Mike Pence must have firmed up his position on evolution, because he won the Values Voters straw poll this weekend. Matt Yglesias was all over Pence’s stupidity after he was elevated to a House leadership position:
He has no grasp, whatsoever, of public policy issues. And yet I can only gather from the fact that his colleagues have elevated him to a leadership post, that a large faction of them are actually so much stupider than Pence that they don’t realize how dumb he is. But it’s really staggering. In my admittedly brief experience talking to him, his inability to grasp the basic contours of policy question was obvious and overwhelming.
Pence’s win isn’t surprising, since you don’t need to be a genius to tell the Values Voters what they want to hear.
mad the swine
You don’t need to know every detail of a Democrat policy initiative to vote against it. You just need to know it’s a bad idea. And a Democrat idea. (But I repeat myself.) I’d rather be represented by an ‘ignoramus’ with a healthy suspicion of all government activity than a Rhodes Scholar who keeps trying to think of more ways government can intervene to ‘help’ people.
Keith G
I know that straw polls like this are meaningless, but it warmed my shriveled little heart to see
PenisPence come in first.He needs a lot more face time.
Comrade Javamanphil
Stupidity in GOP leadership is a feature, not a bug.
Keith G
Ooops. I forgot. Now I am in moderation purgatory. Help!
jwb
@mad the swine: I’m feeling nostalgic for Brick Oven Bill. Better trolls please.
timb
I went to Mike Pence’s undergrad school and was mentored by the same professor he was. I listened to his talk show in the 90’s ( a local Indiana show which cloned Limbaugh precisely). I remember him as the guy who wanted to run pictures of aborted fetuses in campaign ads in the late 80’s. I have heard him speak on numerous occasions on the radio and on TV (mostly to other wingnuts).
He is a magpie. He repeats the things smart people have told him: consultants, law school professors, undergrad professors, Sunday School teachers and he mixes it into a pablum of white resentment that just plays perfectly with the people of suburban Indiana.
Just think of it, 25 years ago, there was no way a brain-dead wingnut could win that district. It’s made up of UAW factory towns and manufacturing is more important than any other industry. But, people like Pence helped destroy unions and now those towns are dried up husks of white fear and anxiety, where non-union manufacturing and corporate farms are the main industries…..Mike’s kind paved the way for more of Mike’s kind. It’s Idiocracy in real life
Ash Can
@mad the swine: Dear, what you want is no government at all. You’re angry with the system but have no coherent ideas about how to fix it, so you’re falling on your face trying to debate issues here. Go do some homework, and try to bring better game next time.
Steeplejack
@jwb:
Yes. After reading this I’m sorry I wasted time responding to him in the thread downstairs.
timb
Then you better pick superior people than Pence, because he’s about as much for small government as any corporate Republican is.
Got an energy PAC? Mike’s there to help write the tax regulation to protect you from legal action and keep the nasty environmentalists away. Need a defense contract for a weapon system that doesn’t work or is unnecessary? Mike will help you get the contract. Upstart consumers are eating away at your bottom dollar by declaring bankruptcy? A quick donation to Mike and he’ll support your tiny little banks from all those grifters (we tend to call them citizens). Need to set up an “intelligence” consulting firm after you retire from the Air Force? Go to Mike’s church, make a donation and a contract will be all yours.
If that’s your idea of small government, then Ayn Rand would disown you
c u n d gulag
A friend of mine works for the NSA and has had to appear in front of both houses of Congress. He tells me that Pence is by far the dumbest MFer in either one.
And that’s some pretty stiff competion!
Citizen_X
@mad the swine:
That’s nice. However, I actually am represented by that ignoramus. Go fuck up your own district and leave mine alone.
@timb: Spot-on history. And that’s why I’m leaving one of those towns for good in a couple of weeks.
gnomedad
You do not “believe” in evolution, you recognize it or deny it.
timb
@Citizen_X: That is sad. Central Indiana needs MORE smart people, not less. Still, it’s not like I can blame you. Unless you are a feudal lord/landowner/factory owner in Anderson or New Castle or Columbus, then I don’t know why anyone stays.
