It's going to take a while to digest everything, let it sink in, see how it all sorts out, but the initial impact of Obama's near-landslide election is undeniable. I'm not quite to the "skies are bluer, food tastes better, sex is more pleasurable" stage the true believers are, but it's a step in the right direction that I wasn't sure enough of my fella 'murkins really had in 'em.
Skepticism and cynicism frequently are what motivate and inform us, but it's nice to at least have the opportunity to start tempering that with a bit of cautious optimism. Also, for the first time in eight years, we'll have an English-speaking president. And I can start using that "p" word which I have studiously avoided so diligently.
Good job, America. After exhausting all the other options, you've finally come around to doing something resembling the right thing. And all y'all closet crackers and ignorant buffoons that have weighted down the country and the world with your drinkin' buddy, kindly go piss up the nearest rope for a few years. Go John Galt like you keep threatening, and do us all a favor. We'll send someone up to your Rocky Mountain fort to dig out your corpses at the next spring thaw.
Showing posts with label indecision '08. Show all posts
Showing posts with label indecision '08. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Sunday, November 02, 2008
The Party's Over
John Cole, like many other former Republicans and/or conservatives that have disembarked the Straight Talk Express, sounds sincere enough in his misgivings about the current state of that party/movement. But the problem isn't really that they're out of ideas. They have them, they're just all bad ideas, or ideas put forth on false premises, or the propagation of lies and rage.
Whatever illusions of Lockean or Burkean conservatism the movementarians might have once had in the wake of the Reagan Revolution, those avowed principles have long fallen by the wayside, replaced by strip-mall theosophy and the sort of ideological hackery one expects to find in the North Korean press. The problem is that the most popular promulgators of their compromised philosophy have overcommitted, both in their support for a manifestly failed administration and in their disdain for the cartoonish version of "liberalism" they railed against. They've painted themselves into corners with their comic-book sophistries and strawman arguments, and most of them can't walk it back now.
The people who, right or wrong, were at least operating by a tangible code of principles, have already left, mostly in disgust at what it's all become. I wish I knew what to tell them. On the one hand, when people who can articulate serious principles and goals give up on the vehicle for their cause, that vehicle is going to rapidly devolve into a political Pinto. It has already; one assumes that in the event of an Obama blowout, the internal bloodletting will commence en masse. On the other hand, I can't help but think that at least some of their misgivings revolve not around the depravity and immorality of their most vocal elements, but the failure of those tactics. If those tactics somehow unfortunately resonated with a sufficient amount of people, many of these folks would be fine with it.
The people who posture and preen as professional "conservatives" now are obviously not actual conservatives; they are authoritarians and/or ideological mercenaries, and while it is more of a natural progression than libertarian-minded conservatives would care to admit, it is still a dangerous progression. It has turned the party into the natural habitat of post-John Birch kooks, not-so-closeted racists, and Christianist (as opposed to simply Christian) weirdos, perpetuated by the toxic feedback loop of talk radio ranters and sideshow hucksters. It's an incoherent wad of cryptofascist rhetoric and buzzwords, with very little thought put into how their fever dreams would take hold in our material plane of existence.
They seem to genuinely not understand how overextended the country is, collectively and individually. They think the empire will go on forever, as all marketers for empire have throughout history. They appear to not comprehend the consequences of widening income disparity, of just how close the ordinary people they pretend to identify with are to living in the gutter.
Even in good times, most people live paycheck-to-paycheck, buying toys on a margin that has now been called out from under them. That is a consequence of chronic wage stagnation and widening income disparity -- the natural conclusion of their laissez-faire economic policies. There are no surprises here; these people are either monumentally stupid or breathtakingly cynical.
When the two-party system "works", to the extent that it can given its inherent defects, it does so because the two entities present reasonable counterbalances to each other. That is no longer the case. The Donk is certainly no paragon of steadfastness and competence, but compared to the carnies, draft dodgers, and closet cases on the other side, they're downright statesmanlike.
But it's obviously not healthy to have any one party dominating things for an extended period of time. Right now it's a necessity, because the Republicans have screwed the pooch so utterly, have failed to admit or hold responsible parties accountable, and cannot play well with others. Hopefully by 2012 or 2016 they will have learned how to use their indoor voice again. It's not as ideal as my preferred paradigm of lightly-armed, post-Westphalian, Hanseatic-style regional trading confederations, but it's the moment we're at in our political and cultural evolution.
What the Republicans have in the wake of an electoral thumping is an opportunity to get their shit together, to re-evalute their principles and their approach. But it starts with marginalizing the yahoos that have turned the party into a clown car.
Whatever illusions of Lockean or Burkean conservatism the movementarians might have once had in the wake of the Reagan Revolution, those avowed principles have long fallen by the wayside, replaced by strip-mall theosophy and the sort of ideological hackery one expects to find in the North Korean press. The problem is that the most popular promulgators of their compromised philosophy have overcommitted, both in their support for a manifestly failed administration and in their disdain for the cartoonish version of "liberalism" they railed against. They've painted themselves into corners with their comic-book sophistries and strawman arguments, and most of them can't walk it back now.
The people who, right or wrong, were at least operating by a tangible code of principles, have already left, mostly in disgust at what it's all become. I wish I knew what to tell them. On the one hand, when people who can articulate serious principles and goals give up on the vehicle for their cause, that vehicle is going to rapidly devolve into a political Pinto. It has already; one assumes that in the event of an Obama blowout, the internal bloodletting will commence en masse. On the other hand, I can't help but think that at least some of their misgivings revolve not around the depravity and immorality of their most vocal elements, but the failure of those tactics. If those tactics somehow unfortunately resonated with a sufficient amount of people, many of these folks would be fine with it.
The people who posture and preen as professional "conservatives" now are obviously not actual conservatives; they are authoritarians and/or ideological mercenaries, and while it is more of a natural progression than libertarian-minded conservatives would care to admit, it is still a dangerous progression. It has turned the party into the natural habitat of post-John Birch kooks, not-so-closeted racists, and Christianist (as opposed to simply Christian) weirdos, perpetuated by the toxic feedback loop of talk radio ranters and sideshow hucksters. It's an incoherent wad of cryptofascist rhetoric and buzzwords, with very little thought put into how their fever dreams would take hold in our material plane of existence.
They seem to genuinely not understand how overextended the country is, collectively and individually. They think the empire will go on forever, as all marketers for empire have throughout history. They appear to not comprehend the consequences of widening income disparity, of just how close the ordinary people they pretend to identify with are to living in the gutter.
Even in good times, most people live paycheck-to-paycheck, buying toys on a margin that has now been called out from under them. That is a consequence of chronic wage stagnation and widening income disparity -- the natural conclusion of their laissez-faire economic policies. There are no surprises here; these people are either monumentally stupid or breathtakingly cynical.
When the two-party system "works", to the extent that it can given its inherent defects, it does so because the two entities present reasonable counterbalances to each other. That is no longer the case. The Donk is certainly no paragon of steadfastness and competence, but compared to the carnies, draft dodgers, and closet cases on the other side, they're downright statesmanlike.
But it's obviously not healthy to have any one party dominating things for an extended period of time. Right now it's a necessity, because the Republicans have screwed the pooch so utterly, have failed to admit or hold responsible parties accountable, and cannot play well with others. Hopefully by 2012 or 2016 they will have learned how to use their indoor voice again. It's not as ideal as my preferred paradigm of lightly-armed, post-Westphalian, Hanseatic-style regional trading confederations, but it's the moment we're at in our political and cultural evolution.
What the Republicans have in the wake of an electoral thumping is an opportunity to get their shit together, to re-evalute their principles and their approach. But it starts with marginalizing the yahoos that have turned the party into a clown car.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Spanking the Monkey
"Growing the pie" is indeed precious nonsense of an almost Palinesque -- hell, almost Bushian -- stature, so perhaps the tundra shrew is rubbing off on the old fart despite his best efforts. It's a phrase that could just as easily be replaced by "slamming the ham" or "flogging the dolphin", which pretty much sums up his inept free-floating jerkoff of a campaign.
Boy howdy, they run a tight ship there, don't they? It's bad enough that they stake their homestretch run on theseBill the CatJoe the Ringer/Bob the Builder jokers. But Obama draws thousands in freezing rain in Pennsylvania, and midnight rallies in Florida, while the Straight Talk Express sputters into early-morning monologues at East Overshoe Junior High. Is the field there bigger and nicer than the high school's, or are we trying to win over a couple hundred thirteen-year-olds?
I caught a little over half of the Obama infomercial last night, out of basic curiosity more than anything, and I noted that not once did I hear the name of either of Obama's opponents uttered. This was much more effective than any open repudiation would have been. Yet it's not an unreasonable impression to assume that neither McCain nor his Neiman Marxist sidekick can go three minutes without lobbing some incendiary lie about Obama, because they're simply incapable of coming up with anything else. Their arguments have been uniformly impotent and incoherent. I'd have some respect for them if they, for example, talked about the working-class people who got hosed by Joe-the-Delaware-Senator's sponsorship of the credit-card industry's bankruptcy bill, but there's too much common ground there, I suppose.
As obnoxious as that "big lies, oft-repeated" aspect of McPalin's tepid effort is, perhaps what's worse is the gleam in Palin's eye as she dutifully recites laundry lists of "This the That" faces-in-the-crowd, almost as if it actually meant or accomplished a single useful thing. More than ever, she comes off like an annoyingly precocious fourth-grader who not only has memorized most of the state capitals, but insists on reminding everyone within earshot as often as possible.
It's easy enough to observe that both parties and their respective candidates are, in the end, simply the far-right and the center-right wings of a militarizing, data-mining corporatocracy, red in tooth and claw, extending the hegemon whilst picking our pockets and drowning our dreams of anarcho-syndicalist bliss, etc., etc. I'm down with all that. But that doesn't mean there aren't serious differences not just between the candidates and policies, but more importantly their audiences. I'll take painfully earnest, muddled idealism over doddering senescence and increasingly virulent yahooism any day. Even the golden opportunity of tearing down a corrupt edifice isn't worth unnecessarily empowering these throngs of hooting retards.
“Joe’s with us today,” McCain said. “Joe where are you? Where is Joe? Is Joe here with us today? Joe, I thought you were here today.”
After a four second pause, he realized that Joe was not present this chilly morning at Defiance Junior High School.
“Well,” he said, “you’re all Joe the Plumber, so all of you stand up!” That was easy since nearly everyone was standing already.
“I saw Joe on television this morning,” he added. “He did a great job.”
Aides said later that the campaign mixed up its events and that Joe would be appearing later in the day. McCain is at the start of a two-day bus tour through Ohio, a state he must win Tuesday if he has a shot of victory.
Boy howdy, they run a tight ship there, don't they? It's bad enough that they stake their homestretch run on these
I caught a little over half of the Obama infomercial last night, out of basic curiosity more than anything, and I noted that not once did I hear the name of either of Obama's opponents uttered. This was much more effective than any open repudiation would have been. Yet it's not an unreasonable impression to assume that neither McCain nor his Neiman Marxist sidekick can go three minutes without lobbing some incendiary lie about Obama, because they're simply incapable of coming up with anything else. Their arguments have been uniformly impotent and incoherent. I'd have some respect for them if they, for example, talked about the working-class people who got hosed by Joe-the-Delaware-Senator's sponsorship of the credit-card industry's bankruptcy bill, but there's too much common ground there, I suppose.
As obnoxious as that "big lies, oft-repeated" aspect of McPalin's tepid effort is, perhaps what's worse is the gleam in Palin's eye as she dutifully recites laundry lists of "This the That" faces-in-the-crowd, almost as if it actually meant or accomplished a single useful thing. More than ever, she comes off like an annoyingly precocious fourth-grader who not only has memorized most of the state capitals, but insists on reminding everyone within earshot as often as possible.
It's easy enough to observe that both parties and their respective candidates are, in the end, simply the far-right and the center-right wings of a militarizing, data-mining corporatocracy, red in tooth and claw, extending the hegemon whilst picking our pockets and drowning our dreams of anarcho-syndicalist bliss, etc., etc. I'm down with all that. But that doesn't mean there aren't serious differences not just between the candidates and policies, but more importantly their audiences. I'll take painfully earnest, muddled idealism over doddering senescence and increasingly virulent yahooism any day. Even the golden opportunity of tearing down a corrupt edifice isn't worth unnecessarily empowering these throngs of hooting retards.
Monday, October 27, 2008
No Sleep 'til Wordsmith
I don't often find myself agreeing with Safire, but when he's right, he's right -- the "proof of the pudding" is in the eating, truly a difference with an actual distinction.
Other things that rub my anal-retentive nub:
As for the rest of Safire's scrying of the rhetorical frottage of McCain and Palin, characterizing their endless vamping as "verbal tics" is at once too kind and insufficient. Watching their speeches is about as entertaining as listening to alley cats mate on a backyard fence; reading the transcripts is different but not much better. McCain seems to benefit a bit from reading his piffle rather than listening to it, being tethered to his toneless, cadence-free delivery.
Palin, on the other hand, gathers steam and gall in her delivery as she pounces from one crowd of halfwits to the next. Transcripts are inadequate in capturing her snideness and sarcasm, her smirking glee as she parks lie after shrill lie into the cheap seats.
The fact that all they've been able to attract at most of these things is career yahoos such as Hank Williams Jr. and Elisabeth Hasselbeck is, I suppose, something of a relief. Professional wrestlers and NASCAR drivers seem to be few and far between at these rallies, surely a cultural barometer of that particular base.
All of which points to something that even Safire would have to concede. This past weekend featured much speculation over Palin becoming a "diva", and perhaps looking ahead already to 2012. More than a few professional leg-humpers made the usual rounds to encourage such speculation.
If Palin really is the best they've got to offer next time around, then their party is well and truly dead from the standpoint of ideological legitimacy, and their Wills and Krauthammers and Safires will have to do some real soul-searching. It would seal the notion that they are no longer the party of Lincoln, nor even of Schwarzenegger, but rather the satrapy of cartoon characters directly descended from Tom DeLay.
There has to be more to their would-be philosophical underpinnings than giving Rich Lowry a boner. Palin's future -- and the country's -- would be better served by letting her ply her trade at one of the indistinguishable poliporn glory holes that litter the abandoned rest stops of the basic cable spectrum.
