I don’t care that Mitch Daniels’ wife Cheri left Mitch, married another guy, then came back and remarried Mitch three years later. I don’t care if Mitch spent the intervening years working out and hanging with his motorcycle buddies.
But if Daniels were a Democrat, I doubt Ben Smith would be writing things like this:
The bitter pill has now, at least in part, been swallowed. If a fear of triggering public discussion of a 15 year old marital rift was a reason for Cheri Daniels to veto the run, it’s less of one now, for the simple reason that it’s already underway.
[….]And so Daniels, whose waiting game (in this theory) was effective family politics, if puzzling national politics, can now say, “Well, now it’s out there. And now it’s old news. No reason not to run.”
I think Daniels is a weak primary candidate for a variety of reasons, but there’s no doubt Daniels will be establishment media’s favored candidate in both the primary and, if he gets there, the general. He’s the new John McCain. So his personal life will not be explored. Funny how this never happens with Democratic candidates.
Yutsano
Fixed that for ya there Ben. At least try to be credible when you do dishonest hackery.
El Cid
I think you only need refer back to David Brooks’ loud and messy public orgasm over Mitch Daniels to understand and anticipate the punditarian and billion-dollar-media establishments’ view of him.
MikeJ
If Mitch Daniels does run we’ll be treated non-stop to questions about why Michelle left Barack and came back some years later. Or if they aren’t that blatent, it will at least be, “did you see that they weren’t holding hands when they walked out to the Rose Garden?” “she talked to somebody other than him at a State dinner!” ad infinitum. They’ll make up marriage trouble for Obama if marriage trouble is one of the weaknesses of their candidate.
BGinCHI
Countdown till the GOP machine fires up the “Cheri is a real feminist for those actions” meme.
geg6
The Village, which despite his protestations to the contrary includes Andrew Sulivan, is having loud and explosive orgasms over a little person who has been cuckolded and was, by W’s own estimation, one of the most influential figures in getting his tax cuts for MoUs passed and who gave the world’s most inaccurate and laughable estimate of the projected costs of W and Dick’s Excellent Iraq Adventure. As always, the Village lives in an alternate universe. I think they are aliens. Or, more likely, Lizard People.
Warren Terra
Screw Mitch Daniels’s private life. I want to know how this SOB manages to have been George W Bush’s budget director and nonetheless gets taken extremely seriously in his guise as a sternly moralistic deficit hawk.
Oh, and any mention of Mitch Daniels should include a link to Doghouse Riley’s blog on Indiana politics.
bleh
And Daniels’ past WILL be explored, to turn up other factoids they can use to celebrate his steadfastness, his unwavering moral code, and his deep masculinity (in contrast to the obviously hormone-driven hysterical emotionality of his wife). He’s just that way, you see, unlike the equally obviously shifty gangsta-influenced Obama.
Washington journalists have been so long trying to make up for being the targets of bullies in junior high school that it’s become embarrassing. Why does anybody bother to read what they write, or listen to what they say any more?
Yutsano
@geg6: Question Daniels will never get asked:
At least not by the fluffers. Since they won’t let Amy Goodman within 100 yards of him the question will sit there lingering and unanswered.
Anya
Tweety was calling Daniels (with disgust in his voice) “a cuckold”. He also mumbled something about real men and weak.
I think Daniels gets a point from me for being a good father and a forgiven man.
Comrade Javamanphil
@Yutsano:
Why? There’s no career prospects or money in that. Ben knows who he
blowsserves.bryanD
Mitch Daniels was W’s first budget director and beneath his sad sack exterior he’s some kind of sexual masochist-exhibitionist, evidently.
Mitt Romney could only WISH it were simply mano-a-mano with Mitch Daniels.
As it is: Ron Paul! Everyone else seems to be old chickenhawks.
Chris Martinez
Gonna be Pawlenty.
Doug Harlan J
@Anya:
Tweety really said that? That’s kind of fucked up.
cleek
Daniels is the designated Maverick. just as Newt is the designated intellectual, and Mitt is the whipping boy.
gonna be a long 12 months…
opal
@MikeJ:
If he doesn’t run, we’ll have to put up with all that “Where’s Mitch?” nonsense about Sarah Palin.
Omnes Omnibus
One of the 382 Republicans currently running or considering it will bring this up. All dirt on every candidate will surface. The mudfight will be spectacular.
huckster
I keep looking at the straw poll of goopers at the top of the pages, and smirking… I just can’t help it.
As to the beltway media whores, what can I say? fluffers gotta fluff. Just wondering if MoDo or Milbank will start the “Mitch Daniels is short” narrative (seriously dude, be serious)
rikyrah
ok, boys and girls…let’s just ask…
WHAT IF…..
Michelle had left Barack with Malia and Sasha…married another man, THEN decided to come back after a few YEARS…
1. what would they say about Michelle Obama?
2. what would they say about Barack Obama?
uh huh
just like I said in 2008, if Michelle Obama had
been the SECOND Mrs. Obama, and the first Mrs. Obama had been done to what Country Last did to his first wife…not only would he have not won the Presidency…he never would have been nominated.
Snayke
The math demands that we take Mitch seriously.
Moe
@Doug Harlan J:
Yep, I remember he said that too, I believe on Friday’s show.
I’m sorry if this is the wrong idea, but…are you saying he was gay?
Omnes Omnibus
@rikyrah: But McCain was a POW, or didn’t you know that?
Citizen_X
@cleek: Then I’m cheering for Bachmann or whatever Teatard-driven loon bobs to the top rank.
And I’m with Warren Terra: I want to hear Mitch Daniels justify his marriage to George W. Bush.
Villago Delenda Est
The fact that Mitch Daniels was the OMB director who oversaw the turning of a federal budget surplus into a federal budget deficit is, in and of itself, a damning fact.
THEN he went and put two entire fucking wars “off budget” to hide their impact on federal finances. When Obama came into office, he said “fuck that shit”, and the result was wingtards screaming about how Obama “broke the budget”…by being honest about the deserting coward’s two totally optional wars, one a fully illegal and immoral war of aggression similar to the one we put Germans and Japanese to death for starting in the 1940’s.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Doug Harlan J: Tweety’s psyche, especially when it comes to gender roles and sexuality, is one dark and haunted place, and he has trouble holding the mask in place.
Fox News’s own Mara Liasson was on NPR, of course, this morning, where in the space of less than a minute she referred to Newtie as both the “intellectual force of the GOP” and an “idea machine”. I think she was correct in saying he sets the terms for Republican discourse, so if bumper stickers are intellectual and buzzwords are ideas, I guess she had a point.
Cat Lady
@Doug Harlan J:
Tweety’s been kind of on a roll lately. In that instance I think he was comparing Gingrich’s transgressions to Mitch’s travails. I think he was anticipating what the criticisms of each candidate were going to be, not what his were, but he got some hack reporter from Politico to give up defending Newt’s Mau Mau comments. He doesn’t like Newt, at all. Called him a chickenhawk, also too.
Baud
I’ve reached a personal saturation point with respect to evidence that the establishment favors the GOP. I would suggest someone print some “Annoy the Media, Reelect Obama” bumper stickers, but I think only fairly liberal Dems of a certain age would get it.
BGinCHI
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Newt is an “idea machine” the way a toilet is a “waste machine.”
RossInDetroit
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
From now on I’m referring to Moe Howard as “the intellectual force behind the Three Stooges.”
Omnes Omnibus
@RossInDetroit: The comparison is unfair.
RossInDetroit
@Omnes Omnibus:
I know. Moses Horwitz was a pretty decent human being
Doug Harlan J
@Moe:
He’s really into working out and riding motorcycles.
Keith
@RossInDetroit: It tends to drive me nuts when Gingrich is elevated as some intellectual juggernaut (aka The Professor) while at the same time Obama is criticized for being professorial (and by extension arrogant – and in this regard also contrast with treatment of Trump’s ego). It tends to expose politics for the horribly cynical business it is that the mediocracy/pundocracy can play both sides like that without even waiting a few years before praising what they just criticized.
Moe
@Doug Harlan J:
Lol, my mistake; my mind just registered “Republican + ‘working out’ + ‘motorcycle buddies’ = THE USUAL”
SFAW
Yes, just last week, Newtie suggested feeding mayo to tuna to make prefab tuna sandwiches (well, if you add bread). He just can’t hold ’em back.
Chris
I only know one person active in GOP politics (here in DC), and her opinion as of this weekend is that the nomination will go to Mitch Daniels, or if not him Tim Pawlenty.
I choose to believe her. Their party’s name is mud and all of the big names have too much baggage with them, so it’s probably the best thing the GOP could do at this point. Pick a fresh face without too much name recognition and run a generic campaign on the flag and apple pie, and how we’ll get the country working again if we just wave the flag hard enough and bake enough apple pies.
bryanD
“The math demands that we take Mitch seriously.”—Snayke
Yep. Economy, bankruptcy, losing wars. It’s the GOP’s to lose. (Except in the case of Newt who committed the unforgivable sin of being played like a Stradivarius by the “old” and pathetic version of Hillary Clinton back in the late-90s after all that Big Talk and hand grenade throwing.)
