Archive
In Which the Blogger is Distraught
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Polls are closed. I didn’t vote.
It’s pretty fucking embarrassing, because anyone who has been paying attention to the blog for the last year knows I’m a giant liberal wonk. https://clantilyscad.com/category/politics-or-the-art-of-looking-for-trouble/
I’m a registered Democrat, canvassed for the Democrats, and am probably one of the few moderate liberals that thinks that Obama has done a thoroughly decent job at President given the filibuster-heavy Congressional opposition. So why didn’t I just walk to the middle school a few block away and vote?
It’s pretty impossible to understand if you’re not also wrecked with mental illness. Not just run-of-the-mill depression where nothing sparkles. But the kind where everything is a nightmare, your digestive tract feels like its cannibalizing itself, and the very thought of social interaction can give you a panic attack.
Long story short, I had a mental breakdown right before the Hurricane (for reasons not related to the Hurricane) and have basically developed agoraphobia. So yeah, even though I waltzed into a school gym two months ago and voted in a primary that no one knew about, I’m currently having enough trouble feeding myself, much less go into public at the moment.
That sounds really really sad, and it is.
14.9% of non-voters in 2008 listed “illness or disability” as their reason.
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Sorry I don’t have many fun links tonight for you fellow wonks. Nate Silver being a math genius kinda ruined the anticipation aspect of this election for me.
Comedy Central’s Indecision 2012 Live Show is here.
I don’t think I need to give a spoiler about who won.
Live-blogging the Second Presidential Debate
Live from Safety School University!
But first…
Dave Itzkoff @ditzkoff“Tonight’s first question comes to us from a man who calls himself Violentacrez. Go ahead, Mr. Violentacrez.” #debate
Bwahahahahaha.
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Patton Oswalt @pattonoswaltOBAMASATDOWNFIRSTHELOST — inside Hannity’s brain right now.#debate
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9:05
“I want you to be able to get a job.” Yeah, so you can fire me from it.
9:15
I think Romney just admitted to not caring about birds dying. Big Bird is crying.
Tom Junod @TomJunodNow he wants to kill Little Bird.
9:20
Once again a moderator is failing to move on.
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The New York Times op-ed, November 18, 2008:
by Mitt Romney
^not The Onion
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9:30
I’m so bored of talking about jobs. Go back to talking about killing birds.
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Chuck Wendig @ChuckWendigObama starts explaining economic theory. Romney makes fart noises and monkey sounds in the background. #fakedebate
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9:39
”I put women in my cabinet.” ~Romney misquote
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Franklin Leonard @franklinleonard“I hired lots of women.” = “Some of my best friends are black.”
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9:51
Wow, invocation of the G.W. We should start asking: Is our children learning from this debate?
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Indecision @indecisionThis guy’s on fire. Hold on- how do we know it isn’t Joe Biden wearing his Obama costume a few weeks early? #debates
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Nina Bargiel @slackmistress“I CAN SEE SYRIA FROM MY INVESTMENTS!” – Mitt Romney#MocktheVote
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Alex Halperin @alexhalperinWhat took so long? http://bindersfullofwomen.tumblr.com/ #debates
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10:25
Now that we all understand each other, group hug?
10:27
Nothing like talk to currency manipulation to rally up the masses.
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Romney’s Binder @Romneys_BinderMitt Romney: “I want to make America the most attractive place in the world for my binder.”
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”Barry, I’ll pretend your question was worthy of a presidential debate, not a centerfold interview: truncated stump speech and stuff.”
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Complete transcript:
(Pro-tip: when you get there: Ctrl-F “gang bangers.”)
Jobs Report: Employment Below 8%
September 2012 unemployment according to the BLS: 7.8%
The jobs numbers are certainly not enough to change the basic story of a slow economic recovery, and it will take many years for the economy to get back to full employment.
However, the jobs numbers are one of the more hopeful signs for the economy on balance. An average of 146,000 jobs have been created per month over the past year, or closer to 157,000 with the government’s anticipated benchmark revisions accounted for.
Those aren’t great numbers by any means, and would translate to an annualized growth rate of 1.4 percent. But over the past 25 years, payroll jobs have grown at an annualized rate of 1.1 percent, or the equivalent of about 125,000 jobs added per month given today’s population. By this measure, it’s been a fairly average economic year, although certainly not enough to make up for the productivity that was lost from the economy in 2008 and 2009.
Live-blogging the 10/3/12 Presidential Debate
Presidential Bro Hug
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Pre-game:
The Obion: Biden Implores Obama To ‘Rub One Out’ Before Debate
‘Don’t Want Pussy On The Mind Out There,’ Reports Vice President
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9:07
Mitt Romney invokes a story involving a baby.
Lizz Winstead Romney bored that unemployed person to death. #MockTheVote #Debates
9:11
Obama talks about specific tax cut numbers and the moderator sounds old and confused.
9:13
Mitt Romney: “I like coal.”
Me too, as long as I’m not getting trapped in a Chilean mine, mining it.
9:20
My Internet stream keeps buffering and I don’t care, because everyone is so boring.
9:23
Boring point-in-case, Obama just talked about “math.”
Good thing they keep talking about math. Nothing gets America fired up more than math. #debates
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9:28
“I like Big Bird.”
This debate reminds me of…
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9:38
Matt Yglesias I think Obama should have practiced some zingers.
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9:40
Andrew Sullivan First unforced Romney error: “I may need a new accountant.”http://thebea.st/RdXvE9
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9:50
This campaign to re-elect Bill Clinton is going really well.#debates
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9:52
I think Obama’s boring is rubbing off on Romney. R-Money just mentioned “leverage limits.”
