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Mourning morning in America

When you wake up to headlines like these — “Editorial: Romney is GOP’s best choice” (Washington Examiner); “Huntsman jumps into 3d in New Hampshire” (IBD) — it’s time you begin accepting reality: the conservative movement, lately made manifest in the rise of the TEA Party, has been successfully infiltrated and overtaken by establishment GOP organizers who have learned to speak as if they are conservative, all while selling the base on the parameters for an “electable” candidate, which just so happens to stipulate that the only viable conservatives are those who aren’t conservative at all, constitutionalism / legal conservatism / classical liberalism being a fringe, extremist, and largely reactionary force in today’s political struggle over which party will get to control the power of a federal leviathan.

That is, the GOP establishment has once again convinced us that it is the only alternative to the New Left; and that our “best chance” for defeating the new left is to elect a statist that will do us all the solid of promising to keep our taxes a little bit lower — even as we lose more and more of our liberties.

And because we get to vote for the candidates they’ve essentially chosen for us, we’ll continue to believe that we are a free people. When what we really are is a people who once every few years gets to pick the faces of its new masters.

I’m going back to bed.

114 Replies to “Mourning morning in America”

  1. Ernst Schreiber says:

    So it’s the old left versus the new left, with (so the professional canvassers tell us) the left-over left holding the margin of victory? Yet Glen Beck is the nutter.

  2. Ella says:

    The Tea Party was infiltrated a month in. In Tulsa, they had Congressman John F’n Sullivan (supporter of TARP) and John Gibson (radio host, supporter of TARP) hosting two Tea Party rallies on Tax Day 2009. That was the SECOND spat of Tea Party rallies in Tulsa. #2. The first was in February, with only angry citizens and homemade signs. #2 — slick signs, radio promosions, and big-government, bailout-loving pragmatists as the keynotes. I was at that rally, and I have never bought into the Tea Party hype since.

    Although, abandoning all hope actually makes the day seem brighter. Hope can be a burden, apparently.

  3. Squid says:

    The national contests were and are only going to break your heart.

    It’s part and parcel of our observations and complaints from the beginning: federal government is too big, too distant, too powerful, and (most importantly) too corrupt. At the national level, we’re up against a billion-dollar machine that has been digging in since Reagan left office 30-odd years ago. How on Earth does anyone expect us to prevail over that kind of behemoth?

    I don’t blame anyone for writing off the national candidates, or for writing off the national media and the national electorate they misinform each day. But I really must insist that we not let the frustration and disappointment of the big horse race keep us from our work closer to home. Most of us have mayors, and city councils, and county boards, and school boards, and state legislators, and governors, and senators and representatives to Washington, each of which is closer to us and more responsive to our demands than some suit on the baby-kissing circuit. These are battles that we can still win. We won’t win all of them, but we can extend and consolidate the gains of 2010 to the point where it will be harder and harder to ignore us.

    The Oval Office is a lost cause. That doesn’t mean we can’t send Paul Ryan a new batch of friends.

  4. happyfeet says:

    Everyone seems to have decided that Newt is an erratic whore with a tacky slut wife so that means we’re probably gonna get faggy unprincipled piece of shit Romney.

    Me I would have preferred Newt but even a faggy unprincipled piece of shit is better than Obama.

  5. Ernst Schreiber says:

    And besides, you’re going to want your community to be a functional one. Once the music stops and the riff-raff comes spilling out of all the disfunctional ones like the zombie apocalypse (uugh…en—title—ments aargh…) you’re on your own except for the neighbors.

  6. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I think what everyone’s decided is that it’s easier to pretend that we don’t know we’re being lied to.

  7. happyfeet says:

    oh Mr. Jeff btw that should be Examiner not Times I think

    I’ll read it later after I get to work myabe they have a compelling argument why we should nominate a faggy hyper-entitled unprincipled piece of shit

    again

  8. Jeff G. says:

    Fixed, happy

  9. alppuccino says:

    Again, my vote goes to the guy/gal who, before starting the debate with Obama, offers him a gift of a dozen Pinnacles or Top-Flites.

  10. Joe says:

    happy I thought you were talking about Huntsman, but carry on. Given Newt and Mitt, I could basically toss a coin. They both suck.

  11. Joe says:

    alppuccino, but they have to be used ones recycled or retreieved from a water hazard…for the environment!

  12. alppuccino says:

    Good point Joe. Along with a comment, “Mr. President here some balls for you. It’s obvious you need them.”

