Wednesday, January 4, 2012 11:33 AM (58 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

eh he has a number of heterodox opinions

hey, the GOP is the Big Tent party

it's just that when you let in too many people, things get crowded and someone inevitably jostles you and you spill yr vodka martini; the tent is more about elbow room than inclusiveness

the big spacious tent party

MA gov romney is prob further from the 'gop median' than 2011 ron paul. no?

Jon King supposedly has a source that Perry's staying in (if I heard the TV in the background correctly).

Oh those smoke filled rooms:

A group of movement conservatives has called an emergency meeting in Texas next weekend to find a “consensus” Republican presidential hopeful, POLITICO has learned.

“You and your spouse are cordially invited to a private meeting with national conservative leaders of faith at the ranch of Paul and Nancy Pressler near Brenham, Texas, with the purpose of attempting to unite and to come to a consensus on which Republican Presidential candidate or candidates to support, or which not to support,” read an invitation that is making its way into in-boxes Wednesday morning.

The meeting is being hosted by such prominent conservative figures as James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family; Don Wildmon, one-time chairman of the American Family Association; and Gary Bauer, himself a former presidential candidate.

MA gov romney is prob further from the 'gop median' than 2011 ron paul. no?

ehh, I'm pretty sure the average Republican voter is more likely to vote for Romney than Paul.

wasnt it Frothymix who complained that Paul was "to the left of Obama on national security"? as if there was any room there, huh.

its nice to know that in 2012 big deal republicans still implicitly word their invites to read 'no jews'

A group of movement conservatives has called an emergency meeting in Texas next weekend to find a “consensus” Republican presidential hopeful, POLITICO has learned.

Good luck USA!

MA gov romney is prob further from the 'gop median' than 2011 ron paul. no?

― iatee, Wednesday, January 4, 2012 11:39 AM (30 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

naw pauls stances on foreign policy / criminal justice / economics are p much the oposite of the gop establishment - romney is just somewhat moderate - i mean its wroth repeating that he pushed for 'romneycare' because it was a major republican concept at the time - he did it because he thought it would help him get elected president! lol

Oh those smoke filled rooms:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMcaRMSjk70

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/assets_c/2011/12/newt-gingrich-gradient-cropped-proto-custom_28.jpg

what if a candidate looks like a smoke-filled room in human form

Interesting that those Texans are inviting the usual Dobson, Wildmon et al. A Republican caller this morning on CSPAN said, pretty accurately I thought, that the "family values" issues that Santorum is likely to press if his success were to continue would alienate enough moderate R's to guarantee Obama another four years.

GOP treats the fundies like Dems treat progressives: "Where ya gonna go?"

tbf the gop gives way more lip service to its fundies, they just rarely enact actual legislation

the GOP treats the fundies better than the Dems treat progressives!

that's because they make up a substantial % of gop voters and (these days) gop politicians

yerp

because fundies have a lot of money.

the GOP treats the fundies better than the Dems treat progressives!

^^^this. how is this even debatable.

crazy pro-life shit, crazy pro-Israeli shit - they throw plenty of meat to the fundies (it's just that, of course, they always want MORE)

crazy pro-life shit, crazy pro-Israeli shit

which party are you talking about lololollzolzozlzolzzzz

http://images2.fanpop.com/image/answers/841000/841439_1281274003656.07res_450_300.jpg

"I want MOOOOOOOORRRRRE!"

Bachmann’s Out
By Katrina Trinko
January 4, 2012 11:58 A.M. Comments0
West Des Moines, Iowa – Announcing the end of her presidential campaign, flanked by her family and close associates, Michele Bachmann made it clear that she had enjoyed the ride.

“I have no regrets. None whatsoever,” she said.

Explaining her decision, Bachmann said that Iowans had sent a message “with a very clear voice” last night.

She also made a plea for Republicans to unite around the eventual nominee. “I believe if we are going to repeal Obamacare, turn our country around, and take back our country, we must do so united,” she said. “And I believe that we must rally around the person that our country and our party and our people select to be that standard bearer.”

sorry, I think the 'fundie' pols are mostly poseurs, esp the gay ones.

