From Robert M:
Regarding your post “A note to the GOP leadership and all the establishment conservatives who will now begin telling us it’s our duty to rally around Mitt Romney.” I agree with you a more conservative/classic liberal would be the best way to go, but none of those running are and Mitt Romney seems to be heading towards the nomination. Let’s think about just two things:
1. The old saw “don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good” comes into play here. Is Mitt Romney a classic liberal or conservative? No. Would it be better to have Barack Obama in the White House instead of Mitt Romney? No, HELL no. We cannot remain America if Barack Obama wins and you know that as well as I do.
2. I sometimes wonder if all of these “if it’s Romney I won’t vote” types, which is a vote for Barack Obama, forget how the government works. The legislature passes legislation and then the President signs it or not. If both houses are Republican (and that’s the way I see it shaking out), even those not the pure conservative/classic liberal types, will send legislation repealing Obamacare (if the SCOTUS doesn’t make the call this summer), reforms of social security/medicare, putting reins on the out of control bureaucracy and walking back the military cuts because that is what they will run on to be elected. Do you actually think Mitt Romney will veto any of those? Let’s be serious.
We must keep our eyes on the ball. Barack Obama is a disaster, he does not love this country. His history, policy choices and demeanor prove this, how many more apologies for our country does it take to make this crystal clear. He must be soundly defeated, Reagan 1980/1984 defeated. Then, we of the more classic liberal/conservative bent will have an opportunity to “work from within”, incrementally moving the Republican party back to positions we can agree with. Start with one step at a time, small steps but always in the right direction. And yes, the pun was intended.
First off, if Romney is the nominee and I don’t vote for him, that isn’t a vote for Obama. It’s one less vote for Mitt Romney — mostly because Mitt Romney doesn’t represent my interests, and so hasn’t earned my vote. So let’s just get that out of the way. Or, to put it another way, I sometimes wonder if these GOP cheerleaders even understand what a vote actually is, and why we as individuals are granted them in the first place.
Secondly, here’s my response, which I’ll open up to discussion:
Your response has been the predictable response from the rank and file Republican voter every time the GOP nominates its newest moderate. The establishment knows this. So they have no motivation whatever to change their ways.
If you enter into a negotiation with the opposition already aware that in the final analysis you will accept whatever candidate they give you (because you find the alternative, in this case, Obama, to be even worse) — that is, if you show your hand at the outset — they’ll give you who they want, relying on your resignation, your capitulation, and, ultimately, your support.
What you want doesn’t matter. And it will never matter. Because you’ve told them that they have your vote no matter what — which allows them to pursue their own interests while counting on you to enable them election after election after election after election.
I won’t give my vote away so cheaply. And I’ve grown weary of losing more slowly.
Discuss.
Obama is hurting people. He’s viciously grievously fucking people up.
It transcends ideology, making him stop does.
He’s raping people in the here and now and also he’s crippling their futures. Not just people where you can say hey sucks to be you, but kids. Kids are growing up thinking they live in a failshit rapey whorestate.
Because they do.
Romney can’t possibly make it worse than it is now and God help us certainly not worse than what that malevolent piece of shit in our white house will do when he doesn’t have to worry about running again.
This stuff is making my head hurt. People say one thing but are really not what they appear. Here’s a palette cleanser…
Unless the stopgap is one of them frothy Jesus people. Then, fuck that.
So the argument, then, is that it’s my duty to accept who I’m told is inevitable; but it’s not the duty of the GOP establishment to put forth candidates who represent me — and in fact, it is acceptable that they actively work to minimize and marginalize such candidates, and have every right to rely on my vote no matter what?
That’s quite a nice gig the GOP’s got going there.
no go ahead and vote your feelings when Colorado has their primary but when Team R decides who their nominee is, you have to decide if it’s the right thing to do, not helping your flawed and pitiful little country fix their stupid obama mistake
I’m gonna do what I can to help, even if Romney sucks ass only marginally worse than Meghan’s coward daddy.
And I betcha he picks a spiffy running mate.
Maybe.
Besides, what makes you think that both sides of the ruling class aren’t running a train on the people?
Obama out, Romney in. Business as usual.
I’m going to vote against Obama.
I can’t NOT vote against him.
I am hoping for a palatable VP.
But if Obama is on the ticket, I will vote against him.
You miss the point, happy. Hardly surprisingly.
If we argue up front that no matter who the GOP nominee winds up being s/he’ll have our support, the establishment, knowing this, has no motivation at all to worry about who or what it is we want.
The TEA Party movement took them by surprise. So they worked to co-opt it from one end and marginalize it from the other.
At some point all these “go team!” people are going to have to recognize that the GOP establishment is closer to the Democrat establishment than it is to the conservative base.
Nancy Pelosi even said so: she couldn’t wait to get rid of these TEA Party Nazis and get back to the time when Party didn’t really matter.
“Our” response? Let’s help DC re-establish its insularity and embrace the status quo! Not doing so is unpatriotic!
So, did the TEA Party folk not have the courage of their convictions? Are they so easily bought by the glamour of DC? Was it all just fashion?
#1 I was wondering if you remember when you claimed that the Catholic Church was responsible when two random black gentlemen stole your Blackberry? All the incredibly gauche and purely nasty things you have had to say over the years regarding them G**bothers? “Romney can’t possibly make it worse than it is now”. That word worse; I don’t think you even begin to know the meaning. You have turned your back on real virtue and elevated every vice to it’s place. One petard + your ass, some assembly required.
Hostess pink tits are not the enemy of the good.
Just sayin’.
Seniority is a bitch leigh. The bitch of all bitches in the House.
She sure is, Ernst. A taskmaster.
sdferr, you better make room in your freezer before the titties are no more.
huh? Catholic church what?
On Robert M’s second point:
I don’t think it’s likely that that’s what will be run on in more than a handful of races. What’s more likely is that they’ll run on Stop Obama!
Which, as far as mandates go, is only better than Hope and Change! because now we know what Obama meant by that.
We’ll see cosmetic measures that don’t actually change anything, followed by tremendous harrumphing and backslapping and then a return to buisness as usual.
#13 So,you don’t remember that? How about all the nasty things you have said wrt Christians? Right down the memory hole? Look, the reason you don’t poke sh*t with a stick is is that no matter how careful you are, you always get some on you. You beleive that you can continously denigrate Christian ethics and individuals, but when you need them they will have turned the other cheek and forgiven you. Good luck with that.
Don’t rule out depression, exhaustion, and the realization that nothing they do matters.
Go Team Inevitable / Electable!
I don’t think that the tea party will become the Republican version of the Democrat’s “black vote”.
There is this difference. The Democrats have to work tirelessly to insure that that voting block, and indeed all their identity group voting blocks, always fear Republicans gaining power.
On the Republican side it is the tea party which knows how bad for, not just them/us but America it is to have Democrats in complete power. The tea party has to work tirelessly to insure that the Republicans fear/know/believe that too.
I didn’t get the candidate of my choice either Mr. Jeff but me I have no problem saying I’ll vote for whoever Team R picks cause validating Obama’s rapings and plunderings with a second term is a far far larger setback for freedom than electing Romney would be
it’s just too bad it worked out this way
Typos to win in Iowa. Now Chicago rising in NH.
Tea Party!They FTFY.#18 What if the Republican candidate is elected and is worse? Ie: Patriot Act, TARP I and the Department of Homeland Security come to mind. “it’s just too bad it worked out this way” This was the plan all along.
OT: Did any of you see this shit?
To which I can only say “Fuck you. Just… fuck you!” Words fail me.
Today’s progressives, bringing you a worse tomorrow, where you have to share your goddamned car with random strangers. PROGRESS!
—
Iowahawk had a bunch of fine tweeting on the subject:
To which I can only add: I very much look forward to the epic Downfall video post-mortem of this PR fiasco. It will be a PR fiasco, right? I mean, it’s just gotta… right?
Long comment (TLDR). Part 1 of 2:
So the argument, then, is that it’s my duty to accept who I’m told is inevitable; but it’s not the duty of the GOP establishment to put forth candidates who represent me
Huh? What does “duty” have to do with it? No one owes anyone anything. You’re free to do what you like; you don’t owe your vote to the GOP or me or anyone, Jeff– only to yourself (& perhaps your children, since they don’t get a vote yet). We all have our interests (individually, in conflict, & in common), and we seek to realize them as best we can. We have elections, messy imperfect dirty brutal frustrating unsatisfying things. A number of politicians enter the race, or they don’t, they campaign, and people either vote for them or not. You speak of “the establishment” as if it were this monolithic agent with brainwashing powers and in control of a candidate factory that manufactures products according to certain (establishment-approved) specifications. The kind of monolithic agent you can write a customer complaint letter to, and boycott “their” products, to make a point, until they change those specifications to your liking, and fabricate a different product, custom-made for you. Who exactly is this “establishment”? And where do other voters fit in? They’re at the negotiation table, too.
