Category Archives: 2012 Presidential Election

Not Exactly Cassandra

Michael Barone predicts disaster for the Dems this year.  His headline today in The Washington Examiner says it all — “Democratic Strategists in 2014 Are Like French Generals in 1940.”

Y’all remember Michael Barone writing on November 2, 2012, don’t you?  He predicted that Mittens would get 315 electoral votes, and the Kenyan Muslim Socialist would get 223.

Kind of makes you think “Republican Strategists in 2012 Were Like French Generals in 1940,” doesn’t it?

Also kind of makes you think, “Why does this guy still have a job?”

 

Tea Party Tyranny

From  “Tea Party Ain’t Over Yet:  How Conservatives Still Control Congress,” Talking Points Memo:

“The tea party has taken a series of hits since it goaded Republican leaders into a costly and self-defeating government shutdown last fall.  But the conservative movement remains formidable when it comes to pushing Republican leaders to just say no, at all costs, to new economic and domestic initiatives that aren’t essential to avert immediate crisis.

“The emerging dynamic is one where the tea party can no longer hold the basic functions of government hostage to conservative policy reforms, but has effective veto power over major new proposals that require bipartisan deal-making.

“Even on initiatives that are broadly popular, as in the case of emergency unemployment compensation and raising the minimum wage, conservatives have successfully blocked any movement forward.

“An initiative that Republican strategists say is imperative to stave off electoral extinction — immigration reform — isn’t going anywhere.  Recently, Speaker John Boehner took a significant step toward action by releasing a pro-reform blueprint.  But within one week, after a fierce backlash from tea party organizations…he hit the brakes and signaled that the House wouldn’t take up reform.”  Emphasis added.

A minority of the minority is controlling this country, is keeping it from moving forward economically and socially.  It really doesn’t matter at all that Obama beat Mitt, that Dems have a majority in the Senate (because you need 60), and that Dem House candidates got over a million more votes than GOP candidates.  What the hell did we win exactly?

Ron Paul Gets the Last Laugh

If you remember the GOP presidential debates of 2008 and 2012 (I know, who the hell wants to do that?), whenever there was a foreign policy or defense question, there was pretty much crazy Ron Paul off by his isolationist self and all the other candidates basically laughing at him and openly embarrassed by him.

But isn’t he getting the last laugh?  Just as the Tea Party pushed the GOP far, far, far to the right on domestic issues, the libertarian isolationists, led in the Senate by Ron’s son Rand, are pushing the GOP far, far, far to the right on national security issues.

When I read that 2016 prez hopeful Marco (“Big Gulp”) Rubio is voting against the Syria resolution, thus ensuring there’s no daylight between him and Rand, I immediately flashed back to those debates where Ron was odd man out in every sense of the word.  And now Rand is seen as reasonable and legit.

We live in scary times.

It’s Early, But…

I know it’s early for 2014, but GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann is already running TV ads for her re-election campaign in Minnesota.

A new PPP poll shows her 2012 Dem opponent, Jim Graves, who plans to try again, ahead of Bachmann, 47 to 45.

Last time, Graves lost by only 5,000 votes, little more than 1% of the vote.  And last time, Bachmann wasn’t dealing with a blossoming campaign finance scandal from her 2012 presidential campaign.

Maybe Bachmann will go where she belongs, looking pretty and spouting crazy on Fox.

FBI Joins Bachmann Investigation

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minnesota) is already under investigation by the Federal Elections Commission, the Office of Congressional Ethics, and the Iowa State Senate ethics committee for possible campaign finance violations in her 2012 presidential campaign.

Now the FBI is joining the party, which means possible criminal charges and penalties.

I want to see her gone from the House as much as, well, as much as she wants to see the Kenyan Muslim Communist gone from the White House.

I don’t care if she goes to jail, I just want her out of politics forever, replaced by someone a little brighter and a lot less crazy.  That would be just about anyone who lives in her district.

 

Feeding the Paranoia

So you have a bunch of people yelling and screaming that the government can’t be trusted and is coming after us.

What does the government do?  It feeds and justifies that narrative by the IRS specifically targeting these groups and subjecting them to extra scrutiny.

The IRS has admitted and “apologized” for the fact that tax-exempt groups with “Tea Party” or “Patriot” in their names were singled out for heightened review during the 2012 election cycle, including unlawfully demanding names of individual donors, that left-leaning groups didn’t receive.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Jen Rubin Is in Love Again

During the 2012 election, Jennifer Rubin’s “Right Turn” bloggy-column thing at WaPo essentially functioned as a gauzy ad campaign for Mitt.  How Jen loved Mitt, despite the fact that she is Jewish and he is Mormon, despite the fact that they are married to others.  Every day, Jen rose and faithfully posted her school-girlish love letters to Mittens.  So sweet, so sad.  So charming, so creepy.

Right till the end, she refused to believe those annoying, Obama-biased polls, and was devastated when the Kenyan Muslim who hates Israel (the country our Jen loves most) won.

But 100 days into O’s second term, with spring upon us, Jen has recovered and found herself a new man.  Her bloggy-column thing today is a love letter to Chris Christie worthy of Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  Sorry, Mittens.

This Brightened My Day

From “Former chief of staff to break silence on Michele Bachmann,” Kevin Diaz, Minneapolis Star Tribune:

“GOP operative Andy Parrish, a former chief of staff to U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, is expected to tell an Iowa Senate ­ethics panel that her 2012 presidential campaign made improper payments to its state chairman.

“…Parrish referred questions Wednesday to his attorney, John Gil­more, who said his client will corroborate allegations from another former Bachmann aide, Peter Waldron.

“Waldron, a Florida pastor, claims that the campaign hid payments to Iowa Sen. Kent Sorenson, in violation of Iowa Senate ethics rules that bar members from receiving pay from presidential campaigns. …

“Waldron’s accusations are also the subject of inquiries by the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and the independent Office of Congressional Ethics. The investigations are part of a growing web of legal problems facing Bachmann, including a lawsuit by former staffer Barbara Heki alleging that Sorenson stole a proprietary e-mail list of Iowa home-school families from her personal computer. Those allegations also are the subject of an ongoing police investigation in Urbandale, Iowa.

“Gilmore said Parrish can provide the ethics panel documentary evidence that Sorenson was paid $7,500 a month to work on Bachmann’s campaign, money that was funneled to him indirectly through C&M Strategies, a Colorado-based company controlled by Bachmann fundraiser Guy Short.

“Among the sources of the funding, Waldron contends, was Bachmann’s independent political organization, Michele­PAC, also headed by Short.”

It would be fantastic to see Bachmann go to the Big House, but I’ll be thrilled just to get her out of the people’s House.

Obama May Have Won, But He Still Can’t Win

“Members of both parties say Mr. Obama faces a conundrum with his legislative approach to a deeply polarized Congress.  In the past, when he has stayed aloof from legislative action, Republicans and others have accused him of a lack of leadership; when he has gotten involved, they have complained that they could not support any bill so closely identified with Mr. Obama without risking the contempt of conservative voters.”*

So what’s a Kenyan Muslim Communist to do?

* “Obama Must Walk Fine Line As Congress Weighs Agenda,” Jackie Calmes, NYT