    I’d send the maximum contribution if I saw that on national tv.

  13. Matt says:

    Mitt’s not the enemy. Obama’s the enemy. Like Sauron. I really can’t stomach 4 more years of Obama ruining Middle Earth. I’d rather have Romney than Newt, quite frankly. Gingrich is unpredictable and is all about Gingrich. Plus, Romney has executive experience, has run a state and understands the economy. Romney is much less likely to have personal skeletons in his closet, imho. Newt blows like the wind, to ethanol subsidies and Nancy Pelosi’s global warming couch and then back again, when it appears conservatives regained the momentum. I understand MItt is more of a “moderate” than people would like- quite frankly, he’s more a moderate than I’d like but with Rick Perry, Michelle Bachman and Herman Cain no longer in contention (full disclosure- I’ve been a Perry supporter since he got into the race), I want someone who will beat Obama and draw in independents. I do not believe Gingrich will resonate with independent voters, no matter how smart he is and no matter how well he would do against Obama in the debate. There’s a place for Newt in the next admninistration, it just shouldn’t be chief executive.

  14. Jeff G. says:

    See, Matt? You’ve made my point for me.

    Haven’t had a vote yet. And still, the idea is that it’s down to Newt or Romney — with Bachmann and Santorum out there, reliably conservative.

    We’ve already lost.

  15. Ernst Schreiber says:

    That’s the kind of stunt that diminishes the office for everyone who comes after. And that’s the one part of job (according to his understanding of it) that Barry doesn’t need any help with.

  16. Ernst Schreiber says:

    15 for 12.

    If you want predictable, Mitt’s your guy. He’s the most predictable Republican since Eisenhower.

  17. happyfeet says:

    Mitt represents the stepfordization of Team R I think cause he’s such a bland sexless unprincipled president-of-the-student-council piece of shit type who relies heavily on negative campaigning and financial advantage. Plus he likes to force people to buy health cares at the barrel of a gun.

    Which taken all in all is really a lot how the fuckstain in the white house now rolls.

  18. alppuccino says:

    Stunt Ernst? Really?

    OK, I’ll try to tweak it.

    “Mr. President, the office lost all of it’s prestige when you were elected. You’ve blamed your predecessor when convenient and taken credit for your predecessor’s accomplishments when even more convenient. Some would say that “the office” deserves respect and my mentioning your 100+ rounds of golf diminishes it. But those who would enable your hiding behind “the office” diminish those who stood, stand, and will stand and fight for principles that make this country what it was before you took office. So I will risk having some think that I diminish “the office” by telling you that you have shown yourself to be unworthy of “the office” and I aim to get you out of it.”

    I’ll double my contribution. (the second donation under the name of Adolf Hitler or Haywood Jablomey)

  19. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I like the sentiment as part of a stump speech alp. The “presentation of the balls” aspect is just going to encourage the next Axelrod crapweasel to do something more outrageous.

  20. sdferr says:

    Herman Cain is a simple choice. He’s got a hard-on for America. People just don’t happen to know that other people want to vote for him, so keep a discrete but lonely silence about their urges. It’s a pity so many ships pass solitary and silent in the American night, ignorant of their unity.

  21. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Haven’t had a vote yet. And still, the idea is that it’s down to Newt or Romney — with Bachmann and Santorum out there, reliably conservative.

    Yeah Jeff, but those two, there like Hobbits man! They’d try to destroy the Ring, y’know, and that’s just not practical. Now, Mitt, you can trust him with the Ring, he’d never try to keep it for himself, and if he did keep it for himself it would only be for good and not for advancing the agenda of Mordor, and if he did advance the agenda of Mordor, well he’s the best we got and he’s gonna do the best he can, and well Mordor is the future man and we have to make the best deal we can before we all wind up bitches for orcs or something horrible like that!

  22. leigh says:

    I’d like to see someone elevate the level of discourse about our disagreements with the donkeys. We have a president who acts like the office of the presidency is his personal license to act like a spoiled brat—not that he hasn’t always acted that way. Here is a guy who has done zip his entire life presuming to tell all of us what to do with ours. All while he spends most of his time golfing, boozing at parties, acting like a fool overseas, &c.

    “I won.”
    “Tell me whose ass to kick (paraphrase).”

    Who is he kidding,besides himself, I mean?

    And, anm I the only one who wants to knock him out of his chair every time we see a phot op of him with his feet up on the Resolute Desk?

