Kevin Drum thinks Bobby Jindal is the new Republican hotness who “might win” in 2016. Drum’s excuse for Jindal’s obvious charisma issue is that “everyone gives bad responses to State of the Union addresses”.
Really? This bad?
Whatever you want to say about Romney, who was fairly uncharismatic to put it mildly, he came off as the kind of cold-eyed dick who would fuck when he says “fuck” and fight when he says “fight”. After Mitt’s performance in the primaries, if he and his ward, Paul Ryan, said they would starve granny, the base believed there were going to be some skin-and-bones grandmothers prowling the dollar store for dented cans of generic Alpo.
Jindal provides the base no such reassurance. He certainly wants to project an aura of a serious Burkean who advocates a return to our proud history of geriatric malnutrition as suggested by a careful reading of Federalist 12. But when it comes down to the nut cutting, he drops the knife and runs away. Case in point: how better to prove that you’ve got the balls to really fuck the poor than to eliminate hospice care from Medicaid? The vision of a bunch of terminally ill moochers and looters gasping for their last breath while writhing in pain in some back alley probably gave the whole Heritage Foundation board solid wood when they heard it. Alas, that dream will remain only as part of their recurrent sexsomia, since Jindal wimped out at the last minute.
Bobby looks funny, he talks funny, and he doesn’t have the sand to pull the trigger on a balls-out Republican agenda. The GOP and DC Press Corpse will have to look elsewhere for their brown daddy because Bobby’s just a cub.
Ben Franklin
Holy shite. Must we take the Media bait on 2016, already?
Hmm. Slow news cycle.
BGinCHI
Can’t win primaries in deep red states.
Can’t brag about accomplishments since he’s from a state that ranks near the bottom in everything except squirrel hunting.
Can’t beat Hillary or Biden in a debate.
Probably can’t dance.
Frankensteinbeck
You are giving Romney vastly too much credit. Jindal is superior to him in charisma terms in every way.
That is a floor level bar. He’s still a nobody going nowhere. You’re especially right that he doesn’t throw the red meat the base will demand. Without Obama hate driving them in the next election, they’ll be starving for red meat.
Hill Dweller
As with Ryan, once the nation gets a good look at the crazy shit Jindal is advocating, his hopes of becoming President will be dashed.
Aimai
No coveted business cred. Not personally wealthy enough to jiddle their pendulums. Looks and talks like a hundred pound weakling? Uh… No.
Baud
@Ben Franklin:
I’m glad you’re the first comment.
FlipYrWhig
Jindal is a good prospect for _vice_ president, in that Kemp/Ryan way where you pick The Idea Guy to make your party’s ideologues excited. President, no way.
PsiFighter37
I think part of the problem is that the dumbass MSM assumes young people will vote for the young minority candidates. The thing is, we youngsters do have eyes and ears, and when we see the draconian policies that clowns like Jindal and Rubio are advocating, there’s no way in hell we’d vote for them.
Honestly, the only way that the Republican Party is going to get young voters again is to get up to the times on social issues. I work in finance, and every single young person I can think of votes Democratic – and I would assume for largely those reasons. You can’t be taken seriously when you actively discriminate against gay people and women, and your dog whistle is showing. The GOP is alienating an entire generation of voters because they are beholden to a base that is stuck in the 19th century when it comes to social issues.
Bobby Jindal should know better, too. He’s a Rhodes Scholar, for crying out loud…bet they wish they could rescind that one after hearing him say shit about denying evolution.
Jennifer
Jindal’s nomination campaign will go under the title Exorcist IV.
I never can see a picture of him from that state of the union rebuttal speech without thinking “Dr. Suess.” It’s that red and white stripey tie – looks like the Cat in the Hat’s hat.
gbear
You left out the best part of that speech. When Jindal comes walking up to the podium, Chris Matthews mutters ‘Oh God’ under his breath, and someone laughs in response. It cut Jindal off at the knees before he even spoke a word.
BGinCHI
If we elect a President from the Deep South in my lifetime I’m going to be very fucking surprised.
John M. Burt
One of the YouTube comments expresses a hope that in 2016, Mitt Romney will choose Bobby as his running mate.
