At about 2:10 in this video, this Colorado TV reporter asks about medical marijuana, an issue in that state, after having asked about gay marriage and in-state college tuition for children of illegal immigrants, and Mitt says:
Aren’t there issues of significance you want to talk about — the economy, the growth of jobs, the need to put people back to work, the challenges of Iran?
This is grade-school stuff. She wasn’t asking him about the finalists on Dancing with the Stars–those are all legitimate issues. After years of running for President, Mitt can’t even do a stand up with a local market TV reporter without his inner asshole showing. To her credit, the reporter makes him answer the question.
Chyron HR
Mitt thinks the “challenge of Iran” is having to interact with commoners every time he ran for office.
amk
Doesn’t take much to rattle this gattlian overlord, does it now ? Why the fuck the rest of the world just doesn’t bend to his will ?
The
russianssoviets and the chinese will make a mincemeat of this clueless fuckwad, if the unthinkable happens.EIGRP
I wonder if Mitt believes holding hands is a gateway activity to sex.
And why doesn’t anyone ask a religious person against gay marriage “Why shouldn’t an atheist gay couple be allowed to marry?”
Eric
JPL
The last part when he says those are state issues right, and she points out that they could be federal issues was great.
Raven
God, he says “NO” just like Reagan.
dr. bloor
Entitled Turd, every day in every way.
EconWatcher
The Mittster has never had to please anyone, and it shows. Even when he was working his way up in business, it sounds as if his supervisors were out to please him, rather than the other way around, partly because of his dad’s political juice, but also because his pedigree in the Mormon aristocracy gave him unique access to some particularly flush investors. (What had he done in his life, to earn a risk-free guarantee from his boss when he agreed to start Bain Capital?)
I thought W projected a sense of entitlement, but he was a piker compared to the Mittster.
Brian R.
I love that two of the three questions he said weren’t of concern to Colorado voters were, as the reporter noted, sent in by Colorado voters.
Svensker
@Brian R.:
Yeah, I noticed the same thing. The question that got him all “why are you asking me dumb stuff?” was sent in by a named viewer. That guy and his family will probably not be voting for Mitt.
The thing that amazes me about Mitt is how can he be such a frigging bad candidate after spending the last 8 years running for office?
He must be way dumber than I thought cuz he sure ain’t learning.
MikeJ
On the same day that the Republicans shut down the state house, leaving 30 bills unmoved so they could avoid a domestic partner bill, Romney says gay marriage isn’t important in Colorado.
Waynski
@EIGRP: I think a more interesting question is why are straight atheists allowed to marry? If marriage is purely a religious issue as they claim, clearly straight married atheists are threatening the “sanctity” of marriage, no?
Personally, I think they fight so hard for this because it’s the only area of civic life where the church is actually allowed to be involved in an officiating capacity in a civil proceeding. IANAL, but it seems to me that a “pure” establishment clause look at this would say no one can be “married” by the state. You can file papers, straight or gay, at city hall for a civil union encompassing all that marriage does now. If you want to get “married” go to a church, but it’s not legally binding, only the civil union is.
Kay
It’s such a loser move to fight with the press in a general election.
Base voters, both sides, love it, but to less obsessive people it sounds whiny and evasive.
eemom
Mitty HATES what Obama did yesterday.
He SOOOOO fucking hates it.
Tee hee hee hee hee.
Tom65
This isn’t really surprising. One of the biggest knocks against Mitt during the primaries was the extremely tight control on media access. He’s a thin-skinned plutocrat who does NOT like being challenged, and it shows in every interview that doesn’t stick to his script.
Napoleon
One of the guys over at TNR’s blog (forget which one) has had several post in the past about his theory that Mitt has self control/management anger issues that most reporters are not picking up on. His blog post have been convincing on that issue, and I wonder if the Obama crew are thinking of ways to set Mitt up on the issues with ads or something Obama may say during a debate.
HRA
Mitt and his keepers are getting a tad upset from the other issues taking over the ones they want to hone in on (i.e. ones they believe are winners for them)
I didn’t watch the video above. I feared for my breakfast.
Did he do the ha ha bit like he did on Fox with Brett?
Let’s make him a loser!
JPL
@Tom65: McCain’s thin skin never drew the ire of the media, they’ll give Romney a pass also. It’s shocking to me that they don’t call him on his lies though.
grandpa john
Mitt didn’t realize that there are reporters out there that do their jobs unlike the MSM members who immediately drop to their knees and fellate him
Jager
Romney wasn’t a businessman, he was a Venture Capitalist. People who go to VCs for money always agree with whatever the VC says. Mitt probably has never heard no in his life except when Ann said “I don’t want a 6th kid!”
