the most important election of your lifetime: 2012 american general election thread

lol mh certainly not my intention.

The time is way overdue to fight back rhetorically against this Randist fairy tale.

agreed. but it can be done without implicitly making an "example" of everyone who's ever owned a bbq shop. idk. maybe i'm making too much of this. or maybe i need to stop trolling local political msg boards.

I don't think it's wrong to say that like many of us Obama stumbles when asked to explain how a business works.

but I don't employ speechwriters

what do you mean?

from what i can tell dude clumsily jacked that elizabeth warren gif that floated around a while back

nah, I was referring to Vic Perry

Alfred means that his speechwriters work pro-bono

though if the best ammunition they have is an out-of-context line and some deleted scenes concerning hippies obama knew from the 2008 campaign, RELEASE THE DANGED TAXES

By now Obama, long accustomed to accusations of socialist revamping of the American free enterprise system, should be able to dismiss the idea that one creates a small business – any business – in a vacuum free of loans, tax breaks, etc. Like will, I didn't like the way his remark came out the other day either.

And now, an interlude for some LOLs from the Ohio Senate race:

An eagle-eyed conservative blogger recently spotted a photograph of Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) looking cozy with a woman. And not just any woman -- a journalist, in fact.

The blogger, sensing scandal, then contacted the journalist, Connie Schultz, and asked her why she was hugging this elected official she is supposed to cover.

The only problem in this blogger's story? Schultz is married to the senator.

Schultz runs an active Facebook feed and on Tuesday, she put up an email exchange she had with a conservative blogger who was "doing an expose on journalists in the elite media who socialize with elected officials they are assigned to cover."

Schultz replied to the blogger that not only does she often hug Brown, she kisses him too. The exchange can be seen below. A source in Ohio confirmed the authenticity of the exchange to The Huffington Post.

Schultz is a Pulitzer-Prize winning columnist who was based at the Cleveland Plain Dealer. In September 2011, Schultz stepped down from her position at the paper, citing a conflict of interest while Brown was seeking reelection.

Schultz's email exchange:

Email from conservative blogger, dated July 9, 2012:

Dear Ms. Shultz,

We are doing an expose on journalists in the elite media who socialize with elected officials they are assigned to cover. We have found numerous photos of you with Sen. Sherrod Brown. In one of them, you appear to be hugging him.

Care to comment?

-----------------------

Response, dated July 10, 2012:

Dear Mr. [Name Deleted]:

I am surprised you did not find a photo of me kissing U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown so hard he passes out from lack of oxygen. He's really cute.

He's also my husband.

You know that, right?

Connie Schultz.

------------------------
July 17: Waiting, I'm waiting....

Voters won't give a fuck about how many j's Obama rolled in college.

hahahahahahaha Phil

oh my God what is the name of the blogger that dude needs to be given ENDLESS shit

pwning wannabe Breitbart acolytes is like shooting gophers, not that I'd shoot a gopher but yeah

Actually, it is pretty much impossible to speak without having words dishonestly taken out of context, if somebody wants to do that. Taking just:

"If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen."

which are the infamous fourteen words that tore the hearts out of American entrepreneurs everywhere la la, out of:

"If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet."

Is Deliberately Fraudulent Quotation, making it sound like he said "you didn't build your business." Extremely clear from the context that he was talking about all the other things in America that didn't emerge from the forehead of John Galt, not your blessed business itself.

Buncha crap, and there's no way to protect yourself from that except to expand upon these notions. Retreat would be a very stupid move.

there's no way to protect yourself from that except to expand upon these notions. Retreat would be a very stupid move.

100% agreed

hot sauce doesn't actually need for me to count the words I quoted from his post in order to demonstrate that I didn't quote his whole post, right? do it yourself, rugged individualist

God, I got in a fight on FB about this yesterday, pointing out that government as the engine of infrastructure building is like undergrad-level econ 1010 shit, and noted that if Wal-Mart had to build its own roads everywhere it would be kinda fucked. To which someone responded, "How much could government save if Wal-Mart DID build its own roads?" How do you even respond to dumbshittery like that?

All I could do was fire back a bunch of questions -- "Could everyone else use those roads, too? Could Target and K-Mart use them? Could small hardware and grocery stores use them? Would they all have to build their own? Isn't that an insurmountable barrier to entry for small businesses? How much land would be given over to road building?" -- in an attempt to maybe get his head to explode like a computer on Star Trek.

hot sauce doesn't actually need for me to count the words I quoted from his post in order to demonstrate that I didn't quote his whole post, right? do it yourself, rugged individualist

except... you did quote his whole post? and then you requoted excerpts of it?

I feel like there's no uniting the US rhetorically at this point but 'we' built the roads, 'we' built the internet, etc. Same 'we' that starts the preamble to the constitution of the United States. It doesn't matter whether you're broke, an entrepreneur, a homeowner, a renter, sick, healthy, or whatever else, you're in the same pool of people using the same resources and supporting the same system.