I think we are thoroughly a bipartisan crazy-pro-Israeli circus.

this isn't a 1-1 comparison, fundies outnumber progressives and if that weren't enough our electoral structures benefit them too

who knew Ariel was in Sisters of Mercy

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/web05/2012/1/4/11/enhanced-buzz-wide-5467-1325695972-36.jpg

u mans far right

aww man michele's gone. RIP lady whose pronunciation of the word "Obama" took nasal to previously undreamt-of sonic heights

ah, the backlash

who was president sterling?

xp

Newt Gingrich is hitting back after Ron Paul called him a “chicken-hawk.”

“What (Paul) just said has about the same amount of accuracy as the newsletters he denies he wrote.”

I do tend to laugh at how effective Gingrich's mean zings are.

crazy pro-life shit, crazy pro-Israeli shit - they throw plenty of meat to the fundies (it's just that, of course, they always want MORE)

― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, January 4, 2012 12:12 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

compared to what theyre continually promised the fundies get almost nothing, pro life stuff is incremental at best and Israel isnt a major or a primarily fundy concern, gop establishments been playing them for years

while the gop is for sure more solicitous, for demographic reasons mostly, of their less moderate members than the dems, if you look at how those respective cohorts feel abt how theyre being treated its p much a mirror image, both think their party is hopelessly defeatist and cowardly always giving into the well oiled tactically ingenious malevolent other party, and that they would surely win if they only stood up and fought for their true righteous views

if you look at how those respective cohorts feel abt how theyre being treated its p much a mirror image

yeah this is definitely true

http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2012/01/kevin-drums-peak-crazy-republican-presidential-poll-share-graph.html

i really like brad delong but man he's interpreting this absolutely backwards

Dem and Repug pols are sep'd mostly by rhetoric. They steer the ship together onto the beach.

hmm ive never heard that point from you before morbs

pro life stuff is incremental at best

please don't minimize the actual effect that these "incremental" setbacks are having on real people's lives every day in states where abortion access is now hindered, limited, or, as in Kansas and elsewhere, effectively illegal

im not, just speaking as far as what they want

just like every progressive calls obamacare watered down

which btw is an area where you can't actually argue much party difference - these "incremental" setbacks are signed-off on by Democrats, who then talk about the rights the didn't sign away, which they then classify as gains - "we gave up x, but they wanted to take y!" which is just the saddest

im not, just speaking as far as what they want

they are actually getting what they want via incremental setback. that's the ground plan, it's the whole plan, there isn't any plan to REVERSE ROE V. WADE no matter how they talk, the plan is to gradually restrict access to abortion via local & state measures. the big game they talk translates into a series of plays down the field. these are the plays Democrats ought to be pushing back against, not some fantasy "they're going to appeal this case to the Supreme Court" scenario.

^^^

otm!

i understand that thats the hardcore pro life movers and shakers plan now, but its not what like yr average fundie voter wants, theyre still just all outlaw the murder of innocent babies and prob consider to the extent that theyre aware of it, this sort of compromise to be hopelessly corrupted by washington values etc

there are for sure all sorts of areas where the parties agree, recently both parties have figured out that most people dont want abortion illegal but dont really mind if its incrementally restricted, so they can stop fighting abt that - its p instructive as to the vile mechanisms of inter party cooperation

and they all like killing Muslems overseas.

well i mean who doesnt

killing them over here not as fun

u might get blood on u

Muslims don't have blood iirc

I think you underestimate the average anti-choicer's sophistication about this issue. They have been coordinating their game for a long time. I know they often sound dumb in comments threads or if news cameras catch them, and the temptation to succumb to caricature is heavy when we disagree so strongly with their beliefs, but they are about their fucking business & are not dumb. Carole Joffe's book Dispatches from the Abortion Wars is worth a read on this subject.

yah i know their activist base is v on their grind, its just my contention that theres a larger group of fundies for whom this isnt necessarily their main issue who are not as dialed in or on board

Muslims don't have blood iirc

― lumber up, limbaugh down (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, January 4, 2012 12:44 PM (57 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

