David Frum‘s two part essay on why Mitt Romney is 100% wrong on the 47% is a must read.
The background to so much of the politics of the past four years is the mood of apocalyptic terror that has gripped so much of the American upper class.
Hucksters of all kinds have battened on this terror. They tell them that free enterprise is under attack; that Obama is a socialist, a Marxist, a fascist, an anti-colonialist. Only by donating to my think tank, buying my book, watching my network, going to my movie, can you – can we – stop him before he seizes everything to give to his base of “bums,” as Charles Murray memorably called them.
And what makes it all both so heart-rending and so outrageous is that all this is occurring at a time when economically disadvantaged Americans have never been so demoralized and passive, never exerted less political clout. No Coxey’s army is marching on Washington, no sit-down strikes are paralyzing factories, no squatters are moving onto farmer’s fields. Occupy Wall Street immediately fizzled, there is no protest party of the political left.
…
From the greatest crisis of capitalism since the 1930s, the rights and perquisites of wealth have emerged undiminished – and the central issue in this election is whether those rights and perquisites shall be enhanced still more, or whether they should be allowed to slip back to the level that prevailed during the dot.com boom.
Yet even so, the rich and the old are scared witless! Watch the trailer of Dinesh D’Souza’s new movie to glimpse into their mental universe: chanting swarthy mobs, churches and banks under attack, angry black people grabbing at other people’s houses.
It’s all a scam, but it’s a spectacularly effective scam. Mitt Romney tried to make use of the scam, and now instead has fallen victim to it himself.
And these two assessments of the inner Romney are bang on.
So there are two possibilities: this is the real Romney, a callous cynic with contempt for half the country, the weaker part; or that Romney is a man so empty of human qualities he even has to fake cynicism.
I think he really genuinely believes that the only reason that his particular message isn’t resonating is that people want something for free and he’s not offering it to them.
And let’s remember that Romney’s words are simply a reflection of the bigger Republican message. The pain that Republicans are experiencing over the release of the Romney video has nothing to do with what Romney actually said about the 47 percent, as inaccurate as it all was. No, the real pain the right is feeling is having their disdain for the poor and middle class expressed so openly and candidly.
Republicans prefer their true intent on most issues muddied up and camouflaged in layers of BS and lies. So when one of their people gets caught stating the party’s true intent, it’s like kryptonite to them for it’s essential that the little people never know how deep and hard Koch and friends are screwing them.
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The Romney source photograph is a Creative Commons licensed image from photographer Gage Skidmore.
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The only entitlement that Romney believes in is his ascension to the Whitehouse.
Mitt was pretty transparent before the release of that video — if you have any intuition about people’s character at all — however, this revealing insight into how he thinks tied it all up in a neat little package for you. My hope is the independents will sit up and take notice, and cast their ballot for Barack Obama, to represent ALL of the people as our president for another four years.
As the old saying goes, “Better to keep your mouth closed and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt”.
Romney’s whole philosophy is wrong because he truly believes that free enterprise is the only way for the USA poor and middle class to get out of their doldrums. He simply needs to look back and he will find that the poor and middle class have been getting harpooned for the last 20 years at least. Look at the jobs that are opening today and you see a rise at McDomald,Taco Bell,Harvey’s etc…positions. Paying jobs have been outsourced or have come back at reduced salaries, some of the brain power is leaving the country and the rich are still getting richer. Corporations have substituted future pensions of employees for management bonuses and stock options and future defined contribution pensions will create a poorer population by retirement.
We have seen where tax cuts have led us in the past and what it did was create more wealth for the rich and encouraged the hiding of this wealth in tax shelters such as Cayman Island or Switzerland. NO jobs worthy of mention were created to substantially lift the middle class. It is a pipedream to think that every american has a shot at the american dream ( because there is so much space up there ) and somewhere we must admit that while it is a worthy goal,it is accomplished more by the few who are encouraged by the many. So when Obama asks the few to help the many,you will see Romney spit the rant of entitlement and victims of circumstance.
Republicans ! Wake up ! You of all people are in that 47% amd most of us are in the 99%.If you vote for Romney, you will see governmental reductions of services that you have never seen so he can enciourage our young to go to wars and die for nothing becuase dying for corporate interests is never in the ideals that are so dear to me.
O=mc2
As usual, well put Mario!