I lived in Mass when he ran against Kennedy, Ted was behind in the polls and flat kicked Mitts ass in the debates. When he was elected Governor he started running for President almost the next day. In Boston he played the moderate Mass Republican then he would get on a plane fly to one of the confederate states and play his conservative cards. When he was called on it, he played hurt. Within a year and a half he was polling in the 30’s.
Chris
Taking this opportunity to repost this (Romney turning his back on the medical marijuana patient back in 2007).
That would be the original moment when I pegged the guy as a fucking asshole.
Jay in Oregon
@Svensker:
Because he’s an entitled asshole who thinks he should get to be President simply because he wants it.
He’s lucky he got through the nominating process in his own party, and look at the freaks and geeks he was dealing with there.
If being the GOP candidate didn’t automatically give him a home-field advantage among the Villagers and the Fox News crowd, Obama would eat him for lunch once the debates start. Better get used to hearing that nervous laugh of Mitt’s, because we’ll be hearing it a lot.
EconWatcher
@eemom:
Obama did the right thing, and I’m proud of him for it, but I’m not so sure of the politics of it. As a commenter on TPM pointed out, the base doesn’t exactly love Mitt, and many might otherwise stay home, but if the national election is turned into a referendum on gay marriage, that might just get them to the polls.
Maybe others will correct me, but I think Kerry might have won in 2004 were it not for the anti-gay marriage initiatives on the ballot in several key states, which helped turn out the fundie votes. The country as a whole has certainly moved on the issue–massively–since 2004, but that’s not really the point. The fundie base hasn’t moved at all. Will the issue fire them up?
Chris
@Tom65:
Quoted for truth.
Davis X. Machina
CEO’s don’t answer questions.
They have entire departments of corporate communications and public relations to do that word-stuff for them. Someone’s got to hire all the humanities majors, dammit.
Jager
@Tom65: He blocked off access to the Governor offices in the Mass State house with velvet ropes and security guards.I lived there for almost 40 years and no Gov had ever done that.
Marcellus Shale, Public Dick
Mitt looks about as comfortable in that interview as a 19 year old groom in a rented tux being forced to recite the wedding vows written for him by the bride’s father.
dmsilev
@Kay:
I think there’s also a difference between fighting with a professional network-level political pundit and fighting with a local TV reporter. Local reporters, especially the long-time ones, can have fairly deep roots in a community. A tussle with one may not go outside that community (though in the YouTube era, it may), but it won’t reflect well on you at all in that community.
Davis X. Machina
@EconWatcher: The gay-marriage-referenda-sunk-Kerry theory has been seriously wounded, if not killed outright, by the sharp lances of poli-sci.
amk
@grandpa john: Bingo. Kudos to that reporter saying FU to him.
the fugitive uterus
pls give props to the reporter who would not let him off the hook about the whole President being tried for treason thing. again, can we have more of this, pls?
jibeaux
I love it that Mitt thinks that to the average Colorado voter, Iran is clearly a more pressing concern than college, immigration, medical marijuana, and marriage equality.
gene108
What was the reporter thinking asking a man, who doesn’t drink alcohol or caffeine or smoke tobacco about legalizing, even in a controlled manner, marijuana?
Really, all Mitt has to say is, “I’m Mormon, on top of opposing legalizing marijuana, I’m also opposed to beer and coffee.”
Shrillhouse
Whoa.
Look at his body language in that screencap. Stand up straight already, Mitt. You’re running for office, for Pete’s sake!
EconWatcher
@Davis X. Machina:
Interesting, thanks. Mainly, of course, Kerry sank Kerry.
I did all I could and gave money I didn’t really have to spare to his campaign, but man, he was one sorry excuse for a candidate (much like a liberal Mittster, really). When he said he still would have voted for the Iraq resolution, even knowing what he knows now, I was left thinking, I’m just wasting my life on this.
Gin & Tonic
@EconWatcher:
Why would it be? November is six months away, and he was just expressing an opinion, not moving legislation. This will be a complete non-issue by the general, which is why it was smart to get it out of the way now, as opposed to in September.
gene108
@gene108: If Mitt became President, would he impose his religious restrictions on beer and coffee on the rest of us?
Sort of like Obama’s secret plans to turn us all Muslim?
amk
@Jager: Get off my
lawnoffice, you fucking, tick infested plebes.jibeaux
@gene108: He really does need to go out and say that. It took me a while to realize it, but at some point in my adult life I realized that I drink basically nothing that is neither alcoholic nor caffeinated. I try to drink more water, but I just don’t like it. I’ll drink the fizzy stuff. Still, 90% alcoholic or caffeinated. Self-medicating, cubicle style!
Kay
@EconWatcher:
I’ll defend Kerry, although he had a lot of trouble connecting with Democrats here. Kerry had an appealing sort of self-deprecating side that came out in local appearances. He knew he wasn’t “like them” and he wouldn’t playact or pander, and when he did pander it was just awful to watch. He wasn’t any good at it. I ended up admiring that, although it probably hurt him.
Too, religious conservatives here absolutely loved President Bush. They adored him.
“He’s a good man“. I’ll never forget that phrase. It seemed to be freighted with all sorts of hidden meaning.
EconWatcher
@Gin & Tonic:
I don’t understand your comment. 1988 became a referendum on the death penalty, the ACLU, and the pledge of allegiance, even though none of those really had anything to do with what Dukakis could or would have done as president.
Have you not noticed that cultural issues, which have nothing or almost nothing to do with the president’s job or pending legislation, somehow still seem to have some infuence in our presidential elections? You haven’t picked up on that?
eemom
@Davis X. Machina:
Maybe, but you don’t need a Ph.D to see what a pile of horseshit that is.
eemom
@EconWatcher:
dial down the condescension a notch or two, wouldja?
Reasonable minds can differ quite a bit over the DEGREE of influence they have.
And have you perchance picked up on the fact that 2012 ain’t 1988?
It ain’t 2004 either (though I think the above-referenced meme re Kerry is horseshit regardless of that).
zmulls
@Waynski:
I think just the opposite, actually. Marriage is a sacrament in the church (or synagogue, mosque, FSM output, etc.), and one does get married within one’s religion. But one *also* gets married (simultaneously) in a civic context. To be married in the eyes of the state (rather than God/religion), you get the blood test, you get the license and there are some state-specific words that have to be spoken by an approved officiator.
The religious leader is empowered by the state to perform that office. The state will recognize that union.
I got married in a theatre, without any religious trappings. We designed our own ceremony. But at the very end, the officiator (a local mayor) was required to run through the 2-minute Pennsylvania marriage thingie to make it official.
My parents (who are Jewish) once contemplated divorcing, thinking it would affect their taxes in a positive way. They reasoned that they would still be married under Judaism, and wouldn’t truly be “divorced.”
A church cannot be compelled by the government to marry two people of the same sex, but the government can marry them.
I do agree that the state can either perform a union and call it marriage, or the state should get out of the ‘marriage’ business and only do ‘civil unions.’ But then my wife and I would no longer be married…..
Ash Can
So much fail packed into one brief interview. I can’t wait for the one-on-one campaign to start, especially the debates. Obama has a mile-wide devious streak in him when it comes to making his opponents implode, and he’s going to be pushing Mitt’s buttons like a speed typist. Combine that with the likelihood of Mitt continuing to blow off local reporters and citizens with his “don’t ask me about that; that’s not important” routine, and all the DC news bureaus working together won’t be able to cover up Mitt’s stench.
RSA
@Chris:
Mitt apparently failed Public Speaking 101. “To steer an interview in a favorable direction, you should say to a reporter, ‘Stop asking me such stupid questions.’ True or false?”
terraformer
I, for one, am really looking forward to watching Obama mop the floor with this silver-spooned misanthrope.
rikyrah
for kay on that goober running for Senate against Sherrod Brown:
College degree isn’t necessary, Mandel says
Bring back shop class.
So says Republican state Treasurer Josh Mandel, who in his campaign to unseat U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown says it is “my mission right now to tell every school administrator they’ve got to put shop class back in high school.”
“I am sick and tired of young people in this country being told they need to get some four-year, liberal-arts degree in order to be successful,” Mandel said yesterday in a wide-ranging interview with The Dispatch. “The reality is, you can be a lot more successful and happy in life with a vocational degree.”
So how did Mandel, who has taken heat in this campaign for refusing to take positions on current legislation in the Senate, including bills introduced by Brown, find himself issuing such a passionate plea for schools to reinstitute industrial-technology education in their buildings?
Is the Democrat Brown against shop class?
“This has nothing to do with Sherrod Brown,” said Mandel, who got onto the topic of shop class while discussing his endorsement yesterday by the National Federation of Independent Businesses.
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2012/05/09/college-degree-isnt-necessary-mandel-says.html
Boots Day
In a way, this shows Romney’s contempt for the average voter. We all know what he wants to do to get the economy moving: repeal Obamacare and tax cuts for the rich. He apparently thinks the little people haven’t been paying attention to his big ideas in these areas.
