Rand Paul is a smarmy douchenozzle who doesn’t give a flying fuck about US drone policy except when it serves as a handy stick to beat the Obama administration and rile up the wingnut militia crowd. His remarks on the program of notable civil liberties guru Rush Limbaugh yesterday made this pretty clear.
But in as much as Baby Doc has inspired the Republican Party to start punching itself in the face, I applaud him [warning: PolitiHo link]:
As good a day as this was for Sen. Rand Paul on Twitter, it was at least that bad for Sen. Lindsey Graham.
Laced throughout the thousands of tweets cheering on the filbustering Kentucky Republican was a vicious, visceral anger aimed squarely at the South Carolinian up for reelection next year.
“This very well could be a defining moment in this particular campaign — the moment Lindsey Graham lost his grip on the boots on the ground in South Carolina,” Daniel Encarnacion [warning: YouTube link], state secretary for the Republican Liberty Caucus, said in an interview.
Alexander McQueen crocodile boots, one hopes. And now there’s this:
A pitched battle between the Beltway hosebags like McCain, Graham, etc. and the tea party loons is exactly what the party needs right now. The Democratic Party, I mean. Rock on, Paultroon.
[X-posted at Rumproast]
Jim, Foolish Literalist
There was an article in I think last Sunday’s NYT about how well Lindsey’s Benghazi demagoguery is playing in So Carolina. I think the “Primary Lindsey” hashtag will be enough to put the kaibosh on any kind of ‘grand bargain’, he’ll have to double down on the Obama hate again to undo this. I don’t want another Tea Bagger in the Senate, but it would be poetic justice if Graham flames out. And at this point, the difference between Graham and a DeMint Jr is media love and attention.
shortstop
As I guffawed in another thread yesterday, this is pure McCain rage and envy at some other stung-pulling GOP senator stealing attention that rightfully belongs to Grandpa McTantrum. Graham is going to regret serving his master so imprudently and obviously.
Suffern ACE
Ha ha Lindsay. Had his own role stirring up the teacup with that paranoid rant about using drones on Katrina and Sandy victims of the future.
shortstop
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Right, and senate seniority. I have to admit I’d enjoy watching Graham go down…this way. And I’m certain his doing so would inspire his sober reflection on how his idol’s elevation of Sarah Palin made the whole teabagging debacle possible. Certain!
srv
You Dramaobots just don’t have any strategic vision when it comes to Randstanding. This should be a quarterly McGrumpsfest.
Proceed, Sen. Cruz
c u n d gulag
Ah, John McInsane (R – Dementia) and Limpseed Cornpone Grahamcrackers (R – Closet) have their panties all in a scrunch!
The poor “Booby Twins” are just jealous, because the MSM is starting to take their spotlights off of them.
I guess these two were a lot better off when their ‘Third Amigo,’ Joe LieberPutz, was with them.
Two-legged stool(sample)s have a harder time standing.
Mnemosyne
Given how much of the Republican Party’s strategy is built on grumpy old white men being pissed off that they’re going to be replaced by the younger generation, open warfare between the Olds and the Young Whippersnappers was pretty much inevitable.
Hilarious, too.
LAC
I love republican circular poo-flinging wars between grumpy old men, drama queens and douchebags. It is something Bravo should put on its channel. I mean, it does, but at least those folks have some talent. This would be pure crap…
Betty Cracker
@c u n d gulag: There’s been too little celebration of Lieberman’s departure from the Senate. There should have been a week of rejoicing at minimum. I keep wanting to call the Senate switchboard and ask for him, only to be told he’s no longer there. I want to call over and over and over just to hear those sweet words.
Litlebritdifrnt
He did have a point though when he asked where all the Republicans were during the Bush administration.
The Dude Abides
I have just discovered the fact that I can’t think any less of these truly horrible people. I suggest we follow the example of Monty Python and the proper derogatory stance toward the Belgians. “Let’s not call them anything. Let’s just ignore them.”
SiubhanDuinne
Never more perfectly apt.