Is “the establishment” to blame for the roster of candidates before us? Well, other politicians (more to our taste) could have entered the race, but they chose not to. In all the world, who would’ve been your preferred candidate? If he/she didn’t enter the race, it’s not the establishment’s fault you can’t vote for them, but that person’s choice not to enter.
Is “the establishment” to blame that Romney is getting more votes than the others? Well, you’ll have to take that up with the voters, who have their own interests & fears & priorities & impressions & opinions & values & calculations. And you’ll have to blame the losing candidates themselves. I don’t buy this “anointed” business. Sure, the pundits (including bloggers) have their favorites & bugbears & use their persuasive power to influence the race– you’re one of those voices yourself– but I hardly saw a monolithic push from the “establishment” (whoever that is) for Romney. Who has a bigger audience & more influence, Jen Rubin or Limbaugh? Not much love for Romney there (Limbaugh wasn’t happy to have to rebuke Newt & Perry for their stupidity, he was genuinely disappointed). By the way, interesting datum: Rupert Murdoch supports Santorum, tweeting that he’s the “only candidate with genuine big vision for country,” see here. Is Murdoch part of the establishment? I presume you’d say FOX is. From what I’ve seen, they’re not particularly rah-rah-ing for Romney.
When Perry got in, it was his race to lose. And boy, did he. In the end, no one’s to blame for that but Perry himself (and I say that as a disenchanted Perry ex-supporter). No one’s to blame for Newt losing, but Newt. And so on. In the end, they just couldn’t make the sale. The “establishment” (even if it were monolithic, which it’s not) doesn’t have brainwashing powers.
Like it or not, it will take time for Tea Party politicians to go through the slog & hard climb from local to national politics. Like it or not, you can’t just go from bushy-tailed unknown outsider to presidential candidate in one leap. Our votes & voices & contributions can count, and make a difference, in all elections, from the local to the national. But so do everyone else’s. Educating people on the issues is perhaps the most important thing– so that when a candidate appears who actually makes sense, offering something good & of real substance, voters will recognize it & vote for it– and that’s why what you (& other bloggers) do is so valuable.
Part 2:
As for the choice to not-vote for Romney in the general (which is mathematically equivalent to granting a vote– not cancelling out a vote– for Obama). Like I said, you don’t owe a vote to anyone, other than yourself. I can only express my personal opinion– viz. not voting in 2012 seems to me a foolish act– and try to persuade you otherwise. IMO the cause-effect link you’re positing between voting/ not voting and what the GOP “gives you” is valid in the primaries (obviously): the GOP candidates are indeed vying for our hands. But in the general? You see your non-vote as a kind of letter of protest, a message you’re sending (to the “establishment” that owns the factory which manufactures & churns out candidates), a message which they will receive, interpret correctly, & revise their product (4 years hence) accordingly. You’ll send that message feeling righteous indignation (like Greenberg, the Ben Stiller character, writing his letters of complaint).
But IMO you’re kidding yourself if you think there’s actually an addressee (the “establishment”) who will receive that message & read it correctly. Sure, pundits will analyze & spin the numbers & turnout & exit-polling questions & so on; but we know from experience how much bullshit is spun by people presuming to explain the significance of election results (I can’t remember a national election in which I think they’ve gotten it right). When it comes down to it, the only message is: we (USA citizens) chose a second term of Obama, or Romney instead. If you’re not-voting as a matter of principle, a matter of conscience, fair enough– that’s an act of “pure conscience,” something between you and you. But that “act” will have no effect– no reach, no real-world significance– outside of that (other than helping to elect Obama, if he’s re-elected). It will have no influence as a “message” between you and an other (especially if that other is meant to be the “establishment”). As a message, it will be lost– like tears in the rain.
And if Obama is re-elected (& your state was involved in that victory), you will have to live with the fact that your non-vote contributed to that. (Even if your state wasn’t involved, you would have played a part in the popular vote.) I’m not trying to guilt-trip you– I dislike people guilt-tripping other people for voting or not voting (like they do to Althouse, for voting Obama in 2008). You can always rationalize, find a way to justify that vote (as a matter of conscience, or principle, or whatever). But IMO– as I’ve said– it just won’t have the beneficial real-world effect you’re claiming for it, other than getting Obama elected. As a message, it may be equivalent to saying “fuck you” to “the GOP establishment”– in your head. And that by itself may be satisfying. But there’s no one at establishment headquarters who will receive that message (read your mind) and go on to change the product specifications at the factory.
The only message that can have an effect (beyond a primary vote) is the one you send to other voters, e.g. persuasion through your blog. Perhaps you will persuade more voters to go for Santorum, and perhaps there will be enough to make him the nominee (I personally hope not). As you realize, at this point that is highly unlikely. If the nominee is Romney, as seems most likely, then the primaries are history, and the choice before us is a different one. The stakes are high. I hope you would vote for Romney. You don’t owe anyone anything, Jeff, but IMHO you owe it to yourself to vote against Obama.
Since I’m still up… (last comment of the night).
Re “losing more slowly”– that’s from that great line in Night Moves, spoken by Gene Hackman, right? Such an amazing movie, just saw it for the first time a few weeks ago, instant favorite.
In the end, perhaps, you may be right– no matter who wins, we’ll find ourselves dazed on a boat, unable to reach the steering-wheel, going around in circles. But you have to admit, with Romney we have a better chance (if only a slim one) of surviving, and perchance finding our way to shore. With Obama, we’ll most likely die from the gun shot, if we don’t sink with the ship and drown first.
Exact quote from Night Moves:
“Who’s winning?”
“Nobody. One side is just losing slower than the other.”
The general is going to be a spectacle.
Imagine Obama asking someone to release their tax records. Transcripts anyone?
How about questioning someone’s religion via surrogates? The Return of Jeremiah!!!
From what I can see, there is one star coming out of this mess: John Sununu. Not only is he quite handsome, he’s quick on the trigger to call someone a ridiculous doofus.
And you show yourself @ 20 Gulermo.
Shorter rachel:
I can’t but call bullshit.
Romney — who’s statements read like the product of a progressive character disorder — was the nominee from months ago. The reason is evident. I too will not vote to affirm that corruption … of proper historical national trajectory, of honor, and of truth. We WILL end up in the same place and in fact I suggest that the pushback against Romney will, except in the press, be significantly less than the pushback against Obama, thereby hastening the real end of this constitutional republic, and not hindering it.
Whatever powers the decline will power Romney because he is not the ideologue Obama is. Romney will prove the ultimate tool.
That Romney will slow the decline is an entirely unsupportable assertion.
Romney cannot run against Obamacare. And this we consider a victory.
The Republicans are exactly like the Democrats were in 04. So caught up in zealotry and anger they lose all reason.
The only thing Obama had to do with ObamaCare is he didn’t veto the bill Harry and Nancy sent him. That is all a President is going to do as far as repealing it. All we need out of a President to overturn it is for him to not veto it.
If Obama gets re-elected, there will be no repeal.
Sure he can. He already has been.
What is acceptable at the state level is unconstitutional from the Federal.
Robert M has it wrong. Any analysis of the dynamics of Slowing the Decline™ must include the parameter that I’ve yet to see it include. Not in any conservative circles and not on the blogosphere’s right-leaning bigs.
That America is itself in serious, even terminal decline.
By this I mean that in a land whose entire trajectory ran from the blood of liberty through that of pioneering through that of industry and found itself rocketing up on the greatest commerce engine in history, at some point in the post-war vicissitudes of rank postmodernism and progressivism, it reversed course. Today, having decimated what powered those early engines — largely through an impoverishing, destroying Welfare State enabled by the printing press — we actually see government as a service provider and ourselves as having no choice in the matter.
This is a fundamental shift in philosophy, assuming you can call insurmountable debt and the envy, theft, and the official institutions that sow, cultivate, and reap it anything above base corruption. (You need to really get that money is the grease on the ways of serfdom. Our money. I’ve been banging this drum for years and this is why. The US dollar is the instrument of the ruin of American classical liberalism and thus America by way of the Welfare State and what’s been constructed since Reagan, and even before and during.)