Anya
@Doug Harlan J: Yup. I was shocked. What century does Tweety lives in? I think he buys into the whole macho crap, so in his little universe, real men cheat, their wives don’t cheat on them.
SFAW
Well, if his buddies were dressed like a construction worker and an Injun, you might have something there.
Joel
The cool kids never liked Mitt Romney and now it’s clearer than ever. If Romney were a man of vision, he’d know he has no chance in the upcoming primaries, nevermind the general election and he’d drop out of the race. Then he could go through a “wilderness” phase where he disappears for a while, identifies some focus group-tested positions that he feels would work for him, maybe even write a book. Afterwords, sometime in 2014, he makes his return, solicits puff pieces from the Times, Atlantic and New Republic and recasts himself as Mitt, the rightful heir of Barack Obama. The stories write themselves…
Of course, he’d still be an ingenuine sack of shit. But the Politico won’t care.
Yutsano
@Keith:
Fixteth. It’s really what they think of Obama every time he trumps them.
Gustopher
The Daniels’ marital problems will be held up as an example of fine family values — she came back, he forgave her, they are raising their children together.
Somehow, this would be compared to the Obamas, and the Obamas will be found lacking because their relationship hasn’t been tested the same way, plus their black. And then the right wing will start saying that Michelle had an abortion as this year’s version of the whitey tape.
Amanda in the South Bay
LOL, more tough guy macho Republicans that have less (i.e. none) military experience than me. Can the media nominate me for the presidency?
BGinCHI
@SFAW: Already invented by Bill Blazjowski in “Night Shift.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@SFAW: heh…. and of all the GOP contenders, he is the one most likely to be running a brothel in the morgue. Or at least patronizing one
opal
@Doug Harlan J:
And he’s good with his hands. Pretty much keeps to himself.
Kind of a loner, but always good with the neighbor children.
SFAW
Laugh all you want, but I just received an Extremely Important e-mail from a “Chief Editor Korir”, telling me that Larry Johnson now has that video in his hands, and will be releasing it very soon.
Davis X. Machina
@Doug Harlan J: He should arm-wrestle Scott Brown’s pick-up truck for the nomination.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Anya: I’ll always believe this was in reaction to everybody making fun of him for his infatuation with with the Codpiece and Fred Thompson’s aftershave
Admiral_Komack
“And I’m with Warren Terra: I want to hear Mitch Daniels justify his marriage to George W. Bush.”
Hey now!
You just said that to tick Condi off!
SFAW
Jim Keranga of Watts, CA, will provide my thoughtful response.
JPL
I have no doubt that Mitch Daniels would prefer to discuss his marriage rather than his time as budget director.
fasteddie9318
@Yutsano: The “uppity” subtext over the bin Laden thing alone has been amazing to watch.
Villago Delenda Est
@Amanda in the South Bay:
The irony here is, that guys with actual military experience (Al Gore and John Kerry) were attacked for it by Rethuglicans supporting a guy who has, in the most charitable interpretation, an incomplete record of his military service.
Those of us who know about these things call him a deserter, because that’s the name that the record that does exist supports.
Caz
Honestly, where do you come up with this stuff?
SFAW
Jim, Foolish Literalist –
Sshhh! Don’t tell BGinCHI.
Tom Q
@Chris: Isn’t that what they tried to do with their Senate hopefuls in 2010, and found the bland choices getting upset by teabagging crazies in about 2/3 of the primaries?
I recognize, the presidential year primaries aren’t quite the low-turnout monstrosities that off-year elections are, and maybe the saner (not to say sane) GOPers will push through someone vanilla like Pawlenty. But, based on the lack of discipline in ’10, alot of Republican behind-the-sceners have to be concerned the genie’s been let out of the bottle, and that enough motivated base folk will coalesce around someone unelectable to bring the whole party down in flames.
SFAW
I guess your comment would make a tad more sense if you defined “this stuff”.
But, Failing that, the proper response is “It’s a gift”.
cmorenc
@Doug Harlan J:
In the 2008 campaign, it wasn’t so much Obama’s personal life per se that was explored, because even the FoxBots and wingers realized there wasn’t anything “there” to be found, other than the NI…er, Rev. Jerimiah Wright thing. OK so the media never used the N-word with Rev. Wright, just the un-american allegations about his sermons, but that kind of explicitly black radicalism was what the allegations were really about. Yes, there were some nascent stirrings of the birther issue, but that never took off enough to divert more than negligible amounts of media attention and oxygen until many weeks after Obama took office. Instead, the focus was more on his professional life, more particularly implications that his experience as a community organizer (combined with the Rev. Wright thing and the Bill Ayres thing) were possible indications he might be out-of-mainstream socialist radical falsely parading in the guise of a mainstream black politician with an Ivy League pedigree. At the same time, his short tenure in the US Senate combined with this “community organizer” background supposedly raised questions whether his resume for President was thin compared to a longterm veteran mavricky Senator who was a POW. But these objections mainly went to his professional, rather than personal life, even the warped attempts at misreading Obama’s “Dreams of our Fathers” etc.
