Insidious Liar: Mitt

UPDATE:

Mitt Romney's "Binders Full of Women" lie:

According to the Boston Phoenix's David S. Bernstein, the "Binders Full of Women" story isn't even true, as presented by Romney. More details:

First of all, according to MassGAP and MWPC, Romney did appoint 14 women out of his first 33 senior-level appointments, which is a reasonably impressive 42 percent. However, as I have reported before, those were almost all to head departments and agencies that he didn’t care about — and in some cases, that he quite specifically wanted to not really do anything.

None of the senior positions Romney cared about — budget, business development, etc. — went to women.

Secondly, a UMass-Boston study found that the percentage of senior-level appointed positions held by women actually declined throughout the Romney administration, from 30.0% prior to his taking office, to 29.7% in July 2004, to 27.6% near the end of his term in November 2006. (It then began rapidly rising when Deval Patrick took office.)

Third, note that in Romney’s story as he tells it, this man who had led and consulted for businesses for 25 years didn’t know any qualified women, or know where to find any qualified women. So what does that say?





President Obama clearly won the debate last night, keeping Willard on the defensive and correcting his blatant lies, with help from Candy Crowley's fact-checking.  Willard didn't get away with fabrications and lies this time:



"Presidential debate moderator Candy Crowley fact checked Mitt Romney after the Republican presidential candidate charged that President Obama failed to call the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi an "act of terror."

More than an hour into the debate, an undecided voter in the town hall forum asked the president about the recent attack in Libya that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three additional Americans.

When Romney responded to the question, he charged that it took Obama days to call the Benghazi attack an act of terror. Obama called the incident an "act of terror" during his remarks on September 12, just one day after the tragedy.

"No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation, alter that character, or eclipse the light of the values that we stand for," Obama said in the Rose Garden. "Today we mourn four more Americans who represent the very best of the United States of America." --HuffPost




"Obama clearly prepared for his Libya response. Romney makes a dumb mistake: Obama says he spoke in the Rose Garden after the attack and called it an act of terror. Romney says "no you didn't." Obama says "get the transcript." Crowley says "he did." THE AUDIENCE APPLAUDS CROWLEY LIVE FACT-CHECKING ROMNEY. Like, twice. They applaud twice. Romney stutters through the rest of his response, and it doesn't matter what he says: He just got f*****g destroyed. By the audience, basically." --Andrew Sullivan's blog

Another lie by Willard:

Romney said that Obama quadrupled regulations on small businesses. Here's what Bloomberg has found:

Obama’s White House has approved fewer regulations than his predecessor George W. Bush at this same point in their tenures, and the estimated costs of those rules haven’t reached the annual peak set in fiscal 1992 under Bush’s father, according to government data reviewed by Bloomberg News. The average annual cost to businesses under Obama is higher than under his predecessors, the Bloomberg review shows. The increase is estimated to total as little as $100 million or as much as $4.1 billion, or at most three one-hundredths of a percent of the total economy.
 

Another:

 “And coal, coal production is not up; coal jobs are not up.” 1,500 coal jobs have been created under Obama. 




Another:

I put out a five-point plan that gets America 12 million new jobs in four years and rising take-home pay.” The Washington Post’s in-house fact checker tore Romney’s claim that he will create 12 million jobs to shreds. The Post wrote that the “‘new math’” in Romney’s plan “doesn’t add up.” In awarding the claim four Pinocchios — the most untrue possible rating, the Post expressed incredulity at the fact Romney would personally stand behind such a flawed, baseless claim.



Another:

“And the president’s right in terms of the additional oil production, but none of it came on federal land. As a matter of fact, oil production is down 14 percent this year on federal land, and gas production was down 9 percent.” 14 percent is a one-year number. “Overall, oil production on federal land under Obama is up from 566 million barrels in 2008 to 626 million barrels in 2011, a 10.6 percent increase.” Compared to the last three years of President Bush, there have been 241 million more barrels of oil produced from public lands in the first three years of Obama."






Sleazy Mitt:

"In his closing statement, Mr. Romney said he "served as a pastor" in his church for 10 years. This was intentionally misleading. It was a way of saying "See, we Mormons are just like you - we have pastors, and I was one." The LDS church does not have clergy, only lay leaders. It does not use the title "pastor" or "minister." It uses "bishop" to indicate a lay leader with designated spiritual responsibilities. Stake president is the leader of a group of wards, which are local congregations. None of these positions require formal theological education nor are the people in them "ordained" for vocational ministry as are Catholic priests or Protestant pastors. In the LDS, a bishop or stake president is chosen for a period of time and none of them work as vocational clergy.