<Paultroons.
Am loving. Am stealing.
JS
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/08/the_invisible_shrinking_democrats/
Hold your partisan heads in shame while you support a President who goes out and “supports” the International Women’s Day with drone policies that continue to murder women and children. Awful.
Misterpuff
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: All that careful Benghazi drumbeating flushed down the memory hole eclipsed by a pot-loving AquaBuddha with a horrible rug, Oh The Humanity!
c u n d gulag
@Betty Cracker:
OOOOH!!!
Now THAT sounds like FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thank!
the Conster
@SiubhanDuinne:
Commenter Cacti used “Baby Doc Paultard, Jr.” yesterday, which is even better, and which I also stole.
Chyron HR
@JS:
It’s fascinating how the same people insisting that, “Well, I only Stand With Rand on THIS ONE ISSUE, not any of the crazy shit” nonetheless think that voting for one of the two candidates in a Presidential election means you endorse all of that administration’s policies.
SiubhanDuinne
Never more perfectly apt.
Am loving. Am stealing.
pamelabrown53
@srv: Between Senator #Randstanding, Senator Cruz and Senator Rubio trying to hone his presidential candidate bone fides, I’d say the republican plan for rebranding is proceeding excellently.
In case you’re wondering why I included Rubio, it seems he’s remounted the repeal ObamaCare sawhorse by threatening to shoot the economy. Just another day in the life of republican extremism. But hey-both sides do it.
ETA: both Baby Doc and Paultroons will soon enter the Urban Dictionary.
raven
@SiubhanDuinne: And then there is the great Liz and Burton vehicle . Tonton Macoute!!!
SiubhanDuinne
@the Conster: Excellent! Missed that on the first go-round.
SatanicPanic
@JS: Dude, linking to an article that favorably quotes Glenn Greenwald= party foul.
General Stuck
You gotta admit. The real thing filibuster wasn’t a bad idea for an aspiring idiot king. It ruffled the old guard wingnut feathers, as well as triangulated with hero starved emo progs on the left. A new coalition of morons that could go places, with right kind of spiritual guidance.
The Moar You Know
I’m hoping this ends up looking like the results of a lawnmower fight in an overcrowded and dark garage full of people I loathe.
Nobody puts McCain in a corner, bitches
Journalmalist
I hate Rand Paul as much as the next guy and I hope he dies in a cockfire, but it’s not really fair to say he is anti-drone only for the opportunity to slap Obama around. As a good libertarian — and by good I mean ‘typically myopic’– Randford has been consistently anti-war, not because he gives an unmanned flying fuck, but because he really, really does want to shrink every part of the state down to nothing so the new Gilded Age can continue apace.
Bubblegum Tate
So I see wingnuts crowing that Paul “won a concession” from Obama, i.e. that he forced Obama to change the drone policy. But nothing actually changed, right? Holder just re-affirmed that the president does not have the authority to use drones to just kill Americans for no reason, right?
Of course, wingnuts are also proclaiming that Paul has “made himself an American hero,” so there’s that.
Gin & Tonic
@shortstop:
I see what you did there.
Scott S.
@Bubblegum Tate: Truly, Rand Paul is the new Sarah Palin.
pillsy
@Journalmalist:
Paul is so incredibly sincere about his “libertarianism” that he thought people shouldn’t be allowed to build a mosque on their own property in New York City.
Betty Cracker
@pillsy: And let’s not forget he wants to police 150 million or so uteri too.
pamelabrown53
@pillsy: The only thing paul is sincere about is using libertarianism in the service of bigotry and corporations.
Suffern ACE
@JS: dude. Are you seriously worried that the government is going to call for a drone strike on a Muslim protester carrying a sign 50 feet from the White House as a combatant? Really? Don’t you think the honorable professor who penned that is a bit stark raving mad? DISSENT my ass. That is not dissent. It is abandonment.