Since Obama took office, the right wing has expanded into viewing anything in his family background as game for ginning up scorn and scandal, including both vicious and silly stuff about his wife Michelle Obama, his college transcript, his birth certificate, his early life abroad, his black, did we mention Kenyan African and VERY black father who wasn’t a US citizen?
I have one question from all this: WHERE ARE MITCH DANIELS’ COLLEGE TRANSCRIPTS?
Yutsano
@SFAW: That question seems more proper to ask Ben Smith honestly.
EDIT: And along the way, Newt plays cute.
And his last quote in that article is full of fail.
Anya
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: richter scale on creepiness. The only redeaming quality Tweety has, is his deep seated aversion to racism.
Omnes Omnibus
@Tom Q: I think this one reason the GOP powers that be are running a variety of people up the flagpole. They are trying like mad to find someone who can deliver the Tea vote without being abso-fuckingly-lutely crazy. Unfortunately, they just haven’t found that a person who can walk on that razor’s edge.
Carol
@Chris: But neither man will excite the base very much, and certainly won’t get any cross-over votes. So the Republicans have decided to punt this election for a better shot in 2016. Rather than run against Barack’s billions, and Barack’s army, they are going to try to make gains or save Congress and wait until 2016 for the win. Sometimes that’s the best you can do-hold on to what you have and wait until a better day.
None of the so far named candidates are going to raise even close to what it takes to compete with Obama, none will match the enthusiasm. Sarah Palin could be the person who gives the needed jolt to keep things competitive on the lower levels, that is to say, she could keep turnout high enough to defend red seats while losing badly in her own race, but she has plenty of liabilities as well. Even a historical race wouldn’t be enough to make up for those.
BGinCHI
While we’re on the IOKIYAR biz (Politico shop window full of it).
If Paul Ryan runs for WI Senate seat, will he get called on his budget, or will the adjective “serious” wipe out all other descriptors?
(he also works out, no idea on the motorcycle)
JPL
The discussion of the marriage of Mitch and Cheri is out of the Rove playbook. He will become a sympathetic character and his days as budget director will be forgotten.
I’d be willing to bet that what this is about.
opal
@Caz:
One of the big chains that deals primarily in Chinese goods.
Yutsano
@Carol: The beauty of this is how much it must just completely gore them that they can’t remove Obama from office. After the Bin Laden raid it was pretty much game over. They are going to be stuck with THAT ONE for four more years and they know it. And it burns their evil little souls because now no matter what harebrained scheme they come up with they have to at least compromise to get anything done.
@BGinCHI:
Can I pay to make this happen and have his opponent be Tammy Baldwin? She’d slaughter poor Paulie Boy.
cmorenc
The delicious irony in discussing how the media gets fixated too uncritically on certain narratives, and develops powerful inertia to continue developing them that’s difficult to divert even with copious factual evidence contradicting it….
is that far more important politically than any momentary approval “bump” Obama got from the raid which got Bin Laden is that it seems to have fundamentally changed the media narrative about Obama, and placed him on an elevated platform of respect he didn’t heretofore enjoy, except perhaps on Fox (and even there, they remain awkwardly gobsmacked by the sheer audacity and success of the raid). Even the obvious right-wing attempt late last week to develop a counter-narrative that Obama’s National Security team egregiously endangered the future of Navy Seal operations by leaking far too many critical details of the raid doesn’t seem to have gained much traction. Instead, CNN gave over last night to wondorously glowing accounts of how the plans for the raid unfolded, and what a risky call it was for Obama to choose the Seal team raid rather than simply an obliterative bombing approach. IMHO it’s going to be very difficult for Mitch Daniels to get enough traction to beat Obama, no matter who in the media decides to give Daniels little but blowjobs all the way to November 2012.
Carol
Something tells me that this may be another 1992 for the Republicans in that there will be a significant third party on the right. Trump will definitely run a race as an independent for the publicity, and maybe Sarah as well.
The left for once will be united behind Obama.
RossInDetroit
@Carol:
Yup. If they can’t rally the base(s) behind someone in the main race they’ll get steamrollered all over the place. The Osama operation could end up benefiting hundreds of Dem candidates whose GOP challengers just can’t get the vote out in 2012 because the presidential race looks like a shoo-in for Obama.