Mr. Romney left the impression - intentionally - that he worked for 10 years as pastor of a local church. I would think many LDS members were troubled by the remark, as they do not, ever, use the term "pastor."



The Fix:

WINNERS

* President Obama: It was a near-certainty that the incumbent would improve on his mystifying bad first debate performance. And, he did. But he also did more than that. After coming out a little too hot — Obama seemed to be on the wrong side of the angry/passionate divide in the first 15 minutes — he moderated his tone to the sober/serious yet forceful persona that he needed in this debate. Debates are about moments — the moments that get replayed again and again the after-action analysis — and President Obama had three: 1) his line about how his pension wasn’t as big as Romney’s 2) winning, against all odds, the scrap about the Benghazi attack (with an assist from moderator Candy Crowley) and 3) his strong close in which he used Romney’s “47 percent” comments as a cudgel to beat up his rival. Obama’s performance wasn’t flawless and he didn’t score a clean win as Romney did in the first debate. But, he was the better performer this time around.

LOSERS

* Mitt Romney: The Republican nominee absolutely had his moments in this debate. He was excellent when laying out the case for why we aren’t better off than we were four years ago and for why his record as a jobs creator was far superior to president Obama’s. But, as we noted above, these debates are about moments. And Romney thought he had one when it came to what President Obama said on the day after the Libya attacks. But, in trying to catch the incumbent in what he thought was a clear mistake, Romney was hoisted with his own petard by Crowley in what will be the single most memorable (and replayed) interaction of the debate. Yes, we are aware that there is considerable controversy already over whether what Crowley said regarding Obama’s statement was right/accurate but remember that the average viewer simply isn’t going to read everything ever written about the subject to get to the bottom of it. (If you, gentle reader, want to get to the bottom of it, you should read this amazing piece by the Post’s Fact Checker.) They are going to watch the debate and think: “Obama looked strong there, Romney looked like he didn’t have his facts straight.” Allowing Obama to win — or come damn close to it — on what should have been his weak spot in the debate was a miss by Romney. And, he was clearly jarred by how the Libya fight turned out; he didn’t regain his footing for 10 minutes or so afterwards.

Biggest, most hilarious, over-the-top, lying-his-privileged, comes-from-wealthy wealth arse line of the night:


Mitt Romney: “Our party has been focused on big business too long. I came through small business. I understand how hard it is to start a small business.”




cnn debate poll: 46% obama; 39% romney
— @jcpolls via web

CBS News Instant Poll: Obama edges Romney in second debate (CBS News) http://t.co/...
— @OpinionToday via web

Colorado voters give Obama a 48/44 victory in the debate- more importantly 58/36 among independents. Sample is R+3
— @ppppolls via web

The Janitors and The Candidates -- Political Wars in Elementary School

A friend of our family sent me this story about dueling political janitors and free speech.  She also sent me some great photos of the stickers she mentions in this story, but Blogger is not cooperating  tonight, and it won't let me upload them to this post.

But no matter.  I'll let A.E. McDonough tell her story and you'll just have to imagine what the photos look like--especially the "robo Romney" one.





"I did not watch the [first] debate due to being several loads of laundry behind my goal of having at least one pair of clean socks per person in the sock drawer. Luckily, Zayn still insists on wearing sandals so I'm up by one pair in the total count.

According to one of the janitors at the kids' school who posted a super caffeinated robot photo of Romney on the exit door with a quote from CNN, Romney won the debate. 

Yes, the political janitor wars are raging at Northeast Elementary. This all started back in the primaries when said janitor posted several republican signs on the school garbage cans. I was irritated but let it go until "Gone Back to Hawaii" appeared and I had a visceral reaction to the quasi-racist undertones and just tore the damn thing off and stuffed it in said garbage can.

The aforementioned janitor and I then had it out in front of a horrified Zayn, an unconditonally supportive Sami, and several other first and second graders eating french toast. The janitor thought it was his right to post whatever garbage he wanted on 'HIS' garbage can. He said there was a picture of Obama in the hallway so I tried to explain the difference between the Office of President (President Bush was up there when he was President) and a political statement that doesn't belong on a school trash can, especially one in favor of Newt Gingrich, the republican front runner at the time. He later told Zayn, 'Your mom is crazy." I said, "I'm crazy? How about a janitor who posts signs in support of a candidate who wants to eliminate his job and replace him with 8th graders! Now that's crazy!"

So I complained to the principal about the political garbage cans and the signs ended up on the doors near the back exit. The right door for Romney.  The left door for Obama.