*checks bible* oh damn u right

yah i know their activist base is v on their grind, its just my contention that theres a larger group of fundies for whom this isnt necessarily their main issue who are not as dialed in or on board

nah i think if anything cynical mnstrm republicans would love to have abortion as an issue to campaign on forever, the on the ground crazies really are the ones who are getting shit done in small incremental steps in places like north dakota. and i think abortion is still - despite all the stuff abt socialist big government death camps - the reason that there are so many political evangelicals

republicans can still campaign on abortion if they want! no ones stopping them

I don't think cynical mnstrm republicans exist to the same extent post-bush. if the GOP could make abortion 100% illegal across the country w/ no political consequences, would they? sure. but that's never going to be a possibility absent a huge shift in peoples' views on the subject. that being the case it's not that they're just toying w/ the voters, there genuinely isn't that much more they can do on the national level w/o a backlash.

even if abortion just disappeared as a subject there would still be a culture war to fight. there will always be a culture war sujet du jour.

idk according to many recent think pieces the culture war is no longer a trending topic

if anything cynical mnstrm republicans would love to have abortion as an issue to campaign on forever

have always thought this about the Democrats

not much thought in those pieces

Speaking of culture wars, Sullivan's dug up a pleasant missive from Santorum's past:

http://www.catholic.org/featured/headline.php?ID=30

It is startling that those in the media and academia appear most disturbed by this aberrant behavior, since they have zealously promoted moral relativism by sanctioning "private" moral matters such as alternative lifestyles. Priests, like all of us, are affected by culture. When the culture is sick, every element in it becomes infected. While it is no excuse for this scandal, it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm.

Take it easy, media--it's Boston.

lmao santorum even u can do better than that

next thing hell try to blame the fact that he brought a stillborn fetus home and cuddled it w/his family for a few hours on the gays

When the culture is sick, every element in it becomes infected. While that is no excuse for the Red Sox implosion in 2011, it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm.

who was president sterling?

fer the young'uns among'uns, see: free speech movement in 1964, president sterling of UC @ Berkeley.

just got an email from the DNC with the subject line "what iowa means" and thunderbird popped up a little notification: THIS MESSAGE MAY BE A SCAM.

Nobel Prize for Software

Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism

yeah, right. Nothing says liberalism like the locked-down Harvard campus, the Koch bros. compound, or Scott fukkin Brown.

lol srsly, i mean political maybe, academic no, and cultural you must be fucking joking me

So it startles Santorum that I can "sanction private moral matters" and still be appalled by pedophilia. Yeah, that's really well reasoned...

perry stays in :)

Swimming in Santorum's wake.

hahahaagghhhhh

“I took the day off work for this,” said insurance salesman Justin Yourison, a Paul precinct captain. “If he doesn’t get the nomination, I’m not voting for anyone else. . . . If the GOP doesn’t let us in, they can do without us.”

wonder how Paul feels about this sentiment

Yes, he's back.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zt6XCZz2X1Y

(Morphing Santorum into Obama--just talking visually, Morbius--is quite an achievement.)

I think it's time people stopped maligning the Montana Sheep Institute.

apparently lots of hard core Paul fanatics (which is surely like 95% of his support?) are committed to a write-in campaign if he doesn't get the GOP nod. i'm pretty ignorant about the viability of this wrt certain states/ local jurisdictions but hey

lol @ Santorum is a porker's best friend

I have a feeling this may come back to haunt Rick (no embedding):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCmvEuYjQSI

when Rick is listening to other people talk he looks like he smoked a full gram of hash about half an hour ago and is struggling to just keep it together until he can figure out how to put one foot in front of the other & leave the room

he looks like he ate a full plate of corned beef hash.

what kind of yes men does rick perry have, jeez

kevin drum getting pessimistic:

http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/01/how-do-you-solve-problem-mitt-romney

I'll be surprised if the GOP primary race goes much beyond the end of February, and I'll be shocked if Super Tuesday on March 6 doesn't end it completely. This means that the Republican base will have six months to resign themselves to their fate and come to the conclusion that Romney is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being ever to run for president. And they will. When Job 1 is beating the anti-Christ, learning to love Mitt Romney will be a piece of cake.