I have not really been a huge fan of Andrew Sullivan, but this is so poignantly focused for the revelation of the real Mitt. Especially:
That is a perfect description. Mitt doesn’t even know he has contempt though. He just believes he and his kind are better. He will send our young to die and cut ALL benefits to the 47% without a single night of tossing and turning. It is for their own good, now they will learn to be strong like us…
I wonder how you cocky liberals will feel on the morning of Nov. 7 when you wake up and realize that Mitt Romney is your president. The secret video you’re all harping about is exactly what republicans needed to expose the truth behind the Obama socialist agenda. The age of entitlements is coming to an end. We’ve tried it for 50 years and it’s time for it to go. It’s bankrupting this nation. The videos are a wakeup call for all republicans to finally bring this issue to the forefront. Let’s have this debate and let Americans decide if they want to live in a country that rewards hard work or rewards freeloaders.
Marcus…I can’t help but wonder if you are independently wealthy, if you have a “grand plan” for becoming so or are you simply independent of your senses?
Marcus — you might do a little fact checking on the folks that comprise the 47% before you call them “freeloaders”. My husband worked for 47 years, and I worked 35 years outside the home and raised a family. We paid into Social Security all of those years, paid our federal and state income taxes, property taxes, etc. — in other words, we always played by the “rules”. Now we are retired, drawing the meager Social Security we paid into, and continue to pay taxes on purchases and on our property. All those years we kept our noses to the grindstone, without let up. We are not alone — there are many retirees in this country that could tell you the same story. I would hardly call us freeloaders. That is offensive.
Marcus is a troll. No one would have been able to evade the enormous amount of information that has gone out, even from several conservative pundits, contradicting Mitt’s beliefs on that 47%. Either Marcus is choosing to not hear it – or he is just trolling. So, either not very bright – or just obnoxious.
Some of the posters will now present a massive bundle of facts – and Marcus will just come back about Obama is a Socialist or some other claptrap, all the while ignoring the facts set out before him.
Well, Marcus -
You yourself don’t seem cocky at all (read sarcasm here). But I will feel relieved and gratified if that is indeed the result of the November election (not certain it will go that way myself).
If you were paying attention you would have learned that the aforementioned 47% referred to by your favorite elitist rich bastard aren’t “freeloaders” at all. If you were paying any attention, you would notice that “The secret video you’re all harping about” doesn’t expose ANYTHING about Obama. It is all about Romney and his duplicitous journey to a Presidency where he intends to represent the worthy 53% such as yourself.
I guess if we are cocky, that makes you cockless. No wonder you are angry.
Notice Marcus just paraphrases talking points like a good little drone, I am so glad I can think for myself and just don’t fall in line and repeat the same thing the rest of the republicans are taught,,, republican brainwashing = Say it enough times and it will become the truth.
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Heroin is not bad Marcus
Wheres’s redstate girl.
Like to hear her view about the red states being the biggest collectors of welfare recipients in the country,,, I can almost hear her answer, its the blacks…
@Nivi – you right in what she will say, but whites account for the majority of welfare recipients. That little fact doesn’t play well on the right.
Mitt is nothing more than a corporatist – he won’t represent the 53% any more than he’ll represent the 47% – he’ll represent the 1% – his corporate buddies that are pouring money into this campaign so they can gain all the goodies they can under his presidency.
The elite of the right have made millions laughing all the way to the bank pushing their meme of the lazy liberals. They’ve told that story so often they now believe it themselves. And those on the left have gotten rich trying to fight back against the lazy liberal meme.
How many books and other crappy stuff made in China have they sold the masses filling them up with hate? Obama’s election has made them rich — just ask Glenn Beck. Who the hell ever heard of him before Obama was elected? Pushing the socialist, redistributionist nonsense. Good god, don’t these people understand that redistribution of wealth is what government does! Every single bill that requires funding is moving cash from the taxpayers to someplace else. Be it Wall Street, a corporation either building something for us, or getting a tax subsidy, an oil company or some low income kids getting food stamps. And let me tell you, that monthly food stamp stipend adds up in most states to around a $1.50 PER DAY, not per meal. So i can assure you the oil companies are getting a much better deal…and they’re multi-national corporations, not even American ones! Talk about freeloaders!
The mad men of Wall Street and the Rovians are the ones getting rich off the class warfare they’ve (although not begun) have perpetuated and sadly both right and left have bought into it.
How sad it is that they have so divided our country to the point that I for one would like to have a two state solution.
You and me Marcus.
I am solid Obama Democrat but I like to stir the pot, too.
