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

Wish someone could animate Christie into that "Gangnam Style" video.

David Stockman lets'er rip:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/14/opinion/paul-ryans-fairy-tale-budget-plan.html?_r=4

grunge!

"Mitt Romney is extremely stiff ... because he still has this persona where it hard for him to feel relatable. To have someone who is young and dynamic helps soften Romney up and attracts that 'it' factor and 'wow' factor," Gillespie said.

"Paul Ryan would seem to be cooler. Even talking about the fact that he listens to Led Zeppelin and grunge....The fact that he says he likes hard rock makes him seem cooler. ... That charisma is born in youth."

http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/14/politics/ryan-gen-x/index.html?hpt=hp_c1

i can't believe that ryan still cites his love for rage against the machine. on political or musical grounds, either way it doesn't add up.

or as ryan likes to call them, "rage"

i'm sure mitt loves the grungers too

on political or musical grounds, either way it doesn't add up

i forget what year (2000? 2001?) but i remember going down to the mall for the imf protests. it was not long after the seattle wto protests of '99 and the dc cops were out in force -- in certain places there were ranks of mounted cavalry with piles of horseshit steaming in the summer heat underneath them.

lots of streets were cordoned off, so i had to make a wayward path home to u street. this led me past some gw frat house (i hadn't even known they existed) with shirtless frat dudes jeering commie fags even as rage against the machine blasted from the top floor.

Most likely they never made it past "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me to!"

"Yeah, this band rocks, and the singer has hair like Bob Marley, dude!"

http://i1059.photobucket.com/albums/t427/sayhey1/big.jpg http://i1059.photobucket.com/albums/t427/sayhey1/suit.jpg

Nineteen pixels wider--no comparison.

tbf, i wonder how many of my lefty/liberal friends from high school & college who were Rush fans paid much mind to Neil Peart's lyrics circa 2112. and one of my best friends from high school has political opinions more or less identical w/ Paul Ryan's (Ayn Rand fetish inclusive, sadly) and back in the day was a huge Dead Kennedys fan (who were no slouches in when it came to über-lefty lyrics).

as for the appeal of RATM to jocks, fratboys, Paul Ryan-style right wingers and other assorted meatheads: it's rather obvious innit? it's jock music, perfect for work-outs and power-whatevers. i'm sure that this has been hashed out already on ILM no?!?

I'd kind of love it if RATM and Bruce Springsteen both came out with singles that addressed Chris Christie and Paul Ryan by name for totally missing the point.

What kinds of music do Republicans genuinely enjoy?

mentally, i file Paul Ryan's RATM love and Chris Christie's Springsteen love away in the same drawer with teenage/twenty-something hip-hop fans who nonetheless are quite racist.

swinging back to ryan, tuition fees & social security, really great, sensitive amy davidson piece:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2012/08/paul-ryans-father-and-al-smiths.html

man Al Smith was such a badass. I don't even want to read the rest of the article that compares him to fucking Paul Ryan.

tbf, i wonder how many of my lefty/liberal friends from high school & college who were Rush fans paid much mind to Neil Peart's lyrics circa 2112.

Call me when Ryan announces an initiative to give every man, woman and child a guitar to fight the oppression of the Priests of the Temples of Syrinx and the man's got my vote.

I need to read an Al Smith bio; he comes off as a badass in Last Call and the Prohibition series but an asshole in subsequent dealings with FDR. The first neocon?

this year's swiftboat?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/15/us-usa-campaign-binladen-ad-idUSBRE87E01F20120815

Kerry was easy to swiftboat...he was a noodly senator nobody honestly liked and stumbled into the nomination by default. Good luck doing this to a sitting president.

yeah maybe but experience teaches to

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-uvvn5sJ4SA8/T_IB-iwjEyI/AAAAAAAAALM/MRQjsO1Cp10/s1600/Boy-Scout-Be-Prepared-Emblem.jpg

i heard kerry sent his boy scout badges back b/c he hates america, t/f?

