Writing a few days ago in the Washington Post and Kaplan, inc. Loss Leader, Jennifer Rubin:
The Obama campaign can’t bear the thought that the well-traveled Mitt Romney will make a nice impression on his overseas tour.
Maybe Rubin’s editor’s will let her #retroactively make that column about pink Himalayan salt.
Via Scott McConnell at the American Conservative, whose post is worth reading in full.
Hill Dweller
What does being well traveled have to do with diplomacy and/or competence?
Rubin is a shameless hack.
gwangung
Frankly, I don’t think the Obama team was worried at all about Romney and his international tour.
This was just a part of the Beltway media’s general all around cluelessness about American life in general.
Alison
Well…he did make a nice impression, if we use “impression” in its “do an impression of” sense, and if his goal was to do a nice impression of a completely inept, graceless, thick-skulled preening asshole. In that sense, he was fucking brilliant!
lamh35
So while Ann and Mitt are droning on on Today Show about how they just love “Downton Abbey” (way to pander huh), to quote Montel Jordan: This Is How We Do It
“Michelle Obama on Olympics: British “know what they’re doing””
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505263_162-57481220/michelle-obama-on-olympics-british-know-what-theyre- doing/
Nemesis
“Great Britain” gets a taste of american politics and hacks up a hairball.
The US media has been sooo laid bare by this dust up. Would appear mittbot has been coddled by the MSM in the US. Wonder why….
DH
Since I am Jewish, I can say this with a bit of authority.
Jennifer Rubin is a fucking Pisher and a Shanda.
If I live long enough, I bet I will read a researched history that shows she is on the Rombots payroll.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
“Can’t bear” as in “need to stop hyperventilating” from laughing to hard, then the answer is yes. Mitt has indeed failed the urine filled boot test.
Hill Dweller
@lamh35: I’d bet the farm neither has seen “Downton Abbey”. Nevertheless, is that supposed to connect them with the British people in some way?
Willard is an awful candidate running an inept campaign.
Mike G
Wow, that’s some Baghdad Bob-level reporting.
Alison
@DH: As a fellow member of the Tribe, I agree – Jennifer Rubin is Bad For the Jews.
redshirt
Don’t worry about Rubin. She’ll re-write the story and Mitt will come out looking like a King.
Gin & Tonic
@lamh35: Not to attempt in any way to diminish Michelle’s skill in that interview, it simply isn’t that hard to be a gracious guest in someone else’s home. What she said is pretty much what most of us were taught by our mother when we were young. How Willard can so consistently wrong-foot it is truly a mystery to me.
Roy G.
Remember what a huge Achille’s Heel that Joe Biden’s gaffes were supposed to be for the Dems? Oh! how the mighty wingnut memes have fallen.
gwangung
@Gin & Tonic: Pretty much this. Not a great deal for Michelle to knock a T-ball beyond the fences, but the contrast is so amusing…
rlrr
@Hill Dweller:
Someone should ask the Romneys if they enjoy Inspector Spacetime and Cougarton Abbey.
PeakVT
@gwangung: In Rubin’s case, it’s more of a neocon thing. She’s part of the MSM, but she’s also a propagandist intent on electing a Republican. That’s why a lot of people were surprised when the Test Prep Daily hired her (though they shouldn’t have been).
patrick II
@Alison:
The British have summed up your apt description of Rmoney by calling him “The American Borat”.
lamh35
London 2012 Olympics: Are you watching Mitt? Michelle Obama gives a fun masterclass in diplomacy
DH
@Alison:
Thanks:) Looking at your twitter feed, I notice you are also a refutation of her brilliant description of the typical Jewish woman who won’t vote for Sarah Palin. Please take that as a compliment
catclub
@redshirt: It would be interesting if Romney visits Israel and comes down with King David Syndrome (special whitebread Mormon version).
Spaghetti Lee
So smug. So entitled. And yet, so wrong.
In any job other than opinion journalism, being wrong as often as Rubin is would get you fired. What a life she leads.
catclub
@patrick II: Throw the Mormon in the well!
geg6
@DH:
Fixt.
yopd1
Romney’s vetting process is worse then McCain’s. He used Eric Edelman as an expert to complain about the possible leaking of classified information from the White House.
JenJen
Awesome!! Day Two of Mittenfreude!!
DH
@geg6:
LOL…it would not surprise me.
scav
Playing with the OED again. † Nice, sb. Obs. rare. [f. next.] A foolish or simple person ; a fool.
blab blah blah 1390 Gower Conf 11. 285 That wol with ydel hand reclame His hauk, as many a nyce doth.
Easy and practically Anglo-Saxon. Ha!
yopd1
@Alison: This!
Pinkamena Panic
“A nice impression”.
Like Wile E. Coyote hitting a mountain.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
Romney up nationally.
Americans are politically retarded. That is all.
JPL
The British politicians come across as policy wonks and Mitt comes across like monk.
Okay someone else can come up with a better rhyme scheme please.
Valdivia
The full article is indeed worth the read. I think Romney will be bolstered in Israel by his handler Adelson and Bibi, like the piece says. But there is danger there too–Adelson is a one stater guy, and embracing that would be a lot of trouble for Mitt. I think if he tries to outdo his hosts he might still put his foot in his mouth. Watch too for the supposed meeting with Palestinians, that will be interesting.
