Garry Wills’ fairly brutal assessment of Mitt Romney’s future, where he tries, and fails, to find recent campaign loser with as little to offer as Romney, got me thinking about a historical figure marginal enough to compare with Romney. The guy in this (great) photo, Wendell Willkie, Roosevelt’s opponent in 1940, is one possibility. He was a corporate lawyer who hadn’t run for office until he faced Roosevelt in 1940. However, unlike what I expect Romney to do, he joined forces with FDR to promote internationalism and wrote a book about the “one world” movement. Since he died in 1944, at age 52, we don’t know exactly what he would have done had he lived a full life.
Probably a better candidate is poor old Tom Dewey, the governor of a Northeastern state who also thought he was going to win on one of the nights he ran for President. After losing to FDR in ’44 and, more famously, to Truman in 48, Dewey pretty much stayed on the sidelines, turning down a nomination from LBJ for the Supreme Court, and concentrating on making money as a corporate lawyer. I imagine Mitt will follow a similar path.
Killjoy
Who?
JPL
Maybe but without the Supreme Court part..
Baud
@Killjoy:
More like, who cares?
WereBear
Has Mitt Romney EVER done anything else but make money?
While successful at amassing it and not letting anyone else have it, I don’t think he’s particularly good at actually making it appear.
Heck, I could take over a company, hoover up its assets, and leave the husk on the side of the road. Is this a skilled job?
Cermet
Once a Vulture, always a parasite on our country. Parasites never die, they just keep looking for a new host to bleed and suck dry. At leaset we got the pleasure to tell that asswipe – “Your fired!”
Hey, he’s right, I like doing that to a piece of low life shit like him.
You’re fired, you’re fired … feels good in the morning.
Chris
This reminds me of my American Diplomatic History course at Indiana University (which has a Wilke Hall), with Prof. Joan Hoff (a Nixon biographer) having a socratic back and forth with one of my classmates, who turned out to be Wilke’s grandson.
Kirk
Right now I’d call it even odds Romney blames the loss on others and throws his hat in the ring for 2016.
SiubhanDuinne
Somewhere among my thousands upon thousands of books, I actually own an autographed copy of “One World.” As I am probably never going to read it, maybe I should find out if anyone would pay cash money for it.
Retirement project: catalogue personal library and get rid of 90% of dead-tree books. Be ruthless. Seriously, I mean it.
PeakVT
I like this borderline non-encyclopedic paragraph from Wikipedia:
The hubris feels familiar.
RoonieRoo
I think the more interesting question, now that Romney slides off stage right, is “who is the leader of the Republican party?”
brettvk
I really don’t expect Mitt to do anything with his wealth and legacy that enriches anybody outside of his family or the LDS. He could get lots of props inside the Mormon hierarchy for a relatively small investment, and maybe that will be really satisfying to him, since it seem he’s comfortable with hermetically-sealed bubbles. And he may owe the church some back tithes if he’s finagled his taxes — he’d probably come clean to the prophet before he’d stop cheating his fellow citizens.
I don’t think Mitt is stupid. I think he’d like to have a legacy as the sort of international statesman that Jimmy Carter has made himself, but I don’t think he could possibly force himself to be that generous. Even if he gets his own planet when he dies, he seems to think he can take the Bain cash with him to furnish it.
WereBear
@RoonieRoo: Heck, when that question has come up in the past, hasn’t it always been Limbaugh?
El Cid
Romney attempted a leveraged buyout of the U.S. government, looking forward to pocketing lots of fees and commissions and using its assets and revenues to pay off his backers with interest.
In the end, the U.S. rejected the offer.
aretino
I doubt that Romney will be as memorably mocked as Wendell Willkie, whom Harold Ickes called “a simple, barefoot Wall Street lawyer.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Killjoy: @Baud: Yup. Willard will fade from even our memories faster than Dukakis. No disrespect to him, but I bet your average voter would have to stop and think when it was MD ran, and against whom. My other prediction, four years from now, having flamed out early in the GOP primaries, Paul Ryan will resign from Congress to take Palin’s place as Fox News concern troll, if Palin, who looked pretty haggard on Tuesday night, lasts that long.
dan
A man who did nothing but serve his own ambition his entire life is not going to turn suddenly to serving others.
fourmorewars
Thought you’d get a kick out of this. On a rw facebook page called, w/o a trace of irony, ‘Uber-American,’ one of the fan posts states breathlessly that 17 states have petitioned to succeed (sic) from the U.S. No, that’s not the funny part. The funny part is the page moderator’s reply: “If this is real, then why isn’t it on Drudge?”
Craigo
Tom Dewey didn’t stay on the sidelines long – he drafted Eisenhower in 1952 specifically to kneecap frontunner Bob Taft (of Taft-Hartley infamy). Since there was essentially no way the GOP wasn’t winning in 1952, we should at least thank him for that.
Zifnab25
@Kirk: That’s not how the GOP works. He had his turn. Now he’s done.
Maybe Tag will get a shot at the big time in 20 years or so, but for now I think Romney’s on the fast track to loserdom obscurity.
JGabriel
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mistermiix @ top:
That’s because Willis is looking in the wrong place. If he wants to find GOP candidates with as little to offer as Romney, then he shouldn’t be looking at the campaign losers. Instead, he should be looking at the GOP winners (c.f., Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Reagan, Bush II).
.
WereBear
I see Romney as someone who has always cheated his way into achievement. His whole life seems to have been led under pressure to perform; if it’s true that he was supposed to be the fulfillment of the White Horse Prophecy, it would certainly explain his actions and statements.
The constant drumbeat of “To make wonderful things happen, Mitt just has to show up!” was an article of faith in his campaign from the beginning.
He’s expected to be a successful businessman, so he gets ahold of money. He’s expected to get at least one office under his belt before the Presidency, so he gets to be Governor of Massachusetts. He’s expected to be a husband and father, so he gets married at the usual time and has five kids.
Done! There is never a whisper of what Romney really wants. Does he have a soul in there, somehow? I’ve never seen anyone so hollow.
MattF
The pundits who had something positive to say about Romney (e.g., Brooks, Parker) all did the ‘if only Mitt acted in public the way he does in private’ segue– without, somehow, realizing that there’s a huge problem with that line of reasoning.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Zifnab25: ah yes, the other good part of this election: Without “son of president” on their resume, the only place the Mittlets can have that political career at least two of them (Tagg and Josh, IIRC) are said to want is Utah, where the Romneys are neither that special (the True White Horse would not place) nor I believe, that popular. Willard owed no small part of his career to being the son of a man widely admired. Running to avenge the failure of someone no one liked is a poor way to start. /gloaty gloaty gloat gloat
edited
PeakVT
Romney’s done. He’s never been a networker or activist among the Republican elite. It’s always been all about Mitt, and now that he’s discovered the whole country doesn’t like him, he’s going to take the millions he never put into this contest and go home to one of his mansions.
