Today in why Mitt's Fucked: Liberal Trepidation Edition

Tonight was a tricky beast. I was watching the debate in a Portland Oregon bar which had a decidedly liberal bent to it. Obama got lots of applause, Romney got lots of boos. In some ways, it could have been like watching Independence Day from an alien bar.

In contrast, my friend was texting me from a bar in Tennessee, and sending messages to the effect of "Romney's cleaning up". These two very different settings cast two very different lights on the debate.

Now, with a couple hours behind the debate, and a couple of tequilas out of me, I am feeling nearly objective enough to make some kind of assessment of what really happened:

-Romney had a stronger debate, but gave up a lot of ground.
-Romney got in better points on the president's shortcomings
-Obama stayed on message and remained more composed
-Obama seemed muddle and reiterated lines on green energy and education that seemed hollow
-Romney genuinely lost control several times, showing cracks that made him seem like a sociopath and a wingnut

More analysis tomorrow. The key take away from tonight was that there was most certainly not a game changing moment and both candidates lived to fight another day. If Romney can string more of these together, we may yet see a real race. For all Romney has been criticized for not laying out specifics, Obama was equally evasive tonight - but he survived the economics debate, which was his biggest weakness. The question now is can Romney string some good days together, and can stand out clearly in the National Policy and Town Hall debates and bring forward his message clearly.

Bonus mindless observations:

-Why pick on Big Bird?

-Jim Lehrer would make a very good owl

-Gotta love the anniversary shout out

Today in why Mitt's Fucked: Paul Ryan can't Explain Romney Tax Plan

This morning, in my usual compulsive clicking and scanning of the New York Times, BBC, CNN, Fox News, The Daily Best, Slate, Politico and twitter I had a little revelation: Nobody is talking about Mitt Romney today. There were no headlines on anything coming from his camp, only some horse race stories and some grim statistics (for Romney) about the probability of him winning without Ohio (not good, for Romney).

I was about to close my laptop, end this blog and take up whittling, but mercifully I found this just in the nick of time I found this:

The fun starts about 30 seconds in where Chris Wallace asks Paul Ryan for specifics on the Romney Tax plan in order to counter claims that the math does not work. This is on Fox News, so the questions stay friendly and focused on proving doubter wrong. For the next three minutes Ryan beats around the bush while Wallace gently prods for some clarity on how revenue could go up when taxes are lowered 20 percent and Ryan gives up this gem: "It would take me too long long to go through all of the math". (Show's up at 2:25)

Through the whole series of questioning, Ryan squirms around giving any specifics at all. He doesn't name any loopholes that would be closed. He doesn't say who would benefit. He just wriggles invoking Reagan, bipartisanship and the old line that the plan is clear and well documented.

When Enron collapsed, Lewis Black observed (paraphrasing) If you can't explain what your business does in  a sentence, then chances are it's not honest. While this might be a little reductive, I think here we see the same thing apply to political platforms.

Today in Why Mitt's Fucked: A Campaign that was Lost in the Primaries

Turn your television or internets to pretty much any media outlet, and you will hear the following refrain over and over again from Republican talking heads:

 "Mitt has a likability issue. If people could just get to know the real Mitt, he would really connect with voters."

It makes a lot of sense. George W. Bush was palatable to moderate voters, despite having ruinous policies, because he came across as likable and seemed genuine. Romney is not going to be that guy - but in theory that's OK. There are lots of American personalities that American's don't like but whom are well regarded. Michael Bloomberg certainly comes to mind and therein lies Mitt's problem. He cannot run as Dubya, because he is not a fun or warm person, but he could have run as an experienced businessman, family man and earnest politician. Heck - he did that for a long time both at Bain and as the Governor of Massachusetts and it worked!

Instead he decided that Mitt had to become a brand, and a very conservative one, in order to win the primary. If he had held his fucking horses he might just be winning this thing now. 

Now, let's take a little trip back in time to last year when the Primaries were a total zoo. Bachmann was a presence. Perry was a favorite. Herman Cain was low profile, but intriguing. Santorum was on the periphery due to his "google problem". Ron Paul was Ron Paul. Newt Gingrich was having a late career comeback. There were more clowns in the car, but only Perry, Gingrich and Romney appeared to have any kind of credible shot at winning.

Sure, everybody got to be in front in the polls for a little while. Even this ^ guy, but nobody else really stood a chance over Romney. Let's remember who these people where!

-Cain was a serial groper who had to drop out on his own. Prior to that, "9-9-9" was his only message that made it through (for all of 72 hours).

