If Mr. Charles P. Pierce is to be trusted, it looks like I may have been wrong about the 2016 primaries already, or else “obvious anagram Reince Priebus” is:
The occasion was the New Hampshire GOP’s First Annual “Liberty Dinner“… a chance to get an early glimpse of what the next Republican campaign is going to be like…. And lord above, what a pipsqueak Reince Priebus is… He spent five minutes talking about the administration’s contempt for the Constitution.
“A president that touts ego, power, and a hatred for dissent above everything else, that’s Barack Obama, that’s the leader of this country. I don’t think this administration realizes that the First Amendment wasn’t a suggestion. The Bill of Rights is not a wish list, it’s a set of non-negotiable limits on the federal government.”
He thereupon ripped Eric Holder for wanting to read Miranda rights to the Christmas Day bomber and to Osama bin Laden (?). It’s all just conjuring and code words but, between the lines, there was a clear indication that the 2016 Republican presidential campaign is going to be a tangled ball of seething resentment and unbridled victimology. The whining and poor-mouthing is going to be audible on Mars as the party staggers, blinking, out of the mental moonscape into which eight years of radical Kenyan Muslim socialism has placed it…
And, later:
… Priebus is not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, but he does know two things: 1) that he needs the crazoids in the monkeyhouse because they are the only reliable source of political energy that the party has, and 2) that dependence on those same crazoids is going to be eternally toxic to the party in general elections from now until Rand Paul’s grandchildren are misquoting James Madison. That may well be the function that Senator Aqua Buddha serves. He may be the spark-gap between those two opposing dynamics on which Priebus’s job ultimately depends. If he can drain enough of the Tea Party’s energy into what will still be a fairly conventional Republican primary campaign — the difference between Michele Bachmann and Rand Paul on the social issues is not vast at all –then he might just be able to straddle the consequences in November. When you hear Republicans talk about how Rand Paul is “not like his father,” this is what they mean. He would be the vehicle to keep just enough of the Tea Party faction inside the party so that the party could then ignore whatever of the Tea Party chooses to remain outside. The great Bobby Lounge of Louisiana cautions us that “A mule with aspirations ain’t worth anything.” However, a Judas Goat with ambition can go a long, long way.
If the GOP’s Permanent Party, the guys with the keys to the primary ballot boxes, have decided that Rand ‘Thanksdad’ Paul will be their bulwark against the hardcore Believers… well, I think they underestimate the negative energies of St. Rick Sanctorum and his ilk. I also think it’s gonna be even harder to keep the Paultrons in line than it will be to corral the “religious”, because if there’s anything a dedicated Ron-Paul-for-LIBERTY! primary voter cherishes more than his bitcoin & kruggerand stockpile, it’s that bold pure rush of outsider contrarianosity that comes when the local wardheelers call the cops to escort you out of the VFW hall on primary day.
Upon one thing, however, I think we can all agree: You can’t take your eyes off these bastids, or there’s no way we’ll ever get the stains out of the drapes.
***********
Apart from premature speculation, what’s on the agenda tonight?
Baud
Obama had bin Laden killed to cover up his attempt to read bin Laden his Miranda rights.
Wake up, sheeple!
raven
Just wondering if the princess is going to come sit down and watch the Midwife and Mad Men????
Litlebritdifrnt
Reposted from below Flossie and Skeeter love at first sight
crittersbybritty.com/
MattF
It is interesting that the institutional ‘R’s are now all about resentment. They used to outsource that stuff to Beck, Limbaugh, et. al.– but now– it’s all they’ve got. What else could he actually say, besides N*****r, N*****r, N******r— and he’s not going to say that… Right?
Gozer
Watching The Right Stuff on HBO Go. I grew up around planes and ships and I’ve always been fascinated with the technological history of the US between the end of WWII and the moon landing. Everything from conceptions of what Americans thought the future would bring to the seemingly endless parade of futuristic design choices and appliances available to many Americans.
JPL
@Litlebritdifrnt: You definitely did good!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
fuckwit
Unserious nutbags, the lot of them.
Really nailed it with the combination of vindictitude and victimhood.
It’s the wail of privilege, entitlement, and small pen15.
That’s yer GOP. Confederates still wailing about the loss of their plantations and “I may be poor but at least I ain’t a N-word” status, other white people wailing about immigrants, christians wailing about their privilege as dominant religion giving way to modernism and technology and other religions, men (especially the religious ones) wailing about the patriarchy giving way to feminism and equality and terrified of women’s sexuality, straight (and a fair number of closeted?) men wailing about losing their privilege by having to deal with gay people sharing a supermarket aisle, gun nuts and warmongers with very small pen15es wailing about the loss of privilge for their pen15 substitutes, greed-mongers and the 1% desperately clinging to their outsised privilege, and in general, men with needle-dicks throwing a tantrum about that.