NCSteve
The more you look at Dewey, the more perfect the comparison to Romney. Wealthy, corporate attorney, former governor of a liberal state. This is from his Wikipedia article about the 1948 campaign:
Bill E Pilgrim
@RoonieRoo: It’s still Rush Limbaugh.
They may want to change that. Whether they will is not as clear as many people think.
I still hear a lot of them talking about their big sweep in 2010, so you know, win some lose some, not realizing that it was just a gerrymandered illusion. As hard as it is to imagine, it might actually take a few more losses for them before it really changes.
Kirk
@SiubhanDuinne: If you mean it, start with a simple but painful trick. If you have used (read or referenced) a book more than once in the last three years, keep it. If you have had the book less than three years you can keep it for now unless you know you won’t read or reference over the next year.
“I might need it someday” does not count.
You are allowed slack for things with personal significance – some autographs, Th Book that you shared with a loved one, that sort of thing.
It works. Hurts, but works.
Kirk
@Zifnab25: I didn’t say he’d win. I said he may not have faced reality. If he does it will be brutal (the ridicule), but Instill think it even odds right now.
PurpleGirl
@RoonieRoo: Was Romney ever the “leader” of the Republican Party? Didn’t they have a multiplicity of pundit/entertainer voices telling people what to believe? Did he really explain policies he wanted to enact or guiding principle that were steady and consistent?
gelfling545
@SiubhanDuinne: That was one of my retirement projects, too. Retired in 06; library still the same
Cacti
I think he’ll probably get some sort of sinecure from the Mormon church.
JGabriel
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WereBear:
That’s such an unfair characterization. I’m sure Romney’s innards are just filled with circuitry and pistons.
.
Enhanced Voting techniques
After reading about the utter delusion Mittens ran his campaign under I suspect Severely Elder Statesman Romney is going to be a laugh to watch. My bet is Romney is going to attempt to act like he is an ex-president; write a book, set up a library and foundations, attempt to give advice to upcoming Republicans. I don’t see a slot on Faux news for him, beneath the Romney dignity and all that.
But figure, Romney has never, ever seen the responsibilities of public office, just the privileges.
hueyplong
I don’t care for the analogies in the original post. Those people (Dewey, Willkie) actually did things on the party or international stage and influenced events in some way, even if only in the short term.
As early as Wednesday morning, Romney became an unperson to Republicans, Democrats and Americans in general. I’d be surprised if he had a single additional moment of political relevance in his life. It’s difficult even to imagine the subject on which he’d be asked a question by anyone with a microphone.
The analogy is to current ex-president and unperson George W. Bush, and the difference is that Bush actually did something in terms of presidential activity upon which comment might be made. Romney didn’t.
Romney long ago repudiated the only thing he ever did (Romneycare) that will have any lasting effect of any kind on the country. It’s possible that future generations will struggle to remember just who it was who lost to Obama in 2012.
Whether Romney lives to be 100 or dies today, his future political “impact” will be the same. Zero.
Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason
@Kirk: So, all those boxes of books that I haven’t unpacked since we moved here in 2003? You’re saying I don’t need to keep them?
Perish the thought. I’ll be setting up some more bookshelves Real Soon Now.
Schlemizel
I want to start a fund to have a monument put up to Willard – it really is the Epitaph for the entire GOP – its from the linked column:
kay
That’s what I don’t understand about the mainstream pundit excuses for Romney’s cowardice.
What makes him terrible is not his positions (no one knows what they are) it’s that he wanted to be President yet couldn’t stand up for ANYTHING. We saw it again and again and again. Mitt Romney stood there while a GOP debate audience savaged the gay soldier. He passed on Rush Limbaugh’s disgusting attacks on a private citizen. It happened over and over and over. This is a character issue. It can’t be ignored or papered over with ” he’s really a moderate” or “he’s really a good Guy”
He’s a good Guy when it’s easy and doesn’t carry any risk. Anyone can be that person. That’s a REALLY low bar.
General Stuck
In five years, Romney will be eligible for the Circus Clown Hall of Fame.
Robin G.
@brettvk: Agreed. I think he’ll devote himself to the LDS from here on out, which seems to be where his heart (three sizes too small though it is) lies. And he’ll keep growing hos fortune through that time honored tradition of moving it from one bank account to another as interest rates apply.
I don’t think we’ve heard the last of the Mittlets, though. I see a run for US Senate in Utah in the future for at least one or two of them.
JGabriel
Wikipedia via NCSteve:
That editorial was wrong. I give you their future, with an even more inept president:
“I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully.”
.
Davis X. Machina
@WereBear:
You mean “Has Mitt Romney EVER done anything else but accumulate virtue?”
This is, after all, still America.
Alex S.
Romney is old. He’ll retire and let his portfolio do the work. Politically, he leaves nothing behind.
Schlemizel
I read Trumans biography years ago and his comments on Herbert Hoover were eye opening. There was a man run out of office in disgrace, charged with running the country into the ditch, a fool and a bungler.
But HST knew he was a man with bad friends (It was the GOP after all) who was a hard worker and a decent human being. Truman tapped him to run the recovery effort in Europe after the war an he did a tremendous job.
That sort of future is impossible to imagine for Hoovers modern equivalent (W) or this fop, Willard Marquise du Mittens, Rmoney
RoonieRoo
While it is pretty funny and scary that Limbaugh is a leader of the party in some respects, he really isn’t. Romney was the leader while he was the nominee, weak though he was.
Wouldn’t Boehner be considered the highest ranking in the government right now?
dr. bloor
@Bill E Pilgrim:
Although the gerrymandering has created a situation that isn’t entirely illusory. They held tight to the House this cycle despite losing the aggregate popular vote in House races, and it’s going to take an act of FSM or well-placed tactical nukes to get them out of the majority there.
I’d hope for some real reform in elections, like proportional voting, before I’d expect the neanderthals to see the light. That, or we’re just going to have to wait for “demographics” to do their magic.
Cacti
@kay:
Mitt’s vision for the Presidency started and stopped with: “Willard M. Romney, 45th President of the United States”.
He deserved the title. Everything beyond that was an afterthought.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Cacti@Enhanced Voting techniques: I think this is close. The acting like an ex-President part definitely, similar to how pathetic loser John McCain lectures Obama now at every opportunity.
Romney presented this oddly bland, even sort of goofy personality during the most of the campaign, but during that first debate his asshole boss side really came out. You could just see him badgering some CEO of a small company that Bain had just bought: “So do you know exactly how many people you need to fire to bring the balance sheet in line? Do you? Do you? I’m asking you if you know that, do you? Give me a figure. Do you know it? No, you don’t.”