-Perry shot himself in the foot when it turned out he couldn't get out a complete sentence at a debate. Remember the "oop" moment?

-Newt Gingrich had the terminal handicap of being an unlikable blow hard who had already proven at every turn to not be able to get out his own way. For fucks sake, he was cheating on his wife while impeaching Clinton.

Did Team Romney have the foresight and the balls to wait these idiots out? Did he have the patience watch them self destruct? Did he say, "hey, I have a $100 million cash advantage, let's wait for America to get sick of this."?

Nope.

He took the "safe" route out of all of this and beat a path clear to the right of all of them. He out Bachmanned Bachmann, he out anti-immigranted the Texan, he outcrazied Newt. He won and he won quickly. At what cost though?

Erik Fehrnstrom, a senior campaign adviser infamously said after the primary was won that the general election would provide an "Etch-a-Sketch" from the primaries hard line positions. Americans aren't that dumb though. 

Point being: Team Mitt wants so badly for America to get to know there guy and how great he is, but they spent more than a year keeping that "real Mitt" buried deep underground for when he was needed. The problem is, that now that they do need the moderate friendly Massachusetts Republican so badly, the first impression has already been made.

Today in Why Mitt's Fucked

To the best of my knowledge, Mitt seems to have made it through a whole news cycle without saying anything scathing or stupid, had any of his surrogates say anything scathing or stupid or been publicly bashed by a high profile personality from his own party.

Hell, if he could start stringing more than one or two of these days together at a time, there might even be a little bit of racing in this race. If he does that, perhaps we will begin having a different discussion.

But until then - I offer you this:

Yes - that is Fox News, mouth piece of the GOP displaying a poll which places Obama ahead of Romney 48.9 to 44.9. To poll in question was taken by Rasmussen, a polling house that exclusively works for conservative causes.

Scroll anywhere else on the site, and you will find stories about Obama being an unpopular, dishonest socialist who has taken America to the precipice of destruction and that's what makes this all the more revelatory. It means that despite all the whining, moaning and pontificating that the liberal media is manipulating the polls or that Obama v. Romney is just like Carter v. Reagan that the conservative political establishment has come to accept that Mitt's toast.

The Last Days of Mittens

Next week, we will see the debates start as we enter the home stretch of this 2 1/2 year election slog. Back in 2010, with the emergence of the Tea Party and Sarah Palin at her zenith (and when Mitt's campaign was starting to get going) Obama's chances of winning seemed slim. But oh, how far we've come.

Quick recap of why the GOP is screwed:
-GM and Chrysler stop hemorrhaging money, and start turning a profit
-OBL Killed
-9 GOP Primary contenders, all but one of which was ahead of Romney in the polls at one point turn the primaries into an ugly spectacle
-The Supreme Court upholds the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare)
-Obama backs gay marriage and stops deporting Dream Act kids
-The Mitt humiliation tour of Europe and Israel

Quick recap of why they shouldn't be:
-They have more money from Super PACs than there are add slots to buy
-A base that is deeply angry and afraid of Obama and willing to get him out at any cost
-A candidate who has been grooming for this run for 20 years
-High Unemployment
-High national debt

Which brings us to today. For all that has happened, and all his experience Mitt has proven that he is completely incapable of running a presidential campaign. While most of the media is depicting the race as close - the numbers certainly doing look it. In fact fivethirtyeight.com has Mitt with only a 22% chance of winning. As of this morning, the betting site intrade.com has Mitt with only a 29% chance of winning.

The campaign and much of the party faithful is still hanging on, but the infighting and voices of GOP criticism are starting to grow louder. Soon the facade will come down and we will see the GOP vanguard eat Romney's campaign like a hamster eating its young.

Here's a list of signs to look for:
-Paul Ryan promoting his own messages and opinions sometimes at odds with the campaign
-A spike in Obama fundraising as interest groups that need access ditch Mitt
-A switch of Super PACs and talking heads from the GOP to focus on the senate race
-Rush Limbaugh et al giving angry, outraged advice to the Romney campaign in a way that undercuts him
-Open rebellion from the religions right, Ron Paul fans and other special interest groups that usually vote republican
-Senate candidates distancing themselves from Mitt (already happening with Scott Brown)
-Defections from the campaign to more lucrative gigs (See Tim Pawlenty)
-A decrease in Mitt's on air presence
-Gaffes, confusion and exasperation by Mitt and surrogates (Ann's "This is hard"might be a start) during interviews, even at friendly events
-Increased media interested in Gary Johnson
-Fox News, Drudge and Breitbart running distracting pieces or simply focusing their attentions on things other than the race
-An increased presence of Donald Trump

So fill out your bingo card kids! Unless Obama gay marries a cub scout while dressed in a burka It looks like Mitt should probably start thinking about how he is going to retire with a shred of dignity and credibility.