So what does this mean for Team Obama? My guess: the flip-flopper charge probably won't get much traction. It's mostly a problem for conservatives, who don't fully trust that Romney is one of them, but by the time summer rolls around they're going to be his most fire-breathing supporters. They'll have long since decided to forgive and forget, and independents won't care that much in the first place as long as Romney seems halfway reasonable in his current incarnation. It's possible that Obama can do both — Romney is a flip flopper and a right-wing nutcase! — but if he has to choose, my guess is that he should forget about the flip flopping and simply do everything he can to force Romney into the wingnut conservative camp. That'll be his big weakness when Labor Day rolls around.

k drum veering a lil too into the abstract, romneys biggest weakness is that hes a droid

but by the time summer rolls around they're going to be his most fire-breathing supporters.

so not gonna happen

Obama's gonna paint him as an out-of-touch plutocrat, gonna go hard on the populist angle

Haven't seen any mention of it in recent days but I'm now idly wondering how much of the non-Romney sentiment really IS driven by "Mormons, ew."

is there a documented case of Romney creating jobs in a failing company as opposed to downsizing until the company is profitable? because I have only ever heard/read the latter

my understanding is all he's ever done is the latter

so can we raise enough money to produce commercials accusing Romney of wanting to deport unemployed Americans, since that is where his expertise lies

i don't know if it's quantifiable. frankly i think a lot of liberals are overstating it out of hope.

frankly i think these interdenominational divisions are just not that important anymore as long as everyone is "conservative". there have been mormon senators and governors in good right-wing standing forever now. a generation ago catholics and baptists and jews and all the rest had huge alignment problems but now those lions and lambs are laying down just fine. thanks, pro-life movement, and 'clash of civilizations' etc.

sure mormonism is a little wilder with its heresies but as long as your policy positions are where they need to be all the angels-on-other-planets shit is just irrelevant

xp to ned

feeling very frank today i guess

No, that makes plenty of sense through and through. I was mostly shrugging the idea off as well and was only struck by it a bit today given that Texas meeting from all the Perry backers that was announced.

These hand-wringing conservatives will start to chill out when they realize President Romney will nominate the, er, right kind of judges to the bench and SCOTUS.

idk, I think the religion thing is gonna be important for some, maybe not a lot, but my aunt (in her 70s, Oklahoman, staunch Baptist) is going to have a REAL tough time voting for a Mormon.

if he wins he'll win w/ a congress that's even more right-wing than he is, so yeah, they'll be fine

RedState is starting to cave on the point.

despite being very political and very conservative for as long as i can remember, my aunt did not vote in 2008 because she was so disillusioned by McCain's nom. even though she hates Romney/Santorum/Paul even more than she did The Mav, she is going to vote GOP no matter what b/c of devil Obama

this time

Rick Perry would make a "better general election candidate" in which country?

is texas a country yet

so many errors in that Red State post

i have a friend from college who is still pining for perry, so to speak

One of the commenters talked about pulling for Perry and well there you go.

Perry's basic problem atm, aside from his blatant failure to attract voters, is that he took a shitload of money from his wealthy Texas backers in order to run for POTUS. If he quits now, those folks are going to be mad as hell if he walks off with their money with nothing to show for it. My guess is either they're going to make him stay in the race or else they'll force him to endorse their second choice - or they'll make his life a living hell for screwing them out of $$$.

what? that makes no sense.

political donations disappear as soon as they are made. there is no "ROI" unless your guy wins, which perry isn't going to do. his donors are going to demand he keep going to burn more of their money? why?

yeah I don't get that

If nothing else, Perry's 'wealthy Texas backers' will just keep getting paid off in-state.

This meeting with them is probably to arrange that in-state payback and to abase himself for running such a damn fool campaign he made Phil Gramm look competant by comparison.

mitt romney's phone game, interesting stuff

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/victory_lab/2012/01/romney_s_iowa_win_it_took_a_lot_more_than_money_.single.html

But what was more important for Romney’s team was not just that his total share of the vote remained steady but that the individual voters who comprised it didn’t move either, making it easy to keep track of who they were and to mobilize them personally.

It was the ability to pinpoint and track supporters that settled Romney’s decision to publicly commit to winning Iowa late this fall. Romney’s campaign made a big show of converting the former video store into a headquarters, while spending millions on local television ads and dispatching the candidate to travel the state more aggressively than he had. But a ruthless yet largely invisible strategy had already been in place for much of the year, tracking both Romney’s supporters and his opponents. Only when Romney’s count appeared to exceed any rival’s did advisers unveil the trappings of a traditional caucus campaign.

iirc, unspent campaign contributions accrue to the donee, who then has wide latitude on how they are spent, even if he can't blatantly shove it in his own pocket. If Perry has a big unspent war chest and it was full of hundreds of thousands of my dollars, I would demand to retain an interest in that cash. Perry isn't the sort of pol who'd say fu to that either. He knows he's just a puny man propped up by these rich guys.

well i doubt perry is flush atm, and as to what perry could do right now to carry out a donor's interest in that money, my point stands. i really don't get where you're going with this. perry wants to quit but his donors are begging he keep going, for the money?