Alas, we could never be that lucky three times in a row, could we…?
HRA
@Frankensteinbeck:
If it’s Hilary, they will do the hate to the max.
Schlemizel
If we are seriously going to discuss ’16 lets consider a couple of things
Hillary will be 70 & Biden 74, thats too old for the job, seriously look at the guys we have had at that age & the results are not good. Yet those are the only two we keep hearing about.
I don’t care who the goopers nominate. Unless they are successful at gerrymandering the EC they can’t win if they ran a Jesus/Ayn ticket. Who do the Dems have on the bench with a national presence or state-wide cred that can lead? Anybody like Barack with some charisma?
Maybe Franken but I doubt it & he does not appear interested. I can’t name a single House member that fits the bill. Is there a governor that has a success story to tell?
Todd
In a matchup between Tester and Jindal, how do y’all think all those gerrymandered R+5 districts come out in the “new” EC?
Violet
Jindal is 2016’s Pawlenty. The media props him up, thinks he’s got what it takes and he’s out of the running before it ever gets started. He’s got the same hangdog looks and the “Love me! Pick me!” attitude. Not gonna work. Republicans want a bully not a brown who lectures them about being too mean.
Forum Transmitted Disease
As thrilling as a wet pizza box. With no pizza inside.
Amir Khalid
Like you, mistermix, I would apply the term “hotness” to Bobby Jindal only as snark. The man is profoundly uncharismatic. And he lacks True Belief. First he doesn’t have the nerve to oppose the mean and crazy in his party’s positions, and then he doesn’t have the nerve to follow through those positions.
That he’s not really a mean bastard at heart, unlike his party, is to his credit as a human being. But it looks like it will keep him from a serious run at the presidency.
MattF
One also gets the sense that Jindal actually believes this stuff– which makes him look scary to the establishment Big Money and makes him look gutless when he backs off.
Frankensteinbeck
@HRA:
I don’t think that would be as bad, but that’s a guess – you’re right, they have one serious hate on for Hillary.
Violet
@Schlemizel: I agree. They’re both old and that will be an issue. I don’t know who else the Dems have. They need a strong bench and I am not sure if they have it.
RossInDetroit, Rational Subjectivist
Can I hit that when he’s had his toke? Seriously, we’re talking Republicans here. One word: melanin.
22over7
@Schlemizel:
I agree. I seriously doubt that Hillary will run, and now that she has double vision and (probably) repercussions from her blood clot, I’m guessing she’s done. And I love ol’ handsome Joe, but 74?
Frankin has never voiced any desire, and in fact has kept his head so far down in the Senate that nobody knows what his voice sounds like any more. O’Malley is apparently interested, but I thought his speech at the convention was boring. Maybe our new senator Elizabeth Warren? Colorado governor John Hickenlooper? Any other ideas?
Xecky Gilchrist
You have to admit, though, that trumpeting a contard policy and then reneging when it turns out to be unpopular is a very Romneyan move.
Ted & Hellen
Your vivid writing above has left me with the distressing but persistent visual of a skin and bones, terminally ill grandma with nuts.
ew
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Violet: Precisely. This is why they loved Perry so much – looked and acted like the guy on the football team who used to beat up member of the science club – and he’d have been their candidate if not for the obvious drug problem that cropped up in the debates.
Romney did OK on the asshole front. The 47% speech doomed him with the majority but the faithful thought it was great.
Christie will win it easily if he can drop a hundred or so pounds and learn how to walk again – that guy is an abusive asshole and not only is he really good at it, he enjoys it.
yam
Am I the only one who thinks Jindal looks like Alfred E. Neuman?
Aimai
@Amir Khalid: He is a mean bastard at heart. But he’s also a coward.
JPL
@BGinCHI: Oh, I don’t know. A Southerner could run on the get the government out of my education platform.
Schlemizel
@22over7:
Agreed. It sort of worries me that I can’t name a couple of obvious possibilities even if I don’t like them. Its way too early to worry about it but it would be comforting to say the names of a couple of people that make sense to be in the running.
Thank Pasta the goopers have such a clown car of losers.