I mean, except the rich, they take their money out of the system, right?

moral of the story is that obama needs to go through speeches and take out the parts where he says "you got something? you didn't make it happen" and change it to "you got something? someone helped you"

WE THE PEOPLE

and Mitt Romney

WHICH DO YOU STAND WITH

Oh, sorry, yeah, I get it. Is that bad, by the way, did I take up too much of everybody's time when I put the quote in? How about now? Is this taking too long? Definitely by now. Yeah. Going on too long now for sure.

lol

Voters won't give a fuck about how many j's Obama rolled in college.

however if his rolling technique is revealed to have been bogus some of us will clown him so badly that he will never recover

I feel that if Obama gave a speech that began "I built this country...on rock and roll!", all the people who presently hate him would fall in love with him.

Clinton didn't even inhale, whatever man, no credibility in my eyes, ever.

"Did you ever own a 'bong' sir? A 'bong' with a skull on it, like the one I'm holding here?"

god i saw the first fifteen minutes-ish of Political Animals and while most of it was just clumsy, shameless exposition based on Hilary Clinton there was one part where she and the younger jerk who beat her in the primary started dancing together on stage at a campaign rally and it was like "yeah, i don't know whether it'd be better or worse if she and obama really did that"

I feel that if Obama gave a speech that began "I built this country...on rock and roll!", all the people who presently hate him would fall in love with him

You overestimate our affection for Starship.

I'd be happy as long as they fell into the band pit

xp

now if he were to bust out some "count on me" me by J. Starship

xpost

It's no lie. After pretending to inhale Clinton pretended to be high.

morbz, i'm confused - do you like politicians or not?

If he can punctuate the Starship quote with an emphatic rock and roll hand gesture, though, I think it'll work.

http://wonkette.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/beast-obama-devilhorns.jpg

That's a Hawaiian "hang loose," LOL Canadians.

(I kid, I kid.)

that's a shop. actual photo is of Obama flipping the bird

do you like politicians or not?

IF they're properly cooked

to be fair judging from the url wonkette has misinterpreted the shaka as well

I expect more from clemenza than I do from wonkette. Hmph.

Taking just:

"If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen."

which are the infamous fourteen words that tore the hearts out of American entrepreneurs everywhere la la, out of:

"If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet."

Is Deliberately Fraudulent Quotation, making it sound like he said "you didn't build your business." Extremely clear from the context that he was talking about all the other things in America that didn't emerge from the forehead of John Galt, not your blessed business itself.

Buncha crap, and there's no way to protect yourself from that except to expand upon these notions. Retreat would be a very stupid move.

― Vic Perry, Wednesday, July 18, 2012 8:35 AM (7 minutes ago)

"Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet."

the longer passage is just as colossally tone-deaf and nearly as damning as the "unfair" single-sentence reduction, imo. at the same time, it's factually valid and does fairly represent obama's apparent intent. the problem is the oppositional stance. the president is pinning the medal for "your" success not on "us" - the american collective in all its manifestations - but specifically on the federal government. the bit about the origin of the internet makes this clear.

true or not, this is just fucking stupid. obama could easily have stuck with the inspirational suggestion that we all, in various ways, collectively work together to make our individual successes possible, and that our government is a part of this. the president could have limited himself to a "we" that includes even his own administration. but instead, at least for a moment, he went out of his way make the shitty, divisive, needle-sticking point that "you", the business owners of america, you owe your success to big government. it's no surprise that people reacted badly, even if his overall message was laudable.

well, we had the reductive analysis of that speech, now we have the interpretative one

I'm pretty sure this line of reasoning from Elizabeth Warren and Obama is why tax rates were as high as 90% for rich folks back in the day. 'We hooked you up, now give back'

not sure what's being debated here. does anyone really doubt that obama is unimpressed and cynical about aspects of America? occasionally he's going to hit a tone that suggests he thinks he's smarter than half the country, because he is and most of us think we are too. like the "guns and religion" bit in '08 this is just a reminder to check for that, esp if you want to be a "uniter".

yup, esp esp as missteps like this go a long way towards "proving" that obama really is the success-hostile pocket-picker the right so desperately wants paint him as

in the end i don't think it will be an issue. Nobody who voted for Obama in 08 didn't know he was a smug liberal who smoked weed as a kid, and he's not going to do a press blitz friday saying "yes, america, you should credit your success to big brother."

last night he was going on about Obama's mentor back in Hawaii, Frank Marshall Davis.

According to this article about conservative author/commentator Jack Cashill, Davis also figures heavily into Cashill's various conspiracy theories about Obama. (Cashill, incidentally, is a friend of my dad's from grad school and apparently wasn't always a crackpot.)

ha cashill is the guy who 'proved' ayers wrote obama's books. because both their memoirs used really unique words like "gleamed" or something.

"Baleful"! A word Cashill had never heard of!

Romney campaign going ham on Obama's "youthful transgressions"/conspiratorial associations will endear him to the base and alienate everyone else. I say go for it dude, I need more lolz this summer.