GOP Nominee 2012 - Pt. 5

[BonosSaint]

The New York Times

August 31, 2012
Only the Good Get Rich
By GAIL COLLINS

As the Republican convention fades into oblivion, the one thing everybody is still talking about is, of course, the party platform.

Honest. You should see the tweets.

The convention was so full of opportunities to catch a glimpse of celebrities like John Sununu and Rudy Giuliani that I didn’t get around to the platform until the flight back from Tampa. But it was so worth the wait. Really, I could hardly take my eyes away from it long enough to watch the flight attendant demonstrate how to use a seat buckle.

As you’d expect, there were paeans to things Republicans like (phonics, Israel, coal, English, defense spending, transparency for everything except political donations) and denunciations of the stuff they hate (Obamacare, mass transit, the Law of the Sea Treaty, Venezuela, teachers’ unions, Obamacare). But you may be interested to know that the proven methods of improving school performance are high standards, accountability and “renewed focus on the Constitution and the writings of the Founding Fathers.”

Some of the recommendations are stunning. Besides the inevitable tribute to the Second Amendment, the platform goes to the trouble of specifically mentioning that Republicans are against limiting the sale of those extra-bullet magazines for guns that maximized the victim count in the mass shootings in Tucson, Colorado and Wisconsin.

Please, keep that in mind. Wherever there’s a gun capable of spraying 100 bullets, there’s a Republican platform behind it.

But the most startling sentence is in the preamble, where the Republicans announce they are the party with “a positive, optimistic view of an opportunity society where any American who works hard, dreams big and follows the rules can achieve anything he or she wants.”

People, do you think the Republican hierarchy really believes that working hard and playing by the rules is a guarantee of big-dream fulfillment? This is a worldview you usually only hear before the first elimination round on “American Idol.”

No wonder they don’t like food stamps and unemployment compensation.

The platform provides some welcome hints about what the Romney ticket stands for. We do need help on that point because when it comes to actual plans, Romney-Ryan has been pretty opaque.

Leaving Tampa, we knew no more about the big Medicare issue than when we arrived. The biggest Republican talking point is that the Obama health care reform will, in the words of Mitt Romney, “hurt today’s seniors.” That’s all about the $716 billion in projected long-term savings, except that Ryan had the same cut in his budget plans and what the heck are we supposed to make of that?

Fortunately, Fortune magazine asked the House majority leader, Eric Cantor, that question during the convention, and Cantor was able to clear it all up thusly: “The assumption was that, um, the, the, ah, again — I probably can’t speak to that in an exact way, so I better just not.”

So, O.K.

The big, if-not-quite-articulated, message in Tampa was that in a free economy, everybody will get what they deserve. There is no need to worry about the vast, growing gap between the richest and the rest, or the shrinking middle class, or the fact that America currently has one of the worst rates of social mobility in the developed world.

Untrammeled, the business sector will create plenty of jobs, and the hard-working big-dreamers will jump in, amass wealth and achieve success. You cut taxes, reduce regulation and let the magic happen. It’s that or what Paul Ryan called “a dull adventureless journey from one entitlement to the next, a government-planned life, a country where everything is free but us.”

Listening to the convention speeches, it was easy to get the impression that every high-ranking Republican in the country had parents who were truck drivers or convenience store workers who moved up entirely through their own efforts. Also, there were a lot of grandfathers who worked in the mines. Republicans love mines, particularly coal mines. This is partly because of their big donors, but the fact that environmentalists hate coal makes coal mines even more adorable.

And the miners themselves are always sympathetic figures because they work hard and play by the rules. As a result, their biggest dreams have been realized, and they are able to spend their lives underground developing chronic pulmonary disease.

Shortly before the convention, Mitt Romney had pressed the coal theme with an appearance in Ohio, where he stood with a group of sooty miners whose sad, solemn faces seemed to underscore their concern about big government. Also, some of them later told the news media that they had been required to show up and weren’t paid for the day.

The reward will undoubtedly arrive at a later date.

I come from coal miners, so I had a particular bit of distaste for this.

Beyond this article, I don't like either party much, but my contempt for the Republican party (not necessarily individual Republicans--many of whom I like very much) runs miles deeper.
I don't share many values with them at all. I don't believe the Democrats, but at least I like their talk better.

[deep]

TRENDING: Mitt Romney flies U2's plane

[maycocksean]

Can anyone think of the last time the LESS charismatic candidate won the presidency? Because based on that criteria, it would be very surprising of Romney won this year.

[deep]

In 1999 I was telling everyone W was an idiot.

Carter was very bland in his day.