EDIT: Cory Booker – like or not he at least has the profile.
Chris
The only appeal he has is to the “ooo he can be our Obama!” idiots. If Herman Cain is any indication, that’ll wear out real fast.
Xecky Gilchrist
@22over7: O’Malley is apparently interested, but I thought his speech at the convention was boring.
That was pretty funny – leading up to the convention I started seeing a bunch of preliminary swooning over O’Malley, then after that speech he was like SO LAST WEEK.
Short Bus Bully
… and SCENE.
This post needs to be sent to Jindal’s staff asap so they can find new gigs.
mistermix is on a motherfucking tear these days. Doing God’s work my son…
Haydnseek
@Frankensteinbeck: True, there will be no Obama hate to drive them in the next election. HillaryHate(tm) will have to pick up the slack. I’m betting it will.
Violet
@Schlemizel: Cory Booker is only a Mayor. If he doesn’t get at least one higher office–governor, Senator, whatever–he can’t run for President. Giuliani tried that and failed, although he’s just an asshole. But at least he was Mayor of the largest city in the country.
Cory Booker does have a high profile but he’ll need to do something else first.
Roger Moore
@PsiFighter37:
I think the bigger idea is that any successful Republican candidate needs to be able to put together a coalition of right wing crazies and moderates. George W Bush succeeded by being a right wing crazy who could tack to the center and look respectable to moderates, while McCain and Romney failed by being apparent moderates who had to tack to the right to keep the crazies motivated. The basic idea, then, is that the Republicans need a candidate in the mold of Shrub: authentic enough crazy to attract the wingnuts without being too scary to moderates.
The media thinks Jindal is a reasonable candidate because he’s definitely a religious nut but seems wonky enough that he might be able to convince moderates. That he’s younger and a minority is a bonus as an attraction to the moderates, but not really the essential point. I think the media may be right in their general interpretation- the Republicans really do need somebody who can attract wingnuts without scaring away too many moderates- but wrong about Jindal. It may be, though, that the moment has passed where any candidate can make that strategy work, and the Republicans’ only hopes to win the presidency are electoral shenanigans, a serious Democratic screw-up, or a complete revamp of their coalition.
gf120581
Jindel can’t play the attack dog role that the GOP base loves so much. He’s Governor Kenneth the Page, for crying out loud. Every time he speaks he looks like he’s about to cringe and say “Don’t hit me again!”
The comparisons to Pawlenty are good ones. Granted, Jindel’s not as uncharismatic as the Dead Tree Stump, but he’s not much better.
SatanicPanic
Based on Kevin Drum, Digby and Charles Pierce, I suspect there something about being a boomer-era pundit that renders people incapable of making intelligent assessments of candidates.
Linda Featheringill
@Schlemizel: #14
The Democratic bench:
Franken is interesting. Warren is interesting. Sherrod Brown from Ohio is a possibility, although he doesn’t have much of a national standing as yet. Deval Patrick is good but again he may be just a local hero.
My SIL thinks Robert Kennedy Jr. is a possibility.
Julian Castro is a person to watch.
And this is just my short list.
Amir Khalid
@Aimai:
I sit corrected.
Schlemizel
I did some google-fu & came up with some lists from other sites
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/12/15/1170016/-2016-Democratic-Presidential-Candidates
(as a constituent of Ms. Klobucher – DEAR GAWD NO!!)
http://www.policymic.com/articles/18960/presidential-candidates-2016-10-democrats-who-might-be-the-next-presidential-nominee
Oddly, these guys ran a ‘5 dems’ post & later a ’10 dems’ one yikes! Beau Biden?!? Seriously !?!
There are a couple of interesting people on the list. Despite the success of BHO I’d think newbies like Warren & Hildebrand might be too green. I guess it will take the fire of the primaries to harden one of these gems
JPL
Harkin is going to retire. 2014 is going to be a tough year.
Kyle
Jindal doesn’t fit the personality type the base demands. Repukes like overt bullies and assholes with a mean streak – Bush, Cheney, McCain, Rmoney. But Jindal looks like the guy the bullies beat up every week.