Suffern ACE
Your newly righteous civil libertarian defending senators in action. http://p.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/mar/8/republicans-denounce-nyc-terror-trial-bin-laden-so/
Suffern ACE
Your newly righteous civil libertarian defending senators in action. http://p.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/mar/8/republicans-denounce-nyc-terror-trial-bin-laden-so/
quannlace
The party must be pretty comatose if Rand Paul’s stunt was enough to ‘energize’ the base.
FlipYrWhig
@quannlace: especially when “the base” doesn’t give two shits, or even a shit and a quarter, about executive power and surveillance.
General Stuck
@Suffern ACE:
Nice move by O. Get him into the country, then let the wingnuts whine about it. They didn’t have a problem with it concerning the shoe bomber, or so called 20th hijacker Moussaoui being tried on the US mainland. Just more political bruises Obama is delivering to their lost mojo on national defense, and other issues.
kay
@General Stuck:
I thought it was interesting, too.
Didn’t they have a nervous breakdown last time, then it went to trial and no one ever mentioned it again?
Where is that defendant, from 2009? Are Republicans checking to see if he’s “secure” in prison?
I love how there’s no follow up, at all, ever. They just flit from one thing to another.
shortstop
@FlipYrWhig: Well, they do when a black guy is in charge.
Frankensteinbeck
And so they out themselves. They hate Obama. Period. That’s it.
JS
@Chyron HR:
It does when you turn into a blind partisan hypocrite.
JS
@Chyron HR: I voted for Jill Stein, no way in hell was I voting for that closet Republican Obama.
Suffern ACE
@kay: they had a breakdown when the underwear bomber wasn’t shipped to Guantanamo. But he was actually caught on the ground in the US. Now, I think bypassing Guantanamo is a good idea, don’t you? I wonder what Rand Paul thinks.
General Stuck
@kay:
Yes they are, and seemingly the same motive every time. Concern for Optics and how they effect the mangled GOP brand. On policy, they flop around like beached fishes, Pure reactionary, and they don’t have a clue how that political mindset is doing to their brand, what they fear most.
Chyron HR
@JS:
But of course we were supposed to be outraged by the Hagel nomination because Republicans are automatically bad. Guess that makes you a blind BIpartisan hypocrite?
JS
@SatanicPanic: What’s wrong with Glenn Greenwald? Speaking the truth? Same problem you have with Jeremy Scahill and Democracy Now? Just curious…are you a liberal or are you a Democrat?
SiubhanDuinne
@raven:
I had an insane but adorable cat once that I sometimes called “Tonton Macute.” Not to be confused with the “Meow-Meow Rebellion.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JS: Have you ever considered that maybe you have trouble persuading people because you’re not self-righteous and dogmatic enough? Tighten up, Francis.
FlipYrWhig
@Chyron HR: “It cheeses me off that Obama is always making nicey nice with Republicans. It’s evidence of disloyalty to the cause. That’s a big part of why I’m so excited about standing with Rand Paul!”
JS
@Suffern ACE: The Justice Department is already arguing a case against an African American man, stating that he doesn’t have a right to free speech in the halls of the Supreme Court. Refer here: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/03/05/1191702/-Man-Wearing-Occupy-Everything-Jacket-Arrested-At-First-Amendment-Free-Zone-In-SCOTUS-Building
It’s easy to assume that where does this kind of reasoning end? Again, are you a liberal or are you a Partisan Democrat?
Frankensteinbeck
@JS:
Lying. Claiming that Awlaki did not get due process of law, for example. That is a flat-out lie that as a constitutional lawyer Greenwald must know is not true.
JS
@Chyron HR: Um, what? This isn’t about nomination process, filibusters, etc, this is about drone policy and the fact that this President thinks that he can order the summary execution of a person’s life without due process. Not the best strawman argument ever presented to me….one of the worst in fact.
Pinkamena Panic
Looks like we got a new toy.
JS
@Frankensteinbeck: @Frankensteinbeck: Where is your proof on this? To my knowledge, that information has NEVER been made public for national security reasons, unless you’re telling me that you’re now a whistle blower for the State Department and can produce that documentation?
