Bush political strategist Mark McKinnon had an ostensibly serious piece the other day about how Michele Bachman could win, not only the Republican nomination, but the presidency. It’s filled with glowing quotes from Karl Rove. This may indicate that the Republican establishment might not sandbag Bachmann the way they would have Palin.
Listen, I’m not going to bullshit you. I don’t give a good fuck what they know, or don’t know, I’m going to root for Bachmann in the primary regardless. It’s amusing, to me, to have that obvious of an idiot as a major party nominee. You can say anything you want cause I’ve heard it all before. All you can do is pray for a Tim Pawlenty victory, which you ain’t gonna get.
I do think Bachmann would be both a weaker nominee and a less destructive president than Tim Pawlenty. She seems like a perfect Rove vessel, a gaffe-prone but charismatic idiot, but there’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, it’s probably in Tennessee — that applies here. The Village will be less likely to support the Ryan plan if president Bachmann pushes it than if president Pawlenty pushes it. Bobo will never be able to convince Gail Collins that Bachmann is a font of plain-spoken Burkean wisdom but he might with Pawlenty, let alone Mitch Daniels.
A Bachmann nomination is win-win for Democrats.
Kristine
For that idiot to be the first woman to be elected President…oh please, no. It would take us a generation to recover.
MFA
The last time the ‘Publicans ran “a gaffe-prone but charismatic idiot” the SOB was in office for 8 years and pretty well destroyed the country. I know it’s been a long two and a half years, but dang, try to remember.
Snayke
Reading that reminded me of that bloody Condi vs. Hillary election in 2008.
Omnes Omnibus
You have become a nihilist. You obviously need to get yourself an ethos, stat.
Snayke
@MFA:
Bush campaigned as a “uniter.” Bachmann would get trampled by indepedents.
kdaug
And if the invisible hand of Diebold and a little hush-hush “The president’s a ni-“?
I ain’t putting Bachmann/Palin Overdrive outside the realm of possibility.
Don’t get me wrong, I generally like apocalyptic horror films. Just don’t want to live through one.
Comrade DougJ
@Snayke:
Condi would make make a lot better president than McCain, in truth.
Bob Loblaw
Your math checks except for one itty, bitty problem. The only way Obama can lose is if the Middle East blows up or if some terrorist actually manages to set off his car bomb/IED/whatever. Or even just takes a gun and shoots up an airport security line. Or a church. Like what happened to those Egyptian Copts before the revolution.
Because if any of that shit goes down, and it is far from a low probability that it won’t, you’re going to be begging for the sanest fucking Republican you can find. Just in case.
Comrade DougJ
@Bob Loblaw:
There won’t be any sane ones, so I will be rooting for the one who is most seen as insane.
mlk
@Kristine: Amen! It would like having Snooki from Jersey Shore being elected President.
Tunch
مجد الله. جون كول يبقي لي سجين. كنت تعيش اليوم في حالة يمكنني دمعة/له وسأبذل للضعف, وقال والدموع. يخاف مني, خوفه, يثير اشمئزاز لي. يحصل لي بعض التونة والسمك وبالتالي.
Tunch
Yutsano
As an actual “plan” for winning the Presidency McKinnon is fairly light on details there. As a declaration that Bachmann gives him starbursts it hits all the right rhetorical notes. In other words, McKinnon is trying to get the big money to gamble on her. Good luck with that. She’s too much of a loose cannon and too unpredictable. She’ll get squashed for a nice safe white male here soon enough.
@Tunch: Gesundheit.
Lolis
I would love Bachman to win the primary too. I swear I have seen a video of her saying women should defer to their husbands. I would love to see that get some play were she to become the nominee.
I think if Bachman won Obama would have this in the bag. No matter what. I don’t buy the Sully argument that a majority of Americans will vote for someone they believe to crazy, ignorant, and extreme just because Obama didn’t do X, Y, or Z. Plus the Republican crazy in FL, OH, WI, and MI is helping out the Democratic Party.
Beta Magellan
@Bob Loblaw:
Or if the cuts he’s trumpeting manage to take a nice juicy bite out of the GDP. He’d still win against Bachmann, or Palin, or Gingrich, or maybe Barbour, but I could easily see things getting close against Pawlenty or Romney. They may be empty suits, but that makes them better screens for people to project their ideals on.
scav
At this point, they seem to be careening from anything with the requite amount of pre-built name recognition: a pick and choose buffet from the top trending queries on Google, updated hourly.
chamois
Not fair to cast Gail Collins in such a light. She’s totally aware and Bobo couldn’t mess with her mind.
