Paul Revere by Cyrus Dallin, North End, Boston

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Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Thoughtful Take on the Debate

UPDATE BELOW


I've read pages and pages of analyses on the internet about last week's debate between Willard Romney and President Obama, but by far the best is this one from Andrew Sullivan's [who went beserk during the debate and nearly collapsed into a pile of wet confetti afterward] blog by a perspicacious reader: 


"How did the right wing react when Bush the Younger looked like he'd been drugged in that first debate with John Kerry? Did they run around screaming and rending their garments in despair? Did they amplify the bad debate performance by publicly excoriating Bush over and over and over again? Did they turn into pissy little bitches, willing to throw everything away in a fit of juvenile disappointment? No. They put their head down and kept fighting.

As poorly as the President may have performed in that debate, far worse has been the narcissistic pouting from you and Jon Stewart and everybody else. Barack Obama is not now and never has been a savior. It is not his holy mission to rescue us from Mitt Romney and the GOP. We are the masters of our collective fate. We our the captains of our national soul. If we're willing to hand the wheel over to a guy spouting economic gibberish and a return to Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld foreign policy, it is not Barack Obama's fault because he gave a shitty debate performance. Democracy cannot survive if we must rely on someone to save us from ourselves."

And one more that is not as eloquent, but to the point:

"When the guy leading the way falls down, you pick him up. What you don't do is stop, unzip your fly and piss all over him."


Nate Silver of the NYTimes:

"...incumbent presidents just aren’t that easy to defeat. Mr. Obama’s approval ratings are now hovering around 50 percent and don’t seem to have been negatively affected by his performance in Denver. Although Mr. Obama’s approval ratings may be slightly lower among those most likely to vote — meaning that Mr. Romney could win with a strong turnout — historically that number has been just good enough to re-elect an incumbent. (Mr. Bush’s approval ratings were in the same range late in 2004.)


In some ways, then, the election might not be quite so unpredictable as it appears. There was reason to believe that Mr. Obama’s numbers would fade some after his convention — and the first debate has quite often been a time when the challenger drew the race closer."


Another example of Willard the inconsistent charlatan:

 
 
UPDATE
 
Mitt the Major flip-flopper now says that his statements he made this spring about the 47%, and the subsequent statements he made doubling down and confirming his support of them after the 47% comments were exposed, the original statements and the confirming supporting statements are now:
 
GUESS WHAT?
 
 
So this political hack first tells a roomful of fat cats what he really, truly, honestly thinks about  47% of the American people, then when that got plastered all over America and his numbers started tanking, he doubled-down and said he most certainly agreed with those comments.  Now the political hack says what he said three and four times is "completely wrong."
 
What the hell kind of a dissembling charlatan can look the American people in the eye and lie that shamelessly about his own convictions and words?
 
What the hell is this guy?  I mean besides a political hack of the worst kind? And most important, who are the suckers who believe this amazing liar?
 
 

3 comments:

Dave Miller said...

Shaw, he was against the 47% before he was for them... and what should we make about his subsequent defenses of those statements in the days immediately afterwards?

Were those defenses also wrong?

And if those were also wrong, what has happened in his life, or on the campaign trail to cause him to come to this understanding?

We'll never know and we'll surely never hear a cogent answer from the conservative side...

Shaw Kenawe said...

SF now loves him some Maher--the guy he's ruthlessly dissed in the past. But since he's making jokes about the president, Maher is now SF's newest bromance. I guess they're dating now.

Dave,

Mitt overplayed this one, and it's so awful even his kids are embarrassed.

Does he really think he can be taken seriously on his "completely wrong" worm-turn?

There are at least a dozen good anti-Romney ads in this latest flip-flop where Mittens disavows himself.

His cynacism toward the American people is astonishing.

Jerry Critter said...

Hell, Mitt tried to be one of the 47% when he claimed to be unemployed.