Redshirt
@JS: Are you a Unicorn or a Pony?
General Stuck
@JS:
What does it matter the mans skin color. He did some civil disobedience and like all those before him that break the rules, he has to face the consequences. Why would he not want to be tried, if he seeks spread his message? Let me clue you in. Liberals believe in both the rule of law, and a right to protest, and when they collide, for the system to work its will of due process. You are assigning anarchy to the meaning of liberal. They are not the same thing.
Frankensteinbeck
@JS:
Have this article. There was another case where his family tried to stand for Awlaki instead, which is not legal. Due process of law doesn’t mean he gets a trial. One of the options is giving up his right to trial – which he did, as a federal judge ruled. Greenwald did not tell you about this stuff or discuss the legal context of giving up your right to fair trial, did he?
General Stuck
My first thought, is a lot.
Suffern ACE
@JS: so arresting someone and trying them in court is the slippery slope to declaring someone an enemy combatant and adding them to a secret kill list? I may have sympathy for the protester and his views, but what the hell kind of slippery slope is this?
JS
@Frankensteinbeck: I refer you here: http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_65149.shtml
And I refer you here: http://truth-out.org/news/item/14386-kill-list-exposed-leaked-obama-memo-shows-assassination-of-us-citizens-has-no-geographic-limit
FlipYrWhig
@JS: you might consider acquainting yourself with the difference between what a president has the authority to do, which includes some pretty awful shit, and what a president chooses to do with that authority, on the one hand, and how a well-intentioned person might help politicians in restricting that authority, on the other. IOW, the president does in fact have the power to do things you don’t much like, and will have it until it’s specifically taken away. Every president on becoming president supports the widest possible view of presidential powers. Do you think President Jill Stein would invite Congress to tinker with and place rules around what she could do in any area? No more than any restaurant owner, even the most liberal vegan-friendly gluten-free cafe, is excited about a visit from the health department.
Yutsano
@Redshirt: ALICORN!!
(sorry, carry on.)
JS
@General Stuck: You’re seriously going to back up the claim that the Supreme Court is a “no 1st Amendment” zone? So, you’d arrest a kid for wearing a Minor Threat shirt? You sound like a bunch of really dumb old people that read National Review. What site is this?
General Stuck
@JS:
“No Geographic limit” both the AUMF, and the UN security council res passed before it, expressly states that their is not geographic limit to going after AQ. The question is how that is done with regard to local situations. Such as lawless lands, and those with civilian police forces and legal institutions. But trying claim the “No geographic limit” mantle is utterly irrelevant as a basic limiting notion for going after AQ.
Pinkamena Panic
@Yutsano: You are not royalty.
JS
@Suffern ACE: And no one should be arrested for wearing something you disagree with. It’s not the same as yelling fire in a theater. Seriously, you guys are totally okay with protest zones, and all of these other laws laid out by corporations? Really? Wow.
The Other Bob
That wackaloon Amash is also being mentioned as a candidate for the U.S. Senate seat Levin is vacating.
General Stuck
@JS:
I would argue that the Supreme Court is a neutral zone for politics, and the clear rules they have about bringing political sloganeering into the very heart of the house of unbiased judging which is our judicial branch, is that which should govern this situation.
You can’t bring politics and slogans into places of voting either.
You must be a young snot nose punk.
Mike in NC
Rand Paul will NEVER be as dreamy as Paul Ryan to the Villagers.
Suffern ACE
@JS: take a chill pill. Did I say I was ok with that arrest. I think it was kind of ham fisted. Now, if you feel that that is a threat to liberty, then by all means go for it. It is something that is actually happening! I might say, well at least he’s in court where some judge will decide on the matter, so you’ll have to convince me that the whole system is broken. But don’t go throwing that up there in response to my response to your article indicating that protesters with signs are going to be declared enemy combatants and killed by drones.
JS
@FlipYrWhig: The President does not have extra judicial powers (that include execution) for the whims of what might constitute a “Terrorist”.
