How do we know they have nothing to run on?

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They've more or less said so.

Here's former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright speaking at a campaign rally in Colorado and really making the case for Team O's track record:





Now, she may have been speaking tongue-and-cheek but the enthusiasm exhibited by the crowd certainly suggests, "Hell yeah, we've got nothing to run on. Let's keep blaming Bush."

Bush Derangement Syndrome: more and more evidence like witnessed above surfaces that shows the possibility that BDS may simply be incurable.



How do we know they have nothing to run on (Pt. II)?


Because Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said so:

Back in February, Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner was responding to questions raised by House Budget Committee Chairman, Paul Ryan, and specifically what the broadly outlined Obama budget made public via an Obama speech was going to do with respect to our long-term debt problem. Geithner's response:

“We’re not coming before you to say we have a definitive solution to that long-term problem. What we do know is we don’t like yours (Ryan's budget proposal.)”

Everything you need to know about the shameless cynicism, small-mindedness and lack of seriousness possessed by this administration is summed up in that quote. But you better get used to it because that quote will represent the emotional and intellectual rigor behind everything else you will hear from now until November.

The depth and extent of the aforementioned unseriousness we wrote about above earlier this spring is frightening if not totally beyond description.

They have nothing to run on so they continue to blame Bush. They have no plan other than savaging yours.



A supposed strength of Team O back at the beginning of the administration was it's "competence". Seriously? Is the campaign they have been running suggest they collectively have anything resembling competence?

They had trouble finding anybody for their top Cabinet positions that didn't have tax problems. And before that, the President, the smartest man in the room in his first big decision as a would-be President chose as his running mate, the person "one heart-beat away", not just a loose-cannon but as he has proven over and over again during the course of his political career, a certifiable wack job. That's the guy whom Obama thought would be a prudent and wise choice for a running mate. He built that.

And when the economic fortunes of this country did not turn around despite promises to the contrary with the continuation of the Bush-era TARP bailout, the Chrysler and General Motors bailouts and the $800 billion American Recovery Act (Porkulus), we were told that the underlying problems were "worse than assumed". Got it. We have the smartest kids in the room from Christine Romer and Timothy Geithner to Peter Orszag and Larry Summers, Ivy Leaguers all, and all they can summon is a feeble "shit's worse than we thought, man" before beating it back to academia and Wall Street.

That's competence?

A cabinet that can't keep its yapper shut with respect to the details of the killing of bin Laden.

A president that gives cover to his BFF, Eric Holder, by on one hand extending executive privilege to details surrounding the highly successful federal gun-running scheme, Fast and Furious, but on the other hand, claiming he knew nothing about it.

And let's not forget that both the President and Holder in pushing for a civilian trial for terrorist master-mind KSM, reassured the country that even if KSM were acquitted, he would never see the light of day. Huh?

An administration whose Department of Energy green loan program that is more kiss-of-death than the job-creator and green energy innovator they promised it would be such is the number of companies that have gone bankrupt resulting in the laying off of thousands of workers and the loss of billions of tax-payer dollars. And we're supposed to be horrified of Romney's record while at Bain Capital.

Please stop us at any time, if anything you are reading here resembles "competence".

If the media were playing this straight-up Romney/Ryan would be up 10 right now and cruising. But they aren't which is the only, the only reason this thing is as close as it is.

No time for weak knees, now. Let's keep driving. November's right around the corner.

Video clip of the day

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Trending topic out there on the 2012 campaign trail is overseas investments and overseas bank acounts, er rather evil overseas investments and bank accounts which rather incoveniently is a bipartisan affair.

Anyway, here's Reason's Matt Welch breaking tbings down:

(apologies for the video quality)





Diversification


Welch nails it at the end: We are asked to be more concerned with what someone is doing with his money than what the government is doing with our money.


Or as @iowahawkblog tweeted: Romney invested his money in Swiss banks - Obama invested our money in Greek economics.

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Crony capitalism by the numbers

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Entrance question: Just how incompetent do they have to be that they cannot even make crony capitalism work?



Marc A. Thiessen in writing for the Washington Post helpfully explains that if Mitt Romney's private equity record is fair game then so should be Obama's public equity record. Through either the stimulus bill or the Department of Energy's loan program, the administration has invested billions of taxpayer dollars in private businesses. And how's that been working out?

By the numbers...

33 million: The amount of money given to Raser Technologies to build a power plant in Utah. The company filed for bankruptcy protection in 2012 and owes $1.5 million in back taxes.