Any images of him slinking away humiliated and subdued doesn’t fit the real Romney personality.
Schlemizel
@RoonieRoo:
They all bow before The great Rush Limbaugh!
Notice that any gooper who publicly rebukes the one true Lamebrain is forced to grovel before his greatness and beg forgiveness.
WereBear
@kay: Romney reminds me of a dog who has been trained to do some complicated trick; they do their thing and get a treat.
The whys and hows don’t enter into it.
IowaOldLady
Mr. IowaOldLady is watching his tivo of Fox Sunday. You’ll be surprised to learn that the only important political event of this week was the resignation of Petraeus, which apparently is directly related to Benghazi. I had to shut the door so I wouldn’t hear it.
Cacti
@Bill E Pilgrim:
I imagine Mitt in a professional setting to be something like this.
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
@RoonieRoo: I think boss Norquist is the leader, despite some concern about his Muslim wife.
Bill E Pilgrim
@dr. bloor: No it wasn’t illusory in that sense but it was in the sense that they think it was demographics that got them there instead of gerrymandering. I have read that the demographics will overtake even the redistricting, but when is the question.
They got a sugar rush and think that it was real nourishment, in other words. With a lot of damage to the rest of us along the way, to be sure.
Enhanced Voting techniques
@Schlemizel: Hoover was a good candidate for that because he successfully ran the recovery for Europe, disaster relief in the US in the ’20s and famine relief in the Ukrainian during the great famine there. The reason Hoover is so reviled is because, of any president this country has ever had, he was the best equipped to deal with the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. Instead, he sat on his hands because he bought into the bootstraps bullshit.
kay
@Cacti:
To me, reading Kathleen Parker, she may as well say “Mitt Romney would be a good President if he were a completely different person”
Well, YEAH, I guess so. I got news for her. That was a long run. Years and years. We KNOW what he is. There isn’t some better more honorable Romney. He’s in his sixties. We would have seen it by now.
hueyplong
RoonieRoo, I think you describe the GOP as it should have been but was not. I don’t think it’s either funny or merely witty to call Rush Limbaugh the leader of the GOP. Unless and until he savages one of his own and that guy does not either conform his behavior accordingly or flat out apologize in public, Rush Limbaugh is in the hunt to be called the de facto leader of the Republican Party.
It’s not altogether improper to call the right wing media the leader of the party. They drive the “factual” world upon which party action is taken, and we’re only now seeing that do something other than work for them electorally.
If I had to pick an actual holder of public office, I’d go with McConnell. Boehner’s every move seems calculated to keep Cantor’s shiv from penetrating his back, so it’s hard to call a guy acting so reactively the party’s leader.
dmsilev
To me, the more interesting question is what will Paul Ryan do having been given a temporary national stage.
I suppose he could run for President in 2016, though the odds are against it working out for him; out of curiosity, I went back through the last 100 years worth of elections. There are only three losing VP candidates who went on to get the nomination in a future cycle: FDR, Bob Dole, and Walter Mondale. Two of those lost in the general.
Schlemizel
@Or something like that.Suffern Ace:
Muslim wife you say? Hmmmmmmmm, doesn’t Sharia prohibit taxation as immoral?
Damn I wish I could start that rumor & make it fly – wingnut head exploding all across the country!
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
@hueyplong: The closest is probably Dukakkis. have you ever heard of an elected official turning to Dukakkis? Has he ever been even asked to play party gadfly?
Bill E Pilgrim
@Bill E Pilgrim: I haven’t the slightest idea how the @cacti part got in there, morning stumblefingers. Was a reply to EVT.
Alex S.
@RoonieRoo:
I would agree that it’s probably Boehner right now. He is the last man standing. Though it’s probably Jeb’s party if he wants it.
I’d like to know how the Supreme Court judges influence the parties. The highest ranking republican in general is Justice Roberts, after all (and Ben Bernanke, but he doesn’t matter).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@IowaOldLady: What kind of screens or shields was it Captain Kirk used to call on Mr Sulu to put up, that would get Scottie yelling “She can’t hold, captain!”? In my mind’s eye, I see Britt Hume yelling to Brett Baier and Megan Kelly “Close the episteme! Seal it off!”
From the NYT
PurpleGirl
New York named a major roadway (the Thruway) for Gov. Dewey.
Will Massachusetts ever name anything for Romney?
jurassicpork
Well, at least liberals can engage in the schadenfreude over the fact that poor Mitt will have to slink back to his quarter billion dollar fortune and five mansions.
I can’t stand listening to the bellyaching from right wing nut jobs who keep insisting that Christie, Sandy, Democrat voter suppression, etc. are responsible for Obama’s “squeaker” of a win. Hence, my open letter to them, Democracy Isn’t For Wimps.
different-church-lady
Well, the two examples you cited apparently had enough to offer that the presidents who vanquished them offered them roles. What could Romney do for Obama? Be ambassador to the Cayman Islands?
Schlemizel
@PurpleGirl:
An outhouse at the roadside rest on the Mass Turnpike, it will be the one with no paper in the stalls
Davis X. Machina
@Or something like that.Suffern Ace: You have to take the long view: Teaching is the best revenge…
kay
@WereBear:
That’s what amazed me about that slick, expensive biographical film they put out. That was THE BEST of Mitt Romney. He’s nice to his family and people he knows, likes and (mostly) shares a religion with. All of that IS EASY. It’s the bare minimum.
PurpleGirl
@Schlemizel: More importantly, it frowns on things like interest. The Old Testament also frowns on interest, or as it would say “making money off of a dead thing (money is not a living entity)”.
Fluke bucket
@Alex S.: retire from what? The only thing that has ever worked for him is his portfolio.
gf120581
@dmsilev: Yeah, I don’t put much stock in the “Paul Ryan is a presidential contender” talk. You only have to look at Sarah Palin to see how ridiculous that is.
Even those three examples you bring up don’t work. FDR and Bob Dole didn’t get the nomination until a long time after they’d run (12 years for FDR, 20 years for Dole) and when they were known respectively as the popular Governor of New York and the Senate Majority Leader than as failed running mates. And Walter Mondale was an actual former Veep, not just a running mate.
No, in my view, Ryan is as irrelevant now as his former boss Jack Kemp was after 1996. The only difference is that he still has his House seat, but I wonder if he may get bored with that and quit for Fox News.
Xecky Gilchrist
@dan: A man who did nothing but serve his own ambition his entire life is not going to turn suddenly to serving others.
Oh, I dunno.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@RoonieRoo: I’d say Boehner is the highest ranking elected Republican right now, officially and in fact, especially if Reid manages to get through some filibuster reform. I gather no one’s even talking about getting rid of it entirely, which I’m ambivalent about, but they want to re-instate the ‘talking filibuster’, and you have to filibuster an actual bill, you can’t block debate on it, which I think is good.