  23. sdferr says:

    The NRO crowd has begun to take me a little by surprise, at least to the extent that the principled dissenters still there haven’t declared “we’re out of here, and we’re forming our own new magazine, one more representative of our political beliefs and teachings”, or something to that effect. They’ve more than enough provocation, surely. Yet, they stay and take it. Why? For their friendships’ sake? For the pay? What the use of that?

  24. Crawford says:

    I really can’t stomach 4 more years of Obama ruining Middle Earth. I’d rather have Romney than Newt, quite frankly.

    Well, Romney’d make sure Sauron only kept half of Mirkwood, and tax the Shire to provide homes and food for the Uruk-hai. Probably institute a mandatory fitness program for the fat, lazy hobbits, too — too much smoking, drinking, and obesity in that community.

    Newt would write an alternate history of what-if Galadriel had forged the One Ring.

    Neither one would give a rip about the wave of Southrons illegally setting in South Ithilien, nor do anything about the regulations preventing dwarves from mining ANYTHING — except maybe come up with a worthless jobs training program for the displaced workers of Dale. The greedy bastard dwarves can go hang, anyway, after the way they abused the Misty Mountains and chased the last of an endangered species out of his home in the Lonely Mountain.

    Frankly, if Middle Earth were in the shape the US is in, the elves at the Grey Havens would have to use pikes to keep the ships going Into the West from being swamped with refugees.

  25. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Leigh, that’s the difference between being humbled by the honor bestowed upon you by the American people, and being proud that the poor benighted masses were smart enough to recognize that you deserved to be elected.

  26. Crawford says:

    Yet, they stay and take it. Why? For their friendships’ sake? For the pay? What the use of that?

    Where else will they go?

    Stand on principle and you get branded “too right-wing for National Review” and never, ever get a mainstream press gig unless you go all the way to Batshit Crazy like Buchanan.

  27. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Frankly, if Middle Earth were in the shape the US is in, the elves at the Grey Havens would have to use pikes to keep the ships going Into the West from being swamped with refugees.

    That’s why we need to take up the Ring and fix the Healthcare Reform Act!

  28. sdferr says:

    Where else, I was suggesting, is to repair to their own brains and ambitions, to build their own outlet of political thought, observation and commentary. Act entrepreneurially. Make something new. Or if not exactly new, something hewing closer to their own views. As it is, they sit, dullards.

  29. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Where else will they go?

    The American Spectator?

  30. happyfeet says:

    National Review says that since Newt has had several whore wives and Romney has just bred the shit out of the one whore wife, we should all vote for Romney.

    I’m gonna have to take the day to think this over.

  31. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I think NR’s point is that the vagaries of Newt’s personal life, combined with his intellectual flights of fancy, and political inconsistencies means that he can’t be relied upon to govern in a predictable manner, from an establishment Conservative point of view. Whereas, with Romney, you know exactly what you’re going to get, even if, like, say Ann Coulter, you pretend otherwise.

  32. alppuccino says:

    I still say that the “niggerhead story” makes Perry the ideal candidate.

  33. JHoward says:

    Saw that too, feets, Ernst, in a for-shit written piece, no less. NR has become so, so dumb.

  34. Ernst Schreiber says:

    NR has become so, so dumb.

    Chalk it up to regression towards the mean I guess.

  35. happyfeet says:

    Honestly Mr. Howard if Newt is for reals deemed too much the zany tacky-slut-fucker I think I’m much more simpatico with Paul than any of the fringey ones or Perry.

  36. Slartibartfast says:

    You know what else is discouraging? This, that’s what.

    Tallbloke got raided, for those of you who’ve hung out around the various climate-alarmism discussions. I’m guessing it’s not because he hacked anyone’s email so much as it is because he might know someone who knows someone else who did that.

  37. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Also, so, so predictable since I haven’t even read the piece, but apparently described it accurately.

  38. Slartibartfast says:

    Who next? Me?

  39. alppuccino says:

    Newt bonin’ chicks.

    Thanks for that image happy.

    Now, do I pour the muriatic acid right into my nostril or do I deliver it to my brain in some other fashion?

  40. sdferr says:

    Stand on principle and you get branded “too right-wing for National Review” and never, ever get a mainstream press gig unless you go all the way to Batshit Crazy like Buchanan.

