Well done, Mittens:
Expected Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney tread on socially dangerous ground last night as he talked about the need to “hang” a misery index around the neck of Barack Obama, the nation’s first black president.
Romney almost immediately caught himself, with the English major declaring “metaphorically” speaking, but the mix of nervous laughter with applause indicated at least some in the audience realized its potency.
You know, the fact that he immediately realized what he was saying and that it was a tragic word choice shows to me that at the very least, Romney possesses a degree of self-awareness and the tiniest sliver of decency, something that I think has eluded a lot of the other Republican hopefuls.
On the other hand, there is the fact that Romney simply isn’t as stupid as the many policies he has adopted in his rightward lurch the past few years. Some of his positions have been straight out evil- whether it be his double Gitmo bullshit, or hiring advisory staff who recommend knifing prisoners in the thigh, or his decision to grab up a baton and stand at the front of the Planned Parenthood Hate Parade, or any of the millions of other issues in which he once had maybe not the ideal position, but one that was at least humane and defensible, but jettisoned in order to curry favor with the wingnut primary voters.
So basically, my general position is that there is a sliver of humanity in that shell of a man, but it is being held down and waterboarded by the inner sociopath that just has to be President to show up daddy. I leave it to you all to decide what is worse, to just be plain evil, like Palin, or to know better but do evil anyway like Romney.
IM
Oh, he is intelligent. But someone intelligent with the wrong policies – in his case plutocracy – is still dangerous.
Brian S
I don’t think it really matters. If you try to “read his heart” and say he’s not as bad as the rest, then you’re counting on the idea that he’d change once in office. But that’s based on nothing more than supposition–sort of like the “progressives” who saw Obama as one of them when he campaigned as a moderate. I think at some point you have to look at Romney and say that even if he does have a sliver of humanity, he’s decided to suppress it in favor of increasing his chances of getting elected. More evil or less evil? I don’t think it really matters.
Omnes Omnibus
There is also the possibility that use of “hang” was deliberate and the immediate catch and minor walkback was also intentional. He gets his dogwhistle and credit for a sliver of decency from people like you. My benefit of a doubt for the GOP is pretty much gone. If they want credit for behaving decently, then I want to see decent behavior.
ploeg
That’s as may be as your analysis applies to Romney himself. To his supporters, he’s just another martyr of political correctness who got away with one, this time.
PsiFighter37
The man will do or say anything to get elected. I bet it’s killing him on the inside though that he has to appeal to a bunch of nitwits on a level that is clearly below his intellectual plane (at least based on his past career accomplishments).
You reap what you sow…
Tom Q
I’d say this puts him in the same position where Garry Wills placed Bush the Father in 1988 — obviously smart/aware enough not to believe the full load of crap, but willing to intone it in order to get elected. Wills’ conclusion was that this made Bush an enabler. And I don’t see what difference it makes in the long run. It’s like the distinction between David Brooks and Rush Limbaugh — they’ll get to the same place, but the first one more politely.
Josie
@Omnes Omnibus: This.
Gretchen
According to my childhood study in Catholic school, a mortal sin (the sort that sends you to hell for all eternity), requires:
You must do something seriously wrong.
You must know it’s seriously wrong.
And you decide to go ahead and do it anyway.
Sounds like what you described.
Whereas someone who decides to do something they don’t think is seriously wrong, doesn’t get the big guns, even if they do it, because they didn’t realize it was so bad.
By that standard, Romney is worse than Palin. The only saving grace is that, if he were in office, he’d probably moderate some of his positions, while she’d think that getting elected was her go-ahead to go full-tilt crazy.
Brian S
@Tom Q: You’re right about Bush the Elder. I also thought of John McCain circa 2000, when it became clear that he’d endure any insult necessary to have a shot at the top job, even racism directed at his family. When you’re willing to sell out at that level, then you can’t be counted on to stand for anything.
freelancer
but libtards are the real racists!
gnomedad
@Gretchen:
So let us praise St. Ronnie, the patron saint of un-self-awareness.
Villago Delenda Est
@Omnes Omnibus:
That’s my take on it. It was a dogwhistle to the racist vermin who constitute the GOP base. “See, I’m not really some RINO…I’m a bigoted asshole, just like you!”
MikeJ
One republican once did something somewhere that indicated he might not be a racist fuckwit.
Let’s throw him a parade.
MattF
Problem for me is that Romney has that non-human gleam in his eye. He’s sold his soul, and there’s something evil peeking out the window.
Marlene
Don’t you think he read what he was going to say before he said it and maybe he even wrote part of it himself? If so, wouldn’t he have caught the ‘hang’ reference before stating it.
The Dangerman
@Omnes Omnibus:
This.
Allan
That’s right, because Republicans aren’t into lynching any more. They’ve moved on to necklacing.
4tehlulz
In the modern GOP, showing decency, whether genuine or fraudulent, is a sign of weakness.
Either way, he’s apparently decided not to compete seriously in the SC primary.
WereBear (itouch)
A worse person? Palin.
A worse sin? Romney. At least I remember my Dad it explaining it thusly.
But really, it does matter. For the state of their souls. Governing-wise, believing the crap you’re slinging works out worse.
Villago Delenda Est
@Brian S:
Yeah, McCain, being an utter slave to his ambition, gladly sold out his family and his honor for a shot at fulfilling that ambition.
Which is perhaps the principle reason I loathe him so. The man underwent the sort of treatment that the deserting coward malassministration handed out to “high value” detainees, and he did not speak up in opposition…no, he actively supported the very things that you’d think he’d most object to, due to his up close and personal experience.