So, into this we’d inject a Romney chimera, insisting that lacking any supporting record, it will slow our new trajectory through the grey, raining twilight of what had been a great nation but is now one of the two worst failures the West has even seen?
It’s a nonsensical formulation. There is literally no support for the prediction that Romney will do anything but play to the new statist status quo — the record he’s running on is nothing but being what the majority want, and as I’ve pointed out, the majority is now roughly 50% committed to decline and dependency, not the vigor or liberty and prosperity.
How in God’s name Romney would now configure the spine to perform reforms against what could be more than half the country when he hadn’t that spine to reliably assure us on the campaign trail and never once did in the governor’s office in one of the top three most socialized states in the union should escape all of us.
We don’t face a choice except whether we’ll reverse an entire nation, not just the hairstyle of the Republican component of the establishment that whether in a representative way or not, brought us to the brink, and I’d argue, over it. In the face of this disaster — against the literal loss of everything that even forty years ago defined what this country was and why it existed — I’d hold my nose and vote for Ron Paul just to then learn how much of his stated platform is to be dependable and how much was the craziness many of us suspected, so spectacularly are we screwed.
If I’m going to vote on faith, and in the utterly mistaken notion that we’ll pass a president into office to learn what’s in him, I think I’d take take the most aggressively-worded guy in the ostensible right’s bag of tricks, just to see what happens. If we all did we could have had a Palin or a Cain; instead we caved. See, that’s what Slowing the Decline™ advocates insist I do with Romney, despite my knowing quite precisely from experience just how this finger-in-the-wind will behave. He’ll feed the machine that elected him.
As a nation, we literally cannot withstand more of the same, even thrown into neutral. This is an active problem that must be reversed; torn out by the roots.
Romney’s greatest rhetorical advantage should be campaigning against and debating Obama via Obamacare. But Romney designed it.
The constitutional surge against Obamacare is slowly going the way of the TEA Party. If it is repealed, it’ll be a Congress that leads that effort, assuming Romney will comply. Of the latter there is no evidence.
With Romney in office the chances of repeal — whether by the evidence of the vote that put him there or by way of his own actions — drop to single digits.
And this we consider a victory.
Is that the “Royal We” Jho? Does this mean you consider it a victory? I know you’re mad, but don’t lump me in. You lend a tremendous knowledge base and voice, but again, no lumping allowed.
Sherrod Brown came to our little town, in our little poor county and met with “local leaders” ie. sheriff, school superintendent, etc. etc.
All the local leaders whined was, “We need more money” and Sherrod’s response was “are their wealthy people we can tap.”
Sherrod’s got to go, and so does every one who thinks like this. By vote or gun, one way or the other.
Present company excepted, al.
By the way, in the Doug Ross piece linking Mish (who we all should be reading) the words “cascading defaults” appear. These are most important words. They are the name of the way we get to full statism. We will fail our way there through Too Big To Fail institutions indistinguishable in their effects on us from the federal government.
Exactly. All we need is a President who won’t veto a repeal. None of the Republican candidates would. So why are we obsessing over it?
Unless you have decided Cloward-Piven is the way to go, we need a President who can get things done, and has the business savvy to know what needs done. We don’t need another career politician.
You’re always cool me me Jho.
The herd is a powerful force. You can profit from it, or get trampled by it.
I love the “part-time” congress idea. Radio host asks “How will congress get anything done if they’re part-time?” Wow. But the Bain attacks bum me out.
Military, roads, promote and maintain general “not-getting-killed-by-a-random-stranger” atmosphere. Everything else, let the people figure it out.
See? Now I’m a spectacle. What else is new?
Barack Obama used a 52% vote as a mandate to bully pulpit legislation that a much larger percentage of people disapproved of. (Funny how selective percentages can work that way.)
Should the GOP nominee win and my vote helps to push whoever that candidate is to victory, I don’t want that candidate, if it happens to be Mitt Romney, to believe that any conservative vote cast in support of him indicates the presence of a mandate. Any candidate winning the “you are not Obama” voting bloc should not assume that it carries with it a mandate to enact the sorts of big government solutions that Mitt Romney loves.
Short of not voting for the guy outright, how do I get that point across? The only way I can think of is to take my own vote seriously and not lavish it upon a candidate solely because he is not someone else. I’m holding out and not tipping my hand. I need to be wined and dined first by this candidate, and I need to let future candidates know too that I ain’t that easy.
BTW, is it too late to nominate Sarah Palin?
Because the assertion is baseless, B. Moe. Romney will fix it. He has no choice.
Is this the B. Moe I know?
There is literally no support for the prediction that Romney will do anything but play to the new statist status quo — the record he’s running on is nothing but being what the majority want, and as I’ve pointed out, the majority is now roughly 50% committed to decline and dependency, not the vigor or liberty and prosperity.
Honestly, I have this argument every night at the dinner table. My father argues that Romney is the moderate we’ve been waiting for. As he sees it – Obama’s “failures” (which I can only imagine is viewed through poll numbers because he’s certainly done a ton legislatively) is because he turned TOO far to the left. If we (my dad’s view) vote in someone too far right, the exact same thing will happen. Romney apparently will get things done as a Great Compromiser,or something.
I offer this up to explain why I pull my hair out.
I agree with Jhow – we have NO PROOF that Romney will do much of anything. Does anyone have any clue? He just seems like such an empty suit to me. He mouths words, but I have no idea what he means to DO.
BTW, is it too late to nominate Sarah Palin?
Help us Sarah Palin, you’re our only hope.
In regards to the question “Is this the best there is?” – I look squarely at the media and the established republicans. This chess match has been planned for months and months and months.
And wrong on both levels and anybody who tells me I have to vote for the guy who did something wrong but “acceptable” is going to get “Fuck you” for an answer.
JHoward, you’re making a different argument, not the one I addressed.
If you really think a second term for Obama would in fact be better for the USA than a term of Romney– which is what you seem to be arguing– fair enough, that right there is a reason not to vote for Romney (though then you might as well vote for Obama). I must admit your politico-historical reasoning to prefer Obama to Romney seems outlandish to me– reminds me a little of the Marxist who hopes for an intensification & hyper-acceleration of capitalism, the more capitalism the better, so the contradictions are sharpened, the system collapses sooner, and we can finally get on with the revolution. But I’m not going to argue the point with you– don’t see the point of debating, because the premises we’re starting from are just way too far apart. Virtually incommensurable.
(Will say this, many use something like your reasoning to argue that it was better for us to have a term of Obama than McCain. Althouse makes something like this point. And I do find that argument somewhat persuasive. For all its costs, a term of Obama has been very instructive for the nation. A second term? It is my deepest conviction that we just cannot afford it. Too ruinous, too irrevocable.)
In my comment to Jeff, I wasn’t arguing the merits of Romney over a second term of Obama (I think those merits go without saying, but I guess I’m in the minority here). My point was limited to this. If you’re not-voting as a matter of principle or conscience, fair enough. If you’re not-voting to say a cathartic psychological “fuck you” to “the GOP establishment” (in your head), fair enough. But the only real-world, material (to use a Marxist term) effect of a non-vote is to contribute to an electoral victory for Obama. And if that’s what you’re going for (as you suggest), fair enough.
But if you’re not-voting in hopes of sending a “message” to “the establishment” that they (whoever they are) will receive & understand as you wish it to be understood, and which will have the effect of forcing the “establishment” to “give you” better GOP nominees in the future… then I think you’re kidding yourself.
We may or may not get better candidates in the future– I think we will, simply because the new crop of GOP politicians out there is much more promising than the relics among our candidates today. But it won’t be because the “establishment” is yielding to your vote boycott of 2012.
[…] Shut up and vote. Jeff responds to the idea that conservatives simply have no choice, because BEAT OBAMA is what matters at this […]
Again, rachel: I will not vote to affirm that corruption. We will end up in the same place and I propose, much sooner than the majority of the right thinks. And to those who adopted this progressive Republican status quo months and even years ago I say that the pushback against Romney will, except in the press, be significantly less than the current pushback against Obama, also a dangerous eventuality for classical liberalism. My point here is to push back against the complacency on the right that put us in this predicament.
I’ll also say to anyone expecting me to vote for Romney as the outcome of the fallacious formulation that only an apparently progressive Republican can be elected on the basis of his non-existent record as a conservative, that by that logic I strongly urge you, now that it’s entirely too late, to vote for the most caustic anti-leftist in the field and see what happens. Speculation is all we have left.
This has become about first predicting the nominee on faulty terms and then following through and predicting that nominee’s effect on our present trajectory, also by faulty reasoning.