"Mr. President, you did not kill Osama bin Laden, America did. The work that the American military has done killed Osama bin Laden. Somebody invested in Pakistani roads and bridges. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that phone calls could be tapped & satellite data transmitted. The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together.”

Ha!

http://blogs.desmoinesregister.com/dmr/index.php/2012/08/14/revealed-the-president-brews-his-own-beer-and-brings-it-with-him-on-the-road/

how long had they been waiting to pull this one out

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/09/16/earlyshow/main20107292.shtml

ugh are you saying i have to watch network news now

if ppl want me to donate money to the obama campaign they will continue to undermine the time he personally strangled bin ladin w/ his own hands

Kerry was easy to swiftboat...he was a noodly senator nobody honestly liked and stumbled into the nomination by default. Good luck doing this to a sitting president.

How did he stumble into the nomination?

Via windsurfer, iirc.

nobody AND a noodly

noboodly

also, complaining that bin ladin leaks threatens soldier's lives is such a namby-pampy effete liberal concern. have the republicans become the party of discretion or something?

a big part of the reason I thought Romney would be the choice for '12 is that he seemed to be the only one who could make it look like a reagan-carter. I had no idea what a whiny baby Romney would be though.

http://blogs.desmoinesregister.com/dmr/index.php/2012/08/14/revealed-the-president-brews-his-own-beer-and-brings-it-with-him-on-the-road/

how long had they been waiting to pull this one out

“I have exhausted my knowledge of this subject,” Carney said. “When someone hands me a beer I don’t ask how it was made, I just drink it.”

sweeeet

LOL at a thing called "OPSEC" bitching about intentional leaks. That's some hardcore IRL concern trolling. I mean, if they really are from the intelligence community they would know better than anyone that what information gets released is just as important as what information is concealed and the white house can't just willy nilly drop stuff off to the NYT without seriously screwing up the program... If it wasn't leaked by someone like Lt. Manning, it was on purpose and OK'ed by the Pentagon... I think even Average Joe Sixpack understands this?

the rove-y innovation is to savagely attack your opponent's strengths, not his weaknesses

Don't get that "Obama didn't kill BL, America did" bit. Because it pretty much agrees with Obama on the point he was originally trying to make.

the literal charge is that by leaking to the press and bragging about it Obama is endangering america by compromising secrecy

the uh emotional charge is that Obama is a faker and real men were in charge of the hit

it kinda feels like an ad campaign democrats would run

haha like the ads claire mccaskill ran "against" her now-opponent? that shit was hilaire

But they are implicating that the government did something that an individual couldn't!

This 'leaking' thing is just so transparently desperate. They really have nothing to stand on. No wonder if he had kept BL's death a secret they would all be "HOW DARE HE KEEP THIS A SECRET FROM THE AMERICAN PEOPLE!"

ha did everybody read that article to the end

Responding to criticism about the president taking credit for the bin Laden raid, an Obama campaign official pointed to an interview with CNN last month in which Admiral Bill McRaven, commander of the raid, said: "At the end of the day, make no mistake about it, it was the president of the United States that shouldered the burden for this operation, that made the hard decisions, that was instrumental in the planning process, because I pitched every plan to him."

those soldiers didn't kill bin laden, and neither did the guns they used. it was the bullet piercing through his body that killed bin laden.

and in the end, it was the failure of bin laden's cells to repair themselves quickly enough that killed bin laden

Lots of funny stuff in here:

http://www.salon.com/2012/08/15/obama_plans_non_consecutive_second_term/

lol z s

it kinda feels like an ad campaign democrats would run

haha like the ads claire mccaskill ran "against" her now-opponent? that shit was hilaire

haha no, though there's that, i just mean the whole concept feels weak and inept in that classic democrat way

plz republicans continue to remind Americans that obl was killed on obamas watch. that's def a winning strategy

In that scenario, do you envision President Obama accepting defeat gracefully? Do you picture him congratulating President Romney on his victory, and pledging to do everything possible to ensure a smooth transition? Do you think the president will be ready to move on to post–White House life, focusing upon memoir-writing, building his presidential library, some charitable and foundation work, and plenty of golf?

uh, yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes?