10: Romney

Live Pink Or Dye

I thought that was quite a turn of phrase.
 
Romney Is President

Mitt Romney is the president of white male America. .... Maybe the group can retreat to a man cave in a Whiter House, with mahogany paneling, brown leather Chesterfields, a moose head over the fireplace, an elevator for the presidential limo, and one of those men’s club signs on the phone that reads: “Telephone Tips: ‘Just Left,’ 25 cents; ‘On His Way,’ 50 cents; ‘Not here,’ $1; ‘Who?’ $5.” .... In its delusional death spiral, the white male patriarchy was so hard core, so redolent of country clubs and Cadillacs, it made little effort not to alienate women. The election had the largest gender gap in the history of the Gallup poll, with Obama winning the vote of single women by 36 percentage points. ..... As W.’s former aide Karen Hughes put it in Politico on Friday, “If another Republican man says anything about rape other than it is a horrific, violent crime, I want to personally cut out his tongue.” .... the more they insulted the president with birther cracks, the more they tried to force chastity belts on women, and the more they made Hispanics, blacks and gays feel like the help, the more these groups burned to prove that, knitted together, they could give the dead-enders of white male domination the boot ..... Romney was still running in an illusory country where husbands told wives how to vote, and the wives who worked had better get home in time to cook dinner. But in the real country, many wives were urging husbands not to vote for a Brylcreemed boss out of a ’50s boardroom whose party was helping to revive a 50-year-old debate over contraception. ........ More women voted than men. Five women were newly elected to the Senate, and the number of women in the House will increase by at least three. New Hampshire will be the first state to send an all-female delegation to Congress. Live Pink or Dye. ........ as Bill Maher said, “all the Republican men who talked about lady parts during the campaign, they all lost.” ..... The voters anointed a lesbian senator, and three new gay congressmen will make a total of five in January. Plus, three states voted to legalize same-sex marriage. ..... wanted to see an openly gay cabinet secretary and an openly gay ambassador to a G-20 nation.

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Bobby Saying All The Right Things

Biden, Bobby
Bobby Is Going To Run And Win In 2016
Bobby Will Run In 2016
Bobby Converting Is Not A Problem
Bobby Jindal
Bobby Jindal: Streamliner
Bobby For McCain's VP?
Bobby Jindal For President Of The United States 2016
Bobby 2016, Until Then Adios
Barack, Bobby

Bobby has to do nothing less than reconstruct the Republican Party, and I think he is making good early noises. You borrow money from China with which to give tax cuts to the rich, and the poor and the middle classes are saddled with interest payments on that borrowed money. How is that small government?

Paul Ryan is a fake intellectual. Bobby is the true intellectual.

Quote of the Day: Bobby Jindal Joins Ranks of GOPers Edging and Urging Towards More Moderate

“We’ve got to make sure that we are not the party of big business, big banks, big Wall Street bailouts, big corporate loopholes, big anything,” Jindal told POLITICO in a 45-minute telephone interview. “We cannot be, we must not be, the party that simply protects the rich so they get to keep their toys.” ...... “It is no secret we had a number of Republicans damage our brand this year with offensive, bizarre comments — enough of that,” Jindal said. “It’s not going to be the last time anyone says something stupid within our party, but it can’t be tolerated within our party. We’ve also had enough of this dumbed-down conservatism. We need to stop being simplistic, we need to trust the intelligence of the American people and we need to stop insulting the intelligence of the voters.” ....... Calling on the GOP to be “the party of ideas, details and intelligent solutions,” the Louisianan urged the party to “stop reducing everything to mindless slogans, tag lines, 30-second ads that all begin to sound the same. “ ..... He added: “Simply being the anti-Obama party didn’t work. You can’t beat something with nothing. The reality is we have to be a party of solutions and not just bumper-sticker slogans but real detailed policy solutions.”