Do more, Marcus!
No, I’m not independently wealthy but I am comfortable. Why does my financial status have anything to do with what I’m saying? You need to all admit that we’re going bankrupt and if we don’t start doing something NOW about entitlement reform, there won’t be any medicare or social security to support granny in 10 years. We dont’ have to get rid of it all. We need to REFORM it.
And there is only one guy running for president who is serious about reform. You don’t have to like Romney to understand that we need him to be CEO of this country and get the books in order. Look at it as a trip to the dentist. You don’t have to like it but you know it’s necessary.
My dentist doesn’t slash his fees for his wealthier patients and raise them for everyone else.
My dentist doesn’t ask me to lay face down when I get a new filling.
My dentist doesn’t ask me to bend over forward and grab my ankles while insisting I wear a blindfold.
My dentist doesn’t tell me the plan is to simply fill in the cavity as he grips pliers in his filthy hand…behind his back.
My dentist doesn’t put me out, extract ALL of my teeth, and send them to China for a profit.
My dentist doesn’t tell his dentist friends that he doesn’t care about me at all.
My dentist doesn’t neglect 47% of my teeth because he thinks they aren’t worthy of his attention.
BTW – Marcus,
I officially apologize to you for my comment yesterday (cockless). That was far below my usual standard of maturity in discourse. We can disagree without being disagreeable.
Not a problem, OC. I’ve been called worse things.
My dentist doesn’t keep replacing fillings in my molar when the tooth is rotten at the root.
What if your Dentist’s party made your molar rotten in the first place?
What if he did, it’s still rotten.
Good reason to not see a dentist who was trained at the same dental school. No?
I think Marcus just inadvertently started a new internet meme: Romney the new dentist. “Would you trust this man with a dental drill?”
Why would we want to go back to Republican policies that drove the economy into the ground in the first place? That isn’t reform and it certainly isn’t progress. We’re coming back from the economic disaster left by the Bush administration slowly but surely, and we need to stay the course. We also need a prudent president who can manage the volatility and fragility of foreign affairs in these trying times — Mitt Romney has already shown us he’s not ready for the world stage — his aptitude for bungling our relationships abroad could seriously jeopardize our national security. He’s a loose cannon.
We need the steady hand of President Obama for another four years to continue the recovery and to move this country forward. Thanks to him our citizens have access to affordable health care, which is a major accomplishment for this country, and the first thing the opposition wants to dismantle if they succeed in their bid for the White House.
We don’t need the Romney-Ryan kind of reform that has no empathy and understanding for the wellbeing of the general population — Romney’s made it clear we are not his concern.
I’ m wondering if “comfortable” Marcus might concede cutting our Military/Pentagon outlays representing 33% of annual total disbursements. Our military spending is greater than that of the rest of the planet combined! Contract over-runs? Nah! Corruption…in and out of government.
We are in the business of war (as Eisenhower warned); the military acts on behalf of the corporations, the interests of our strategic world partners -like the Royal Saudi Family. (Mystified why we invaded Iraq? Now you have the answer…the House of Saud feared Saddam. Same as they would see the ayatollahs of Iran as a rusty mist over Bagdad.)
Of course the US military has many domestic customers; for instance Monsanto who have been buying acreage in North Africa -where only Libya has a deep-water port (A- HA!)-with a view toward planting their magic seeds to SELL food to the next Ethiopian starvation…and if this next starving customer doesn’t pay Monsanto…not to worry…our military is an excellent collection service.
With respect to all the brouhaha over who will win the presidency, please forgive me for requesting you all get your heads out of your asses. It doesn’t matter, when you know that our president has fostered a security enterprise that has “out-Bushed Bush”…a security structure that allows employees of the president (read military) to arrest US citizens without protection of Habeas Corpus, that has developed a listening program (main office somewhere in Utah) with sub-stations at all the usual CIA, NSA listening stations, except now they are listening to us…to everything we say or write in whatever media.
And how about that Legislature in DC? You know, the one that used to belong to us, the one that receives over $400,000 in lobbyist -let’s call it what it is- bribery seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year…48.7% of whose members are millionaires.
Oh. As BasicFunguist has previously stated: “Kid Kenya -that great kid from Chicago- will whip the Romneyan Shape-shifter’s snake-oil ass like a rented mule…like the walking, talking Jackass that Willard has so aptly -all on his own!- demonstrated himself to be.
