Political Theatre category archive

Via ABLC.

In the Guardian, Michael Cohen compares the two recent political conventions and what they might indicate about the parties. A nugget:

Quite simply, Democrats and Republicans operate in two completely distinct realms, one that is defined by an attachment to reality and one that is increasingly detached from it.

If their three-day convention in Tampa is any indication, Republicans reside in a fantasy world where government plays no role but that of malevolence, where the free market is the salvation to all that ails this nation and where the country is locked in a Manichaean struggle between the forces of freedom and a failed, socialist interloper named Barack Obama.

Meanwhile, Gary Younge wonders whether that bell you hear is finally tolling for the odious Southern strategy:

This could be the final hurrah for what became known as Nixon’s southern strategy in what is shaping up to be the most racially polarised election ever. Black support for the Republican party literally cannot get any lower. A recent Wall Street Journal poll had 0% of African-Americans saying they intend to vote for Romney. At 32%, support among Latinos is higher but still remains pathetically low given what Republicans need to win (40%) and what they have had in the past – in 2004 George W Bush won 44%. As a result, the party of Lincoln is increasingly dependent on just one section of the electorate – white people. To win, Romney needs 61% of the white vote from a white turnout of 74%. That’s a lot. In 2008, John McCain got 55% from the same turnout. “This is the last time anyone will try to do this,” one Republican strategist told the National Journal. And Republican consultant Ana Navarro told the Los Angeles Times: “Where his numbers are right now, we should be pressing the panic button.”

Follow the links. Read them both.

Daniel Ruth wonders why all the fuss about the wives of presidential candidates. A snippet:

For some inexplicable reason, if the wife can reveal to voters that her husband likes pork rinds, or leaves his socks on the floor, or is partial to meat loaf, or once drove a rusted jalopy, or prays even more than the pope, this translates into him being just the man jack to be leader of the free world.

This is the most magnificent flame I have ever read. I’ve written some great flames, especially back on the old AOL STA message board, but this surpasses my best work.

Even better, it was sent to a bigoted gay-bashing Maryland state legislator by an NFL player who does not fear speaking out.

Via Balloon Juice.

Via Delaware Liberal.

. . . for Republicans. Steve Benen reminds us

Towards the end of President Clinton’s second term, debt clocks that had been established in various U.S. locations had to be shut down — the deficit had been eliminated and the clocks had never been set to run backwards. By the time Clinton left office in 2001, the nation not only had a large surplus, it was also on track to pay off the entirety of its debt — roughly $5 trillion at the time — by the end of the decade.

Then the Bush/Cheney era happened. Republicans took a massive surplus and turned it into an even more massive deficit, adding the costs of two wars, two tax cuts, Medicare expansion, and a Wall Street bailout to the national charge card.

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) later referred to the Bush/Cheney era as a time in which Republicans decided “it was standard practice not to pay for things.” In just eight years, GOP policymakers added $5 trillion to the debt in eight years.

As Driftglass pointed out in this weekend’s podcast, one party lives in a world of facts and of cause and effect.

The other party–well, their convention was last week.

Republican magickal fanstastickal thinking accounts for the ability of Paul Ryan to give a speech so fanciful that even the establishment press could not ignore the fabrications, even as his fellow Republicans acclaimed them as tablets from the mount.

Via Raw Story.

Heh.

A clip of RNC highlights released Sunday by the Romney campaign emphasizes top Republican politicos like Romney, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, cutting Eastwood out entirely. But that didn’t have much of an effect on Romney’s supporters.

In other news, further down the story, individual Republicans seem to have adopted the empty chair as a symbol of the party.

It fits.

They nominated an empty suit.

Via SLANTblog.

Afterthought:

Stolen labor has been fundamental to the American economy since 1619.

Robyn Blumner considers the state of political discourse and suggests some new norms. Here’s one.

Rule One: Identify yourself. Reputation is a powerful civilizing force, while anonymity exerts the opposite push. The role of anonymous money for vicious political attack ads coarsens the debate. The people giving would never affix their names to what’s being said. Stop the cowardice and lower the temperature.

The rest pretty much flow from that one.

The comment (here’s an example) misses the point.

The Republicans didn’t invite Clint Eastwood to speak. Clint Eastwood was just a vehicle.

They invited Dirty Harry. Anything else was gravy.

Thom explains the con:

The courts seeem to be seeing through the con.

Ronald E. Riggio, blogging at Psychology Today, has a simple explanation:

So, the question is why do politicians so often lie, exaggerate, and distort the facts? The short answer is that it works! People are notoriously bad at detecting when others are lying, and there are several psychological reasons for this.

He goes on to explore very briefly those psychological reasons.

If you pay attention to politics–or maybe especially if you do not pay attention until an election nears–this should be required reading.

Der Spiegel is not improessed.

But Ryan still sees himself as a man of the people. He loves to quote Ronald Reagan’s assertion that, when the rich have more, their wealth will “trickle down” to all citizens. He seems to forget that the results of that experiment are well known. In 1982, Reagan had to massively increase taxes because the US budget deficit had grown so huge.

But that doesn’t shake Ryan’s convictions. In terms of hypocrisy, he is a worthy heir to those Republicans who condemn the state but are happy to use it when they want to ban something that does not fit into their worldview. Ryan, who is supposedly so skeptical about government, has supported more abortion restrictions than his party colleague Todd Akin, who recently caused a scandal with his remarks about “legitimate rape.”

Read the rest.

This picture purports to be about the London Daily Mail, but I think it’s about Fox News.

Via Mr. Feastingonroadkill.

Reg Henry comments on convenient conventional lapses:

The most amazing lapse of memory concerns the president whom Mr. Obama succeeded — you know, what’s his name, the Texas-drawling fellah from Maine. Republicans have wiped all mention of him from their collective memory banks, which is strange seeing how much they liked him at the time. We have gone from having a vice president at an undisclosed location to an ex-president with an undisclosed persona.

(snip)

This is a truly inspired type of forgetfulness, because it makes Mr. Obama responsible for everything. Republicans are blessed because they can’t remember the deficit when what’s-his-face was in the White House, suggesting to them that it probably didn’t happen. Nor can they remember Rep. Paul Ryan’s part in supporting the huge spending by whoever was doing it.

Click to read the rest, wherein he also wonders what the Democrats will forget in two weeks.