MattF
@Haydnseek: It’s going to be interesting to see how that works– Clinton-hating was fine during the ’90’s, but it fell out of fashion. It’s going to be tougher to make the case in 2016 that Hillary is a murderous drug-dealing lesbian.
gf120581
@Schlemizel: Booker’s not ready yet. Maybe after some time in the Senate he’ll be ready for 2024 or something, but he needs a higher profile gig like that. He can’t run for President just on being mayor of Newark.
Three other options I can think of:
Andrew Cuomo (obviously, though many here may not care for him)
Mark Warner (if not President, he’ll be high on the Veep list)
Brian Schweitzer (same as Warner)
Of course, if Hillary runs, it’s all moot. No one, not even Biden, will get in her way if she wants it.
BGinCHI
@Linda Featheringill: Please let it be Sherrod Brown.
Chris
@Amir Khalid:
This.
You really, really need to enjoy hurting people and show it, to be taken seriously in Republican primaries.
gf120581
@JPL: That seat won’t be hard to hold. Especially if Steve King is the GOP nominee.
Baud
I hear John Edwards is available.
Davis X. Machina
Both 2016 nominees will be someone we’re not even talking about now.
So start talking about Andrew Cuomo, dammit. The sooner that candidacy is buried, the better for all of us.
Villago Delenda Est
Kevin Drum has his moments.
This is not one of them.
Linda Featheringill
@BGinCHI:
Sherrod Brown would be good.
Dunno tho if folks across the country even know him.
On the other hand, I never heard of Obama until the campaigning started.
Violet
@Roger Moore:
I’m wondering the same thing. The people who voted in their first presidential election in 2008 and voted for Obama are 22 this year. They’ll be 26 in 2016. And Obama brought along a whole new crop of people who voted for him, who will be 22 in 2016. Those young people know the Republicans only as the party of crazy old white people.
Meanwhile, the Republican voters–the old white folks–are shrinking as a percentage of the population. There will be fewer of them in 2016.
Where will the “moderate center” be in 2016? Will it be closer to wingutopia–the land of crazy old white people–or will it be closer to Obama’s America–younger, browner, technologically proficient, data-driven, and happy they have Obamacare? I think it will be the second. Republicans are going to have to lean much further left than they are accustomed to to capture those “moderate center” voters.
Baud
@Davis X. Machina:
Agree. Of all the potential candidates, Cuomo gives me the most heebie jeebies.
Mike in NC
Barbour/Jindal 2016 : two clowns from the Deep South is where the GOP wants to go. Rmoney/Ryan were Yankee faux conservatives.
JPL
Wouldn’t it be fun to have a Whitehouse in the White House?
Chris
@Roger Moore:
Moderates and crazies, also elites and base. Which, again, Bush could do.
@MattF:
Hence Benghazigate. New scandals, new conspiracy theories, new Clinton hate.
Villago Delenda Est
@Chris:
Exactly.
The instant he breaks desired character and acts civilly, as Cain did on Perry’s ranch’s name, he’ll be kicked to the curb.
Haydnseek
@MattF: She’s a dem. That’s enough. In WingnutWorld(tm) dem hating NEVER goes out of fashion. Only the absurd conspiracy theories change. They’ll have a bit of difficulty painting her as a muslim who actively promotes Sharia Law, for instance. They’ll come up something more insane. Count on it.
Xecky Gilchrist
@Baud: I hear John Edwards is available.
A little too much so!
22over7
@Violet:
That’s an interesting theory, and that’s where I’d take the GOP if they want to be viable, but, at least for now, they seem utterly uninterested in the demographics they need to win. Instead they’re spending their energy proposing draconian budgets, bills to put rape victims in jail for having abortions, and proposals to change the electoral college. The immigration fight should be interesting.
If they keep going there, and especially if the economy makes real strides in the next four years, they’ll be a laughingstock.
PurpleGirl
@yam: Now that you mention it, he does look like Alfred E. Newman.
