Political Theatre category archive

On the Media analyzes the media’s fascination with Mitt Romney’s dog carrier, From the website:

In 1983, Mitt Romney took his family on a road trip from Boston to Canada, with the family dog Seamus strapped to the roof of the car. Almost 5 years ago, the Seamus story made it into a Boston Globe story, and to this day, the anecdote of Seamus the dog continues to haunt Romney. Bob speaks to Boston Globe Magazine writer Neil Swidey, the person to first dig up the Seamus story.

Follow the link to listen.

Aside:

Frankly, I think the story has staying power because the idea of strapping a dog in a carrier to the top of a car is so outre that most persons would not have thought of it, let alone considered it seriously.

One of the commenters at the website (the comments are mostly–and surprisingly–sane) has this to say:

I wonder if the host of this segment is a Romney fan and/or has never had a dog he liked very much.

He spoke about the dog carrier as if it was a custom built carrier for car rooftops and that this misunderstanding is the root of the story’s staying power. . . .

Try doing some research (like a Google shopping search) and you’ll find that there is NO SUCH THING AS A “ROOFTOP DOG CARRIER!”
Never was.

Leonard Pitts, Jr., commenting on Little Ricky’s reception from college students in New Hampshire.

You will recall that they booed his homophobic homilies.

There is a historical pattern to the bigotry of social conservatives. They use terms of moral Armageddon against the freedoms sought by some despised or condescended-to other, whether it be a woman wanting to work outside the home, a Jew seeking to join a country club, or an African American trying to get home on a city bus. Then the freedoms are won, and people – even socially conservative ones – realize the world kept spinning after all. Armageddon did not come. Only change.

Take two minutes out of your day and listen to the numbers shrink from “hundreds of thousands” to “thousands.”

(Warning: Short commercial at beginning.)

Via TPM.

According to these folks. I think the quiz might have skewed things a little (but not much).

Note that they are not using the same definition of “libertarianism” as do the Paulistas. From the results page (emphasis added):

The usual understanding of anarchism as a left wing ideology does not take into account the neo-liberal “anarchism” championed by the likes of Ayn Rand, Milton Friedman and America’s Libertarian Party, which couples social Darwinian right-wing economics with liberal positions on most social issues. Often their libertarian impulses stop short of opposition to strong law and order positions, and are more economic in substance (ie no taxes) so they are not as extremely libertarian as they are extremely right wing.

My guess would be that my high score on the “libertarian” scale came because of my strong views on civil liberties and privacy. Furthermore, I sometimes selected seemingly contradictory answers from one question to another, because a question said “most important value,” rather than “important value.” The word “most” could change my answer from “agree” to “disagree.”

I can’t link to my results page. As near as I can tell, the results page is dynamic, based on one’s answers to the quiz, so, to see their explication, you’ll have to take their quiz.

Via PoliticalProf.

Via C&L.

David Shuster analyzes Mitt the Flip’s required disclosure forms and divines why the Flipster won’t release his tax returns.

Attack of the Newts.

Even considering the source, it’s worth watching.

Via Andrew Sullivan.

Addendum:

Shaun Mullen has excerpts. If you don’t want to watch the video, hop over and read them.

Jimmy Kimmel explains how gay marriage will lead to the end of humanity.

Via Andrew Sullivan.

Last night, a couple of us started wondering about Ron Paul’s fan base among the twenty-somethings. (The other person in that conversation is of that generation.)

We wondered at their inability to see the big picture of his destructive radicalism, which is founded in the states rights credo that has served as a smokescreen for exploiting minorities, women, and the poor throughout the sweep of U. S. history.

(The cynical suggest that they hear “legalize drugs,” at which point their brains cease to function. I doubt it’s quite so simple. I think it more likely that, upon hearing the Galtian credo, “Every man for himself, and the devil take the hindmost!” they fail to realize that many of them will end up amongst the taken.)

Bob Cesca, whom I cite here often because he is a realist (he knows that, to attain the ideal, you must start by attaining the doable), just posted an excellent piece on Paul and the Paulistas. A nugget:

But a million Elvis fans can’t be wrong. Or can they? In other words, Ron Paul supporters are easily some of the most exuberant, die-hard, overzealous political activists around, and you’ll probably get a hearty sampling of that zealotry in the comments below this post. Nevertheless, the perpetual question about a movement like this is: how can so many people be so completely delusional?