I believe the rule now is you have to get sixty votes to overcome a filibuster. I’d like to see that changed to needing forty votes to create one. No more hiding behind abstentions, no more “Democrats failed to overcome…”, rather “Republicans voted to block Law X or Nominee Y”
But I think because what Boehner, who knows he’s risen as high as he’s going to, fears above all else is revolt from the Cantor-Ryan wing of his own caucus, I suspect he fears Limbaugh, and O’Reilly, and Norquist, and Vigeurie, and Robertson. If he had the guts to lose, he’d be pretty powerful for a week or two.
jeffreyw
@fourmorewars: I, for one, take great pleasure in living in one of the succeeding States. I was not thinking about petitioning for recognition, though. All part of “a life lived well is the best revenge” mind set – Not one to toot my own horn, & etc.
IowaOldLady
@gf120581: I think you’re right about Ryan. House members are often not prepared for electoral battle beyond the local level. Ryan’s inexperience with the national press showed.
RoonieRoo
@hueyplong: McConnel is certainly stronger than Boehner. Do you think it matters that most negotiating will have to occur with Boehner since the house will be the choke point? I’m also curious if Cantor is going to be shiving Boehner or if he will back down.
I do get what you are saying about Limbaugh. Where he definitely has great influence over the party and there policy, that does not make him the leader of the party.
Cacti
@gf120581:
Ryan has also never shown that he can win an election in anything larger than a Congressional District. He couldn’t swing Wisconsin in Mitt’s direction in a national election.
He’s done as a national contender. His future is in wresting away Newt’s title of “dumb person’s idea of a smart person” on the grift circuit.
Cacti
@Xecky Gilchrist:
I imagine Melinda leaned pretty hard on Bill for the philanthropy.
Does anyone see Queen Ann wanting Mitt to give up a cent to “you people”?
Poopyman
@PurpleGirl: A public hospital, if there’s any ironic justice in the world.
RoonieRoo
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Okay, I was thinking Boehner was technically highest ranking. Thanks.
Not sure why this has peaked my interest. I think it is because I think an internal battle in the party is coming and I might want to have my popcorn ready.
NotMax
(best George Takei imitation) Oh, my.
A small corner of Hell offers ice skating.
dmsilev
@gf120581: Yeah, that was sort of the take-away lesson of the history. ‘Failed VP candidate’ is in and of itself not a highway to the nomination. It’s often a highway to a humiliating failure in the primaries though (c.f. Joe Lieberman finishing in a “three way tie for third place”, aka “fifth”, in the 2004 NH primary).
Brachiator
@mistermix:
Uh, Romney has spent much of his life making money. That’s the path he has long been on. Running for president was a nice little hobby for him.
If you only meant that Romney will retire from politics, I agree. And he doesn’t have the brains to be on the Supreme Court.
Also, Romney is kinda old, despite all appearances. If the Republicans find a way to win in 2016, I could see Romney being offered a job as ambassador to Mexico, France or Great Britain, but that’s about it for him.
ETA: anybody going to watch the Sunday news shows? I imagine that the Fox show will be a funeral, with voodoo denialism used like magic to try to reanimate the rotting corpse of Republican defeat.
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
@NotMax: Oh Christ. If he were a Sicilian, I’d be worried. His Predictions are always wrong….so is he saying that knowing that someone would take that advice and poison us all? Where is the poison glass?
Villago Delenda Est
@WereBear:
Which is one of their very serious problems. Limbaugh knows nothing, nothing about the nuts and bolts of policy. He’s a pure bullshitter, and his bullshit damages his brand, it doesn’t help it.
Kirbster
I predict a board of directors slot at Marriott International for the Mittster.
Bago
@PeakVT: building a better tomorrow, tomorrow?
Brachiator
@Cacti:
The Romneys used to support Planned Parenthood. I always wondered if politically moderate philanthropy was hidden away in those unseen tax returns.
Lojasmo
@PeakVT:
Seems he might end up with 47% of the vote. Irony.
Xecky Gilchrist
@Cacti: Does anyone see Queen Ann wanting Mitt to give up a cent to “you people”?
Good point. I was just gobsmacked when Bill Gates showed he could be talked into doing anything at all other than scorched-earth destruction of everything Not Windows.
MikeBoyScout
Let’s be clear. There is one thing, and maybe only one thing, most Republicans and Democrats can agree upon in early November 2012; The Romney Legacy is a legacy of EPIC FAIL.
Good riddance to bad rubbish.
Soylent Green is FReepers
Has anybody else noticed that at RedState lately every time they use the word “majority” it’s in quotes? As in:
and
Seriously, if 50%+1 isn’t a “majority” in your “dictionary” then maybe you aren’t “in touch” with “reality.”
Xecky Gilchrist
@Soylent Green is FReepers: Has anybody else noticed that at RedState lately every time they use the word “majority” it’s in quotes?
Interesting. Those look to me like snot quotes, which mean that the text enclosed is to be read in the most annoying, spoiled-brat nasal whine you can muster. They don’t necessarily mean that the writer disagrees with whatever’s enclosed, just thinks it should be dragged behind a truck or something like that.
Hard to say, with people whose thought processes and composition skills are so sewage-bemurked.
JPL
@NotMax: Wonder if he’d accept a flat tax of 28 percent on earned and unearned income for millionaires…
See I can lower the top rate..
bemused
@IowaOldLady:
Is MrIOL a Fox fan or does he tivo it for amusement?
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
@Soylent Green is FReepers: As if the bushes were known for reaching across the aisle.
aimai
@brettvk:
I think he will either 1) retire or 2) move back to Utah and run for governor and then for one of the top jobs within the Mormon Church (to the extent that you can run for that). I think he needs to retrench, emotionally, and mere money isn’t going to do it for him. But I also think that he may have fatally blotted his copy book with his Mormon comperes because of everythign that came out, at the last minute, about how he used his CRUT to basically grift off the Mormon Church. I am really, really, sure that although the Church hierarchy knew he wasn’t really tithing ten percent to them (for pete’s sake) the rest of the body of the church and lower level mormons were completely unaware of the special dispensation for important people–just like the rank and file scientologists are unaware that the celebrity scientologists get special treatment.
aimai
dmsilev
@Soylent Green is FReepers: Their temper tantrum is kind of cute. Still, if it keeps going we’re going to have to send them to their room for a bit of a time out.
IowaOldLady
@bemused</a@bemused:
Amusement. He laughs at way more things than I do, which is why he dragged me to the Roller Derby last night.
Brachiator
@Soylent Green is FReepers:
Did these clowns ever write anything similar about Dubya?
Oh, well.
NotMax
@jurassicpork
Speaking of schadenfreude:
Quoted from concession speech given in the name of your publicly supported candidate.