126 million: The amount of tax-payer dollars given to ECOtality for the installation of 14,000 electric car chargers. ECOtality’s own SEC filings, the company has since incurred more than $45 million in losses and has told the federal government, “We may not achieve or sustain profitability on a quarterly or annual basis in the future.”


98.5 million: The size of a loan guarantee to Nevada Geothermal Power (NGP) in 2010. The New York Times reported last October that the company is in “financial turmoil” and that “[a]fter a series of technical missteps that are draining Nevada Geothermal’s cash reserves, its own auditor concluded in a filing released last week that there was ‘significant doubt about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern.’ ”


3 billion (yes, that's billion with a "b"): the amount of tax-payer dollars given to First Solar in the form of a loan guarantee for power plants in Arizona and California. According to a Bloomberg Businessweek report last week, the company “fell to a record low in Nasdaq Stock Market trading May 4 after reporting $401 million in restructuring costs tied to firing 30 percent of its workforce.”


400 million: the amount of a loan guarantee given to Abound Solar, Inc. to build solar panel factories. Currently, the company has halted production and laid off 180 employees.



43 million: the size of the loan guarantee given to green-energy storage company Beacon Power. According to CBS News, at the time of the loan, “Standard and Poor’s had confidentially given the project a dismal outlook of ‘CCC-plus.’ ” In the fall of 2011, Beacon received a delisting notice from Nasdaq and filed for bankruptcy.

From linked article:

This is just the tip of the iceberg. A company called SunPower got a $1.2 billion loan guarantee from the Obama administration, and as of January, the company owed more than it was worth. Brightsource got a $1.6 billion loan guarantee and posted a string of net losses totaling $177 million. And, of course, let’s not forget Solyndra — the solar panel manufacturer that received $535 million in taxpayer-funded loan guarantees and went bankrupt, leaving taxpayers on the hook.

And our favorite numbers from this article:

71: the percentage of DOE grants and loans that went to “individuals who were bundlers, members of Obama’s National Finance Committee, or large donors to the Democratic Party.” This according to Peter Schweizer's book, "Throw Them All Out".

100: the number of criminal investigations that have been launched by the DOE's inspector general related to the department's green-energy program.




Here's some more on private equity firms from Democrat Lanny Davis:

Private equity firms often invest in distressed companies by putting in cash and cutting expenses in order to save a company that is already close to bankruptcy. Sometimes the investment works and the company and jobs are saved. And sometimes, to save the company, jobs need to be cut or wages and benefits reduced.

Does that sound familiar? It should. It’s called the General Motors bailout, widely touted by President Obama and Democrats as a success story, which it was.

Except that it wasn't. GM stock is currently trading at $22/share, down from the $33/share at its IPO. And that price will have to get up to $50/share in order to break even on the bailout. As it stands right now, we have lost billions to General Motors and we, most likely, will never get it back.




And one last thing regarding public equity and Obama's miserable track record regarding the same, next time you hear a Team O water carrier or someone from the administration itself pop-off about the people Romney laid off, remember this:

The Treasury Department encouraged automakers seeking TARP funds to rapidly close their dealerships, even though the plan contributed no specific savings to the companies and caused job losses at a time of mounting unemployment, according to a scathing new audit published Monday.

The report focuses on the plans by Chrysler LLC and General Motors Corp. to rapidly reduce their number of dealerships by about 25 percent each, and the role that Treasury played in encouraging the automakers to do so quickly instead of over the course of five years.

The audit was prepared by Neil Barofsky, a former federal prosecutor who now serves as special inspector general for the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Chrysler eliminated 789 dealerships in June 2009, and GM plans to wind down 1,454 dealerships by October of this year. The rationale behind those moves was that the old dealership network was too big, and that by closing some of the dealerships, the remaining ones would be more profitable and better positioned to re-invest in their businesses.

Wow. Kind of sounds like something Bain would've done.

Heh.


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Constitutional republics are like, hard (cont.)

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If you watch nothing else today or this week, please check out this video (~7 min.) below from Bill Whittle and Firewall and with respect to inherent rights and being free to do what the hell you want.



President Obama is totally bummed out over the provisions within the National Defense Authorization Act which he signed into law in November of 2011 which gives the federal government the power to indefinetely detain U.S.-born suspected terrorists on U.S. soil without due cause and presumptive G.O.P. nominee Mitt Romney is cool with it because he totally believes that neither Obama nor he, were he to be President, would abuse this power.

