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

if all romney has left in his quiver are jeremiah wright and bill ayers...

That's what I thought was so weird--this has to be the lamest veiled threat ever. So lame that there's really no point in even veiling it. (On a Friday afternoon, no less--let's time it so no one will even notice our veiled threat.)

are mitt's people only allowing him to give big interviews on fridays? yow.

if they don't lay off the taxes thing Mitt's going to demand to see Obama's birth certificate

Next Friday Mitt will threaten to call Obama a "crazy bozo ozone man"

In hindsight, Obama probably made a mistake by drawing out the birth certificate shenanigans. Accusations were baseless, of course, but he should've produced the long form the next morning to shut people up. Now Mitt has a blueprint for dodging the tax history question (of course, I've learned he did the exact same shit in Massachusetts too).

More (fake) shenanigans from Massachusetts:

http://www.boston.com/politicalintelligence/2012/08/08/scott-brown-says-effort-register-welfare-recipients-geared-boost-elizabeth-warren/olZaD3PyuyEcUBue4TdHHL/story.html

The taxes thing, it's almost like if you went for a big job interview and your resume listed one place of work for 20 years and you refused to give any contact info.

Hahaha, my dad on facebook: "It may be true that Romney doesn't connect as well with ordinary people. That is because he connects much better with extraordinary people!"

dad ftw (in the corny dad sweepstakes)

Romney to Announce Vice-Presidential Choice on Saturday Morning in Norfolk, Va.

I wonder if he actually planned to make this a weekend thing or if between the romneycare slip and the whining to Chuck Todd they realized they had to hurry up and give the press something else to talk about

Feel a little sorry for the person that takes it, tbh.

actually turns out palin and biden were announced on saturdays too, guess there's a logic to it

The timing of Palin's was to pull the rug out from Obama's convention speech--it was the day after. Worked quite well, in terms of that one specific objective.

In this case it will pull the rug out from...uh...the women's 4x100m relay world record?

dear god, plz let the vp nom be someone lulz.
thx,

I remember how closely Obama's announcement was covered--CNN had cameras outside Biden's home as he was whisked away late at night. I'm guessing that Rob Portman's house is not even being monitored by a neighborhood kid with a cell phone.

all the twitter speculation I'm seeing points to Ryan.

nbc news is reporting it

(didn't the obama campaign deliberately punk a news outlet they didn't like with the wrong VP pick last time around? i wonder)

well, nbc news is reporting that "sources say"

intrade has ryan at 89.9%

If it is Ryan, I expect they'll cut away from the announcement to an Obama attack ad.

among a lot of left-wingers i knew at the time, there was a kind of unknowingness + fear surrounding palin. who was this woman? why did right-wing america respond so fervently to her? i got chain-emails about how she banned books and used her baby like a secret fascist prop. anyway, i don't think ryan is going to inspire the same reaction.

when they first started talking about him as a possible vp candidate i thought for two weeks that they were talking about rand paul. i'm still not sure who this guy is besides from wisconsin iirc?

Yeah, Ryan feels more like a younger Jack Kemp. Supposed to give the ticket heft, but instead gives it somebody who puts people to sleep.

zombie-eyed granny starver iirc

this guy is a deficit hawk

a real hawk for deficits

so, will ryan also run for his house seat?

if there is a deficit, he will fly over it and then strike

If it is Ryan, the latter paragraphs of that Ryan Lizza profile are going to get circulated quick.

why would you release this information on a friday night/saturday morning anyway

No, it won't be tabloidish like with Palin (xpost), but they will go after Ryan's budget furiously--I think they've been hoping for him, but be careful, etc.

Gotta think Ryan is a poor choice. His budget plans didn't stand up to any scrutiny.

At an Atlas Society meeting celebrating Ayn Rand's life in 2005, Ryan said that "The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand", and "I grew up reading Ayn Rand and it taught me quite a bit about who I am and what my value systems are, and what my beliefs are. It’s inspired me so much that it’s required reading in my office for all my interns and my staff."

Yeah he's been running away from that for a while now. Amusingly.

it's comparable to the palin pick in that it's wasted trying to 'win the base' that by any means should be his at this point. you can sorta see future gop presidential noms going down this exact same path.

He's going to win over "the people" with "his ideas." That's how politics works in the abstract, but I'm not sure guys like Ryan understand how it works IRL. I mean, maybe Romney/Ryan would be this magical triumph of the twin robots, but probably not.

the right-wing base hungers for attack dogs but the republican party keeps giving them robo boy scouts

Where's that old Nixon/Agnew/Dole spirit when you really need it.

i think we expect a kind of bullshit-smiling-politician image from our presidents in last couple decades that maybe precludes srsly explicit vicious candidates from holding the office

Not that they don't have a few of those people just biding their time right now, if only Mitt had the courage to go spectacularly and suicidally bold.

http://xfinity.comcast.net/blogs/tv/files/2011/12/newt-gingrich.jpg http://www.nypost.com/rw/nypost/2011/04/20/pagesix/photos_stories/donald_trump--300x300.jpg http://ezkool.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/michelebachmannteaparty-300x300.jpg

what's weird is that i keep seeing ppl (chait, sullivan, weigel, etc) referring to paul ryan as a bold, exciting choice, not another "incredibly boring white guy." that can't be right tho -- ryan seems ibwg to me? i can't imagine any undecideds are going to change their minds bc he's on the ticket, or that any republicans are going to suddenly be motivated to go vote. i mean, look at the guy

http://paulryan.house.gov/uploadedphotos/highresolution/7231cf6a-99da-435f-a0dd-fb50946f65fa.jpg

destined to be an extra credit question on AP American Politics in 2065

Any chances of it being McConnell?

http://images.buddytv.com/articles/gabe-the-office.JPG

what's weird is that i keep seeing ppl (chait, sullivan, weigel, etc) referring to paul ryan as a bold, exciting choice

Nerds think it's bold and exciting to put a nerd on the ticket.

(If Romney does it, I predict towel-snapping and swirlies for Ryan.)

I think Ryan's supposed boldness is partly a function of his story--the guy in the wilderness who took on Obama early in 2009, when Republican morale was not great--and partly by default, which becomes clear when you listen to Pawlenty or Portman for 30 seconds.

when defining nerdiness, real nerds draw the line at Ayn Rand freaks. they have standards, you know.