    Thing about it is, to me anyhow, human reasoning power is always simultaneously appealing and inadequate to accounting for the whole of the world. I mean, John Rawls’ A Theory of Justice is still in print for Christ’s sake (nevermind Kapital!), and it’s a nutter’s view of politics — as demonstrated by a century plus of political history — yet evidently appeals to someone. No-one has to become Pat Buchanan. No-one has to be wild-eyed or anything of the kind. ‘Twould be well if they dug deep within themselves to best express their deepest beliefs on political subjects in coherent and consistent writings (and I think we’ve seen it done by at least a few of the writers there, some of whom nevertheless continue to go along to get along.)

    And after all, the stuff contra “too right-wing . . . ” ought to practically write itself, given the flimsiness of the charge, the centrist tendencies currently running the show at National Review, and the volume of documentary record of American political theory. There’s uncountable lifetimes of meat in the founding documents and founder’s papers.

  41. LTC John says:

    #24 was pretty good stuff….

    I wish IL’s primary was sooner, so I can NOT vote for Mitt or Newt and have it make more of an impact!

  42. McGehee says:

    “Editorial: Romney is GOP’s best choice” (Washington Examiner)

    I’ll say to the Examiner what I said to a commenter elsewhere who tried to tell me Romney was the only choice.

    And I quote: “Bullshit.”

    Sometimes you just gotta stick to the classics.

  43. happyfeet says:

    Newt is id and id is Newt I think

  44. leigh says:

    So, the Establicons have seized the “wouldn’t be prudent” line of attack on getting Obama out? I’m starting tp think we have met the enemy and they is us.

  45. sdferr says:

    I’m with you McGehee. Bullshit.

    But you and I may be wrong about Examiner’s potentially correct estimation of what the GOP currently is, has become, and how the GOP conceives its own interests, which dollars to doughnuts, you and I see as athwart the interests of the nation itself.

    So in that limited sense, they just may be right. (Though they also may not admit they meant it in that sense, but believe, against us, that the GOP is actually interested in the good of the whole. To which, should they do, I’d again reply: bullshit.)

    And we have long ago abandoned the GOP as a party worthy our support, though as to coming to that place, it may take others longer to recognize a similar sentiment in themselves. But as with political organizations on the order of nations — “Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed” — so, at only slightly less weight, with political parties.

  46. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I think it’s time to recognize that what we’re dealing with is a right-progressive political party (Republican) ostensibly friendly to conservatives/classical liberals, competing with an ostensibly left-progressive political party (Democrat) long since co-opted by socialists and communists.

    Third party or quiescence are the only ways forward I think.

  47. sdferr says:

    “I’m starting to think we have met the enemy and they is us.”

    Pogo was, after all, only quoting Abe Lincoln’s thought in other terms:

    At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
    –January 27, 1838 Lyceum Address

  48. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Suicide is painless…

    It brings on many changes…

  49. Crawford says:

    No-one has to become Pat Buchanan.

    No, but as far as the left-fascist press is concerned, the only acceptable voice of opposition is the squeaky one with the clown nose.

  50. sdferr says:

    Suicide is painless . . .

    Herman Cain has a hard-on for America. No erectile disfunction there.

  51. leigh says:

    That Pogo was one well-read possum.

  52. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I think it’s safe to say that Herman Cain’s been castrated.

  53. sdferr says:

    Oh, I don’t. Not at all. The people who’ve abandoned him for the sake of their standing in public? Another matter altogether.

  54. Ernst Schreiber says:

    We’ll see, I guess.

  55. geoffb says:

    To go along with #36.

    Obama’s Justice Department joins Britain’s ‘Climategate’ leaker manhunt
    […]
    On December 9, DOJ sent a preservation letter under 18 U.S.C 2703(f) to the publication platform (website host) WordPress. This authority authorizes the government to request an Internet Service Provider (ISP) to preserve all records of a specific account for 90 days while the feds work on a warrant.

  56. sdferr says:

    See what Ernst? See Cain disavow his beliefs about the Constitution? See him repudiate his political views?

  57. Ernst Schreiber says:

    In keeping with the spirit of the thing,

    Michele Bachmann got a great big strap-on for America.

  58. sdferr says:

    Hehs . . . and “Go get ’em, Michele!”, we’ll watch.

  59. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I was thinking along the lines of actualizing those views by …umm… consumating his relationship with the electorate.