Then the "Anyone But Obama" signs started appearing on the back exit door which working moms have to use when they pick up their kids from afterschool care. So I started removing them under strong protest from Zayn who complained that I was infringing upon aforementioned janitor's free speech rights. Far be it from me to squelch free speech and I love a good argument but can we contain the political rhetoric to one door that I don't have to see every day?

When the in-your-face bumper stickers start spilling out onto garbage cans and exit doors, it becomes a bit excessive, especially since the one Obama janitor seems to belong to the minimilast school of political sign posting. It's classy but does not seem to be getting the job done. But then maybe the Obama janitor knows about that wonderful vestige of 18th century American politics, the electoral college.
So now I need to plot my oh-so-clever response to said aforementioned janitor's latest post. Or I could just ignore it and do another load of laundry. But the photo of Romney is just so perfect for a speech bubble on top of the paper. I was thinking .... "What? I could've gotten another tax break when I shipped all those jobs overseas. I maybe need to get a new accountant." (Second half of sentence an actual Romney quote from this article.
>

Attention Seniors!

It's Official: Non-Partisan Kaiser Foundation Says 60% Of Seniors Would Pay More For Medicare Under Romney-Ryan Voucher Plan


"A new study out today by the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation confirms what many have been saying for a very long time—the Romney-Ryan Medicare plan would result in six out of ten seniors paying substantially more for the same Medicare benefits they receive today.

The premium support approach to Medicare involves the government providing seniors with a set amount of money each year—pegged to the second lowest priced private health care plan available—in an effort to turn over health care for seniors to the private insurance market. While proponents of the approach believe that this will generate more competition in health care, make seniors more responsible for how they spend their health care dollars and result in less spending on seniors by the federal government, critics have argued that the sum of money the government would pay would be insufficient to cover the rising costs of health care, leaving seniors exposed to having to pay an ever growing portion of their health insurance coverage.

[skip]

The study further found that the additional costs to seniors would vary from region to region, with areas of high per-capita Medicare spending seeing a cost boost for 80 percent of Medicare recipients."

When you hear Mr. Romney lie again tonight, remember this:

Glenn Kessler at The Washington Post concludes that Romney's is lying when he says his plan will create 12 million jobs. He gives the claim four pinncochios:

"This is a case of bait-and-switch. Romney, in his convention speech, spoke of his plan to create “12 million new jobs,” which the campaign’s White Paper describes as a four-year goal. But the candidate’s personal accounting for this figure in this campaign ad is based on different figures and long-range timelines stretching as long as a decade — which in two cases are based on studies that did not even evaluate Romney’s economic plan."

31 Straight Months of Job Growth

 

We'll hear from the opposition that it's the slowest recovery on record.  But what the opposition won't admit is that President Obama managed this 31 months of job growth without any help from the GOP, and with the GOP obstructing everything he's tried to do to hasten the recovery. And despite the GOP announcing that their first and most important goal was to make Mr. Obama a one-term president.  Notice that their primary goal was not putting Americans back to work?  The GOP's most pressing goal was self-aggrandizement, not helping our country recover. 

 

But the indisputable fact is that we have experienced 31 straight months of job growth.  And there isn't a drop, an iota, a scintilla of any evidence whatsoever that exists for the opposition to point to and say they could do better.  In fact, the man who wants Mr. Obama's job had one of the WORST job creation records as Massachusetts' governor.

 

 

"But...but...,"his people will point out,  "he inherited a bad economy, and the Massachusetts legislature is Democratic, while Gov. Romney was the opposition! And when he left office, the jobs were beginning to come back to Massachusetts and after 4 years, job growth was improving!" 

 

Yes.  They will point that out.  And we will all laugh.

 

 

FactCheck.org looks at claims from the Romney campaign on his record as Massachusetts governor:

 

"A campaign ad that praises Mitt Romney’s performance as governor of Massachusetts presents a slanted view of his record on jobs, unemployment and taxes. To every claim, there is a “yes, but” qualifier.

• The Romney ad claims that as governor, “Romney had the best jobs record in a decade.” Yes — Massachusetts added more net jobs during Romney’s four years in office than during the four-year period of either his predecessor or successor. But — that ignores the national recessions before and after Romney’s time in office. If you look at how Massachusetts stacked up on job creation compared with other states, Romney actually fared worse than his predecessor and successor.

• The ad claims Romney “reduced unemployment to just 4.7 percent.” Yes — Massachusetts’ unemployment rate went from 5.6 percent to 4.6 percent under Romney. But — the state’s unemployment rate was slightly lower than the national rate when he took office, and was roughly the same as the national rate when he left office.

• The ad claims Romney “balanced every budget without raising taxes.” Yes — Romney never raised personal income taxes. But — in order to balance the budget, Romney increased government fees by hundreds of millions of dollars."

