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Dog's Breakfast: An Unappetizingly GOP 2012 Open Thread

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As with automobiles, the new model year is out early in GOP 2012 presidential candidates. Advertising is flowing fast and furious to convince the buying public that Brushforward Styling and Birther Bumpers are All The Rage for 2012. Whether more than half of interested parties will sign on the dotted line after the salesman talks football with his manager (“I have to clear this Special Deal with my boss, you hang tight right here”) is an open question.

What do you think? Will the puppy eat the reconstituted beef gristle and pork snouts?

Consider this an olfactorialy offensive Open Thread.


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/ 109 Comments

109 comments

  3. HappyinVT

    I will do everything in my power to keep whomever the GOP nominee is from moving into the White House.

    We may focus on the kookiness of “top tier” prospects but the underlying philosophy and policies of all the potential candidates is the real problem.  A Mitch Daniels might sound sane but he’ll do the same damage as Michele Bachmann.

  4. Shaun Appleby

    Are clearly disoriented.  If that is part of a long-term strategy for a second term defence then mission accomplished.

  5. Jjc2008

    No one ever challenged McCain (born in Panama) to produce anything.  But then I hear people (colleagues/friends) say, “Ignore him…no one really cares about Trump…he’s just an entertainer….”

    I have heard the same about Beck and Limbaugh.  

    How can it be 2012 and people (ANYONE, ANYWHERE) who do not believe they are racist, and honestly do not do anything racist, accept that it is “entertaining” to be a racist, creepy, fear mongering jerk (which describes many of the talking heads on the right).

    Maybe I am the crazy one because Trump OFFENDS me as much as the others. I am sickened by this cr*p.

    And I am wondering why so many on the left are not angrier at this.

  6. fogiv

    courtesy the delta bravos @ Fox News:

    The broad presumption in Washington is that Donald Trump’s quasi candidacy will be a disaster for Republicans.

    Part of this Trump talk is merely Democratic hope in the guise of analysis. It fits their narrative that the GOP field is so impossibly weak that even he can lead the pack. What could President Obama have to fear from such a bunch?

    Another part of the conventional wisdom is the assumption that anything as weird as the Trump infatuation has to be bad for the party involved. If a politically minded celebrity – say Jon Stewart – had been competitive in early Democratic polls for 2008, it would not have been deemed a good sign for the party. What is unfamiliar is usually deemed bad by the political establishment.

    But it is instead President Obama and the Democrats who have more to be concerned about in the spring fever for the boom-and-bust billionaire.

    http://www.foxnews.com/politic…

  7. Shaun Appleby

    For Republican strategists.  They are a party of king-makers with no prospective kings.  The religious Right now shares their fund-raising clout with the Tea Party and Palin.  The Chambers of Commerce and captains of industry are just waiting to twist the arm of the anointed one but the field is badly broken:

    Bachmann – Media catnip and a possible contender in some alternate Randian reality.  And they thought Palin was a bad idea?  The calculus doesn’t compute and representatives need not apply.

    Barbour – Buffoon.

    Guiliani – All time record for most expensive single delegate in a totally embarrassing US presidential primary.  Past his use-by date.

    Huckabee – No fund-raising clout but won Iowa last time on the whiff of an oily rag.  Probably hits a brick wall in New Hampshire and splits the early polling.  Still, he’s a possible alternative to the Tea Party crazy and would probably capture most of the “base.”

    Jindal – That speech.  A day is a long time in politics.

    Palin – Probably more inclined to be king-maker than king.

    Paul – Probably thinks he can do an Obama and run as a half-term senator but he’s wrong.

    Pawlenty – A possible Romney alternative but he has no proven performance in early primaries and is pretty boring to watch.  Possible.

    Pence – Pence who?

    Romney – Can’t see him emerging from the apparently cynical decision that he couldn’t carry the base properly last time.  Now he has both the Christians and the Tea Party to contend with and the same people who think Obama’s a Muslim know he’s a Mormon.  How do you fix that?  Business is concerned he will fade in the clinches.

    Trump – Narcissistic putz.

    Did I miss anybody?  Name one candidate that could win both Iowa and New Hampshire and we’ll talk.  The entire focus of the election will be on the Republican party and they have apparently taken advice to keep it low-key.  It’s like a wax museum of failure.

  8. DTOzone

    I’m ambivalent about it because I don’t think most ads do much of anything. Debbie Halvorson had a great ad last year and lost in a landslide.

    But the DKos diary was interesting;

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/…

    Comments ranged from “Awful” and “Weak” to “Brilliant” and “LMFO This is great”

    We can’t even agree on how to attack.  

  9. Shaun Appleby

    On the recent Standard and Poor’s equivocation on the US AAA debt rating:


    “As long as there is diesel fuel to power up the back-up generators that run the government’s computers, they will have the money to back their own bonds.”

    James Galbraith

    I guess.  Scary hearing an economist talk about diesel generators but there it is.

  10. DTOzone

    My only question is this: Kos, you write that it probably would have failed and would probably still fail, but that it will “show” Latinos who’s fighting for them and help Democrats at the expense of Republicans. When has this ever happened? The experience of the last two years – and from previous years – is that when a major legislative initiative fails, it’s pretty much a disaster for the party that pushed it: the opposition gets riled up, while the base is demoralized and angry that the effort failed rather than supportive that their party “tried”.

    The “I’d be happy if he just tried” bullshit always riles me up, because it’s bullshit.

    People don’t get rewarded for trying in politics. If a bill doesn’t pass, inevitably it will be because someone “didn’t try hard enough” or “didn’t fight hard enough”

    No matter what the facts

  11. DTOzone

    now it’s “Even when he fights, we don’t believe him”

    Back in the heady days of the 2008 campaign, a powerful, impassioned speech like the one Obama delivered would have had a definite positive impact on the numbers. But the soaring rhetoric now comes with a bitter aftertaste.

    Perhaps it’s because we feel like we’ve seen this movie before. Call it “Attack of the Impassioned Yet Empty Rhetoric.” But this version was even more unsettling than the earlier versions, in which the president delivered great speeches then failed to back up his words with the promised action. In this sequel, his words turned to broken promises as soon as they passed his lips.

    So, yes, this was a defiant speech, eloquently defending the idea that the wealthy should bear “a greater share of [the economic] burden than the middle class or those less fortunate” because “of our belief that those who’ve benefited most from our way of life can afford to give back a little bit more.” But this defense is much less effective when it comes four months after you’ve allowed the rich to pass along that burden to the middle class and the less fortunate.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

    jjc, this is why I don’t agree with you “we need him to fight” concept…because it is not possible to fight and lose. This is the reaction now when Obama fights for the left. it’s “just words” and that’s the stupid excuse the emo left use to defend the lack of a bump in polls they expected to see.

    Why wouldn’t Republicans be obstructionists…no one is going to stop them. They can either force the President to compromise or force his agenda to fail, and either way he wins.

    I give up, fuck the left.  

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