“Sacramento will be destroyed” by disasters of Nature next year.
“Right now,” we are in the “coldest winter in human history.”
Build “a million solar-powered houses in each state.” (ed. – Quite the bonanza for the 7 states (and D.C. as the 8th area with EVs) whose entire population is less than a million.)
“Will be calling President Obama to offer “congratulations” and “our condolences.”
Obama has “won a job he is unqualified to do.”
Bago
@Cacti: I doubt the impetus was that. I would like to think of it as a Carnegie moment. You’ve won, you have the high score, and you’re going to die soon. What kind of memory do you want the world to have of you after your organs fail?
Uncle Cosmo
@Craigo:
Well, things might’ve been pretty interesting if he hadn’t–considering that Taft died at the end of July 1953 from cancer that was asymptomatic until earlier that year. The question is who would’ve been Vice President at the time. Given the importance of the California delegation in the actual process, one possibility is Governor Earl Warren…but another is its junior Senator, a young man in a hurry named Richard Milhous Nixon. Imagine a world in which Nixon became President in 1953….
Taylor
@Brachiator:
The Brits will not soon forget his comments about their running of the Olympics.
Ambassador to Luxemburg, or Cayman Islands as already noted, seems more appropriate.
WereBear
I forget where I read it, but some R leader/pundit was lamenting that “these talk radio guys, they are making millions but damaging the party.”
And I thought, Geez people, I thought that was your philosophy in a nutshell.
bemused
@IowaOldLady:
He has a higher tolerance level than I would have….I can only stand about 5 minutes of video Fox greatest stupidity hits here and there.
El Cid
@WereBear: Yeah, not to mention, if Rush Limbaugh is so great a businessman he can make such a fortune, how can he be wrong about politics?
If you make a lot of money and are a right winger, it means that you’re right, by definition, by heavenly decree.
hoodie
@aimai: yep. Multi-level marketing seems to be the preferred form of organization in right wing circles, it’s infused in everything from churches to campaign organizations. OT, but anybody catch Chris Hayes this morning? He had on this smug asshole from Bain. Hayes is talking about the failure of Republican messaging and asks him straightforwardly about whether he bought into the “makers vs. takers” theme. Initially he says he’s not down with that construction, but 15 minutes later he resurrects it as “investors vs. consumers.” They cannot get past this incessant need to create hierarchies, i.e., creating a rationalization for stepping on someone else to get ahead. It’s in the DNA.
maya
I see a for-profit Mitt Romney On-Line High School mill conducted exclusively through Comcast in his future.
bemused
Anyone think of the possibility of one (or more) of Mitt’s boys climbing onto the political train with eventual presidential hopes? Fourth time trying for the WH could be the charm after Romney Sr one time and Mitt two times failures.
Hillary Rettig
I’m hoping this experience has soured the entire Romney clan on running for office, but i’m not counting on it. I’m guessing we’ll see one of his kids run one day. Hill
NotMax
@Hillary Rettig
Discomfiting thought that they could conceivably fan out and run for 5 governorships.
PurpleGirl
@hoodie: Not so much hierarchies as bifurcating the population into two oppositional groups: investors v. consumers and makers v. takers.
Villago Delenda Est
20 years ago, I saw a magazine cover that had a picture of Rush Limbaugh on it, and the text read “The leader of the opposition”.
He’s had this role as the default leader of the GOP for a long time, which helps explain the long term damage to the Republican party that we’ve seen. The rot started with Nixon, was helped along by Reagan, and has only been getting worse. The effort by the likes of Buckley, Weyrich, Viguerie, and Norquist to transform the GOP in to the party that stands on the tracks and tries to stop the train that is the future has turned it into a rump party of fearful, resentful old white men, pining for an imaginary past.
Villago Delenda Est
@NotMax:
Ala the Bush Crime Family, which simultaneously held the governorships of Texas and Florida.
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
@NotMax: That’s unreal. Geebus.
Hill Dweller
Why is the Village trying so hard to convince the public Obama doesn’t have a mandate?
Patricia Kayden
@kay: You forgot his birther “joke” where he boasted to his Michigan supporters that noone had ever asked him for his birth certificate.
He’s a disgusting human being and I’m glad he lost soundly.
aimai
@Or something like that.Suffern Ace:
Yes, is that real? What level of disgusting cowardice would it take for Jill Stein not to make her own speech? I note that at the bottom the thing is defined/tagged as “comedy.” Can it really be for real?
Also: I want to add to my predictions that the Romney boys and Anne split from Mitt in some unobvious way–like Ann starts living primarily at one house while he lives at another and one or more of the boys comes out as either liberal (ish) or gay or both.
aimai
Or something like that.Suffern Ace
@Hill Dweller: Because 1) they are in income tax brackets that will pay more in taxes. 2) with their rush to influence the election by creating Mittmentum almost single handedly defeated by Nate Silver, they lost Tuesday as well. Plus they’re all a bunch of cowboy dreaming st. Ronnie lovers now. If you don’t win like st Ronnie, no one really loves you.
maya
@Hill Dweller:
Because the majority of old, white, beer gutted, mans dated Romney?
hoodie
@PurpleGirl: You can’t have hierarchies without differentiation. You define the groups to support the hierarchies. For example, investors are “better” than consumers and thus deserve disproportionate power, despite the fact that investors in large part rely on consumers for their wealth, and despite the fact that many of these “consumers” actually are making investments in things like their families, maintenance of our society and education of our children, while many of these “investors” are actually consuming much of the productive capacity of our country and it’s irreplaceable resources so that they can be more powerful.
kay
@Patricia Kayden:
There were so many moments like that. There was no reason he had to go on 60 minutes and spout that ridiculous Bush-era nonsense about emergency rooms being a health care safety net. HE KNOWS BETTER. He doesn’t lack knowledge. He lacks character. They couldn’t “fix” that.
He had SO MANY opportunities to reveal the the “real” better Mitt Romney. He passed on all of them.
Villago Delenda Est
@Hill Dweller:
The vile parasites are afraid their taxes might go up.
Chris
@WereBear:
La Cosa Nostra probably thinks so.
Or did you mean an *honest* skilled job?
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@fourmorewars: I know there’s a petition gathering signatures on whitehouse.gov for Louisiana secession.
Chris
@Craigo:
Yeah, from what I remember reading about Dewey, I don’t think he was nearly the waste of a human body Mittens has been. Still would’ve voted Truman, mind you.
Jewish Steel
@aimai:
That’s solid, aimai. I’ll co-sign this prediction. I’ve thought much the same thing.
handsmile
@WereBear:
I think you may be referring to remarks made by David From on Friday’s “Morning Joe”:
“The problem with the Republican leaders is that they are cowards…The real locus of the problem is the Republican activist base and the Republican donor base…Republicans have been fleeced and exploited and lied to by a conservative entertainment complex.”