Roger Moore
@SatanicPanic:
I wonder if it isn’t an inherent problem with older generations understanding the motivations of people much younger than themselves. The younger generations have grown up watching their elders, so they have a pretty good idea of what motivates them, but the older people who haven’t made a careful study of the younger generations assume that they are motivated by the same thing the olds were when they were young. That’s why older politicians continue to trot out issues like Vietnam, the hippy movement, and Reagan that have very little resonance with younger voters. Older pundits make the same assumptions and are mistaken for exactly the same reason.
Violet
Hillary got angry during the Benghazi hearing this week. She banged her fist on the table and raised her voice. That’s enough to revive the shrieking banshee/angry lesbian talk.
There’s a reason Obama never gets angry–he can’t afford to be seen as the Angry Black Man. Unfortunately, the first woman President is going to be saddled with the Hysterical Woman label if she’s perceived as being angry or upset. The press will be only too happy to help that meme along.
Citizen Alan
@Xecky Gilchrist:
Right, because there’s no precedent in the Democratic Party for someone to bounce back from a poorly received convention speech to become a two-term president.
ruemara
Since republicans were upset that Jindal used a teleprompter for his last speech, Drum is beating a dead horse.
Violet
@22over7: The GOP seems to be aware there’s a problem–hence people like Jindal saying they can’t be the “stupid party”, Barbour saying they have to stop saying un-PC things, and attempts like the breakout group on “how to attract women and minorities” they had at their legislative meeting. They see there’s a problem and some of them even seem able to identify what the problem is. They don’t seem to have any idea how to solve the problem, though. Their breakout group was filled with white male speakers.
Davis X. Machina
@22over7: You can make a credible presidential campaign theme by more or less running against your own Congressional party — not them as such, but the era, the mind-set, etc, that they represent. Carter’s 1976 campaign did this quite a bit, which caused him hella problems with Congress when he got in. But it did mark him off against Generic Big Liberal.
Davis X. Machina
@Violet:
You can’t fool me. That’s a touring summer music festival!
Roger Moore
@Chris:
My suspicion is that the elites don’t much care about the candidate’s positions as long as he’s weak enough to leave the real decision making in the hands of the party bosses. That means they’re in great shape, because the Republican party seems pretty much devoid of anyone with a genuine personal agenda.
JCT
@Violet: Though it was interesting to note the immediate pushback when Johnson that hopeless moron started in with the “she used emotion” stuff.
I think the GOP needs to be real careful with how they treat Hillary from the “hysterical woman” standpoint, that one rings the bell for all women; women who are fed up with their behavior and comments. They cannot let that gender gap get any worse at this point.
Haydnseek
@Violet: That’s an excellent point. Hillary will get tarred and feathered as the “hysterical woman,” every frothing lunatic with an “R” next to his name is always portrayed as a loyal public servant who isn’t the type to seek publicity for it’s own sake, but this time feels the need to speak out because this issue has such grave national implications. Thus do they maintain the fiction that they are driven by the “courage of their convictions.”
22over7
@Violet:
Yes, they are aware that something went wrong, but it seems (to me, anyway) that their current solution revolves around Frank Luntz working overtime to come up with pretty new phrases to describe the same old crap. And the emergence of the preppers/militia/gun fetishists as the current face of the GOP probably won’t help.
That’s my hope, anyway.
CaseyL
Well, if we must talk about 2016…
Chrisie, Haley, Jindal – likely to try.
Susana Martinez – possible dark horse.
Kasich, Pence, JEB! – just to round out the field.
Alison
@Haydnseek: I have to think that this tactic would not serve the GOP well among their already-miniscule young voters, especially younger women. In the same way that a lot of them were put off by the fucked up rape comments and the blatant attacks on women’s health, I think that archaic sexist shit about BITCHES BE CRAZY EMOTIONAL AMIRITE is not going to sit well with millennial women who may not agree with all of Clinton’s politics, but who see a strong, powerful confident woman who has gained international respect and who is being treated like a silly girl for having feelings.
Valdivia
@Violet:
Totally agree that there is some level of cognition that there is a problem. It seems though that in general they think it’s a packaging problem not a structural one with their policies and ideas. I was reading–I am still recovering from that–an article by Byron York about the get together in NC and he said that the consensus is that they have to improve messaging and that’s it. They are all agreed that all they need is a great new Savior candidate in 2016 to fix them. They think that the dems did no reexamination after 1988 and it was only Bill Clinton who fixed the Dem party and not Clinton emerging because the party went in a different direction.