Other things that rub my anal-retentive nub:
- Saying that you "could" care less. Really, could you? I mean, so could I. So could anyone. What makes you so special? Doesn't matter what the subject is. We could all care less. Fucking duh. But if the expression has any meaning, which it doesn't, then you could not care less, right?
Eh, fuck it. I could care less. - Having your cake and eating it too. How is that accomplished? Doesn't eating your cake and still having it make more logical sense or what? In what other way are you "having" this abstract cake? In the conjugal sense? That would certainly explain the existence of Twinkies.
- "From whence". This is redundant construction; "whence" itself means "from where" or "from when". It's funny that some of the people who lapse into such usage are exactly the sort of folks who should have encountered Strunk & White at some point in their professional writing careers.
As for the rest of Safire's scrying of the rhetorical frottage of McCain and Palin, characterizing their endless vamping as "verbal tics" is at once too kind and insufficient. Watching their speeches is about as entertaining as listening to alley cats mate on a backyard fence; reading the transcripts is different but not much better. McCain seems to benefit a bit from reading his piffle rather than listening to it, being tethered to his toneless, cadence-free delivery.
Palin, on the other hand, gathers steam and gall in her delivery as she pounces from one crowd of halfwits to the next. Transcripts are inadequate in capturing her snideness and sarcasm, her smirking glee as she parks lie after shrill lie into the cheap seats.
The fact that all they've been able to attract at most of these things is career yahoos such as Hank Williams Jr. and Elisabeth Hasselbeck is, I suppose, something of a relief. Professional wrestlers and NASCAR drivers seem to be few and far between at these rallies, surely a cultural barometer of that particular base.
All of which points to something that even Safire would have to concede. This past weekend featured much speculation over Palin becoming a "diva", and perhaps looking ahead already to 2012. More than a few professional leg-humpers made the usual rounds to encourage such speculation.
If Palin really is the best they've got to offer next time around, then their party is well and truly dead from the standpoint of ideological legitimacy, and their Wills and Krauthammers and Safires will have to do some real soul-searching. It would seal the notion that they are no longer the party of Lincoln, nor even of Schwarzenegger, but rather the satrapy of cartoon characters directly descended from Tom DeLay.
There has to be more to their would-be philosophical underpinnings than giving Rich Lowry a boner. Palin's future -- and the country's -- would be better served by letting her ply her trade at one of the indistinguishable poliporn glory holes that litter the abandoned rest stops of the basic cable spectrum.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
McCain Campaign Stays Mainly in the Lame
Looking back at the waste and debris that comprises the 2008 Republican campaign, perhaps the most striking feature is how consistently inept and incoherent it has been. It has not been a coordinated campaign with an actual mesage, so much as a series of disconnected weekly stunts and gimmicks.
None of these stunts and catch-phrases have made it beyond what marketing weasels would call "early adopters", but in the political arena are simply (to be charitable about it) true believers. They'll believe whatever they're told, because they're predisposed to. The effective campaign is the one that can move its message beyond that first layer of self-selecting dopes, but all you see at these "events" is the same idiots with their "I Am Joe the Plummer"[sic] signs, proving on several levels that they indeed slept their way through the public school system.
So when I read a breathless, gushing chronicle of McCain appearing in Denver with by far the most famous face of that city's NFL franchise, I instantly wonder what the numbers are. After all, Obama just drew 100,000 in St. Louis, and turned around and drew another 75,000 in Kansas City the very next day. Surely John Elway can reel in some numbers on his home turf for Poor Ol' Straight Talk.
Four thousand. 4,000 people showed up to listen to this mess. Come on. Elway probably can't go shopping at the mall in Denver without attracting a few hundred gawkers, and the draw is only 4k at a campaign event?
First, you know, go fuck yourself, Elroy. You would think a guy who went to Stanford might actually have a clue about the implications of continuing this pernicious little "McCain loves his country more than Obama" theme. But he's got his car dealerships and his new cheerleader wife, so it's all good. He's set, and nobody in Colorado will ever hold him accountable for anything he says, no matter how obnoxious or flat-out stupid. Don't be too surprised if a desperate Colorado GOP taps him for statewide office in the next few years.
But whatever. It's about what you'd expect from pro football players, most of whom just vote for whoever will take the smallest chunk of taxes out of their fat paychecks. The thing is, I'd bet money that the turnout would have been at least triple what it was if Palin had been scheduled to speak. She's their only draw now, because the campaign itself has no meaning, it's just a traveling American Idol, with an indistinguishable group of cartoonish morons at every stop.
Think about that: ten days out from Election Day, and one of the major-party candidates has been so overshadowed by his running mate, who was virtually unknown just a couple months ago, that he can't draw a decent crowd without her. He's gotta know what bad news that is for his prospects, and what that says about his tepid, shallow support, while Obama ground forces dwarf his in every state, red and blue alike. The way things are going, this election won't even be close enough for them to steal this time.
Nobody's voting for John McCain. They're either voting for the naughty librarian they think Sarah Palin is, or they're voting against what Limbaugh and Hannity have told them about Obama. For a guy that's spent a quarter-century in the US Senate, that's pretty damned sad.
Update: Hee hee. Suck it, Elway. Just fuckin' blow me long time. Real mature, I know. But still: Suck. It. Long. Time.
None of these stunts and catch-phrases have made it beyond what marketing weasels would call "early adopters", but in the political arena are simply (to be charitable about it) true believers. They'll believe whatever they're told, because they're predisposed to. The effective campaign is the one that can move its message beyond that first layer of self-selecting dopes, but all you see at these "events" is the same idiots with their "I Am Joe the Plummer"[sic] signs, proving on several levels that they indeed slept their way through the public school system.
So when I read a breathless, gushing chronicle of McCain appearing in Denver with by far the most famous face of that city's NFL franchise, I instantly wonder what the numbers are. After all, Obama just drew 100,000 in St. Louis, and turned around and drew another 75,000 in Kansas City the very next day. Surely John Elway can reel in some numbers on his home turf for Poor Ol' Straight Talk.
Four thousand. 4,000 people showed up to listen to this mess. Come on. Elway probably can't go shopping at the mall in Denver without attracting a few hundred gawkers, and the draw is only 4k at a campaign event?
Elway said McCain knows how to show "leadership and sacrifice for the good of the team."
Turning to the candidate, he said "It's the fourth quarter, and some have counted you out. But I know a thing or two about comebacks."
Elway urged everyone to vote. "We need to put someone in the White House who puts country first."
First, you know, go fuck yourself, Elroy. You would think a guy who went to Stanford might actually have a clue about the implications of continuing this pernicious little "McCain loves his country more than Obama" theme. But he's got his car dealerships and his new cheerleader wife, so it's all good. He's set, and nobody in Colorado will ever hold him accountable for anything he says, no matter how obnoxious or flat-out stupid. Don't be too surprised if a desperate Colorado GOP taps him for statewide office in the next few years.
But whatever. It's about what you'd expect from pro football players, most of whom just vote for whoever will take the smallest chunk of taxes out of their fat paychecks. The thing is, I'd bet money that the turnout would have been at least triple what it was if Palin had been scheduled to speak. She's their only draw now, because the campaign itself has no meaning, it's just a traveling American Idol, with an indistinguishable group of cartoonish morons at every stop.
Think about that: ten days out from Election Day, and one of the major-party candidates has been so overshadowed by his running mate, who was virtually unknown just a couple months ago, that he can't draw a decent crowd without her. He's gotta know what bad news that is for his prospects, and what that says about his tepid, shallow support, while Obama ground forces dwarf his in every state, red and blue alike. The way things are going, this election won't even be close enough for them to steal this time.
Nobody's voting for John McCain. They're either voting for the naughty librarian they think Sarah Palin is, or they're voting against what Limbaugh and Hannity have told them about Obama. For a guy that's spent a quarter-century in the US Senate, that's pretty damned sad.
Update: Hee hee. Suck it, Elway. Just fuckin' blow me long time. Real mature, I know. But still: Suck. It. Long. Time.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Sarandipity
Li'l Miss Can't Be Wrong continues her DiMaggio-like streak of not answering simple interview questions from mainstream tee-ballers:
I would have expected this sort of question from Neal Boortz or Hugh Love Hewitt or some such, but there you have it. "Gubna, why are you so awesomely awesome, even more so than your mavericky running mate? Is it because you graciously allowed him to stay on top of the ticket?" Sheesh.
But what is her answer? The usual boilerplate about what a "reformer" she is. She won't specifically bring up the "thanks but no thanks" Bridge to Nowhere lie anymore, but what else is there? Her only "step" toward energy independence is the "drill baby drill" chant. She does not, has not, "[told] us how she's done this", nor, more importantly, how any of it would apply outside the politically inbred confines of Frontierland.
It was pretty clear from the get-go in the context of Obama's phrasing that "spreading the wealth" was more broadly implied as maybe it's time the assholes who've been picking your pockets all these years and blowing up your 401(k) need a shakedown. Not too unreasonable under current circumstances. Nobody's entrepreneurial spirit is going to be shitcanned by the knowledge that incomes -- not revenues, which Wurzelbacher the Ringer couldn't seem to distinguish -- over $250K are going to get tapped slightly more than before. The idea that this is some sort of confiscatory redistributive policy in the offing is hysterical.
And nobody's fooled by your ringer, dearie, at least nobody who wasn't already on board. They're not after Joe the Plumber or Joe Six-tooth or Bob the Builder or Tito the Screaming Douchebag; they're after this Joe, and that's exactly what they're getting.
Skipping past her injecting her latest Joe Biden stump riff into the mix, let's get to the "apology" at the end:
Bullshit. It came across exactly the way it was meant to come across, to incite rural crowds with the frisson of resentment at know-it-all city slickers. This campaign has done nothing but appeal to people's baser impulses, to gin up a snide, unseemly hostility among people whose states are statistically on the taking end of things. They talk about self-sufficiency while taking more federal tax dollars than they put in, tax dollars that are put in by coastal elite state that get back much less than their share.
And they talk tough about gettin' them al Qaeda fellers, but not one of them, in their jingoistic fury, bothers to wonder why exactly it is that New York City -- the place that actually got hit by these bastards, not your Piggly Wiggly in Squatter's Gulch -- are pro-Obama to a degree that's not even laughably close. In fact, regardless of the issue, in the months this dreadful thing has gone on, I honestly cannot recall a single person at a single Republican rally who could make their case without this aphasic mad-libbery wingnut-bingo of Ayers-Wright-Muslim-Rezko-celebrity.
And now the rallies seem more like chattering hordes of red-assed baboons seen on National Geographic specials, except perhaps even less coherent and reasoned. Palin's a huge reason for that, obviously, lowering the bar in what her campaign really has to offer, as opposed to merely attempting to detract by smear. Her interview may be more civil, but is not any more reality-based or intelligible in terms of practical aspects.
CNN: You seemed to be very much on your game. You get huge crowds. Even bigger crowds than [Republican presidential candidate Sen.] John McCain. Why is that?
Sarah Palin: I think it's what I'm representing and what the message is and that is true reform of government that is so needed, and having a representative of someone who has a track record of showing that, yeah, you can, you can do this, you can reform, you can put government back on the side of the people, you can fight corruption. You can actually take steps towards helping our nation become energy-independent and all those things that we're talking about. I think that more and more Americans are realizing that, well, good, we have a candidate who has actually done some of those things and it's not just, talkin' the talk, she's gonna tell us how she's done this.
I would have expected this sort of question from Neal Boortz or Hugh Love Hewitt or some such, but there you have it. "Gubna, why are you so awesomely awesome, even more so than your mavericky running mate? Is it because you graciously allowed him to stay on top of the ticket?" Sheesh.
But what is her answer? The usual boilerplate about what a "reformer" she is. She won't specifically bring up the "thanks but no thanks" Bridge to Nowhere lie anymore, but what else is there? Her only "step" toward energy independence is the "drill baby drill" chant. She does not, has not, "[told] us how she's done this", nor, more importantly, how any of it would apply outside the politically inbred confines of Frontierland.
CNN: Yeah. Uh, Joe the plumber?
Palin: Yeah.
CNN: Socialism, it's come up on the campaign trail now.
Palin: Sure.
CNN: Governor, is Barack Obama a socialist?
Palin: I'm not gonna call him a socialist, but, as Joe the plumber had suggested, in fact he came right out and said it sounds like socialism to him and he speaks for so many Americans who are quite concerned now, after hearing finally what Barack Obama's true intentions are with his tax and economic plan, and that is, to take more from small businesses, more from our families, and then redistribute that according to his priorities. That is, that is not good for the entrepreneurial spirit that has built this great country. That is not good for our economy, certainly it's not good for the opportunities that our small businesses should have, to keep more of what they produce, in order to hire more people, create more jobs. That's what gets the economy going. So, finally Joe the plumber and as we talked about today in the speech, too, he's representing, you know, Jane the engineer and Molly the dental hygienist and Chuck the teacher and, and all these good, hard-working Americans who are, finally, were able to hear in very plain talk the other night, what Barack Obama's intentions were to redistribute wealth.
It was pretty clear from the get-go in the context of Obama's phrasing that "spreading the wealth" was more broadly implied as maybe it's time the assholes who've been picking your pockets all these years and blowing up your 401(k) need a shakedown. Not too unreasonable under current circumstances. Nobody's entrepreneurial spirit is going to be shitcanned by the knowledge that incomes -- not revenues, which Wurzelbacher the Ringer couldn't seem to distinguish -- over $250K are going to get tapped slightly more than before. The idea that this is some sort of confiscatory redistributive policy in the offing is hysterical.
And nobody's fooled by your ringer, dearie, at least nobody who wasn't already on board. They're not after Joe the Plumber or Joe Six-tooth or Bob the Builder or Tito the Screaming Douchebag; they're after this Joe, and that's exactly what they're getting.
Skipping past her injecting her latest Joe Biden stump riff into the mix, let's get to the "apology" at the end:
CNN: You've talked about America. And certain parts of America, that are maybe more American than other parts of American, Are there?
Palin: Ehhh, I don't want that misunderstood. No, I do not want that misunderstood. You know, when I go to these rallies and we see the patriotism just shining through these people's faces and the Vietnam veterans wearing their hats so proudly and they have tears in their eyes as we sing our national anthem and it is so inspiring and I say that this is true America, you get it, you understand how important it is that in the next four years we have a leader who will fight for you. I certainly don't want that interpreted as one area being more patriotic or more American than another. If that's the way it's come across, I apologize.
