So, the New York Times is basically reporting that Team Romney has concluded that the only way to get white working class folks to overlook their candidates’ policies, religion, and elitism is to make racist attacks against the president. So, for example, Romney is running ads falsely accusing the president of eliminating a work requirement for welfare. And he’s making references to the president’s birth certificate. And we’re supposed to see a lot more on this theme at the Republicans’ convention.
It’s one thing to lose an election. It’s another to take the low road and lose an election. I don’t think the swing voters this year are just sitting around waiting for Mitt Romney to be more of a racist before they can support him. Maybe they are waiting for him to offer a single policy that won’t make their lives more difficult.
It’s another to take the low road and lose an election.
Dignity slunk out of the Republican party around the time GHW Bush was bleating “ozone, man, ozone!”
Dignity in the Republican Party was a brief interlude called “Eisenhower’s second term”.
You know, you’re right.
Who knows what they’re waiting for. Maybe they enjoy the spectacle and the horse race as much as the msm do. It would go a long way toward explaining how it’s still possible to be a swing voter in this era.
There are times when I’m tempted to believe the Republicans are deliberately tanking this election, NBA style.
Mitt Romney wants to raise taxes on the middle class. How is that even possible? Obama is running against the Republicans as the tax cutter! What a long strange trip these last twelve years have been.
It takes either a spectacular bout of incompetence, or a spectacular bout of pure, unrestrained plutocratic indifference, to blow up your party’s central selling point to the masses. Once Republicans can’t even offer lower taxes anymore, what in god’s name do they have left besides white supremacy?
They are the dumbest motherfuckers in American history, and we used to have a group called the Know-Nothings.
I figure part of what they’re doing this year is floating some trial balloons to see what they can and can’t get away with in future elections, and also to establish some precedents, as with only releasing a year or two of tax returns. If they can do away with that tradition in the public eye, they will have accomplished something useful for future races.
At this point, the different factions are jockeying to determine which faction gets blamed for the loss. Suspect the crazies remember 1992 — they didn’t get their guy, showed up and voted for him anyway, and were blamed for the loss. Also suspect that the GOP elites have detected that the crazies aren’t going to meekly accept such blame this time. Hence, roll out the “crazy approved” version of Mitt.
It reeks of desperation. Mitt is singularly unappealing and has nothing to offer his party in the way of goals, other than killing off government. He has to resort to cheap shots, racism, and Right to Life nonsense to fire up the half-hearted voters.
I noticed recently that while there is a never-ending stream of negative, lying ads on TV, there are very few yard signs and bumper stickers for the candidates. This time four years ago, you couldn’t walk through a neighborhood or parking lot without seeing signs plastered everywhere. There is one kook in our neighborhood who has a “Stop the Attack on Religion” sign in their front yard, whatever that means.
There is one kook in our neighborhood who has a “Stop the Attack on Religion” sign in their front yard, whatever that means.
He’s either a Rusty Limpballs fan, or a big time religion guy(or maybe both, of course). You know, because Obama had the temerity to copy the GOP’s 1990 era health care plan(and Willard’s too!!) from them, less any federal funding for abortion(which of course Willard’s plan funded in MA).
There is one kook in our neighborhood who has a “Stop the Attack on Religion” sign in their front yard, whatever that means.
Maybe he’s an Iraqi Shiite?
If the prevalence of yard signs were a measure of election outcomes, Ron Paul would be the GOP nominee.
Well since it looks like the GOP Convention is going to be run on Skype, it’ll be fun watching how and where the delegates run for cover. Will Romney take to Skype during the storm and be so enthralled with demanding a 3rd birth certificate that he forgets to tell his fellow R’s to take cover? What a leaderish guy.
Charlie Crist is a great little reminder in today’s OpEd endorcing Obama in the local newspaper that Rubio only knows how to lead downhill.
hmm so Charlie Crist endorsed Obama for re-election. what does that mean fo FL?
FormerGovernor Charlie Crist: Here’s Why I’m Backing Barack Obama
Booman, this from Ron Paul will not make Paulites happy!
Jeez, nobody likes the Mittens. are we even sure his family likes him
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/us/politics/ron-paul-passing-torch-to-a-libertarian-legion.html?_r
=2
Do you know the Paulites? If Ron Paul agreed to that, they might actually come up with some sort of criticism of the old bastard.
I disagree. They…many of them, anyway…are “waiting around” for a usable excuse regarding the ongoing collapse of this society. Since they cannot/will not/must not be told the truth of the matter…that both sides of the two party system are complicit in the problem since both exist under the same corporate ownership…then the campaign must be waged around blaming “the other.” And if the so-called “swing vote” is primarily white…which it is…the wonderfully racist system in which America has lived for 400+ years has an easy answer.
It’s “their” fault. The Dems can’t use that lick because:
A-They need the minority vote.
and
B-The president is brownish.
But the Rats can use it, and use it they will.
Successfully? I doubt it. Not successfully enough to overturn the fix, anyway. But then…I don’t think that at the top levels of the Republican Party they are really trying to overturn the fix. They’ll get their turn in the saddle next time.
