I didn’t watch the debates, but it sounds like T-Paw was true to his nature and wimped out, and Michelle Bachmann was able to speak in complete sentences and therefore has stolen the critical MILF vote (or more accurately, the vote of those who will vote for women they consider MILFs) from Palin.
The other big news is that the predictable Pawlenty fizzle, which means Romney is the only David Brooks-approved candidate, means that we’re going to start hearing about the heretofore well-hidden gravitas of Rick Perry, who’s talking to the tea party in Iowa and attending anti-gay rights prayer meetings.
capt
T-Paw folded because he is running for VP.
No surprises
John Weiss
Why would anyone spend their precious time watching morons blow farts? I’d rather pet a cat, you?
And ol’ good-hair? Puh-leeze. We don’t need another fake Texan!
Ron
It was amazing to watch the T-Paw wimpout. John King basically called him out. “Hey, you said this about Romney, are you willing to back it up” and Pawlenty refused to even when King all but called him a wuss.
vtr
I chose to watch game six. Go Bruins.
Chris
I chose to clean out my fridge. That’s how not-interested in the Republican debate I was.
Josie
OT: Finally, someone is going to talk about jobs creation. Rep. Grijalva announces a summer tour of progressives pushing for solutions to unemployment. This is what every debate should be about at this point.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/06/house-progressives-plan-to-wrest-jobs-question-from-gop.php?ref=fpb
Linda Featheringill
From poking around on the net, I get the impression that Michele did better than most people thought she would. This might be interesting. Can she choose to be reasonable and logical? Campaigns are very stressful things. Can she maintain a veneer of sanity throughout a whole campaign?
cleek
i watched Antiques Roadshow (cause it my favorite program on TV), and House.
watch wingnuts lie to each other for two hours? fuckka that shit.
Comrade Javamanphil
Is nobody pointing how incredibly sexist it is to assume that because Palin and Bachmann are both insane, not unattractive female candidates they must be competing for the same exact small pool of voters because it is just so obvious?
PeakVT
We’re more than 16 months away from the next presidential election. Events like this debate shouldn’t be happening.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@cleek:
This. I’ve had high colonics that were more entertaining and benefited American society more than that debate, although I admit that the end result of both was remarkably similar.
Ash Can
@ Linda Featheringill: I have my doubts that she can pull it off. At some point on the campaign trail someone — probably not anyone with the press, because none of them want to make David Brooks cry — is bound to ask her about one of the many batshit-insane things she’s said and done, and make her lose it. On the other hand, with all the kids she’s supposedly raised and fostered, she may be well-versed in the art of mother’s little helpers, and if she maintains a hefty supply of them for the campaign trail, she could remain sufficiently sedated in the face of actual questions.
Chris
Here’s a summary of the “top five moments of the GOP debate” I just found. It lists them as follows:
1) Tim Pawlenty Wusses Out. (I believe we’ve covered that one).
2) Michelle Bachmann Announces She’s Running. That would explain what she was doing at the First Republican Presidential Primary Debate. (Seriously, WTF?)
3) Herman Cain’s Still Not Sure About Those Muslims. He tries to backpedal on his earlier Know-Nothing 2.0 statement, saying that he would make certain Muslim nominees are committed to the Constitution (never mind that he just said that he didn’t believe there was such a thing as a Muslim who was). “It’s not a litmus test,” he adds. Herman, shut the fuck up. I’ve read enough PJTV comments sections to know that a blanket litmus test is exactly what your base wants (and that’s only for starters). All I need to hear from you is that you’re not going to give it to them. Since I haven’t heard that, fuck you.
4) Newt Gingrich Back To Bashing The Ryan Plan. Gotta give him credit for sticking to his guns on this one: he points out the blatantly obvious, that it’s not popular, and dares to point out that “if you can’t convince the American people it’s a good idea, maybe its not a good idea.” Since he’s talking to an audience that believes they are or should be the sum and total of the American people, that’s not going to do much more than make them mad, and hammer a few more nails in his coffin. Still. Good on ya, Newt.