Now, if you are one of those people, then no one is looking out for your cash quite as much as Mike Pence is….I mean, as long as you can send a little taste his way.
Woodrowfan
@timb:
Same here, and we graduated together. He was a self-righteous jerk and an idiot then, and he hasn’t changed. Gad. If you told me then that he would be seriously considered for president I would have laughed in your face…
timb
Woodrowfan,
Hanover or IU law?
arguingwithsignposts
Did Balloon Juice make the top of the “Blogs we need to troll today” list at Idiots for America, Fuck Yeah ™ today?
ETA: Every time I’ve ever heard Pence speak, it sounds like he’s channeling Rushbo. With idiots like him in charge, is it any wonder people see Paul Ryan as the “brains” in the House GOP?
Cat Lady
The Republican primaries are going to be awesome. Romney is smart, but now he knows he needs to double down on the dumbassery. He’ll have to come up with a mama grizzly type catch phrase and use it in a word salad a la Palin, and put a slick veneer of stoopid all over it to out Pence Pence. All without mentioning he wears magic underwear like Glenn Beck and unlike Huckabee. I can’t wait for the first debate – it’ll be like watching midgets mud wrestling.
Guster
@arguingwithsignposts: I dunno. That’s really a perfectly rational encapsulation of the conservative theory of politics:
Omnes Omnibus
@gnomedad: I refuse to believe in gravity; I fall down because I want to fall down, damn it.
Chyron HR
Vote for Mike Pence: He doesn’t trust himself, either.
arguingwithsignposts
@Guster:
Well, if by rational, you mean a concise encapsulation of bugfuck insanity.
Because the GOP has a healthy suspicion of unwarranted military excursions halfway around the world.
FlipYrWhig
Look, Sarah Palin is ridiculous on every level, but she has charisma. I’ll even say that about Dubya Bush — he’s every inch the frat rush coordinator, so people who go for that sort of thing fell for him. What the fuck does Mike Pence have? Who looks at that guy and thinks, wow, that is a president in the making!
cleek
MY’s mistake is in thinking that policy is important in GOP politics.
FlipYrWhig
Also, I’m disappointed in the lack of punning in a thread about Mike Pence. Perhaps “Shilling Pence.”
scav
@Omnes Omnibus: Bravo! Because the true Galtian only obeys those laws, commandments and contracts he feels like doing. At the time.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@mad the swine: You know, that might be an interesting argument if most Republicans believed in smaller government. As it is, they believe in helping their constituents: the wealthy and corporations. So your choice is between those that want to help the wealthy stay rich at the expense of the country, or help the people who actually do the work.
Not that I think you care about anything but spreading your fucking bullshit.
FlipYrWhig
@cleek: Yglesias is carving out a weird niche for himself lately as the world’s first glibertarian Europhile.
arguingwithsignposts
@FlipYrWhig: How long before he gets his Fonzi jacket? (glibertarian europhile – nice)
Guster
@arguingwithsignposts: That’s true. It needs one change to be perfect:
Better?
Dork
The next time he’s too dumb to answer a question, we’ll just say he’s being Pence-ive.
Woodrowfan
@timb:
Hanover…. different frat though…
bemused
@mad the swine:
I suppose you would rather have brain surgery done by an ignoramus with a mail order medical degree and a healthy suspicion of too many exams than a board certified neurologist.
Peter J
It’s the Know Nothing 2.0 Party – Know Nothinger!
I’m guessing the next step would be the Donner Party?
EDIT: Actually, they are, right now, eating the moderate members of the GOP, so I guess it’s the Know Nothinger Donner Party.
cleek
@FlipYrWhig:
it sounds like he found a copy of “Glibertarian Freakonomics For Dummies” and was enthralled by the contents.
at the current rate, he’s about 3 weeks from unreadable.
arguingwithsignposts
@Guster: Definitely sums it up, doesn’t it. We wouldn’t want the big scary government “helping” people, now would we?