Bobby Jindal, newly compassionate conservative, gives interview to Politico

Jindal, a skilled political sailor who can tack into the slightest change in the current wind, provided Politico with a series of remarkable quotes ..... Jindal urged Republicans to both reject anti-intellectualism and embrace a populist-tinged reform approach that he said would mitigate what exit polls show was one of President Barack Obama’s most effective lines of attack against Mitt Romney. ...... On cultural issues, he suggested the party not retreat from its stances opposing abortion rights and gay marriage but rather soften its tone on such matters. ..... “We’re a populist party and we’ve got to make that clear going forward,” he said. ....... “I got the best job in the world and I’m going to be focused on being governor of this great state for the next three years and being chairman of RGA next year and getting a bunch of great Republican governors elected”

Jindal: End 'dumbed-down conservatism'

Bobby Jindal on Monday called on Republicans to “stop being the stupid party” and make a concerted effort to reach a broader swath of voters with an inclusive economic message that pre-empts efforts to caricature the GOP as the party of the rich. ........ He was just as blunt on how the GOP should speak to voters, criticizing his party for offending and speaking down to much of the electorate. ...... his pointed comments reflect his intent on playing an active role in the party’s conversation and perhaps to pursue a presidential bid when his term is up at the start of 2016. ........ his analysis Monday suggests he’s aligning himself with an emerging school of thought on the right that the GOP’s consecutive White House defeats can’t merely be solved by passing an immigration reform bill and appealing more directly to nonwhites. Jindal, a Brown Graduate and Rhodes Scholar, is already a favorite of conservative intellectuals and his assessment that Republican difficulties owe as much to economics as demographics will be well-received by right-leaning thinkers. ...... not enough discussion of what they see as the party’s unimaginative, donor-driven fiscal policies. ...... Jindal, the son of Indian immigrants, said the GOP “must reject identity politics” and “treat folks as individuals, as Americans, not as members of special interest groups.” ...... “The Republican Party is going to fight for every single vote,” he said. “That means the 47 percent and the 53 percent, that means any other combination of numbers going up to 100 percent.” ...... “I think the president has said he wants to present a comprehensive approach; I think we as a party need to hear what he has to say and offer our ideas.” ...... Where Jindal showed a bit more daring was on the banking industry, something that Obama blistered Romney on and to which the GOP nominee offered little response. ...... Declaring that Republicans “can’t be beholden to special interests or banks,” the successor to Huey P. Long indicated support for provisions in the Dodd-Frank law, which requires banks to increase their reserves to prevent future taxpayer-funded bailouts. ..... Even more notably, Jindal suggested he’d look favorably on something akin to the “Volcker rule.” ...... “You’ve seen some conservatives come around to the idea that if banks are going to be using FDIC-insured deposits, they shouldn’t be allowed to co-mingle those funds with some of their riskier investment banking activity,” Jindal said. “There needs to be stronger walls between insured deposits, the taxpayer protected side of business and riskier side of business that generate these risks and profits.” ........ “I think special interests in general have certainly too much influence in Washington, D.C.” ...... Jindal decried “agnostic” lobbyists who work both parties. ..... “They’re access donors because they know whoever is in power — that’s who they want to be friends with to get their special perks in the Tax Code” ....... “We’re a populist party and we’ve got to make that clear going forward,” he said...... To Jindal, that means improving the quality of education for kids across class and racial lines. The author of a major school reform bill this year, he said education is one example of how government needs to be changed to adapt to the times....... “Let the dollar follow the child instead of making the child follow the dollar,” he said of his policies to support charter, private and home schooling...... More broadly, he called for “a bottom-up government that fits the digital age.” ...... calling for expanded oil and gas exploration while also looking more favorably than some Republicans on renewable-energy solutions. ....... Jindal, decrying the GOP’s tendency to reminisce about how things were “better in the good ol’ days,” is tougher on his party’s tone than its substance. He’s an unapologetic conservative who doesn’t want to deviate from small-government principles. But he’s firing a warning to Republicans that they must change how they’re perceived. ..... “You’ve got to give the president’s team credit: They did a very good job portraying the Republican Party as wanting to just preserve the status quo for those who’ve already been successful and burn the bridge behind them,” he acknowledged. “That’s not what we as a party stand for and what we as a party can stand for.”

Jindal: No comment on 2016 run

In his first interview since Mitt Romney's defeat, Jindal told Politico that the party needs to, "stop being the stupid party".

What's Ryan and Jindal's Solutions to What Ails the G.O.P.?

Some party leaders blame Republican voters and donors for being stuck in a rightwing media world ...... Romney and Ryan "got wiped out in the overwhelmingly white state of New Hampshire, and they underperformed in non-urban sections of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa." On taxes, Ryan said he and House Republicans had already presented a plan, and called on Obama to offer his own. ...... Jindal says the problem actually is the Republican plan. ..... Jindal rejected Romney's 47 percent comments, and the idea of makers vs. takers, which Ryan has promoted ....... Jindal thinks the GOP must explain things better, but not necessarily with better slogans. ...... Jindal wants the GOP to "soften its tone" on social issues.

GOP soul-searching, 2016 edition
Hillary ponders the future
Clinton would dominate 2016 Iowa caucuses, PPP shows
Karen Hughes: I'll 'cut out' the tongue of GOPers talking rape

Finally, the Republican Party has to set a tone that is more respectful, positive and inclusive. The immigration rhetoric that came out of the Republican primary seemed harsh, unwelcoming and offputting to many minority voters. Obama increased his share of the Hispanic vote and won it 69 percent to 29 percent (per The New York Times exit poll); likewise he built a huge margin among Asian voters, 74-25, almost doubling the margin of his support compared to 2008. Both of those constituencies are hardworking, upwardly mobile, family-oriented, and should be open to Republican appeals if we don’t make them feel unwelcome....... And if another Republican man says anything about rape other than it is a horrific, violent crime, I want to personally cut out his tongue. The college-age daughters of many of my friends voted for Obama because they were completely turned off by Neanderthal comments like the suggestion of “legitimate rape.”

Obama defends Rice in face of GOP opposition

What about Rebecca Kleefisch for Bobby's running mate?

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Bad Advice From Paul Krugman

When the economist Paul Samuelson urged him to propose an income-tax decrease in 1961, Kennedy said there was no point, it would not pass the Congress. “But then you’ve fought the good fight,” Samuelson said. Kennedy’s answer to that was : “That’s vanity, Paul, not politics.”

Paul Krugman is my favorite political columnist. But he is an economist, not a politician, and it shows in this advice he has for the president. Paul Samuelson said “But then you’ve fought the good fight.” Paul Krugman is saying "No deal is better than a bad deal."

Let’s Not Make a Deal

Both the Bush-era tax cuts and the Obama administration’s payroll tax cut are set to expire, even as automatic spending cuts in defense and elsewhere kick in thanks to the deal struck after the 2011 confrontation over the debt ceiling. And the looming combination of tax increases and spending cuts looks easily large enough to push America back into recession...... nothing very bad will happen to the economy if agreement isn’t reached until a few weeks or even a few months into 2013 ..... standing up to hostage-taking is the right thing to do for the health of America’s political system..... No deal is better than a bad deal.

As for going over the cliff, is it like driving off the roof?

"He drove off the roof!"



Greece Drinks the Hemlock

lawmakers narrowly approved a $23 billion package of new austerity measures, including further spending cuts to social services, pensions and public salaries, as well as tax increases demanded by Greece’s European lenders. ...... In return, the troika of official creditors — the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund — promise to consider, but not guarantee, reducing the punitive interest rates they charge Greece for bailout loans and unlocking a $40 billion aid payment Athens needs to avoid a default on its debts. ...... just about everything in this austerity package has been tried before and failed disastrously. These unpalatable steps will do nothing to make Greece’s debts more payable, bring its budgets closer to balance or help make the structural reforms Greece needs to revive its economy. Instead they will almost certainly further shrink an economy that has already shrunk by an astounding 25 percent over the past few years, making fiscal improvement nearly impossible. ...... The austerity approach was supposed to reduce Greece’s ratio of debt to gross domestic product. But that ratio has grown, despite debt write-offs and bailouts, because the economy has contracted so much. The new package is expected to shrink it an additional 9 percent. ...... The only way forward is through more debt write-offs and more low-interest European loans, as well as by opening up restricted job markets. ...... measures that extend and deepen Greece’s severe recession are certain to intensify public opposition to labor market reforms that could increase an unemployment rate already over 25 percent. And imposing new fuel taxes and health care charges will hurt ordinary people and make a tax system that is scandalously unfair even more so