  60. sdferr says:

    His views, so far as I can see, are already actualized in all the measures he undertook to offer his services. He loves the country and its meaning as a Constitutional Republic. Simple. And does that well enough to risk himself to threat and calumny (received, repeatedly). The country, as the people, doesn’t love itself embodied in those principles and meanings well enough to recognize Cain’s virtue. Their choices aren’t his choices.

  61. dicentra says:

    Where else will they go?

    The Blaze.

    Or outer darkness.

    Sixes.

  62. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Rush just called NR the “voice of Republicanism” (!)

  63. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Their choices aren’t his choices.

    Got you now.

  64. Crawford says:

    Rush just called NR the “voice of Republicanism” (!)

    Accurate — they’re the Party voice, just as the Daily Worker is the voice of the Democrats. They’re not the voice of conservatives.

  65. Ernst Schreiber says:

    They’re not the voice of conservatives.

    Not anymore. Not right now at any rate.

    At least they still allow conservative voices.

  66. dicentra says:

    Mark Steyn wishes to dissent from the NRO official position somewhat:

    Re that NR editorial, I would like, politely, to dissent from my colleagues’ dismissal of Perry and Bachmann.

    In the former case, a handful of poor debate performances should not disqualify a man from executive responsibility: Our age’s veneration for men with “nothing to do but think and talk” (in Churchill’s words, on the sort of chaps he didn’t want in his war cabinet) is one reason why the Western world is sliding off a cliff.

    In the latter case, Congresswoman Bachmann has fought a principled, conservative campaign with only one significant misstep — her overreach on the Gardasil business. Again, that shouldn’t be a disqualification. Nor should having more chiefs of staff than she has foster children (I speak as a guy who believes citizen-legislators shouldn’t have chiefs of staff, anyway). To be sexist about it, President Bachmann at her best would be another Thatcher and at her worst another Merkel — and Chancellor Merkel currently presides over the least worst Western economy. What’s not to like? Go, Michele!

    Go MARK!

  67. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Steyn is biased has a soft-spot towards Bachman —she’s not afraid to be seen on the campaign trail with his book.

  68. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Paging Di:

    Rush played a bunch of Media Reactions to Mitt calling Newt “zany.” MBM pretends not to know what “zany” means and acts as if it will hurt Romney.

    I think that’s Mormon for “Dude’s fucked up man!”

    So am I right or what?

  69. sdferr says:

    Spike Jones was zany. Not bad company in my book, but Newt hardly qualifies.

  70. leigh says:

    Wasn’t the word “zany” used in a question asked of Mittens and not by Mittens as a discriptor?

  71. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Other than pointing out the opening salvo in the entirely predictable, Isn’t he weird? V. 2.0 offensive of 2012, I’m suggesting the Mormon usage isn’t standard usage.

    From a Mormon p.o.v Spike Jones might seem pretty fucked up as well. Just to hazard a guess.

  72. dicentra says:

    “Zany” with special meaning in Mormonland?

    Not as far as I know.

    You’ll have to look elsewhere to peg Romney’s intent on that one.

  73. Ernst Schreiber says:

    “Zany” isn’t a polite way of saying “fucked-up?”

    Damn.

    Ace hat on/ I’m right and you’re wrong! And I’ll continue to insist upon my fundamental rightness and your fundamental wrongness until death or loss of credibility, whichever comes first! /Ace hat off.

  74. dicentra says:

    “Zany” isn’t a polite way of saying “fucked-up?”

    It might be, but it isn’t something endemic to Mormonism. Besides, Mitt wasn’t raised in the Mormon Corridor (ID, UT, AZ), so he wouldn’t have picked up on most of our idiosyncrasies.

  75. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Okee Doke then.

    I guess that’ll learn me not to trust South Park. [grin]

  76. VekTor says:

    While it’s important to continue the fight against statist candidates, we should not lose sight of the big picture. The trajectory of the country during the years 2013-2016 inclusive will be determined FAR MORE by the congressmen and senators elected in 2012, as opposed to the distinction between the degrees of conservatism of whichever Republican happens to have been elected.

    Getting to at least 60 in the Senate, and substantially increasing the Tea Party fraction in the House, will do far more to drag whichever statist-minded Republican president in the right-minded direction than a life-or-death struggle over which particular Republican candidate to put up against the current Occupier of the WH.

    And, of course, whichever candidate it is, still has to actually WIN the general election. Yes, that’s the “electability” argument, but it doesn’t just apply at the middle… put someone whacked-out enough (like Ron Paul) in there, and the work of the House and Senate, even with big victories, will be much harder, if the Occupier manages to somehow win.

