I’m on a Johnny Mercer kick, and I found this incredible performance of Satin Doll. Open thread.
I went down to the demonstration…
I live in the Tampa Bay area, and in the run up to the RNC, I thought I’d engage in a little citizen journalism. Or at least wander around the circus and capture shots of crazy people with my camera phone for y’alls’ amusement.
But when the convention actually started, I couldn’t summon the will to leave home, fight the traffic and elbow my way through damp crowds of Republican assholes when I could be home instead watching the circus unfold in air-conditioned comfort with iced cocktails. Until last night, when I finally dragged my ass down there.
Early Morning Open Thread: Tree-oompppphhh
(Tom Toles via GoComics.com)
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Best descriptive title award goes to Paul Constant: “Triumph of the Willard“:
Mitt Romney finally got exactly what he wanted tonight. A coming out party. A debutante’s ball. A two-and-a-half-hour long very special episode of This Is Your Life, so the whole world can see just how gosh-darned great Mitt Romney really is. He’s smart, successful, calm, dignified, loving, kind, and, oh, yeah, did we mention humble? Totally humble. And real. Authentic. Human. Honest. Funny. Did we say kind before? Let’s just say kind again, to be sure…
… Mitt should be happy with himself. He didn’t fuck up his speech. He got properly pissed-off at the right parts, even though he stumbled on the humorous parts, looking awkward as he waited for people to laugh. He shouted out to evangelicals with his calls for the banning of abortion and gay marriage.
And he even pulled one of his famous pranks, when he said he’d create twelve million jobs in four years. Twelve million! Can you imagine the roars of laughter in the writers’ room when that number came up?… There was no policy to back up that number, only a 5-point plan involving killing Obamacare, lowering taxes and regulations, cutting the deficit, promoting school vouchers, and drilling for oil on American land. Over half of those things have absolutely nothing to do with small business creating jobs at all in the short term, and would probably re-cripple the economy, Bush-style, in the long term. So, get it? That’s rich. That’s a real knee-slapper. And it was the only policy in the whole speech, aside from a vigorous remounting of the Bush doctrine.
But that doesn’t matter, either. What maters is that Mitt Romney spent eleven hours over three days listening to his enemies sing his praises to the heavens. Gingrich, Santorum—he crushed them all, and made them lavish hosannas upon him after the fact. His whole party rallied around him, and they almost made it feel convincing. Still, nobody likes Mitt Romney. But they will back him now, because they have no choice. They will pretend that they’ve always tolerated his wishy-washiness, his powdery touch, his creepy smile.
And as Romney’s celebration ended and the perfect balloons fell from the ceiling perfectly, I sat there in the Tampa Times Forum looking down at him relishing his moment, and I thought to myself, huh. I guess money really can buy you love.
Concerning the other Big Watercooler Topic of the evening, here’s Erick “Always for Sale, to the Right Bidder” Erickson:
… Now a word on Clint Eastwood.
It was entertaining, but it was weird. Many Democrats are scratching their heads wondering what the heck that was. I’ll tell you what it was. It was the unscripted conversation of an independent voter coming to terms with the end of the Obama love affair.
That speech may not resonate inside the beltway, but it resonates in Ohio and Florida and Wisconsin and other swing states. Clint Eastwood made people comfortable laughing at the President and Joe Biden, the great intellect of the Democratic Party, a smile with a body behind it.
I thought it was bizarre. But as a friend pointed out, lots of politically astute people thought Carly Fiorina’s now infamous demonsheep ad was bizarre and it turned out to resonate with people because the bizarreness and unfamiliarity with what they were seeing made them pay attention.
Clint Eastwood did that and it worked.
Is there an alternate universe inside the gated communities of Atlanta where Carly Fiorina won? Because I’m sure hearing ‘Go ahead and laugh at That Black Man in Our White House, since it’s not like he’s the one in charge now anyways’, was a relief to certain portions of the GOP/Confederate Branch, but if Eastwood’s “old man yells at chair” comedy stylings turn out to be as resonant as the Demon Sheep ad, this is… not good news for John McCain Mitt Romney.
Early Morning Open Thread: Tree-oompppphhhPost + Comments (77)
Is Invisible Obama drinking Mitt’s milkshake?
I have to agree with John. This is the weirdest stuff I’ve ever heard at a GOP convention. I listened to it on NPR and when the clock struck 11 pm our local station just ran the 11 o’clock news update concurrently with Mitt’s word salad.
And to answer Mitt, I felt pretty fucking glad I voted for President Obama when Health Care passed, when the auto industry was saved, the War in Iraq ended, when Bin Laden was killed, when DADT ended and for a thousand other things that President Obama has done.
And I’ll feel even better when I can vote for him in November and send Mitt back to wandering between his four or five estates and cheatin’ on his taxes…
Cheers
Is Invisible Obama drinking Mitt’s milkshake?Post + Comments (186)
Open Thread
I’m with DougJ- I used to watch every second of every convention, Democratic or Republican, and I have not so much as watched an instant of it. They are just lying and then parading the 15 or so minorities in the GOP before the camera. What’s the point of watching that?
Think I’ll play some Civ V Gods and Kings while watching the Steelers. Speaking of the Steelers, mom and dad are at the game. They decided to go up, have a good dinner, then go to the game to celebrate their wedding anniversary.
Open thread
I have not watched a single second of this Republican convention. I usually watch more or less the whole thing. It seems to me something has changed, that it’s now just a silly exercise in telling lies. And that’s not compelling tv.
Talk about whatever.
Thursday Evening Open Thread: RNC Sideshows
(Jeff Danziger via GoComics – to embiggen)
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Paul Constant at the Stranger explains “God Saved Me From A Breitbart Documentary“:
Yesterday, I attended a free screening of Hating Breitbart, a hagiographic documentary about Andrew Breitbart. The theater was about a quarter full, but it was packed with enthusiastic teabaggers, eager to cheer on proud conservative comments, especially those that mocked education. Brietbart’s father-in-law shrugs off Breitbart’s origins as a liberal by saying “he went to college, you see.” The theater hooted and cheered. They booed and sneered at a Columbia School of Journalism professor. And they loved the fact that the first forty minutes or so of Haitng Breitbart was an account of James O’Keefe’s anti-ACORN stunt journalism. The end of ACORN is a proud conservative moment.
The problem is, I don’t know if Hating Breitbart ever gets around to explaining O’Keefe’s weird attempt to seduce a CNN reporter on a ship stuffed full of dildos and pornography and his other failed attempts at transcending one-hit-wonderdom….
Find out why here, and while you’re at it, check out some of Constant’s outside-the-security-fences vignettes as well.
Dave Weigel at Slate reports on the RNC response to liberal skepticism about evangelicals embracing a Mormon cultist: “Mike Huckabee, Putting Up with Mormons Since 2012.”
And Alex Pareene at Salon has been doggedly highlighting Arianna Huffington’s not-so-new solution to the unemployment crisis: Con people into “volunteering” as personal servants. Because if America’s gonna achieve its full potential in a New Gilded Age, Arianna knows how much we’ll need a dedicated Servant Class for the Banana Republicans to bitch about!
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Apart from human and other monstrosities, what’s on the agenda for the evening?
Thursday Evening Open Thread: RNC SideshowsPost + Comments (47)