But his ambition overruled even that shred of human decency that should have been present in him, due to what one would think would be learning the lesson the very hard way.
Cat Lady
How can anyone take him seriously about anything? He’s the most transparently ambitious opportunistic snake the world has ever seen. His eyes are dead, like a doll’s eyes. And a dog abuser, also too.
ppcli
What he said was actually much worse than the excerpt you give. After saying that the misery index should be “hung around his neck” he continued:
I suppose I’m too naïve, but I can’t believe this was deliberate. On the other hand, in our media age, such positioning is prepared in advance, it’s also hard to believe that a serious candidate and his high-priced handlers would have prepared such an incendiary metaphor without thinking through the ramifications.
I guess I’ll add, though, that I think when the Republicans blow these dogwhistles (I’m not sure this was such a case) there is a double purpose. There is an effort to connect with a certain hard core, but also there is an effort to provoke a reaction so as to dismiss the opposition: “We are Serious, and all they can do is accuse us of being racists, in an effort to detract from the Serious Issues we are facing.”
I confess that even after nearly 30 years living in this country the racial subtexts are a poorly understood non-native language for me. But this kind of thing seems like a trap set by the Republicans. They would like nothing better than to make the opposition seem like one between “Accusations of Racism” versus “Serious Policy Proposals for these Serious Times”. And unfortunately I think a lot of people would buy that.
Gromit
I can’t believe I’m going to bat for Mittens, but isn’t the usage “hang X around his neck” completely unrelated to lynching imagery? The metaphor is about public shaming, not execution, as in to hang a symbol of an offense around the offender’s neck for all to see. Right?
The Ancient Randonneur (formerly known as The Grand Panjandrum)
This is about as much an “oops” as transporting your dog on the roof of a car. At least the dog shit all over the car.
Silver
@Villago Delenda Est:
McCain, being helped along of course, by an enabling village media.
If Obama had left his first wife after an accident because she wasn’t pretty enough anymore and he was whoring around anyways, how many times do you think we would have heard about that?
gogol's wife
@Gromit:
See #22 above. Dogwhistle, no question. “We’re going to hang him” — it’s not just a slip of the tongue, not when you combine it with everything else.
ppcli
@Gromit: Yes, but if you follow it up as Romney did, with: “We’re going to hang him… [ums and ahems omitted] with an Obama Misery Index.” you are no longer in “public shaming only” territory.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gromit:
Oh, please. The walkback itself is the tell in this incident.
It was a wink right after the dogwhistle, to make sure the dog heard it.
trollhattan
I dunno, I heard the Mittens gaffe on the radio and from the delivery and tone (and background chuckles) thought there was a bit of regret that he couldn’t use a quip about this president that would otherwise go over well used on a white dude.
If he’s the best they can come up with….
TD
Ack! Hanging something on someone’s neck is not a lynching metaphor. If anything is being hanged in the lynching sense, it is the millstone, or the albatross, or, in this case, the misery index. Do you think Mitten’s is calling for the lynching of a “misery index”? What would that even mean? In that metaphor, is Obama a tree? It doesn’t make sense.
Racial dog whistles exist, this (probably) wasn’t one of them. You’re acting like the wingers after Obama said “lipstick on a pig”. People are *allowed* to use common phrases.
Yutsano
@4tehlulz:
He has no chance there anyway. A Mormon is regarded as a cultist to teh Jeebus freaks. I still have no idea how Willard threads that needle, especially since in his last run he doubled down on his Mormon ties.
Villago Delenda Est
@TD:
TD, you’re missing, gloriously, the point.
Mittens himself, in the walkback, made sure that his audience understood his meaning.
You recall when Obama used the “lipstick on a pig” metaphor back in 2008, and the sow Palin immediately took personal offense? Mittens was making sure that his audience understood his intent by using what SHOULD be a fairly innocent figure of speech.
Deliberate, with malice aforethought.
ppcli
@TD: “We’re going to hang him… [ums and ahems omitted] with an Obama Misery Index.”
You think “him” refers to a tree?
Dr. Loveless
@ppcli:
Except for the lack of any Serious Policy Proposals, you’re probably right. I expect this “slip of the tongue, then giggle and backpedal” maneuver a lot between now and next November. We can call it the Reverse Romney, if you all want.
Martin
@WereBear (itouch): Nobody thinks Palin realizes the power of what she’s saying? Seriously? Romney makes the worse sin because he acknowledges what he said was wrong, where Palin doubles down in it instead?
Mike in NC
Sincere crazy asshole vs. someone playing at being a crazy asshole to pander to the base: tough call.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus:
Fuckin ouch.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@Omnes Omnibus:
this was my first thought, and being that its romney, i simply don’t care to have another.
Yutsano
@Corner Stone: Angry Midwestern lawyer is angry. I kinda glossed that comment of OO’s the first time but on the re-read I seriously considered going for the storm shelter.
nancydarling
I haven’t read the comments here and just listened to the Romney gaffe. From my perspective, it was calculated. Here are a couple of sentences from a blog in Arkansas I post on sometimes. I guarantee the woman who wrote this heard Mitt’s dog whistle:
>All that it requires is enough people with courage to act en masse. Or even one or two very brave men to act alone, and perhaps change the fate of the nation. You may call me an idealist. History has proven, however, that those who fight for freedom and call upon God’s aid to do so, can overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles.<
nancydarling
Block quote fail. Some one needs to tell me again how to do it.
ppcli
@Dr. Loveless: I agree, of course, that they don’t actually have any serious policy proposals. But they have something just as good: bullshit that media prostitutes like Bobo and George Will etc. will describe as Serious Policy Proposals. (You know – like the proposal to cut taxes on the wealthy to 25%, which will bring unemployment down to 2.8 percent and eliminate the deficit? Serious like that.) Given that the Republicans got a wave of voters to regard them as saviors of Medicare last election, and haven’t seemed to pay any political price for campaigning on a “jobs, jobs, jobs” platform and then doing f*ckall about jobs (but lots about union-busting, defunding planned parenthood, etc.) afterwards, I’m not at all confident in the ability of the public to see a transparent sham for what it is.