If Bush was doing this, you guys would be foaming at the mouth. Come on, stop being so intellectually dishonest.
JS
@General Stuck: No, it’s not. Really? This. Argument. Is. Stupid. It’s not the same as trolling in a voting booth. Jesus, the guy wasn’t even in an active session of judges chambers during an argument. What?? Also, are you seriously going to argue in favor of the impartiality of the Supreme Court? Really? Between the Goldman Sachs stooge of Kagan or on the side of that Monstanto woman hating Clarence Thomas?
FlipYrWhig
@JS: You’re in such a dither that you’re not even listening. I’m not surprised that the president claims to have special executive powers, especially during “wartime,” regardless of who the president is. What’s to be done about that? Not a bunch of whining about how he doesn’t really have those powers, but a concerted effort to curb them–for instance by rescinding the AUMF that further enshrined terrorist-fighting as something the president has carte blanche to pursue. This is not the same thing as saying “I love the smell of drones in the morning.”
JS
@Suffern ACE: Um, why? It’s a safe assumption. http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/06/politics/protester-arrest-controversy
General Stuck
@JS:
Was the guy asked to leave first, and refused? Or to take off the shirt? Or, was he there to protest with his slogan in the first place, and wouldn’t do either request?. If he just walked in and they arrested him without affording an opportunity be advised of the rules, then I would agree with you. But somehow I doubt it went down that way.
But your general tone is that of base anti authority and rebelling for the sake of that. I some have personal experience with that myself, when I was young and stupid. And being that is no path to success for changing anything.
JS
@FlipYrWhig: I’m sure the dead women and children of Afghanistan understand. At least, maybe that’s what all of you hawk-ish self professed “liberals” can say at the end of the night to help yourself sleep better. Besides, who better to gut brown countries and create Kissenger style war crimes than a non-white President working for the Corporations, right?
Chyron HR
@JS:
“Don’t blame me, I voted for
Pat PaulsenJill Stein!”JS
@General Stuck: Did you read article? Are you John McCain about to yell at me to get off your lawn, old man?
Suffern ACE
@JS: ummm. Yeah. We kind of have to support the idea of an independent judiciary and pretend it’s impartial even though judges are prone to human failings. If not for that, then what? If you’re not going to respect the court as an institution, then what do you propose replacing it with?
Ted & Hellen
One part of the problem, in a nutshell, is that elected, alleged Progressives in general don’t own and fight for the ideology with one tenth of the conviction of loose canons like Randy Paul.
WHY that is so opens a whole other avenue of inquiry…
JS
@Chyron HR: Don’t blame me, I voted for
Obamasorry, the third term of George W. Bush.JS
The guy was a former Marine who was looking at an exhibit on slavery. He complied when he was asked to leave and didn’t put up a fight and was arrested anyway. Here is the article again since you can’t read: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/03/05/1191702/-Man-Wearing-Occupy-Everything-Jacket-Arrested-At-First-Amendment-Free-Zone-In-SCOTUS-Building
FlipYrWhig
@JS: what the fuck are you talking about? Do you read, or are you an algorithm based on incoherent vaguely leftish indignation?
FlipYrWhig
@Suffern ACE: it’s important to respect the rule of law. Except when the law is unjust, in which case something else is more important. The main thing is, what I want should be happening, and when it isn’t, that’s on you.
Anna in PDX
@General Stuck: Yes, civil disobedience is where you purposely try to get arrested. It’s not unclear to most people including all those who have even for one moment thought about doing it.
General Stuck
@JS:
Click through from your DKos link to Wired
Just as I figured. And he has not been the first to get arrested bringing political placards and the like into the SCOTUS. So now he is suing the government for arresting him. Ain’t this a great country, or what?
JS
@General Stuck: Um, if he left and was arrested by along with “other protesters” isn’t that just guilt by association? How does that work? So if a guy kills someone wearing a Rage Against the Machine shirt, then according to your (and the government’s) gymnastics, all RATM shirt wearing people are all murderers too??