Happy Days, Even With the Cliff

The fiscal cliff doesn’t happen until the end of the year when the Bush tax cuts expire and monster budget cuts automatically kick in. ..... Trump has no conceivable impact on anything. ....... Boehner... “Mister President, this is your moment. We’re ready to be led” ....... sounded as if the only cliff-avoidance Boehner was really interested in was one that raised new revenue through “fewer loopholes, and lower rates for all.” ...... We have already seen that plan. It was proposed by a man who, on Tuesday, lost the state in which he was born, the state in which he was governor, and the three states in which he owns houses. Thanks to a blog by Eric Ostermeier in Smart Politics, I am able to point out that the only candidate for president who lost his home state by a larger margin than Mitt Romney was John Frémont in 1856. And Frémont was coming out of a campaign in which the opposition accused him of being a cannibal. ........ he’s an older white guy, and, therefore, part of the biggest loser demographic of the election, the flip-side of the insurgent Latino vote. ........ John Weaver worried about becoming “a shrinking regional party of middle-aged and older white men.” On Fox News, Bill O’Reilly moaned that “the white establishment is now the minority.” ..... O’Reilly, 63, added that the new majority was composed of people who “want stuff.” As opposed to older white men, all of whom have signed a pledge never to accept veteran benefits, Social Security or Medicare. ....... Cheer up, white men! You seem to be doing O.K. Next year women will have 20 percent of the seats in the U.S. Senate, and we’re celebrating. ..... If all else fails, strap John Boehner to the roof of a car.