Evolved Deep Southerner
Gretchen:
Well, he’s a Mormon. If he was Catholic, he’d go to hell. But as it is, he’ll go to … some planet?
And, no, I don’t think this was a racist gaffe. I can understand why the default position would be to assume that it would be coming from a GOPer, but I’m just not seeing/hearing it in this case.
He’s saving the unabashedly racist shit for later, I’m sure. The guy will say anything – AN-EE-THING – if he thinks it will help him. I think that’s why you hear so many Progressives say “God, Romney’s a sack of shit, but I think the country would survive him as President. Palin (or basically any of the others?) I’m not so sure.”
Given the number of times he’s flip-flopped, it’s not hard to imagine him doing a complete 180 on all the crazy shit from the first day of his administration.
Which begs the question: How fucked up have things become that many are most comfortable with this blatant panderer – PRECISELY because we know he has no true compass or center?
Brian S
@TD: The problem is that while he may have meant to go with the “hang the misery index around his neck,” that’s not what came out. What came out is “hang him” and then some uncomfortable pauses, and then the reference to the index, and “hang him” is going to come off as a lynching reference, whether that’s where Romney was intending to go or not.
Bob Loblaw
No offense, but I can’t imagine you’ll find another politician yet where that hasn’t been the case.
Unless you think Obama, for example, loves lighting up Pakistani children in drone attacks, discriminating gay people’s right to marriage publicly, and selling arms to Saudi Arabia.
Rationalization in the pursuit of incremental progress is the entirety of the politician’s existence, really.
Nutella
@Yutsano:
And his dad was a Mexican, too, so obviously he can’t be a real American just like he’s not a real Xtian.
ppcli
@nancydarling: Wow. That’s approaching visit from the Secret Service territory. “History has shown”, eh? I wonder if John Wilkes Booth is another of the “one or two very brave men who act alone” that she has in mind.
handy
@Evolved Deep Southerner:
It’s frightening. Our republic is in serious trouble.
TD
I see this as an incorrectly worded phrase, which he then tried to recover from by making it a mixed metaphor. He realized that that didn’t work, and corrected himself.
Has a similar thing really never happened to anyone? The other day I said “on the even”, as opposed to “on the level”. While I didn’t try to be smooth and play it off, I’m also not a politician trying to convey an aura of infallibility.
WereBear (itouch)
Yes, I believe Palin believes what she says, because the best con artists DO.
As much as she believes in anything, which is tiny indeed.
WereBear (itouch)
Yes, I believe Palin believes what she says, because the best con artists DO.
As much as she believes in anything, which is tiny indeed.
Omnes Omnibus
@TD: In an off the cuff remark, your view might make sense, but wasn’t this a prepared speech?
nancydarling
@ppcli: In my reply to her I told her that the Secret Service did not look kindly on those kind of statements. It was on a thread about the release of the long form birth certificate. She just “loved the constitution so much” and was concerned that President Obama might not be qualified per the constitution. That said, there are lots of wonderful liberal, progressive people here in AR and we regularly beat up on people like that woman. I do believe that there are many out there who secretly long for “one or two brave men” and they don’t all live in southern red states. There is no changing their minds though. I don’t argue with them to change their minds. My argument is for the many people who read this particular blog who are open to reason.
Ruckus
Does it matter if he walks on 4 legs and brays or that crap comes out of his mouth? He’s still an ass.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Yes. Which means Mittens owns it. And the fact that he’s trying to weasel out of it is only making things worse. They really will all feel better if they just call Obama the six letter N word. The way it kills them that they can’t is almost painful to watch.
Loneoak
I can’t believe we are at the point where a politician gets points for somewhat gracefully walking back a lynching joke about the President.
Omnes Omnibus
Could someone with keys to the cleaning supply cupboard please fix the blockquote issue here?
nancydarling
@Omnes Omnibus: The problem is not with the site. The problem is with me. I forgot how to block quote. If someone tells me again how to do it, I promise to write it down this time. I am getting old and have to do things at least eleventy-seven times before I get it etched in my brain.
Omnes Omnibus
@nancydarling: I use the buttons.
Did this work?
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Loneoak:
It’s not a lynching reference.
Do you watch Curb Your Enthusiasm? If so, do you remember the episode that ends with Larry wearing the sandwich board that says “I steal forks”? That’s what Mittens is talking about: An old fashion way of shaming someone, not lynching.
maus
I don’t believe this is a HUGE issue, because I believe that plenty of Republicans are honestly stupid enough to write a speech that invokes both lynching and an albatross at the same time. I don’t see it as a dogwhistle, but who knows these days? I couldn’t count it out.
Ken
Isn’t this similar to that old saying, “Ignorance is curable but stupid is permanent”? In that case, ignorance is more culpable; you can learn what you don’t know. Here, I think it goes the other way – the evil person cannot help what they are, but the good person who chooses evil can.
soonergrunt
One needs an asskicking and the other needs to be put down.
When you meet a rabid dog, you call animal control, because it’s never going to be more than a rabid dog, no matter what you do and it might kill you and your kids on the way down. It doesn’t mean to be that way. It just is. So it is with Palin.