And speaking of Perry:

Perry spoke to reporters in Des Moines, Iowa, on Wednesday following his disappointing fifth-place showing in the Iowa caucus...Perry clearly wants to put his Iowa experience behind him. He called Iowa a "quirky place" with "a quirky process."

I kinda wish more candidates that flop would just flat out shit talk the place for the LOLs.

And from the Mormon who did stay out of Iowa about Romney's endorsements:

“It seems the more establishment piles on, Dole, McCain, all the rest, nobody cares. Nobody cares about this."

[quote]Texas Gov. Rick Perry says he is leaving the ''quirky'' state of Iowa to continue his presidential race among ''real'' Republicans in South Carolina.[/quote]

("real" = "not those freakin' Yankees")

man if he is casting iowa as yankeeland it just shows how bad he is at politics

Perry's donors may not understand the depths of his inability to win. I mean, they sank a lot of money into him because they believed quite the opposite. If they think that his campaign is salvageable, say, by a radical replacement of his staff and shift of strategy, then they might be very pissed off if he fails to make a last ditch effort to turn it around.

These are Texans -- people who are used to celebrating football players who stay on the field with broken ribs and make the tackle that saves the touchdown and the game. It may not make sense in a practical context, but this is Texas... you win or you come back on your shield.

http://i.imgur.com/T1AiN.png

RELATED: Jon Huntsman Says Iowans ‘Pick Corn,’ Not Presidents

too honest to be president

who was president sterling?

― goole, Wednesday, January 4, 2012 5:18 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

prez of stanford, in whose office the hippies were "sitting in" to protest vietnam

Up in New Hampshire:

Wandering around the event, Romney supporters were surprisingly difficult to find in the crowd, even among those sporting campaign stickers and signs. Outside the event, a small group of backers politely argued with a group of unidentified protestors dressed in animal costumes, including a dolphin mocking Romney’s “flip flops.”

“We loved him as governor,” Amanda Stradling, who moved to the state from Massachusetts, told TPM, holding a nine-month old baby wearing a Romney sticker.

But for every Romney, there seemed to be plenty of undecideds, independents, and even Democrats. One group of three friends, two of whom said they plan on voting for Obama, came up from New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut as “political tourists” just to check out the candidates.

“It’s just too early to decide,” one twenty-something in a Boston Red Sox hat said.

Simona Amiet, a homemaker who immigrated from Switzerland 20 years earlier, said she was leaning Romney because he was “knowledgeable with enterprise,” but had yet to decide. A Hillary Clinton supporter in 2008, she said she knew she wouldn’t be voting Democrat again in the general election, upset with both deficits and how he treated her favorite candidate four years ago.

Al Plass, 57, said as an independent he was still not sold on Romney, and that he was beginning to even warm up to Rick Santorum. But he was still holding out hope that his dream candidate would run: Donald Trump.

“He has way more business experience than Romney,” he said. “He’s straightforward, he’s a patriot, he loves this country.”

Outside the event, a small group of backers politely argued with a group of unidentified protestors dressed in animal costumes, including a dolphin mocking Romney’s “flip flops.”

I can't even

in what way is Trump a patriot

did he kill a muslim I don't know about

Simona Amiet, a homemaker who immigrated from Switzerland 20 years earlier, said she was leaning Romney because he was “knowledgeable with enterprise,” but had yet to decide. A Hillary Clinton supporter in 2008, she said she knew she wouldn’t be voting Democrat again in the general election, upset with both deficits and how he treated her favorite candidate four years ago.

asd vjudfoivsj8ivu aeugjSEUfioihaw4egyvhfaduighaertghaohdu;fvuos dfhaegv98yfhaguer tgyhauoshdfjlw4 hfasduo yfalf;jaw;efser fkwer84aiiv893as fas gatjjyghk jhgcn gdsfbrg bkjghn

sounds like newt's her candidate then

“knowledgeable with enterprise"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWIEyZFwZ8k