How a Race in the Balance Went to Obama

Seven minutes into the first presidential debate, the mood turned from tense to grim inside the room at the University of Denver where Obama staff members were following the encounter. Top aides monitoring focus groups — voters who registered their minute-by-minute reactions with the turn of a dial — watched as enthusiasm for Mitt Romney spiked. “We are getting bombed on Twitter,” announced Stephanie Cutter, a deputy campaign manager, while tracking the early postings by political analysts and journalists whom the Obama campaign viewed as critical in setting debate perceptions...... No one wanted to go to the spin room and speak with reporters. ...... “Boy, the president is off tonight,” said Stuart Stevens, the senior Romney strategist, sounding mystified, according to aides in the room. ...... he would now accept and deploy the prewritten attack lines that he had sniffed at earlier. “If I give up a couple of points of likability and come across as snarky, so be it” .... His antipathy toward Mr. Romney — which advisers described as deeper than what Mr. Obama had felt for John McCain in 2008 — led the incumbent to underestimate his opponent as he began moving to the center before the debate audience of millions of television viewers. ...... The power of this operation stunned Mr. Romney’s aides on election night, as they saw voters they never even knew existed turn out in places like Osceola County, Fla. ..... On Tuesday night, a crestfallen Mr. Romney and his family watched as the television networks showed him losing all but one battleground state. ....... Romney, who had earlier told reporters he had written only a victory speech ...... It was 11:30 p.m., and Romney field teams in Ohio, Virginia and Florida called in, saying the race was too close for the candidate to give up. At least four planes were ready to go, and aides had bags packed for recount battles in narrowly divided states. Bob White, a close Romney friend and adviser, was prepared to tell the waiting crowd that Mr. Romney would not yet concede.... But then, Mr. Romney quietly decided it was over. “It’s not going to happen,” he said......... As Ann Romney cried softly, he headed down to deliver his speech ..... Obama had returned, if not to the candidate that he was in 2008, as a man hungry for four more years to pursue his agenda in the White House ...... Mr. Stevens argued that Mr. Obama’s dislike of Mr. Romney would lead the president to underestimate him. “They think there’s something intellectually inferior there,” he said later. Mr. Romney’s advisers also believed that Mr. Obama had demonized Mr. Romney to such an extent that their candidate would benefit when judged against the caricature....... In August, Mr. Romney began testing out one-liners on friends flying with him on his campaign plane. On issue after issue, Mr. Romney led discussions on how to frame his answers, to move away from the conservative tone of his primary contests in front of the largest audience he would have as a candidate.......... (Mr. Romney’s advisers broke out in laughter when the real Mr. Obama opened with a similar line, and nodded approvingly when a very prepared Mr. Romney countered with a gracious response that even Democrats said put Mr. Obama off balance.) ........ Nothing had been left to chance: Mr. Romney put on full makeup and did his final practice in a room set up to replicate, down to the lighting and temperature, the hall where he would meet Mr. Obama. ....... George W. Bush phoned Mr. Romney, too. ...... incumbent presidents almost invariably lose their first debate. ..... presidents are not used to being challenged, and unlike candidates, are out of practice at verbal jousting. ...... Obama showed no interest in watching the Republican debates. But his aides studied them closely, and concluded that Mr. Romney was a powerful debater, hard to intimidate and fast to throw out assertions that would later prove wrong or exaggerated. At one debate, Gov. Rick Perry of Texas criticized Mr. Romney for having praised Arne Duncan, the education secretary, days earlier. Mr. Romney flatly denied it, leaving Mr. Perry speechless. ....... “I’ll be there on game day,” he said. “I’m a game day player.” ..... came across .. as professorial, arrogant, entitled and detached from the turmoil tearing the nation. ....... appeared to be disdainful not only of his opponent but also of the political process itself. Mr. Obama showed no passion for the job ........ The voter-analysis database back in Chicago noted a precipitous drop in perceptions of Mr. Obama among independent voters, starting that night and lasting for four days, long before the public polls picked it up. Voters who had begun turning to Mr. Obama were newly willing to give Mr. Romney another look. ........ After the debate, Mr. Obama called Mr. Axelrod on his way back to the hotel room. He had read the early reviews on his iPad.... “I guess the consensus is that we didn’t have a very good night,” Mr. Obama told Mr. Axelrod.... “That is the consensus,” Mr. Axelrod said........... Romney soon recognized the scope of his accomplishment. He flew from Denver to Virginia for a rally the next day, and as the motorcade headed toward the event, there was so much traffic that Mr. Romney and his top advisers thought there must have been an accident. In fact, the roads were jammed with people on their way to see him. ........ Obama used his rallies to collect supporters’ telephone numbers and e-mail addresses. ..... the hurricane pushed him off the stage at a crucial time. ..... Colin Powell, a former secretary of state, endorsed Mr. Obama. The ad, Mr. Obama’s aides said, produced a spike of support from independent voters. (Mr. Obama’s aides grabbed the clip from a television interview with Mr. Powell, deciding not to chance asking him for permission). ...... The futility of that effort was apparent outside the sprawling Jeep assembly plant in Toledo, which had just had a $500 million renovation for production of a new line of vehicles, a project requiring 1,100 new workers...... “Everyone here knows someone who works at Jeep”

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Bibi

The Likud Party led by Benjamin Netanyahu wins a narrow victory in the Israeli general election (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Netanyahu Rushes to Repair Damage With Obama

Over the past several years, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has on several occasions confronted or even undercut President Obama, taking his message directly to the Israel-friendly United States Congress, challenging Mr. Obama’s appeal to the Arab world, and seeming this fall to support his opponent, Mitt Romney. ...... Netanyahu still maintains strong ties to members of Congress, particularly Republicans ..... Jerusalem is worried that Washington will agree to direct talks with Tehran, and go easier on the Palestinian Authority’s quest this month for upgraded status in the United Nations. ....... “Given what Netanyahu had done these recent months, the question is: Does our prime minister still have a friend in the White House?” Mr. Olmert asked at a meeting with Jewish leaders in New York. “I am not certain of this, and this might be very significant to us at critical points.” ...... “My sense is that he both dislikes and distrusts Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, and that he is more likely to use his new momentum to settling scores than to settling issues.” ..... Obama was loath to take on a new Middle East military operation ..... “a decade of war is ending.” .... the bid for nonmember state status in the General Assembly

Can Republicans Adapt?

