All I can say, is that was two hours of my life I’ll never get back.
I did my civic duty. I watched that put-me-out-of-my-misery dog and elephant show. I watched to the bitter end as the participants congratulated each other on being an exceptionally “strong field” of candidates, while the rest of America choked on its root beer floats.
I watched Timmy “the Paws” Pawlenty, cower in fear when asked to confront Mitt “the Man” Romney, with his newly coined Obamacare slogan.
I watched Newt throw his beer gut around in self-presumed authority and say nothing that was the least bit memorable. I watched Santorum and for the life of me couldn’t think of anything beyond “frothy” and feel the awful acid at the back of my throat.
Michelle engaged in Michelle stuff; can we all say “Obama will be a one-term president!” and do it all together kids. She wouldn’t interfere in New Hampshire’s decision to allow same-sex marriage, except when she found herself alone with Herman “why is the black man down at the far end?” Cain on that issue. She quickly returned to the fold–she would support a constitutional amendment which the states could all participate in voting on. Not a one had the decency to say that such an amendment stands the proverbial snowball’s chance. . . .
Cain is a deep dish man by the way, in case you care.
Oh and Ron Paul basically told us we don’t get monetary policy and won’t ever get the economy until we do.
Oh, and they all said, lower corporate taxes, deregulate, and stop spending. And they did not say, we did that for eight mind-numbing years and that produced no jobs, but exactly the opposite. And they all blamed Obama for everything. And they all pledged to repeal the health care law. And they all lied about most everything. And they all smiled.
And for the life of me, the audience did not get up en mass and charge the stage and massacre the entire bunch for being too stupid to suck up air. They sat there and clapped here and there, smiled, and actually, if you can believe this, nodded from time to time.
Which suggests that they were all locked up in a time capsule that was sealed in 1982, and they haven’t heard about the fact that none of what the GOP contenders said is news. It’s all be tried before, and failed miserably, and they blame the president for not doing anything about the economy when they have voted against every single thing he tried to do.
Oh, and the pundits today said that Romney/Bachmann won, and Pawlenty lost, and the rest were mere cyphers. And I wasted two freaking’ beautiful hours of my quickly diminishing life. And somebody owes me something for that.
♦
You know, it came to me last night.
The GOP/right-wing/evangelical/neocon/crazy/insane/stupid/douchebagforBigBusiness, really aren’t the constitutionalists they claim to be. I mean they have taken the fine art of Founding Father worship to new levels. They are, the FF that is, akin to at least Jesus’ cousins at this point. They walk on water, truly, that is how Washington crossed the Potomac.
So, then the document in question should have been perfect after the first 10 amendments, which were added post-haste by most of the original signers correct? Therefore it stands to reason, that all the rest of the amendments, are all tinkering with perfection no? So therefore, the gullible piles of poop that pass for the normal GOP membership these days, must consider the rest of the amendments to be vile add-ons. They should be repealed no? And that would include the one that makes the first ten amendments applicable to the states, and that pesky slavery-ending crap.
And do you realize that most of the knuckle dragging infantile jackanapes who claim they “want their country back” would happily vote for such repeals? And don’t you really think that the lying power-agenda craven scum like Barton, Palin, Gingrich, Santorum, and all their nasty ilk would love to do just that?
And in very much like lickety-split, you would find yourself in a fundamentalist wet dream land of Christians hell, where you’re only rights would be to serve the state on the hill, as defined by your elders in the church?
Problem is that our simian-like Bud-swilling NASCAR-watching, nachos-munchkin crowd can’t project consequences more than about two hours in advance, so they won’t see the 2×4 that hits them in the head before it’s too late.
And we are frantically trying to warn them using English, which sounds Greek to them for some reason, and we end up watching silently as they drive ever closer to the cliff. And stop the world I wanna get off.
And that is the way I see it. Today.
Tomorrow I may have a different point of view. I’m fickle like that.
Related articles
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- What You Missed While Not Watching the New Hampshire GOP Debate (swampland.time.com)
- Romney & Bachmann Rise, Pawlenty & Cain Fizzle In Mostly Lackluster Debate (outsidethebeltway.com)
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Existential Ennui 
Great reporting, Sherry!
