Tag Archives: Republican Party

Sep 26 2012
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politics

Keep On Talking: Tommy Thompson Edition

What is it about Republican politicians in Wisconsin that makes them so cruel?

We all know that Governor Scott Walker hates unions. Well, unless we are talking about the professional football referee’s union whose members are far more skilled than those replacement scabs that cost the Green Bay Packers a victory the other night.

Mitt Romney’s running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan hates, well, everything.

Former Wisconsin Governor and current candidate for Senate, Tommy Thompson, joined this illustrious club recently when he was caught on tape recently saying that he is simply the best person around to “do away with Medicaid and Medicare”:

Keep on talking, former Governor Thompson. By saying you want to “do away” with two of the most important and successful social welfare programs in American history, you are making the case against yourself, and against your party, far better than your opponents can even hope to approximate.

Thank you, very much.

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Jan 11 2012
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politics

Some Other History For Romney To Ponder

“Tonight we made history,” said Mitt Romney after being projected the winner of the GOP primary in New Hampshire.

USA Today

Yes, he is the first GOP candidate, not an incumbent President, to win both Iowa and New Hampshire.

Yes, he garnered 39% of the vote in New Hampshire.

Yes, he beat second-place finisher Ron Paul by more than 16 points.

Yes, he beat fourth-place finisher Rick Santorum by nearly 30 points.

Yes, his victory was the second-largest margin since Reagan in 1980.

Yes, he won among all demographic and ideological groups.

Yes, he may sew-up the GOP nomination in South Carolina on January 21.

All of this is great for him, personally.

But now for some other “history”:

  • In 1988, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis won the Democratic primary in New Hampshire with 36% of the vote.
  • In 1992, former Massachusetts Senator Paul Tsongas won the Democratic primary in New Hampshire with 33.2% of the vote.
  • In 2004, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry won the Democratic primary in New Hampshire with 38.4% of the vote.

Ever hear of President Dukakis, President Tsongas or President Kerry?

They each won the New Hampshire primary like Romney did.

They each got less than 40% of the New Hampshire vote like Romney did.

They each hailed from Massachusetts like Romney does. In fact, Tsongas lived in Lowell, Massachusetts, about six miles from the New Hampshire border. Romney has a summer home in New Hampshire.

New Hampshire is the political backyard for statewide elected officials in Massachusetts seeking the presidency. New Hampshire residents watch Boston television stations. They listen to Boston radio stations. Many of them work in Massachusetts. Nashua, New Hampshire is 45 miles from Boston. The two largest cities in one part of California — San Francisco and San Jose — are only 47 miles apart.

For all practical purposes, New Hampshire is Romney’s home state, just like New Hampshire was the effective home state of Dukakis, Tsongas and Kerry. Massachusetts politicians should do well in New Hampshire. They should win the New Hampshire primary, just like Romney did.

But the last Massachusetts governor to win the New Hampshire primary with less than 40% of his party’s vote (Dukakis) was thumped in the general election by George H.W. Bush, winning only nine states and the District of Columbia en route to a paltry 111 electoral votes.

Go back to 1960, however. John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts won the New Hampshire primary with a whopping 85% of the Democratic vote. He, of course, won the general election.

Romney’s 39% in New Hampshire is not the kind of history he needed to embrace.

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Dec 16 2011
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politics

Crazy Gets Even Crazier: Allen West Invokes Goebbels

Just when you think “crazy” has hit its high watermark in Today’s GOP, Rep. Allen West (R-Fla)  emerges from his lair to prove you utterly wrong.

As reported by ThinkProgress, West likened the Democratic Party and President Obama to Hitler’s Minister Of Propaganda:

“If Joseph Goebbels was around, he’d be very proud of the Democrat Party, because they have an incredible propaganda machine,” West told reporters during House votes Thursday afternoon. “Let’s be honest, you know, some of the people in the media are complicit with this and enabling them to get that type of message out.” [...]

“But let’s be very honest,” he added. “You have the president, who has an incredible megaphone and a platform, and he has people all across this country believing that the only people on Capitol Hill are House Republicans. He’s not talking anything about his controlled Senate. So, it’s a great propaganda.”

West was taken to task for his Holocaust mongering, only then to repeat the charge by calling the Democratic Party a “propaganda machine.”

Earlier this year, West called Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla)  “vile, unprofessional, and despicable,” and “not a lady.”  He also claimed that Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn)  represents “the antithesis of the principles upon which this country was established.” Ellison’s crime? He’s a Muslim. Wasserman Schultz is Jewish.