Bullshit. It came across exactly the way it was meant to come across, to incite rural crowds with the frisson of resentment at know-it-all city slickers. This campaign has done nothing but appeal to people's baser impulses, to gin up a snide, unseemly hostility among people whose states are statistically on the taking end of things. They talk about self-sufficiency while taking more federal tax dollars than they put in, tax dollars that are put in by coastal elite state that get back much less than their share.
And they talk tough about gettin' them al Qaeda fellers, but not one of them, in their jingoistic fury, bothers to wonder why exactly it is that New York City -- the place that actually got hit by these bastards, not your Piggly Wiggly in Squatter's Gulch -- are pro-Obama to a degree that's not even laughably close. In fact, regardless of the issue, in the months this dreadful thing has gone on, I honestly cannot recall a single person at a single Republican rally who could make their case without this aphasic mad-libbery wingnut-bingo of Ayers-Wright-Muslim-Rezko-celebrity.
And now the rallies seem more like chattering hordes of red-assed baboons seen on National Geographic specials, except perhaps even less coherent and reasoned. Palin's a huge reason for that, obviously, lowering the bar in what her campaign really has to offer, as opposed to merely attempting to detract by smear. Her interview may be more civil, but is not any more reality-based or intelligible in terms of practical aspects.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Powell Trip
Colin Powell's word ceased to mean much to me after that dark day where he trudged into the UN, covering up Guernica in the process for some weird reason, and jerked the world's chain over the imminent danger of WMD. He's a lifelong company man, whether covering up Charlie hamlets being machine-gunned into makeshift ditches, or rushing off to mayhem in the desert.
And yet, his endorsement adds clarity and meaning and momentum to the realities of the campaign. It makes the Republicans nervous as hell; the more frantically they spin and sour-grapes this thing, the more clear it is that they would have loooved, like fuckin' lurved to have Powell's okey-doke. It would have huge for them, just for all the thinly-veiled racial reasons they're trying to dance around.
Most importantly, it means something to the media weasels, probably them most of all. As far as voters, Powell might move some undecideds, but you can't count on anything there because those people are by definition narcissistic morons. But the media loves them some Colin, and this automatically seizes the penultimate news cycle, mere hours after Sarah flailin' on some overhyped late-night comedy show.
It's going to be fun to watch the conservabots spin this one without intimating any racial connotations, their deepest fears of Flavor Flav being made Seckatary of What Time It Is welling in their puny hearts. If Condi Rice makes a move, their heads might explode.
And yet, his endorsement adds clarity and meaning and momentum to the realities of the campaign. It makes the Republicans nervous as hell; the more frantically they spin and sour-grapes this thing, the more clear it is that they would have loooved, like fuckin' lurved to have Powell's okey-doke. It would have huge for them, just for all the thinly-veiled racial reasons they're trying to dance around.
Most importantly, it means something to the media weasels, probably them most of all. As far as voters, Powell might move some undecideds, but you can't count on anything there because those people are by definition narcissistic morons. But the media loves them some Colin, and this automatically seizes the penultimate news cycle, mere hours after Sarah flailin' on some overhyped late-night comedy show.
It's going to be fun to watch the conservabots spin this one without intimating any racial connotations, their deepest fears of Flavor Flav being made Seckatary of What Time It Is welling in their puny hearts. If Condi Rice makes a move, their heads might explode.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Consequences
I suppose it's encouraging to see erudite expatriate limeys such as Sully the Pooh and Hitchens come around to the side of common sense. The latter in particular is appropriately scathing in his denunciation of Palin's manifest unfitness for the office she seeks, as well as her unblinking hypocrisy and prevarication. Yet he seems unmindful of how the American political system has devolved to this point.
Hitchens was an occasional guest on Dennis Miller's old HBO show, back before the two of them became willing dupes for this nightmarish administration. I distinctly recall (though strangely, cannot find it on YouTube, amidst the numberless squids trying to teach a cat to skateboard or some such) one such instance, either right before or right after the 2000 electoral debacle. Miller and Hitchens were snickering, rightly so, at the prospect of a person such as George W. Bush even getting in the room, much less being granted the opportunity to set policy for this nation. Hitchens in particular riffed on someone else's (favorable) assessment of Fredo as being "able" and "capable", amused and mortified by the acquiescence of such a pale endorsement. Miller, as he always does, knowing his intellectual place around someone such as Hitchens, agreed with a cascade of giggles and esoteric references.
The thing is, Hitchens and Miller were absolutely correct at the time in their perception of Bush. And what Bush's reign of error has shown us is that even a disinterested, incompetent person can have torrents of unforeseen consequences. Possibly the most difficult to undo will be the infestation of federal departments by scads of Pat Robertson-bots, ideologically-driven religious fanatics committed to the mission of gumming up the workings of the federal government. This is a direct consequence of what Rove and Cheney brought to the table -- even if you win by one vote, govern as if you have a full mandate, and reward your base.
Which brings us to Palin's involvement in the current campaign, again an entirely natural consequence of a dumbed-down base endowed with an unearned sense of entitlement. This was McCain's (and, despite his protests, Rove's) present to the extra-chromosome bloc, which they need desperately to even remain notionally in contention. That in turn was because Rove and Bush and Cheney and the lot of them had proven that that sort of shit works, that if you incite the nastiest, most ignorant elements of American society with the most ludicrous fairy-tales, they will literally set aside their own rational self-interest and vote for pure nonsense and lies.
Political junkies, professional and amateur alike, typically focus on policy objectives first, then in how the proponents' temperament and character jibe with those objectives. This is understandable. One lesson every observer should draw from the last eight years, not that there aren't a whole mess of lessons to be drawn, is that a McPalin administration would most assuredly extend the internal efforts begun by Bush and Cheney. They'd probably replace Stevens and/or Ginsburg not with a Harriet Miers cheerleader, but some baby-faced shithead from Falwell's or Robertson's home-school-advancement cracker factories.
Republicanism as such is an incoherent mush of pseudopatriot memes and god-bothering piffle to whip up the base. Its intent is at once self-perpetuating and parasitic, which is ultimately far more destructive than the corporate homilies Obama and Biden have been riding on. Palin's selection says much more about the party's goals in renewing itself, than about McCain in particular. Hitch would do well to realize that the people he has aligned himself with don't compartmentalize things as well as he can. He's a skeptic's skeptic, and seems almost bemused that they believe this shit. It is all of a piece with this breed, and alliances of convenience with them are bound to turn sour.
Hitchens was an occasional guest on Dennis Miller's old HBO show, back before the two of them became willing dupes for this nightmarish administration. I distinctly recall (though strangely, cannot find it on YouTube, amidst the numberless squids trying to teach a cat to skateboard or some such) one such instance, either right before or right after the 2000 electoral debacle. Miller and Hitchens were snickering, rightly so, at the prospect of a person such as George W. Bush even getting in the room, much less being granted the opportunity to set policy for this nation. Hitchens in particular riffed on someone else's (favorable) assessment of Fredo as being "able" and "capable", amused and mortified by the acquiescence of such a pale endorsement. Miller, as he always does, knowing his intellectual place around someone such as Hitchens, agreed with a cascade of giggles and esoteric references.
The thing is, Hitchens and Miller were absolutely correct at the time in their perception of Bush. And what Bush's reign of error has shown us is that even a disinterested, incompetent person can have torrents of unforeseen consequences. Possibly the most difficult to undo will be the infestation of federal departments by scads of Pat Robertson-bots, ideologically-driven religious fanatics committed to the mission of gumming up the workings of the federal government. This is a direct consequence of what Rove and Cheney brought to the table -- even if you win by one vote, govern as if you have a full mandate, and reward your base.
Which brings us to Palin's involvement in the current campaign, again an entirely natural consequence of a dumbed-down base endowed with an unearned sense of entitlement. This was McCain's (and, despite his protests, Rove's) present to the extra-chromosome bloc, which they need desperately to even remain notionally in contention. That in turn was because Rove and Bush and Cheney and the lot of them had proven that that sort of shit works, that if you incite the nastiest, most ignorant elements of American society with the most ludicrous fairy-tales, they will literally set aside their own rational self-interest and vote for pure nonsense and lies.
Political junkies, professional and amateur alike, typically focus on policy objectives first, then in how the proponents' temperament and character jibe with those objectives. This is understandable. One lesson every observer should draw from the last eight years, not that there aren't a whole mess of lessons to be drawn, is that a McPalin administration would most assuredly extend the internal efforts begun by Bush and Cheney. They'd probably replace Stevens and/or Ginsburg not with a Harriet Miers cheerleader, but some baby-faced shithead from Falwell's or Robertson's home-school-advancement cracker factories.
Republicanism as such is an incoherent mush of pseudopatriot memes and god-bothering piffle to whip up the base. Its intent is at once self-perpetuating and parasitic, which is ultimately far more destructive than the corporate homilies Obama and Biden have been riding on. Palin's selection says much more about the party's goals in renewing itself, than about McCain in particular. Hitch would do well to realize that the people he has aligned himself with don't compartmentalize things as well as he can. He's a skeptic's skeptic, and seems almost bemused that they believe this shit. It is all of a piece with this breed, and alliances of convenience with them are bound to turn sour.
Friday, October 17, 2008
About a Girl
Tina Fey's impressions of Sarah Palin have been funniest when she simply recites what Palin has actually said -- out loud, in public, to a journalist in the context of an interview no less. There is no need to caricature Palin, she does most of the work for you. But the idea that it's some sort of biting satire, come on. It would be amazingly difficult to come up with an entertaining skit that could begin to encapsulate the seething contempt McCain and Palin exude for their opponents and their opponents' voters -- or hell, even McPalin's own voters.
If McCain really gave a rat's ass about which direction the country was going, he wouldn't have given the time of day to a rabble-rousing buffoon like Palin. Genuinely serious conservatives have acknowledged this fact en masse. When Chris Buckley leaves the magazine that is essentially his legacy birthright, because he no longer recognizes the clown car driving the magazine and its political endorsements, maybe, just maybe the fuckin' problem is with McCain and not Buckley. You wouldn't know it to read the 'tards who claim to carry on in the old man's name, though.
For some reason, probably in the name of some misguided veneer of "objectivity", Palin herself will appear on tomorrow night's SNL. Only the show's rather unseemly longevity lends it any credibility to the politically credulous. Aside from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, there is nothing in this country resembling competent satire, and even those two have compromised as they've mainstreamed.
For years SNL has been little more than a sausage factory for idiotic characters somehow being converted into unwatchable 80-minute extended skits. Shit, Bob Roberts had the subversion-lite of SNL nailed over fifteen years ago. It's a defense-contractor-owned petting zoo of political observation, with nothing ever quite finding an envelope to push.
What is Palin going to do during her appearance? Who cares? That's not the point; the event of her showing up to portray herself as a "good sport" about Fey's mindless Fargo-isms is the point. Most likely she'll show up for a 30-second cameo and repeat a couple of Fey's more popular zingers. Oh, snap!!1!1!
But perhaps one of our eminent satirists might like to take on the creeps in Palin's crowds, the perpetually aggrieved losers who have taken to assaulting opposing protesters and now even attacking reporters. Maybe they were just pissed because this guy wasn't from the Völkischer Beobachter.
The operational and philosophical realities of the McPalin campaign, much like those of the nation itself, remain mostly beyond the ability of most satire or even parody. Sure, Fey makes an ideal Palin, and Kristen Wiig did a dead-on Crazy McCain Townhall Cat Lady. But at the end of the day, Fey's there to plug 30 Rock, and Wiig to be in the next opus from the Apatow crew. It's only business, which removes any hope for truly effective satire.
Maybe they'll surprise us all and portray Palin for what she really is, a politically adept but fundamentally ignorant pathological liar and religious freak married to a secessionist, and whose primary skill is demagoguing the most reactionary, thuggish elements of her party's base. I don't think anyone's holding their breath, though the discomfort on the set while Miss Thang is present ought to be palpably entertaining. Too bad we won't get to see that, we just get the faux-self-deprecating good-sport cameo.
Update: Boy, was that ever a big sack of meh. Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey both looked sick to their stomachs, just wanting it to be over, Fey especially seeming tired of the skit itself, tired of being our campaign-season dancing monkey every weekend. Palin looked like she might have a glimmer of recognition that the best she could hope to get out of all this was more stump material for the gibbering rubes who believe her happy horseshit, how she went into the belly of the entertainment industry and came out unscathed. They'll boo on cue for Baldwin and Fey, which is about all the energy they can muster anymore.
If McCain really gave a rat's ass about which direction the country was going, he wouldn't have given the time of day to a rabble-rousing buffoon like Palin. Genuinely serious conservatives have acknowledged this fact en masse. When Chris Buckley leaves the magazine that is essentially his legacy birthright, because he no longer recognizes the clown car driving the magazine and its political endorsements, maybe, just maybe the fuckin' problem is with McCain and not Buckley. You wouldn't know it to read the 'tards who claim to carry on in the old man's name, though.
For some reason, probably in the name of some misguided veneer of "objectivity", Palin herself will appear on tomorrow night's SNL. Only the show's rather unseemly longevity lends it any credibility to the politically credulous. Aside from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, there is nothing in this country resembling competent satire, and even those two have compromised as they've mainstreamed.
For years SNL has been little more than a sausage factory for idiotic characters somehow being converted into unwatchable 80-minute extended skits. Shit, Bob Roberts had the subversion-lite of SNL nailed over fifteen years ago. It's a defense-contractor-owned petting zoo of political observation, with nothing ever quite finding an envelope to push.
What is Palin going to do during her appearance? Who cares? That's not the point; the event of her showing up to portray herself as a "good sport" about Fey's mindless Fargo-isms is the point. Most likely she'll show up for a 30-second cameo and repeat a couple of Fey's more popular zingers. Oh, snap!!1!1!
But perhaps one of our eminent satirists might like to take on the creeps in Palin's crowds, the perpetually aggrieved losers who have taken to assaulting opposing protesters and now even attacking reporters. Maybe they were just pissed because this guy wasn't from the Völkischer Beobachter.