The Political Nihilist Formerly Known As Kryptik
Like many folks here, I’m simply not putting my faith into the system any more to believe that Bachmann couldn’t squirm herself into the presidency, not when the depths of electoral stupidity have proven to be far more expansive and pervasive as ever.
Yes, you know the political structure in this country is seriously fucked when Michelle Bachmann can be considered to have an actual shot at the presidency.
JPL
@Tunch: Hilarious. Must credit google. When the FBI shows up at John’s house looking for Tunch, we’ll know why.
sukabi
@kdaug: ummm, pretty sure Palin’s not going to be near the R ticket… take a look at what showed up on Fox…
who says they don’t know how to subliminally message?
Spaghetti Lee
I think you’ve got a point. Given both how insane and how ideologically homogeneous the Republican Party is, I don’t think you can really say that Daniels/Pawlenty et al would be any less disastrous than one of the crazy people, so why not root for the crazy person? Show America what the Republicans really are and all that.
sukabi
@Tunch: lol … fish, I want my damned fish!!!
jo6pac
I’ll change to repug for the primary just so I can vote for her. Then it’s nothing but Green for me.
rikyrah
If they nominate that stupid heifer, then they are in worse shape than I thought.
Woodrowfan
After 2000 and 2004 I no longer believe that any Republican is too stupid or crazy to win.
Warren Terra
@Tunch:
Per Google translate, offered as a public service to the thread:
Hopefully someone can make more sense of this than Google Translate offers to me.
Spaghetti Lee
Trump/Bachmann 2012! The Hairpiece and the Harridan!
inkadu
@Tunch: شقيق Tunch. المشي بين أقدام العملاق حتى يقع فوق. حينها يمكن أن يكون حرا. الله أكبر
Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)
@Tunch: Hang tough, guy. Tuna’s on its way.
Spaghetti Lee
@Warren Terra:
I think “get me some tuna fish” is all we really need to take away if we want to keep all our fingers.
me
@Omnes Omnibus: “Say what you want about the tenets of National [email protected]…”
Really, if she wins, the country deserves to burn.
Omnes Omnibus
@Warren Terra: Actually, that is pretty articulate for a cat.
sukabi
@Warren Terra: obviously Tunch is threatening Cole… He’s claiming he’s a prisoner… But he really just wants his damn fish.
scav
@Spaghetti Lee: Take away tuna fish from Tunch? You first.
sukabi
@inkadu: I think that belongs on the “What did I miss” thread below.
Raenelle
Good argument in favor of a Bachman nomination. You’ve convinced me.
Church Lady
Doug, WTF is the saying? It may apply here, but you didn’t bother to say what it was.
dogwood
Bachmann and Palin are both stupid and ambitious. But Bachmann is willing to put in the hard work, stick with her job, stay off reality tv, do actual interviews with the press and defer getting stinking rich. That’s why she will run and Palin won’t.
eemom
let me go out on a limb here and insist that crazy twat ain’t gonna win the presidency. The nomination, maybe. Not the presidency.
Villago Delenda Est
Bachmann is the deserting coward with tits.
Utterly incompetent and unfit for any public office, whatsoever.
srv
Doug puts his shades on, throws Bachman Turner Overdrive’s You Ain’t Seen Nothin Yet into the 8-track, and hammers that accelerator.
Vanishing Point meets the Wingularity.
Napoleon
As for Rove saying nice things about MB, wasn’t he saying the same things about Palin at this point in her fame? People like him know people like Dubya, Palin and MB are idiots, but the idea is to sucker the nation into electing them before they figure it out and in the interim the people Rove really represent have a puppet in the White House.
sukabi
@Church Lady: he was making light of something Duhbya said that was so very pResidential…
JPL
Bachman’s former staff member is backing Pawlenty. That’s not a good omen.
Anya
DougJ, why won’t you think of the children? The coutry cannot survive crazy eyes and the lunatics in the House, plus the cowards in the Senate and the enabling villagers. Why do you hate America?
Lolis
Sounds like Mark McKinnon is now a covert agent for Team Obama.