An Iowa caucus is basically like a livestock auction crossed with a general assembly, right?

and a New Hampshire primary is basically a Rotary Club crossed with a toadstool.

link courtesy nro/the corner but i put here so more people would see

http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/my-night-at-michele-bachmanns-headquarters

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/web03/2012/1/3/2/enhanced-buzz-23574-1325574283-7.jpg

pathos

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/terminal05/2012/1/3/2/enhanced-buzz-1479-1325574650-157.jpg

I overheard someone say: "We have a lot of courts trying to institute Sharia Law. They stoned a woman in Toronto and didn't do anything about it."

show me this Corner post!

I was watching last night when all this nonsense transpired, and, yes, I found it very funny ("We know--a lot of people Tweet in America!")

http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/01/the-iowa-spectacle.html

Number one rule in Toronto: everybody must get stoned.

x post

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/287016/visit-bachmann-hq-robert-costa#comments

what's also funny is the other thread he links to - the santorum scrapbook - takes the piss out of rick

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/web05/2012/1/2/11/enhanced-buzz-29688-1325522119-20.jpg

where does he want to put the end of nuclear war?

iLegal same sex marriage

Legalize the Death Penalty

the corner:

Katharine Hepburn said that Ginger Rogers gave Fred Astaire sex appeal. Iowa has restored the glow to Rick Santorum.

Put more money in the "investment of education" of our children so they learn to spell illegal.

1 person named April Buysman in Iowa | WhitePages
names.whitepages.com › Name Popularity › April Buysman
Find April Buysman on WhitePages. There is 1 person named April Buysman in Orange City, IA.

orange city!! haha no shit

new Corner thread:

NRO's The Corner 2: Ghost Protocol

From the Bachmann article:

She spoke for about a minute and then they played "Hey Soul Sister" 3 times in a row.

This is literally my idea of what hell would be like.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Correct top three. Wrong order, but the 25 Romney voters came damn close.

I voted for Santorum. Force of habit from all the NRO polls where I vote for what I want to happen (within reason, else I would have voted for Gingrich).

Me too.

i voted paul because he is a living god

I voted for RuPaul, because I expected this was his best shot at muddying the waters and giving the Republican establishment a hissy fit. I never dared to think Santorum would actually win it; he's such a loser.

I didn't honestly think he would win, I just liked the idea of him winning.

120,000 - 30,000...I think there about 90,000 people in Iowa who, big-picture, would probably say the same thing.

Kind of sad I didn't go to the democrat caucus last night, but my district was one of the ones where the room was practically overcrowded anyway.

I kind of love and hate this but I'll park it here since this thread's probably the last of the Iowa-mentioning for some time:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLZZ6JD0g9Y

i totally dont think iowans are all hillbillies, u need hills for that

i don't think iowans are hillbillies. I think they are predominantly small town or rural dwellers, without big cities. They also have a high percentage of college grads. Prob ag colleges, but those are diplomas, too.

wait, the Democrats caucused? did they just bow toward Washington?

The smug Iowan Obamaniac in that video might wanna listen to the first 2 minutes of this clip of the late (mostly) liberal talkshow host Lynn Samuels in 2008:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw0zr9hn01E

hey smug Iowan check out this youtube

it's 2012 & Matt's supporting his party by trolling Dr. Morbius on ilx political threads. come lord Quetzalcoatl incinerate us all in fire

http://www.statelibraryofiowa.org/datacenter/quickfacts

Btw I have no idea where the guy got the 4/5 in cities thing. All seems like smug pandering but I had a guilty lol.

"wait the democrats caucused" is kind of the "I have no idea what went on beyond headlines" statement here.