And then the god-botherers terrified that someone somewhere doing something that might piss off the biggest small-pen15 in the sky– obsessed with the threat of being thrown into a fiery pit of hell by said celestial douchebag as part of some massive collective punishment for what others do in their own private lives.
Your modern GOP: Needle-dick, the bug-fucker!
Let’s see if the WP filter lets those through.
UPDATE: Ooooh cool, it did!
srv
Rational Rand Paul and Harvard Law School Magna Cum Laude Cruz are going to join hands and the Tea Party will march lockstep into the White House and Senate in 2016. Vilify these reasoned people all you want with your petty emotionalism, but by then their objective realism will be the only thing preventing America from becoming a backwater Mexico.
Roger Moore
I think that’s “Paultroons”.
fuckwit
OK, back to work…
Chyron HR
@srv:
VICTORY! The electoral map is expanding! ASK ME ABOUT PROJECT ORKO!
Chris
So kind of like 2012, and 2008, and 2004, and 2000, and 1996, and 1992, and 1988, and 1984, and 1980 – don’t know if 1976 was like that, but 1972 definitely – and 1968 – and 1964. Only… more so.
HinTN
Premature speculation, now that is gonna get us going.
Anoniminous
The GOP is very much a Top/Down organization and none of the 2012 goofballs look to me like someone capable of getting the National and State parties behind them.
I figure we’ll see someone who didn’t run come to the fore.
HinTN
P@Chyron HR: Okey dokey, I’m askin’
gene108
Had a 10 year old DVD player that conked out. I had it hooked to my 17+ year old 13″ Zenith T.V. I need an adapter to hook the red, white and yellow cables to co-axial out, because the only connection on the back of the T.V. is for a co-axial input.
I bought a new DVD player, but for whatever reason the new DVD player creates a lot more interference with the T.V. picture than the old one did, so watching DVD’s is impossible.
I’m going to return the new DVD player, but I”m not sure whether to get keep tryng different brands until one works or just give up on having a DVD player hooked to the old T.V., as the new ones seem a bit too advanced.
Chris
@Anoniminous:
Part of the top/down thing is the notion that everybody gets their “turn.” By that standard, isn’t Rick Santorum the person in line for 2016?
HinTN
Where is that sideways 8 symbol? Making pizza, reading shite.
Aitch + sideways
SiubhanDuinne
@Anne Laurie top:
You did that there, and I saw it.
HinTN
And, before I’m gone: Glad Sooner family is safe! Ciao
mdblanche
Would it be unfair to interpret this as meaning that infringing on the rights of a white person is just as bad as pretending non-white persons also have them?
@Anoniminous: The GOP was a top/down organization, but that was before they let the tea party take them over. I would be surprised if the top can still impose their own candidate on the bottom in 2016.
scav
@HinTN: ∞ ?
found it under the couch.
SatanicPanic
My band’s CD is done! probably NSFW lyrics. Oh and if any San Diego people are reading this, we’re playing at The Tower Friday the 7th
Anya
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
He’s just trolling. That suggestion is a dead giveway.
beltane
@mdblanche:
It may yet happen, but they ought to get a bedroom and make sure the door is locked as the whole thing sounds somewhat dirty to me.
As Chris said upthread, isn’t it Santorum’s turn?
Anoniminous
@Chris:
@mdblanche:
(Dinner is just about on the table so I have to be quick.)
1. The TeaBaggers are a re-branding of the same Fundie/Con idiots the GOP has relied on for decades.
2. They are a bunch of incompetents.
3. Ultimately, they will vote for whomever they are told to vote for.
4. In theory it’s Santorum’s turn, in practice he’s toast. The GOP would be destroyed with him at the head of the ticket.
5. Paul may be the GOP Great White Father of 2016. I despise the man so I have a hard time being objective about his chances. At the moment, I don’t see it. I concede, lacking polling data, I may be wildly off.
the Conster
Please conservatives, don’t pick Santorum! As a liberal, I find him to be everything that scares me and makes me angry, just like Sarah Palin except even smarter and more dangerous to my liberal beliefs, so please please please don’t pick Santorum!!
gene108
I wonder why Chris Christie doesn’t get any consideration by the pundits for the 2016 nomination?
Republicans can always change their primary rules to have a short sweet primary season, like they did in 2008. The only reason we were subjected to the clown show in 2012 was because of the energy the 2008 Democratic primary generated amongst non-Republicans and they thought they could emulate it, by abandoning the winner take all system they had been using.