Rush Limbaugh and Roger Ailes are the de facto leaders of the GOP; Grover Norquist may well be the third leg of this diabolical stool (in all its meanings). There is not a single GOP officeholder or aspirant who dares to go up against them. Such omnipotence is a reliable measure of leadership status.
David Atkins at Digby’s blog has an excellent post on Frum’s eviscerating analysis and the befuddled response of Joe and his fraternity buddies:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2012/11/frum-on-morning-joe-remarkable-15.html
Gindy51
@PurpleGirl: Not even a road stop outhouse, poor Willard. not even good enough to shit in.
andy
@WereBear: The skill is avoiding the inevitable revenge. It’s sure to happen sometime. You take away somebody’s livelihood, in a way you take away somebody’s life. Why do you think the Office Shooting is so common nowadays?
Charity Froggenhall
@fourmorewars: Awesome, let ’em go. And in the next natural disaster, we won’t be responsible for FEMA money for them.
Chris
@Schlemizel:
From what little I’ve read of him, Hoover reminds me of Louis XVI or Mikhail Gorbachev – not all that bad a guy, certainly not as bad as most of his predecessors, but ultimately overwhelmed by events and paying for the flaws in all the sins of the fucked up system he inherited.
Gindy51
@aimai: And that in a nut shell is why he got less Mormon votes than Bush did.
gVOR08
Obama should offer Romney the only federal public service job for which Romney has solid experience. Put Romney in charge of coordinating and promoting the implimentation of Obamacare. I don’t know if Romney’s head would explode, but several other would.
JoyfulA
@Craigo: Dewey was apparently more successful than the Democrats, who also offered Ike the job.
trollhattan
Willard can go back to France and this time, pay those heathens to join the church.
That would be cool.
M31
about the Obama mandate, Dick Morris said it perfectly the other day: they were expecting a 325 Electoral vote Romney landslide, but what we got was a 332 Electoral vote Obama squeaker.
Schlemizel
@Chris:
I don’t think you could find a former President more reviled in his time that Hoover. Thats not to say he was a bad guy or incompetent only that he was the guy who bought the BS of the 1% and continued the process of appointing crooks and incompetents. Really the only difference between him and Boy Blunder was Hoover was not a bad guy & he was competent, just not as President.
Had Truman not seen Hoovers abilities and used them he would have remained on histories scrap heap
AA+ Bonds
:|
AA+ Bonds
But will his millions hug him at night? No, wait, his wife will hug him at night because he’s not in jail where he belongs
M31
Interestingly, it’s been shown that if a family has a lot of boys, the younger ones are increasingly likely to be gay. A hormonal shift in the mother is thought to be the likely cause.
So who’s the youngest Mittling and how high does he ping your gaydar?
PeakVT
@handsmile: Scarborough’s reaction to Frum’s second mini-rant cracked me up: “uh, hey, so, Chuck Todd…”
trollhattan
@NotMax:
Holy f@#k, we’re going to have a combo megaquake AND flood at once, next year? I gotta list the house and start packing, stat!
hoodie
@handsmile: I caught that Morning Schmoe and was taken aback by how frank Frum was and amused how Schmoe and his buddies tried to change the subject because it hit them where they live. Gerson actually has said similar things, though not as starkly as Frum. However, the thing is that guys like Frum can’t explain is why they just don’t become Democrats, or at least independents aligned with Democrats. Obama is closer to the Republican president they’ve always wanted, and there are plenty of conservadems that represent their interests better than anyone in the Republican Party. Their interests would be better served if they hastened the demise of the Republican Party, as that would inevitably lead to a splintering of Democrats into left and right factions, with the Overton Window pushed back to the left. There are too many established warlords in the Republican Party to save it, and Democrats already serve the interests of those who aren’t in the camps of those warlords.
JoyfulA
@Cacti: A lot of the Gates philanthropy is great, but a lot of it has gone to develop and fund charter schools.
Bill D.
@Bill E Pilgrim:
Please, redistricting happens the year after the new census data come out, as the races start before those data are even available. The districts that people were running in during 2010 were largely drawn in 2001 after the 2000 elections.
Actually, it was the big off-year wins in state legislative races around the country in November 2010, due to poor Democratic turnout, which gave the Republicans the political muscle to do so much gerrymandering in 2011. It’s the 2012 districts which are gerrymandered and which gave Republican candidates for the House an unfair advantage as documented by the vote totals.
AA+ Bonds
@hoodie:
Because after losing their meal ticket in the conservative media, people like Frum have to keep that gimmick or no one will pay them to speak on Fox or MSNBC
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@handsmile: Good. Lord. That clip is nine minutes of pure Villagery.
Joe Scarborough, Chuck Todd, David Gregory, Mark Halperin and David Frum… and a young woman I don’t recognize. Who says not one word, and is not asked one question, for nine plus minutes.
That fucking douche parade (with apologies to the one I don’t recoginze) is from EvenTheLiberalMSNBC?
Well, shut my mouth. David Frum is pointing out (almost, mostly) pointing out that Republicans have no platform for people who aren’t, like most people on TV (a pet peeve of mine) economically secure (rich) and health insured. My apologies to the Grumpy Code Monkey.
Mark Halperin: “I’m a fan of John Cornyn”. Not surprising, but can you imagine if a ‘straight reporter” said “I’m a fan of Patrick Leahy”, or John Kerry, or Dick Durbin.
scav
@NotMax: Ow Ow Ow Ow Ow. Many, Most! of the greens I’ve met deserve better. I broke down at the litany of disasters that were ravishing this country. I’m giving up on the comment here, that wreck is delusional. We need better parties across the spectrum for this thing to work better.
Chris
@Schlemizel:
You think the Carter-hate’s been as bad? That one’s been pretty intense in the last thirty years (with less justification, but it’s out there).
redshirt
I don’t give W. much credit for anything, but I was gladdened to see him stay far away for the last 4 years.
He could have done a lot of damage if he tried to be a shadow President or something similar.
LD50
@M31: no doubt about it, Ben is the one who’ll come out as gay or liberal: http://www.buzzfeed.com/jpmoore/the-romney-sons-a-guide
LD50
@Chris: Hoover hate was worse. Carter hate was something the GOP had to remind everyone of, since Carter didn’t actually ruin anyone’s lives. Hoover beat off and said a lot of appallingly 1%er type shit for the first 3 years of the Depression while people’s lives crashed and burned. People hated Hoover.
SiubhanDuinne
@Kirk: Thanks. That sounds like a good approach for me.
As the child and grandchild of bookstore owners, I ended up acquiring or inheriting a slew of first editions, autographed volumes, etc., so I do need to see what I’m dealing with before I start merrily pitching.