Watch.
You also write:
Policies? Only policy wonks really believe them. How does the National Defense Authorization Act fit inside of the “policies” upon which Obama ran four years ago? Remember the DemRat 2008 platform? It was called “RENEWING AMERICA’S PROMISE.” Part IV of that platform was titled “Renewing American Democracy” and had as its first two subheadings “Open, Accountable and Ethical Government” followed by “Reclaiming Our Constitution and Our Liberties.” Ask Bradley Manning and Julian Assange about those two “policies,” please.
Plus…who gives a flying fuck what the NY Times writes? It is a partisan newspaper that takes the PermaGov line whenever it is supposed to do so. Never, ever forget Judith Miller’s role in the runup to the Iraq War.
Ever.
Just because something the NY Times publishes is “true”…and I expect that this little nugget is quite accurate because when you get right down to it what else do the RatPubs have left upon which to run…what good is that information if equally accurate information is not presented about DemRat lies? Not reporting is just as good as misreporting. The whole story of the U.S. since JFK’s assassination has been about the various media dogs that did not bark. If you cannot trust a dog to bark when there is danger then you cannot trust that dog when it does bark, either.
And here we jolly well are, aren’t we.
Media WMDs…Weapons of Mass Disinformation…loaded and at the ready for the coming political Olympics. The really big show!!! Every four years…the great medal chase for who gets to run the trillions of dollars through the U.S. money and power machine.
Step away from the media with your brains in the air. Go do something useful.
I dare ya.
AG
Looking through the article, that is, indeed, exactly what the NYT is reporting. Only they can’t bring themselves to say so.
Instead, Romney is “injecting volatile cultural themes.” His campaign is “infused with a sharper edge and overtones of class and race.” He’s banking on “running up his edge among white voters.”
The words “racism” or “racist” never appear in the description of either Romney’s attacks, the appeal of those attacks, or who they are meant to appeal to. Or anywhere else in the article.
Anyone who works with words for a living will tell you immediately what’s going on here. The article is worded accurately, but obliquely enough that many readers – especially the vast majority who only skim the first couple of paragraphs – won’t realize what it says. Corporate media publishes articles like this in the hopes that most readers won’t take their meaning.
It’s very reminiscent of the runup and aftermath to the invasion of Iraq, when for several years corporate media refused to use the word “lie” to describe the Bush case for war (although they used every euphemism imaginable), and castigated anyone who did use it.
It’s as though elite national media are so vested in perpetuating the myth of our noble political system that they’d rather lie – er, create a misleading impression – than spell out clearly how low a national political leader has sunk. Bush’s team used that to his advantage. Now Romney will, too.
Ugh.
I think we now know why the Republicans freaked the hell out, way out of proportion, over Joe Biden’s comment.
I’ve been thinking that they were running into the same problem John McCain had in 2008 – an inability to stick to a long-term plan, a habit of going “Squirrel!” and chasing after every day’s news cycle using a different message in response to that day’s story. I found this very strange, because Romney was very disciplined during the primary.
Nope. This is a disciplined, long-term strategy. Every time they get off the jobs message, it’s to hype a story with a race angle.
This also explains why Scott Brown’s supporters keep talking about American Indian heritage and Elizabeth Warren unfairly getting her job.
Does make one wonder if a ‘purity test’ isn’t far off for membership in Rep Party, eh?
Far off? See Richard Lugar.
Right you are. What I didn’t clarify was that I was thinking a racial purity test and/or a priviledge purity test.
That was at least 20 years ago. When I was graduating from college in Florida I associated with a number of Republicans – almost exclusively Republicans. I was considering going into politics, and talked with them about it. They advised me that I should consider something else, because while they liked me and would certainly support me, I could expect a much-less than enthusiastic reception from the rest of the party – wrong color.
I owe them a debt of gratitude – all things worked together for my good – their honesty saved me a lot of heartache. Take a look at the GOP convention this week – count the number of Blacks in the seats of the convention and see how many times they show the same 5 Blacks.
I don’t think the swing voters this year are just sitting around waiting for Mitt Romney to be more of a racist before they can support him.
Who is a swing voter in 2012?
White working-class people in the mid-west. Do they vote their wallets, or their fears?
Funny thing, in all my canvassing so far I haven’t run across one undecided voter who said they were waiting to see Obama’s birth certificate.
Well the low road’s again confirmed. Have you seen the new Rep Convention tshirts? “Mitt’s Legit”
Har. And Todd Akin is “2 legit 2 Quit.” You half think these guys will figure out how to run a campaign one of these days, but then that day never seems to arrive.
Yeah, the purple band-aid people are classy geniuses.
They’ve only just begun this year. By next Friday you’ll look back fondly on when it was just purple bandaids and attacking someone who did what most of them did not do — go to Vietnam.
as noted in a previous post – I think the swing voters were nudged by the Michigan comment, and are gonna swing towards BHO in majority numbers, and that some sane repub votes will be lost as a result as well.
And the Christie endorsement all but insures the latter.