At some point, Republicans fall in line behind who ever they are told to fall in line behind.
I think Christie gives them the best chance to win in 2016. He’s going to cruise to re-election as governor this year.
At some level, even the most rabid right-winger* would rather re-take the White House than allow any more time with Democrats in power.
*Christie doesn’t have the Romney problem of re-thinking what he’s done, while governor. The Democratic legislature keeps his worst wing-nut instincts in check, but he’s rejected federal funds for a new rail line between NJ and NYC, he cut the income qualification for Medicaid down from $25,000 to $5,000 so the poors are sufficiently hurt, he rolled back a millionaires tax while keeping the 1% increase in sales tax the previous governor also got passed, and cut out state subsidies to people upgrading their home infrastructure to more energy efficient water heaters, furnaces, etc., but has still kept the solar energy subsidies in place, so he can get credit as an ardent environmentalist (and he’s fat, just like Al Gore so he has to care about the environment or something).
piratedan
can’t we just give them a jar of paste and set them down in the corner until it’s fingerpainting time?
gene108
@Chris:
If the billionaires aren’t bank rolling him, Santorum doesn’t get another turn. His actual on the ground campaign infrastructure, including actual fund raising sucked. He and Gingrich were pet projects of a few bored billionaires.
All someone has to do is what Bush, Jr. did in 1999 and make damn sure he has tied up all the fundraising ability of the GOP to funnel money into his campaign and his campaign only, then that person becomes the automatic front runner.
What will be interesting in 2016 is if another Democratic candidate can tap into the unprecedented fundraising juggernaut/machine that President Obama created in 2008 and 2012.
I remember after Bush, Jr. ran in 2000 and 2004, I figured we’d be hard pressed to see anyone come close to that kind of war chest, but Obama just blew the doors off of all fundraising records.
Gin & Tonic
The world is going to hell in a handbasket, I say. People just can’t leave well enough alone.
schrodinger's cat
Thread needs more kitteh, I brings you the biblical kitteh.
ETA: Is on the voting pages for ICHC/lolcats, give it a thumbs up, but only if you like it.
The Fat Kate Middleton
@the Conster: Oh, this, absolutely. Please don’t run Santorum, Goopers. He could destroy the Democrat Party. And liberals … and, and … secular humanists! We’re begging here.
catclub
@gene108: just buy a new 13inch tv, should be pretty cheap.
Baud
@The Fat Kate Middleton:
If Santorum runs, I’ll probably vote for him, and I know a lot of Democrats who will also. Santorum Democrats are a very large group. No way the Democratic Party survives.
Chris
@Anoniminous:
True. If only because the teabaggers are nothing without the astroturf money from rich corporations and families like the Kochs.
@gene108:
I agree that Chris Christie is by far their best choice. I’m just not sure the party will pick him anyway.
Fort Geek
Seriously considering going to a bar to start a fight and get my ass kicked for starting a CAD project last night and not saving my work.
Farking power went out this morning after I went to bed…and *zot!* there goes the drawing.
Note to self: Dumbass! You _know_ better than that… *grumble*
catclub
@the Conster: Palin and Santorum on the same ticket would scare the bejeezus out of the lieberal democrat party.
catclub
@Fort Geek: Autosave is your friend, but was off at a different bar.
mdblanche
@Chris: @beltane: Going strictly by second place, 2000 should have been Pat Buchanan’s turn. Instead they decided to give the nomination to a scion of the party aristocracy. I doubt the establishment is crazy enough to just give ol’ Frothy a turn.
@gene108: He put his job ahead of his party and was photographed with the Kenyan usurper. He’s permanently disqualified.
ETA: just beaten to it.
NickT
@HinTN:
Hey, don’t knock premature spectaculation until you’ve tried it. If Ron Paul’s parents had, we’d all be better off today.
IowaOldLady
I hope you all are right about Christie, because he might be trouble. His temperament might defeat him in a long campaign, but he’s not stupid and he can make himself sound reasonable.
NickT
@efgoldman:
Chris Christie – now in one squishy RINO-sized package….
The attack ads almost write themselves.
Baud
@IowaOldLady:
Rudy Giuliani was scary until he became a joke. And the GOP is even nuttier now.
Anoniminous
@gene108:
Adding to what has already been said, being a presidential candidate is a grueling two year 24/7 slog. Looking at Christie (and there’s a LOT to look at!) I don’t think he is physically up to it.
Fort Geek
@catclub: My CAD prog (QCAD) doesn’t have it :/
It’ll only take a couple hours to get back where I was, fortunately.