The operational and philosophical realities of the McPalin campaign, much like those of the nation itself, remain mostly beyond the ability of most satire or even parody. Sure, Fey makes an ideal Palin, and Kristen Wiig did a dead-on Crazy McCain Townhall Cat Lady. But at the end of the day, Fey's there to plug 30 Rock, and Wiig to be in the next opus from the Apatow crew. It's only business, which removes any hope for truly effective satire.
Maybe they'll surprise us all and portray Palin for what she really is, a politically adept but fundamentally ignorant pathological liar and religious freak married to a secessionist, and whose primary skill is demagoguing the most reactionary, thuggish elements of her party's base. I don't think anyone's holding their breath, though the discomfort on the set while Miss Thang is present ought to be palpably entertaining. Too bad we won't get to see that, we just get the faux-self-deprecating good-sport cameo.
Update: Boy, was that ever a big sack of meh. Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey both looked sick to their stomachs, just wanting it to be over, Fey especially seeming tired of the skit itself, tired of being our campaign-season dancing monkey every weekend. Palin looked like she might have a glimmer of recognition that the best she could hope to get out of all this was more stump material for the gibbering rubes who believe her happy horseshit, how she went into the belly of the entertainment industry and came out unscathed. They'll boo on cue for Baldwin and Fey, which is about all the energy they can muster anymore.
Saturday, October 04, 2008
Spanking the Donkey
In the midst of tearing Klondike Barbie and her flock of knuckle-dragging troglodytes yet another new one, I forgot to smack Biden around for a few of his more reckless assertions. Occasionally we can be equal-opportunity pimp-slappers.
- Biden's and Obama's statements regarding "energy independence" leave me somewhat nonplussed. Both talk a great game on "alternative" energy sources, as if we're all going to be buzzing about our economically desolate exurbs on soybean-oil-powered hovercars with just a half-decade or so of commitment, wind turbines and solar panels humming in every backyard. I have heard neither one even so much as mention conservation, driving smaller and smarter, especially since we just silently bailed out the American automakers, rather than letting them sink into the tar pits of their own irrelevance. Or at least reinstating the CAFE standards.
It's more than just sheer waste of gas that takes place every second of every day, it's the commensurate repair to a decaying infrastructure, having to invest in the renewal of a withering paradigm. I think we're all for creating a happy sunshiny green economy that doesn't rape the planet quite so much, but nothing would have quite so immediate and meaningful an impact as even slight modifications to personal habits.
Indeed, many people were forced into that by high fuel costs earlier this summer, and the drop in demand has impacted oil prices. But if Americans hadn't gone stone broke in the last couple months, they'd just take that as a signal to start driving their grocery schooners again, carrying nothing to nowhere. Availability of resources is only part of the problem; sheer waste and excess is by far the easiest part of the equation to address. Yet no one even bothers to bring it up, though impending economic hardship has a way of wiping away the condescending sneer of conservation being a "personal virtue". - Biden (and again, Obama) fails to make a convincing argument on Pakistan. I find it very difficult to believe that an Obama-Biden administration will make cross-border incursions into Waziristan a priority, and it would be a very bad idea if they did. Even a "surge" in Afghanistan is unlikely to provide the desired outcome. Afghanistan needs roads and schools and infrastructure and a more powerful centralized government. Pakistan needs to keep its ISI out of its incessant meddling and subterfuge, and help seal the Durand Line more efficiently. Some continued bribery will no doubt be necessary, and in this context acceptable.
But to hear Obama and Biden talk about it, it's a chance for that muscular diplomacy talk that they hope will peel off a couple of points from the flag-waving demo. Look, guys, anyone still seriously thinking that the McPalin ticket has anything but pure grief in store for the country and the world is probably beyond convincing. They cannot explain themselves, and you cannot explain anything to them. Their politics are a direct projection of their psychological problems. You are not going to out-crazy their political crushes, and life (and the rest of the campaign season) is too short to suddenly have to become a special-ed teacher for these people. Just give 'em the pitch and move on. Half of them can't find Pakistan on a map anyway. - Are we seriously intervening in Darfur? Only if we're prepared to enter into a dangerously adversarial relationship with our biggest creditor, and if one thing about both political parties is true, it's that money always trumps morality. Hell, Palin couldn't even tell the truth about divesting Alaska's state funds from Sudan, which means she's just okey-doke about using genocide as a political prop, doncha know.
This sort of tedious moralizing always brings out the worst in politicians, because they always overextend on their idealistic happy-talk. They never actually mean it enough to follow up on it, and they never want to talk about the obvious constraints to doing so. You want to help out the Darfurians? Stop buying products from China. Most of it seems to be saturated with melamine anyway. But we're not fooling anyone with this "something must be done about Darfur" schtick. George Clooney has done far more about Darfur than either Joe Biden or Sarah Palin will ever do.
Friday, October 03, 2008
American Idolt
So we're all tired of reading, writing, hearing, and talking about Sarah Palin, and yet we can't look away. It's as if another crappy Fox game show is being pitched as we speak, Jeff Foxworthy -- or even better, Larry the Cable Guy -- hosting Are You Smarter Than Sarah Palin? Elementary schools are being combed far and wide to assemble a prospective pool of contestants.
Okay, not entirely fair. The Sarahcuda that showed up last night for the Second Banana Super Bowl was not quite the same naïf that innocently stumbled into the notorious journalistic bear trap that is Katie Couric. She set her trademark burbling to a nervous staccato rhythm, punctuated with increasingly phony, insouciant winks and enough contrived Marge Gundersonisms to run through a snowbound wood-chipper.
She's smart enough to know that Biden has her outclassed, but since her party trucks in fecklessness and gall, she has been given full license to not give much of a shit. Even if it means trying to tie Obama to questionable bills that, um, her own running mate also voted for. Even if it means setting herself up with an ignorant assertion about Iraqi "surge principles" being applied to Afghanistan, and being instantly rejoindered by Biden with word that the American commander in Afghanistan had earlier that day specifically repudiated such a notion. Even if it means, bloody hell, lying outright about divesting state funds from Sudan because of the Darfur genocide.
I got your "thanks but no thanks" right here, bub.
Another thing that struck me as fairly important, but seems to have gone unmentioned in the online necropsies of this thing, is Biden's concise evisceration of McPalin's unremittingly ugly excuse for a health-care bill. A $5,000 tax credit on something that costs an average of $12K/year is not a deal, fucking duhhh. It is merely a sop to corporations, both the employers who would be off the hook to providing decent plans for their employee risk pools, and the insurance/pharma corporations who rake in the bucks already by ass-raping sick people. "Let the free market decide", she chirps in rebuttal, as if it hadn't been lo these many years. How's it been working out for ya, America? I betcha not so swell, doggone it.
But that's what this woman does, it turns out: she compensates for her lack of genuine knowledge and principle with a bottomless sack of twinkly lies, defying any would-be debunkers with a Tracy Flick-like commitment to her internal vision, whatever that turns out to be. Judging from her warm endorsement of increasing the vice-presidential portfolio, as if the grasping opacity of Cheney's tenure weren't warning enough, it's power and validation. Jesus H. Christ, the woman's so clueless, she didn't even realize that her own campaign had pulled out -- and not in the biblical sense -- of Michigan until this morning. I knew about it before she did. That is indescribably weird.
So of course her no-forehead fan club are way on board with all this, heartened by the fact that she wasn't gotcha'd this time around with tricksy questions about news sources and such. Our Lady of the Talking Dolphins has a mash note that makes ya wonder if she thinks Palin is inhabited by the shade of Saint Ron of Rancho del Cielo. There's tonsa pull quotes, doncha know, but this one's a real winner, right up there with Norm's duck stamp:
Unfortunately Nooners doesn't mean off a bridge. She means the sort of emotionally stunted twits who imbue the people they see on their teevee with their own projected assumptions. They don't want to vote for the John McCain-Sarah Palin ticket because they sincerely believe that the policies of the ticket will provide the best path out of the messes this country has become mired in. They want to be at the next Sarah Palin event so that they can come closer to their imagined objective of, fuck, I don't know, watching soap operas and having topless pillow fights with her. Whatever it is you chicks do together when we're not around.
I mean, seriously, what kind of a flaming jackass goes through their life like this? It's not just silly, self-absorbed women -- the next middle-aged guy at the office that comes up and makes some dippy "I'd like to hit it" crack without a little further explication is going to get punched in the fuckin' throat. I'm glad you want to fuck her, guys, and it's not that she's unattractive, it's just that there's a lot of serious shit going on here and everywhere else, and you're ready to hand the keys over to some broad I wouldn't trust to do my measly taxes, just 'cause you think she's winking at your scroungy ass.
Your house is on fire, asshole. The fire department shows up, but the chief seems a bit aloof, boring, pompous. Probably drives a better car than you. Looks like he's in better shape. Seems to know how to do his job, but intimidating to your latent inadequacies nonetheless. Then the milf from next door shows up, offering you a place on the couch for the night. It'd sure be nice if she came out and woke you up on that couch, maybe wearing some negligeé, a little sympathy rub-and-tug, sorry about your house, I've never done anything like this before. No no, leave the glasses on, baby, I kinda dig it. Hey, a guy can dream. But that doesn't put out the house fire, especially when it's just a cock-tease fantasy in your head anyway.
The main thing I take away from this overblown event is that Palin is about done. She'll be shuttled off to the Fixed Noise safehouse for the homestretch, to try to rehabilitate her earlier flubs for the mouth-breathers. There's no fucking way they're going to put her on Face the Nation or Press the Meat; there's no way they're going to risk putting her in front of a journalist with an ounce of integrity or self-respect. They'll call her frenetic, over-rehearsed and underprepared debate performance a win for their side, but the only people buying it are the ones who already had their money out. Biden hit back where it counted, attacking McCain instead of Palin, heading into a weekend sure to be dominated by quizzical looks at how we could give a bunch of Wall Street thieves and poltroons $140 billion more than they were extorting from us, yet still have the stock market continue its dive.
And Tuesday is the "townhall" debate, supposedly McCain's strength, but even Chuck Krauthammer implicitly concedes not only the election itself to Obama, but the correctness of that choice of intellect and temperament over an endless series of head-fakes and cheap stunts. An easy guess is for McCain to overcompensate the reports of his refusal to visually engage Obama, and come off looking even more stilted and awkward.
And the thing is, not only is Obama the more gifted orator and debater, the way Biden actually is over Palin (not that it counts in these things), but Obama is also more gifted in the abstract areas "real" Americans care about. Obama has defied his supporters' ministrations to go all Chuck D on the old man and scare the shit out of Peoria, while McCain, irritable in temperament to begin with, has become more erratic in the face of Obama's calmness. He is turning into Cotton Hill, a ranting, strutting banty rooster, barely concealing his indignation at not having received his just reward for what the Tojos put him through. He does not get that his time was eight years ago, that he had a real shot before Rove and Bush ratfucked him in that South Carolina primary, and that he has shown up to the burning house with a half-full bucket and a bad attitude, wondering why the guys with the big ladder truck are getting all the attention.
The thing is, if conservatards ever got over their silly schoolgirl crushes they carry for their candidates, and thought hard about the serious issues they so regularly posture and preen about, they wouldn't let McCain nor Palin anywhere near the levers of national power. That's not an affirmation of Obama's messianic greatness, nor Biden's moral superiority. They both have considerable flaws. But it's not even close as to which ticket is consistently, tangibly worse in every conceivable area. That can't be so easily hidden with a bunch of repetitive falsehoods and bumptious catchphrases, not when people are wondering how much longer they'll have a house and a job, thanks to the current occupant.
Okay, not entirely fair. The Sarahcuda that showed up last night for the Second Banana Super Bowl was not quite the same naïf that innocently stumbled into the notorious journalistic bear trap that is Katie Couric. She set her trademark burbling to a nervous staccato rhythm, punctuated with increasingly phony, insouciant winks and enough contrived Marge Gundersonisms to run through a snowbound wood-chipper.
She's smart enough to know that Biden has her outclassed, but since her party trucks in fecklessness and gall, she has been given full license to not give much of a shit. Even if it means trying to tie Obama to questionable bills that, um, her own running mate also voted for. Even if it means setting herself up with an ignorant assertion about Iraqi "surge principles" being applied to Afghanistan, and being instantly rejoindered by Biden with word that the American commander in Afghanistan had earlier that day specifically repudiated such a notion. Even if it means, bloody hell, lying outright about divesting state funds from Sudan because of the Darfur genocide.
But a search of news clips and transcripts from the time do not turn up an instance in which Palin mentioned the Sudanese crisis or concerns about Alaska's investments tied to the ruling regime. Moreover, Palin's administration openly opposed the bill, and stated its opposition in a public hearing on the measure.
"The legislation is well-intended, and the desire to make a difference is noble, but mixing moral and political agendas at the expense of our citizens' financial security is not a good combination," testified Brian Andrews, Palin's deputy revenue commissioner, before a hearing on the Gara-Lynn Sudan divestment bill in February. Minutes from the meeting are posted online by the legislature.
Gara says the lack of support from Palin's administration helped kill the measure.
"I walked out of that hearing livid," Gara recalled of the February meeting. Because of the Palin administration's opposition to the bill, "We could not get a vote in that committee," he explained. At no point did Palin come out in support of the effort, Gara said.
I got your "thanks but no thanks" right here, bub.
Another thing that struck me as fairly important, but seems to have gone unmentioned in the online necropsies of this thing, is Biden's concise evisceration of McPalin's unremittingly ugly excuse for a health-care bill. A $5,000 tax credit on something that costs an average of $12K/year is not a deal, fucking duhhh. It is merely a sop to corporations, both the employers who would be off the hook to providing decent plans for their employee risk pools, and the insurance/pharma corporations who rake in the bucks already by ass-raping sick people. "Let the free market decide", she chirps in rebuttal, as if it hadn't been lo these many years. How's it been working out for ya, America? I betcha not so swell, doggone it.
But that's what this woman does, it turns out: she compensates for her lack of genuine knowledge and principle with a bottomless sack of twinkly lies, defying any would-be debunkers with a Tracy Flick-like commitment to her internal vision, whatever that turns out to be. Judging from her warm endorsement of increasing the vice-presidential portfolio, as if the grasping opacity of Cheney's tenure weren't warning enough, it's power and validation. Jesus H. Christ, the woman's so clueless, she didn't even realize that her own campaign had pulled out -- and not in the biblical sense -- of Michigan until this morning. I knew about it before she did. That is indescribably weird.
So of course her no-forehead fan club are way on board with all this, heartened by the fact that she wasn't gotcha'd this time around with tricksy questions about news sources and such. Our Lady of the Talking Dolphins has a mash note that makes ya wonder if she thinks Palin is inhabited by the shade of Saint Ron of Rancho del Cielo. There's tonsa pull quotes, doncha know, but this one's a real winner, right up there with Norm's duck stamp:
She will re-electrify the base. More than that, an hour and a half of talking to America will take her to a new level of stardom. Watch her crowds this weekend. She's about to get jumpers, the old political name for people who are so excited to see you they start to jump.
Unfortunately Nooners doesn't mean off a bridge. She means the sort of emotionally stunted twits who imbue the people they see on their teevee with their own projected assumptions. They don't want to vote for the John McCain-Sarah Palin ticket because they sincerely believe that the policies of the ticket will provide the best path out of the messes this country has become mired in. They want to be at the next Sarah Palin event so that they can come closer to their imagined objective of, fuck, I don't know, watching soap operas and having topless pillow fights with her. Whatever it is you chicks do together when we're not around.
I mean, seriously, what kind of a flaming jackass goes through their life like this? It's not just silly, self-absorbed women -- the next middle-aged guy at the office that comes up and makes some dippy "I'd like to hit it" crack without a little further explication is going to get punched in the fuckin' throat. I'm glad you want to fuck her, guys, and it's not that she's unattractive, it's just that there's a lot of serious shit going on here and everywhere else, and you're ready to hand the keys over to some broad I wouldn't trust to do my measly taxes, just 'cause you think she's winking at your scroungy ass.
Your house is on fire, asshole. The fire department shows up, but the chief seems a bit aloof, boring, pompous. Probably drives a better car than you. Looks like he's in better shape. Seems to know how to do his job, but intimidating to your latent inadequacies nonetheless. Then the milf from next door shows up, offering you a place on the couch for the night. It'd sure be nice if she came out and woke you up on that couch, maybe wearing some negligeé, a little sympathy rub-and-tug, sorry about your house, I've never done anything like this before. No no, leave the glasses on, baby, I kinda dig it. Hey, a guy can dream. But that doesn't put out the house fire, especially when it's just a cock-tease fantasy in your head anyway.
The main thing I take away from this overblown event is that Palin is about done. She'll be shuttled off to the Fixed Noise safehouse for the homestretch, to try to rehabilitate her earlier flubs for the mouth-breathers. There's no fucking way they're going to put her on Face the Nation or Press the Meat; there's no way they're going to risk putting her in front of a journalist with an ounce of integrity or self-respect. They'll call her frenetic, over-rehearsed and underprepared debate performance a win for their side, but the only people buying it are the ones who already had their money out. Biden hit back where it counted, attacking McCain instead of Palin, heading into a weekend sure to be dominated by quizzical looks at how we could give a bunch of Wall Street thieves and poltroons $140 billion more than they were extorting from us, yet still have the stock market continue its dive.
And Tuesday is the "townhall" debate, supposedly McCain's strength, but even Chuck Krauthammer implicitly concedes not only the election itself to Obama, but the correctness of that choice of intellect and temperament over an endless series of head-fakes and cheap stunts. An easy guess is for McCain to overcompensate the reports of his refusal to visually engage Obama, and come off looking even more stilted and awkward.
And the thing is, not only is Obama the more gifted orator and debater, the way Biden actually is over Palin (not that it counts in these things), but Obama is also more gifted in the abstract areas "real" Americans care about. Obama has defied his supporters' ministrations to go all Chuck D on the old man and scare the shit out of Peoria, while McCain, irritable in temperament to begin with, has become more erratic in the face of Obama's calmness. He is turning into Cotton Hill, a ranting, strutting banty rooster, barely concealing his indignation at not having received his just reward for what the Tojos put him through. He does not get that his time was eight years ago, that he had a real shot before Rove and Bush ratfucked him in that South Carolina primary, and that he has shown up to the burning house with a half-full bucket and a bad attitude, wondering why the guys with the big ladder truck are getting all the attention.
The thing is, if conservatards ever got over their silly schoolgirl crushes they carry for their candidates, and thought hard about the serious issues they so regularly posture and preen about, they wouldn't let McCain nor Palin anywhere near the levers of national power. That's not an affirmation of Obama's messianic greatness, nor Biden's moral superiority. They both have considerable flaws. But it's not even close as to which ticket is consistently, tangibly worse in every conceivable area. That can't be so easily hidden with a bunch of repetitive falsehoods and bumptious catchphrases, not when people are wondering how much longer they'll have a house and a job, thanks to the current occupant.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Master Debaters
As tempting as it was to have a debate drinking game last night, I figured I'd be face-down 45 minutes into it. So I just caught some of the end, knowing I'd be making the rounds of postmortem entrail-reading over the weekend. Of course it's too soon to tell much of anything, but Nate Silver has some perceptions and observations that jibe pretty well with the limited amount I saw. Obama wisely played to his strength and addressed the camera/nation directly as much as possible, while McCain was in town-hall mode, still trying to win back his dwindling coterie of pundits and rubes, after spending the second half of the week looking like an erratic, tornado-chasing oaf.
The statistical jumps Silver cites, if they hold, may prove to be the most crucial in the end. I beat on McCainiacs for being dopes and idiots, and I haven't wavered in that assessment, but what we bloggerses and political junkies frequently forget -- or at least I do -- is that most people are not too wrapped up in these things, arguments over policy and such. They may tell themselves that both sides are ripping them off to equal degree or whatever, but they do not involve themselves much until the very end. And that coveted "low-information voter" swath is McPalin's sweet spot; by definition, they have to count on obstinate, ignorant people to get their backs up over perceived slights and imaginary grievances.
And they might have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for that meddling economy. The prospect of Wall Street weasels threatening us if we don't help them cover their lousy bets and unchecked greed to the tune of thirteen figures (if $700 bn was the figure they pulled out of their asses, the real number is probably at least double that) tends to wake up even the most reality-teevee-addled doofus. Even the dimmest bulb looks at these million-dollar clowns, with their crummy track records and ludicrous side bets, and wonders why we should believe them -- not only this time, but right now, and they need it all or we're gonna die!!1!Z0MG!1!1!!
It's pure gall and avarice, and the low-info demo know it, just as they figure that even though Obama has actually taken more Wall Street money, and despite the fact that at least some of this Goldman Sachsification of the financial superstructure originated and perpetuated under Bob Rubin's tenure as Treasury Secretary, the Democrats are still slightly less likely to tell them to go fuck themselves in hard times. Oddly, this makes a tangible perceptual difference.
One of the cooler observations is that of McCain's lack of eye contact being described in terms of monkey politics. I think it's probably more contempt than fear; more and more McCain comes off as the sort of person who feels that he's above having to explain shit to people. But considering he has two main policy advisors (Georgia lobbyist Randy Scheuenemann and UBS banking bigwig Phil "Whiners" Gramm) caught up in two major current issues (Russia and the bailout, respectively), and his "game-changer" running mate has been exposed as a pathological liar and a blithering, sorely unqualified moron, he has quite a bit of 'splainin' to do.
As for the next round, Obama's team is smart in refusing the bait of lowering expectations for poor ol' Punxsutawney Palin.
Nice. They're not giving Open Mike Allen even a toehold here. She's expected to perform well, period. And if Biden's smart (which, depending on the day, can itself be open to debate), he'll let her do as much talking as possible. She may internalize a few important names in her frenetic cramming sessions, much as Will Ferrell's Bush parody in the 2000 debates showed him confidently reeling off "Obasanjo" and such. But there's a lot of specialized knowledge involved, and she clearly seems to be starting from scratch. A week might be just enough time to explain basic geopolitical ramifications to someone who isn't up on any of it, but it's not enough time for her to make it convincing.
Palin's numbers haven't dropped because of Democrats armed with facts -- her devoted cultard followers have no use for such things -- but because of her. Every time she tries to think or speak extemporaneously, a few more people wonder what they were thinking -- which, if they ever voted for George W. Bush and are seriously considering voting for John McCain, they should have been asking themselves in the first place. There is no "Palin Derangement Syndrome", it's all in their feverish pea brains. She's probably a perfectly nice person, but we're not voting for a neighbor, so grow the fuck up already.
Added fun: Perrin nails it. Even the most ardent Obama supporter should understand that the choice is not between Satan's Spawn and the Bringer of Light (which, after all, was Lucifer, n'est-ce pas?), but between an almost 100% assurance of further catastrophe, and a small but worthwhile chance to mitigate ongoing crises. As always, it matters less who wins than what all of us do the day after, the week after, the year after the election. As long as we put up with mal-fee-ance from either party, we're just as guilty as our electoral vessels of collective absolution.
The statistical jumps Silver cites, if they hold, may prove to be the most crucial in the end. I beat on McCainiacs for being dopes and idiots, and I haven't wavered in that assessment, but what we bloggerses and political junkies frequently forget -- or at least I do -- is that most people are not too wrapped up in these things, arguments over policy and such. They may tell themselves that both sides are ripping them off to equal degree or whatever, but they do not involve themselves much until the very end. And that coveted "low-information voter" swath is McPalin's sweet spot; by definition, they have to count on obstinate, ignorant people to get their backs up over perceived slights and imaginary grievances.
And they might have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for that meddling economy. The prospect of Wall Street weasels threatening us if we don't help them cover their lousy bets and unchecked greed to the tune of thirteen figures (if $700 bn was the figure they pulled out of their asses, the real number is probably at least double that) tends to wake up even the most reality-teevee-addled doofus. Even the dimmest bulb looks at these million-dollar clowns, with their crummy track records and ludicrous side bets, and wonders why we should believe them -- not only this time, but right now, and they need it all or we're gonna die!!1!Z0MG!1!1!!
It's pure gall and avarice, and the low-info demo know it, just as they figure that even though Obama has actually taken more Wall Street money, and despite the fact that at least some of this Goldman Sachsification of the financial superstructure originated and perpetuated under Bob Rubin's tenure as Treasury Secretary, the Democrats are still slightly less likely to tell them to go fuck themselves in hard times. Oddly, this makes a tangible perceptual difference.
One of the cooler observations is that of McCain's lack of eye contact being described in terms of monkey politics. I think it's probably more contempt than fear; more and more McCain comes off as the sort of person who feels that he's above having to explain shit to people. But considering he has two main policy advisors (Georgia lobbyist Randy Scheuenemann and UBS banking bigwig Phil "Whiners" Gramm) caught up in two major current issues (Russia and the bailout, respectively), and his "game-changer" running mate has been exposed as a pathological liar and a blithering, sorely unqualified moron, he has quite a bit of 'splainin' to do.
As for the next round, Obama's team is smart in refusing the bait of lowering expectations for poor ol' Punxsutawney Palin.
Obama campaign manager David Plouffe told reporters Saturday that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice presidential nominee, is “a terrific debater” who could give Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joe Biden (D-Del.) a run for his money when they meet Thursday.
“We’ve looked at tapes of Gov. Palin’s debates, and she’s a terrific debater,” Plouffe told reporters on a conference call. “She has performed very, very well. She’s obviously a skilled speaker. We expect she’ll give a great performance next Thursday."
Nice. They're not giving Open Mike Allen even a toehold here. She's expected to perform well, period. And if Biden's smart (which, depending on the day, can itself be open to debate), he'll let her do as much talking as possible. She may internalize a few important names in her frenetic cramming sessions, much as Will Ferrell's Bush parody in the 2000 debates showed him confidently reeling off "Obasanjo" and such. But there's a lot of specialized knowledge involved, and she clearly seems to be starting from scratch. A week might be just enough time to explain basic geopolitical ramifications to someone who isn't up on any of it, but it's not enough time for her to make it convincing.
Palin's numbers haven't dropped because of Democrats armed with facts -- her devoted cultard followers have no use for such things -- but because of her. Every time she tries to think or speak extemporaneously, a few more people wonder what they were thinking -- which, if they ever voted for George W. Bush and are seriously considering voting for John McCain, they should have been asking themselves in the first place. There is no "Palin Derangement Syndrome", it's all in their feverish pea brains. She's probably a perfectly nice person, but we're not voting for a neighbor, so grow the fuck up already.
Added fun: Perrin nails it. Even the most ardent Obama supporter should understand that the choice is not between Satan's Spawn and the Bringer of Light (which, after all, was Lucifer, n'est-ce pas?), but between an almost 100% assurance of further catastrophe, and a small but worthwhile chance to mitigate ongoing crises. As always, it matters less who wins than what all of us do the day after, the week after, the year after the election. As long as we put up with mal-fee-ance from either party, we're just as guilty as our electoral vessels of collective absolution.
Friday, September 26, 2008
The Smell Test
So a couple weeks ago the wife decides she wants to pick out some perfume for her birthday. Off we go to the department store scent counters to see what's what. I am intrigued by the number of boutique fragrances abounding these days. Are there really people willing to part with their cash in order to smell like Paris Hilton? The mind boggles.
Anyway, passing the mens' cologne counter, my wife and I spot the boutique scent from my good friend Pee Diddly. I believe the product is called "Skid Mark" or "Taint Sweat" or some such. The missus turns and says, "Oh boy, I wonder what that smells like." Without missing a beat, I responded, "Eh, I dunno, prob'ly purple drank and an unearned ego trip," prompting a snicker from the counter girl. Who says youth is wasted on the young?
The thing is, while I crack wise at Diddly's expense, I'm not really kidding. Well, maybe about the purple drank. If Diddly drinks at all, it's not the oxy-and-tussin plastic-cup cocktails the street crowd partake of, it's bound to be something ostentatious and vulgar, to let everyone else at his table know how much money he rolls in. He'd pay 300 bucks for flat horse piss, as long as it came in a Cristall bottle.
But the other part, the inflated self-regard, I'm dead serious. The guy started as a "musician", and the examples I've heard of his efforts in that field suck dead rhino cock. I've been playing a long time, and I like a lot of different kinds of music, and I'm enough of an adult about my likes and dislikes without undue prejudice. And the guy fucking sucks at music, in a way that only a true perpetrator can. He does seem to know how to dress himself, I'll give him that. But there's an unearned smugness to the whole packaging vibe I could do without, like he thinks no one ever got laid before he came along to tell them what to consume -- or more importantly, to be seen consuming.
Yet he's turned himself into a brand, through sheer will, and moved on to other things. It's marketing 101, getting people to identify the association of the person, rather than the product and its specifics. And he's been enormously successful at it. People will buy anything, so long as you make them feel validated for it.
Which brings us to Punxsutawney Palin, slowly emerging from her campaign-imposed chuck-hole for more and dumber photo-ops. As if to prove that her stilted, aggravating turn with Charlie Gibson was no mere aberration, but only an appetizer, Palin went full-bore suck on Katie Couric. It is a stark measure of Palin's abject worthlessness as a reasonable candidate for office, when Katie Couric comes off like a justifiably aggrieved Rhodes scholar.
Certainly Fredo's stubbed-toe syntax has kept us all in stitches lo these many years, but in spite of his best efforts you can usually at least dope out the general thread of what he's trying to say in his inimitable way. But I'll be damned if I can tell what Palin is saying here. "As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where do they go?" I honestly have no idea what that is supposed to mean.
Notice also that Couric asked her a fairly simple yes-or-no question there. Either Palin has been personally involved in diplomatic negotiations with figures in the Russian government, or she hasn't. It's a clear pattern with how Palin dodges and obsfuscates simple questions, mad-libbing her way into nonsensical blather.
Jesus. What in the fuck is she talking about, seriously? None of these sentences mean anything. As everyone else has noted, this is that Miss Teen Vegetable South Carolina dingbat all over again, except Miss Teen Vegetable isn't auditioning to run the freakin' country. Palin has yet to give a substantive answer in an actual interview thus far, this being 0-for-2 (no, Hannity's hair doesn't count, unless you're Colmes -- and by God, why would you be that?). So she's incoherent, and she lies like a bearskin rug, which makes her an ideal successor to Bush.
And yet, her newfound fans still lurve them some Sarah. She's standing up to the librul media, babbling incoherently for all of them, man, speaking for the little guy, or the small town, or something.
Bollocks. If anything, this assumption that people who live in small-towns always speak and think in butt-simple, unsophisticated platitudes is much more condescending than what the supposed elitists conjure up.
Anyway, passing the mens' cologne counter, my wife and I spot the boutique scent from my good friend Pee Diddly. I believe the product is called "Skid Mark" or "Taint Sweat" or some such. The missus turns and says, "Oh boy, I wonder what that smells like." Without missing a beat, I responded, "Eh, I dunno, prob'ly purple drank and an unearned ego trip," prompting a snicker from the counter girl. Who says youth is wasted on the young?
The thing is, while I crack wise at Diddly's expense, I'm not really kidding. Well, maybe about the purple drank. If Diddly drinks at all, it's not the oxy-and-tussin plastic-cup cocktails the street crowd partake of, it's bound to be something ostentatious and vulgar, to let everyone else at his table know how much money he rolls in. He'd pay 300 bucks for flat horse piss, as long as it came in a Cristall bottle.
But the other part, the inflated self-regard, I'm dead serious. The guy started as a "musician", and the examples I've heard of his efforts in that field suck dead rhino cock. I've been playing a long time, and I like a lot of different kinds of music, and I'm enough of an adult about my likes and dislikes without undue prejudice. And the guy fucking sucks at music, in a way that only a true perpetrator can. He does seem to know how to dress himself, I'll give him that. But there's an unearned smugness to the whole packaging vibe I could do without, like he thinks no one ever got laid before he came along to tell them what to consume -- or more importantly, to be seen consuming.
Yet he's turned himself into a brand, through sheer will, and moved on to other things. It's marketing 101, getting people to identify the association of the person, rather than the product and its specifics. And he's been enormously successful at it. People will buy anything, so long as you make them feel validated for it.
Which brings us to Punxsutawney Palin, slowly emerging from her campaign-imposed chuck-hole for more and dumber photo-ops. As if to prove that her stilted, aggravating turn with Charlie Gibson was no mere aberration, but only an appetizer, Palin went full-bore suck on Katie Couric. It is a stark measure of Palin's abject worthlessness as a reasonable candidate for office, when Katie Couric comes off like a justifiably aggrieved Rhodes scholar.
Couric: Have you ever been involved in any negotiations, for example, with the Russians?
Palin: We have trade missions back and forth, we do. It's very important when you consider even national security issues with Russia. As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border. It is from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there, they are right next to our state.
Certainly Fredo's stubbed-toe syntax has kept us all in stitches lo these many years, but in spite of his best efforts you can usually at least dope out the general thread of what he's trying to say in his inimitable way. But I'll be damned if I can tell what Palin is saying here. "As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where do they go?" I honestly have no idea what that is supposed to mean.
Notice also that Couric asked her a fairly simple yes-or-no question there. Either Palin has been personally involved in diplomatic negotiations with figures in the Russian government, or she hasn't. It's a clear pattern with how Palin dodges and obsfuscates simple questions, mad-libbing her way into nonsensical blather.
COURIC: Why isn’t it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle-class families who are struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries? Allow them to spend more, and put more money into the economy, instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?
PALIN: That’s why I say I, like every American I’m speaking with, we're ill about this position that we have been put in. Where it is the taxpayers looking to bail out. But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health care reform that is needed to help shore up our economy. Um, helping, oh, it’s got to be about job creation, too. Shoring up our economy, and putting it back on the right track. So health care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions, and tax relief for Americans, and trade — we have got to see trade as opportunity, not as, uh, competitive, um, scary thing, but one in five jobs created in the trade sector today. We’ve got to look at that as more opportunity. All of those things under the umbrella of job creation.
Jesus. What in the fuck is she talking about, seriously? None of these sentences mean anything. As everyone else has noted, this is that Miss Teen Vegetable South Carolina dingbat all over again, except Miss Teen Vegetable isn't auditioning to run the freakin' country. Palin has yet to give a substantive answer in an actual interview thus far, this being 0-for-2 (no, Hannity's hair doesn't count, unless you're Colmes -- and by God, why would you be that?). So she's incoherent, and she lies like a bearskin rug, which makes her an ideal successor to Bush.
And yet, her newfound fans still lurve them some Sarah. She's standing up to the librul media, babbling incoherently for all of them, man, speaking for the little guy, or the small town, or something.
Bollocks. If anything, this assumption that people who live in small-towns always speak and think in butt-simple, unsophisticated platitudes is much more condescending than what the supposed elitists conjure up.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Branding Cattle
Sometimes you encounter a conservatard writer whose renderings of the official hymnal are so overwrought, you wonder about them. Is it a put-on, do they roll their eyes and snicker as they type each laboriously-crafted tautology? Are they counting the zeroes on their paychecks as they lovingly polish every rhetorical turd? Or worse, are they serious, so mindlessly wedded to their ridiculous tropes, lacking in self-awareness in a way normally attributed to one of the blow-up dolls from The Hills?
As is his wont, Fred Barnes invites us to speculate as to worst-case scenarios.
Whatever post-convention bounce McPalin enjoyed appears to be gone, supplanted by a sense that their American Idol dog-and-pony show is worth fuck-all in the face of a potentially catastrophic economic situation. These people are clowns and liars -- showboating buffoons with no ideas, no knowledge, and no curiosity as to how to handle problems. Over the past month or so, McCain has insisted that he knows how to find bin Laden, win wars, and fix the economy. One asks politely why the hell he has yet to do any of those things then, or to even proffer any viable solutions to his colleagues in the Senate or the current occupants of the office he seeks.
(And really, the next time McCain asserts that he "knows how to win wars", it would be helpful if the person he's speaking to responds with a request for him to produce an example. That should be entertaining, though not quite as entertaining as Barnes trying to convince his hordes of saps that empty jabber and listing approval ratings are good things.)
Which proves only that Alaska Republicans are as obstinate and irrational as their continental counterparts. And it's nice that Barnes thinks that the problems he listed "either don't exist anymore or aren't as significant in 2008". It's not as if the perpetual election campaign hasn't sucked all the oxygen out of all those other stories, which are indeed still relevant and significant.
Barnes goes on to talk about the British Tories' rejuvenation against a stagnant Labour Party, as if Tony Blair's association with (and steadfast refusal to repudiate) Fredo hadn't tainted that brand sufficiently. It is, Fred may have noticed, the same reason Bush has only appeared in public to stroke everyone over the impending economic collapse, and hasn't been seen in public with McCain in months. Cheney is also nowhere to be found. These are not the actions of the incumbent leaders of a resurgent brand.
Barnes is bold in putting the date of September 29 on his column. McCain has already been uncomfortably exposed as an increasingly empty candidate in genuine danger of being overshadowed by his neophyte running mate, who in turn has been overexposed as a typical backwater cronyist who knows nothing about the world beyond her state broders, and who is clearly in waaaayyy over her head, no matter how much or how desperately they try to prep her. Most people with an IQ above room temperature are already at the point of asking "what next" when they hear Palin's name, just three weeks into her "getting to know you" phase. They know her now, and while she might be a perfectly good neighbor or mayor, she is not qualified to occupy the newly-empowered office of vice-president. Barnes can thank Cheney for that one.
By the time Barnes' pro-forma date rolls around, the first debate between Obama and McCain will have been held. And while Obama's supposedly professorial demeanor may still be off-putting the emotionally unstable who project their anxieties and ignorance upon their political representatives, the fact is that he is a much better extemporaneous thinker and speaker than McCain. And now that people are losing their homes and jobs and pensions in droves, more of these chuckleheads are starting to pay attention past the peripheral nonsense they've been indulging in.
We'll see -- the older I get, the more I believe that Mencken was an optimist -- but if I were Barnes, I wouldn't be counting my Palins before they're even incubated, much less ready to hatch. People are starting to figure this broad out, and the numbers show it.
As is his wont, Fred Barnes invites us to speculate as to worst-case scenarios.
It took Conservatives in Great Britain a decade to restore their party's good name. It is taking Republicans a far shorter time--perhaps only two years--to begin a significant comeback. Who's responsible? For sure, John McCain and Sarah Palin have played major roles. But so has a Republican who was one of the causes of the party's decline--President Bush.
Republicans suffered from the same ailment as the Tories. In the minds of millions of voters who once supported them, Republicans had become the political equivalent of socially unacceptable people. They were disliked, personally as well as politically. Republicans had no one but themselves to blame.
The Tories lost three elections before changing the face of their party with new leaders who stressed fresh issues (while muting but not abandoning their core conservative principles). In 2006, Republicans lost Congress and numerous statehouses. Now McCain and Palin have supplanted President Bush and Vice President Cheney as the party's leaders. They're stressing a pair of new issues: political reform and fixing a "broken" Washington. Actually, those may be a single issue.
Whatever post-convention bounce McPalin enjoyed appears to be gone, supplanted by a sense that their American Idol dog-and-pony show is worth fuck-all in the face of a potentially catastrophic economic situation. These people are clowns and liars -- showboating buffoons with no ideas, no knowledge, and no curiosity as to how to handle problems. Over the past month or so, McCain has insisted that he knows how to find bin Laden, win wars, and fix the economy. One asks politely why the hell he has yet to do any of those things then, or to even proffer any viable solutions to his colleagues in the Senate or the current occupants of the office he seeks.
(And really, the next time McCain asserts that he "knows how to win wars", it would be helpful if the person he's speaking to responds with a request for him to produce an example. That should be entertaining, though not quite as entertaining as Barnes trying to convince his hordes of saps that empty jabber and listing approval ratings are good things.)
Other factors have also been crucial in the Republican rise. Recall what caused the party to tank in 2006: corruption and scandal in Congress, excessive spending, a losing war in Iraq, unpopular leaders. The party had a bad odor.
Those problems either don't exist any more [sic] or aren't as significant in 2008. Congressional Republicans who were caught up in scandal or outright crimes are gone or soon to leave. The one exception is Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, who is under indictment and awaiting trial as he runs for reelection. Yet he's running even with his Democratic opponent.
Which proves only that Alaska Republicans are as obstinate and irrational as their continental counterparts. And it's nice that Barnes thinks that the problems he listed "either don't exist anymore or aren't as significant in 2008". It's not as if the perpetual election campaign hasn't sucked all the oxygen out of all those other stories, which are indeed still relevant and significant.
Barnes goes on to talk about the British Tories' rejuvenation against a stagnant Labour Party, as if Tony Blair's association with (and steadfast refusal to repudiate) Fredo hadn't tainted that brand sufficiently. It is, Fred may have noticed, the same reason Bush has only appeared in public to stroke everyone over the impending economic collapse, and hasn't been seen in public with McCain in months. Cheney is also nowhere to be found. These are not the actions of the incumbent leaders of a resurgent brand.
Barnes is bold in putting the date of September 29 on his column. McCain has already been uncomfortably exposed as an increasingly empty candidate in genuine danger of being overshadowed by his neophyte running mate, who in turn has been overexposed as a typical backwater cronyist who knows nothing about the world beyond her state broders, and who is clearly in waaaayyy over her head, no matter how much or how desperately they try to prep her. Most people with an IQ above room temperature are already at the point of asking "what next" when they hear Palin's name, just three weeks into her "getting to know you" phase. They know her now, and while she might be a perfectly good neighbor or mayor, she is not qualified to occupy the newly-empowered office of vice-president. Barnes can thank Cheney for that one.
By the time Barnes' pro-forma date rolls around, the first debate between Obama and McCain will have been held. And while Obama's supposedly professorial demeanor may still be off-putting the emotionally unstable who project their anxieties and ignorance upon their political representatives, the fact is that he is a much better extemporaneous thinker and speaker than McCain. And now that people are losing their homes and jobs and pensions in droves, more of these chuckleheads are starting to pay attention past the peripheral nonsense they've been indulging in.
We'll see -- the older I get, the more I believe that Mencken was an optimist -- but if I were Barnes, I wouldn't be counting my Palins before they're even incubated, much less ready to hatch. People are starting to figure this broad out, and the numbers show it.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Palin Comparison
On the anniversary of the day where, if everything didn't exactly change quite as much as advertised, at the very least our approach to foreign policy was completely upturned, it seems appropriate to peek in on our would-be future assistant decider:
It would be easier, I suppose, to just have her say "yes" and be done with it, pin that on her outright. But there's no confusion regardless; I don't see how she could be any more clear in enunciating her endorsement of the neocon precepts. Oddly, I keep hearing the voice of Marge Gunderson as I read Palin's responses. It's not nearly as much fun as it sounds.
Later, Palin also makes a point of ruffling Russia's feathers, but not before contradicting herself on a pretty fundamental point.
Sooo....many foreign leaders come to Alaska for trade talks, but she has yet to meet with any of them, and it doesn't count anyway because the American people are sick of people who have that sort of [contemptuous sneer] experience and expertise. Also, that must be your friend in the, ah, wood chipper.
There are quite a few positions from which to assault this, even from someone like myself, with only a rudimentary knowledge of geopolitics in general and Russian politics in particular. But let's start with the basics -- Russia will not tolerate its closest (geographically, culturally, and politically) former satellites becoming NATO members, for essentially the same reason we wouldn't tolerate Soviet "advisors" in Cuba or Nicaragua. They're just not going to, especially if we don't bother to at least pretend to make it worth their while.
Add to that the fact that, as jingoistic and paranoid as we can be about world affairs (remember, Saddam was on the verge of sending Predator-type drones to nuke Baltimore or something, even while we use actual Predators to bomb villages in Afghanistan and Pakistan), the Russians have had the market cornered on political insularity and paranoia for nearly a thousand years, and not entirely without reason throughout that course of time.
Next, despite Palin's claim that Russia attacked Georgia completely unprovoked, that's just not true. Saakashvili -- under urging, it appears, from McCain's own foreign policy advisor, Randy Scheunemann, coincidentally enough a lobbyist for Georgia -- was emboldened to launch artillery strikes on South Ossetian and Abkhazian towns because he was at least led to believe that we would have his back if Russia retaliated. So he did, they did, and we didn't. We couldn't, but Saakashvili was misled to think we could. Economic sanctions? Does McCain or Palin think that Germany and France are going to cast Security Council votes that would affect their energy supplies?
The fact is that Russia is not entirely unreasonable in seeing our actions under the auspices of NATO expansion as provocative and antagonistic. Missile base in Poland to protect from an impending onslaught of Iranian missiles? Should Russia or China then strike a deal with Canada to build a missile base in Saskatoon, on the off chance of a missile strike from Mexico? Would we tolerate that for a split-second?
The thing is, even though Obama and Biden nominally support all these prospective NATO moves, chances are they are also aware of the inherent bargaining power of such proposals. You advance an untenable proposition, and haggle down to something that lets both sides save diplomatic face. Not real complicated. Except you assume that McCain -- and by proxy, Palin -- genuinely accept, from an ideological certainty, the urgency for undertaking such provocative steps.
Finally, as part of puffing up her supposed foreign policy acumen, we keep hearing how close Russia is to Alaska. Well, then why has she never been, not even right across the strait to Vladivostok, which is a tourism-driven boomtown these days? She clearly knows nothing about Russia at all, yet presupposes that mere geographic proximity grants her some keen insight to dealing with them.
I realize all this means nothing to the tedious buffoons who had never heard of Palin two weeks ago, but are already enthused about hitching their lives and sacred honor to her stupid lipstick jokes. But it bears attention from the people who have at least the pretense of serious interest in actual national security. Rule Number One, as Iraq has most recently shown us: Don't start shit with people you don't know a goddamned thing about.
GIBSON: Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?
PALIN: In what respect, Charlie?
GIBSON: The Bush -- well, what do you -- what do you interpret it to be?
PALIN: His world view.
GIBSON: No, the Bush doctrine, enunciated September 2002, before the Iraq war.
PALIN: I believe that what President Bush has attempted to do is rid this world of Islamic extremism, terrorists who are hell bent on destroying our nation. There have been blunders along the way, though. There have been mistakes made. And with new leadership, and that's the beauty of American elections, of course, and democracy, is with new leadership comes opportunity to do things better.
GIBSON: The Bush doctrine, as I understand it, is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense, that we have the right to a preemptive strike against any other country that we think is going to attack us. Do you agree with that?
PALIN: I agree that a president's job, when they swear in their oath to uphold our Constitution, their top priority is to defend the United States of America.
I know that John McCain will do that and I, as his vice president, families we are blessed with that vote of the American people and are elected to serve and are sworn in on January 20, that will be our top priority is to defend the American people.
GIBSON: Do we have a right to anticipatory self-defense? Do we have a right to make a preemptive strike again another country if we feel that country might strike us?
PALIN: Charlie, if there is legitimate and enough intelligence that tells us that a strike is imminent against American people, we have every right to defend our country. In fact, the president has the obligation, the duty to defend.
GIBSON: Do we have the right to be making cross-border attacks into Pakistan from Afghanistan, with or without the approval of the Pakistani government?
PALIN: Now, as for our right to invade, we're going to work with these countries, building new relationships, working with existing allies, but forging new, also, in order to, Charlie, get to a point in this world where war is not going to be a first option. In fact, war has got to be, a military strike, a last option.
GIBSON: But, Governor, I'm asking you: We have the right, in your mind, to go across the border with or without the approval of the Pakistani government.
PALIN: In order to stop Islamic extremists, those terrorists who would seek to destroy America and our allies, we must do whatever it takes and we must not blink, Charlie, in making those tough decisions of where we go and even who we target.
GIBSON: And let me finish with this. I got lost in a blizzard of words there. Is that a yes? That you think we have the right to go across the border with or without the approval of the Pakistani government, to go after terrorists who are in the Waziristan area?
PALIN: I believe that America has to exercise all options in order to stop the terrorists who are hell bent on destroying America and our allies. We have got to have all options out there on the table.
It would be easier, I suppose, to just have her say "yes" and be done with it, pin that on her outright. But there's no confusion regardless; I don't see how she could be any more clear in enunciating her endorsement of the neocon precepts. Oddly, I keep hearing the voice of Marge Gunderson as I read Palin's responses. It's not nearly as much fun as it sounds.
Later, Palin also makes a point of ruffling Russia's feathers, but not before contradicting herself on a pretty fundamental point.
GIBSON: Have you ever met a foreign head of state?
PALIN: There in the state of Alaska, our international trade activities bring in many leaders of other countries.
GIBSON: And all governors deal with trade delegations.
PALIN: Right.
GIBSON: Who act at the behest of their governments.
PALIN: Right, right.
GIBSON: I'm talking about somebody who's a head of state, who can negotiate for that country. Ever met one?
PALIN: I have not and I think if you go back in history and if you ask that question of many vice presidents, they may have the same answer that I just gave you. But, Charlie, again, we've got to remember what the desire is in this nation at this time. It is for no more politics as usual and somebody's big, fat resume maybe that shows decades and decades in that Washington establishment, where, yes, they've had opportunities to meet heads of state ... these last couple of weeks ... it has been overwhelming to me that confirmation of the message that Americans are getting sick and tired of that self-dealing and kind of that closed door, good old boy network that has been the Washington elite.
Sooo....many foreign leaders come to Alaska for trade talks, but she has yet to meet with any of them, and it doesn't count anyway because the American people are sick of people who have that sort of [contemptuous sneer] experience and expertise. Also, that must be your friend in the, ah, wood chipper.
GIBSON: Would you favor putting Georgia and Ukraine in NATO?
PALIN: Ukraine, definitely, yes. Yes, and Georgia.
GIBSON: Because Putin has said he would not tolerate NATO incursion into the Caucasus.
PALIN: Well, you know, the Rose Revolution, the Orange Revolution, those actions have showed us that those democratic nations, I believe, deserve to be in NATO.
Putin thinks otherwise. Obviously, he thinks otherwise, but...
GIBSON: And under the NATO treaty, wouldn't we then have to go to war if Russia went into Georgia?
PALIN: Perhaps so. I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you're going to be expected to be called upon and help.
But NATO, I think, should include Ukraine, definitely, at this point and I think that we need to -- especially with new leadership coming in on January 20, being sworn on, on either ticket, we have got to make sure that we strengthen our allies, our ties with each one of those NATO members.
We have got to make sure that that is the group that can be counted upon to defend one another in a very dangerous world today.
GIBSON: And you think it would be worth it to the United States, Georgia is worth it to the United States to go to war if Russia were to invade.
PALIN: What I think is that smaller democratic countries that are invaded by a larger power is something for us to be vigilant against. We have got to be cognizant of what the consequences are if a larger power is able to take over smaller democratic countries.
And we have got to be vigilant. We have got to show the support, in this case, for Georgia. The support that we can show is economic sanctions perhaps against Russia, if this is what it leads to.
It doesn't have to lead to war and it doesn't have to lead, as I said, to a Cold War, but economic sanctions, diplomatic pressure, again, counting on our allies to help us do that in this mission of keeping our eye on Russia and Putin and some of his desire to control and to control much more than smaller democratic countries.
His mission, if it is to control energy supplies, also, coming from and through Russia, that's a dangerous position for our world to be in, if we were to allow that to happen.
There are quite a few positions from which to assault this, even from someone like myself, with only a rudimentary knowledge of geopolitics in general and Russian politics in particular. But let's start with the basics -- Russia will not tolerate its closest (geographically, culturally, and politically) former satellites becoming NATO members, for essentially the same reason we wouldn't tolerate Soviet "advisors" in Cuba or Nicaragua. They're just not going to, especially if we don't bother to at least pretend to make it worth their while.
Add to that the fact that, as jingoistic and paranoid as we can be about world affairs (remember, Saddam was on the verge of sending Predator-type drones to nuke Baltimore or something, even while we use actual Predators to bomb villages in Afghanistan and Pakistan), the Russians have had the market cornered on political insularity and paranoia for nearly a thousand years, and not entirely without reason throughout that course of time.
Next, despite Palin's claim that Russia attacked Georgia completely unprovoked, that's just not true. Saakashvili -- under urging, it appears, from McCain's own foreign policy advisor, Randy Scheunemann, coincidentally enough a lobbyist for Georgia -- was emboldened to launch artillery strikes on South Ossetian and Abkhazian towns because he was at least led to believe that we would have his back if Russia retaliated. So he did, they did, and we didn't. We couldn't, but Saakashvili was misled to think we could. Economic sanctions? Does McCain or Palin think that Germany and France are going to cast Security Council votes that would affect their energy supplies?
The fact is that Russia is not entirely unreasonable in seeing our actions under the auspices of NATO expansion as provocative and antagonistic. Missile base in Poland to protect from an impending onslaught of Iranian missiles? Should Russia or China then strike a deal with Canada to build a missile base in Saskatoon, on the off chance of a missile strike from Mexico? Would we tolerate that for a split-second?
The thing is, even though Obama and Biden nominally support all these prospective NATO moves, chances are they are also aware of the inherent bargaining power of such proposals. You advance an untenable proposition, and haggle down to something that lets both sides save diplomatic face. Not real complicated. Except you assume that McCain -- and by proxy, Palin -- genuinely accept, from an ideological certainty, the urgency for undertaking such provocative steps.
Finally, as part of puffing up her supposed foreign policy acumen, we keep hearing how close Russia is to Alaska. Well, then why has she never been, not even right across the strait to Vladivostok, which is a tourism-driven boomtown these days? She clearly knows nothing about Russia at all, yet presupposes that mere geographic proximity grants her some keen insight to dealing with them.
I realize all this means nothing to the tedious buffoons who had never heard of Palin two weeks ago, but are already enthused about hitching their lives and sacred honor to her stupid lipstick jokes. But it bears attention from the people who have at least the pretense of serious interest in actual national security. Rule Number One, as Iraq has most recently shown us: Don't start shit with people you don't know a goddamned thing about.
Sunday, September 07, 2008
Dead Cat Bounce
Coupla weird polls, and people start panicking. The CBS poll from Friday that showed the candidates tied at 42 had a pretty small sample size, for starters. And even today's Gallup poll showing McCain ahead by three could easily prove to be a statistical outlier as well.
Obviously, in a rational country with a grasp of actual issues, the Democratic ticket, flawed as it is, should be running away with this. They have a golden opportunity to hang Republican failures around McCain's neck, but can't resist the stupid urge to preface their attacks with tedious, predictable caveats about what a great guy he is. Perhaps a diagram would be in order.
It's as if the poll panickers are worried that yet another dirty Republican victory would, at long last, irrefutably confirm their sneaking suspicions that in the aggregate, we are an impulsive, ignorant, easily misled gaggle of miscreants. Well, duh.
This is not a terribly rational country: there, I said it. Look, there's a teevee show premiering tonight called Hole in the Wall, where contestants valiantly try to keep from being swept into a pool by, um, a moving wall with a cutout. I imagine this is Fox' bold attempt to counter the inherently elitist trappings of Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?. It makes sense that a large number of people would be at least momentarily distracted by the shiny penny of Sarahcuda Palin. Such people regard politics as just another iteration of Survivor anyway; actual policies and positions have fuck-all to do with it.
And there have been all too many horserace stories profiling the face-in-the-crowd donut-head, wowed by the newbie's rapier wit and borscht-belt schtick, claiming to have been an Obamanaut but converted literally overnight to a McCainiac. Friends 'n' neighbors, this is what we small-town folk call a crock of shee-yit. Such a person is by definition lying, ignorant, or completely delusional. In any case, good riddance. I think this story provides a more considered profile of what the hotly contested Vaginal-American demographic actually think about McCain's transparently cynical stunt-casting.
That's it in a nutshell -- The Economy, Stupid. All the major polling sites have accounted for these polling anomalies, and even Real Clear Politics, whom no one is going to confuse as being in the tank for Obama, calls this one for him even on their no toss-up map, which has McCain taking Ohio and Virginia, when one or both are likely to squeak to Obama. Most of the current electoral models have Obama with over 300 electoral votes.
Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight has probably the most reasoned current analysis of what's going on. All conventions, no matter how dismal or meaningless, get some sort of bounce in some poll or other. But it takes some time to see if the bounce is consistent across the spectrum, and the pick of an unknown running mate has thrown the signal-noise ratio out of whack, which is exactly what it was supposed to do. And the media pounce on these things because they have a vested corporate interest in keeping things close. You've been watching this reality show for two years now, folks, gotta stay tuned in for the big season finale.
But they can't hide her in the tundra forever, and while she can warm up her interview chops on the usual chumps and hacks, at some point someone will ask a question she won't like and can't deflect. Palin's record clearly indicates someone who doesn't handle dissent or disagreement well, whose self-styled reformist credentials are bogus, and whose actual executive expertise is grotesquely padded.