A Brief Rambling on the Efficacy of Exercise, Obama and Perseverance

This week has been pretty crazy for me. I took on a project last Friday in a consulting role, and somehow by Monday had become the owner of the project; the building of an Access db to track employee training. It initially seemed simple, and by late Monday morning, I was pretty sure I could get it done by end of day. By Monday afternoon however scope creep had attacked, and what I thought was going to be simple had ballooned into a monstrosity that had to be geared toward an audience who was not Excel/Access proficient.

I spent 12 hours a day working on it for most of this week. Initially I was cursing my luck, but now sitting here on Friday afternoon on the verge of completion I am feeling a solid sense of accomplishment for pushing myself.

Between crossfit and biking I am starting to look and feel the way I want to. I had really forgotten how much fun it is to have an activity that you are always motivated to do. Skiing was the exception for a long time, but with snow fall sucking most of the last 5 years, it's gotten harder. Being on either the Mountain Bike or the Road Bike though feels great. Especially now that I have the right gear and the right protection.

Lastly, the last few weeks have been an amazing vindication for me and my belief that Obama can be a great president. No, I am not happy about his proposal to allow off shore drilling, and no I don't think that either health care reform, or the proposed financial reform will go far enough but what has been done (and undone) from when he took the reins from W. is very respectable.

In the last few weeks he has gotten health care through, strengthened title 9, created a nuclear treaty that will halve the number of nukes, visited Afghanistan and pushed an agenda for Financial Reform that looks like it will pass.

Redacted

After 8 years of not really knowing fact from fiction when it came to CIA and military conduct, several things have come to light in the last weeks that show just how totally fucked things were in the prime years of the now renamed GWOT (these days it's the Overseas Contingency Operation).

The first story which broke two weeks ago, and which continues to evolve is regarding Blackwater USA (now Xe), which for the uninitiated is the private army hired by the Pentagon to protect diplomats in Iraq, as well as other security operations. These are no rent a cops though -- comprised largely of ex-military, led by ex-special forces and commanding it's own air force and APC's Blackwater is in all right a full fledged army. If you'll recall they have had a very bad record of killing Iraqi civillians, and as it has now emerged during depositions, the former CEO may have actually demanded this behavior. According to former employees, the CEO and founder Erik Prince, believed he was part of a holy war against Muslims and allegedly went so far as to kill individuals in the US who opposed his doctrine.

While the track record of Blackwater as a protection agency is almost unblemished, the idea of such an idealogically motivated force operating in this, and other sovreign nations terrifies me.

The other story which continues to break this week regards the torture during the Bush years at so called "Black Sites" conducted by the CIA. A highly redacted report released by the Attorney Generals office confirms that the methods used went far beyond water boarding. High lights of detainee abuse include:

-Threats with power tools
-Threat of rape
-Threat of murdering and raping families
-Mock executions of other detainees
-Beatings
-Constriction of blood flow resulting in loss of consciouness

While these things are in themselves extreme, much of the document is not yet available and appears to be secret to prevent public and international back lash.

As the final icing on the cake, Dick Cheney who as recently as last month was asking that interrogation documents be released specifically to show that extreme measures were effective has been proven wrong. The documents he was referring to have been released, and rather than showing Jack Bauer like success resulting from torture, they show that conventional methods were in fact more effective.

It might not be until a long time from now that we know most of what happened during the Bush years, but knowing this much makes me glad that the neoCons are out of office.

Wild Prognostication 1.

Cash for Clunkers and the Next Election.

Cash for Clunkers will replace about 1% of cars. By the next election gas will be $4 a gallon again. Here's the kicker. As people are making the choice of who they elect in three years, for the first time in American Politics, gas prices are going to have much less of an impact on the people they used to matter to most.

Will this win the election for Obama's second term? Maybe not. But if you think that the last 4 elections have been won or lost by less than 5%. If <1% of American voters got a new car from Obama and the evil demo congress, than maybe (Just fucking maybe) there will be less pouting about drilling in Alaska and more willingness to acknowledge that this somewhat stupid program has actually moved us away from our "oil addiction".

Additionally, this week saw the first gas powered, production ready car EVER get a preliminary EPA rating of 230/100 MPG, and it's being made in America.

The change we were promised is coming and in a sustainable way.