IowaOldLady
Yeah, and Rick Perry was scary until he opened his mouth. I know. And I hope you all are absolutely right. But I think Christie’s lapband surgery is a sign he intends to make a bid. We’ll see.
Chris
@IowaOldLady:
I thought the same thing about his vetoing the gay marriage bill. That wasn’t ingratiating himself to New Jersey voters, it was ingratiating himself to the national party and the Heartland based bigots especially.
lojasmo
Watching 3:10 to Yuma and drinking Pinot N.
Ran 3 miles of singletrack and drove up to St. Paul to have Thai food with wife’s union thug colleague.
Growing a beard by atrition.
NickT
@Anoniminous:
Chris Christie will live off his own fat as far as the GOP primaries are concerned. What will do him in is that he’s not obviously crazy and bigoted enough for the base – and anyone who is is unelectable at the national level.
Baud
@Chris:
So how does he stay anti-gay-marriage three years from now? It’s already something that’s becoming verboten. Or does the GOP stop caring about the issue in 2016?
maya
“Republicans are cool.” Joe Camel
daverave
@Fort Geek:
I haven’t done that in many, many years. I pretty much do an quick-save after every other command.
Chris
@Baud:
I don’t know when they’ll stop caring, but it definitely won’t be 2016. Way too soon.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@daverave:
I haven’t worked with AutoCAD since r14. Doesn’t it now have a save every X minutes feature?
Redshirt
@daverave: Can you ever “save” too much? The answer is no, there is no amount of saving that is too much.
NickT
I sometimes wonder whether Christie’s rather obvious ambition might lead him to consider switching parties. I just don’t see him being able to slither any higher up the greasy pole as a Republican.
danimal
@Chyron HR: Ur doing it wrong. You didn’t mention UNLIMITED CORPORATE CASH!!!@HinTN: Chyron’s referencing a multi-nym’d Romney-troll from the 2012 election.
Roger Moore
@schrodinger’s cat:
Sorry, I think I prefer this kitty Russian Reversal.
Fort Geek
@daverave: Haven’t drawn anything since September or so. Still knocking the rust out (maybe I do need that ass-whippin’ after all, to accelerate the process ;)
Anne Laurie
@NickT:
Yeah, I think Christie’s ‘conundrum’ is whether to dramatically switch sides in an attempt to capture the “centrist Dem” vote all the pundits are so convinced are waiting to vote for a mean cranky white guy again, or wait to see if the Kochs/Pete Peterson/Sheldon Adelman will stop dicking around with surrogates and flat-out start their own “Sensible DFH-Hating Centrists for Austerity Against Poor People for Jesus” Party. He’s a Democrat’s dream of a ‘sensible’ Republican, and a Republican’s dream of a ‘centrist’ Democrat.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Absent some focus by the Democrats on retaking state leges it seems to me that any Democratic president will be hobbled in the same ways that Obama is. That doesn’t mean that electing a Democrat isn’t important. It does mean that my expectations for his or her presidency will be muted.
NickT
@Anne Laurie: Admittedly, there is a Specter haunting New England.
Too early for a Marx pun?
Regnad Kcin
@NickT: Pardon me while I have a Strange Interlude
Steeplejack
@Fort Geek:
WTF?! I save even my Word documents about every five minutes. It’s a reflex action at this point. How hard is it to mash Ctrl-S (or Cmd-S) or click File | Save?
mai naem
@Anne Laurie: Unless the Repubs reverse their right wing march, he’ll have to change.
Kind of OT, I saw OK Gov Mary Fallin on the boobtube this AM – she looked like she was swallowing broken glass when she was thanking Obama for his response to aid for the tornadoes. She is definitely not pulling a Christie.
Keith G
Stupid people are saying stupid things, says this and hundreds of other posts.
What affirmative steps is our side going to take next week to move along the agenda we need?
The Other Chuck
@IowaOldLady:
Precisely the qualities that disqualify him.
Fort Geek
@Steeplejack: Not hard, once I remember it…
ottercliff
@srv: Two men joining hands, Paul/Cruz or anyone else, is in direct violation of the RNC platform. What next, a man/dog slate?
LAC
So, instead of the piles of shit they had during the last republican primary, the loons have decided to this time scoop the shit up and make shit sandwiches instead because that will do it? That is…just awesome…
JR in WV
To paraphrase a wise pundit from history; All that is necessary for a good man to grow a beard is nothing, nothing at all.
The Red Pen
Bi Cruiser Peen
Ed Drone
@Anne Laurie:
Why does the name “Zell Miller” come to mind?
Ed