5) Tim Pawlenty Floats His Medicare Plan. Allow Medicare to continue but only as an option, priced against other options… feature “performance pay rather than volume pay” to hospitals and providers. Well, that guy seems like he’s fucked anyway, but his Medicare plan is probably going to be the one Goopers fall back on after the dismal Ryan Plan; Romney came out in support of something similar.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the straight talk.
jonas
@Linda Featheringill: Having to watch Sarah Palin’s antics over the past few weeks makes Bachmann look sane by comparison: she uses complete sentences with actual English words, doesn’t try to make up history, and seems conversant with at least some policy issues. She was poised and well-briefed, which is the very antithesis of Palin. Now, the question is how she’ll do in a less scripted environment on the campaign trail where the urge to wax eloquent with her truly unhinged opinions will be much stronger. And of course the media have years and years of video tapes of her saying crazy stuff to confront her with as well. We’ll see.
MattF
I agree that the commentariat will soon be experiencing starbursts for Perry. He’s so… rugged an’ so manly an’ everything.
suzanne
I watched the whole thing, and I know appearances shouldn’t matter, but Michele Bachmann was wearing so much fluorescent pink makeup that I was honestly distracted. Under those lights, it looked like she grew up next to a nuclear power plant.
Pawlenty’s wuss-out was so breathtaking that my husband and I looked at each other, asking, “WTF was THAT?!?! Own it, dude!”
Newt has no chance, but I actually came away not hating him completely. The stupid “Elvis or Johnny Cash?” questions that the others completely weaseled out on, he at least answered quickly and definitively. I oddly like people who don’t give a crap about public opinion. LOL.
Cain apparently wants to ask Muslim job applicants, “Are you a GOOD Muslim, or a BAD Muslim?” Fuckwit.
Romney is such a slimy motherfucker. GOD.
NonyNony
@jonas:
I believe what you mean here is that the DNC will have years of video tapes of her saying crazy stuff to create ads from.
If she ever speaks to anyone in the media who would dare to confront her with her past words I’ll be surprised.
She’s much smarter than Palin – the softball questions that a Katie Couric-type asks aren’t going to trip her up like they did Palin.
Ash Can
@ Chris: So basically, Newtie was saying that what he said about everything he said being a falsehood, was a falsehood? He givz me a conflubbered.
Chris
@suzanne:
I’m mildly shocked that Romney is actually the front-runner, despite his Mormon status and, much more important, his record governing Massachusetts as an economic and social liberal. That makes me even more shocked that Pawlenty didn’t take the opportunity to attack him. Good Lord, Romney’s more vulnerable than any of them, or should be.
David
Michele Bachmann is too old.
cleek
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
Vote GOP for better lower GI health!
Rhoda
@Chris: Everyone else figured Pawlenty would bash Romney. Bachmann wanted to look sane, Santorum smart and religious, Cain a possibility, and Gingrich that he was still standing after the mutiny.
Eventually Romney’s going to be attacked and the MSM is going to be looking for Romney to be attacked and then a whole raft of flip-flopping stories will emerge.
And if the entire field flakes out and Romney is the nominee he has a hell of a lot of baggage in the general election and I see him having the same base issues McCain did in 2008.
Brian S
Bachmann may have spoken in complete sentences, but Politifact rated 16 of her 21 statements as some variant of false, and only 2 reached the lofty level of half-true. That’s impressive, even by wingnut standards.
Edit: Hell, I can’t read this morning. That’s over the course of her career, not the debate. Sorry, my bad.
Shrillhouse
My daughter is three years old. She stands 3 foot 1, and weighs about 27 pounds. I have absolutely no doubt that she could beat the living hell of of Tim Pawlenty. What a pencil-necked weasel. Afraid to take on Mittens? Seriously?
MikeJ
@Chris: I keep telling people, there are way too many people who believe the Mormon stuff will kill Romney. It won’t. I doubt it will even be a blip. If anything it will be loudly trumpeted as proof the right aren’t bigots.
Yes, some people believe the LDS is a cult. But Romney will be running against a black guy who is a Kenyan soçialist. The Republicans will not give a shit if Romney eats puppies on TV. He could paint a pentagram on the tail of his campaign plane and it won’t make any difference.
