I think these two posts illustrate why I’m having such a hard time giving a shit about the Republican primary.
Never mind that Presidents don’t sign constitutional amendments, let’s just remember that Herman is no longersquishy on this issue. Herman also came out for an amendment defending marriage from the gays, and he swore to use the bully pulpit on social issues.
Willard Romney doesn’t seem to have Darth Cheney’s delight in other peoples’ suffering, if only because he doesn’t pay that much attention to other people. But true north on Romney’s moral compass is“What’s best for Mitt Romney, at this point in time?”, and since the Neocons can promise the best short-term gains on the foreign policy market (while blithely ignoring any horizon beyond the Friedman Unit), their arguments interlock nicely with his MBA vulture capitalist training.
None of them seem to have anything sticky enough to even argue about. Why bother getting in a fuss about Romney’s or Cain’s positions on anything, given that they’re likely to change in an hour? Why get into an argument over something that’s not going to be operable tomorrow? Overall, they are going to run as the same anti-gay, anti-immigrant, pro-tax-cut, blow-the-Arabs’-shit-up, fuck-the-poor jackasses Republican candidates have been for the past 40 years at least, so what exactly is the point of bickering over policy distinctions right now?
If I’m interested in Cain at all, it’s only because I hope his candidacy makes the teawads’ racist heads explode. And with Romney, it just seems like it’s his turn. Like 2008 was McCain’s turn, so that the next time around they could all say, “Buddy, we let you try and you biffed it. Sit down like you supposed to,” and move on to some younger, shinier thing.
It’s not that there’s nothing to to talk about, policy-wise. There are plenty of things going on that need fixing up. But nobody on the Republican side is arguing about anything that won’t be resolved into the usual Zombie Reagan Voltron by the end of the second primary.
A.
I have a suspicion as to where a lot of Cain’s support comes from. You know how wingnuts love to tweak liberals? Well, Cain’s supporters are taking it a step further. They’re doing it to tweak the “RINOs”.
i am shocked they are not embracing perry. he has that reagaanistic simplicity of thought. too stupid for the GOP?
They’ll get behind Perry when the primaries roll through the South and West and people actually find themselves in a voting booth. Money buys TV and radio advertising and people spend a lot of time in the exurbs of the South and West watching TV and listening to radio.
The same people that convinced them that Obama caused the recession have convinced them that Romney isn’t really a Republican. Cain is a glamor candidate, and as much as they like the idea of a flat, “Fair” tax, they don’treally want to see what passing that will entail. So they’ll go with the Perry “opt in” flat tax nonsense the same way they believe Obama raised taxes.
‘But true north on Romney’s moral compass is “What’s best for Mitt Romney, at this point in time?”, ‘
This strikes me as true of all the current Republican contenders. They are all just a bunch of grifters making a buck off the rubes who send them money.
“They are all just a bunch of grifters making a buck off the rubes who send them money.”
Used to be, they got elected and looked ahead to the wingnut welfare sinecure waiting for them at the end of their term. Now it’s like they’d rather skip getting elected and go straight to the trough.
Remember Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann? Herman Cain and Rick Perry will join them in the remainder bin next month. At that point the front runners will be, oh I don’t know, Ted Nugent and Victoria Jackson. Why not? Pretty much anybody can be frontrunner as long as it’s not Mr. Money, which is who the Republicans will eventually settle on, of course.
Romney is a cut above the rest of the GOP candidates because Romney is a liar. The other guys are all bullshit artists. Romney knows what the truth is and says something different. The rest of the lot never took the time to learn the truth in the first place.