Romney, OTOH, is like that rich kid in high school that wasn’t the most popular because he was just so desperate to be class president. He’d do whatever he thought would get him elected, and if that meant calling the minority kids and special needs students names behind the teachers’ backs, he’d do it. But once he pissed off the wrong guy and got his ass handed to him once, he at least acted like a decent person.
Neither one would make a good President.
nancydarling
@Omnes Omnibus: In what order?
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): It’s a lynching reference when you are talking about a black man.
Yutsano
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Except that’s not what Mittens said. He said “Hang him”, then paused, mumbled, then threw in the Obama Misery Index comment in there. Even if it was innocent it was rather inelegant. And considering the number of dogwhistles that have been flying all over the place, I’m sure Willard was trying to at least get some focus on himself.
ppcli
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Did anyone on that episode say that Larry should be hanged with the sandwich board? Because – whether accidentally or deliberately – that’s what Romney said about Obama. Read his remarks. I’m naïve enough ( (and perhaps not enough of a “natural born American”) to believe it was an accident. But there’s no disputing what he actually said.
artem1s
@Brian S:
I see it as more along the lines of “here, read this” from his handlers and not realizing the shitstorm he’s going to get into until it has already escaped his mouth. Yes, he’s smart enough to recognize the dog whistle, but he’s not smart enough to vet his remarks ahead of time and he trusted the party line he is fed implicitly. Unlike Bush it doesn’t take a cudgel for him to get a clue. Unlike Dole and McCain he is still capable of being shocked and embarrassed.
So I guess what we have here is the GOP crowned prince for 2012. As long as he remains willing to read what they hand him, accept that the party will stoop to using deplorable dog whistles to win, and learns to cover better in public and act like he doesn’t understand what all the fuss is about. Looks like he doesn’t have the last one nailed down quite yet.
JAHILL10
@Loneoak: This. And to hell with anyone referring to this as the PC patrol picking on poor Mitt. This is disgusting racism. And if we don’t start calling this crap out when it happens, then we are truly doomed. Political correctness has nothing to do with it. Since when did common decency get lumped in with PC? It was a prepared speech, there are at least three other ways he could have expressed the idea that he was expressing. That he chose “hanging” and “hang” was neither accidental nor excusable. I don’t think that politicians have to have infallible speech but you can’t convince me that someone who has the experience of addressing people in a political context that this POS has accidentally let that one slip.
TD
I don’t know how much he strayed from the prepared remarks. That could probably be found out. The answer might even change my mind.
But in truth, I’m doubtful, in part, because cryptic lynching references just don’t SEEM like a normal racial dog whistle. My own understanding about racism in America is such that I don’t think lynching metaphors would be popular, even amongst the most committed racists. Yeah, you have some nuts sitting around fapping to The Turner Diaries, but, on average, the outlets for bigotry strike me as much more banal than murderous fantasies.
So yeah, I think there is a lot of dog whistling over affirmative action, over welfare, over the drug wars, over any number of issues, but…lynching? I don’t see it. I don’t see *most* racists as people sitting around cackling over their plans to kill. Racism is terrible, but it is complicated — it doesn’t make you a murderer, and it doesn’t make you someone comfortable with the idea of murder.
BOSS BITCH
Know better and do evil which means he is unfit to be leader of this country. The fringe is not going away and if he becomes president he will always have to pander to them.
Triassic Sands
What’s worse is Donald Trump…hands down.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@nancydarling:
No it’s not. What you’re doing is conflating it, the way I’ve seen it done dozens of times when Bugs Bunny is used to insult someone- “What a maroon!”- and the malaprop for “moron” is taken by someone as a reference to race.
I’ll go with Freud on this: “Sometimes a cigar is a cigar.” But there’s another choice, Hanlon’s Razor: “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.”
Just Some Fuckhead
I guarantee you that Romney would host the nicest lynching anyone ever attended. He’s just that good a person.
Yutsano
@BOSS BITCH:
Adjusted for accuracy. Pandering is always a choice. It’s just who you pander to that makes the difference.
(blockquote fail. And I’ve edited this comment four times now. I need blood sugar.)
nancydarling
@TD: See my post at #40. That line was from a “nice” church going woman here in AR who has probably never heard of The Turner Diaries.
gnomedad
@ppcli:
He said this after the first bit? Asshole. He gets the dog whistle in, then a little whine about political correctness. Poor Mitt, they played the race card on him.
Omnes Omnibus
@nancydarling: the “b-quote” button is a toggle. Use it before the quote for on and after the quote for off.
nancydarling
@Omnes Omnibus: Got it. Thanks.
lamh34
Hey John C,
Booman has an excerpt up of some reporting on the event that Mittens was at where the “hang ” gaffe was made.
Did you also know that he opened his bits with a birther joke.
Still think he’s deserves some credit???
Booman has a link to article: The Freak Show Begins
by BooMan
excerpt:
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
You can also highlight the text and hit the b-quote button.
That puts the start and end commands around the selected text.
kth
I’d just as soon the racial stuff didn’t distract from the main point here, which is that Romney’s substantive point is just pure bullshit: no real economists (that includes Greg Mankiw but excludes Heritage Foundation hacks) believe that the lingering unemployment is the result of policies Obama favors (except insofar as there ought to have been more stimulus, which I’m pretty sure isn’t Romney’s point).
BR
Saw this today:
TRUMP/PALIN (TP) 2012: Reaching Bottom
MikeBoyScout
Well said.
But evil is evil.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@lamh34:
FIFY
gnomedad
Time to recall Jon Stewart’s take on Mitt’s gracious withdrawal from the Republican primary in 2008.