BGinCHI
@Yutsano: Sure hope so. Would like to see her do that and have Feingold crush Mr. Bobblehead in the Guv race.
Yutsano
@RossInDetroit: Their only real strategy (and I see it formulating now) is getting their voters out for the culture war bullshit. That really will be the only way they can get any sort of momentum going for their side. But even that doesn’t necessarily translate into automatic votes for the Republican upticket.
Carol
@Yutsano: That’s it, Yutsano. Notice how the talk of investigations have faded to nothing. They haven’t found anything after all this time, and they never will. Obama is like Bugs Bunny, sophisticated, clever, and elusive.
This is where the Southern Strategy has left them bereft. The younger generations are coming from the targets of the Southern Strategy, not from the resentful white working. Those generations are inclined to be Democrats because of it.
They have nothing to say to a younger voter at all. White resentment politics is a politics for the old groups who are dwindling.
Where will their dynamic candidates come from?
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: I like Tammy Baldwin; she is my Congressperson. I am concerned that her sexuality would hurt her in a statewide race. I just do not have enough confidence in enough of my fellow Badgers to believe that they will look past it. BTW is Herb “Nice Liberal Dude with Little Charisma” Kohl retiring?
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
yes, i am sure its concern about his wife that is keeping him from announcing, and not any of the other reasons why he might shouldn’t.
this sounds more like creating an exit strategy, testing an excuse, that allows him to not run, but be viable in 2016.
Cacti
@Yutsano:
The most pathetic part about Newt’s self-serving pleas are that he’s basically asking people to treat his life up to age 57 as youthful indiscretions.
chris
@Caz:”Brock: I never see him read. Its like he channnels dead crazy people”
/Venture Brothers
GregB
Vote GOP, we’re always pissed and the targets of our anger are the poor and under-served and we’re proud as piss about that.
By the way, is anyone going to call out Ron Paul for being a perpetual presidential candidate and a grifter to boot? Get off the Goddamn government dole Dr. Paul.
Haroldo
It’s been said many times, and in many ways….
but, to Politico,et alia, Republican Koch perforce tastes much better than Democratic.
PurpleGirl
We should not forget that Mitch Daniels was arrested and convicted of possessing drugs back in college. From the Daily Princetonian:
That’s a lot of pot. And he got off real easy. And he thought it would derail his political ambitions. He hadn’t yet learned about IOKIYAR.
DavidNC
I’m not real worried about Daniels not getting vetted early on. It’ll come. Obama’s billion says so. Also sort of reminds me of seeing Carville and a few other dems on TV responding to news of Newt announcing. Instead of pouncing, they all said a bunch of vague, polite things. Infuriated me at first (fucking village! georgetown cocktail parties!) But it’s really more a reflection of just how weak a candidate Newt is. Let him get some attention first, then break out the bats. Worked on Trump anyway.
Cacti
@PurpleGirl:
Incredibly easy. Two shoe boxes is a “possession w/ intent to distribute” amount.
An amount that would land a non-privileged person in jail for a stretch.
Jeffro
@Carol: Their dynamic candidates will be on the 2016 ticket as Rubio/Haley (or Haley/Rubio)
Carol
And Newt has never run statewide, so he has no real idea of what is in store for him. Being a Congressperson in a ruby red district where the opposition is at best a token one means he has never had to face hard questioning about many of his positions and his ethical lapses. No, being Speaker of the House doesn’t really count, because at the end of the day, he is still just a Congressperson, one out of 435.
Now he is running for a position where he has to get not only Republican votes but independent ones as well-and he clearly lacks the ability to appeal to people who aren’t bomb-throwers and who won’t say “Yes, Newt, you are so brilliant” to him.
Obama will make Newt Soup out of him.
Chris
@Yutsano:
I wouldn’t say they’ve got no chance, exactly. Depends on how the economy is a year from now and how Obama runs his campaign and all… but I’ll agree that Osama being caught was a major blow. They’ve been trying to spin in for two weeks now, but that’s not going to catch on with most people. Their “tough on defense” advantage just got pulled out from underneath their feet, which is a big deal in the post-9/11 age.
Ash Can
@Carol: Now that I think of it, I can see how a third-party “candidacy” could suit Palin well. She could do just enough work to get her name on the ballot, then sit back and be as lazy as she wants. She could do zero real campaigning and still siphon off all the permanently-starbursty types who would otherwise be voting GOP. In an election where the GOP candidate is likely going to get trounced, it could amount to a relatively decent showing, and she’d rake in some extra simoleans and publicity in the process.
stuckinred
@PurpleGirl: Couple of lb’s, not that much in those days. Bout $145 a pound.