OK, that’s in the general, but you think he won’t get through the fail parade that is the Republican primaries. The same people who hate Romney hated McCain too. Hated him. Yet McCain stomped the GOP field because the majority of Republican voters wanted a candidate who wasn’t as obviously crazy as the others. That’s why Romney will crush them, despite the wailing and whining of the teatards.
Ash Can
In all seriousness, Gingrich probably figures his campaign is toast anyway, after his staff bailed on him, so he might as well speak his mind, because it’s sure as hell not going to make things worse.
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
@Ash Can: What Newt said:
“Taken out of context”. He wasn’t referring to the Ryan plan, he claims, just a plan. In, you know, theory. A generic one. The question to him had actually been directly about the Ryan plan of course, but this is his story and he’s sticking to it.
Then he sort of weaseled around and kind of/sort of did criticize the Ryan plan, but by that point you should have heard how fast he was talking, John King interjected “Quickly” which was bizarre until I realized that he meant “finish soon” rather than “talk faster” which Newt was already doing to an astonishing degree.
Gingrich called Ryan’s plan “right-wing social engineering” and now he won’t admit it. He’s a flim-flam man, I can’t imagine why anyone would ever take him seriously about anything.
Chris
@MikeJ:
I’m more talking about his record as a liberal than about his denomination. Being a Mormon is just a bonus point, one that’ll keep away not many but a few Catholic and evangelical voters. His record on Romneycare, abortion and the rest, though, you’d think that would leave him vulnerable in the primary.
(After all, the GOP’s line about 2008 is that they lost because McCain wasn’t conservative enough).
Han's Solo
I tried to watch, honestly I did. I made it about 15 minutes before the blaring shriek of my bullshit detector forced me to switch channels.
One thing is abundantly clear: The Republican Presidential Hopefuls have a very, very, very low opinion of the intellect of their base. After 30 years of “lower taxes” and “less regulation” you would think everyone in the world would realize that the result of these policies is a shrinking middle class and, eventually, economic collapse.
It wouldn’t be so bad if they had multiple “solutions” for various different scenarios, but they don’t. No matter the problem, the answer is always “less regulation” and “lower taxes.” Oh, and occasionally they break out “bomb them” or “invade them” but for that to happen there must be brown people involved.
Violet
No she hasn’t. Palin gives the teabaggers way more starbursts than Michele does. Michele just has the benefit of knowing a bit of policy and being able to talk in complete sentences. But policy and sentences do not starbursts make.
She had an easy debate, given that everyone expected her to be crazy. Talk about low expectations. Now that people have seen her in action, they may expect more. We’ll see how she holds up over time.
@Comrade Javamanphil:
It really is incredibly sexist.
rikryah
Pawlenty was a punkass bitch. period.
Bachmann has always been crazy.
As for Uncle Ruckus, aka Herman Cain. I’ve been saying for forever and a day that he’s stupid. And, if a Black Democrat had stepped onto the national stage being this stupid, he would be mocked morning, noon and night as being an example of ‘Affirmative Action’
Violet
@rikryah:
Uncle Ruckus. Awesome.
NonyNony
@Brian S:
Not really. Those are statements made by her in the media over the last year, not just in the debate. Click through on the statements and you’ll see that they were made at various times, not last night.
And most of her “Pants on Fire” stuff is garden variety conservative “truthiness” – stuff like intentionally “misunderstanding” how the tax code works, or blowing receipts for travel out of proportion. Nothing that would hurt her at all – and a few of which, had they come from someone with more Villager credibility, probably would have gotten a “False” or even a “Half True” from Politifact instead of a “Pants of Fire” (Mitt Romney, for example, could probably make the same claim about small business taxes Bachmann made and get a “Half True” out of Politifact).
moonbat
@Chris: Romney might end up being the eventual nominee for being able to complete sentences and not dribble on his tie, but he’s not exactly the kind of candidate who is going to get the voting base inspired to come out in droves. I think his flip-floppy issues, Romneycare and the Mormonism will serve to leave enough of the manly men, tea partiers, and evangelicals in “meh” mode that he fails. Don’t want to be too overconfident this far out, but it still looks to me like these clowns are all fighting to be runner-up in the general election.