Smedley the Uncertain
@JS: Golly, better check out our artillery, tank and bomb policies too. Ya know the ones refined and executed by the Cheney-Bush regime.
General Stuck
@JS:
Don’t you read your own link click throughs on which the Kos diary was gleaned? Are you some kind of moronic snot nosed punk?
JS
Okay, you guys. Enjoy your closet republican bubble, polyester, gin rummy and your McCain mugs. I’m out you sacks of partisan shit.
General Stuck
@JS:
His arrest has nothing to do with the arrest of outside protesters. He was given an opportunity to abide by the rules on the inside where he was, and chose not to. I don’t take issue with his right to take a stand, just for morons like you to misrepresent it here. You buy the ticket, you take the ride for civil disobedience.
brentblah
@JS:
I was buying it until it was a Rage t-shirt. Just too good, you ruseman.
General Stuck
@brentblah:
If it was a spoof act, he might need to think things through a little better before getting punked with his own petard.
FlipYrWhig
@General Stuck: While he clearly wasn’t reading anything, was moronic, and was a punk, to be fair, he didn’t prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that he had snot in his nose.
SatanicPanic
@JS: pfft!
FlipYrWhig
@brentblah: a friend of mine in high school, circa 1986, got sent home for wearing a Beastie Boys concert shirt that said “Get Off My Dick” on the back. Until this case, that was the biggest injustice ever, and I think he’s been waiting 25 years for the Gestapo and/or the drones to get him.
Paul in KY
@Betty Cracker: You’re right. We haven’t partied enough about that. I will try to rectify that this weekend :-)
chopper
ol’ randy is setting himself up to be the wingnut’s wingnut come 2016. if that means burning the whole house down, so be it. I say lets give him a match and some gasoline.
brentblah
@FlipYrWhig: MCA was a CIA hit job, maaan. He’s right to be scared.
Paul in KY
@FlipYrWhig: They do when President Blackity-Black is at the helm.
Edit: See shortstop got there way before me.
Ted & Hellen
@JS:
I’ve been here a while, and to be fair, BJ is more of a Nixon Republican bubble than McCain.
Although on some issues this place makes Dick look liberal.
Paul in KY
@JS: Ha, ha! That’s a good one. Keep em coming…
JS
@FlipYrWhig: Really, you’re that riddled with hyperbole that you can’t see that the Justice Department is wrong on so many things? Come on, this is ridiculous. There are countless examples of how the Justice Department has overstepped it’s legal boundaries and has grown the anti-civil liberty movement that now includes mainstream democrats such as yourself. I’m the asshole? Really? You think I got punk’d? Really? Who’s going to get punk’d is everyone when you get some Theocratic douche-bag like Santorum gets in the White House and starts doing some really crazy shit with the widening of the Executive Branch that the Obama Administration is engaging in. Seriously, you’re going to make fun of everyone who disagrees with you by terrible red herring arguments? Man, look at you! That doesn’t make any sense and is intensely pathetic. You sound like House Republicans who can’t listen to any reason or sense. Dude, even Van Jones was tweeting his support on this one. I guess that makes him a racist, too, huh? Modern Democrats are turning to Diet-Bush-ites and you should be ashamed.
JS
@FlipYrWhig: It’s not the same thing and this is a stupid argument. The law came about from Bush in 2006 who wanted to limit political speech in Federal areas and then was expanded upon by the Obama administration in 2011. Notice the pattern here? Bush does it, Obama expands it. Sorry, but this is ridiculous.
Chyron HR
@JS:
Except for smart guys like you who cast protest votes for the Green M&M because you thought Hillary was a “closet Republican”.
JS
@Chyron HR: Nope, I voted for Hillary in the primaries and did not vote for Obama because I didn’t like his misogynistic tone in the primaries or his hawkish Nixon like views on Foreign Policy. Hillary is by no means perfect but she would be a much better leader than Obama, no contest.