9:55
What if Jim Lehrer had a heart attack right now? His resuscitation could be funded by viewers like you!
9:57
Newsflash! Nobody has actually read Dodd-Frank.
Dodd Frank: Was that the girl in the attic? #MockTheVote #Debates
Wil Wheaton Okay, so I think this show needs a whacky neighbor to really spice things up. Maybe a talking baby, or a dog. OMG MAKE THIS FAMILY GUY!
Candice Hall @wilw Pot-smoking Koala? It could be American Dad.
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10:09
Obama should just curl up in the fetal position and scream health care statistics for the rest of the debate.
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10:10
ThinkProgress Romney says he didn’t raise taxes to pay for Romneycare. That’s because it was subsidized heavily by the federal gov’t
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10:12
Brooklyn Bitch When can we talk about vaginas and anal sex? #debates #priorities
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10:15
Man, I wish Big Bird was moderating this debate. Big Bird or a corpse would be doing a better job at creating structure than this guy.
10:24
Silent Jim Lehrer …um…I…
10:25
There’s bars out there serving drinks called “zingers” right now, right?
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10:33
Well, my dream of Obama screaming, “You tied your dog to a car!” have been crushed.
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Joëlle Jesus tap dancing Christ! I’d rather hear about bitches, zombies, the apocalypse, sandwiches or anal before any more political tweets. Fuck!
KimJongNumberUn North Koreans should be grateful tonight that Dad banned television.#debate
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Good night and good luck.
Mitt Romney on Bain: “I insisted on having almost dictatorial powers.”
The ethical problem with Bain in a nutshell.
There’s apparently a few ways of taking over a company. The most common ways of doing it with the intent to bankrupt it are a hostile takeover or buying off its executives.
Mitt Romney chose buying off the executives with bonuses.
In business deals called leveraged buyouts, Bain would borrow money to buy troubled companies and then force the companies to pay back Bain’s loans. By moving the loans plus interest payments onto the troubled companies’ already deficit-heavy banksheets, this formula guaranteed the failure of the companies.
The result: All the CEOs and Bain Capital profited on the way out, while the average worker lost his or her job.
This is what happened with Ampad, a pad and paper company bought by Bain in 1992. Bain paid $5 million upfront for the company and profited more than $100 million in debt and management fees before Ampad filed Chapter 11 in 2000 and was resold in 2003.
Randy Johnson, an Ampad factory worker affected by the takeover, once wrote Romney a handwritten letter asking him to intervene and save an Indiana factory. Romney wrote back him saying that he wanted to help but his lawyers advised him not to get involved.
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Green and Debt: The True Story of Mitt Romney and Bain Capital quotes Mitt Romney regarding Bain: “I insisted on having almost dictatorial powers.”
So much for a man who doesn’t want to get involved.
Obama Releases Birth Certificate Mug For Sale
For only $22.50, you too can drink out of the official personal identification of another human being!
Ayn Rand-Eddie Munster Hybrid Wins the VP ticket!
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“I think a lot of people would observe that we are right now living in an Ayn Rand novel, metaphorically speaking. Ayn Rand, more than anyone else, did a fantastic job of explaining the morality of capitalism, the morality of individualism.” -Paul Ryan, 2009.
“I reject her philosophy,” Ryan says in 2012. “It’s an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview.”
Reddit guy: “Ayn Rand rejected judeo-christian values was because they were waaay to altruistic for her taste. Ryan is trying to have his cake and eat it too by swearing by the bible’s relevance as a moral guide and also subscribing to quasi-Austrian views on economic policy.”
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For bragging rights, I called Paul Ryan on Clantily Scad two months ago in:
“Marco Rubio’s Book Comes Out. He Does Not Do Himself Favors.”
I actually originally called Ryan around March or April in a private bet, when I wasn’t feeling the way Marco Rubio was handling the media. As more campaign trail reports came out, I became more confident that the other contenders were either too boring or had too many skeletons to rattle the fundamentalists.
Ryan fits my prediction that Romney’s strategy as the campaign moves forward is going to attack the state of the economy, nitpicking any aberrant number in the economic reports and trying to peg Obama’s name to it. I also think that this strategy is doomed to fail, since even in times of trouble, independent voters are unlikely to sway from the status quo. (I mean, we had Bush for 2 terms).
Talking about deficit reduction is boring, and people mostly only care about what they can see right now. And what they see right now is massive economic inequality and no government participation to ease unemployment. Obama hasn’t helped much on those fronts, but Mittens and Co. don’t seem to understand all the economists who say their plans will make things worse.
I’m sure many downtrodden denizens have not read HR 6110. But I’m also sure they’ll be hearing a lot about it in the next three months filtered through attack ads. Women will hear about how Ryan supports states that want to criminalize abortion. Seniors in former swing-state Florida will be listening when Team Obama rips into Ryan’s Medicare coupon, er, voucher plan.
Good job, Mittens, good job. You’ve successfully energized your white millionaire demographic. The rest of us will be stockpiling birth control and making plans to ship grandma and grandpa to Canada upon your 28% chance of winning.
Link Time
Paul Ryan’s Voting Record: http://www.ontheissues.org/House/Paul_Ryan.htm
Buzzfeed Video List: 10 Defining Videos Of Republican Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan
Nate Silver three days ago, saying that Ryan would not have much effect on swing states: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/08/how-romneys-pick-of-a-running-mate-could-sway-the-outcome/
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