The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge
@Chris:
Yeah, I think the Carter-Hate has been much worse. Once Roosevelt was elected (and reelected 61/49!) there was no percentage in demonizing Hoover any more, but the imaginary Jimmy Carter the right wing has created has been a great whipping boy for 30 years now.
Of course, what’s killing them is that President Carter is the most respected and beloved American around the world. It eats away at their innards….
SiubhanDuinne
@gelfling545:
You’re not very inspiring :-P
SiubhanDuinne
@Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason:
Heh.
Lurking Canadian
@Hill Dweller: There’s a D after his name and his election is tainted by an excess of melanin and a deficiency of Y-chromosomes.
Mnemosyne
@LD50:
I’ve gotta agree with you that the Hoover-hate is more persistent. They’re still singing “We’d Like to Thank You, Herbert Hoover” on stages all over the United States every week. So far, no one has written a hit musical about how awful the Carter years were.
WereBear
@redshirt: I believe W had a LOT of help in staying sub rosa. His own party doesn’t want him running around reminding people he existed.
JosieJ
@kay:
That’s because there was no “real” better Mitt Romney. We kept searching beneath the surface to find one, only to find that he was all surface.
His most enduring legacy will be that multi-millionaires who run for president in the future will no longer be required to disclose the source, or even the extent, of their wealth. It figures that a man who’s all surface would make it harder to penetrate beneath the surface of others.
LD50
@Mnemosyne: Yeah, Hoover hate was a very grassroots thing. Everyday people whose lives had bottomed out despised him for doing nothing at a horrible time in American history. They even named a type of shantytown after him, FFS. Carter hate, on the other hand, is something kept alive by the GOP as a thing that people who are obsessed with politics are supposed to feel. Most people don’t hate Carter, at worst they feel he was an ineffectual president.
This is all obscured by the fact that the people who hated Hoover are almost all dead now, but it was still something my parents could invoke as recently as the 1970s.
Ted & Hellen
Mitt will be non existent within a month.
blingee
I look forward to reading about (will never watch) his appearance on Celebrity Apprentice along with all the other has beens crying out for attention. Trump included.
redshirt
You know, Mitt seems clueless enough that he might just plow ahead and pretend he’s all Senior Statesmen. Hello Dancin’ Dave? Got a seat open next to Johnny Mac?
catclub
@dmsilev: I think Paul Ryan is as close to chief of the party as anyone. They are all talking about the thing he is supposed to be an expert on – the deficit and cutting budgets.
The teflon with which he slid away from any connection with the recent unhappiness is notable ( at least to me).
FlipYrWhig
Nothing more than a hunch, but I have a feeling that Romney will be tapped to be the figurehead of a major charity, like when Elizabeth Dole was head of the Red Cross.
catclub
@Jewish Steel: Wow, I don’t see either of those things, unless they also renounce Mormonism ( and whatever inheritance they would have coming.)
The one thing Mitt never wavered on was Mormonism. I thought that if he could convincingly lie about a profound conversion experience,
he could get a whole lot of baptists VERY enthusiastic. he never did it. He would lose mormons. Wasn’t there some quote about
“something something is worth a mass”?
he did less well than McCain in the south, even though those folks were primed with 4 years of Obama hate.
DPS
There is no “Mitt Romney” constituency that wants to see him do anything. The only reason anybody ever supported him was that they thought he could win and, after the primaries, because they wanted to win the election. There is no post-election demand for Mitt, no army that he leads behind him. The best he could do is put some of that money towards something worthwhile, and I think we know he won’t do that.
Elie
@JosieJ:
I disagree about the financial disclosure. Future millionaires will have a lot of pressure to disclose even though Romney refused. He also lost — significantly. If he had won — maybe. Now — a whole lot of crap is going to be challenged — the continual lying, the cheating on taxes and full out frontal racism. The shit didn’t work and nothing kills strategy more than having failed before. Oh I am sure that they might try it.. like everything else… but their whole approach was all loser and they know it!
Elie
@FlipYrWhig:
I don’t think so. This wasn’t a “regular” loss. He not only embarrassed himself, but the Republicans also embarrassed themselves. They not only failed, they looked unbearably stupid and un-modern — No organization is going to want to have that associated with their mission. Nope — he is headed home to send his cars up and down the elevator.
Jeffro
@NotMax: wasn’t that the plot of a great Clive Cussler novel? The corrupt children of a Dr No-type assumed power in something like Egypt and Mexico??
Oh wait, duh, more obviously: W and Jeb…
Chris
@The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge:
He’s another one who kinda reminds me of Gorbachev. Hated at home, but beloved in the world at large.
JosieJ
@Elie:
I hope you’re right, Elie. I’m not very sanguine, simply because Romney came very close to getting away with it.
elftx
Anyone else notice the number of ads from financial and pharmaceutical co.’s with a woman and a horse…hehehehe
Methinks they figured it was all theirs lock stock and barrel.
Full Metal Wingnut
What fucking squeaker? According to Wikipedia (and some basic arithmetic), Bush beat Kerry by 2.4% of the popular vote, Obama beat Romney by 2.7. So unless the Republicans want to make a similar comment about 04, they should kindly shut the fuck up.
Xecky Gilchrist
@Villago Delenda Est: 20 years ago, I saw a magazine cover that had a picture of Rush Limbaugh on it, and the text read “The leader of the opposition”.
I think that that has had a lot to do with the deterioration of the Party. That is, a lot of the leading proponents of the Republicans’ aren’t even politicians; they’re grifters who don’t really have a dog in the political fight. If the Party loses, Limbaugh still wins – he gets to whine and threaten revolution. In fact, he probably does better when the Republicans are out of power.
It tickles me no end that Rush is getting paid $50MM/yr to point out that the Republicans are dicks.
Not Sure
@WereBear: I think there should be a stiff penalty charged for someone to repatriate assets. All that money can stay in the Caymans, for all I care.
Carla H
@Cacti:
You’d think, but his dad is a philanthropist, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if a good portion of Bill’s giving was learned from his parents.
trollhattan
@catclub:
The Onion thinks Republicans will be lead by a white-hot sphere of rage.
http://www.theonion.com/video/after-obama-victory-shrieking-whitehot-sphere-of-p,30284/
elftx
Also Too this
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petitions/all/0/2/0/
Paul
@Full Metal Wingnut:
Furthermore, if the popular vote mattered one bit, don’t they realize that Obama would have spent all his time in California, New York, Massachusetts, Illinois etc to run up the score? They are pulling the same stupid, illogical trick that Hillary Clinton’s supporters tried in the 2008 primary.
Bottomline: Obama won the EC in a landslide. The popular vote does not matter (as per the constitution they CLAIM to love so much). And if it had mattered, Obama could easily have run up the score in his states.