I used to vote against the worst candidate. As a simple matter of principle and self-respect, I won’t do that anymore. I’ll stay home. The Establishment can take that drop in the sea however it wishes; it has no respect for my classical liberalism anyway. Should I care?
Hear, hear.
Voting against is what got us here, and here we will stay as long as against is all we have.
Remember what the Tree Herder said to Merry and Pippin:
“I’m on nobody’s side, because nobody’s on mine” (paraphrasing i think)
The only reason I voted in the last election was because of Palin. I don’t care who Romney asks to be his running mate, this whole thing sucks so bad and I’m not part of the Republican harem.
We’ll still have Gary Johnson!
If your principles and self-respect tell you that doing nothing while fascism flourishes is the thing to do…
Some time ago Jeff reidentified the federal political machine as a class, which is a most urgent truth. Some time ago Jeff argued that anything less than determining and electing which of the candidates represented classically liberal reform to that establishment would be a failure.
And here we are, having all but failed. Clearly it’s too late to go back, undo the voting right’s surrender to that machine, and finally identify and champion a reliable, conservative, classical liberal (one that I’d add absolutely must work to reform the monetary establishment as well). It’s essential that now the conversation turns from defending pragmatism to identifying what we’ve failed at and how. I don’t think we need to actually endure November 2012 to see just about what way the wind’s blowing. What’s essential is how to pick up the pieces and survive.
Given this, debating what Romney actually is is moot. The conversation at this late stage must pertain to how we reinstill and harvest classical values in a dark but emerging place where only they can salvage the remains and only they stand a hope of restoring our historical principles and way of life.
The entire federal political machine is a class. It is lethal to America as we understand it and wish it to be again. By whatever faint means may develop, anything less than determining how to administer classically liberal reform is a failure yet to come, one we must avoid by learning what went wrong in the present presidential race if we are to endure. Whether it makes sense to elect Romney next year is a diversion on the smooth road to hell.
In other words, I believe we’re in agreement on the points, just out of step in our timing. We’re wiser to take the progressification of the recent right up through the highest office as our mandate to dig it out by the roots one at a time. The POTUS race, save for a miracle, won’t put a classical liberal in office next year in order to then merely stem the tide of the progressive ruin of the nation.
B. Moe, Jeff’s reply to Robert M spells it out. I cannot do better.
The Progressives have spent over 100 years setting this up, it can’t be fixed overnight but it can damn sure be fucked overnight. Cloward-Piven spelled it out, Rahm said it out loud: Never let a crisis go to waste. We aren’t going to have another revolution, the King and his army no longer lives a three month journey away, we are no longer a nation of self-sufficient, independant pioneers. The enemy has control of our information networks and the indoctrination of our children, any economic failure is going to be the fault of the Tea Zombies and Capitalism.
We have to slow the beast down before we can start to turn it, if we hope to have a chance to turn it. You have to keep in mind that clever tyrants can use failure to their advantage, it is the biggest edge tyranny has over liberty.
I think Huntsman is the best choice, but the media has told us he is a noncontender so that must be the truth.
So you care about whether you lose slowly or quickly? I care about whether we lose right now. Which we do, absolutely positively if Obama gets another 4 years. Your ideological leanings are not worth fucking this country, which is what you’re doing if you stay home out of some absurd notion of “protest”. Seriously, the people that stay home because their candidate didn’t get the nomination (or their idea of what a candidate should be) will be responsible for the next 4 years. I really really didn’t like McCain and I thought he was a terrible nominee but I didn’t stay home like so many people did – out of protest- and we got 4 years of marxism that helped further ruin our country. Would McCain have been better than Obama? Absolutely. Would he have been the ideal Republican president. Absolutely not. But he wouldn’t have passed Obamacare. He wouldn’t be so anti-business that the economy couldn’t make a recovery.
Put on your big boy/big girl pants and get behind the nominee. I’m sorry its Romney – he’s not my guy either- but he’s a million times better than the alternative.
As for Jeff’s reply, I don’t see the GOP establishment as being the enemy here, how are they forcing anybody down our throats? The incumbent Republican leadership is a problem getting shit done in Congress, but I don’t see how the Party is influencing elections to the extent you all do.
Fuck this, all I can say is if you social cons force fucking Santorum down my throat I am staying home!
Okay, strike the fucking in 55. I don’t think Santorum believes in that.
Matt, President Obama is a zero and a million times zero is still zero.
I don’t have time to read all the comments so far … so my 2 cents and it may repeat what someone else has said
If Romney gets the nod, I won’t campaign for him. Whether I will vote for him or not I haven’t decided
What I WILL do is work hard on Senate/House campaigns to get TEA Party/Conservatives into the legislature. If we do have a President Romney, he needs his feet held to a conservative Congress as much as an Obama.
and oh … as much as I’m not sold on Romney, I’m really ticked at Gingrich and Perry over the Bain stuff.
Great way, guys, to promote Government control of free markets.
The Republicans are exactly like the Democrats were in 04.
We’re certainly about to nominate our very own John effin’ Kerry.
If Romney gets the nod, Obamacare is off the table. Period.
This suits the Democrats, who of course want Obamacare; the GOP establishment, who think “healthcare reform” is necessary for the imaginary vote of historically Democratically voting blocks like Unions, Minorities and Women, not to mention the lobbying monies from both sides of the issue; and those said industry and unionist and special-interest lobbying groups who have memberships that stand to gain from any kind of “healthcare reform”. As an example see the AARP, who has managed to play both sides of the street, while making a fortune selling “endorsed products” tailored to fit both the status quo and the indeterminate outcome of the “healthcare reform” movement. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against people making money. I just don’t like people making money by changing the Constitution to make their financial products viable in the marketplace.
Romney is the only candidate that looks like a Republican, has executive experience, and removes that issue from the conversation. The only other candidate that may have worked was Newt, arguably the father of “think tank conservatism”; and although I like the guy, when the revolution comes, he, along with Snakeface, Bride of Snakeface, Stephanuppalus, Former President Penis and Luvvy Penis, not to mention all the Landscaping, is going to pay a humiliating price resulting in ignominy, neglect, disavowal, invalidation, and scorn.
In other words, we’ve had our Johnson and Grant; it’s time for Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland, Harrison, Cleveland(again), and McKinley (and we all know how that turned out). We’re back to what could be called the natural state of American politics; “populists” fighting “elites” (Ron Paul as our William Jennings Bryan), reoccurring financial panic with a European root, and worldwide war, Fascism, and Socialism the inevitable result.
Hope I cheered you all up. All hail discordia!
I look at some of the comments here, I think about the exit poll blarney CBS was peddling Tuesday night (one third of caucus goers said defeating Obama was the single most important issue & of that one third, three fifths voted for Mitt Romney), and what I conclude is that we* are reacting out of fear.
We’re not going to be able to do the things we need to do if we’re afraid of losing.
*”We” meaning the broad swath of folks who can’t agree on anything except a Democrat Congress and an Obama second term are Bad Things, alp.
I’d like to think utopian thinking is more characteristic of the left. Sigh.
It’s been said that one thing which distinguishes people on the right from those on the left– or conservatives from progressives– is that the former recognize that humans are, always have been, & always will be a prettty shitty lot. Let’s be nicer, and say imperfect.
They know that democracy & capitalism are shitty systems, the absolute worst political & economic systems in the world– except for all the others.
Just the same, they should know that any particular politician they vote for is the worst candidate on the ballot, a shitty candidate– except for the other candidate(s) on the ballot, which they don’t vote for.
Choosing the “lesser of two evils” isn’t just a matter of making an unfortunate compromise once in a while. In a way, for the conservative, it’s an ethical principle, a principle of existence, because (to some extent) there is evil in everything.
In a way, I think it’s great that we on the right are so dissatisfied with our presumptive nominee– as compared to the whole-hearted adoration the left felt for Obama in 2008. I guess many of you would wish to feel as positive and excited about our nominee as the Democrats felt for Obama… but really, would you? And would that be a good thing? Every politician will turn out be a disappointment, some more than others. I’d rather belong to a party of cynics (distrustful of their own nominee) than a party of rubes. And I think that’s more conducive to healthy governance.
Of course, it would be wonderful to have a GOP nominee much better than Romney in various ways, and I hope someday we will. I have my own fantasy wishlist. But is being dissatisfied with the GOP nominee– really, really dissatisfied– by itself a good reason not to vote for him (that is, if you consider him nevertheless the lesser of two evils)? Some of you sound like you’re turning that refusal itself into an ethical principle: the “lesser of two evils” isn’t good enough; if it doesn’t meet my standard of purity, I choose not to choose. To do otherwise is to give in to “corruption” (as JHoward puts it)), to be tainted by my vote, to compromise my purity or integrity.