Speaking of time capsules (you said it, remember?) I was thinking of the opening pages of “The Making of a President – 1960” where I remember reading about the first informal meeting between Bobby and Jack and one or two supporters to discuss the feasibility of running against Nixon. That was I think in December of 1959 – less than one year before the election. And it was not about un-seating a sitting President.
I hate everything about this presumptive and pre-emptive network sponsored thing we see now. Who has the money for 2-year campaigns? The family Koch? We’ve had some of these clowns in our face since last year! Sarah’s been ‘running’ since 09. The GOP is parading this stuff out like there’s no actual governing to do this year. It’s gotten so that, when these idiots are not actually running the White House (or Senate) they are running for it – and trying to shut the government down by obstruction and distraction in the process.
Beneath contempt, in my view.
It strikes me that we at some point must demand significant change in how our country operates its government. We must limit these elections, and certainly remove the 60 vote necessity to avoid a filibuster. The GOP claim Obama has done nothing on the economy, yet they have voted against every single thing he has proposed and blocked nearly everything. His court appointees cannot be seated on benches, qualified persons are denied their appointments all in the name of “give him nothing”. This obstructionism is deleterious to all of us. The GOP wants the economy in the tank, they want high unemployment. It is their ticket to a chance to win. Isn’t that simply sad? Worse, isn’t it nearly criminal? Can we retain people as our representatives to refuse to do anything not deemed in their party’s interest? Neither side will do it unless we push them to the edge. I can see no other way. Our problems are too pressing, and time is getting short.
The GOP has been the party of the very rich for more than 30 years. The Democrats have slowly become the party of nothing. The GOP turned criminal at Big Dawg’s time, but the Democrats didn’t like him either. Now the GOP are committing treason, but the Democrats, rudderless and leaderless, don’t make an issue out of that. The criminals run the institution while the guards and the warden have disappeared.
No it does not get much worse than that. If we use “Beneath contempt,” it applies to both parties.
PS: I did not say or mean to say that parties are the same; they are not. We still have SS and Medicare due to the Dems.
MS, I would say that the Democrats are not as intelligent as they used to be on the whole, and weak on character, and also terrified of hot-button issues which can spawn Koch-financed attack ads against their re-election campaigns.
Dems are also susceptible to cash donations, which make them weaker. What they probably don’t see is that many names on their own Corporate and fat-cat donor lists are also giving to their opponents – and giving more money to GOP than to DEM (this can be verified). The wealthy know how to get their bread buttered on both sides.
By ‘beneath contempt’ I meant ‘not worthy of viewing’ but I guess ‘beneath’ is superlative. I really have nothing but contempt for the process on either side. I don’t watch DEM debates either. Which makes it great that Sherry reports for me.
I agree that the Dems are not taking this opportunity to stand clearly on one side and let the chips fall. I’m so very tired of this game of re-election at the expense of the country. A serious realignment of our political process is in order to force elected officials to actually do the people’s business and not their own.
It is dreadfully worrisome to see the slate of candidates presented by the Republicans. And so cynical that they can’t acknowledge, for the sake of honesty and integrity, that Obama inherited the giant cesspool that was left to him by previous presidents. I guess that kind of sheer pathological lying and blaming resonates in this country, where people seem to need one culprit to blame.
Set your clock back two hours, Sherry and sleep peacefully.
Now there is an idea! I read a piece from Political Irony yesterday that was so right on. Rethugs want to do what they did for 8 years to no avail. And it was their uncontrolled spending and lack of regulation that caused this mess in the first place. Yet, they have decided it’s all Obama’s fault. No their position from the day after the Nov 2008 election, was to stone wall every legislative endeavor and then blame the continuing crisis on the Dems.
Double Balderdash? is that with two shots of bourbon? Yeah, like it has been pointed out in other places… this brand of GOP candydates bring new meaning to “American Exceptional-ism”……..
Yeah, exceptionally evil, and morally bankrupt.