Here's an interesting analysis of the first "debate" between Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama.

Sunday Night Poetry

CAT IN AN AFTERNOON

He approaches, impudent as vinegar
He owns his own conduct
And he’s not my friend.
It seems so only because I need
his moody company

I’ve always been a friend
To those who build mud-castles on beaches,
Afraid without their inventions,
I would disappear.

He stalks the baseboard, regards the screen.
I am not here, except to feed him. Worshipper
Of yarn and mote, he is one syllable.

I wish I’d learned Latin or something
Useful like planting orange trees.
I always decline in late afternoon.

Sometime his fur, sometime his claw,
The soft, the sharp enigma.

This door, was it here last week?

                                    --S.K.

Good Going, Joe!

 

 

 

Joan Walsh at Salon:

"Joe Biden wiped the floor with Paul Ryan at Thursday night’s debate, but we might have to spend a day debating whether he laughed too much while doing it.

On Medicare, on taxes, on abortion, on middle class opportunity and on foreign policy, Biden made Ryan look like he was trying out for the college debate team, and on substance, he pinned him to his and Mitt Romney’s least popular policies."
 

Please read this analysis on "severely conservative" Mr. Romney and the conservatives by d r i f t g l a s s.  Visit his blog, the link is on my bloglist. [vis dailykos]:

 driftglass writes, Liberal Media Continue to be Stunned That Conservatives Act Like Conservatives:

Don't me wrong: I appreciate the careful documentation the Many Lies of Team Romney during this election season. But I look at those efforts less as the drafting of a bill of particulars against the GOP, and more like Josephus gathering up an armful of books from burning Jerusalem and documenting the great city's demise from a perspective in the ruins.Why? Because for the Conservative 47% of the active electorate, the day Willard sewed up the Republican primary was the day it stopped mattering to them what lies Willard shits down their throat. Willard has calculated (correctly) that their bottomless, mindless, berserker hatred for the Kenyan Usurper means he can get away with saying and doing literally anything and then completely reversing himself hours later and so unless he transforms himself into a Scary Democrat Negro (hence my graphic), he has the base locked down. Willard has calculated (correctly) that the average "undecided" voter is an idiot who is barely aware that Barack Obama is President, much less who said what when. Lies? Truth? All the "undecided" knows for sure is that people on both side should stop being so mean! Willard has calculated (correctly) that most of American media is a joke run by hacks with the moral compasses of Tijuana donkey show pimps, who are congenitally unable to call a liar a liars, and who get paid on commission based on each time they say "Both Sides Do It" when a Republican shits the bed in public. Pointing to each morning's fresh lies from Team Romney, or the Republican Congress, or Boss Limbaugh and his legions of imitators or just random Conservative idiots with spluttering apoplexy has become the the bread and butter of Liberal teevee, radio and print. And good on them (us) for providing that service.   It does, however, beg the question, "Who the Hell are they talking to?" Because there is no referee in this fight, kids. There is no umpire, here: no impartial judge; no jury of 12 good men and true. For us, the playing field will never be level and we must stop playing as if it were, because there is no cavalry coming to rescue us but us. And most importantly, remember that however long the odds or however discouraging a given day might be, we are a hardy and tenacious stock, and our clear understanding of who we are and where we came from gives us a secret weapon that no movement based on a contempt for reality and a tissue of lies can match.

 

Off for the weekend.  Be back Sunday afternoon. 

 

 

Hey Dems! Chill Out!

Blogger Infidel753 was correct in his analysis about President Obama's performance at the first presidential debate:  There'd be a bump for Romney, but it wouldn't last.  The lastest polls prove Infidel's analysis correct.

Hey Dems!  Chill out!  It looks like we're gonna be okay.



"While there’s been an array of state and national numbers over the last few days, two sets of polls from NBC/WSJ/Marist and CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac represent some of the first results from top outlets that polling analysts tend to lend the most credibility. And the numbers, while improved for Romney, still show Obama with an advantage in key states.

Most important: Ohio, a likely must-win for Romney where Obama has held a solid lead in recent weeks. NBC/WSJ pegs the race at 51-45 for Obama, a 2-point bounce for Romney since their last poll with the president’s own support remaining steady. It’s the second post-debate poll of Ohio from a major news organization to show Obama breaking the 50 percent barrier — CNN put him up 51-47.

“The reality is that if there’s a preponderance of solid polling showing Ohio squarely in Obama’s corner, Romney remains in trouble,” Blake Zeff, a Democratic strategist, told TPM. “I’d like to see more polls there before reaching any conclusions, but today’s is a start.”