Bush 1 was low on charisma,



or, I see yon mean LESS than the other guy.


Obama should win.

[corianderstem]

Originally Posted by deep

TRENDING: Mitt Romney flies U2's plane

[U2DMfan]

Originally Posted by deep

In 1999 I was telling everyone W was an idiot.

Me too but the dude was nothing but folksy charisma.
And besides, the question was about the LESS charismatic candidate winning.
Gore was more of a robot than Kerry or Romney.

The answer is probably Bush 41
Although Dukakis wasn't exactly Mr. Charm.

[Irvine511]

GWB became president because of Monica Lewinsky.

In America, preemptive wars are more honorable an dignified than blowjobs.

[maycocksean]

One could also argue that he won because he was more charismatic. I'm looking at only one factor, and based on that I think the more charismatic candidate has won every time since the dawn of the age of television. Granted Bush 1 and Dukakis might be somewhat debatable, but still I recall Dukakis as an utter nerd.

[digitize]

Originally Posted by deep

TRENDING: Mitt Romney flies U2's plane

Romney flies on an MD-80? Poor guy.

[MrsSpringsteen]

My father is old too. Doesn't excuse it when he acts and speaks like a fool. That's one thing I can't stand,that blanket old guy excuse.

Reagan had Alzheimers, apparently even during his Presidency. As far as everyone knows Clint does not.

Nothing much worse than an actor without a script. At least Obama was gracious about it.

[Pearl]

Even my staunch conservative dad who is an Eastwood fan is mixed about that speech. He felt he made some good points, but the whole speech was too awkward.

The Daily Show did a segment on Friday about this, naming it "The Old Man and the Seat".

[MrsSpringsteen]

Yes, I would say the economy gives women a reason to vote for him. If you believe he can make it better, or that anyone but Obama can. The other stuff, well it gives many women pause.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- There's been no shortage of musing over Mitt Romney's failure to win over female voters. The gender gap is pronounced, and with the efforts of the president's political team, growing wider. Romney has been criticized for his failure to speak out in support of equal pay for equal work, he's been tied to some of his party's more hardline positions on abortion, and has been caricatured as a relic of a bygone era in which women put career ambitions aside.

But for all the talk of Romney's trouble among women voters, no Democrat has put it in the terms that former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright did in an interview with The Huffington Post on Monday.

"I'm not sure I'm going to state this exactly right," she said, sitting amidst a sea of convention-related activity and daytime wine drinkers in the Westin hotel lobby in downtown Charlotte. "But I think there are some who believe they are actually protecting women, you know, and that it is better for women to be taken care of. I think women want to take care of themselves, and I think having a voice in how that is done is very important. And frankly, I don’t understand -- I mean, I'm obviously a card-carrying Democrat -- but I can't understand why any woman would want to vote for Mitt Romney, except maybe Mrs. Romney."

Albright then revised her pool of rationally thinking female Romney supporters to include his five daughters-in-law, an obvious but hardly generous expansion. Even with the rhetorical flair, however, Albright's comments reflect a genuine disturbance that many Democrats -- women and men -- feel about the tone of the discussion of women's issues during the course of the campaign.

The former secretary of State, who has been an outspoken advocate for women in the workplace, said she found the assertion by Missouri Senate candidate Rep. Todd Akin (R-Mo.) that a rape victim can shut down her body to avoid pregnancy to be "one of the more outrageous" comments she's witnessed in her 75 years.

"It was appalling and disgusting," she said. "But if I may say so, the things that he said in one form or another are in the Republican platform. So [while Republicans are] saying he is a nutcase and they have to move away from him, they did not move away from their platform."

Her reference was to language in the GOP platform that outlaws abortion even in cases of rape or incest. It's a policy that Romney's running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), has embraced throughout his career, before distancing himself in the wake of Akin's remarks. Romney has always supported such exceptions. Even so, Albright argued, he had "become captive to a party that does in fact think that women should not have voices."

This is about as harsh an indictment as has been leveled by a major Democratic figure at the Republican Party and its nominee. And in conjuring up images of women being pushed into figurative (if not literal) silence, Albright invited some obvious pushback. The current state of the economy hasn't exactly allowed women to warm up their vocal cords.

"I’m guessing the millions of American women unemployed, underemployed or constantly worrying about filling the gas tank or put food on the table can think of a few reasons to make sure Barack Obama isn't our president for another four years," said Kirsten Kukowski, a spokesperson for the Republican National Committee.

Aware of the gender gap, Romney's campaign gave several Republican women primetime speaking roles at his party's recently completed convention, including his wife, Ann, who spoke about the trials that came with their marriage and raising five kids, in addition to declaring in one of the conventions more indelible moments, "I love you, women."