Maude
@kdaug:
It would be worth it for a Bachmann/Palin Overdrive bumper sticker.
cat48
SC GOP org. had Conference this wk and here are the straw poll results for the Clownshow Primary:
gbear
@sukabi: Cole is the New Number Two just waiting to be demolished.
Back OT: I’m not voting for anyone from MN for president unless it’s Franken, although I may vote in the Republican primary just to throw a spanner in the works (we don’t have to register by party in MN).
sukabi
@Anya: yeah, but it would be an interesting run with Tweety yelling at MB, ‘ARE YOU HYPNOTIZED???!?’ every time he “interviewed” her…
sukabi
@gbear: Tunch doesn’t have an endless team of #2’s that he can ‘take out’… and I doubt Rosie will rise to the occasion.
Elia Isquire
There is no future; and Bobo’s dreamin’
Noooooo fuuuuuture
Noooooo fuuuuuture
Noooooo future for yooooou
Spaghetti Lee
Rick Santorum came
Heh.
asiangrrlMN
@gbear: Ditto this. Unless it’s me. But still, just–no.
gbear
@sukabi: So Tunch just demolishes Cole on a daily basis. You work with what you got…
gbear
@ asiangrrlMN: I’ve done it before in order to get Arnie Carlson on the ballot rather than a christianist. It was fun. Lots of democrats did it and we wound up landing some unelectable losers on the ballot (this was back in the days when unelectable losers were unelectable).
Comrade DougJ
Nobody liked the extended Reservoir Dogs rift. Oh well.
El Cid
In the tiny chance that she won and became President, I say there’s at least one positive outcome:
If we really are determined to let this freak show of bastards push this nation off the cliff, I say that instead of this inch-by-inch creep toward the edge, let’s just go ahead full-fucking-hog and careen down to the bottom and stop all this time-wasting and fucking around.
If you’re going to do something, do it; don’t just keep delaying the conclusion.
sukabi
@El Cid: it would definitely start the pendulum swinging back the other way… the string we’re attached to at the moment seems to have stretched about as far as it can without actually breaking…
Sko Hayes
@cat48: LOL, talk about a confused electorate:
Republicans in disarray!! Send in the clowns!
Elia Isquire
@Comrade DougJ: Went over my head. Been years since I’ve seen that one. That scene in particular doesn’t exactly call out to me for a rendezvous…
eemom
@Comrade DougJ:
just didn’t recognize it. Usually have a good memory, but there’s something about the “Stuck In The Middle With You” scene from that movie that activates my mental 404 screen.
eemom
@Elia Isquire:
heh.
btw, I clicked on your blog. You’re cute. I can say that, cuz I’m old enough to be your mother.
Woodrow "asim" Jarvis Hill
@Lolis:
Google proves my memory right — McKinnon’s the GOPer who quit the McCain campagin rather than run against Obama. He’s also the useful fool who helped start this No Labels business.
Make of that what you will.
Elia Isquire
@eemom: Aw shucks.
Egilsson
I think Tunch is saying:
Just a guess though.
Stan of the Sawgrass
Watching the ReThuglican’ts in their race for the earth’s core is fascinating in a “look-what-a-godawful-big-trainwreck, Lord-they’re-still-sending-more-trains-and-demanding-yet-more-and-bigger-trains” kind of way.
Republican Primary 2012! Michele Bachmann vs. Donald Trump as top-tier, with Hulkabeast v. Palin as a second matchup, with Pawlenty v. the always-game, always-a-loser Mitt Romney as a chaser.
I’d be laughing what’s left of my ass off, if I wasn’t down here in Florida, with Governor Not-Quite-Indicted and his veto-proof majority of deranged characters. The Guv may have only won by 1% of the vote (THAT’L show that sellout Obama!), but he says that the invincible forces of the Invisible Hand are behind his every move. Bend over and drop ’em. In the long run, everybody will benefit, and it won’t hurt so much. But for now, lie back and enjoy it.
kth
McKinnon is trying to scare independents and Villagers into engaging with the Republican party. (It won’t work on indie voters, may work on the Villagers). There’s no real danger of Bachmann getting nominated, let alone being elected President. But getting more independents, and especially the Gang of 500, to support a primary candidate makes the GOP look less crazy. But the GOP deserves to look crazy, should look crazy–because they are.
Gus
@Bob Loblaw: I beg to differ. If we go back into recession, he could easily lose as well. With gas heading toward $4/gallon, I think that is a good possibility.