Like I said, if that’s your reason not to vote– as a matter of conscience or principle– fair enough. But I have to say– this is just my impression, I have absolutely no authority to judge– such a choice, or such a sense of principle, doesn’t seem very conservative to me. If you assume that the world is & will always be corrupt, very corrupt, especially politics, and that the best we can do in any situation (especially an election) is choose the lesser evil… then why is it so insufferable, intolerable, unbearable to vote for Romney over Obama? Of course it sucks… but why should we expect it not to suck?
*”We” meaning the broad swath of folks who can’t agree on anything except a Democrat Congress and an Obama second term are Bad Things, alp.
Will we ever agree Ernst?
Can we get the inevitable to sign a pledge? If we’re going to have a biz guy in office, he would certainly understand performance contracts.
Business experience? Have you heard of a successful business run on bullshit promises and outright lies? Certainly the former Captain Jack Sparrow of the corporate pirate ship Bain would know how important it is to put things in writing?
He likes to fire people when they don’t produce? Sign year-by-year contracts based on kept promises.
Just spitballing here.
To reiterate a point I made some months ago: I do not have a duty to vote for the candidate selected by the GOP. The GOP has the duty to select a candidate I can vote for.
Last time around, the Dems used a perfect storm of political factors (Bush’s unpopularity, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, bad economy, wholly co-opted media) to install in office a half-black corrupt Marxist Chicago machine operative. True, the backlash has been bad, but the act itself was bold, and made possible the kind of Progress that these jokers have been long dreaming of.
This time around, the GOP used a perfect storm of political factors (Obama’s unpopularity, unrest abroad, persistently high unemployment, looming economic ruin) to run a vanilla technocrat who is less interested in cutting back government as he is in making it run more efficiently. The GOP has no courage, no leadership, and they absolutely did not learn the lessons the Tea Party tried to teach them in 2010. They want business as usual, where they grow rich and powerful by handing out favors at our expense.
The Beltway Establishment spends extraordinary amounts of time and effort telling you that “If you don’t vote Romney, then Obama will win.” People like Jeff and I are trying to push back against that blackmail, saying, “If you don’t nominate a proper conservative, then you deserve to lose regardless of the opponent.” Because the fact is that we really are heading for a cliff, and we’re given the choice between going over at 70mph with Obama, or 55mph with Romney, when what we really need is somebody who will turn the fucking bus away from the cliff.
I will not look into my niece’s face a few years from now and say, “Well, honey, at least I helped elect a guy who slowed down slightly.” I will tell her that I fought hard to turn the bus, and that I made prudent preparations for jumping out the back of the bus when it became apparent that the cliff was nigh.
If you keep enabling the same group of idiots to get their way cycle after cycle, then you really shouldn’t act surprised that the same group of idiots remains in power.
Romney’s not the nominee,
not yet.
Look, the reason a Republican traditionally and conventionally runs to the right in the primary before running back to the center in the general is to lock up his base. Romney hasn’t done that because Romney can’t do that, not credibly. So instead what his campaign —and especially his campaign’s super-PAC surrogates— have relied upon is to tarnish other candidates conservatism there are no authentic small government individual liberty free-market conservatives in this race we are told, so vote for Romney because I’m he’s guy who’s most electable.
On top of that, we have a conservative (increasingly Republican these days —but that’s what fear will do to ya) punditocracy that spent most of the past decade telling us that you can’t build a winning coalition by a process of subtraction sitting by silently while their preferred (because he’s inevitable, it seems) frontrunner tries to do just that.
Is it any wonder then, that we are divided, listless and dispirited?
We ought to be looking forward to kicking Obama’s ass, but we can’t because the only way to beat him (if we’re lucky) is to first eat another shit sandwich —for the good of the team.
Yeah. How’s that worked out in the past?
I won’t be scared into supporting Isengard because the shadow of Mordor looms over us. I’m not afraid of Mordor.
[…] an obligation to replace a Marxist statist with a Republican statist in the same machinery. “The next time they give you all that civic bullshit about voting, keep in mind that Hitler […]
And when those who take advantage of you know this, the lesser of two evils will always move consistently toward their benefit and away from yours.
At some point you have to take a stand. Or else you find yourselves writing long apologies in blog comments sections that start with “sigh.”
That’s the sound of resignation. Me, I’m not yet beaten.
I may end up deciding that I have to hold my nose and vote for Romney. But I’m not going to tell the GOP establishment up front that, no matter who they end up nominating, they have my vote. Because then what I want doesn’t matter — and my only leverage has been surrendered before the game begins.
I don’t need lessons in how politics works. I need the people on “my side” to grow a set and stop taking bites of the shit sandwich just because it’s dinner time.
Romney is a manager alp. He’s going to manage BigGovCo Inc.,
but on who’s behalf?
what I like most about voting for Romney is when I go vote for Romney what will happen is I will be voting with lots of people what voted for Obama last time, but what learned
so that will be neat
the important thing now s to make sure that Romney is winning a mandate for repealing the socialist health care and rolling back crippling regulation and cutting the spendings and drilling the oils
that’s what Newt and the others should be working on now
all the obamawhore propaganda sluts like Diane Sawyer what do the moderatings, they never ask about ANWR
have you noticed that? I have.
*is* to make sure
In the present case, rachel, the lesser evil is to not give my assent to the leftward drift of the Republican party, the conservative movement and the country as a whole,
even if that means Barak Obama is re-elected.
I got that from Mr. Colonel
Romney is a manager alp. He’s going to manage BigGovCo Inc.,
but on who’s behalf?
By design it should be ours Ernst. So if he ends up being the one, can we remind him in writing.
I know I’m dreaming, but that’s what the Scholastic World Aptitude Pigeon-holer has me as: Full time dreamer, or work with children, or haberdasher.
There. Edited for perspective.
If you surrender your only leverage — that is, your vote — you have no leverage. And without it, politicians are going to serve themselves, not you.
For those who want to talk about how soberly conservative it is to recognize the existence of a kind of human fallibility and evil, perhaps it’s time to examine that dynamic — and not keep blaming the sheep for not wanting to get fleeced every four years.
Yes. I’d prefer not losing at all. It’s time the GOP recognize that some of us are taking this end of the country as we know it thing more seriously than they seem to be.
Fuck this, all I can say is if you social cons force fucking Santorum down my throat I am staying home!
Finally, I’m not alone in the wilderness.
you were never alone leigh cause of when my footprints weren’t there I was just running over to otis jackson’s soul dog but I always came right back
Yeah, exactly. The left has no such compunction whatsoever, as such is The Lie of everything from immediate socialist gratification to theft by government to social equality. But the right routinely gags on it’s, driving the ship of State aground in its sanctimonious zeal to not appear politically cantankerous to that philosophically-bankrupt left, it’s enablers, managers, dependents, and hawkers.
Losing More Slowly™. And yes it is damn amoral, pragmatists.
I feel better now, happy.
but to be clear I would even vote for the frothmeister if I had to
The problem of inadequate candidates, unrepresentative of our or others’ political positions, still appears to me a problem of the agent doing the choosing.
This, in turn, would suggest we, who are dissatisfied, find some means to alter the process of choice, removing the initiating agency from the hands of the self-interested, self-nominating politician who steps forward (for god only knows what purpose and to what ends), to take that initial step ourselves.
This, I fully recognize, has little or nothing to do with the current field, nor to do with the current choice whether to vote for this one, against that one, or not vote at all. But criminy, how many times must we be clobbered over the head with candidates we cannot abide, let alone enthusiastically support — from whom we would have good reason to expect to undertake the basic political steps we believe necessary in the nation’s interests, and in our own — before we step back to finger the source of the problem, and then begin to take measures to repair it?
but that was never a realistic possibility
Mostly through the media — and in the same way the Dems operate to shape a narrative. It begins with who is named a “top tier” candidate (why, eg., Huntsman invited to debates and not Gary Johnson?); it moves on to early talk about electability; it continues with hit pieces in “conservative” publications or by “conservative” columnists on candidates who haven’t been selected by the establishment. And it is reinforced by “analysts” who are no such thing: Karl Rove and the boys at FOX are Romney people. And yet we’re to believe they are dispassionately and objectively looking at the candidates and the race.