MattR
@lamh34: I don’t see anything offensive about that joke. Not funny, either. But not much different in context than any of the other snarky comments I have heard form comedians and others about Obama’s decision to release his birth certificate. It is not like he was using the joke to doubt the validity of the birth certificate.
johnsmith1882
Fuck Romney. We’re supposed to give him credit for realizing that “hanging” a black man is a poor choice of words. Some pretty low standards. I had a similar argument with a friend of mine regarding Sullivan. He wants to give him credit for being anti-torture and thinking Palin is a retard. Wow, good for him. Anybody who isn’t anti-torture is a cretin, Palin is empirically retarded, just because a conservative is able to join the rest of humanity, he should get some credit?
lamh34
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): @MattR:
why mention “birther” meme at all. are there not enough jokes to make about Joe Biden that do not involve a “birther” joke?
Romney is running for President of US, he’s not some random comic trying to get a laugh. Now if Romney wants to be comedian in cheif then he should say so.
The joke was a birther joke hidden within a Biden joke…period and not even a very funny one.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@lamh34:
Oh, I dunno. Maybe because it’s a very hot topic right now. As MattR put it:
Omnes Omnibus
@lamh34: Like I said above, I am no longer inclined to give Republicans the benefit of a doubt on issues or gaffes. They lost that indulgence.
Just Some Fuckhead
Later in the speech Mitt tells another “joke”:
MattR
@lamh34:
Have you been following the news this week? Do you hold other politicians to the same standard when they use the hot topic of the week to try and make a joke to loosen up the crowd? If a Democratic politician had made a joke about Donald Trump’s reaction to the birth certificate being released you would not have had a problem.
lamh34
sorry, i’m calling BS. this was Romney opening bit not a reaction to any question about the birther meme.
Romney who for the most point, was the only contender what actually said unequivically, when asked that the birther thing was NOT an issue. He believed that the President was a US citizen, and that there was other more important issues to confront the President with.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Omnes Omnibus:
It’s one thing to not indulge them, and another thing to overreact like a bunch of WATBs.
jayjaybear
Romney has Bush’s Daddy Syndrome, only about 10x worse, because George Romney was 10x the man and 10x the human that Poppy was, and Mittens knows that he can’t possibly live up to that, as a modern Republican, no matter what he does.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@lamh34:
The joke wasn’t about the birth certificate. It was about Joe Biden’s ambition to be POTUS, that Biden would throw Obama under the bus for something as weak as the birth certificate issue.
MattR
@lamh34:
IMO, this is more evidence against your position. If Orly Taitz was making the joke you would know there was a hidden meaning beneath it. But since Romney has clearly stated that Obama is an American it is hard to see what he was going for.
OTOH – Had the joke been something about it being a coincidence that the doctor on the BC had died in 2003, that would have been an offensive attempt to continue the birther meme.
MikeJ
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): It was “Democrats are insane birthers just like republicans”.
Omnes Omnibus
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Cole is saying Romney deserves credit for what he did; I am saying he doesn’t. He had a prepared speech where he through the issue out there and then reeled it back in. It would have been easy enough to avoid.
I would never have talked about any of this if Cole hadn’t given him an attaboy.
Maude
@Omnes Omnibus:
Mittens isn’t new to the political scene.
It was deliberate.
Edit: I agree with you and he is despicable.
Just Some Fuckhead
The joke was actually a very subtle bit of wordsmithing intended to a) put the birther thing behind Republicans by b) making it seem like it was an issue to Democrats.
TD
“It would have been easy enough to avoid.”
I need to quibble with this. 95 percent of the mistakes and misstatements I’ve ever made were “easy enough to avoid”. And chances are, you could say the same. Thing is, they weren’t avoided, they were mistakes.
Has anyone seen the prepared remarks? People DO go off script. Until I see the prepared remarks, I’m operating on the assumptions made in #49.
Villago Delenda Est
@lamh34:
Sorry, but saying he “believed” that the President is a US citizen isn’t good enough.
“I believe” is weaseling. It’s giving him an out to appease the birthers.
If he had said, in no uncertain terms, that Obama was born in Hawaii, is a natural born citizen, and any other position was flat out incorrect and in conflict with the known and indisputable facts in the case, he’d be on solid ground.
He chose to use “believe” instead.
Villago Delenda Est
@MattR:
No. See my #103.
He has NOT clearly stated that. He’s hedged.
Fred
Ahhhh yes, there is that inner Republican with Libertarian curious streak fighting to get out once again John Galt….err Cole!
eemom
@Omnes Omnibus:
I agree, and it kind of makes me sick that anybody even wants to spend their time arguing over this.
@Loneoak:
That, too.
Seems to me we’re getting sucked into Teh Crazy when we’re debating which amongst this appalling array of sociopathic, soul-selling whores is “not as bad” as another.
Shorter moi: get a fucking clue already, Cole.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Omnes Omnibus:
WATB (2010 Steelers edition):
Helluvan attaboy, there. ‘Way to go, champ! On third and ten you picked up an inch rather than getting sacked! I’ve got a feeling that someone’s goin’ to the super Bowl…’
NobodySpecial
Romney = McCain 2008 2.0
Mako
@eemom:
The race argument is good for pageviews.
And Cole doesn’t seem to mind being manipulated.
MattR
@Villago Delenda Est: Fair enough. And he deserves criticism for that stance. But I don’t think it changes the meaning/intent of his birther/Joe Biden joke.
Dream On
Cole,
You are assuming that there could be a nationally known Republican in 2011 who is not mendacious, avaricious, disingenuous and cruel. I see no evidence to assume such a Republican exists. Why fish in a pond where no fish have ever been caught?