    Yes, it’s important to still fight for principles. But that doesn’t imply that we must go so far in that direction that we ensure that the only possible “victory” is a Phyrric one.

  77. geoffb says:

    Zany fits perfectly as a descriptor of the Ron Paul foreign policy and/or most everything coming from the mouths of people like Dennis Kucinich, Major [Sharks!!!] Owens, Hank [Guam tips over] Johnson and Sheila [Where’s the flag] Jackson Lee.

    Calling a politician “zany” is to say they project the aura of being in someway disconnected from reality. Progressives, in my view, are all “zany” and dangerously so when they have power.

    “Zany” is Mitts way of saying that Newt’s policies are flights of fancy which never touch down on the reality of Earth.

  78. Squid says:

    I think we should get the Middle Earth metaphors cranked up again. #24 was epic!

  79. sdferr says:

    Disconnecting zany from intentional comic behavior is a bad idea, I think. I mean, people can be — and often are unintentionally comical — but that isn’t zany. It’s important to the zany that they’re understood to intend their appearance. Like say, the Stooges, or Spike. This is their living. While most of us don’t go that far, we still ought to honor their schtick for what it is.

  80. Crawford says:

    Mark Steyn wishes to dissent from the NRO official position somewhat:

    I suspect Steyn could fend for himself during the collapse, but does not wish to, as he knows what it would entail.

    The rest of the professional blatherers at NRO would be hard-pressed to fend for themselves at rope drop at Walt Disney World’s Animal Kingdom. On a Sunday. During value season.

  81. dicentra says:

    Zany = crazy funny

    Like Regis Philbin!

  82. dicentra says:

    I think we should get the Middle Earth metaphors cranked up again.

    With Merry and Pippin being the zany ones? Or would that be Shelob?

  83. Matt says:

    Jeff, I agree that it sucks. I like Bachman and Santorum. Believe me, its not what I wanted either. I’m hoping, like Steyn says, there’s a chance of Perry or Bachman doing much better in the primaries then polling would dictate and emerging as a legitimate threat. I’m not changing my Perry vote unless he drops out, which I don’t foresee happening. On the Romney front, when it comes down to he and Gingrich, I think he’s the most immune to being assailed for his personal failings, while I have quite a bit of trepidation more on Newt would come out during his campaign for the general. And I don’t necessarily trust Romney- however, I know for a fact I do not trust Obama and anyone in the democratic party.

    Also, some funny stuff about middle earth =)

  84. John Bradley says:

    “Enough business-as-usual, it’s time for a real outsider with real solutions.”
    Ghân-buri-Ghân 2012

  85. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I vote we give the Ring to Galadriel.

    Partly because All Shall Love Me and DESPAIR is a killer campaign slogan.

    And partly because the thought of ‘feets groveling abjectly at the feet of a woman would make my own tears seem sweeter somehow.

  86. Dave in SoCal says:

    And still, the idea is that it’s down to Newt or Romney — with Bachmann and Santorum out there, reliably conservative.

    Clearly, someone at Santorum’s PAC is a PW reader and has been waiting patiently for Jeff to set the ball so they could spike it.

  87. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Getting to at least 60 in the Senate, and substantially increasing the Tea Party fraction in the House, will do far more to drag whichever statist-minded Republican president in the right-minded direction than a life-or-death struggle over which particular Republican candidate to put up against the current Occupier of the WH.

    In all honesty, I think you have to get to veto-proof margins in both chambers before the onus is on the Administration to compromise with the legislative Majority, rather than the other way around.

    Yes, it’s important to still fight for principles. But that doesn’t imply that we must go so far in that direction that we ensure that the only possible “victory” is a Phyrric one.

    Myself, I can’t think of a more empty victory than watching a Romney administration implement ObamaCare after some cosmetic “fixes” pass a Republican Congress.

  88. sdferr says:

    Mark Levin just told me that Brent Bozell has blown his top at the NR’s anti-Newt editorial. So, though Bozell’s not a frequent contributor at NR, still, that’s the sort of reaction I’d expect from some folks in that organization. Not the fat girl. Certainly not the Princeton casuist. But maybe the newsletter writer.

  89. Ernst Schreiber says:

    That was a mean thing to say about K-Lo.

    Who’s the Princeton casuist? Ponnuru (sp)?