The GOP has worked hard to at once co-opt and marginalize the TEA Party, to the point that Bill Kristol called those who didn’t want to raise the debt ceiling “Obama Republicans,” because a failure to capitulate to Obama means Obama is going to be re-elected. That is, the message seems to be that to fight Obama is to guarantee his election, and the only way to win power is not to fight Obama.
In which case, what’s the fucking point? Are we hoping for our “own” Trojan Horse conservative to sneak into office as a moderate? And if so, are we really supposed to believe Mitt Romney is that guy?
That’s the spirit.
Change is impossible. Don’t try it. Just do as you’re told. And jump in for the big win!
And the
beatbleatperformative goes on.SoCons are expected to suck it up and support fiscal cons and social libertarians, but if they ask for reciprocity, they can get bent. And then the insult to injury is they get told they’re not real conservatives, solely because they did what they were asked to do for the good of the team. Interesting.
Of course what’s more interesting is this leftist ontology that’s been constructed for us into which we all to easily fall.
Somebody should start a blog about that
My, my, quite the hornets nest this morning. Isn’t it great Mr. Jeff provides a forum for almost untrammeled freedom of speech/thought? Thank you for that sir.
Now then, Mr Jeff, your statement “…I sometimes wonder if these GOP cheerleaders even understand what a vote actually is, and why we as individuals are granted them in the first place…” brings to mind Dennis Prager’s recent article, Leftism Makes You Meaner, wherein he posits since Leftists cannot argue the facts, they have to attack (usually in the most vile of terms) the messenger and this leads to a callous meanness of spirit. Alluding someone is stupid or ignorant (GOP cheerleaders (who, me?) not understanding what a vote is or why individuals are granted the vote) because they don’t completely agree with you denotes a tinge of said meanness of spirit and OBTW, condescension doesn’t look good on you. Something else, you haven’t answered the question; i.e.: are 4 more years of Barack Obama better than 4 years of Mitt Romney? Only a few of the commenters have addressed it and to those saying (I paraphrase) after 4 more years of Obama there will be such a backlash that classic liberalism will become ascendant, such a pipe dream is dangerous, far to dangerous regarding our nations future. To those who say even if we have majorities in both houses and the White House, nothing will change because “the establishment” will have run on Not Obama, not legislative alternatives to what is going on now, no far reaching legislation will be passed, I have 2 words, Paul Ryan. Could mention many more, but figured those 2 would resonate with all reading this. Also, Ms. Rachel’s comments address the so called Republican establishment far better than I ever could. Talking heads, so called experts and squishy elected officials do not an establishment make. And OBTW Mr. Jeff, she also gets the no vote arithmatic better than you do.
Now, for all those whose conscience will not allow them to vote for an “imperfect” Republican candidate, so be it, but , Heaven forbid, Barack Obama is reelected, you have absolutely nothing to bitch about so don’t do it.
That’s not the point. This isn’t about Romney the sudden federalist. It’s about Romney the guy whose impulse was to turn health care over to the fucking state.
Robert is kind of a bitch.
Hornets? Whatever became of the good ol’ WASPs?
Everyone here is aware that at this point in the 1980 cycle, both Baker and Bush were “more electable” than Reagan, right?
Former Obama voters who vote for Romney in 2012 haven’t really learner much.
If Romney gets elected, there will be no repeal, either, unless conservatives take over power in the House and Senate.
Bachmann and Steve King kept putting measures up to slow the tide of this ObamaCare Obomination. And the GOP House leadership actively ignored them — relying instead on show votes. Conservative publications routinely explained to us how Boehner’s leadership failures were really sober strengths — and that it was TEA Party Hobbit types who simply don’t understand How Things Work in DC.
The governing class wants state run health care of some sort. Party doesn’t matter. Control and huge federal monies is what matters. The politicians see the cliff. They just don’t want to go over it without first having fucked a pair of stewardesses or owned a 60s Ferrari coup or snorted coke off of the shaved pundenda of a Hooters waitress. So they’re in full-on “live it up” mode.
Everyone here is aware that at this point in the 1980 cycle, both Baker and Bush were “more electable” than Reagan, right?
That is news to me Ernst. But then again, I’m not wearing a diaper and stewing in my own crapulence.
*KIDDING!!!!
(and no, I will not change you)
*kidding again
Robert M, the distinction between “imperfect” and just fucking wrong is far from negligible.
Our future is dangerous. And Mitt Romney isn’t going to noticeably mitigate that.
We may well be looking at our last opportunity to save America as we know it. I’m of the opinion that that’s exactly where we are. The idea that we need to rally around Joe Isuzu to save the day is just silly.
Do you mind if I edit some paragraph breaks into that, Robert M?
So the Hooters waitress is flying somewhere on the plane with the stews? The one that’s going over the cliff? Or is the Ferrari going over the cliff with the flight attendants in back and Hooters spread eagle in the front?
No matter, I can work with either image. How about you leigh?
I plan to shut up about what a shifty candidate Mitt Romneycare is the instant the GOP nomination is settled and not a moment sooner.
During the fall campaign I won’t urge people against voting to feed the crocodile so it eats them last. Unless they get in my face to tell me I should vote that way too.
Ah, I see. It’s not a duty. Just know that if you don’t take who the establishment crams down your throat, you’re really an Obama supporter.
Got it.
Republicans who have spent the last decade working on their portfolios and having not a clue about what’s going on in this country to hasten its decline are the real patriots for remaining faithful to the Party. Whereas those who don’t want to eat the shit sandwich? Well, that’s up to them, provided they understand that when things fall apart, it’s their fault for not doing what they were told.
Of their own free will, of course. And not out of any sense of duty. Except to their families. Who they obviously don’t care about. Because they didn’t do as they were told and stick with the Party.
Of course what’s more interesting is this leftist ontology that’s been constructed for us into which we all to easily fall.
Ernst, it’s awfully early in the morning for such melodrama.
You know what leigh,
fuck you
how’s that for melodrama?
Actually, Robert, that was merely a riff on your own statement: “I sometimes wonder if all of these ‘if it’s Romney I won’t vote’ types, which is a vote for Barack Obama, forget how the government works,” which I’m quite sure you’re now ready to classify as an attack on the messenger and evidence of “a callous meanness of spirit,” yes?
I mean, since you replied to my article, I took you to mean I was one of those “‘if it’s Romney I won’t vote’ types” who you sometimes forget how government works. Which clearly isn’t the case — I think I’ve put out a decade worth of material that militates against such an assertion — and so strikes me rather as a bit of condescension in its own right.
“We’re doomed!” is what I can make out of the chatter, alp.
Mr. Ernst really
That’s not very nice, Ernst, and isn’t advancing your argument one bit.
Riddle me this, pragmatists: If Romney is the only electable candidate, how did we know this a year ago when the meme developed? Can it be anything other than the evident — or should I say, projected — Romney progressivism; that moderate record that gave us the most, yes, progressive dependency program on the federal table?
If so, how is electing another flavor of progressivism going to slow progressivism?
You’re arguing in circles: Romney is the only electable candidate because you gathered he was the only electable candidate from even before he convinced us all that he’s just a progressive career pol, willing to say anything in an already progressive welfare State. You enabled the Team R system in maintaining itself from a time that predated the rise and fall of Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Gingrich, and Santorum.
That reasoning, nice job.
“We’re doomed!”
We have been from day one.
But it’s never too early for soi-dissant Republicans who are forever bemused by the hyperventilating of conservative ideologues whose naivity and earnestness — they really believe the country is in peril! — is worth a good little laugh from time to time. —
Signed,
Nero’s fancy fiddle
Well, earnestness is funny. Most of the time.
Wow. Kind of makes me feel like the Great and Powerful Oz.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Romney is not my preferred candidate. He’s the one who is the last man standing.
Bachmann, Cain, Santorum, Gingrich and Perry * have all done more damage to themselves than the mightiest machine politics could ever do. Who “forced” them to go out on the stump and say stupid stuff or do stupid easily found out stuff (I’m lookin’ at you, Herman)? StealthRomney was holding a gun on them off camera? Mitt’s been doggedly running around planting seeds of doubt and Teh Stupid Soundbite for each and every one of them? They suck. And it pains me to say it since I had great hopes for Perry. It turns out he’s just another pol. Just like them all.
Our goal is to rid the United States of Barack Obama.
*I’ve not mentioned Huntsman dsince he doesn’t even ping my radar.
Jeff, I would submit that ideologues are dangerous in their zealotry, no matter what their stripe, and doomed to failure.
He’s the only electable candidate because he fell in line and supported the last only electable candidate, John McCain, unlike some people. Plus he’s been running for 5 years.