Guess what...?






It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter because this power is now enshrined into law and we are assured by completely fallible human beings that they would never, ever abuse that power.


Where we once had a right, we now have an assurance.


Where we once had 1st amendment rights, we are now forced by the government to pay for other people's contraception, quite possibly against our religious beliefs, because of the provisions contained within ObamaCare.


And it's happening without any of us causing much of a fuss because it's all happening... slowly. You can't feel it, we can't feel it but there's those laws setting on the shelves right now for all eternity waiting for it's moment to be abused.

It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what assurances are given; the legal framework to bury both the 1st and 5th amendment are in place and it really didn't take that long.

Your right to freedom of speech and freedom of religion and your right not to be unlawfully detained are not granted by the Constitution. Those are inherent rights; rights existing merely because you are breathing. They are rights that are protected by the Constitution from interference by the government. And now they are rights that are in serious jeopardy because of the seduction of power and of ignorance and hypocrisy.

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Quickies

A round-up of articles, news items, columns and blog posts that caught our eye this past week.








B-Daddy has some thoughts on a potential Palin presidential run in 2012.

I am always torn by her, she is so unapologetic for my so many of my core values that I can't help but smile when she zings the media, the left and Obama. But she doesn't inspire my confidence, in the same way that Obama didn't inspire confidence in the 2008 elections.

As much as our side disliked John McCain, I respected him for this, he could wade into a hostile town hall meeting, take tough questions, and provide answers without losing his cool. Neither Obama nor Palin seem able to do so. Obama still can't after two years on the job, and I frankly don't think he is very intelligent.

While we largely agree with this assessment, we're not looking forward to a Palin run for a very different reason: the level of savagery and unhinged hatred that would be unleashed upon her would be unprecendented and detract from real issues that need to be addressed by this country as we decide who the next President will be. We would worry for her safety and that of her family's.

Just this past week, on his radio show, MSNBC personality, Ed Schultz called Laura Ingraham a "slut", twice, in case anyone misunderstood him the first time around. Ingraham is a second-tier conservative radio host. Expect more of the same new civility we've all been told we need to be practicing to be directed at Palin but on an order of magnitude or two larger should she decide to run. The mere thought of what we will read and see over the next 18 months should this come to pass is already making us sick to our stomach.


And Leslie at Temple of Mut has some thoughts on Palin Derangement Syndrome in the media, here.






Michael Ramirez... best in the biz.

Honduras is back in the news a bit as legally-deposed former President Manuel Zelaya who had been in exile has been allowed to return to Honduras and thus will return Honduras to everyone's good graces. Left Coast Rebel has the goods, here.

Our previous rants on Honduras can be found here.




If it's a Sunday, must mean it's time for Shane Atwell's weekly regulation watch blog post.

The biggest news this week is that the TSA and Department of Justice managed the bully the Texas legislature into withdrawing its bill to make groping genitalia without probable cause illegal. In related news Rand Paul managed to single handedly delay the extension of the 'Patriot' Act and its surveillance without court orders to the last minute but not past expiration. Does this mean Rand Paul has bigger balls than the entire Texas legislature?

Note that there are dozens of stories of how Obama is going to reduce regulation and streamline agencies. Frankly I think its a big lie and I won't link to those stories here until something good actually comes of it. So far their main accomplishment seems to have been figuring out that spilled milk is not the same as an oil spill.

What a great resource. Thanks, Shane!



There he goes again...

Of all the prospective GOP candidates out there, we are inclined to make the most excuses for or rationalize the most for Mitt Romney. He exudes a CEO-like competence in spades over most of the field and.... that hair, man, that hair.

Anyway, here's Mitt on the subject of ethanol subsidies this past week in Des Moines, Iowa:

It was an odd setting for a policy pronouncement, but on the sidewalk outside the Historical Building here, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney embraced ethanol subsidies. It came just days after and blocks from where his rival for the Republican presidential nomination, Tim Pawlenty, said the subsidies should be phased out.

“I support the subsidy of ethanol,” he told an Iowa voter. “I believe ethanol is an important part of our energy solution for this country.” Iowa leads the nation in the production of corn, a main source of ethanol.

(sigh)


We already showered earlier this morning so we'll save some water by keeping our mouth shut and not even attempting to defend this stupiditiy.





Terrific...