Gustopher
Of all the Republicans, the only one I think wouldn’t govern from the batsh.t insane wing would be Mittens Romney. I have faith in his complete lack of convictions, and recognizing that if he wants a second term he would have to govern from the mythical center-right despite everything he says.
But, failing Mittens, Bachmann is the best choice. Visibly, obviously, undeniably crazy. And stupid. And arrogant enough not to recognize that she’s stupid. And not willing to be someone’s tool. Good luck governing with that. She would snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Imagine if George W. Bush actually wanted to use power rather than just kind of have it and hold it and defer the actual governing to others. And stupid rather than lazy. And just as stubborn, but with a bit more belligerence.
stannate
Thanks, Comrade DougJ, for the Minutemen reference in your title.
Bruce S
“Bachmann would arguably be a stronger GOP candidate for president than Palin in 2012. She works harder, she’s smarter, she has more discipline, more focus…”
Faint praise. I don’t think it’s even “arguable” – I think it’s prima facia, for what that’s worth.
“Bachmann would fill the void left by Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN)”
That is, indeed, a hell of a void…
Rove: “She’s smart, she’s tough, she’s funny…”
Yeah, that last part is absolutely true. How’s about “Hilarious!”
“This could get very entertaining.”
It already is.
I’m sticking with my assessment of The Donald as perfect standardbearer for the GOP – he’s totally full of shit (aka “Himself!”)
SIA
@Warren Terra: Babylon sez:
I think I’ll do my vulnerability too.
Wolfdaughter
@Warren Terra:
I think you translated catly thoughts very well. Thanks for taking the time.
Shoemaker-Levy 9
Bachmann puts up a good fight but comes up just short. In order to consolidate the Bachmann wing of the party nominee Romlenty offers her Secretary of State as a quid pro quo.
Are you sure you want Bachmann to do well in the primaries?
JBerardi
@stannate:
I’ve often wondered why EVERY Balloon Juice thread doesn’t include some sort of Minutemen reference. They’re an absolute leftist hippie goldmine: “Sweat pain, agony, on Friday, I’ll get paid” … “All these men who work the land, should evaluate themselves and make a stand” … “They all work, they’re the working mass. We all work, for the ruling class” … “Hands shaking, bodies stacking, have you been there? I’ve been there!” … “Was this our policy? Ten long years. Not one domino shall fall!”. And that’s just off the top of my head.
Anyway, thanks for a reference to the greatest American rock band ever, DougJ.
BrendanL
@Comrade DougJ: I saw it and loved it!
Evolved Deep Southerner
@Comrade DougJ: Doug, I just now got here and saw it and I’m scrolling furiously down through the comments thinking “I know I can’t be the only one who caught that.” I mean, I didn’t want to pile on if the compliments had been “done to death,” you know? And then I got to your comment. Good shit, my brother. That’s a cultural reference I can believe in.
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@Tunch: I knew it! You are a deobandi!
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@Tunch: yes, الموت للصليبيين
soon, my brother, soon.
;)
bago
Octal, izzat you? Females familiar with Arabic in hacker culture are somewhat rare.
bob h
There is no bottom to American politics. With Trump and Bachmann we are in new territory indeed.
kerFuFFler
@Bob Loblaw: Spot on! All it takes is some “scary” incident to get the masses all hysterical about mooslums and the Repubs could win. Especially if something happens right before the election—–and I’m not sure I’d put it past the Rethuglicans at this point.
Rosie
@Tunch:
شقيق Tunch ، عندما يتم تسليم التونة يمكنني تشغيل بعض تسريب للماجستير كول. دعونا نقول لنصف الحمولة. الصفقة؟
Robert Waldmann
Not gonna happen. No way Bachman is the nominee. Building up Bachman is part of the effort to sandbag Palin. I’m sure that’s the plan. Bachman is a dangerous competitor for Palin — they are both extremist, both young, both female, both really good looking, both ignorant, both crazy, both gaffe prone. I am rock solid certain that Rove et al are promoting Bachman to split the Palin vote. I wouldn’t even be surprised if Bachman is in on it and running, because she has been promised that she will be rewarded somehow for undercutting Palin. Yes that sounds too rational for Bachman, but just because your paranoid doesn’t mean you aren’t out to get what you can.
Hermione Granger-Weasley
@Rosie: Sister, وسنعمل على الصليبيين يغرق في بحيرات من الدم وجعل إطعام الأطباق من جماجمهم.