Friday, November 11, 2011

Two Faces


Lost in the amusement over the Perry brain freeze (which, like Cain's proclivities, will likely help him among teabaggers) are a couple of other significant moments from the latest Republican parade of pareidolia.

Asked about the $300K he received as a consultant for Freddy Mac and Fannie Mae, Newt the Simpering Slimeball claimed they paid him to be a "historian" for the agencies. A note-taker, I guess. Accurate, other than the fact that it's a complete revision of the truth:

... Commercial banks regarded Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae as competitors and were anxious to pick up business that would result from scaling back the two companies.

Pushing back, Freddie Mac enlisted prominent conservatives, including Gingrich and former Justice Department official Viet Dinh, paying each $300,000 in 2006, according to internal records.

Gingrich talked and wrote about what he saw as the benefits of the Freddie Mac business model.

Dinh wrote a legal analysis of private property rights that viewed a hypothetical government-enforced sale of Freddie Mac assets as constitutionally suspect.

The difference between the facility with which both Gingrich and Romney produce lies is that the former brazens through them with his faux-professorial demeanor, assuming that his "I'm-the-smartest-guy-in-the-room" attitude will simply overwhelm any lesser being who'd think to question him. Romney, on the other hand, sort of slinks by his lies hoping no one will notice. He's more like the kid with the cookie behind his back, pretending the lid isn't off the jar.

Which brings us to the other noteworthy moment: asked about his flip-flopping, Romney claimed the mantle of constancy for staying married and remaining in the church of Moroni. Allowed completely to ignore the central point of the question, he went on to claim that Obama's is the most "political" presidency in modern history, after which he declared that Obama is planning when to leave Afghanistan based purely on politics. Follow up questions, demands for explication? Are you kidding?

I'll ignore Herman Cain's arch arithmetical announcement that for every woman who claims he sexually harassed them, there are thousands who don't. Gotta give him that. Probably several thousand. It's a big country.

The above examples are significant for showing the disregard those sad samples of humanity hold for their public. (It's true, of course, of the whole lot of them with the possible partial sometimes exception of Jon Huntsman; but it's starting to seem as though Newt will be the only non-Mitt left standing, while the rest are just background noise, which means, as I said long ago, it'll be Romney...) And they demonstrate their certainty that the media they love to bash won't ever really call them on it. But mostly, they confirm the Death Valley level to which partisanship has sunk us: among Republican voters, lies don't matter. Facts don't matter. What matters is getting the black guy out of the white house. That their grievances and beliefs about what he has and hasn't done have nothing to do with reality is the least of their concerns. And the Republican candidates know it.


3 comments:

  1. Gee Sid, you sure pay alot of attention to the RepubicKKKlans...
    makes me think they might have a chance.
    And I know its a long shot, like the Mariners making the Playoffs...
    I hadn't even heard of Perry's Cerebral Flatulence..which was hilarious...
    I mean if it wasn't for his Trig-Palin level IQ he'd be sort of lovable, with that "Oops"...
    and I've got a theory why Surgeons are such uptight Type A's(for Hole)..
    Its all those years standing, in those uncomfortable Uni(homo)sexual clogs, in a hot gown, all the time..
    NOT BEING ABLE TO SCRATCH YOUR ASS...
    I mean you could, but then you've gotta break scrub, re-gown..
    Well Re-glove at least..
    and I know in the old days, you could get some Pee-On, like a 5th year Surgery Resident to scratch your itch for you...
    While the Gas-passer can put on a gown, take off a gown, take his shoes off, sit down, and scratch his ass to his hearts content...
    cause he's in his office while some CRNA does the dirty work..WHOA!!
    Seriously, even the few minutes I'm in the OR I scratch myself...
    I remember this one time, I tried to get out of work, cause I had posion ivy, and I was dog tired, cause I'd worked 36 hrs the previous week, and it was only a 2 day weekend...the floor runner stuck me with a needle(DECADRON..not the other stuff) ended up workin 2 extra rooms, and you don't know how strenuous countersigning 2 extra CRNA's charts can be...
    And I know for sure Herb Cain's not a cereal Her-Ass-er..
    When he got his hemicolectomy, my loverly wife got to see "little" Herman in all his post-operative glory...
    I mean he could have put Ms Bialik's eye out with that Thang...
    And you know how patients true personalities come out in the PACU, and he didn't try anythang with Mrs. Drackman...
    OTOH, she does get this creepy smile whenever he smiles HIS creepy smile...

    Frank

    ReplyDelete
  2. Not really on topic, but still interesting:

    1.) When corporate taxes are raised, they either increase efficiencies, raise their prices, or most commonly transfer that tax burden to their workforce in the form of lower wages or cutting the workforce. Why do you support an administration whose policies are causing people to lose their jobs, Dr. Schwab?

    http://www.mlive.com/business/west-michigan/index.ssf/2011/11/stryker_corp_to_layoff_5_perce.html

    2.) The CBO's predictions for cost/effects of Obamacare are already inaccurate. How do you feel about Obama/Obamacare now that, despite promises otherwise, it is causing american's to lose their jobs and insurance coverage months before it is even fully implemented? Are you worried that, since the CBO's predictions are inaccurate already, the true overall costs of Obamacare could be much higher than expected?

    http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obamacare-s-passage-millions-have-lost-employer-sponsored-health-insurance_607994.html

    Regards,
    PT

    ReplyDelete
  3. Other than the fact that corporate taxes are lower than they've been in decades, it's compelling. And I've not had anything to say, far as I know, about corporate tax rates, other than, not too long ago, to admit I don't know much about where they should be.

    My argument has been about returning taxes on the wealthy to where they were when the economy was a ball of fire. In order, as I've said, to see to it that we have a future as a country, instead of the long-term wreckage that will result from R insistence on cutting taxes and removing all ability to pay for what we need.

    Other than the fact that millions of people are now covered by insurance than were before, the other is compelling, too. However, as you may recall, I've never been a huge fan of "Obamacare" in that it keeps the insurers in the middle, sucking money out that should be going to care. There are, however, many ways in which it's better than the way things were before. Had the Rs not been so intransigent, it could have been much better still.

    ReplyDelete

Comments back, moderated. Preference given for those who stay on topic.

Popular posts