Chris
@UncertaintyVicePrincipal:
Thanks for the full quote.
Not going to do him any good, though. He’s already been put in the crosshairs as “that RINO who doesn’t like the Ryan Plan.” His equivocating and BS-ing are going to sound just as much like evasive crap to the teabagger base as they are to us. Especially since he started out with low enthusiasm rating, which means the base isn’t emotionally invested enough in him to want to believe his horsecrap (as opposed to Palin, whose paper-thin justifications become gospel writ overnight: “oh, of course that’s what she meant! Mean liberal media!”)
Gingrich = kaput. Not much to cheer about when you consider his competition, but it’s somewhat satisfying to see the guy crucified by a base he did so much, in his day, to create and radicalize.
Craig
Personally, I think Romney is the hardest candidate for Obama to beat in the general. Pragmatic businessman, good hair, etc. So I’m not happy to see him running so far in front. I guess there’s also the fact that he’s maybe the least lunatic of the current crop…but that’s damning with faint praise.
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
@Craig: Romney to me has that Bob Dole ghostly pallor of mediocrity and certain failure, the one that says “I am going to be the nominee, there’s nothing you can do about it, and I’m going lose. Badly”.
Violet
@Chris:
This is a smart move by Newt. His Presidential hopes are toast, but he can now fill the role of “GOP guy who will tell it like it is, even when that truth isn’t popular with the base.” That stuff is golden for being booked on cable news shows. He’ll be more popular than ever. And whenever the GOP realizes they can’t have ever-more-stringent purity tests or they’ll have no one left, and that’ll happen at some point (when, who knows), Newt will be perfectly positioned to be the “voice of reason.”
It’s all good for Newt for the wingnut gravy train circuit.
Cacti
@UncertaintyVicePrincipal:
+1
I think Romney would have been a more formidable opponent in 2008. Four years and one failed presidential campaign later, he feels like the latest Repub who will get it because it’s “his turn”.
Violet
@Cacti:
He does, but also, who else do they have? Outside of the crazies, there aren’t many left. And TPaw just showed himself to be a wimp who won’t stand by his words and backs down from a confrontation. What would he do if Putin reared his head?
I think that’s why the Villagers are going to cream themselves if Perry gets into the race. He’s got better hair! He’s been Governor longer than Mitt! He clears brush!
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
@Cacti: My favorite line from Mitt was “When Obama modeled his health care proposal after mine in MA, why didn’t he call me?? I could have started distancing myself from my own policies sooner! Asshole.”
Cacti
@UncertaintyVicePrincipal:
If he’s the nominee, I expect an endless loop of “Romney vs. Romney” commercials, including Ted Kennedy’s famous “My opponent is multiple choice.”
Han's Solo
I’m just amazed that the entire field can lie and nobody in the press calls them on it. They’ve told the same whoppers so many times that the media just gives them a pass expecting, I assume, that the American people are smart enough to figure it out on their own.
The question is: will this help or hurt the GOP in the long term? I’d think that American’s don’t like being lied to and that when they see someone telling a lie they would have an adverse reaction. That would make beating the GOP as easy as allowing them to get fully invested in their lies, then, at the right moment, proving to the American people that they are, indeed, lying.
Granted, the viewing audience of last nights debate was probably limited to the GOP base and pundits, but these days that does not matter. These days we have video. A lot of the lies they tell are required lies, they have to spout these lies to appeal to the reality deprived Republican teabagger base. But how will these lies influence the “independents?” Will they fall for them?
gnomedad
@Cacti:
In 1996, I kept hoping to see a bumper sticker:
BOB DOLE: IT’S HIS TURN, I GUESS
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
@gnomedad: Yeah, but compared to this congeries of ninnehammers Bob Dole would be the Second Coming.
Gawd.
BDR
When the media gets ahold of him, Romney won’t be the New Bob Dole. He’ll be equal parts of the New Al Gore (phony, plastic, insincere) and the New John Kerry (stiff, flip-flopping, patrician). They’re practically salivating over the prospect.
chopper
@Chris:
what’s also entertaining is watching the GOS full-on flip out over romney. they seem to think he’s going to wipe the floor with obama because he put out a decent ad about jobs (which would be really effective if he wasn’t a job-killing machine).
as if romney’s candidacy is going to survive the primary.
scav
Got an either/or for the panel. Debate or Infomercial?
Cacti
@chopper:
Romney’s history as a job-destroying vulture capitalist wasn’t explored in 2008. I’m sure team Obama is waiting to acquaint the public with that aspect of candidate Romney.
General Stuck
Too bad King didn’t ask any questions on this. Maybe next time.
Not exactly not investigating torture under the Bushies.
Chris
@Han’s Solo:
More likely, they expect that the American people are dumb enough not to figure it out on their own, and therefore not to call them on it.
I think the American people hate being told ugly truths at least as much as they hate being lied to, also. That’s one of the things the GOP electoral strategies have been relying on for the last forty years. Reagan didn’t win by recognizing and facing reality, he won by waving it away and sweeping it under the carpet with a big used car salesman’s grin.
Bruce S
It’s time for the press corp to finally reveal their secret knowledge that will change this race – if you have a beer with Rick Perry you get a tingle in your leg.
Dream On
Wait for the Jeb. You can sense it.
Villago Delenda Est
@Violet:
It represents the sexism of the very pool of voters that Palin and Bachmann are competing for.
They’re liked because of the starburst “she winked at ME!” factor.
artem1s
@MikeJ:
yes, but the real advantage for McCain was military service. Romney doesn’t get the default wingnut hawk vote. And remember one of the crazies McCain stomped on was Mittens.
but yes, I do think Romney will survive the primary because he gets the money, its his ‘turn’, and well, yes, the rest of the field.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Han’s Solo:
What makes you think the press knows that the whoppers are such, or cares? Everything I’ve seen of the mainstream press over the last decade has me convinced that they are bone-deep stupid and as ignorant as a bucket of spuds that haven’t been pulled out of the ground and turned into French Fries yet.
Villago Delenda Est
@Cacti:
This is, for a change, a very good example of powder that should be kept dry, for now.
There’s no need to help the other GOP candidates by pointing out that Romney’s fortune is based on destroying jobs, not creating them, until after Tampa, should Romney be the nominee.
Then, go whole hog on just what Romney’s executive expertise is all about.
Villago Delenda Est
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Case in point: John King, prettyboy airhead.
artem1s
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
ignorant as a bucket of spuds that haven’t been pulled out of the ground and turned into
French FriesFreedom Fries yet.BDeevDad
If Rick Perry runs it would be appropriate. The GOP has been trying to re-fight the civil war for how long now and Perry has publicly supported secession.
chopper
@MikeJ:
the GOP of 2011 isn’t as sane as the GOP of 2008. if the teabaggers were in full bloom back then, i don’t think walnuts would have won the primary.
also, mitt has serious baggage that mccain didn’t.
i got one word for you: romneycare.
i got three more: romneycare covers abortion.
chopper
@Villago Delenda Est:
that and the fact that obama has a year and a half to get some shit done in job creation and romney doesn’t.
Villago Delenda Est
@chopper:
If you’ll recall, McCain was written off very early in the process, but kept coming back as the “reasonable alternative” to the other candidates.
He sort of slouched into Minneapolis as everyone’s favorite “second choice”.
This year, it appears that Romney has that role.
trollhattan
@Violet:
Uncle Ruckus for Secretary of Pizza!
Elie
@MikeJ:
Romney is not that good under stress on the road. He tends to go lame when under continuous scrutiny. He is just not that good a candidate. The Mormonism and his record will just add to it. I also wonder how long he can campaign on the theme that everything Obama did is wrong. Not only is that wrong, it just gives him no chance to sound halfway reasonably intelligent and sets him up for comparison to his problems in Massachusetts.