The United States is running out of a rare gas that is crucial for detecting smuggled nuclear-weapons materials because one arm of the Energy Department was selling the gas six times as fast as another arm could accumulate it, and the two sides failed to communicate for years, according to a new congressional audit.

The gas, helium-3, is a byproduct of the nuclear-weapons program, but as the number of nuclear weapons has declined, so has the supply of the gas. Yet, as the supply was shrinking, the government was investing more than $200 million to develop detection technology that required helium-3.

As a result, government scientists and contractors are racing to find or develop a new detection technology.

And finally, more incoherency on illegal immigration. Here's DNC chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz not making a whole lot of sense:

I think the president was clearly articulating that his position — the Democrats position — is that we need comprehensive immigration reform. We have 12 million undocumented immigrants in this country that are part of the backbone of our economy. And that is not only a reality but a necessity. And that it would be harmful if — the Republican solution that I’ve seen in the last three years is that we should just pack them all up and ship them back to their own countries, and that in fact it should be a crime and we should arrest them all. I mean that was the legislation that Jim Sensenbrenner advanced a couple of years ago.

Never mind that the establishment wings of both parties are in bed with one another on this subject, it's telling the lack of any middle ground that can be negotiated over when the other side simply refuses to acknowledge the fact that illegal immigrants are breaking the law and indeed committing a crime.


That's all gang. We'll be back in tomorrow.

The Bay State: once again the health care bell cow

Since this is yet more wonderful news we are finding out after the ObamaCare legislation has been passed, this qualifies for Nancy's Nuances: a journey of discovery.

Remember, folks, if it is happening to the Massachusetts health care sector you can pretty much bet on it happening to the rest of us when all the "benefits" of ObamaCare start kicking in.

The relentlessly rising cost of health insurance is prompting some small Massachusetts companies to drop coverage for their workers and encourage them to sign up for state-subsidized care instead, a trend that, some analysts say, could eventually weigh heavily on the state’s already-stressed budget.

Since April 1, the date many insurance contracts are renewed for small businesses, the owners of about 90 small companies terminated their insurance plans with Braintree-based broker Jeff Rich and indicated in a follow-up survey that they were relying on publicly-funded insurance for their employees.

In Sandwich, business consultant Bill Fields said he has been hired by small businesses to enroll about 400 workers in state-subsidized care since April, because the company owners said they could no longer afford to provide coverage. Fields said that is by far the largest number he has handled in such a short time.

“They are giving up out of frustration,’’ Fields said of the employers. “Most of them are very compassionate but they simply can’t afford health insurance any more.’’

Compassion and a couple of bucks might get you a cup of coffee but as the employers of Massachusetts are quickly finding out, paying the $300 fine instead of covering their employees to the tune of an order of magnitude more than the fine just makes more business sense, compassion be damned.

This, even after Romneycare which was signed into law in 2006 included incentives for employers to provide coverage to low income workers.

Word around the campfire is that Congressional liberals that were not initially onboard with ObamaCare because it did not include the single-payer/public option were convinced otherwise because of this perverse incentive built into ObamaCare whereby businesses saw the option of paying the fine preferable to providing health care for their employees and thus dumping them into a public health plan.

The single-payer model is the defacto endgame here, even though it was never expressly written into the legislation.

H/T: Hot Air

Checkin' in from the RNCC

At long last, we have a "Mark" sighting. Our intrepid NYC-living, Minnesota-born correspondent, from whom we last we heard was potentially being assailed by a bunch of self-aggrieved, middle-class white kids, has checked in with this report:


"Greetings from the RNC... although I am now safely back home after an unbelievably hectic week! The networking in St. Paul and Minneapolis surpassed my wildest expectations. In addition to meeting Bill O'Reilly (in a restaurant restroom, but hey a celebrity is a celebrity) and three US senators (at a panel discussion), I was able to secure tickets for the BIG event: delegate guest pass seats inside the Xcel Energy Center to witness Sarah's speech (as well as Rudy's, Romney's and Huckabees') first-hand! UNBELIEVABLE experience. The enthusiasm for Sarah almost brought tears to my eyes. It was so LOUD that my ears are still ringing 6 nights later, and my voice is still hoarse from yelling.

As Dean mentioned, it got a bit dicey on the shuttle bus back to downtown Minneapolis afterwards (I had to stowaway on a Kentuck delegation bus... long story), due to the dopey, unwashed "protesters" rampaging throughout downtown Minny that night. Our bus actually had to get a 10-motorcycle police escort back to the delegation's hotel! SCARY for a few minutes... but the police (in full riot gear) got things under control just before last call... hooray! I spent the last 2 hours of an incredible day toasting the GOP, as scummy socialists with no job (and apparently no soap) were being loaded into police vans.