The media weasels, because they instinctively went after the soap-opera angle of her family rather than matters of policy, are temporarily thrown off. But a lot changes in two months, especially in the accelerated pressure cooker of the campaign homestretch. The main danger is excessively lowering expectations, thus enabling her to exceed them easily, which is what happened with Fredo. It will be enough to catch her in her lies and misrepresentations, emphasize the increasing unemployment rate, and ask people if they can get over themselves just long enough to not vote against their own self-interest for once in their misbegotten lives.
And if not, if their shameless lies and comical gestures work yet again on the goobers, and you get another round of the same boss? Hell, I dunno. Disengage. Opt out. Get yours and move on. Heighten those contradictions. I still think the system has failed and we are essentially where the British were a hundred years ago, by and large, but at least the Democrats are somewhat more likely to cushion the blow a tad for the peons. If the system hasn't quite yet failed, it most certainly will with clowns like McCain and Palin in charge. And a catastrophically diseased, debauched system will and should ultimately fail on its own terms, so instead of trying to further stand tall against the tide of stupidity in such an aftermath, look around for a board and ride the wave.
Obviously, in a rational country with a grasp of actual issues, the Democratic ticket, flawed as it is, should be running away with this. They have a golden opportunity to hang Republican failures around McCain's neck, but can't resist the stupid urge to preface their attacks with tedious, predictable caveats about what a great guy he is. Perhaps a diagram would be in order.
It's as if the poll panickers are worried that yet another dirty Republican victory would, at long last, irrefutably confirm their sneaking suspicions that in the aggregate, we are an impulsive, ignorant, easily misled gaggle of miscreants. Well, duh.
This is not a terribly rational country: there, I said it. Look, there's a teevee show premiering tonight called Hole in the Wall, where contestants valiantly try to keep from being swept into a pool by, um, a moving wall with a cutout. I imagine this is Fox' bold attempt to counter the inherently elitist trappings of Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?. It makes sense that a large number of people would be at least momentarily distracted by the shiny penny of Sarahcuda Palin. Such people regard politics as just another iteration of Survivor anyway; actual policies and positions have fuck-all to do with it.
And there have been all too many horserace stories profiling the face-in-the-crowd donut-head, wowed by the newbie's rapier wit and borscht-belt schtick, claiming to have been an Obamanaut but converted literally overnight to a McCainiac. Friends 'n' neighbors, this is what we small-town folk call a crock of shee-yit. Such a person is by definition lying, ignorant, or completely delusional. In any case, good riddance. I think this story provides a more considered profile of what the hotly contested Vaginal-American demographic actually think about McCain's transparently cynical stunt-casting.
Trish Heckman, a 49-year-old restaurant cook and disappointed Hillary Rodham Clinton supporter, watched last week as the country's newest political star made her explosive debut.
She followed the news when John McCain introduced Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate, paid attention to the raging debate over her qualifications, even tuned in to watch her dramatic speech at the Republican convention.
But when it came down to an issue Heckman really cares about -- sending a daughter to college on $10.50 an hour -- her desire to see a woman reach the White House took a back seat to her depleted savings account.
"I wanted Hillary to win so bad, but I saw Sarah, and it just didn't work for me," said Heckman, taking a break in the empty courtyard of J. Paul's restaurant in a downtown struggling to revive. "I have no retirement. Obama understands it's the economy. He knows how we live."
That's it in a nutshell -- The Economy, Stupid. All the major polling sites have accounted for these polling anomalies, and even Real Clear Politics, whom no one is going to confuse as being in the tank for Obama, calls this one for him even on their no toss-up map, which has McCain taking Ohio and Virginia, when one or both are likely to squeak to Obama. Most of the current electoral models have Obama with over 300 electoral votes.
Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight has probably the most reasoned current analysis of what's going on. All conventions, no matter how dismal or meaningless, get some sort of bounce in some poll or other. But it takes some time to see if the bounce is consistent across the spectrum, and the pick of an unknown running mate has thrown the signal-noise ratio out of whack, which is exactly what it was supposed to do. And the media pounce on these things because they have a vested corporate interest in keeping things close. You've been watching this reality show for two years now, folks, gotta stay tuned in for the big season finale.
But they can't hide her in the tundra forever, and while she can warm up her interview chops on the usual chumps and hacks, at some point someone will ask a question she won't like and can't deflect. Palin's record clearly indicates someone who doesn't handle dissent or disagreement well, whose self-styled reformist credentials are bogus, and whose actual executive expertise is grotesquely padded.
The media weasels, because they instinctively went after the soap-opera angle of her family rather than matters of policy, are temporarily thrown off. But a lot changes in two months, especially in the accelerated pressure cooker of the campaign homestretch. The main danger is excessively lowering expectations, thus enabling her to exceed them easily, which is what happened with Fredo. It will be enough to catch her in her lies and misrepresentations, emphasize the increasing unemployment rate, and ask people if they can get over themselves just long enough to not vote against their own self-interest for once in their misbegotten lives.
And if not, if their shameless lies and comical gestures work yet again on the goobers, and you get another round of the same boss? Hell, I dunno. Disengage. Opt out. Get yours and move on. Heighten those contradictions. I still think the system has failed and we are essentially where the British were a hundred years ago, by and large, but at least the Democrats are somewhat more likely to cushion the blow a tad for the peons. If the system hasn't quite yet failed, it most certainly will with clowns like McCain and Palin in charge. And a catastrophically diseased, debauched system will and should ultimately fail on its own terms, so instead of trying to further stand tall against the tide of stupidity in such an aftermath, look around for a board and ride the wave.
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Elephant Gun
"My friends, that is a vacation cabin you can believe in!"
[Photo via Talking Points Memo]
Parting thoughts from the
- If the DNC is generally oleaginous piffle couched in encounter-group boilerplate, this is the vicious flipside -- unmitigated gall and inchoate fury; smug, defensive rhetorical gambits (i.e., lying) to impress these drooling chowder-heads with at least the illusion of plausible deniability. With this crowd, there's no doubt it worked. Two out of every three people in any given crowd pan looked like they'd have difficulty putting their fingers together in the dark. When Bob Eubanks asks the magical question, "Where's the most unusual place you've ever made whoopee?", these are the people who say, "Um, in the butt?".
- Party animals: Considering these people have chosen an elephant to represent the fundamental characteristics of their virtues and values, it's a bit ironic that they appear to be so forgetful about which party got us into this mess. Ah yes, the dhimmicrats, who have controlled Congress for about 22 whole months, and stood up to Bush approximately never.
- Has anyone ever had a week quite like Sarah Palin's? Sure, the base is energized for now, but it's still not enough. Her speech had 37 million viewers, nearly as many as Obama's 40 million, but what chunk of Palin's viewers were just tuning in to see how badly Straight Talk had stepped in it by picking her? And she raised $7 mil today for the GOP -- and $8 mil for Obama. Right now she's just an unknown milf with some Bushies writing some smartass barbs for her at an event she practically trained for, as a sportscaster/beauty pageant contestant. The novelty will wear off fast, and then she'll just be a hotter Marge Gunderson.
- Plus her "reform" talking points are already being debunked, pretty much every third word out of her piehole is an exaggeration or flat-out untrue, and some folks from that quaint hometown are already fleshing out the Norman Rockwell narrative she's trying to write for herself. Keep shitting on community organizers, sweetheart. That'll really pay off for ya.
- Meanwhile, back at the ranch: Noted diplomat and fellow hunting enthusiast Big Time is spending his last-minute vacay from the 'tard party to do what he does best -- stirring up shit. Consider it an extra present in the punch bowl for the next administration to deal with.
- Party animals, part duh: The other elephant trope is the one in the room -- or rather, the one not in the room. I suppose the Goopers had to ignore Nixon at the '76 convention, though I was too young to know one way or the other. But a sitting two-term head of the party, still inexplicably popular with the dead-enders in this crowd, gets a six-minute wank on an off-night, and that's it. No Cheney, no further mention of Bush by any of the speakers, no burbling by Count Chocula, in between his imprecations at Obama, of his apocryphal claim to have thanked god on 9/11 that Bush was in office. Let's face it, the Democrats could not have done as forceful a job of sheer repudiation as Bush's own party just did.
- I guess I had assumed at some point that maybe conservatards meant that shit about small-town values, at least to the extent that they might have some familiarity with what small-town governance is actually like. Apparently they don't or they'd realize that almost all a small-town mayor does is break ties in city council votes and cut ribbons for the local Chamber of Commerce. It's generally a ceremonial position. This is not exactly a secret; anyone who actually lives in a small town knows this. These morons would put Mayor McCheese on the ticket if you told them he was a moose-hunting, book-banning creationist.
- Meanwhile, back at the ranch again: The search for the elusive October Surprise is resurgent. Imagine, this administration taking advantage of Pakistani instability to launch Special Forces incursions into border villages. It can't possibly blow up in anyone's face.
- For people who have a hotline to What America Wants, they sure do seem hard-headed and thin-skinned. Wonder why that could be.
The mayor must overcome a reputation for womanizing before he can be considered a viable contender in the upcoming Oklahoma gubernatorial race, a well-known stepping stone to national prominence.
Already people are waging snark over whether Palin will allow Straight Talk to stay on the ticket, so underwhelming was his speech, to an underpopulated hockey arena, probably one-fifth the crowd Obama got in Denver. Surely Obama and his party do not deserve unthinking adulation, except compared to these knuckleheads. These people and their party just spent a week lamely attempting to spackle over their manifest failures with a lot of wild gestures and mumbo-jumbo. But Bush will become more conspicuous by his absence, the debates should be blowouts, and even the kool-aid chuggers in the Tearoom watching Rudy G and Cowboy Troy and all will realize that a three-peat would pretty much doom what's left of our standing in the world. And even these bozos know who's footing the bills these days.
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Tales From the Crypt
Last week, it seemed like mining the RNC for ridiculousness and snark would be like shooting fish in a barrel, or finding stray clumps of popcorn chicken in Jonah Goldberg's footie jammies. But since it was a house-payment week, and I couldn't swing the Costco bottle of Jameson's, I just couldn't stomach the prospect of actually sitting through that mess sober. Life, as they say, really is too short.
But I did manage to sit through enough potent bite-size chunks so far to get the gist of it. A few observations:
But I did manage to sit through enough potent bite-size chunks so far to get the gist of it. A few observations:
- The more gallons in your hat, and the more buttons and/or bumper stickers it is festooned with, the more patriotic you are.
- I sure hope the Minnesota Wild has better luck filling this thing than the Republicans are having. You could put the living half of Milli Vanilli on stage with a karaoke machine and get this many people.
- Is there anybody at this fucking thing under 60 years old? Aren't they missing an oatmeal-and-Matlock marathon somewhere?
- I keep hearing that Republican chicks are hot. I've seen a lot of crowd shots the last few nights -- more than I care to think about. I have yet to see a single one I would fuck with Ann Coulter's cock.
- So being pregnant every few years and moose-hunting are now sterling quals for higher national office. Perhaps Sarah Palin can impress the neighbors by field-dressing Fred Thompson on stage.
- Seriously, this is the oldest fucking audience I have ever seen for anything. Is there an early-bird special and a live taping of Murder, She Wrote or something?
- Joe Lieberman is so far up John McCain's ass, it is technically a violation of the Geneva Convention. Which this crowd has never heard of, even though most of their Social Security numbers are in double digits.
- Loved Fredo's aphasic reference to his "resolute desk". That's where he keeps his "action pen" for signin' "freedom documints". There's also the collection of post-its he keeps in his "idea drawer". When the finally build that factory in Crawford, the one that makes cheese-filled hot dogs, they'll know who to thank.
- Just when I thought Ol' Fred and Holy Joe were runnin' neck-wattle-to-neck-wattle for the coveted Asshole of the Week award (which for this crowd is a pretty fuckin' deep bench to choose from), along comes Rudy. Breslin's line on Giuliani cannot be quoted too often: a small man in search of a balcony. The guy's such a flaming asshole, he's not Tony Soprano, he's Phil Leotardo. Five pounds of cousin-fucking shit in a ten-pound bag.
- Finally it's Marian the Librarian's turn. The thing about following Rudy G, even when he runs over into your segment, is that you could read aloud from Mein Kampf and still come off as more rational and contemplative. The expectations have been so severely lowered already for Palin, all she has to do is not sound like a complete moron. Or Joe Lieberman.
- The only thing remotely resembling a coherent policy statement is some vague thoughts here and there about "energy independence" and investment in "alternative energy", which for this crowd means nuclear plants and "clean coal". Does anyone really believe for a moment that any of them would be willing to live either next to a nuke plant or a mountain that is being blasted and melted?
- This may be the only major event in recorded history where they have to take a milk-of-magnesia break every 45 minutes. I would not be surprised to hear that this greasy monkeyfuck was sponsored by Metamucil and the estate of Lawrence Welk.
- There are several levels of grating intellectual offense. Obviously the professional grifters and propagandists scuttling to the microphone are the first level. Then you have the commentators, each trying to be the one that susses correctly the zeitgeist of a brainless, deadened husk of a failed ideology. So far, Campbell Brown of all people has grilled some fat trout, though Nooners' hot-mike slip-up tells you all you need to know about what the GOP insiders really think about their own circle-jerk.
But the final, most irritating level is that of the drones on the floor, the delegates, the nameless morons from hither and yon (mostly, it would appear, yon) who, when asked what they think and why they think it, burble the most incoherent streams of nonsense imaginable. Why do they like Sarah Palin? Because she validates their own personal reproductive choices; because she seems like she'd be a good neighbor; because they feel like they can hang out at her house on weekdays and watch All My Children and get sloshed on gin fizzes.
Who the fuck can tell? None of them make a goddamned lick of sense. You want to slap these fucktards and tell them that there are better ways to find friends than, you know, voting. It's like they're all in third grade -- which, hell, maybe they are. Bored with their own lives, they have aught to look forward to but sticking their wrinkled beaks into everyone else's, while keeping them off their lawn, I guess.
I mean, I get the first two sets of insufferable assholes -- they're getting paid. Ol' Fred and Rudy G make bank to catapult the propaganda. Ditto Olbermann and Tweety for their orotund furbelows. But to get all these suckers to drive and fly hundreds of miles and not only listen to this bullshit, but repeat it? My friends, that is some stupidity you can believe in.
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