I’ve been bitching about what brought us to this dismal point for decades. If you’ll permit and I don’t think you just have.
I will not vote this time against the left because it is impossible to vote against the left. None of us can vote against the left because the left is all that’s running for the office, Robert.
You need to get that. And then we can stop speculating whether Obama’s velocity or Romney’s acceptability will best hasten the complete collapse of classical liberalism in America, so we can all rise Phoenix-like from the ashes and go throw tea in a harbor and put lanterns in steeples all over again The Next Time.
There shall never be a next time — there are no more fresh green continents.
Kindly forgive me if I’ve know this for years and as my vote this time, finally refuse to grant our ruination my infinitesimal, one-in-a-hundred-million momentum at the polls. One way or the other, which at this point is faint speculation for fools.
If you wanted to bust my balls, leigh, you should have whacked me for using ontology instead of episteme, which better reflects what I’m trying to get at.
Newt Gingrich decides to go nuclear on Romney —hit’s him with the greedy heartless capitalist bastard who likes destroying lives for money: Leftist trope shaping the episteme
Mitt Romney says he likes firing people and in the pile-on is made to regret the error: Leftist trope shaping the episteme
Socal issues don’t matter it’s the economy stupid so we all need to rally around a candidate to save the economy whoever that candidate is, unless he can be labeled a social conservative, because social issues don’t matter and that means Bachmann and Santorum are out because even though they’re running on the economy first like everyone else, social issues don’t matter (mattering more than economic issues for the purists): Leftist trope shaping the epistime
Next time, if you don’t know what the hell I’m talking about, maybe you should try “what the hell are talking about?”
Well, earnestness is funny. Most of the time.
I think of it as hortatory myself. Some of the time.
Wow, Hillary sure can work that venom-in-the-voice angle. Would that she could manage it when talking about the Mullahs, or the Islamist murderers.
So you’re just going to shrug and vote for the biggest pol of them all because he out-pol’d the rest of the field, which is what pols do, and if Bachmann, Cain, Santorum Gingrich and Perry had been better pols they might not have said and done all those stupid things? The lack of political professionalism is the reason we can’t have politicians who aren’t professionals?
I give up. You really are a fucking idiot.
I don’t think I’ve ever even seen the word hortatory before. But my dictionary widget says it’s a real live word with a meaning and everything.
The Tragedy and the Farce.
leigh, you should have whacked me for using ontology instead of episteme, which better reflects what I’m trying to get at.I give up.
See? I’m a giver like that.
You really are a fucking idiot.
That’s absolutely not true, but, have it your way if it makes you feel superior.
[…] light of our very heated (but very useful, I feel) recent discussion on the role of the voter — does he owe allegiance to himself of to a Party? should his vote […]
Insty’s notice:
have it your way if it makes you feel superior.
you’ve mistaken my frustration for your smugness giver.
You know who evidently hasn’t said stupid things, and so not damaged himself more than the mightiest machine ever could? Romney. State run health care, cap-and-trade, distancing himself from Reagan, defending corporatism, refusing to acknowledge Obama’s socialist impulses: these are evidently not quite so stupid as “same-sex marriage decreeing by courts as a right is a perversion of the Constitution,” or “using the power of the state to require people opt-out of a vaccination for a disease that is contagious only through certain kinds of contact is not particularly conservative.”
You know how I know this? He hasn’t been destroyed.
QED!
Order extra copies for leigh and happyfeet sdferr.
So for all those who aren’t Republicans, they have no right to bitch about Obama?
That makes no kind of sense.
That’s right: nothing more dangerous than actually believing in shit. Why, believing in the founding principles, as did the ideologues responsible for fighting a revolution against the Crown in their zealotry, is quite the same as, say, believing it okay to as a Muslim to kill non Muslims!
I’m enamored with sophisticated-sounding relativism. It’s very non-icky.
Mr. Jeff, you seen to have left out the rest of the paragraph.
“The legislature passes legislation and then the President signs it or not. If both houses are Republican (and that’s the way I see it shaking out), even those not the pure conservative/classic liberal types, will send legislation repealing Obamacare (if the SCOTUS doesn’t make the call this summer), reforms of social security/medicare, putting reins on the out of control bureaucracy and walking back the military cuts because that is what they will run on to be elected. Do you actually think Mitt Romney will veto any of those? Let’s be serious.”
What I was getting at is if the legislature is Republican and they pass the legislation mentioned, who better to have in the White House, Obama or Romney? No meanness of spirit meant there, just an observation/question. Perhaps using the If it’s Romney I won’t vote types was flippant, but thought that was the order of the day here.
JHoward, please do give me help on my paragraph breaks and grammar in a comment on a blog, am sure it’ll make all the difference. Shot, there I go, flippant again.
Why are you positing a false equivalency?
As I have said, repeatedly, my goal is to remove Barack Obama from the White House. If you’d rather sit at home on your hands because you can’t bring yourself to vote for whomever is his opponant, then that is on you.
Right. But let’s go with that.
To which I’d reply, why are you assuming a tone that says you intend to be taken seriously? Because no matter how I hear it, I simply cannot.
So what? I find you an angry, bitter grouchbag. And, I wasn’t talking to you.
Let’s go with that too, leigh. I’m an angry, bitter grouchbag*.
Why are you assuming a tone that says you intend to be taken seriously? You know, the question you put to Jeff.
*with principles and the ability and inclination to defend them, not myself.
You mean if I can’t bring myself to vote for his Republican opponent. You know, someone who you believe can win.
Right?
Because I assume you’d also begrudge me a vote for, say, a libertarian candidate, too. That would be essentially a vote for Obama.
Because any vote that isn’t a vote for who the GOP tells you to vote for is a positive vote for Marxism. So deal with it, Marxist!
Is that about the gist? The nuanced view?
1) What’s the false equivalency that’s been posited?
2) Why is your goal limited to removing Barack Obama?
3) Why do think Jeff’s goal is the same as yours?
I’m asking, not snarking here.
It is. But then, I didn’t initiate the complaint about tone. I simply pointed out that I was riffing on yours.
As for the rest, no, I didn’t miss it. I know how things work. I know that Bachmann and King have been trying to defang the institutionalization of many parts of ObamaCare for some time now and have been thwarted by the House GOP. I know that McConnell has on several occasions undercut Boehner from the left — and Boehner has hardly a conservative bone in his body.
Meaning, I’m not convinced that without a strong conservative voice leading the Party, the GOP Congress will act as forcefully as necessary — and I suspect we’ll start hearing about how we need to tweak the affordable care act rather than rescinding it entirely, you know, to make it align better with free market principles, while showing our “compassion”. The net result will be a slightly less intrusive move of government into health care, but a move nevertheless — a foothold, a rationalization. And then we’re still sunk, even though we’ll claim plausible deniability and cite polls saying that “most Americans like X” part of the Act, so we simply had to keep it, else we risk not being “electable” going forward.
This is the game. The quicker you recognize it the better.
As I have said, repeatedly, my goal is to remove Barack Obama from the White House.
Your aspirations are underwhelming, to say the least.
My goal is to restore our Republic to a balance of power where the feds in Washington don’t have control over most of the acts and income that I make each day. My goal is to reform or establish a party that actually believes in limited government as spelled out in our founding documents. My goal is to push back against the indoctrination that has taught three or four generations that the solution to every problem is More Government. My goal is to put a stop to the spending that has my goddaughter holding over $130,000 in debt that she never signed an agreement to take on. My goal is to see the restoration of the rights and dignity of myself and my countrymen.
Getting rid of Obama is necessary, but not sufficient. Replacing Obama with somebody who will continue the ruinous practices that have gotten us to this point is nothing like victory. It is, to borrow a phrase, “losing more slowly.” You can say that the country can’t take four more years of Obama, and I’d agree wholeheartedly with you. Where we part ways is where I recognize that the country can’t take four years of Romney, either. He’ll govern much more competently and effectively than Obama, I’m sure, but that doesn’t change the fact that the guy believes in using the government to force us to do things (or not to do things) for our own good. I don’t give a crap what he says on stage; the fact that he’s the architect of RomneyCare tells me everything I need to know about his beliefs on the role of government.
It’s not enough simply to slow down; it’s far past time we reverse course.
[…] also appreciate this refutation of a tired old saw: First off, if Romney is the nominee and I don’t vote for him, that isn’t a […]
Whereas my goal is to establish a THEOCRACY and breed a stable of submissive HANDMAIDS
just like Rick Santorum
unless it’s not.