My week at the RNC was incredible... and I come away, back to the friendly confines of my apartment in NYC, more enthusiastic and dedicated to the Republican cause than EVER. I am sure the GOP is thinking, as far as their convention in the Twin Cities is concerned, "Mission Accomplished!"



Nice work, Mark. Glad to hear you are safe in the NYC and didn't get any of that on ya.

Mitt Romney Slept Here?

No, but seeing this in the top drawer of the nightstand of our hotel room here in Boston, Mass. instead of the usual Gideon's Bible did catch us off-guard.

Our suspicions were confirmed as the front desk informed us that Mr. Radisson was indeed a Saint.




We were able to locate something else, though, by opening up another compartment inside our room by which we were much more accustomed but one which Mr. Radisson may not have approved.




...aaaaaaahhhhhh. Much better.

Reaganesque....? Believe It.

Because we spent approx. 18 hours in airports and planes the past couple of days, we were unable to see the Obama race speech and all the accompanying commentary surrounding it which is a good thing because after watching it in its entirety on YouTube this evening, we did have a few unfiltered thoughts:

Overall, we thought it was good but it fell short of the mark and certainly did not have the broad sweeping impact that Romney’s religion in America speech did (but guess which one will always be referred to more often down the line?).

Why did it fall short of the mark? Well, for one thing it was too long. He starts off well keeping to the arching themes of race in this country’s history and giving what we felt was a very strong repudiation of Wright’s words and rhetoric. However, Obama starts drifting half-way through his speech, using his call for racial reconciliation as a jumping-off point for better healthcare, education, ending the war in Iraq, etc., etc.… campaign stumping that should have been placed on hold for this occasion.

He then goes on to rationalize the bigotry exhibited by some blacks on real injustices visited upon them in the past and at times, in the present. Fair enough (don’t necessarily agree but…O.K). But then, mystifyingly, he turns around and rationalizes white bigotry on affirmative action and welfare which, in his opinion, formed the foundation of the Reagan coalition. This is pure hooey, of course, and does not even dignify a response.

While listening to all this rationalization for plain old bad behavior without a straight-up unqualified condemnation of the same, a quote came to mind made by Rosalind Carter when speaking of (speaking of…) Reagan that we will apply to the subject at hand: “Obama make us comfortable with our prejudices”. He does. Because he didn’t just come out and say bigotry and racism was inexcusable, he made us feel a little more comfortable with some that we may harbor… its not really our fault, after all….just look at history.
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We will commend him, though, for recognizing part of the greatness of this country is that it is not “static” with respect to progress whether its race, gender or religion. This is a theme pro-Western Civ types like us have been making for years especially with respect to Islam: “yeah, some of our history is not pretty… freely admitted… but we always reserve the right to be smarter and better than we used to be”.

We may have more later but that was what made the strongest initial impressions. Good but not great. Certainly, with all the hoopla surrounding this dust-up the opportunity for greatness was there so we’ll just call this a long single rather than a home-run.

P.S. The nagging suspicion remains…. He wants to use the "crazy uncle” argument but how can you break bread with that same crazy uncle for over 20 years without cracking him upside the skull? Obama says that we all have people in our lives that we love yet have disagreements with but, my g#d, those types of disagreements. And, worse, he never gives any evidence that he challenged Wright on any of his rhetoric over those 20 years. Nice speech but actions do speak louder than words so we don’t believe he is quite off the hook on this one.

If you see this man coming towards you…. Run!

Click here for segment of a McLaughlin group roundtable debate on Romney’s Mormonism speech. Its over 9 minutes long but you only need to see to the first 3 or 4 minutes to see what a insecure grown-up, who was beat up by a Mormon as a kid and then later dumped by a Mormon chick as a 23 yr. old, acts and sounds like.

Lawrence O’Donnell an MSNBC political analyst and a person who has a history of untoward behavior on the talkies, kind of loses it by latching on to what he alleges as Mormonism’s (former) support of slavery like a hungry dog onto a meat bone. He just wouldn’t let it go and wound up looking the ass because of it.

Pat Buchanan’s facial expression during this tirade is classic. Head cocked to one side and eyes slightly squinted with a “Dude, what are you talking about?” expression on his face. Buchanan parries nicely by retorting, “My grandfather owned slaves”, as in “Are you going to hold that against me?”