Bex
@Brachiator: Yeah, the Mittster is real popular in Great Britian.
YellowJournalism
@elftx: Some of those just scream crazy. My favorite is: “Not allow the FDA to regulate premium cigars.”
YellowJournalism
@NotMax: I don’t know much about Stein, but was she really advocating a “one child per family” rule/law? Because that’s worked so well in China!
different-church-lady
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism:
I say let ’em go, and then we don’t have to bother redesigning the flag when Peurto Rico comes in.
John
Dewey didn’t immediately abandon public life. He was still governor of New York in 1948, and was re-elected in 1950. By that point he was an elder statesman of the internationalist eastern establishment wing of the Republican Party, and was a key supporter of Eisenhower in his victory over Taft in 1952. He was apparently partly responsible for the choice of Nixon as Eisenhower’s running mate, and his people took key roles in the Eisenhower administration – both Dulles, the new Secretary of State, and Brownell, the new Attorney General, were old Dewey advisers.
In 1956, Dewey was also apparently responsible for convincing Eisenhower not to dump Nixon.
Triassic Sands
It’s worth clicking “Next” at the bottom of the Will’s piece to read Elizabeth Drew’s comments on the real but failed GOP efforts to “steal” the election through voter suppression.
Romney’s long term reputation should include his campaign’s efforts to suppress Democratic votes; the fact that he failed is a testament to both the determined efforts on the left to prevent another stolen election and Romney’s more or less universal incompetence.
Note to the anti-democratic thugs in the GOP (aka virtually the entire party): It’s a good idea, when you plan to steal an election, to keep that fact to yourselves; announcing that your latest legislative vote suppressing scheme will deliver your state (PA) to Romney is not a great idea. Jeb Bush and Katherine Harris went about their business a lot more quietly and in the end delivered Florida and the election to brother George.
In the future, I expect the GOP to invest huge sums of money in “Cones of Silence” since Mitt proved that even behind closed doors in the presence of your most loyal subjects offensive comments may still escape to reach a wider audience.
elftx
@YellowJournalism:
I don’t get that one at all..but noticed the few signatures for repeal of NDAA
I happen to reside in TX and lol at LA having more signatures than us to secede
Schlemizel
@Chris:
No, my grandparents and parents remembered Hoover and I grew up in a factory neighborhood. 40 years later they still HATED the guy. People may laugh at Carter or say he was incompetent but never heard the hate for him that I heard for Herbie
Schlemizel
@LD50: OMG!
Gaydar firing 5 alarms!
RSA
@brettvk:
Right, I can just see Mitt showing up at a Habitat for Humanity project.
On the leadership of the Republican party, I think the conventional wisdom from Carter through Bush II was that the best Presidential candidates were popular governors rather than members of Congress; presumably they had less baggage in the way of hard votes. I don’t know that this applies any more, but maybe a popular Republican governor might try to pull the party together. (Mostly when I think “Republican governor,” though, I think of very bad men.)
Odie Hugh Manatee
Erick, Son of Erick, is getting over his grief in the usual way crazy wingers do, backwards! He has a post up at Redstate where he has posted a copy of something he wrote a year ago stating that Romney was someone who was on every side of an issue, not a real conservative, lose the election to Obama and be the death of conservatism. The only thing he adds as an update is at the end, where he says that he is reconsidering his stance that Huntsman wasn’t a better candidate than Romney.
IOW, forget all about his humping Romney’s leg like a horndog in the general because he was right before he was wrong! Erick is working through the five stages of grief backwards.
Acceptance: Erick pretty much immediately accepted that Obama won, even tweeting to Obama ‘Thanks for getting it over with quick’. Done Deal.
Depression: He posted a depressing tome about the loss at Redstate after the election that tried to reassure everyone that while it was bad, it wasn’t the end of the world. That they all had their families and they would get through this.
Bargaining: He opines about a variety of things that could have gone different with most thoughts leaning towards the right not having to had to anything different, such as having their rape candidates shut their mouths and keeping those ‘facts’ to themselves, and having had a better ground game. Not much thought is given to doing something about their problem with minorities other than improving their message without changing anything else that could positively affect minority opinions.
Anger: Erick lashes out at those who say that the social conservative need to be thrown out of the party. Erick lashes out at the crappy consultants who didn’t know their asses from a hole in the ground.
Denial: Today Erick is rewriting his personal history on Romney in the primary and general by telling everyone ‘I told you so!’.
One RS member had the audacity to opine to Erick that he wasn’t any better than Romney:
Erick has not responded but his members have. The argument “We fight in the primary and back the winner in the general, no matter what” is winning the day. Erick just can’t accept the fact that he is part of the problem with the party. Working through the five stages of grief backwards is probably part of his problem.
If the five stages of grief enable you to get through and deal with a difficult time in your life, doing it backwards must help you to avoid it.
priscianusjr
The comparison with Willkie is very superficial. Running against Roosevelt in 1940, Willkie didn’t have a chance, and he was much ridiculed, I suppose, for even thinking he was worthy to replace FDR. As in this poem I learned from my mother:
“A horse’s tail is soft and silky,
Lift it up and you’ll see Willkie.”
But my mother also told me that Willkie, a liberal Republican, was actually a fairly good guy. Proof of this was that after he lost, he was appointed by Roosevelt a sort of roving ambassador, or personal representative.
Nothing like Romney, really.
opie_jeanne
@PeakVT: Even my family, Republicans to the core, disliked and distrusted Wilkie. I don’t know who they voted for that year.
Odie Hugh Manatee
A funny response in the Redstate diary I reference above:
It didn’t go over too well. Republicans just don’t have a sense of humor.
Holy fuck, Erick responds to the criticism such as I quoted above:
Shorter Erick: “You should have known that we were lying to you!”
The brass on this guy… ;p
Terry Ott
@RoonieRoo:
Marco Rubio, I suppose.
Ruckus
@aimai:
Do you have a really mean streak or just going with the law of averages? Either way works, just different motivations.
Ruckus
@kay:
He didn’t pass on showing the “real” zomney, he doubled down by showing his shitty character.
Matt McIrvin
@catclub: “Paris is worth a Mass”, supposedly said by Henri IV of France, formerly a Huguenot, upon conversion to Catholicism so he could ascend the throne.
Matt McIrvin
@Carla H: I think Bill Gates had been planning to do this for a long time. For years and years, he was conspicuous for his relative lack of philanthropy and kept making oblique statements implying that he was planning something really big. I recall Ted Turner suggesting that he was full of it.
Mike G
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
It’s the Flounder from Animal House defense:
“You fucked up – you trusted us!”
AA+ Bonds
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
It is true that the Republicans really fucking hated Romney
That was always the escape hatch for the opinion-makers on the right