I really think they believe Rubio and Ryan will save them when in reality they are a reflection of the deep problems they have.
Violet
@CaseyL: I didn’t see Susanna Martinez’s speech at the GOP convention, but heard it was very good. She’s a governor, which has traditionally been a stepping stone for President. Female. Latina. I see her as having a good shot, although didn’t she used to be a Democrat? Rank and file may not like that, although if she’s convincing enough on why she switched and it was long enough ago, it might not be as big a problem. I don’t know anything about her–can she play the bully role? A bullying female, a la Palin, will work fine with them.
22over7
@Alison:
Besides, now all we have to do is post pictures of John Boehner. Sort of takes the wind out of that argument.
Baud
The only interesting thing about the GOP field is how they will respond to Obamacare, which will be over 2 years old by then.
Brachiator
@mistermix:
Bullshit. Romney would talk shit, maybe hire someone to fight for him, but he never came across as anything other than a blustering asswipe whose only core belief was that his money made him better than the average Joe.
It’s early. Obama’s second term has barely begun. I could give less than two shits about whoever the GOP thinks is hot.
And from an earlier news story, Jindal has problems holding the attention of even the most hospitable GOP audiences:
This is not much of a trial balloon.
@Schlemizel:
I really like Franken, but he is kinda wonkish and not particularly charismatic.
Still, this stuff is too far in the future for me to worry about.
I am, though, enjoying the GOP discomfort.
Evolving Deep Southerner
@gf120581: Think Biden would be up for re-upping as VP under Clinton? It wouldn’t be the first or even the second time in history someone’s served as VP under two presidents. George Clinton (not the “Paint the White House Black” George Clinton, the other one) was the Vice President under both Jefferson and Madison. John C. Calhoun served under John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson.
Haydnseek
@Alison: I agree with you 100%. They will be very poorly served by this tactic, which is not to say that they won’t pursue it. Ultimately, it’s all they have. The repub. lack of support among women was devastating in the last election, and only figures to get worse as they dial up the crazy with more “personhood” bills and attacks on not just freedom of choice, but even contraception in any form. They pay lip service to tactics, but they remain driven by ideology, resentment, hate and out and out racism/sexism.
Culture of Truth
Paul Ryan runs away from true budget cutting too.
Having said that, Bayou Gilligan has no chance.
Culture of Truth
Think Biden would be up for re-upping as VP under Clinton?
No.
Haydnseek
@Culture of Truth: BAYOU GILLIGAN! I am so going to steal that………
handsmile
Another Bobby Jindal thread? It seems largely a reprise of Doug Galt’s post yesterday, though with more Booker in the comments. Both Violet (#16) and RossinDetroit (#22) succinctly state why Jindal will never be the Confederate candidate for President or a heart’s beat away from that office.
But for all the persuasive evidence offered to refute the contention of Drum or other bored pundits, once more let me introduce the factor even more definitive than melanin: Jindal once performed an exorcism::
http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2012/05/bobby-jindal-exorcised-his-college-girlfriend
Consider me hopelessly naive, but even in a country that believes in angels and Kelly Clarkson’s artistry while regarding evolution and climate change as hoaxes, exorcism will remain a hit only in movie theaters not the voting booth. Mormonism was (is?) a great mystery to voters. Linda Blair and Max von Sydow helped to ensure that the practice of casting out demons is lodged deeply in American popular imagination.
Xecky Gilchrist
@Citizen Alan: Exactly… which is why I said it was funny.
ETA: I know you knew that – mention just in case anyone didn’t pick up.
CaseyL
Violet: All of which would make Martinez attractive to a GOP that wants to dig itself out of its demographic/general loathesomeness hole. That’s a big “if,” though.
I don’t see Hillary running. Her age alone wouldn’t be an issue, but her health isn’t good, and that makes age more relevant. Also, after last week’s testimony on Banghazi, I think her well of suffer-fools-gladly has run completely dry. She’s put up with unimaginable crap for 20 years and, unless she has an absolute burning desire for the White House, I just can’t see her wanting to put up with unimaginable crap for another 12 years.