As a Colorado voter, medical marijuana and gay marriage are issues I care about, and issues that I haven’t heard Romney talk much about either. But Romney is so arrogant he thinks he gets to decide what’s important to me.
Legalize
Why is Willard holding the interview in the post-apocalyptic Australian wasteland? Such a weird visual. I kept expecting a mohawked marauder to come by and slice off an arm. Which is what Obama is going to do to Willard in the debates.
Southern Beale
Apparently Mitt Romney was the bully at his prep school for rich assholes. Not surprised.
rikyrah
@EconWatcher:
you are absolutely on point.
and, it shows.
WHENEVER he is challenged in ANY WAY, he gets the ‘ don’t you know who I am’ sneer on his face.
magurakurin
@Waynski: but isn’t that really they way it is now, except for the semantics? A church doesn’t really have civic authority in the matter of marriage other than the right to perform a ceremony, that can also be performed by other non-religious entities. Without a marriage licence the ceremony has no legal meaning. The state holds all authority over granting the status of marriage. If two people only get “married” through the words of the priest in a church, they aren’t married. It’s the license granted by the state that makes them married.
So fuck the churches. They really shouldn’t have any say over what is, already, a purely secular and legal matter.
And Mitt Romney is a total piece of shit and anybody who votes for him is a total piece of shit. I hate that fucker more than Bush, and that’s a lot. I hope Obama pounds that silver spoon asshole ten feet under.
Linda Featheringill
@Jay in Oregon: #21
Sometimes I truly believe that the Romney family and maybe the Romney team believe that the election is theirs, they just have to go out and harvest it.
On the plus side, that was quite a tell, Mitt. I can think of several social issues to dog Mitt about. This could be fun.
jwb
@EconWatcher: It’s an odd thing. All the polls—even PPP—show this to be an exceptionally tight race on a national level. But watching the GOP and especially the press, I don’t get the sense that any of them believe it. Everybody is taking Mitten’s lead: they say what they know they have to but no one believes any of it. (Excepting of course Mittens who thinks he’s entitled to win so long as he is willing to say what he doesn’t believe.)
Gin & Tonic
@EconWatcher:
Thank you ever so much, Professor.
I repeat. By November nobody will give a shit. Those that do would not vote for Obama in a million years anyway.
1988 was almost a quarter-century ago. The “news cycle” was so different then as to be almost unrecognizable. You may as well be talking about the election of 1888.
chopper
“Aren’t there issues of significance you want to talk about…
the economy, the growth of jobs, the need to put people back to work, the challenges of Iranthe ones i’ve actually prepared answers for?”Suffern ACE
@rikyrah: Oddly, I agree with him on this. A good industrial arts system would actually be a good thing. Those programs get cut and shouldn’t be. Tech School Preparation isn’t a democratic party value how exactly?
Nemesis
Mitt Romney deserves a lot of credit for creating Mitt Romney.
EconWatcher
@Southern Beale:
Wow. That story strikes me as a big deal, and the prep school setting makes it all the more pointed.
eemom
@magurakurin:
I’ll see that, and raise you a I hate him more than Cheney.
Srsly, I am beginning to believe I just might hate him more that ALL of them.
EconWatcher
@Gin & Tonic:
OK, I disagree with you, but my comment was too sarcastic. Sorry.
magurakurin
@Legalize:
hahahahaha
that was a nice one. great imagery.
cheers, mate.
gogol's wife
@Legalize:
Yes, that struck me too. I expected the crop-dusting plane to come along and strafe them.
This man is so despicable. His anger is just below the surface. I’m with all those who can’t wait to see him lose it during the debates. He hasn’t faced anyone like Obama before.
Shalimar
@grandpa john: As others have noted, he got pissed off at Bret freaking Baier for not fellating him enough. Six months is a long time to keep your cool. I don’t think Mitt can manage it.
GregB
It is obviously a big talking point. I just watched Iowa Governor and inveterate pud-wipe Terry Branstead pull the same line with Chuck Todd.
These are just horrible, horrible people.
Gin & Tonic
@EconWatcher: Thanks.
eemom
@jwb:
The only polls that matter are the ones in the swing states, and they tell a vastly different story. Here in Virginia, Obama is beating the shit out of Mittens, even WITH “popular” Gov. McDonnell hypothetically on the ballot.
Virginia. Fucking VIRGINIA: which elected not only McD but that scumbag Cuccinnelli in 2010; which did what NC did on Tuesday six years ago; which prior to 2008 was solid red in every presidential election since 1964.