  90. sdferr says:

    Exactly, on both counts.

  91. newrouter says:

    wiki

    Ponnuru was raised in Prairie Village, Kansas, a suburb of Kansas City. He attended Briarwood Elementary School and Mission Valley Middle School. He skipped the 8th grade and directly entered high school. After graduating from Shawnee Mission East High School at the age of 15, he went to Princeton University, where he earned a B.A. in history and graduated summa cum laude. He is of Asian Indian descent and has converted to Roman Catholicism.[3] He is married to April Ponnuru.[4][5]

  92. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I wasn’t aware Princeton had a Jesuit faculty.

  93. sdferr says:

    It’s as much a life choice as a question of training, I reckon.

  94. leigh says:

    More on Tim Tebow, who is on this week’s cover of SI, from Bill Press, who is not:

    BILL PRESS (15 DECEMBER 2011) (29:45): Oh yeah, all right all right yeah first of all I just have to thank my lord and savior Jesus Christ and you know what I want to say, S.T.F.U. [shut the f*** up]!

    I’m tired of hearing Tim Tebow and all this Jesus talk….

    Tim Tebow, everybody wants to make him a hero. I think he’s a disgrace! I think he’s a disgrace! I think he’s an embarrassment!

  95. happyfeet says:

    bill press should be more nicer that Timmy does the best he can with the gifts the good lord gave him

  96. sdferr says:

    Just checked in on William Jacobson and hoo-boy, he’s pissed.

  97. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Who the hell is Bill Press? Must be related to the Kardashians.

  98. Ernst Schreiber says:

    How come you didn’t take a shot at Rich Lowry sdferr? I’d guess he’s the party mostly responsible here.

  99. sdferr says:

    I think by condemning the editorial position in general, I’d be seen as condemning the editor-in-chief in particular. He can’t escape responsibility, can he? I thought about a nasty use of fat girl’s brownnosery so far up Lowry’s ass as to present her ears as an appearance of Lowry’s empty ballsack, but thought better of it ’til now.

  100. geoffb says:

    Meet Bill Press:

    Press was the chair of the California Democratic Party from 1993 to 1996. He has previously served in different appointed positions such as a chief of staff to Republican California State Senator Peter Behr from 1971 to 1973, and as director of the California Office of Planning and Research under Democratic Governor Jerry Brown from 1975 to 1979.
    […]
    Press was steeped in Catholicism from an early age. He was an altar boy and took vows of obedience, poverty and chastity. He describes his young self as a “soldier in God’s army” (CNN Politics, March 28, 2002). Press attended (the Catholic) Niagara University and earned a theology degree from the University of Fribourg in Switzerland.

    Something in the Holy Water?

  101. newrouter says:

    mr. press left the church to serve the state

  102. leigh says:

    This isBill Press, former cohost of Crossfire.

  103. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Just wondering why we’re singling out the Catholics for special abuse tonight is all.

    Press isn’t that raving moron with the radio show in the Bay Area, is he?

    Not to be confused with the other raving moron from the tundra area who’s first name is also Bill.

  104. VekTor says:

    In all honesty, I think you have to get to veto-proof margins in both chambers before the onus is on the Administration to compromise with the legislative Majority, rather than the other way around.

    You seem to use the term “compromise with” in the same fashion that I would use “capitulate to”. At veto-proof majorities, there’s no need for compromise, so I wouldn’t expect there to be any. Compromise is only needed in situations where both of the two factions has the meaningful ability to, and most essentially the will to thwart the other faction.

    Myself, I can’t think of a more empty victory than watching a Romney administration implement ObamaCare after some cosmetic “fixes” pass a Republican Congress.

    I doubt that Romney would have the stones (and thus the will) to actually veto a filibuster-proof passing of a full repeal of Obamacare, thus I don’t see that as a realistic case to consider. Romney wouldn’t have many levers to control with respect to implementation of ObamaCare even if he were so bold as to veto a repeal, as it can simply be funded at the level of $1 a year until he capitulates.

    Since he’s not stupid, I assume he knows this… and thus wouldn’t veto a repeal bill, especially given how large the public support for a repeal has become. He’s nothing if not a wind sock.

    A Progressive Republican in the Oval Office with a strong Tea Party House and Senate isn’t that much of a threat to rolling back the damage done and getting things going on the right path. It’s a minor inconvenience when compared to O sitting in that same chair, since he’s been making it more an more clear that (in the words of Arcturus Mengsk) “I will rule this sector or see it burnt to ashes around me!”