Pococurante
How can Gary Johnson, a two-term governor, not qualify for CNN’s debate? CNN’s excuse was pathetic, that he didn’t poll well when of course CNN never put him on the polls to begin with.
Yet we had Gingrich, libertarian Ron Paul, and both Trump and Palin were invited.
When did Ailes take over CNN management…
chopper
@Villago Delenda Est:
yeah, again, 2011 is 2008 + teabaggers + funny-named black democrat in the WH.
‘reasonable’ doesn’t stand a chance.
chopper
also, mccain’s legacy doesn’t include “$50 abortions for everyone.”
in conservative land, that frames itself. shit, i can just see the one-liners now; “during romney’s stint as governor of mass. the state was 47th in the country in job growth – seems to me the only jobs he created were for abortionists”
MikeJ
@Elie:
Again I refer you to McCain. There is no pressure on Republicans in campaigns.
Romney will invite everyone over to swing on the tire swing and they’ll make sure the press has first crack at the food table at campaign stops.
chopper
mccain had conservative bona fides. romney does not.
romney spent the entire 2008 primary campaign saying over and over again ‘yes, i am conservative. i really am’. things aren’t going to be different this time around either.
secondly, outside of trying to change focus from that mess, he’s smart to focus on jobs for another reason, that is as a signal to wall st and the CoC that he’s the rational guy in the room that should get the gravy. problem is, this cycle it isn’t just standard pro-business interests that are throwing money around. the teabaggers are well funded.
Brachiator
RE: Is nobody pointing how incredibly sexist it is to assume that because Palin and Bachmann are both insane, not unattractive female candidates they must be competing for the same exact small pool of voters because it is just so obvious?
It is sexist, and stupid, and demonstrates how some Balloon Juicers consistently underestimate Palin’s appeal to voters.
Palin and Bachmann may be fighting for control of the Tea Party vote which, in turn has taken over from purely religious fundamentalists in keeping the Republican Party firmly entrenched in the extreme right, as opposed to breaking away to form a third party.
No matter how disastrous either Palin or Bachmann would be as president, they are power brokers and Palin, even more than Bachmann, has followers who intensely identify with her, especially conservative women.
Brachiator
@Villago Delenda Est:
It will be interesting to see how things turn out.
In 2008, Romney was branded a phony and a flip flopper. He did poorly in the South, possibly because being a Mormon is not perceived as being a “real Christian.” He was out of the campaign by February 7.
If Romney can sell himself as a new man, and if he can tap into the uncertain reservoirs of white racial anxiety, Mittens might be an even bigger Comeback Kid than Bill Clinton.
Otherwise, he might turn out to be as “inevitable” as Rudy911 and Hillary Clinton. Or is that Lebron James?
By the way, I think that Romney is even phonier than John Edwards (something I felt about Edwards that had nothing to do with his being a trial lawyer or any subsequent personal revelations). Worse, Romney is a coward and a bully. I still recall a 2008 debate where Mittens attacked Rudy911 over Giuliani’s rational policy toward illegal immigrants. Mittens kept badgering Giuliani, daring him, “are you going to kick them out? Are you going to kick them out?”
Of course, today Mittens and the other GOPers can surf the wild wave of anti-Latino and anti illegal immigrant sentiment. But I will not forget how eagerly Romney wanted to show that he was big enough to kick weak people in the ass for a grab at political power.
I also especially detest people who come from an oppressed group (yeah, this includes Mormons) who want to do unto others the nasty shit that previously was done unto them.
moonbat
@Pococurante: Maybe because Johnson was too recently seen “debating” a fake Obama on Faux. I don’t think anyone, especially not Johnson, wants to recall that episode anytime soon.
Richard W. Crews
PILFs!
James E. Powell
@artem1s:
This, plus the fact that McCain was every Village stenographer’s favorite Great American Maverick. He spent political capital that he had spent years building up. They granted him almost total immunity from tough questions, granted him foreign policy ‘expertise’ despite the fact that he’s never shown he has any, and ignored his many acts of hypocrisy. Romney has nothing like that going for him.