Anoniminous
You do realize you’re taking the same people who brought Sarah Palin and Donald Trump to the fore to be serious political operatives?
Daniels is a punk-assed nobody. He doesn’t have a campaign staff. He doesn’t have any street-cred in Iowa or New Hampshire. He doesn’t have the in-state players for Super-Tuesday lined-up. He doesn’t have national support. He doesn’t have national contacts to GOP national political activists to garner national support. He doesn’t have the money.
He might be able to get away with lacking one or two of the above. But not all of them.
Martin
@PurpleGirl:
Um, it’s Princeton. Different rules for different breeding stock, and all that.
mr. whipple
@Cacti:
Yup. Had to be dealing.
Carol
@Chris: The problem with their economic proposals is that in a time of hardship, they want to take even more away from those who need it. That’s a depressing message to say the least, and compared to Obama’s optimism, anxiety creating. Anxious voters will vote for the status quo that won’t take away what they already have. Also, a lot of voters have had to retire early due to the recession. “Reforming” Social Security and Medicare is like taking their last net away.
Obama can say that he’s trying his best, that he has created jobs, that with a Democratic Congress he can do more to help.
Martin
@stuckinred: What, are you the keeper of historical pot commodity prices? You know what pot cost per pound, 40 years ago? Impressed, I am.
Omnes Omnibus
@mr. whipple: I have it on good authority that he had really bad glaucoma back then.
Anoniminous
@Carol:
Nah. Neither one will get the nomination.
Trump isn’t going to toss $50 million of his own money in order to be the 2012 edition of Giuliani.
Palin is one of the few pols who the more people see her, the less they like her. Her negative “would never vote for” within her own party is 58%.
stuckinred
@Martin: Hell yes! I’d take out a short term loan (vets could get one from the U on a signature), buy a lb, break it into lids and sell 12 and keep four. Pay back the loan and skate. It was all that fancy Thai Stick that started fuckin things up.
“Now the road to Acupulco is very hard indeed
And it isn’t any better if you haven’t any weed
Henry’s drivin’ hard and straight on twisted mountain roads
Fifty people waitin’ back at home for Henry’s load”
nrps
Omnes Omnibus
@Martin: The man has skills.
I think it a bit weird that Princeton let cops bust someone in a dorm. I went to college a decade later and my private university had very strong rules against the cops walking in uninvited. Private property and all that. Hell, no matter what you did in town (serious violent felonies excepted), if you made it onto campus the local police stopped pursuit. My little school doesn’t have the pull that Princeton should.
cbear
@Martin: Don’t be. If he was paying $145 a lb, he was getting ripped. Fooking amateurs.
stuckinred
@cbear: Sheeet. Tell me I overpayed for the shit I sent home in my hold baggage.
Carol
@mr. whipple: If you are right, then a few of his “customers” could be pried loose and start talking. Dealing pot at college is not a private thing, and with the quantity described, he wasn’t just supplying his friends, and didn’t just get his supply from a friend either. Daniels had better hope that his supplier is no longer among the living and no longer needs to earn a few extra bucks telling his story to the Enquirer. He also better hope his former customers all think well of him and aren’t about to settle old scores either.
Even in this more liberalized attitude era about pot, dealing isn’t looked upon too favorably.
stuckinred
@Carol: You’re dreaming, these right wing motherfuckers can get away with shit like this without breaking a sweat.
birthmarker
@cleek:
Carol
@Anoniminous: These rules don’t apply if you run third party, though. Third party independent runs don’t have expensive primaries, just ballot access issues that a well-paid lawyer can finesse, and where signatures are needed, can be gotten from a combination of true believers and Democrats who want to throw the Republicans an anvil. All the money raised goes to the General Election, and since there is no realistic way to the Oval, a third party/independent candidate can campaign anywhere there is sufficient interest.
A run that can then be turned into an equally profitable think tank or PAC after the inevitable loss. An organization that could then provide a permanent living income and some influence for the candidate.
Certainly worth the investment.
James E. Powell
Doesn’t this scenario seem just perfect for the call to go out to Bloomberg to save the nation? He will, reluctantly, answer the call. Because what America needs is an independent billionaire to produce policies favored by billionaires.
If this sounds impossibly stupid, consider that Arnold Schwarzenegger was twice elected governor of a very Democratic state.
Omnes Omnibus
@Carol:
Well, there is professional dealing and there is being the guy who has the connection and then selling to a few friends.