Wtf is an "ag college?" one of the two state universities has ag programs (both science and business) but they're not the largest parts of the school. According to j.'s stats there, there a about 90k people working on farms versus 1.5mil working elsewhere in the economy. 1 in 16 people working on a farm is kind of high, I guess?

it's 2012 & Matt's supporting his party by trolling Dr. Morbius on ilx political threads. come lord Quetzalcoatl incinerate us all in fire

― unlistenable in philly (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Thursday, January 5, 2012 4:39 AM (53 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I'm really kind of hurt that you think this is my reason above all the other far superior reasons to aggravate Morbs.

really feel like we need a moratorium on the term 'trolling' at this point, just a cooling out period

I'm not gonna watch that YouTube but Iowa State is an ag school for sure. Mrs. Aero worked on glycine max aka the noble soybean in their lab, they do a lot of research on g. max & corn & parasites etc @ Iowa State. "Farms" kinda doesn't really begin to describe just how much of Iowa's economy is agricultural - co-ops, grain elevators, transport, pesticides etc., whatever you classify anhydrous as they gotta buy shitloads of it to keep farming, etc

i mean that was a straight up zing by matt there, solid hit

there are three state universities.

the one with ag programs folded the ag college into one with all life sciences (and some other sciences—many of which used to be grouped with the liberal arts), and even still, there are more engineering students than there are ag and life sciences students, and more liberal arts and sciences students than there are engineering students:

http://www.iastate.edu/about/docs/facts/FactsFY12.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Iowa_products_2006.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/91/Iowa_products_2006.jpg

that doesn't entirely disprove what aero said but it's interesting how little of the gsp is directly ag

where is the hillbilly sector, something is wrong

laginfinityn yr right it's just a zing I'm just protective of Morbs because I agree w/him more than w/ppl who zing him generally

xp the thing is that chart is pretty deceptive - "construction" and "real estate," for example, are going to figure largely into the money changing hands in the country's #2 pork producing state. "ag" in w/"forestry" and "fishing" there probably means "crops," which takes up a lot of land but generates less money than pork, and than the manufacturing of products (and the delivery of services) to the pork producers. it was the Iowa State lab that sequenced the entire g. max genome iirc (nb I may not rc)

also "finance and insurance" I would imagine are doing huge business with farmers who've been losing their asses for years

actually I think the pork itself would be included in that ag % but that manufacturing % is probably fairly related to crops/ag.

there was a piece somewhere today questioning just how often you can cry wolf before ppl stop paying attention to you.

it did not take into account whether or not the wolf was actually threatening -- if there's a wolf, we shouldn't ignore it no matter how many times it's been called out.

morbius is annoying as fuck on all political threads, because he will not compromise with reality/what's possible. nevertheless, he is invaluable at (incessantly) reminding us what exactly we've already conceded.

(the nicknames do get old, tho)

Posting this here, because I'm not reading the other thread:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2012/01/04/duverger-kushner-bonhoeffer/

Duverger, Kushner, Bonhoeffer
By Fred Clark, January 4, 2012 5:15 pm

A brief reminder: Duverger’s law.

That’s how it works. Candidate A vs. Candidate B. Party A vs. Party B.

Moral purity and moral perfection will not be on the ballot.

Those seeking moral purity and moral perfection pleasure themselves by imagining that theirs is a superior ethical responsibility. But this is delusional — an embrace of irresponsibility. It’s the claim that one is not responsible for any outcome, consequence or action in this world apart from maintaining, above all, one’s own impotent but unsullied moral purity.

You voted for Candidate A? Then you are responsible for every evil act and poor decision made by Candidate A. I refused to vote for Candidate A, or for any candidate because they’re all corrupt and all the same. And therefore I am not responsible for anything at all in this world. You are tainted. I am pure.

I do not accept that irresponsibility is a virtue.

As Tony Kushner said:

Listen, here’s the thing about politics: It’s not an expression of your moral purity and your ethics and your probity and your fond dreams of some utopian future. Progressive people constantly fail to get this.

Or as Dietrich Bonhoeffer said:

Responsible action must decide not simply between right and wrong, good and evil, but between right and right, wrong and wrong.

That is all.

also "finance and insurance" I would imagine are doing huge business with farmers who've been losing their asses for years

― unlistenable in philly (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Thursday, 5 January 2012 05:47 (8 hours ago) Permalink

des moines is a huge town for insurance

"hey smug Iowan check out this youtube"

This was a solid zing? hey icey, maybe u too authentic for the internets

it was funny! i lold nbd

it wasnt a crippling blow or anything

I can tell, since I walked to the subway.