RFK, Jr has a few problems, not least of which is he’s a science illiterate. He’s an anti-vaxxer, which writes him off my list completely, full stop, period.
Brachiator
@Evolving Deep Southerner:
Why would he consider this?
I would vote for Biden in a heartbeat. I would vote for Clinton if Biden decided that he wanted to retire from politics. I have absolutely no interest in seeing Clinton on top of the ticket over Biden.
And if Biden chose to run, I would prefer that he choose a younger VP.
@handsmile:
I believe in Kelly Clarksson’s artistry. The rest, not so much.
Violet
@CaseyL:
It’s two and a half years before the primary season starts in earnest. Lots of jockeying for position before then. I guess it’ll depend on how the 2014 elections go. If the teabaggers manage to claw back some power and old white people see themselves as having influence again it might be too soon for a female latina candidate for president for them. We’ll see.
ding dong
@Violet: seriously you guys think we don’t have a deep bench : kaine warner gillibrand klobuchar patty murray maria cantwell kathleen sebelius schweitzer whitehouse
cuomo patrick daniel malloy who I like. Warren Ken Salazar vilsack hickenlooer the udalls and I know he’s not intereed but gore would be good retread.
FlipYrWhig
@ding dong: plus, some “moderates” will want to jump in too. Red state Democrats. Maybe Jay Nixon? Steve Beshear? Most of the big names that have been being talked about are liberal-ish and/or populist, so there might be a space on the right to launch a competitive campaign.
Yutsano
@Brachiator: Kelly has pipes. The fact that she got discovered through a ridiculous reality show doesn’t change that.
@Violet: Martinez has other issues, mainly that she doesn’t give out starbursts. That and she’s not well-known outside of NM. She could raise her profile or even be a decent VP candidate (she would have been much more of a plus than Paulie Boy for sure) but the Big Chair no.
Now let’s all lay back and FEEL TEH JEBMENTUM!! It is his turn, after all.
Violet
@Yutsano: I don’t know much about Martinez. Is she not Palin-level starbursty? She seems attractive enough to me. Of course she’ll be a few years older when primary season gets going.
It’s Santorum’s turn. Won’t stop Jeb from trying to rehabilitate the Bush name.
handsmile
@Yutsano:
Congratulations on your passage to a higher Order within the IRS realm! As a tax instructor, do pupils bring you apples as well as questions?
Re Kelly Clarkson
The NYC subway and sewer systems also have pipes. To my ears, they are no less industrial than Ms. Clarkson’s.
Yutsano
@Violet: Well see Dubya got to cut in line, why can’t JEB!! get to do the exact same thing? Of course Poppy Bush is not doing too well so he may not be around to grease the skids like he did for Georgie Boy. That was really how Dubya got away with the stepping on Grandpa Walnuts’ dick like that.
@handsmile: I’ll take apples. Of course all my classes will have chocolate. This may or may not be for the students however. :)
Chris
@Valdivia:
I said this yesterday in a dead thread: their biggest problem is that they’re so used to operating in a political environment that doesn’t hold them accountable for anything. From Nixon onwards, conservatives have been free to let the country drive off the cliff for the most part without consequences, because so many white voters cared more about having their racial and cultural anxieties stroked than whether the people doing it were actually delivering results.
Nowadays, between the state of the economy and the changing electorate, that stuff doesn’t work anymore. Like you said, they’re convinced that the only problem’s packaging, so they’re fumbling around looking for new shibboleths that will placate the new voters just like the old ones did. It still hasn’t sunk in that the emerging electorate might actually expect them to work for a living.
22over7
@Yutsano:
Martinez has a severely mentally disabled sister for whom she is responsible. Moving to Santa Fe from Las Cruces was difficult for her.
Also, she’s not charismatic, her husband is not interested in politics at all, and she hasn’t got the chops for the job. Not even the one she has currently.
Svensker
Going for the Moore Award, I see. If Sully’s read this, he’s probably still in a faint.