SFAW
Well, I dunno, but I seem to ‘member a pound being a tad bigger than “size 12 shoe box”. Shoe boxes seem more like the 2-3 oz range.
(Not that I would know about that stuff, of course. But I once knew someone whose cousin had heard a story from his girlfriend’s brother’s classmate.)
cbear
@stuckinred: my bads, bro. I thought you were talking the regular sticks-n-stones Mex.
Omnes Omnibus
@SFAW: Is Ferris okay?
stuckinred
@cbear: Aw I’m just fuckin around anyway. There was a pretty wide price variation if you happened to be in the midwest as opposed to the coasts. The load from “over there’ didn’t last very long.
cbear
@SFAW: Too true, I’m just repeating stuff I got from watching old Miami Vice episodes.
R-Jud
I’ve got nothing of substance to add to this thread, except that for years I thought the lyrics of that Journey song went
Oh, Sherry, our love
Is Voltron
Voltron
Carol
@stuckinred: Maybe in the primaries-if he can get past the church people. But independents may not be so forgiving.
Tonal Crow
@Omnes Omnibus:
I am unconvinced that there is a single elected Republican who is not crazy. Really.
cbear
@stuckinred: What are you talking about—and who’s cbear?
stuckinred
@SFAW: An OZ fit in a baggie. ! 16 of them fit in a shoebox (or an ammo can) pretty well. When you got keys from Mexico they were compressed and blew up when you pulled it apart. As my man said, that’s when you found the sticks and stones.
http://www.jeffs60s.com/70s/lid4.jpg
Omnes Omnibus
@Tonal Crow: That is why I used the modifier “abso-fucking-lutely.” I know they are all crazy, but some are crazier than others. Crazy isn’t a binary state. God help us all.
stuckinred
@cbear: Huh? Oh, I thought this was you?
AxelFoley
I seriously cannot understand where the hype for this guy is coming from. Well, yeah, from the media, but why? What are his accomplishments? At least with McCain, he had his POW/war hero status, however overblown that was. But this guy Daniels? Hell, I didn’t even know what the fucker looked like until last week.
stuckinred
I said shotgun
shoot em till they run now
SFAW
Well, he’s rich. but I’m guessing he’s not $13B-to-blow-on-a-campaign rich. Then he’d be down to only around $6B – barely enough to put pate on the table. Maybe he’ll get Bill Gates or Warren Buffett as a running mate?
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@Carol:
a buddy of mine growing up, had one of the ne’er do well fathers of all time, in fact he would take his own family economically hostage, let them get down to scraping by 1930s style while he was on an alcohol and unemployment binge…
but, the man had a harvard degree, so there was always a firm of some sort that was willing to add the cache that comes from adding one to your company profile, even if the person themselves was, as i imagine, fairly useless.
i am guessing that a princeton degree works a lot the same way. so no matter how much a princeton alum may need the money, the best way to get it, wouldn’t be ratting on daniels. plus they would be admitting their better left unsaids in the process.
if his connects were further up the distribution chain, and non-students, who knows.
it doesn’t seem like marijuana back then, was as potent, and thus personal use, and supplying the dorm, might have involved weight, or in this context, volume.that today would make you a distributor first, user second.
also, too, the police are notorious for mis-describing the amount of weed seized in a bust. i wouldn’t expect further clarity from any official source.
Citizen_X
@stuckinred:
I’ve heard–not that I would know, oh, of course not!–that hash has been pretty commonly available from one’s local pot dealers these last few years.
I wonder what historically-a-big-source country that’s been coming from, and who’s been bringing it here, eh wot?
stuckinred
@Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal: In the early 70’s you could get LIFE in Indiana for one joint.
SFAW
An oz of buds, maybe. Maybe with some stems.
Again, not that I’d know.
And besides, I remember so little about those days, I’m probably misunderestimating as well.
SFAW
Well, why do you think he went to Jersey? It wasn’t for the waters, nor the fresh air.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@stuckinred:
oh no doubt the laws were harsh, and enforcement varied, and daniels still got as friendly a roll as possible. i am just saying i won’t buy that he was the kingpin on campus.
stuckinred
@Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal: Roger that. Minor league fo sho.
Violet
@MikeJ:
This is very true. Right now the wingnut talk radio guys like to talk about how much bad-for-you food Michelle eats and pretty much call her fat.
SFAW
Hmmmm … let’s look at that more closely …
“Michelle is fat”
“Michael Moore is fat”
“Michelle” is the feminine version of “Michael” (well, “Michel”)
Has anyone ever seen Michelle Obama and Michael Moore in the same room at the same time? I wonder …
Paging Donald Trump! We need you to get your “investigators” on this STAT!