Regardless of the polling, however, Zeff added that it may take a solid debate performance from Obama in New York next week to reassure jittery supporters.
 
In another encouraging takeaway for Democrats, NBC/WSJ found that Democrats’ ground game may be paying dividends in early voting. Obama is winning Ohioans who have already cast their ballot by a 63-37 margin, and they make up 1 in 5 of the poll’s respondents. Early voting began the day before the first debate, giving Romney an opportunity to potentially bank some ballots ahead of Election Day with his strong performance, but it seems from NBC’s results that Obama still has the edge there.

Some 92 percent of voters also said their minds were made up before the debate, suggesting that Romney may have somewhat small — though still significant — base to court in the final weeks.
 
Another key state is Virginia, which could put Obama over the top in a number of hypothetical electoral scenarios that have him losing Ohio and Florida.

Here the two pollsters diverged. CBS/NYT found Obama actually gaining on Romney to move into a 51-46 lead, even in the immediate aftermath of a debate that the vast majority of state voters thought the president lost. NBC found things closer at 48-47 Romney, a shift from a 48-46 edge for Obama in their previous poll.
 
Other swing states polled suggested a tight race, but one whose margins are little changed from before the debate. CBS/NYT put Wisconsin at 50-47 Obama and Colorado at 47-48 Romney. NBC/WSJ found Florida essentially tied at 48-47 Obama, the same margin as before the debate. "

h/t TalkingPointsMemo


Go read more from Infidel753.

Go Elizabeth!

Elizabeth Warren was great in her debate with Scott Brown last night!   Here she is at her best:

"I have no doubt Sen Brown is a good husband and a good father to his daughters, but this is an issue that affects ALL of our daughters and our granddaughters. And what matters here is how Sen. Brown votes.

So he's gone to Washington and he's had some good votes. But he's had exactly one chance to vote for equal pay for equal work, and he voted no. He had exactly one chance to vote for insurance coverage for birth control and other preventive services for women. He voted no. And he had exactly one chance to vote for a pro-choice woman -- from Massachusetts -- to the United States Supreme Court, and he voted no.

Those are BAD votes for women.

The women of Massachusetts need a Senator they can count on not SOME of the time, but ALL of the time. I want to go to Washington to BE THERE for ALL of our daughters and ALL of our granddaughters.

This one really matters. There is a LOT at stake here...

... And I want to be blunt. We should not be fighting about equal pay for equal work and access to birth control in 2012. These issues were resolved years ago until the Republicans brought them back."

Classless

Romney uses the death of a Navy Seal to promote his presidential candidacy, against the wishes of  Glen Doherty's family.

Classless.

"On Tuesday, Romney spoke to supporters in Iowa, recalling a chance encounter with a former Navy SEAL while mistakenly attending a Christmas party in San Diego a few years ago.



' I met some remarkable people, one of whom was a former Navy SEAL,' Romney said. 'I just learned a few days ago that he was one of the two former Navy SEALs killed in Benghazi. It broke my heart.'

Romney didn't directly provide Doherty's name, but his campaign later confirmed his identity. He was one of four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, killed during a violent assault on the consulate in Benghazi last month.

Boston's WHDH later reached out to Doherty's mother, Barbara, to get her reaction to Romney's campaign trail anecdote.

"I don't trust Romney. He shouldn't make my son's death part of his political agenda," she told WHDH. "It's wrong to use these brave young men, who wanted freedom for all, to degrade Obama.”


Doherty similarly decried the politicization of her son's death in an interview with the Boston Herald last month.

Glen Doherty's friend, Elf Ellefsen, also spoke with Seattle's KIRO, expressing similar disagreement with Romney's mention of his friend's death.

According to Ellefsen, Doherty found his exchange with Romney to be "insincere and stale."


"Mitt Romney approached him ultimately four times, using this private gathering as a political venture to further his image," Ellefsen told KIRO. "He kept introducing himself as Mitt Romney, a political figure. The same introduction, the same opening line ... [Doherty] said it was pathetic and comical to have the same person come up to you within only a half hour, have this person reintroduce himself to you, having absolutely no idea whatsoever that he just did this 20 minutes ago, and did not even recognize Glen's face."

Romney had again made mention of his meeting with Doherty in the wake of these reports on Wednesday during a town hall event in Ohio."

Makes me throw up a little bit in my mouth.

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?

 

"COMPLETELY WRONG!"

 

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?

 

 

MITT vs. MITT

The Freak-Fringe Side Show: The GOP

If anyone had any doubts about how disconnected from reality and mainstream America many GOP politicians are, one only has to read their own words to understand their extremism.  The quotes below are a small sampling of what many GOPers and their followers think about our contemporary society and how it should conform to a Biblical Christian orthodoxy. 