Josie
I thought the opening joke was supposed to be on Donald Trump. He made reference to that “amiable, know-it-all windbag” and then paused, so that everyone would think he was going to name Trump and then put a twist on it by naming Biden. It was a poorly written joke and not funny at all, but it wasn’t meant to question Obama’s citizenship. Full disclosure, I really can’t stand Romney and think the other thing was a definitely planned dog whistle, After all, he saw Trump getting by with it and figured why not.
danimal
If the knowledgeable, temperate Mitt were anywhere on display, I’d have more hope. But the Romney that we see is just a sad spectacle. Does anyone believe that President Mittster has the stones to tell Limbaugh to STFU? I know I don’t.
I’m glad he realized the potential harm and immediately walked back his words, and I don’t sense he was dog whistling racism on this one. But in the end, it just doesn’t matter. He’s going to follow the evil yahoos and do their bidding, no matter what is in his heart.
eemom
@Dream On:
Or, in the alternative
grandpajohn
@Gromit: Now a days the use of words indicating hanging something around ones neck, conjures up the idea of this;
Necklacing is a type of execution in which a rubber tyre is filled with gasoline, forced over the arms and chest of the victim, and set alight. It was a common practice in South Africa during the 1980s and 1990s anti-apartheid struggle.
kdaug
@soonergrunt:
Funny, I happen to be watching the remake of Dawn of the Dead on SciFi right now.
RossInDetroit
I’m pretty sure that there’s the voice of a conscience whispering in Mitt’s ear.
But it’s drowned out by the voice hollering PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES! in his other one.
cckids
@Josie: “poorly written” is throwing roses at it. No matter which side you’re on, who describes Trump as “amiable”?
Nickws
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again):
WTF? When did it become the accepted wisdom that Biden still had any ambition to be president? I missed that bit.
He was running to be Hillary’s VP in the ’08 primaries. It’s just pure happenstance Obama ended up being the boss who would hire him.
You going to spend the next year explaining the Mormon’s robotic non-humor to us, eh brah?
Josie
@cckids: True, but he’s walking a fine line and doesn’t want to piss off the 50% who are polling for Trump.
grandpajohn
Seems as if I was the only one to immediately associate hang around the neck with the practice of necklacing rather than with the old style of lynching
phoebes-in-santa fe
@nancydarling: Nancy, would you link to the blog? I love reading local blogs! Thanks.
nancydarling
@grandpajohn: I think that would be an extreme dog whistle not heard by many. Most of the people dog whistles are intended for have never heard of necklacing. I’ll just go with the hanging bit. And even if Mitt didn’t mean it as a dog whistle, a lot of people will hear it that way.
nancydarling
Here you go:
http://www.arktimes.com/blogs/ArkansasBlog/
soonergrunt
@kdaug: good movie.
mclaren
No one seems familiar with irregular past tenses anymore.
The past tense of tread is “trod.” Likewise, the past tense of wreak is “wrought.” The other day some WaPo bozo wrought about how the Tea Party had “wreaked havoc.” No, the Tea Party has wrought havoc.
I understand that the average person can no longer grasp basics like the documented fact of Darwinian macroevolution or global warming, but can’t we at least speak the English language?
Allan
@grandpajohn: You’re not alone. See my #17.
Gromit
@gogol’s wife (and others):
Ah, I didn’t see the “hang him” part. Halfhearted defense withdrawn.
In my defense, the bit of the article John quoted conflates one metaphor with the other in an unhelpful way.
Omnes Omnibus
@mclaren: And what is up with people who are no longer capable of using future perfect tense? Amirite?
Just Some Fuckhead
@mclaren: Gah! Yesterday, on this very blog, someone used “insure” instead of “ensure”. I was so overcome, I had to lie down.
Corner Stone
Can we please have a thread on anything but racism?
Auto erotic mishaps, dentist visits that went wrong, times we woke up in a place where no one spoke English and we weren’t sure why we had a box of thumbtacks, bucket of ice and a 9 iron on the floor beside us? How awesome the new Fast Five movie is, or maybe the NFL Draft?
Fuck.
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone:
That happened to you too? Small world.
suzanne
Has anyone heard from Amanda? I hope her surgery went well. I would assume that’s not the kind of medical procedure immediately after which one is kicked to the curb (a.k.a. sent home)….
Yutsano
@suzanne: She didn’t say how long she was going to be out of contact, but my guess right now is A) she’s still hospitalized and B) she is probably too sore and tired to do much actual blogging. The surgery is quite involved from what I understand.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Corner Stone: If you were as white as Allan (which is really fucking white, BTW) you’d feel differently about racism in America.
burnspbesq
Until Romney can say what he said without causing this kind of freakout, we have no business thinking of ourselves as a post-racial society. Because the simple fact is that he should be able to say what he said. That imagery should be innocuous.
Shame on all of us.
Corner Stone
I swear to fucking God, if the god damned Hall Monitoring around this fucking hole doesn’t cease and/or desist I’mma take a FLAME-THROWER to this place!!
Just Some Fuckhead
@Corner Stone:
It’s unfortunate to see you threaten others with violence. Your bullying tactics are little more than a derailing tactic to deflect conversation away from topics that make you uncomfortable.
Amir_Khalid
@mclaren:
You’ll love this, from Mark Halperin (The Page, April 30):
Incorrect use of past tense, instead of infinitive “smite”.
burnspbesq
@Corner Stone:
“I swear to fucking God, if the god damned Hall Monitoring around this fucking hole doesn’t cease and/or desist I’mma take a FLAME-THROWER to this place!!”
Or you could just GTFO, if it bugs you to that extent. Life’s too short.
Barb (formerly Gex)
Way late to the thread, but I have a little more respect for anti-gay folks who *actually believe what their preachers and Bible tell them* deep in their hearts than the assholes that deliberately stoke that bigotry and then give it a respectable veneer of being about “protecting marriage and children” and all that other family values bullshit.
Not much. But a little. I don’t see how we have 40 states banning SSM and DOMA without the assholes who profit. Those true believers were there all along.
MikeJ
@burnspbesq: You think people shouldn’t freak out when a politician says, “We’re going to hang him — uh, so to speak, metaphorically”?
Omnes Omnibus
@Just Some Fuckhead: Technically, he didn’t threaten others, as in people. He threatened the place, a thing.
Allan
@Corner Stone: Let me see if I understand.
You’re upset because you don’t like what other people are writing in the comments, and you want them to stop because they make you so incredibly angry?
Who’s the hall monitor here, exactly?
Chuck Butcher
@burnspbesq:
There is a possibility that without all the other shit going on that Mittens could have said that. The fact that his Party has made this impossible ought to dawn on him and his supporters. If this shit was coming only from, oh say The Aryan Nation, that awkward construction might just get ignored.
I doubt that any nation will ever be free of xenophobia and racism (regarding whomever) unless fear is eliminated as an emotion. When you’ve got 27% wedded to this crap you’ve got a screwed up society, especially with another portion even paying attention to them.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus: I also did my best Al Pacino, which idiots like burnsy missed.
Corner Stone
@Allan: No, you do not understand.
Nor did any one here expect you to, Hall Monitor.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Omnes Omnibus:
A place filled, with others. I understood the point. He wants to dehumanize us, by referring to the place instead of us, and he is doing it because, the predominant culture is a dehumanizing culture.
Just Some Fuckhead
So I ask you, who is the humanizing monitor, and who is the dehumanizing monitor?
,
Corner Stone
@Just Some Fuckhead: I suggest you e-mail Cole about it, and let him know you’ll no longer be commenting here until he does his duty as a blog owner.
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: Um, how to say this… It may have been your best Al Pacino, but….
@Just Some Fuckhead: He might have meant to do when no one was here. Perhaps you should confront him with your feelings.
Allan
@Omnes Omnibus: I thought JSF was Corner Stone’s sockpuppet. Check the kerning.
soonergrunt
@Omnes Omnibus: But did he do it in a grammatically correct manner?
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus: My real problem is, who the hell names a girl “Pippa” ?
That’s been bugging me.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Corner Stone:
It is not my place, to tell John Cole, how to run his, blog. I can only tell him, what he shouldn’t do. , As a concerned citizen of the, blogosphere, I have a duty to uphold the, values of everyone, not a select few.
soonergrunt
@Just Some Fuckhead: Excessive use of commas, dude.
here–
We recently had a shortage of punctuation around here. Please conserve your commas or we’ll hit peak comma much sooner than otherwise.
@Just Some Fuckhead: and here you just leave a perfectly good comma hanging all by itself. Bastard!
Just Some Fuckhead
@Omnes Omnibus:
I can, certainly see that you have no interest, in the feelings of me or others, based on your flippant suggestion that I should share my feelings, which are my feelings and my feelings alone, and therefore inviolable, with a bully who is proud of his bullying.
Just Some Fuckhead
I am so in character now. I hope I can come out of it before tonight’s party. I might get beat up by a girl.
Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)
@mclaren:
No it ain’t. Wrought is the past tense of work. As in wrought iron.
Merriam Webster:
Amir_Khalid
This place has hall monitors? Damn. I thought the rule here was anarchy, tempered but infrequently by John Cole’s vague notions of commenter decorum.
soonergrunt
@Corner Stone: Her name is Philippa. They’re British you know.
soonergrunt
@Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): Ohhh, burn!
Corner Stone
@soonergrunt: I am aware. I really just wanted to talk about how hot she is.
nancydarling
There’s some pedanticalness going on here.
Just Some Fuckhead
@nancydarling:
A mere technicality over syntaxuality.
AAA Bonds
Mitt Romney is too right-wing to be a safe choice for America. We will choose our chief executive in 2012 by choosing who we wish to exercise unconstitutional police powers over us that will, no matter who is elected, continue unreformed. They will likely expand, no matter who is elected.
But if the Republicans nominate any of their current slate other than Mitt Romney, I’d conclude that the Republican electorate considers national stability a secondary issue in the 2012 general election.
karen marie
If Romney is so smart, how is it that he uses a metaphor that he had to have practiced and not realize how totally inappropriate it is?
I don’t know, I think he’s very happy with what he said. He takes a very small hit of negativity now but it engenders positive feelings from the base toward Romney and, maybe, assuages some of the dislike/distrust they hold for him on a variety of issues.
This smells like a total win for Romney. He got to snicker at the president and have it excused as a “gaffe” and he’s now created an “inside joke” that his campaign can share with the base from now forward.
Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)
Poor grammar doesn’t bother me. Hypercorrection is amusing for obvious reasons.
nancydarling
@Just Some Fuckhead: Yes, but my word is in the dictionary and yours isn’t.
Just Some Fuckhead
@nancydarling:
If I make up my own words, I get to decide how to use them. No one gets to tell me the proper transitive form of my own words. Not without a fight.
nancydarling
This place has gone down a rabbit hole.
soonergrunt
Two things–first, what makes you think that Mitt Romney is any more stable than any other Republican, and second, OF COURSE stability is secondary to Republicans. Getting the darkie out of the WHITE house is the primary goal.
Omnes Omnibus
@nancydarling: Duck hole!
lldoyle
Everybody here has probably seen this, but for anyone who hasn’t, it’s as though little has changed in 75 years other than a ratcheting up of the crudity by the Republicans.
[It’s from youtube and the sound/picture synch ain’t so great, but the audio is all that matters.]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3RHnKYNvx8
BattleCat
Cracker-ass cracker.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Nickws:
Amongst the general public? It hasn’t. But to the partisan GOP crowd being addressed? Let’s see…When did Biden first run for public office as a Democrat? And when did he make that run for the office of POTUS that ended amidst accusations of plagiarism?
handy
@Just Some Fuckhead:
I say you go with it. This recent streak you’re on suits you. You know, in a non-dehumanizing sort of way.
Allan
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Why should tonight be different than any other night?
AAA Bonds
BLOOD IN THE WATER
MikeJ
@Allan: He won’t be paying for it?
karen marie
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): Wow, you really are clueless, aren’t you?
“It’s topical”? Really? And that makes it okay to blithely ignore the fact that it’s nothing but mainstreamed racism?
Wow. I’m gobsmacked.
@Just Some Fuckhead: I’ll agree with B but not with A.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@karen marie:
Oh, fer chrissakes…”Topical” was in reference to the Biden’s-a-birther joke.
Context, from the opening sentence of Joshua Green’s piece at The Atlantic:
Maybe he should have broken the ice with a Dick-Cheney-is-so-evil joke? A Reagan/Alzheimer’s joke? That would do him a whole lotta good in fron of an Americans for Prosperity crowd, wouldn’t it?
You can apologize at any time.
karen marie
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again): I realize it was in re Biden/birther “joke.”
It’s not a joke, it’s mainstreamed racism. It doesn’t matter where he was when he said it.
Triassic Sands
Credit, where credit is
duewasted.This reminds me of a friend of mine, who in an apparent attempt to show how open minded he is, said “You know Trump, I agree with some of the things he says.”
It turns out that those things really amounted to only one — we have too many military personnel spread around the world.
Trump runs his mouth round the clock/ eventually he’s bound to say something almost anyone can agree with. But the overall package is so deplorable, that giving credit to Trump — for anything — is a waste of time.
I’m pretty sure every mass murdering tyrant in history has something at least one thing I would agree with — but that’s no reason to praise any of them. Trump isn’t a mass murdering tyrant — and let’s hope he never gets the power that would allow him to be one — but he’s a disgusting moron with nothing positive to offer. He should be ignored.
Mittens isn’t as disgusting as Trump, but he is a well-qualified modern Republican. As such, praising him is a waste of time.
Kane
A noun, a verb, and racist innuendo.
Corner Stone
@Kane: You’re obviously a white guy. What could you possibly understand about it?
maus
Y’know what, after rethinking this, fuck him. He had more than enough time before giving the speech to figure this out. If he had nothing to worry about, he had nothing to worry about. Going through it, then rolling it back comes off like nothing but a wink, nudge, and a crass appeal to the lowest of the Republicans. He’s too smart to play this dumb.
Kane
@Corner Stone: You’re wrong on both counts. And wrongheaded in general.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@karen marie:
You also realize that the set-up acknowledges the legitimacy of Obama’s birth certificate, don’t you?
Corner Stone
@Kane:
Hmmm. Is it because I’m white?
gelfling545
@Omnes Omnibus: This was unfortunately my first thought on reading about this – that it was not a slip at all.
Joel
In the primaries, Romney is toast. Huckabee went scorched earth with anti-Mormon bigotry and Mittens will have that “hung” around his neck for the foreseeable future.
DPirate
So now we are going to outlaw the word ‘hang’. Double plus good.
Caz
You’re really reaching if it’s racist when someone says something about hanging something AROUND his neck. He didn’t say “lynch,” or talk about hanging a person. He used the word hang in the context of how one hangs a necklace.
When you invent the offensive nature of someone’s words, it’s not really offensive. Offensive stuff is offensive by itself, without the offended having to put any effort into it to make it offensive. Not that any of the people who are complaining here are actually offended. You’ve found a clever way to pretend something is offensive, so you go with it. It’s a little disingenuous if you ask me.
I guess if someone were to buy a necklace for Mrs. Obama to hang around her neck, that would be racist too?
Seriously, grow up.
Kathy in St. Louis
[email protected] He’ll change. He changes daily. His views of policy change on every subject, just as soon as he finds out what the most likely Republican primary voters think. Whether he’s racist, I would doubt that. He’s just a tad too ambitious and his sense of entitlement a little too pronounced to ever be able to hide either. He sure looks the role of what the GOP wants their leaders to look like. But he’s nothing more than an expensive suit and haircut.
Draylon Hogg
I’d like to sit down with Mitt and discuss this over a nice cup of coffee.
Jill
Our last three presidents have had some pretty serious issues from their childhoods. The last thing we need is another one. Clinton needed to be adored by everyone because he felt abandoned by his biological father’s death and endured the domestic abuse of his stepfather. Bush Jr. simultaneously wanted his dad’s approval and also to prove that his dick was bigger than daddy’s. Obama has to show white people (Republicans) that they don’t have to be afraid of him. I don’t want another president working out his childhood issues on a national stage.
Why can’t these people get some good behavioral/cognitive therapy like normal people?
CaliCat
Do we really need to give Romney “credit” for meeting the lowest possible bar of expectations? Just because he caught himself saying something profoundly stupid and edited himself in the nick of time doesn’t mean he’s some kind of decent human being – it means he’s a politician who wants to run for president in 2012 and knows the potential fallout of such a comment.