Follow the link for his answer to that question.

Via BartCop.

At the Guardian, Lizz Winstead explores the Republican candidates’ skeevy preoccupation with the sex lives of others simply by quoting them.

Hoo, boy.

Marc Lamont explains why racist stereotypes persist as part of U. S. politics. A nugget:

By racializing the poverty crisis, the Republican Party is able to organize poor whites against their own interests. Throughout American history, disadvantaged whites have supported everything from slavery to welfare reform, all of which undermine their own prosperity.

Of course, this works only against the backdrop of white supremacy, a system that makes whiteness a coveted piece of social, cultural and emotional property. Within this system, even the most socially desperate white citizen finds pride in being white or, more importantly, not being black.

As a result, rather than aligning themselves with other poor people, these individuals instead elect to close ranks around race.

Bob Cesca wonders where the yellers went:

What continues to be remarkable to me is the ineffectual tea party. While Ron Paul was second, much of the tea party, and its far-right voices on the radio and blogs, are supporting Gingrich (before him, Cain and Perry). This so-called powerful movement in the party isn’t very powerful after all, as evidenced by the now-obvious nomination of a moderate Republican.

Anyone paying attention realized that teabaggery was an astroturf movement funded and promoted by (you will pardon the expression) the 1%, destined to be discounted when it was no longer a useful diversion.

OhMyGov! runs down the five most common political Twitter mistwits.

Not one suspected terrorist.

Thoreau seems to have reached the breaking point.

Der Spiegel wonders whether Fox News is willing to sacrifice Republican aspirants to the ratings wars. The publication observes that, as soon as someone grabs the front runner flag, Fox tries to capture the flag. A snippet:

Fox News needs sensationalism to maintain its ratings, which is why the Republican candidates cannot expect preferential treatment this year. Because hatred of Obama and the left has become old news, Fox has turned its focus to transforming the Republican primaries into a circus — fueled by Ailes, the Republicans’ shadow leader, who at times wields his power like a dictator.

It’s an interesting read. Follow the link for the rest.

Anne Laurie tells the tale at Balloon Juice. A nugget:

It was a cold grey pre-spring morning early in 2002, and I was one among the hordes migrating through the Back Bay (subway, commuter rail, and intercity bus) terminal. Suddenly a tall humanoid in an expensively-tailored dark tweed business-capitalist overcoat lunged into my meagre personal space and thrust a dark-gloved hand towards my throat. When I automatically pulled back, he bared his top-quality-dental-hygiene teeth in a primate threat gesture possibly intended to mimic a smile. Two or three much younger, smaller drones in cheap knock-off overcoats immediately rushed over and carefully guided the tall humanoid away from me and towards another potential target. One of the little drones tarried to look back at me, arrange his shiny happy features into a frowny-face, and hiss, “That was Mitt Romney! He’s going to be your next Governor!”

There’s no there there.

Yesterday, Bob Cesca posted that the odious Republican Southern Strategy has returned.

I’m afraid he’s wrong. It never went away.

What’s different in this campaign is that the Republicans are no longer attempting to camouflage it; everyone can hear the dog whistles.

Writing at the Guardian, Teresa Wiltz recounts the almost constant appeals to racism by Republican candidates and concludes, quite rightly, that

Some would call this dogwhistle politicking – the cynical use of code words and phrases to rile up the racist base. That’s what Sarah Palin did back in the 2008 campaign when she famously noted that Barack Obama “is not one of us”. But this goes beyond dogwhistling. These are messages that are coming in loud and clear for all to hear. Gingrich, Santorum and Paul can’t be bothered with prettying things up. It doesn’t matter that they’re spreading lies and misinformation. (For starters, according to the US Census, 59% of food stamp recipients are white, while 28% are black. Poor comes in all colors.)

They just don’t give a flying fig.

Gingrich, Santorum and Paul are using the same playbook as DW Griffith did back in 1915 with Birth of a Nation: painting black folks as the boogeymen.