This is the most technologically advanced society in the world, and yet millions of people actually vote for and approve of the folks who make these wildly inaccurate, ignorant, and racist claims and expect them to become leaders of the USA.

This is the modern Republican Party:


"You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth,” he told the crowd. “I don’t believe that the Earth’s but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says."

"All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell. And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior ... What I’ve come to learn is that [the Bible is] the manufacturer’s handbook, is what I call it. It teaches us how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches. But it teaches us how to run all of public policy and everything in society. And that’s the reason as your congressman I hold the holy Bible as being the major directions to me of how I vote in Washington, D.C., and I will continue to do that." ."--Representative Paul Broun (R-GA)


“… the institution of slavery that the black race has long believed to be an abomination upon its people may actually have been a blessing in disguise. The blacks who could endure those conditions and circumstances would someday be rewarded with citizenship in the greatest nation ever established upon the face of the Earth...will it ever become possible for black people in the United States of America to firmly establish themselves as inclusive and contributing members of society within this country?” Quote from Arkansas GOP state representative Jon Hubbard's book, "Letters To The Editor: Confessions of a Frustrated Conservative" (Pages 183-89)




"If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down." --Rep. Todd Aiken,(R-MO)


"It is no big surprise that we fight the terrorists because they are fundamentally un-American, and yet we have terrorists in our own culture called abortionists. One of the good pieces of news why we are winning this war is because there are not enough heartless doctors being graduated from medical schools. There is a real shortage of abortionists. Who wants to be at the very bottom of the food chain of medical profession? And what sort of places do these bottom-of-the-food-chain doctors work in? Places that are really a pit. You find that along with the culture of death go all kinds of other law-breaking: not following good sanitary procedure, giving abortions to women who are not actually pregnant, cheating on taxes, all these kinds of things, misuse of anesthetics so that people die or almost die."  --Rep. Todd Aiken (R-MO)




"If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual [gay] sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. ... That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing." --Rick Santorum, ex-US Senator  and GOP presidential candidate



"One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country.... Many of the Christian faith have said, well, that's okay, contraception is okay. It's not okay. It's a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be." --Rick Santorum, ex-US Senator and GOP presidential candidate




"I will tell you that I had a mother last night come up to me here in Tampa, Florida, after the debate. She told me that her little daughter took that vaccine, that injection, and she suffered from mental retardation thereafter." –Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), on the HPV vaccine, Fox News interview, Sept. 12, 2011




"Why should I go and do something like that? But the Lord says, 'Be submissive wives; you are to be submissive to your husbands." -Rep. Michele Bachmann, recalling in a 2006 speech at a Megachurch in Minneapolis that pursuing tax law wasn't her choice, but she did so at the urging of her husband because she was certain God was speaking through him.


“[Election Day Registration led to]the kids coming out of the schools and basically doing what I did when I was a kid, which is voting as a liberal. That’s what kids do — they don’t have life experience, and they just vote their feelings.”
~GOP New Hampshire House Speaker William O’ Brien, saying college students shouldn’t be allowed to vote because they vote liberal.


“Last week, we worked on some welfare reform bills. And here, it’s kind of ironic, I’ll read you this little funny clip that we got from a friend. It says, ‘Isn’t it ironic that the food stamp program, part of the Department of Agriculture, is pleased to be distributing the greatest amount of food stamps ever. Meanwhile, the Park Service, also part of the Department of Agriculture, asks us to please not feed the animals, because the animals may grow dependent and not learn to take care of themselves.”
~GOP Minnesota State Rep. Mary Franson, comparing the poor to wild animals.


And finally, the Republican candidate running for state office in Arkansas, Charlie Fuqua:

"The maintenance of civil order in society rests on the foundation of family discipline. Therefore, a child who disrespects his parents must be permanently removed from society in a way that gives an example to all other children of the importance of respect for parents. The death penalty for rebellious children is not something to be taken lightly. The guidelines for administering the death penalty to rebellious children are given in Deut 21:18-21:


This passage does not give parents blanket authority to kill their children. They must follow the proper procedure in order to have the death penalty executed against their children. I cannot think of one instance in the Scripture where parents had their child put to death. Why is this so? Other than the love Christ has for us, there is no greater love then [sic] that of a parent for their child. The last people who would want to see a child put to death would be the parents of the child. Even so, the Scrpture provides a safe guard to protect children from parents who would wrongly exercise the death penalty against them. Parents are required to bring their children to the gate of the city. The gate of the city was the place where the elders of the city met and made judicial pronouncements. In other words, the parents were required to take their children to a court of law and lay out their case before the proper judicial authority, and let the judicial authority determine if the child should be put to death. I know of many cases of rebellious children, however, I cannot think of one case where I believe that a parent had given up on their child to the point that they would have taken their child to a court of law and asked the court to rule that the child be put to death. Even though this procedure would rarely be used, if it were the law of land, it would give parents authority. Children would know that their parents had authority and it would be a tremendous incentive for children to give proper respect to their parents."