There, children. Go back to sleep now; there’s no bogeyman; no, only a lot of guys in black suits who know your Nanas’ pet names for you all.
Always interesting to read Mr. Funquist, a unique style of writing, most times strange and far out, sometimes informative as in this post, and always with a touch of condescension.
True about the defense spending budget, the war in Iraq and the war profiteers who promote unrest in the world and especially true about the lobbyists and our politicians basically bought by rich special interests people or organizations.
On the “it doesn’t matter who will win the presidency” based on the “security issues”, I don’t know.
The world has advanced light years in technology and to keep our country safe may take those measures you seem to disagree with especially when there are idiots making incendiary, violence provoking videos and such under the guise of “freedom of speech”.
As far as “CIA NSA listening to everything we say and know our nana’s names for us” – we must realize that privacy as we once knew it is totally GONE,
with just a few clicks of some keys we can find out whether a person -
worked in the mortgage banking business or whether they like Ecuadorean Straw hats in the Nevada sunshine or perhaps once collected Harley-Davidson commemorative beer cans and likes Swiss Legend watches or whether one was a great fan of the cinematic work of actor Dennis Hopper.
Or whether one was once an Obama supporter but now is filled with the “disenchantment” of President Obama – otherwise known to you as “Kid Kenya”.
Sleep well Mr. Funquist .
Golden Sun-san, you must double-check your work. It’s BasicFunguist (FUNG-GOO-IST), not what you said.
What can I say? Sure. We leave tracks. We always wanna leave tracks, even when these may be those of our brother, the only child.
Did I relate to you the brief history of the retired misanthropic monsignore? Hated everyone; had it on good advice (from his older brother, also a priest) that that swarthy little itinerant Palestinian preacher from so long ago (you know, the one whose blood and living flesh we consume) was in fact an Irish Catholic. From the Bronx.
Did you think they’ll roll in in topless Daimlers? So sorry to hear of your need to be protected from the sensibilities of those with whom you are not in accord. Perhaps we shouldn’t be in their country; perhaps the children shouldn’t be wetting themselves when the drones buzz overhead…
Surgical. Clean. We got #2. Again. On the D&L:, General, how many children with this one?
“Four-thousand of our children, Mr. Vice President…” “So?”
If I’d taken the two basic Ancient Greek courses they’d have conferred a double major; then I may have read in the original the letter from that young, red-headed general -Aristotle’s pupil- to his mother where he said “easy to march in, Mother…very difficult to leave.”
REMEMBER THE MAINE…MAKE THE WORLD SAFE FOR DEMOCRACY…DECEMBER 6TH, A DATE THAT SHALL LIVE IN INFAMY…POLICE ACTION…SAILORS IN TONKIEN WATER…WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION…CURVEBALL…PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL OF FREEDOM AROUND GEORGE TENET’S THROAT
Aloha – Mr. Funquist the aspiring wordsmith – a great mixture of “word salad” you serve. Entertaining indeed !
I must ask, isn’t it thou that feels the need to be “protected from the sensibilities of those with whom you are not in accord” ?..after all, you imply the need for shelter from the “roving” eyes and ears of the American government, whose main reason for existing, is to keep all Americans safe?
Another implication – “Isolationism”- great in theory, but like most libertarian ideas, not practical in the “real world”.
“If only”..is the HOPE, somewhere between that, and “real-time” is the CHANGE.
Ahh… “if only”, more of us were familiar with Aristotle or even one of his many “pupils”, our decision making may have been different and our circumstances better. ~~~
Only extremists or those that don’t serve or make profit off it – like “WAR”.
I’m sure you’ll agree that, We must be grateful that this President has had the temperament to know when to be “flexible” and when to be firm.
*********BTW Mon Ami – Unless I am badly mistaken……………………
“BasicFunguist” or (FUNG-GOO-IST) :
“Fung goo” = a less-offensive way of saying “Phuck You!”
“Ist” = a person who practices in a specific field
“Basic” = fundamental
Therefore, BF, you’re name description is a person who fundamentally practices saying “phuck you”. Gotta Love It !
Would YOU be that “misanthropic monsignor”, that supposed “follower of Christ” – who hates humankind? :-)
Look, I’m no monsignore, GoldenSun-san.
Didn’t you ever bat fungos to little leaguers?…get them warmed up for the game? One who bats fungos is a Funguist…to little leaguers, a BasicFunguist.