BC
Yeah, they go overboard on the Democrats so that when the Republicans are caught doing the same thing, they then want “civility” or “it’s nobody’s business but theirs” or some other shitcan reason to not cover it. Case in point: John Ensign, whose shady sexual dealings were never covered by mainstream media in the way they would have had he been a Democrat.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Moe:
At 5’7″, Mitch Daniels was Hells Littlest Angel.
Omnes Omnibus
@Just Some Fuckhead: He’s 5’7″?
Just Some Fuckhead
@Omnes Omnibus: Officially. Many claim he quite a lot shorter than that.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Maybe in heels or really built-up motorcycle boots. Otherwise I think JSF missed a digit there.
Anoniminous
@Carol:
I have no insight into Palin’s mind (speaking loosely :-) and so will not venture to guess the answer to will-she/won’t-she.
I cannot see her raising the $250 million, or so, it takes to mount a credible Third Party run. For one, there’s no road for her to gather enough support, in enough states, to win which is off-putting to major donors. Second, the major Conservative and GOP donors and players, for that matter, knows if she is on the ballot they’ll lose votes in those states; enough, IMO, to throw the state to the Dem column; meaning the GOP would do everything to keep her off the ballot.
Omnes Omnibus
@Just Some Fuckhead: The Packers used to say that Gilbert Brown only weighed 350 lbs.
suzanne
@Chris:
Then this is going to be the most boring campaign EVAR.
Wake me when it’s over.
Yutsano
@suzanne:
Fixteth. You don’t get out of it that easily missy. :)
SFAW
Ah, it all makes sense now. I had heard that, since seeing “Electra Glide in Blue”, he “looked up to” Robert Blake. Obviously, I misunderstood the context.
Ghanima Atreides
@Just Some Fuckhead: Daniels is 5’3″.
McCain is 5’6″, and wore 3 inch lifters for the debate and nearly fell on the stage.
Daniels is going to need Lordi shoes to make 5’7″.
Mike
@Anya: “Tweety was calling Daniels (with disgust in his voice) “a cuckold”. He also mumbled something about real men and weak.
I think Daniels gets a point from me for being a good father and a forgiven man.”
Perhaps, but it does make you wonder about his good sense–someone treats you that badly and you bring them back into your life? That’s just not right no matter who it is.
I would expect that Daniels’ opponents in the primary will probably dog-whistle the “cuckold” stuff pretty strong. That’s definitely the kind of thing that macho GOP male voters would find to be a big turnoff. Add the fact that Cheri seemingly has veto power over this campaign (and possibly many other aspects of Daniels’ life) and you have a tailor made “he’s a wuss” smear campaign for GOP voters.
We’ll see if any of the other candidates violate the eleventh commandment and give it a go. If they do, it will be subtle, so keep an eye out.
Anne Laurie
@stuckinred:
Yeah, but one of his GOPer co-conspirators should be encouraged to pull an LBJ, make the little fvck deny he sold out his clients so he could waltz free to fail again.
Carol
@Omnes Omnibus: Sure, I doubt he was a pro. But a lot could be made about “unsavory associates” and the like anyway. How many voters could tell the difference at an arm’s length, especially the more “moral” ones he will need to win both primary and general? And God forbid if he got his supply from “boys on the corner” instead of those nice hippies running around in their WV bus.
the fenian
In a sane world, would a man with the line “George W. Bush’s budget director” on his resume still have any kind of political career whatsoever? But, Gary Hart screwed around on his wife, so…
Sophist
Olympia Snowe?
Bulworth
I should know better, but I still don’t get the Beltway Media fascination with this dude.
I mean, really, what country is he promising to invade/bomb back to the stone age?
DFH no.6
@Ghanima Atreides:
I happened to be at the same restaurant in central PHX as McCain a long time back (late eighties, I think). Passed him by in the foyer (he and his small entourage were leaving, and we were coming in).
I’m 5’6”. It’s a bit hard to judge if someone is exactly your height, but I commented then to my wife how surprised I was that McCain was pretty short – maybe only an inch or so taller than me. She thought that about right.
Hey, as a short dude it doesn’t make me happy that there’s a height limit to presidential candidate viability, but that’s the way it is (and I well understand why). McCain must have just made it (“you must be this tall to ride the roller coaster”). I’m guessing you must be correct on lifters or whatever for the bitter old man.
If Daniels is 5’3”, he won’t be tall enough to ride.
Paul in KY
@Martin: I think they called them ‘lids’ back in the days of yore.
Paul in KY
@Citizen_X: Not available around here. I haven’t seen any honest-to-God hash since the late 80s.