A coalition of aging white men is a recipe for failure in a nation that increasingly looks like a rainbow. ...... America needs a plausible center-right opposition party to hold Obama’s feet to the fire, not just a collection of Tea Party cranks. ..... the Democratic Party embraced the pragmatic center-left Bill Clinton in 1992 after three consecutive losses in presidential elections. ..... primary voters are their party’s worst enemy. ...... the profusion of right-wing radio and television programs. Democrats complain furiously that Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity smear the left, but I wonder if the bigger loser isn’t the Republican Party itself. Those shows whip up a frenzy in their audience, torpedoing Republican moderates ......... an ideological black hole that no light can enter. ..... After this election, a record 20 senators will be women, almost all of them Democrats. Opposition to same-sex marriage used to be a way for Republicans to trumpet their morality; now it’s seen as highlighting their bigotry. ...... An astonishing 45 percent of Obama voters were members of minority groups .... Many others were women or young people. ...... if the Republican Party remains a purist cohort built around grumpy old white men, it is committing suicide. That’s bad not just for conservatives, but for our entire country.

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Biden, Bobby

It will be Joe Biden versus Bobby Jindal.

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Jindal, Christie tapped to lead GOP governors

Jindal, who serves on the association's executive committee, will chair the group in 2013 under a plan that officials say has broad support from other Republican governors. Christie, the current vice chairman, will take over in 2014. ..... The move gives both up-and-comers prominent leadership roles in the Republican Party and access to a national network of conservative donors, laying the groundwork for possible presidential bids in 2016 .... Jindal will serve as Christie's vice chair after relinquishing the chairmanship in 2014. ..... Christie was chosen to deliver the keynote at the Republican National Convention in August. ..... has had a meteoric rise within the Republican Party. The 41-year-old won re-election last year in a landslide with minimal opposition. ..... Taking a turn as the association's leader has in recent years been a prelude to seeking higher office. Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, both served as chairman before pursuing a presidential bid.

Top 10 Republican presidential contenders for 2016
Top 10 Democratic presidential contenders for 2016
Will Marco Rubio lead the Republicans in 2016? GOP scrambles to find new standard bearer after Romney loses minority voters

Romney lost Hispanics to Barack Obama by 69 points to 29 and blacks by 93 to six. ..... After being portrayed as an extremist on abortion and fertility issues, Romney also lost women voters by 55 to 43 points. ....... Romney lost Florida, Ohio, Virginia and Colorado - his most likely path to a narrow victory - by just over 305,000 votes ..... The fact that Obama was able to increase his support among Hispanics is indicative of the deep unpopularity of the Republican stance of dealing with illegal immigrants. ..... More than two-thirds of voters believed that illegal immigrants should have some kind of 'path to citizenship'. But in the primary, Romney had argued that the millions of illegals should be forced to 'self deport'...... A broader problem for the Republican party is that among voters who wanted a president who 'cares about people like me', Obama won by 81 per cent

Handicapping the 2016 presidential field

we could be looking at a race as wide open as 2008 for both parties. ..... Bobby Jindal: The Louisiana governor seems all-but-certain to make a bid for president in 2016 and he’s got a strong argument in his favor. He’s Indian American (Republicans badly need non-white faces in top positions), he’s compiled a decidedly conservative record as governor of the Bayou State and he’s among the wonkiest members of his party. Jindal’s time on the national stage hasn’t exactly been filled with star turns — his 2009 Republican response was super awkward — but we’ve always been impressed with his ability to move seamlessly between politics and policy, a rare gift in politicians. ...... Joe Biden: Just in case you had ruled out the possibility of Biden running in 2016 — he will be 73 on Election Day 2016 — Biden reminded you of it while voting on Tuesday. Asked whether this was the last time he would cast a ballot for himself, the Vice President smiled mischievously and said “No, I don’t think so.” If the best indicator of wanting to run for president in the future is having run for president in the past, then Biden qualifies since he has run for the top spot in 1988 and 2008. Biden would have the benefit of semi-incumbency going for him and has always had a top-tier team of political professionals who have stuck with him through thick and thin in a political career that began way back in 1972. Biden’s problems? One is named Hillary. The other is named Joe Biden. The Vice President’s tendency to veer off script would be a major issue if he decided to run in four years time.

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