JS
@Chyron HR: And my vote wasn’t a protest vote, I actually voted for the person that I most believed in: http://www.jillstein.org/issues
FlipYrWhig
@JS: I don’t know what the fuck you’re picking up on in anything I’ve written to you or to anyone else, and I don’t much care at this point, because you seem content to blurt and spew pretty much whatever you feel like venting about, regardless of what anyone else has or hasn’t said.
FlipYrWhig
@JS: wait, one thing first. The person you voted for because the other one was a hawk was… Hillary Clinton, the one who steadfastly refused to recant having supported the Iraq War. You’re crackers.
RSA
Uh, why is Lindsey Graham gripping anyone’s boots on the ground? Is this some kind of sexual metaphor? Are they Appalachian hiking boots?
Betty Cracker
@FlipYrWhig: PUMA. They’re an endangered species.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JS: @Betty Cracker: Wow, that took a while. But it does explain a lot.
@RSA: The So Carolina Tea Party has made a lot of allusions to Graham’s personal life, and if anybody thinks that isn’t a factor in his primary panic, they’re kidding themselves. I refer of course to the Villagers and Sabbath Gasbags.
johnny aquitard
@Ted & Hellen:
This is a double slam on progressives, right? I.e., a tenth of zero is still zero?
Or are you telling us you are incapable of recognizing cynical manipulative and self-interested behavior when you see it in someone else?
Self-Righteous Little White Guy
@JS: I thought you told us all off and left in a huff back at comment #90. Bad form.
Betty Cracker
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Pure speculation on my part, but I read a fair amount of PUMA blogs back in the day, and one tell is a reflexive antipathy towards Obama and unswerving devotion to Clinton, whose policies are practically identical. Most of the hardcore PUMAs I used to snicker at either went full-metal wingnut or firebagger when Obama bagged the nomination, and if HRC runs in 2016, it’ll be fascinating to see if they walk it back when it’s Clinton rather than Obama advocating the exact same political platform.
Self-Righteous Little White Guy
@Betty Cracker: Just Say No Deal!
AHH onna Droid
@JS: Ouch, way to not stick the flounce, Moran. Methinks the rumors of nasal mucus accumulation may have something behind them.
Mnemosyne
I have to admit, I find it fascinating that supposed leftists love Ron Paul and Baby Doc Paul so much that they’ll spend hours disrupting a thread that criticizes either one of them.
Seriously, like we’re supposed to believe that someone who voted for Jill Stein would also be so desperate to distract us from Baby Doc’s grandstanding that he would spend hours disrupting the thread with that criticism in it? Right.
SatanicPanic
@Mnemosyne: I’m willing to believe that some of these people are so eager to be anti-establishment that they’ll support any old dummy who appears to be anti-establishment.
Yutsano
@Mnemosyne: All I’m hearing is PUMA 4EVAH!! The blaming Afghanistan on Obama when he wasn’t even a Senator in Illinois yet is the big tell.
JS
@FlipYrWhig: Just admit you’re a Republican. Just admit it, what’s the problem? You’ll feel better and it will be a cathartic experience for you. It will help alleviate that stress that you have and maybe help you accept all of that false vitriol that you spewed against all of those years.
Ted & Hellen
@JS:
How DARE you!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Betty Cracker: What finally drove me out of Eschaton was the unselfware fusion of the PUMAs and the Naderites (and it occurs to me that I never did thank them for it) to agree that President Inadequte-Black-Male was the Great Betrayer of The Clinton Legacy of Troo Progressivism.
A Humble Lurker
@Ted & Hellen:
Yeah, a vote for George W. Bu- I mean, Ralph Nader, totally understandable and shouldn’t be mocked.
Ted & Hellen
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Why do you feel that President Obama, specifically as a “black male,” is inadequate?
Racist much?
FlipYrWhig
@JS: I suggest repealing AUMF. You, on the other hand, said argleblargle Rage Against the Machine T-shirt polyester gin rummy dead babies. I think the record shows which of us has more to contribute on these issues.
Self-Righteous Little White Guy
@JS: Needs more cowbell.