Doesn’t anybody realize how fucking HUGE that is??
And as for the media, they need their horse race. The end.
gogol's wife
@Southern Beale:
That is an amazing (and stomach-turning) story. So he tortured people as well as animals.
Even more stomach-turning are the comments. “At least there are people who remember going to school with him!” “Obama ate dogs and did cocaine!”
russell
I agree with basically none of Romney’s agenda, and IMO the guy has no clue about how to actually make the economy work for rank and file human beings.
All of that said, I got no problem with how he handled himself here. He clearly wanted to refocus the interview away from the social topics, and toward the economic ones. That’s the platform he’s running on, it makes sense for him to try to redirect the conversation. Nothing wrong with that.
My two cents, FWIW.
pk
@Southern Beale:
If this story is true it’s horrific. Rich mean bastard! This is actually far worse than “dog on the roof”. This man is an insensitive, privileged, jackass.
Cacti
Mitt has a bad case of senior management disease…
“We’ll talk about why I say is important, and you’ll listen, laugh at my jokes, and call me witty, charming, and brilliant, or your ass is fired!”
JGabriel
@MikeJ:
At the end of the interview, Romney complains to the reporter, “Aren’t these state issues?”
Same-Sex Marriage — Federal issue via Defense of Marriage Act, passed by a GOP led congress.
Medical Marijuana — Federal issue via Fed control of the DEA.
College Tuition for Undocumented Immigrant Children –Federal issue via immigration issues being a primary Federal responsibility.
Mitt Romney — over-privileged, ideologically-blindered, jackass.
.
amk
@russell: It was his dickish way of ‘redirecting the conversation, that is being pilloried.
EconWatcher
@gogol’s wife:
At the risk of offending all the pet lovers on this blog, the story of torturing and humiliating that poor kid in prep school strikes me as a way, way bigger deal than the “dog-on-roof” story. True, Romney was only an adolesecent in prep school. But he organized a gang to commit a violent assault. It was a vicious, criminal act. If this isn’t a big deal, I don’t know what would be.
jwb
@eemom: I understand the swing state thing. But I really get the feeling that even the media doesn’t believe the basic national number. Or maybe because they deal with the basic campaign operation all the time, they know how underwhelming the Romney operation is compared to Obama’s (WV notwithstanding).
EIGRP
@GregB: I heard that on the radio. That was a shitty interview. The governor walked all over CT.
Eric
Kay
@EconWatcher:
I think it’s the other people that make that story.
The guy who was involved (and apologized) who says “it bothers me to this day”. Wow.
Suffern ACE
@pk: @pk: Horrific to us, but not to a lot of people. It may be the most decisive thing he’s done in his life. Mitt Romney, Enforcer for the Squares. Sounds about right.
handsmile
@eemom: (#67)
You are of course on record declaring that this election will be a rout. I’ve never been as sanguine as you are on the matter, but then again I don’t have your cheerful disposition. :)
On the issue of polling-the paramount importance of state polls-you are absolutely right. Not that that bit of electoral subtlety will ever be part of the Village palaver. Nothing must impede the tsunami of advertising revenue that a presidential election brings.
As for Richard Cheney, truly I hope I will never have to hate an American politician more ferociously, more steadfastly than that monster. The day I get to “tramp the dirt down” will be one of joyful celebration.
russell
It might just be my own inner dick talking, but it just didn’t strike me as that dickish or rude.
Different strokes.
Lurking Canadian
He’s running for President, for Pete’s sake. He doesn’t have time to answer questions about policy!
Villago Delenda Est
@Svensker:
He’s running for office as a hobby, I think.
When you’ve got a guaranteed annual income of millions from your past criminal activity, it’s very easy to run for office as a hobby. You’re not running for office because you have a vision, or because you need the income from the compensation for the office, or because you have the burning desire to change things for the better for millions.
It’s a fling. It’s something to do. The proles should be happy to vote for you. After all, you could be spending all your time on a beach somewhere, but you’re offering your brilliant self to the unwashed masses and they should be delighted you’ve deigned to do so.
Egg Berry
@Kay:
From the story:
I may not remember a lot of things from high school, but seems like I’d remember forcibly holding someone down and cutting their hair.
Davis X. Machina
@Villago Delenda Est: It’s my old AP USH teacher’s rule-of-thumb in spades: “Great presidents want to do something, mediocre-or-worse presidents want to be something.
amk
@Egg Berry: Yeah, “I don’t recall” typical rethug bs. Fucking coward. Typical of a bully.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
When I was fuming about the election in 2000, my father told me this.
Six years later, he confessed to me that he had been wrong. That the deserting coward was everything I said he was in November of 2000.
EconWatcher
@Egg Berry:
I think this story is going to hit hard. It was a different time, and unfortunately being mean to kids perceived as gay was commonplace. But not that many guys who would have been capable of this kind of violent assault.
handsmile
@Kay:
As it appears you are still reading this thread, if you have a moment I would be interested in your opinion on the prospects of Rob Portman being selected as Rmoney’s running mate.
To my mind his advantages are: swing state representation; service in both houses of Congress; positions in the Executive branch on both international and domestic economics; an apparently deferential manner (always important in service to an aristocrat.)
What am I missing/unaware of? (Actually that’s an enormous topic: I mean just on Rob Portman.) Your fine-grained knowledge of Ohio politics and politicking is always illuminating.
ETA: If you’ve already opined on this matter, sorry to have missed that thread. Could you give me an approximate date so I could find it?
Tom65
I you think he’s bad now, wait until after the conventions. There’s literally libraries full of Mitt’s duplicity on almost every topic – videos, interviews, articles, the list is huge. Romney is an opposition researcher’s wet dream. Once that hits the airwaves in earnest, Mitt’s going to be kept in lockdown by his fearful campaign team.
JGabriel
@Egg Berry:
Only because you weren’t the kind of person who did things like that all the time.
I have no doubt that Romney, in fact, remembers the incident, but he probably remembers it as not a big deal in the context of his other pranks and bullying.
.
Cacti
@EconWatcher:
Romney’s father was also the Governor at the time, and he would have known the chances of any serious consequences were virtually nil. His victim probably knew that as well.
Cacti
@EconWatcher:
It shows that Romney was aware of his social standing from an early age, and used it to torment others.
That’s a character trait that people don’t outgrow. They just learn to hide it better with age.
shortstop
@Villago Delenda Est: “Hobby” underestimates how badly he wants it, I think. He wants it like nobody’s business…but not because he has any vision for it other than getting it, and not enough to learn how to connect with people to obtain it.
@handsmile: The electoral vote will be quite lopsided in Obama’s favor. The national popular vote will be very close; there won’t be a repeat of his seven-point shellacking of McCain.
Roger Moore
@Egg Berry:
Not if it were just one instance of a pattern of similar behavior. What bully can remember every single time he terrorized somebody? It’s like expecting him to remember every round of layoffs he authorized while at Bain.
Alex S.
Touchy issue, he needs the enthusiasm of the Paulistas and cannot afford to alienate them.
shortstop
The impact of the story will be magnified by Mitt’s universal credibility problem. If he said, “I remember this incident and I’ve always been ashamed of it. I was a teenager with a teenager’s judgment and if I could take it back, I would.” But because he constantly lies and everyone in both parties knows it, to deny recollection is to confirm he’s a coward as well as a bully. Not attractive.
Villago Delenda Est
@Alex S.:
Yes, but does he know he needs that enthusiasm?
He does not seem to grok, in any way, the importance of grass roots support. He doesn’t understand a ground game…he thinks that UNLIMITED CORPORATE CASH is all he needs to obtain yet another bauble, the first Mormon President of the United States, who will establish the legitimacy of that pathetic little cult.
Kay
@handsmile:
I don’t think it matters at all. But I don’t think Vice Presidents matter, unless they’re a really bad pick (detriment) or a really good, perhaps unexpected pick (slight celebrity bump).
This is horrible to admit, but Sherrod Brown has been an Ohio Senator since 2006. Before that he was in the US House, and before that he was a two-term Ohio secretary of state. I canvassed for Obama the other week, they included a poll question on Sherrod Brown, and fully a quarter of the people I spoke to had no idea who he is. These are registered voters who voted in 2010.
No one knows who Portman is, and when they find out, they’re going to discover a sort of dronish Bush-bot who spouts absolute conventional trickle-down dogma. He lies a little on trade issues, because he’s in Ohio, but other than that he’s standard issue GOP. I don’t think it matters a bit.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
Can you say Quitta from Wasilla? Sure you can!
Hurling Dervish
@RSA: If he really wanted to push into the economy, he should have figured out how to segue from the legalization question:
“There are those who say that legalization is a way to jump start the economy, but I think there are better ways…”
Of course, then he’d have to name the better ways, and all he has there is Obama-fail.
Cacti
@shortstop:
Between this, the Seamus story, and the story where Mitt was arrested by park police for refusing to display his boat registration, a pretty clear picture is coming into focus…
W. Mitt Romney is a mean-spirited rich prick.
Alex S.
@Villago Delenda Est:
Hmm, true, at the moment I’d say ‘no’. But he probably thinks the enthusiasm will simply be there because of rising polarization. But the libertarians have a good alternative now (Gary Johnson).
Ash Can
@russell: The most charitable take on Romney’s performance was that he was clumsy in redirecting the conversation. But the fact is, redirecting the conversation was not the right thing for him to do at all. He needed to accommodate the questions the reporter was asking because 1) he’s running to be president of all of America, and that means, at the very least, being attentive to the concerns of local citizens, even if ultimately he as a federal-level political figure would not have the jurisdiction to do anything himself, and 2) as JGabriel points out above, these issues are in fact under federal jurisdiction, and therefore as a presidential candidate he needs to be familiar with them, because if elected he would have to take a stand on them.
His manner in trying to redirect the conversation was dickish, but even more important, the fact that he wanted to redirect it at all — to his favorite scripted talking points, no less — showed his ignorance of issues with which he should be familiar, his contempt for the people who would be hiring him for the job he wants, and his lack of understanding of what effective execution of the job of POTUS entails. He handled the interview poorly from start to finish, and if he were being graded on it in a high-school-level social studies class he’d be meeting with the teacher during lunch period to figure out an extra-credit assignment he could do to make up all those lost points and salvage his grade for the quarter.
Keith
Remember last presidential cycle when Obama wearing a jacket with no tie meant that he sympathized with Ahmadenajad? I miss that lost innocence.
amk
@Ash Can: Bingo. On so many issues, the fucker pled
fifthignorance.geg6
@Villago Delenda Est:
I have a lot of friends who have done the same to me. Some of them I have forgiven (mainly those who turned on him for Iraq) and some I have not and never will (those who questioned my love of and loyalty to the country).
I am happy, though, to know that, had either or both of my parents been alive for the 2000 election, they both would have had a deep and burning hatred for W and company that would probably have overshadowed even my own.
Kay
@Villago Delenda Est:
I confess I was taken in by the media slobbering over her convention speech. My own reaction was absolute horror, I thought it was a mean-spirited, really dark speech, and a weird way to introduce her to the nation.
But that turned out to be her actual character, and that truth was quickly revealed, so I should have trusted my gut.
Joey Maloney
The most striking thing for me, is just how inarticulate he is. Dubya was incoherent, but his word salad flowed fairly easily; it had a regular cadence and prosody for the most part. This clown, he can’t get out a single thought without fumfuh-ing around. He sounds like a junior high debater whose flopsweat has smeared all the notes he scribbled on his palms.
What. A. Tool.
DBaker
Beside all of the other issues discussed above, I noticed something else which I had also seen mentioned often lately, and I was wondering where it was coming from: the oil and gas create more jobs than wind power meme”
Lo and behold, Media Matters found this too, here: http://mediamatters.org/blog/201205100002
Charlie Pearce calling him Romneybot 2.0 makes me chuckle every time.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
The MSM is utterly worthless. Remember the 1992 GOP convention in Houston, where Buchanan delivered what the network twits called a “red meat” speech? In the middle of it, Al Franken, over on Comedy Central, called the election for Clinton.
In the days that followed, a great number of “moderate” Republicans reacted to that speech by sending campaign contributions to Clinton.
geg6
@Villago Delenda Est:
Much as I love saying the words “Senator Franken,” I miss Al as a campaign correspondent. I used to love his football helmet cam.
Cris (without an H)
I love how he keeps saying “my view is the same as it was in the beginning.” He’s automatically on the defensive against the flip-flop charge.
Kay
@Villago Delenda Est:
I know, but I get caught up. I spoke to someone I know about this recently, and I said (in my own defense) “Palin got that bump after the convention, which is what got me rattled” and she responded, “that bump lasted 2 weeks”. I forget! It seemed like months.
Sally Rakowski
High school, really?
Really?
This makes me not want to have voted for him as class president. Had I been in his class 45 years ago.
Good timing on WaPo’s part, though. Obama’s high school and college past coming up in Part II of this inivestigative series?
Suffern ACE
@Cacti: Is it just me, or is Mitt really the Malfoy of his class. “Yeah, he was always a leader and lead us to do bad things to others” is not exactly a character endorsement.
amk
@Sally Rakowski: fucking clime act (the birther, deather, racist pig 3-fer troll). Tipped your hand didntja ?
Egg Berry
@Sally Rakowski:
Why does it amaze you that other people have a memory?