So really, why don't libs argue for Obama to use the bully pulpit? (My answer wd be that he's not an advocate for lib positions.)

i feel like libs argue all the time for obama to use the bully pulpit, like 90% amateur political analysis regardless the orientation boils down to we should yell more abt this

if only!! it is actually "obama should yell more about this"

or "knock heads" or whatever

when PEOPLE actually yell about things, i.e. Occupy, it opens the window for people like Obama to act

yeah otm, i meant obama and other politicians

i guess YOU should yell more abt this wouldve been clearer

I don't hear "obama/Dem pols should yell more about this" nearly as much as variants of "Republicans exist, so there's nothing Dems can do"

well that line of reasoning def has a disproportionate popularity amongst professional pundits, i think amateur pundits have a lot more faith in the bully pulpit

the truth is somewhat more complicated *pats self on back*

I'm not gonna watch that YouTube but Iowa State is an ag school for sure. Mrs. Aero worked on glycine max aka the noble soybean in their lab, they do a lot of research on g. max & corn & parasites etc @ Iowa State.

Oh, very true. I think of those as agriculture-related but not farming per se, if that makes sense. Farmers are the "live in the boondocks, wear overalls, vote for social conservatives" dudes that carry the stereotype, imo -- when you hear the generalizations about Iowa and farms and "they pick corn, not candidates, lol," I doubt many people are thinking of research scientists sequencing genomes, people in an urban/suburban area selling crop insurance, or the corporate offices of large ag companies.

fwiw, I went to Iowa State and the one year I was in the dorms, the dudes who were in ag business were kind of picked on as hicks.

On a semi-related note, I'm annoyed by the lack of understanding of the role and usefulness of unions. From what my card-carrying union friends have been saying, democrats are losing support from that sector more from the shortcomings of union leadership than from a real change in the voter base.

Also, I laughed pretty hard at the fact I completely forgot a state university. Sorry UNI! To my credit, though, most UNI grads forget about UNI.

i graduated with a kid who got a full ride to UNI and iirc he didn't go

From what my card-carrying union friends have been saying, democrats are losing support from that sector more from the shortcomings of union leadership than from a real change in the voter base.

Speaking as a (quite happily so) card-carrying union member myself, it can definitely come down to that. There was a LOT of frustration bubbling up in recent years given that our bunch was caught in endless negotiations that went nowhere combined with rather poorly handled PR mailouts and announcements that just ticked a lot of people off. Affiliating with the Teamsters smoothed a lot of that out and we recently approved a handy five-year contract.

Another issue, though, can be boiled down to the question of turf wars. This hopefully has also changed with the Teamsters affiliation but we'll see. Basically, anybody who found themselves in a position to be promoted out of the union to a different status via a new work assignment or a work reclassification often found that the union was essentially working against their interests because that means they would lose a member -- a couple of friends dealt with that for the longest time, to their increasing frustration. So if things like that are more commonplace than expected, I couldn't blame people's annoyance at all.

Affiliating with the Teamsters smoothed a lot of that out

haha I'll bet

We have some odd affiliations on campus here. When the grad students union came into being almost fifteen years back it was as an affiliate of the UAW.

oh look Bono likes Santorum

lol catholics

kinda wanna poll the awkward moments in this story

Santorum "has a kind of Tourette's disease," Bono told New York Times columnist David Brooks in 2006.

These three are winners from that Mitt story:

“The line? The DMZ? Is that it? No, I know what it is: It’s the emergency exit! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Yeah. Ahh.”

“Ha, ha. Uh. I think landslides are terrific....I just didn’t, uh, see that in last night’s figures. I’m not sure about you. Ha, ha, ha, ha.”

“What a, uh, big night we had last night, or what a big morning we had, uh, last morning, this morning, in, uh, Iowa,”

I think that's about as much about Bono dropping names and at least as much about Bono's committment to Catholic 'caritas' as it is about liking Santorum.

"Hair Force One"

tbf it must kinda suck for mitt to continually be reminded that nobody likes him

well he still has a decent shot at becoming president of america, so

he doesn't have a prayer imho

let's hope fundies agree with that statement

Shakey just loves to crucify the Catholics.

not even clemenza will dispute this? it's the Dobbsey twin election, folx.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_big_idea/2012/01/mitt_romney_s_the_nominee_the_republican_primary_race_is_over_.html

Santorum has about $73 in his bank account iirc

wait didn't he raise a million dollars the other day

yes but he then spent it all on wet wipes