I just don’t get this attitude. Even when I was mostly conservative (I got better, thank FSM), I still recognized a legitimate role of government in “promoting the general welfare,” which included blunting some of the sharp edges of fuck-you-i-got-mine capitalism.
Citizen_X
@timb:
Yes, but Texas is calling. We must go where the need is most dire!
JAHILL10
@gnomedad: Thank you! Time people started calling out this faith based talk when dealing with scientific theories. “Not believing” in a scientific theory does not invalidate that theory. Prove or disprove it. Your belief has nothing to do with it.
Just because your religious dogma is too rigid to admit scientific knowledge does not mean the rest of the world works the same way.
Omnes Omnibus
@scav: In the words of PeeWee Herman: “I meant to do that.”
timb
@Woodrowfan: Two Hanoverians on the same thread and both went to school there in the 80’s, although I graduated in 91! What are the odds of that? What fraternity was Pence in?
bemused
@FlipYrWhig:
I’m laughing at your question “What the fuck does Mike Pence have?” because it reminded me of a 49 year old relative who dumped his wife of 30 years for a 19 year old. Everyone was mystified that the this young woman would go for & eventually marry an overweight, heavy drinking guy not the least bit studly with a lousy personality who never made more than $70 thou a year. No one could figure out what was so appealing about marrying him versus just about anything else a young woman could do with her life. Preferring Pence or any one like him is just as puzzling.
Ash Can
@bemused: Judging from this troll’s posts, this may in fact have happened.
Woodrowfan
@timb:
Pence was a FIJI.
Bit of trivia, Woody Harrelson was there at the same time. Quite a different twosome for a small campus at one time.
DanF
Pence is a complete and total f-ing moron who repeats stupid shit whether or not it is even appropriate to the context of the conversation. “Bwaaaak! Tax cuts good!” “Pence want a tax cut!” “Bwaaak! Class warfare!” “Bwaaak! Take back country!”
Which is an insult to parrots as at least they seem to be aware of context. Pence, not so much.
300baud
Is the guy stupid? He has a JD and a radio show, so I presume he’d do fine on an IQ test.
I think the problem is more sinister: I think he’s found that ignorance is no handicap. Worse, he’s found that willful ignorance is actually beneficial to his career.
My rogue of a grandfather was an incredible salesman. Everybody in his small town loved him. (Well, everybody who didn’t know him well.) And as part of that, he was a talented liar. Not because he consciously knew the facts and then said the opposite. No, he just learned early to pay attention only to the few factoids that were helpful to him, ignoring the rest. Instead, he was acutely aware of what people wanted, so he could be likable and convincing.
I think Pence is the same way. Intellectually, we here reluctantly admit that many people prefer ideology to fact. But Pence gets in in his gut, and lives it.
piratedan
Pence has the one quality that appears to matter with Republican voters, he has “corporate hair”.
bago
That was beautiful. If spoof, it is quite sublime, if not, proof that the whole concept of government has been subsumed, and it would be perfectly rational to call these people anti-American.
mclaren
Dunning-Kruger for president in 2012!
Pangloss
@300baud: Agree 100%. They’re political Elmer Gantrys.
Dr. Squid
If you think he’s dumb, the previous congressman in that district said at a hearing about big bad gummint regulation that Big Gummint made a regulation where buckets had to be made with a hole in the bottom to prevent drowning.
300baud
@mclaren:
Please, please, please somebody find an artist and start doing posters, bumper-stickers, and buttons for “Dunning-Kruger for President”. That is brilliant, and I would buy them by the bucketload.
There must be a dozen good taglines. Perhaps Balloon Juice can have a competition?
timb
@Woodrowfan: The Fijis were total stoners when I was there. Pretty cool guys. My fraternity was the geeky ones and the Fijis were the only other people we liked without reservation