If he’d shown any growth in the intervening years, your point might have relevance.
Yes, because NOBODY has snooped around Obama’s high school and college past in the past, oh, 6 years or so.
gaz
@Legalize:
That comment is so full of win it’s “literally” (not figuratively) choking on it!, parenthetically speaking. ;)
feebog
@ Shortstop:
I respectfully disagree with your prediction. I think the popular vote will be very close to, or even exceed the 8% spread between Obama and Gramps in 2008. I’m looking in particular at the defict with women voters that the Rombot2.0 is running up. If that holds up, we could be looking at a 10% spread. Remember that more women voted than men in 2008. Also, the gap with latino’s is massive, last poll I saw was something like 80 to 12%.
Don’t get me wrong, I will still work for and donate to the Obama campaign like he was 8 points down, but I’m feeling pretty good at this point.
feebog
@ Gaz:
The hat trick! Well played sir!
Joey Maloney
@Legalize: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjqF5Vcn6Ns
handsmile
@Egg Berry: (#117)
Well obviously NOT, ‘coz otherwise they would have found the usurper’s Kenyan (or is it Indonesian) birth records.
Also too, why this emphasis upon obtaining BHusseinO’s high school/college transcripts? I mean, why not interview his teachers who probably have some recollection of his grades? Maybe ‘coz they’re all dead now-murdered by his Mau Mau palace guard. The cover-up continues….
eemom
@amk:
No, I was wrong about that. Mea culpa.
Timmy does appear to have found a soulmate, however. : )
Sally Rakowski
No idea what you’re talking about, Stalker amk. Not a birther, don’t know what a deather is, certainly no racist, and as for a troll, please kindly send me your boxes to check with extr room for comments and I’ll tell you exactly how I feel about all your required pet issues for admittance here.
AxelFoley
@Legalize:
Props for the Mad Max visual. LOL
russell
I actually have no problem calling Romney a dick.
He’s the product of extraordinary privilege, but unlike his old man he doesn’t appear to have any understanding that not everybody in whole freaking world did not and do not have access to the remarkable advantages that have been, basically, the pond he’s swum in for his entire life.
He’s the ultimate example of the guy who was born on third and hit a triple. I used to think of W that way, but Romney takes it to a whole other level.
His approach to the nation’s problems are, basically, “Hey, just do what I did. How hard is that?”.
So yeah, a dick.
I just didn’t think his behavior in the interview was particularly boorish. Maybe I need to reset my rude-o-meter.
amk
@Sally Rakowski: lmao. again tipped your hand, didntja birther, deather, 3-fer troll?
gene108
@Hurling Dervish:
Better ways, per Mitt: (1) Cut taxes, (2) Entitlement – Social Security and Medicare – reform along the lines of the Ryan Budget, (3) repeal Obamacare, (4) repeal FinReg and unlock the power of the free markets, and (5) sundry forms of deregulation, more tax cuts and a good dose of ramping up defense spending.
A sharp right-winger would’ve segwayed into his talking points from any position a reporter starts with. Bush, Jr. for all his faults always got back to his talking points.
Goobernotorious
Issues of significance? That mendacious little fucking sack of weasel shit. Medical marijuana, gay marriage and anything to do with illegal immigrants have been made into issues for voters precisely because the GOP has been spending years making them issues. It’s what his own goddamn party has been running on for years!
And jobs and the economy and put people back to work are now quote issues of significance unquote? The GOP hasn’t given a fuck about any of that, and it’s especially galling this coming from a man who insisted an entire industry go bankrupt and three million American workers lose their jobs.
What a soulless spineless hollow man he is. Romney can go pick the corn out of my shit.
Another Halocene Human
@EconWatcher: The Mo world is full of fraudulent and semi-legal investments schemes. Some MLMs, like that magic grape juice product (note: non-alcoholic) are inextricably Mormon.
The biggest fraud, of course, are the Profits using tithes to invest in commercial real estate schemes. I guess they looked at the RCC and figured, I can do them one better.
Another Halocene Human
@Svensker:
Fuck, he only successfully got elected once, and he was lucky to have weak/weakened opposition.
He was horribly disliked in SLC by the time the Olympics were over and while I left the state before the end of Romney’s term it seems like fond feelings for Rmoney are a distant memory over there, too. NYC (wall street) gave him a lot of cash, though. No small donors.
Sally Rakowski
@Sally Rakowski: lmao. again tipped your hand, didntja birther, deather, 3-fer troll?
Curious as to why you dropped off ‘racist’ this time, Stalker amk?
I mean, I thought that one never gets old for you, does it?