*****

None of the above is from an SNL skit.  These are real Republicans who want to take the reins of power and, possibly execute rebellious children, among other Biblical punishments and interesting suggestions from the OT.  These feverish ideas are at the heart of what the GOP is today:

A Freak-Fringe Side Show.

(And these people call liberalism a mental disease.)

And  Republicans want the Presidency, the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the Supreme Court, so that they can make all their squirrelly dreams of making this country into a theocracy come true. 

These are their real ideas and their real words, not those of someone doing a parody of crazy conservative politicians.

Make no mistake.  They would love these ideas to become the law of the land.

The Debate Week and How It All Sounded to Me

Boston has some really fine Indian Cuisine restaurants. Here's one I enjoyed on Saturday: 

Punjab Palace, Brighton, Mass.

About Those "Jobbers"...

you know, the ones who believe the Obama administration manipulated the job numbers?

Here's someone who actually knows what he's talking about:


"Let’s get one thing out of the way: The data was not, as Jack Welch suggested in a now-infamous tweet, manipulated. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is set up to ensure the White House has no ability to influence it. As labor economist Betsey Stevenson wrote, “anyone who thinks that political folks can manipulate the unemployment data are completely ignorant of how the BLS works and how the data are compiled.” Plus, if the White House somehow was manipulating the data, don’t you think they would have made the payroll number look a bit better than 114,000? No one would have batted an eye at 160,000. [...]

The number could, of course, be wrong. The household survey is, well, a survey, which means it’s open to error. But the internals back it up. The number saying they had jobs increased by about 800,000. That seems high, but it’s counting 582,000 who say they got part-time jobs.

This is an encouraging report. What it tells us is that the labor market has been a bit better over the last few months than we thought, and that the recovery hasn’t slowed in the ways we feared. What the response to it tells us is that the election is driving people a little bit crazy. " --Ezra Klein

A little bit crazy?

I'd say out-of-control, crazy-as-a-ferret-on-meth crazy.

Certain rightwingers are so intense in their hatred of President Obama that even good news about more Americans working is seen as something evil and underhanded instead of a relief that our economy is, by inches, doing better.  The unemployment numbers didn't bottom out until half way into Mr. Obama's first year, then it was a slow but steady climb out of the hole we were in.

I find it astounding that a huge segment of our society actually is pissed about that.  But then I remember the GOP's goal:  To do everything in its power to stop Mr. Obama from getting a second term even if that meant hurting American families.  In less than 3 1/2 years this country is coming back from the worst economic disaster since the Great Depression.  And yet, there they are, eyes bulging, veins popping, apoplectic over the good news, and actually claiming the numbers were manipulated.

Why would any sane person vote these people back into office?  People who put their irrational  hatred of President Obama ahead of their love of country?

Ray Mederios of Politicususa:

"...the BLS isn’t the only statisticians in town. We also have APD payroll, a private company that surveys private companies, and for months their numbers have been larger than BLS.


In fact, even this month ADP’s numbers came in bigger than the BLS final number. Being conservative, you would think they would believe the private sector more than the public sector numbers. But considering those numbers are actually better for Obama, they conveniently ignore that fact.

Another indicator that these right wing BLS truthers are just crying over nothing is Gallup polling. Economic confidence is up, and the University of Michigan’s consumer confidence is also increased. What does that tell us? People feel more confident in their economic situation, and are spending more money, etc.

Even Gallup polling for unemployment came in at 7.8%. The problem for Republicans is that these numbers don’t help their prospects of getting elected, or support their argument. It’s pathetic really. When you think about it, the right is cheering on and hoping for bad numbers in order to increase their chances of winning elections."

Debate Schmate

JOBS REPORT:

JOBS REPORT: +114K, 7.8% UNEMPLOYMENT



Heh:

October 4, 2012

In the midst of a painful news cycle after last night's debate, President Barack Obama received a bright sign for re-election. His Gallup approval rating hit 54 percent, jumping to its highest level since November 2009.

His approval rating soared four points from the previous day in Gallup's three-day rolling average. The last time he matched that came in the Nov. 11-13, 2009 period.

 
The 54-percent mark puts Obama well above the "safe" 50-percent threshold for an incumbent's re-election.