It will, in all likelihood, take a bit more than a few speeches in support of Romney to make up the ground among women voters. A TIME/CNN poll of likely voters found Obama beating Romney by 12 and 10 points among women in Florida and North Carolina, respectively.

[deep]

I thought Romney would have gotten a better bounce out of that convention. They did a pretty good job. Romney did not make any errors, he certainly picked his best wife to put front and center.

[Moonlit_Angel]

"I’m guessing the millions of American women unemployed, underemployed or constantly worrying about filling the gas tank or put food on the table can think of a few reasons to make sure Barack Obama isn't our president for another four years," said Kirsten Kukowski, a spokesperson for the Republican National Committee.

Probably. But I've still yet to hear what exactly Romney's plan to fix that situation would be. I don't see anything in the Republican platform that would guarantee me that we'd see any sort of improvement if he were in office.

Anywho, yeah, I think that "protected" argument is spot on. There's a real patronizing attitude regarding women that the GOP seems to have going on (I always got that feeling when I'd hear Palin talk. They wanted her simply because the Democrats had a woman in their ranks, and they knew Palin wasn't qualified. She was there to look pretty and say her silly things, and then the male politicians come in and cover for her mistakes).

And yeah, their whole attitude regarding abortion and birth control has been ignorant at best, and downright disturbing at worst. If they want to try and win women to their side, maybe shut up with the stupid, offensive rape comments that seem to constantly fall from their mouths, and have some women actually come in and discuss this issue. They're the party of small government, it'd be really interesting to see some female politicians who actually advocate said small government and focus on keeping this issue a personal one. And they can still be pro-life without talking about banning abortion outright.

But of course, that would mean they might actually have to start advocating things like making birth control more available*, or making sure women who are pregnant or of an age where they can be pregnant can be taken care of financially so they can have more options available to them, and maybe expanding sex education beyond abstinence-only. And somehow, I think the chances of them changing their views on those topics anytime soon are pretty slim.

(*I still fail to understand how people who are so against abortion can simultaneously oppose anything a woman can do that would avoid her getting pregnant in the first place until she's ready. Sounds like a pretty surefire way for a woman to be less likely to have to worry about an abortion to me, but I guess that's just crazy talk or something.)

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Pearl

Even my staunch conservative dad who is an Eastwood fan is mixed about that speech. He felt he made some good points, but the whole speech was too awkward.

Eastwood was great because he spoke politics like most of us do; no TelePrompTer, no focus group tested phrases, no "stay on message" restraints and with blunt honesty. And in doing so pissed off all the right people -- Obama apologists and the GOP establishment and their inside-the-beltway consultants.

[MrsSpringsteen]

I'm not pissed off at all, I felt sorry for the guy. Can't imagine that devout Mormon Mitt was comfortable with Clint having the President tell him to f himself.

I'd love to see GOP reaction to a similar celebrity "speech" at the DNC.

[Irvine511]

And what you just did right there -- have an argument and yelling at people who don't exist and winning arguments with yourself -- was perhaps a deft and subtle way for Eastwood to indict the entire GOP.

He's many steps ahead, a great double agent.

He performed what the GOP has been doing since 2008 -- fearing people who dont exist.

[PhilsFan]

Originally Posted by INDY500

And in doing so pissed off all the right people -- Obama apologists and the GOP establishment and their inside-the-beltway consultants.

This is easily the most frustrating thing I read from people on the right. You can't engage in a fucking debate because you think disagreement from the left proves you right, that if the "right people" are pissed off, it's because they're uncomfortable with your "truth." You think the argument is over the minute it starts.

If I never heard "pissed off the right people" again, I would be living a better life, one where I might actually be able to debate the merits of Clint Eastwood's rambling speech with someone who agrees with him.

[the iron horse]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Eastwood was great because he spoke politics like most of us do; no TelePrompTer, no focus group tested phrases, no "stay on message" restraints and with blunt honesty. And in doing so pissed off all the right people -- Obama apologists and the inside-the-beltway consultants and GOP establishment.

It took Eastwood to do something the "in the spotlight" American
comedians have failed to to do the past four years.

Slam and mock Obama.

[Pearl]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Eastwood was great because he spoke politics like most of us do; no TelePrompTer, no focus group tested phrases, no "stay on message" restraints and with blunt honesty. And in doing so pissed off all the right people -- Obama apologists and the GOP establishment and their inside-the-beltway consultants.

I don't think you read my post clearly. I said even my very conservative father felt the speech was awkward. You seemed to have used my post as an excuse to trump Eastwood.