LAC
This twat is banging out a blog an hour chocked full with red herrings about the awfulness of Obama. It will a few days before we get the “wonder” of Mitt’s foreign tour, once he is in Israel, of course…
lamh35
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God: I thought that was just one poll and an outlier.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gin & Tonic:
Here’s the thing.
I think OvenMitt’s mom did indeed teach him in this.
It just didn’t take. Obviously.
Sctrojan90
Dear Jennifer:
I seem to remember a junior senator embarking on a pretty successful mideast and europe excursion in July 2008. Do you think mitt will have 200,000 people come out to hear him speak?
Rafer Janders
Never made it to Vietnam though, did he?
Spaghetti Lee
@Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God:
According to who?
jibeaux
I wonder if they watch Downton Abbey and take notes on how to treat the staff and seem approachable and human…
Felinious Wench
I eagerly await American Borat’s Excellent Adventure to Israel.
Villago Delenda Est
@patrick II:
The difference, of course, was that Sasha Cohen was playing a joke with Borat.
OvenMitt isn’t playing. The Rmoneytron the echt OvenMitt.
yopd1
I do hope one of the Israeli journalists asks Mitt about the Mormon practice of post-humously baptizing non-Mormons, especially Holocaust victims. It would be particularly powerful if they asked it at Yad Vashem.
Old Dan and Little Ann
@lamh35: The First Lady Rocks. The video at the bottom of that article was great.
Rafer Janders
Well-travelled, sure. He’s visiting his money.
Seriously, Jennifer Rubin, you really want to remind people that Romney hides his money overseas so he doesn’t have to pay any taxes like all other hard-working Americans do? The “well-travelled” line just opens him up to all of that.
PurpleGirl
Outside of this trip, is Romney well-traveled? Yes, he lived in France many years ago but has he and his family done any traveling since then?
Pinkamena Panic
Romney’s well-traveled; just ask his dog. (You might want to hose him off first.)
scav
Thought of a phrase. Was a time when I met a lot of academics etc. all more or less involved with research and development abroad. There were a certain clueless class of them (usually ending up at about Dean level, but that’s a sidenote) that we called “Men of the Marriott” because cloned lobbies and the airport VIP lounge was about what they would see of a place on their well-travels.
wrb
At least the trip has raise a very important question:
Is the fellow The Sun calls “Mitt the Twit” Borat or Mr. Bean?
The Monty Python Upper Class Twit of the Year contest should be re-shot featuring Mitt.
Villago Delenda Est
@wrb:
He’s Baldrick. Without a clue or a cunning plan.
Blackadder would have a field day with him.
The two finalists: OvenMitt and the deserting coward.
The Lodger
@Spaghetti Lee:
Any job other than economist…
Mike E
@yopd1: Mitt will prolly throw them a retroactive denial about the LDS soul hijacking biz: “As an elder I forbade that practice way back in _____”
gene108
Romney had any backbone, he’d push for Israel to invite Mormon missionaries into their country to convert the heathens to the one true faith.
yopd1
@Mike E: Actually, has admitted to it, just not specifically Holocaust victims. Elie Wiesel called him out on it earlier this year.
JPL
@Mike E: He forbade it retroactively.
Mike E
@yopd1: Being half facetious, sorry. But that does sound like the sort of sideways denial/apology that he’d give when continuing this practice.
Ash Can
She really wrote that? That’s fucking hilarious!
geg6
@Spaghetti Lee:
Yeah, that’s what I’d like to know. NBC/WSJ had Obama up. I think CBS/NYT did, too. Gallup and Rasmussen are the only ones showing Mitten up and their methodology has been questioned, especially Ras.
Tony J
It’s like watching an episode of Columbo. Every time he opens his mouth the rich, entitled prick just makes things worse.
Shamelesly stolen, but I like it.
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@Spaghetti Lee:
Talking Points Memo, among others.
In state-level polls, Obama’s losing ground in CO, VA, NJ and PA. (And with 750K+ voters off the rolls, I assume that PA is already lost– IMO 4% isn’t enough margin to compensate). I just don’t see any way Obama’s numbers go up, as undecideds seem to be breaking for the Mittbott.
Bain capital? Dead story. Tax returns? Dead story. The economy’s been successfully tanked by the GOP, so mission accomplished for them. And the ‘mittwitt’ fun in London, while amusing to folks like us, either won’t register or will actually count as a plus with the little turnips out there.
Romney’s like the Cloverfield Candidate… he keeps getting nuked (with multiple attacks, any one of which would be career-ending for a Democrat), yet he just keeps on stumbling away from it, totally undamaged. Nothing seems to work against this asshole.
I don’t even think it’s the Obama campaign’s fault, at this point: Every attack I’ve seen or heard has been true, well executed, and on point. I expected him to be up by 7-10% by now. The problem is the people. Over half the electorate is functionally retarded. Not even the Founders knew how to route around such damage.
(Don’t mean to depress, but I’ve seen the prequel: Kerry’s position was arguably stronger in late July 2004 than Obama’s is now, and he lost).
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@geg6:
Rasmussen and Gallup’s samples are closer to who will actually be permitted to vote this year, so IMO they’re worth more than usual for this election.
HyperIon
@redshirt: I’ve seen her on C-SPAN and that she is an extremely irritating person is obvious after you listen for about, oh, 10 seconds. It is amazing how annoying she is. Worse than Coulter.