I do know how the game is played and yes, the House leadership and especially McConnell have done poorly since 2010. However, am of the opinion that a Republican legislature and in the White House is a much better place to begin what we would all like to see, a move away from the Big Government, nanny state we have now.
Have to disagree with your views regarding the possible Republican actions re Obamacare. 50+% disapproval by likely voters isn’t something even the squish’s can sneeze at, no matter how much they like to play the compromise, “statesman” act. At least, don’t think so, call me an optimist. Heck, Bloomberg had to walk back his closing of bars and liquor stores in NYC.
*Yes. I’d prefer not losing at all. *
Welp, you’re going to lose big time if enough folks stay home again. I’m sorry, Obama for another 4 years is losing in about as bad a way as I can think of. I can’t even tell you all the things I’ve lost since the dems came into power in 2006- my job, most my stock holdings, my 401k, my home value, etc. And we’re just going to keep losing. And quite frankly, I’m not ready to sacrifice the life I worked hard for so that we can have the “perfect conservative” in the White House. Business is going to continue to cower in fear until it becomes clear the Democrats are no longer in charge of pretty much anything. Business does not recover under Obama under any circumstances- we go further into debt, obamacare gets implemented and he loses more tax payer money while golfing and throwing theme parties. Romney WILL NOT do any of that. Sure, he may govern as more of a big government conservative then we all would like but he will also know how to staunch the bleeding and get us back on track fiscally. I think other candidates would also do that- Bachman, Santorum, Perry, possibly even Gingrich. With the exception of Gingrich, I like all of them more than Romney BUT none of them have a shot at the nomination.
*Why is your goal limited to removing Barack Obama*
Because that is THE most important part of this election. I just don’t understand how you think not defeating Obama will convince the GOP to nominate more “conservative” candidates but will not completely and utterly violate our little country’s economy anally, repeatedly, without KY. The economy is the key here- get it back on track, shrink the deficit, allow small businesses to start hiring again, then tackle the other issues, maybe just not during this first 4 year stretch.
I can’t believe I am in almost complete agreement with happyfeet.
1. The false equivalency that was posited was between radical Islam and Revolutionaries of the American kind.
2. My goals are not limited to getting Obama out of power, but that is where we necessarily have to begin.
3. I think there is a word missing in here, Ernst. I’ll guess that word is “not”. I don’t think our goals are different. I want our Republic back, too.
Robert M:
A nanny State built for decades by the monolithic political class.
But I repeat myself.
Matt:
And all of it one man’s doing. Which shall be another progressive’s four year reformation project.
I give up.
Our old pragmatic overlords find us revolting when we revolt.
just vote for Romney I think and then after that you can repent at leisure
Well, it’s either that or we all blow out the gas pilots after we turn up the stove full blast and hold hands while we go to sleep foever and ever.
But that’s just quitting. So, no go.
I’ll be in my bunk…er.
Vote for Romney, vote for Obama, watch the whole thing come apart either way.
There’s a choice for ya!
Sucks, doesn’t it cranky?
Yes, understand the Big Government/nanny state has grown under both parties. Yes, get the fact Mitt Romney isn’t a conservative and we wish there was one running to become our nominee. The closest remaining in this field is Santorum and was hoping after Iowa he could gain more traction and maybe he can, but do you see him becoming the nominee? Now it’s early so something can happen, but Romney is leading and it isn’t because of some monolithic establishment, he’s run a better race to date. Sorry, but that’s the way it is.
IMO, Matt’s post gets to the bottom line and here’s the money shot, “The economy is the key here- get it back on track, shrink the deficit, allow small businesses to start hiring again, then tackle the other issues, maybe just not during this first 4 year stretch.” We have to defeat Obama or any chance to reshape the future along lines more to our liking, and yes, more to ALL of our liking, becomes virtually nonexistant. Only those that give up are certain to lose.
Oh, I see. So they’re only unhelpful zealots when you don’t agree with their aims.
Sorry for suggesting you were a polished relativist.
Who ran down every conservative so that Mitt would be left standing, and now joins in the reluctant chorus of, “well, we have to get behind Mitt, if only to defeat Obama”.
It’s almost like it was predictable...
It’s almost like you haven’t watched what Congress has been doing.
That’s okay: not just anyone can summarize the news.
I’ve run down Wall Street Romney a lot and very enthusiastically
Well, yeah. It’s not like I’m the only one who feels that way.
Restated: me and lots of my friends think your zealotry is always wrong. And we really, really, really believe it, too.
So.
This is America. Feel free to be a zealot.
See? Leigh is ok with you having the freedom to be firmly principled.
So long as no one expects her to be zealous about it.
This whole thread points to one thing – our complete frustration with the options available to us. On the one hand, we have an eminently beatable one-termer; on the other, a realization that our opportunity is likely to be wasted. Coupled with that is the realization that this may be the last election for awhile (if ever) that can make a difference as we catapult towards the abyss.
Other options – How can control of a brokered convention be wrested from the RNC?
Is it too late to draft Petreaus?
Petreaus/Palin 2012! – has a certain cachet to it.
yes let’s draft general “betray us”. nyt gives special discounts for that propaganda. come on peeps the cliff ain’t that bad. full speed ahead.
I’m good with Patreaus. Palin, not so much.
Petraeus, I mean.
nr, the general can take whatever the NYT throws at him.
abracadabra
Maybe if we wish rilly rilly hard Mitch will save the day after all!
leigh, OK then. Make it Petraeus/Biden 2012!
Just for yucks, which of Romney and Palin is the more conservative? Which would you count on to erase Obamacare or to challenge the corporatist bent of our establishment Repubs?
Just a fun exercise, of course.
“nr, the general can take whatever the NYT throws at him.”
too stupid to comment
arbadacarba picachu!
No Biden. Rubio would be good.
Not taking the bait, leigh? It’s a multiple choice question with only (a) and (b) as possible answers. Be brave.
I deeply respect Gen. Petraeus as an accomplished politician, strategist and student of human nature, but see in his profound ability to keep his own counsel that I, and I think the country, have no insight into his political persuasion whatsoever. Not to say I think he might adhere to progressivism: he doesn’t, so far as it’s possible to see. Just to say I can’t tell whether he’s a Democrat, or otherwise. I don’t know where he’d want to go, or take the country, and would sooner he’d quit his service to government in order to be free to speak his mind, before I’d see the Republicans claim him as a representative.
Bad ju-ju, buying a pig in a poke.
Colin Powell’s name was also dragged out in an earlier cycle, the thought being that a general couldn’t possibly take us down the progressive route. He endorsed Obama.
Romney, Obama, or a pig in a poke? I’m in the porcine constituency.
heh, depends on the purpose I reckon. If we’re planning to feed the little critter to fattening and then eat him, I might take a shot on the pig too.
Well folks, this working stiff has to get up in the a.m. Leigh, I guess I’ll have to triple-dog-dare you and see if your tongue is stuck to the frozen flagpole in the morning.
Be of good cheer, all; it ain’t over quite yet.
Unless I’m getting things completely wrong, Jeff is being painted as objectively prObama for refusing to accept the choice of Obama or the Least Conservative Republican.
So what we’ll end up with is the next in a string of just not very Conservative presidents, if we’re lucky, followed by another defeat by the Democrats when conservatives stay home in disgust the next time around. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Same as it ever was.
I certainly hope Jeff is not being painted as prObama. As far as I can tell, no one is happy with the candidates that are being presented as our putative choices for president. What to do about it seems to be the question and so far there isn’t a clear answer other than the pig in a poke that Pablo and sdferr talked about. That’s really what we always get anyway, no matter the candidates’ track record or lofty rhetoric.
As you say; same as it ever was.
Hope all you want, but the Romney apologists throughout the internet are in full-bore “Vote for Mitt or you’re helping re-elect Obama” mode.
I’d express my reaction to that bullshit but for some reason every species of puppy on earth has learned to stay out of range of my boots.
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I bet puppies love you, McGehee.
I’ve grown pretty wary of reading around the web about the “Vote for Mitt or you’re helping re-elect Obama” nonsense. Fer cryin’ out loud, we’re nine months and change out from the election proper and we’re all suppossed to make up our minds right now! in the middle of January.
We haven’t heard the State of the Union address yet. Obama is trying to widen his base of power by grafting together more federal agencies in the name of “efficiency” and the press is refusing to call it the blatant power grab that it is. Super Tuesday is eight weeks or so from now and it’s all inevitable?
I’m glad we live out in the boonies and are self-sufficient.