Obama's highest mark this year came in the sunny aftermath of the Democratic National Convention, when he reached 52 percent. Then it tanked, and since then it has fluctuated wildly.


Here's why the 50 percent threshold is important, per Gallup managing editor Jeffrey M. Jones:

The 50% approval mark is significant because post-World War II incumbent presidents who have been above 50% job approval on Election Day were easily re-elected. Presidents with approval ratings below 50% have more uncertain re-election prospects. Historically, two presidents below 50% in their final approval rating before the election -- George W. Bush and Harry Truman -- won, and three, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H.W. Bush, lost.

 

 

George W. Bush's approval rating at this point in 2004 was only at 50 percent, so comparatively, Obama is in good shape.

 
In the Gallup daily tracking poll, Obama leads Romney 49-45. That was unchanged from the previous day.

 

cartoon via Democratic Underground

 

 

 

Booman Tribune, October 5, 2012

 

 

"Obama's overall favorable numbers remained unchanged at 56-44. His numbers with Democrats also remained unchanged at 90-10. But he flipped a 46-54 deficit with independents to a 54-46 positive rating. The post-debate sample included fewer Democrats than the pre-debate sample, which helps explain why Obama's overall rating remained constant even as he did so well with independents.

 

Again, this is a single poll. But if these numbers hold up in other polls, it tells us that Obama actually won the debate with people in the middle who are what we call persuadable voters. It could be that people recognized that Romney was more aggressive and therefore assume he won the debate, but they weren't personally impressed. Republicans loved the debate because Romney got to use a bunch of their crazy talking points without the usual contradiction. It made them feel good to watch someone get away with that for a change and also to see someone be rude, arrogant and condescending to the president they love to hate.

 

There's a real benefit to this for Romney. He energized his own troops. He gave them hope. He gave them a reason to keep working. He pulled a lot of people out of their apathetic stupor. Riling up the troops is important and will deliver votes to Romney. But it comes at a cost, too." 

Debate

I couldn't watch the whole debate because of other pressing matters I had to deal with.

From what little I caught on the teevee and the peecee, President Obama's performance was steady and factual; Governor Romney came off as a bully who tried desperately to score points by talking over the president and moderater, as though that counted as substance.

I've never liked these presidential debates, even the ones in 2008 when Mr. Obama did so well against John McCain.  Romney got to repeat his lies and distortions, and the president let him get away with it.  All I learned from what I saw is that this race is still close.

\

 

The always insightful Infidel753 gives us his analysis on the first debate.  Plus this:

 

 

 

 

Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo:

 

 

"Romney’s focus though came at the cost of a few key things.
 
He basically tossed aside his own tax plan or said he would if his numbers didn’t add up. But then he insisted that he could find enough loopholes to close to afford a $5 trillion tax cut for upper income earners. These are more numbers on the table. That’s really what most of the debate was about — budget numbers. Romney insisted with a straight face that up was down.
 
The Obama team isn’t going to try to get into a fight about whether their guy was on his game. There’s no point. (This is what I meant a couple days ago when I said Obama is not a great debater. Not a great night. But I’ve never seen him great at debating.) What I fully expect, what they’ll do if they’re smart is go full court press on Romney’s numbers and press for details about his budget plan.

 
The numbers simply don’t add up. Over a few news cycles that can build up really fast. He says he’ll push massive upper income tax cuts and those have to come at the cost of much higher deficits or big tax hikes for middle income people. His campaign agenda is based on a massive deception.
 
That’s the vulnerability Romney brings out of this debate. And it may be bigger than people realize. " 


"The Shrill One":

Romney’s Sick Joke

"OK, so Obama did a terrible job in the debate, and Romney did well. But in the end, this isn’t or shouldn’t be about theater criticism, it should be about substance. And the fact is that everything Obama said was basically true, while much of what Romney said was either outright false or so misleading as to be the moral equivalent of a lie.
Above all, there’s this:

MR. ROMNEY: Let — well, actually — actually it’s — it’s — it’s a lengthy description, but number one, pre-existing conditions are covered under my plan.

No, they aren’t. Romney’s advisers have conceded as much in the past; last night they did it again.


I guess you could say that Romney’s claim wasn’t exactly a lie, since some people with preexisting conditions would retain coverage. But as I said, it’s the moral equivalent of a lie; if you think he promised something real, you’re the butt of a sick joke.

And we’re talking about a lot of people left out in the cold — 89 million, to be precise.
Furthermore, all of this should be taken in the context of Romney’s plan not just to repeal Obamacare but to drastically cut Medicaid.

So enough with the theater criticism; Romney needs to be held accountable for dishonesty on a huge scale."