To cap it all off, O’Donnell was interviewed later by Hugh Hewitt about his criticism of Mormonism but the lack of same regarding Islam. Here’s the exchange:

HH: Would you say the same things about Mohammed as you just said about Joseph Smith?
LO’D: Oh, well, I’m afraid of what the…that’s where I’m really afraid. I would like to criticize Islam much more than I do publicly, but I’m afraid for my life if I do.
HH: Well, that’s candid.
LO’D: Mormons are the nicest people in the world. They’re not going to ever…
HH: So you can be bigoted towards Mormons, because they’ll just send you a strudel.
LO’D: They’ll never take a shot at me. Those other people, I’m not going to say a word about them.
HH: They’ll send you a strudel. The Mormons will bake you a cake and be nice to you.
LO’D: I agree.
HH: Lawrence O’Donnell, I appreciate your candor. (thanks to Hot Air)

What a piece (of work), this guy. In a nutshell, there’s all you really need to know about the content of the character and the vertebral fortitude of those residing in the newsrooms and occupying the teleprompter pulpits in this country.

We still don’t know who we’re voting for in the Republican primaries but Romney seems to be pissing-off the right people so we definitely haven’t tossed him out yet.

Quickies: What’s in a word?, Mitt’s Mormonism speech and the 8(?) things you can’t say on T.V.

It would appear that campus “liberals” in Iran are far less enamored of their esteemed leader Mahmoud Ahmedenjiad than are campus “liberals” here stateside. Read article here reporting on student protests in Iran.

We have the text of Mitt’s Mormonism speech here. Read it and decide for yourself whether you think his religious beliefs would be an issue. Call us crazy but we don’t think Joe Lieberman would feel compelled to explain his Judaism to the American electorate were he running for President. Judaism being a religion, we might add, that rejects the central tenet of Christianity.

ESPN is becoming increasingly difficult to watch, anymore. They take self-absorbed and self-congratulatory behavior to an entirely different level. Here are a couple of recent examples of the World Wide Leader’s mediocre and/or possibly slanted programming.

…..in the wake of the Ravens choke-job against the Pats last Monday night, the post-game commentary was fixated on Bart Scott’s temper tantrum at the end of the game and Samari Rolle’s (an African-American) allegation that one of the ref’s (also an African-American) referred to him as “boy”. They simply would not let it go…. these two issues were beat to death all week providing cover for Brian Billick and his coaching staff flat-lining in the fourth quarter which was the real story.

also, Tim Tebow’s acceptance speech upon winning the Heisman on Saturday (he had our vote, btw) contained numerous acknowledgments to his faith in Christ… in fact, it was the very first thing he mentioned upon winning the award. SportsCenter aired immediately after the ceremony and the Heisman presentation (we watched the taped re-broadcast at 9 PST) was the lead story and they played back plenty of Tebow’s acceptance speech….. except for any of the “Jesus” and “God” stuff.

Look… we’re not advancing an agenda or necessarily trying to make a point, we just thought it odd that a speech we saw a mere 15-20 minutes earlier and which contained several testaments to faith throughout the speech was wholely sanitized of the same when it came time to roll the hi-lite tape. A faith that Tebow felt was just as important if not more so than any other factor if his acceptance speech was to be believed

There's Just Something About Massachusetts

One of the cool things about being “friends" of other blogs is that you can post stuff you found on their site and feel like you’ve done some actual work.

KT over at the Scratching Post had this video which is a campaign video of sorts for Mitt Romney and which was put together by Slate using material from Romney’s own campaign site. Video can (hopefully) be viewed at link provided below.

http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid271557392/bctid1184432033

Its a parody.... we think. And if it is, it had an odd charm about it. The boy-ish good looks, the playful kidding around, the New Englanders lost-in-Iowa cluelessness, the sports... err, golf.... Were these the Romneys or the Kennedys?

I Say Tomato....

When a politician's ideaology or position on matters moves from left to right (OK, OK.... it doesn't happen often but just work with us here), that person is charged with being a hypocrite, a phony, a right-wing puppet, etc.

However, when a politician's ideaology migrates from right to left, particularly when said politician gets to D.C. and catches the West Potomac virus, its merely, "maturing in office".... a much rosier hue, wouldn't you say?

We chose the "rugged, sporting Mitt" look. A favorite among Presidential candidates from Massachusetts, recently.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20070809/D8QTP59O0.html