    One of those two can be “worked with”… but only one. Is a Progressive Republican preferable to a Conservative Republican? Of course not. But if the pursuit of purity ensures that O gets re-elected, we run a significant risk of being “pure” sitting in a pile of ashes.

    O without a veto-proof Republican majority is a nightmare.
    Romney/Newt without a veto-proof Republican majority is a relatively minor inconvenience.

    We need to keep that in mind. We would do well to recall Aesop’s fable of “The Dog and Its Reflection”.

  105. newrouter says:

    mr. press is “catholic” like ted kennedy & sanfrannan

  106. sdferr says:

    Not Catholics as such, why? Casuistry isn’t limited to products of Jesuit education. And I’ve not complained of Mr Buckley himself,a notable Catholic presence at NR, for instance. I assume Bozell is Catholic. Though, perhaps unbeknownst to me, Catholicism has more to do with the current crop of limp-legs at National Review than I’d thought.

  107. Ernst Schreiber says:

    You seem to use the term “compromise with” in the same fashion that I would use “capitulate to”.

    I do. As does the media and the Democrats (but I repeat myself).

    At veto-proof majorities, there’s no need for compromise, so I wouldn’t expect there to be any. Compromise is only needed in situations where both of the two factions has the meaningful ability to, and most essentially the will to thwart the other faction.

    Exactly. No need to go along with a President for the “good of the party” lest we hand the obstructionist principled opposition of the minority a tool to beat the go-along get along squishes with.

  108. newrouter says:

    i don’t think catholicism is the culprit at nro. more like they haven’t a clue about what to do. when they start publishing articles like: “how reduce the [insert gov’t agency here]” i might listen.

  109. John Bradley says:

    Tim Tebow, everybody wants to make him a hero. I think he’s a disgrace! I think he’s a disgrace! I think he’s an embarrassment!

    I’m curious why Bill Press, or anyone for that matter, would think Tebow is a “disgrace” or an “embarassment”?

    Seems to me that he’d be a fine role model (“voted least-likely to be involved in a shooting incident at a nightclub”) what’s been winning some football games.

    I have no real use for either religion or football, so maybe I’m just not properly tuned-in to appreciate TEH OUTRAGE!!

    When Tebow says something about America having a shamefully poor healthcare system compared to Cuba, or that the Jews in Israel need to be pushed into the sea — then I’d see a reason to denounce him. But that doesn’t seem likely to occur.

  110. Ernst Schreiber says:

    It just jumped out at me sdferr, I’m not implying anything or imputing any implications to anyone else.

  111. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I doubt that Romney would have the stones (and thus the will) to actually veto a filibuster-proof passing of a full repeal of Obamacare, thus I don’t see that as a realistic case to consider.

    Me neither, since I don’t see Romney having those kind of coattails. On the other hand, I do see a Romney administration working with the House and Senate leadership to fix Obamacare and making deals with the Democrats to get enough votes for passage. The reason given will be that there’s not enough support for a full repeal,* so we’ll have to make the best of it.

    *You need to get to 62 or 63 to get past the Main sisters. And there’s probably a couple other squishes worried about ’14 so you need 64 or 65. Now we’re close to 2/3ds.

    Is a Progressive Republican preferable to a Conservative Republican? Of course not. But if the pursuit of purity ensures that O gets re-elected, we run a significant risk of being “pure” sitting in a pile of ashes.

    I’m not interested in purity per se. I’m interested in minimally acceptable and Romney doesn’t pass muster. I’m undecided about Gingrich.

    And if things are going to get reduced to ashes, I’d rather not see the Republican party taking any ownership of that. But I’m still sentimental that way. For now.

  112. SDN says:

    The other problem with a squish like Romney is that he won’t pick a Cabinet with the stones to tell the permanent bureaucracy to shut up or be fired. At which point we get things like fake lynx habitat discoveries by Fish and Wildlife.

  113. Ernst Schreiber says:

    And EPA discovering hydrocarbon by-products in water wells drilled to three times the average water well depth so they’d be sure to hit the hydrocarbon bearing strata.

    Can’t ban frakking without pruf, don’chya know.

  114. Patrick S says:

    OT, Hitchins is dead. He’s the only guy who made me look up nearly as many words as reading Jeff. I’ll raise a glass tomorrow night – already in bed tonight.

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