Well done.
Another Halocene Human
@Davis X. Machina: The good thing is that I get the sense that Dem primary voters–even in states half a country away, will never vote for him. Never.
Chris
@Brachiator:
This.
Culture of Truth
I first used Bayou Gilligan when he gave that initial response. I am still hoping it will catch on.
Bob
Kevin Drum is Mickey Kaus, right?
GregB
Whipped cream on a pile of shit.
The GOP re-branding effort in a nutshell.
Ruckus
@22over7:
This is why I stated a couple of weeks ago that we needed to be thinking about 16. Obama made his move in 04 but no one is doing that now.
Who are the possibles and who are the probables?
Brachiator
@Yutsano:
Yep, it makes no sense that people would disparage her just because she was on American Idol.
Hell, Frank Sinatra once appeared on a show called “Major Bowes’ Amateur Hour.” I guess he was another no-talent slouch.
Of course, Dubya was also a member of one of the top families. McCain was just the hired help, military division.
@Culture of Truth:
Who’s the Skipper, then?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Brachiator: Who’s the Skipper, then?
Gingrich.
handsmile
@Brachiator:
Admittedly, this is a minor point (on a rhetorical remark), but do let me assure you that Ms. Clarkson’s provenance has absolutely nothing to do with my opinion of her, um, talent. My reply (#95) to Yutsano suggests how I would describe her vocal style. Her performance at the Inauguration did nothing to dissuade me (unlike J. Taylor’s). (Oh and fwiw I disliked Richard Blanco’s poem even more.)
Not for the first time, and for as much as I respect your opinion, on this matter our M does V. (and I realize I’m in the much smaller vehicle)
FlipYrWhig
@Brachiator: skipper = Barbour
Violet
@Brachiator: Isn’t the Skipper Rush Limbaugh?
Evolving Deep Southerner
@ding dong:
That’s an interesting prospect. I can see why him not being interested would be the (probably correct) general wisdom, i.e., “He’s rich and successful as shit and enjoying himself without all that. Who in his right mind would do it?” Indeed, he’s got Romney money plus some now, but if the conventional wisdom were always right, Romney would have never run. Unfortunately, Gore is about the only person I can think of, Hillary included, who would bring out Obama-level hate-fervor in the GOP. I shudder to think all of the “Al Jazeera” riffs we’d hear the minute someone even mentioned his name as a possible candidate, much less if he actually ran. And that would just be the tip of the iceberg.
But, hey, he won the presidency once. He might could do it again and make it stick this time depending on who the GOPers ran.
Maude
AWSP, if you read this, I am so sick of 2016 talk.
J.D. Rhoades
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
They still do. I’m still hearing it from them, along with the ‘more takers than makers’ bullshit they did SO WELL with last time.
At this point, 2016 is ours to lose.
Brachiator
@handsmile:
Fair enough. Good to know that you’re not a reflexive hater of Clarkson because she was an Idol contestant.
I didn’t see any of the Inauguration entertainments, so I got no opinion of them one way or another. And on Clarkson, we just disagree. No biggee.
@Violet:
Interesting choice. I can almost hear Rush calling Jindal his “Little Buddy.” No wonder the GOP is lost at sea.
This would make Romney Thurston Howell III, and Newt perhaps, the Professor (or Paul Ryan, they’re both so serious). Let’s see, Mrs Romney as Lovey. Sarah Palin as Ginger. Starbursts. And maybe Michelle Bachmann as Maryann.
Here on Jindal’s Isle.
AxelFoley
@gbear:
That shit was pure gold.
Felonius Monk
Isn’t Jindal one of the main ingredients in the “Frothy Mix” (aka Santorum)?
grandpa john
@Brachiator: Sorry, but no way in hell could Bachmann ever come close to playing the sweet ,innocent, lovable and genuinely open big hearted, friendly to all role of Mary Ann
Liberty60
Hey, lets start a draft petition to repeal the 22nd Amendment and let Obama run again in 2016.
No, its not realistic, but the howling freakout from Wingnutopia would be well worth the effort.
Bob h
Jindal looks like a Bombay slumdogwho needs a bath.