Allen West, tea partier and equal opportunity hater.

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Dec 12 2011
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politics

What Does $10,000 Buy In Des Moines?

Mitt Romney is, of course, being roundly ridiculed for offering at Saturday’s debate in Iowa to bet Rick Perry $10,000 that he had not altered his book on the individual mandate to buy health insurance.  The casual manner in which Romney apparently throws around $10,000 fuels the impression that he is an out-of-touch multi-multi-millionaire divorced entirely from the daily lives of the vast majority of Americans:

Romney’s devil-may-care attitude toward $10,000 had me wondering: What does $10,000 buy in Des Moines, Iowa?

  • The average monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Des Moines is $771. Romney’s $10,000 thus will pay for more than one-year of rent at the average two-bedroom Des Moines apartment.
  • The median price of a home sold in Des Moines in 2011 is just north of $100,000.  Romney’s $10,000 wager would be part of a nice down-payment on the average home in Des Moines.
  • Des Moines residents spend an average of $684 a month combined on health care, personal care, child care and insurance. Romney’s $10,000 wager thus will take care of those essentials in Des Moines for more than fourteen months.
  • Des Moines residents spend an average of $451 a month on food and drink. Romney’s $10,000 wager thus will take care of those costs for more than twenty-two months.

And, finally, the estimated median household income in Des Moines in 2009 was $42,718, or about $3,600 a month. Romney thus suggested a casual wager of three months salary on whether he altered his book to fit this year’s GOP fashion.

So there you have it: Three months salary, a year’s rent, fourteen months of health care and child care, twenty-two months of food — all grist for Mitt’s money mill. 

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Oct 15 2011
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politics

Herman Cain On Foreign Policy: “What? Me Worry?”

You gotta hand it to Herman Cain, this month’s GOP barnstormer. He knows absolutely nothing about foreign policy. He not only admits it, he embraces it. Foreign policy creates no jobs. Its not particularly suited to pithy slogans like his 9-9-9 plan, or the making of cute proclamations like “I kinda like my guns and my bible.” Its complicated. It rarely makes for compelling reading. Its somebody’s else’s problem.

Last week, Cain gave an interview to CBN where he proudly declared that he does not waste his time on the pesky details of foreign policy, like the name of the President of “Ubeki-beki-beki-stan-stan.” Heck, to even ask the question is to engage in “gotcha” journalism. You know, like Katie Couric asking Sarah Palin what newspapers she reads. Who needs to know these things? They will not create even a single job. Besides, Cuba’s not too far from Cain’s home in Georgia so he must know something about foreign policy.

Here’s Cain waxing poetic over his foreign policy ignorance:

Cain waded again into the foreign policy abyss yesterday in an interview with Neil Cavuto on Fox. It seems that Cain is not “foreign policy dumb.” He’s been studying the stuff with some very smart advisors for the past nine months. He plans to employ that vast knowledge only in the right place and only at the right time. You know, sometime in the future. Then, we’ll all be very, very surprised at the depth of his understanding. The joke will be on all of us. We’ll question why we even questioned him in the first place:

So there you have it. Cain’s approach to foreign policy: “What? Me Worry?” Until he drops back to single digits in the polls by mid-November.

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Sep 14 2011
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politics

Rick Perry: I Got Bad College Grades Because I Was Tired

Today’s fresh Snake Meat comes from the estimable Rick Perry.

The Huffington Post recently obtained a copy of Perry’s transcript from Texas A&M. It is not a pretty sight:

A “D” and an “F” in organic chemistry.  A “D” in the principles of economics.  A “D” in Shakespeare.  A “D” in veterinary anatomy. Two “C’s” in the history of the United States.  A “C” in physics.  A “D” in trigonometry.

Perry managed to pull “B’s” in government, algebra and business law.  His only “A’s”:  Something called “Improv. of Learning” and something else called “World Military Systems.”

Today in a speech at Liberty University — founded by the late Jerry Falwell, and not exactly a citadel of academic excellence — Perry blamed his poor college marks on the rigorous military training during his freshman year at Texas A&M. “They wore us out so much that not a single member of my freshman class managed to stay awake in class for the first few weeks.” That, claimed Perry, was “kind of the start of why my grades were what they were.”

I guess then that Rick Perry is not as dumb as everyone thinks. Although he couldn’t make sense of the “principles of economics,” and he barely understood the history of the country he wants to lead, he was just tired. He was very, very tired. For four entire years.

Rick, get some sleep. We wouldn’t want anyone to think you truly are dumb.

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