Oh. May I suggest you willingly suspend your belief in American exceptionalism. Temporarily, OK? Do you suppose this is some sort of little league match? Let me suggest a point of view, not always mine: the ship of state is sinking fast and the eighty-dollar haircuts in DC and their corporate whoremasters are a gettin’ theirs while the gettin’s good. Acreage in Paraguay and Belize going like hotcales to a great many anonymous LLC’s.
And this may all end not very well, especially when it ultimately comes down to food and water and fuel. Out west folks take this quite seriously: fully maintained firearms, plenty of potable water, a year’s store of food…and cash -perhaps $3M around the house. This from the governing body of the LDS Church, no less; just in case this organized denial of our constitutional rights in the name of security is yet another prelude to a bad patch of history. Right-on, Benjamin! Yeah, they wanna keep us safe. Like in Katrina
Right. I am not in accord with with the fundamentalist pastors (except that kid in Dallas with the great hair) who are first cousins of the murderous mullahs; no, I do not expect advice on an exit strategy from four or five star boots on the ground generals whose business is war…”…taking advice from the generals is like the Road Runner asking Wiley Coyote for directions.”
So BasicFunguist is an isolationist needing to be protected by the Military Industrial Complex? Excuse me while I laugh into my four-finger Duke Snyder Rawlings fielder’s glove. Common, kids, into the field; I’m gonna hit a few out. (And because I loved them all, I taught them not to join up-even if they needed a job- unless the bastards were coming ashore at Coney Island.)
After reading your post Basic, for some strange reason I am really craving a salad.
Sydney – thanks for a most delightful comment and the smile it brought ! lol
Mr. Funquist – I give you that “fungo” is a baseball term of olde but wouldn’t a person who “bats fungos” be a funGOist? But Funguist is your made up name, so I won’t debate the term.
Is batting “fungos” your mindset?
Do you consider yourself the “coach” batting politically verbal “flyballs” and the fine people posting on this site, the “little leaguers” who will expend the time and energy to chase down your series of “foulballs”?
The result is – While entertaining for awhile – People grow weary of deciphering your mixture of random words that, while arranged in phrases that appear to give them meaning, actually carry no significance. The problem with your self-styled word-smithing is that your meaning gets hopelessly confused.
Perhaps you cannot help yourself. Chronic use of “word salad” appears in people with dementia and schizophrenia or a brain injury. If that is the case, then I will play catch with you a bit more.
Observation is, you have a grasp of certain facts that you use to introduce the most negative and pessimistic of world views.
Would you accept the concept of Yin and Yang? A Chinese philosophy (no American Exceptional-ism here) that describes how polar opposites or seemingly contrary forces are interconnected and interdependent in the natural world, and how they give rise to each other in turn in relation to each other.
Perhaps it will straighten out your “swing”.
PS – Baseball is a great game.
I was talking about coaching little league, GoldenSun-san. Perhaps it SHOULD have been Fungoist, but it was always with the “U” -at least back East. Thanks for your compliment on word salad, but if you might prefer the master in that craft, take a look at Richard Brautigan…no “docere” -jes’ “delectare”. He wrote TROUT FISHING IN AMERICA, and ROMMEL ROLLS INTO EGYPT et al. back in the sixties and maybe seventies.
Alright. Let me eschew the vain attempt at entertainment wrapping. The night it flashed over the jumbo-trons at the Rio in Las Vegas where the Democrats had joined to follow the election, when the word came over that Barack Obama would be the next potus I was not the only one in the room with tears streaming down a smiling face. Maybe our canvassing all those felons in North Las Vegas helped, maybe that riotous summer out of the storefront in burning Harlem when I was a kid had helped.
I dunno; but what I do know now without question is that his skin tone doesn’t make a good god-damn bit of difference. He may be the lesser of two evils, but GoldenSun-san, he’s not the progressive I misjudged him to be. And I do not accept he could not have done more to keep his word, his promises. There isn’t enough space or time here to go into the case of how he has out-Bushed Bush, that he is indeed a danger to personal liberty, that he sits on the wrong side of the tennis court (that’s a French Revolution reference).
If you would like the point of view I offer supported in enough foot-noted detail to please a monk, look into Jesse Ventura’s latest book, DEMOCRIPS AND REBLOODLICANS. Please. no ad homimem re Governor Ventura.
BasicFunguist just told me this has ceased being fun.
A slow brain-bleed left me comatose for thirteen days in 2002; Yin & Yang? Early ancestor of Quantum Physics.