August, 2012 | The Bitchy Pundit

The Meme That Mean Built

August 31, 2012 by Bitchy

I was watching Clint Eastwood’s train wreck last night, as it was happening and I had the same reaction that everyone else had; What the fuck? He looked like a crazy person. And as the cameras panned the crowd, I could see that some of them were running through the same what-the-fuck cycle I was running through.

And when I woke up this morning, and saw the #eastwooded memes, I laughed (a lot). But I also felt bad because he’s old, and maybe not as sharp as he once was. But the memes kept on coming, and I kept on laughing and feeling a little bad for him.

I’ve watched the speech two more times throughout the day, and a couple of things that didn’t occur to me last night (probably because I was dazed and confused) finally dawned on me. The first thing that I thought of is, why did he even agree to do the speech? He was eviscerated by the right for doing the “It’s half time in America” commercial for Chrysler. His party of patriots went thermonuclear on his ass, for having the gaul to be proud that an American company came back from the brink of disaster. His party is so fucking blinded by their own meanness, that they can’t even take pride in America anymore. Why the fuck would you want to have anything to do with these people anymore? And how do you not assess the situation exactly as I just did? So then I thought that maybe he truly believes that Mitt Romney is the right person to lead this country, despite their disagreement on the Chrysler situation. Remember, Romney wouldn’t have done anything to save them. But if that’s the case, why didn’t Eastwood just say that? Why didn’t he talk about being proud of Chrysler for coming back, while disagreeing (in hindsight, of course) with Mitt Romney about the handling of that one issue. He could have then gone on to talk about the issues in which he agrees with Romney and, I don’t know, maybe talked about why the views they share are better for the country.

That would have been a great speech. It would have been great for Eastwood, in repairing the ill will that republicans had for him, and it would have been great for Romney. But Clint decided to go mean. He decided that saying mean things about (or in his mind, to) Barack Obama. And if you watch the speech, he sounded lucid enough until he got mean. Once he got mean, he sounded like an addled brain old man.

I honestly believe that meanness has a corrosive effect on the soul. And that corrosive effect is what’s wrong with the republican party. That meanness is what makes them incapable of taking pride in goddamned anything about America anymore. They couldn’t take pride in the fact that we, before any European country much older than us, raced through enough racial issues that we elected a black president. I’m not saying that they should have embraced Obama. But they should have taken pride in that American accomplishment. I’ve never heard a republican espouse pride in America for that. They didn’t allow themselves to be proud of America when Osama Bin Laden was finally killed by an American bullet. And they refused to be proud when an American car company came back from nearly total oblivion to thrive.

Meanness is the thing that is corroding the republican party. Their whole convention was centered around being mean to the other guy, rather than praising their guy. Why? Because even they know they have nothing praiseworthy left anymore. Meanness causes blindness. Republicans should have figured out that they needed to completely revamp the party platform after the 2008 ass kicking. But they didn’t, because they’re blinded by meanness. They walked away from that election, thinking they lost because their nominee wasn’t conservative enough. Never mind the fact that there’s nothing conservative left about the republican party. They’ve lost conservatism because of their mean blindness. And I’m sad to say that the ass kicking that Romney is going to get in November, won’t lead them to reassess either. They’re just going to repeat the 2008 mantra of not having a conservative enough candidate.

I don’t feel bad for Clint Eastwood anymore. He’s just fucking mean, and he’s getting what he deserves. Part of me thinks that the GOP was still pissed at him when they booked him to speak. Think about it, the executive producer for the convention got that fucking empty chair for him. They knew what he was going to do. And no sane person could possibly think that was going to go over well. Maybe they wanted him to go out there and look like a jackass, as payback for “half time in America”. Maybe he got outmeaned.

Ann Romney Fail

August 29, 2012 by Bitchy

I think that everybody understands that Ann Romney’s mission last night was to humanize Mitt. After she was done, I asked my Facebook fans if they felt she had accomplished that goal. Most of my admittedly biased fans didn’t think she did. Pundits seem to have mixed opinions, mostly guided by their party affiliation.

I thought she failed. I initially thought she failed based on stylistic mistakes. There was no subtlety in the speech itself. She seemed to me to be the unpopular geek in high school, begging you to like her by doing your homework for you. She used the word “love” fourteen fucking times, which just made the whole thing weird. I was irritated when she proclaimed, “I love you women!”. As opposed to “you people” who have all the tax returns you need from Mitt? The stuff about how she and Mitt met and fell in love was fine. She should have said more along those lines.

But the more I thought about her speech, the more I realized that the issues with it weren’t stylistic. The main issue was the fundamental premise of the speech. Here’s the part where she really fucked up:

I am the granddaughter of a Welsh coal miner who was determined that his kids get out of the mines. My dad got his first job when he was six years old, in a little village in Wales called Nantyffyllon, cleaning bottles at the Colliers Arms.

When he was 15, dad came to America. In our country, he saw hope and an opportunity to escape from poverty. He moved to a small town in the great state of Michigan. There, he started a business — one he built himself, by the way.

He raised a family. And he became mayor of our town.

My dad would often remind my brothers and me how fortunate we were to grow up in a place like America. He wanted us to have every opportunity that came with life in this country — and so he pushed us to be our best and give our all.

Inside the houses that lined the streets of our town, there were a lot of good fathers teaching their sons and daughters those same values. I didn’t know it at the time, but one of those dads was my future father-in-law, George Romney.

Mitt’s dad never graduated from college. Instead, he became a carpenter.

He worked hard, and he became the head of a car company, and then the governor of Michigan.

When Mitt and I met and fell in love, we were determined not to let anything stand in the way of our life together. I was an Episcopalian. He was a Mormon.

We were very young. Both still in college. There were many reasons to delay marriage, and you know? We just didn’t care. We got married and moved into a basement apartment. We walked to class together, shared the housekeeping, and ate a lot of pasta and tuna fish. Our desk was a door propped up on sawhorses. Our dining room table was a fold down ironing board in the kitchen. Those were very special days.

First of all, no one believes that you two were ever poor. And trying to make yourselves something that everyone knows you’re not just enforces the idea that you’re panderers. That was the most disingenuous and disgusting part of the speech. It was disgusting because of the premise upon which that pandering was done.

Their assumption is that Americans don’t like them because they’re rich. They’re dead wrong, and they’re insulting Americans by believing that about us. They really think that we’re a nation of envious assholes. Never mind the fact that no one ever hated Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Henry Ford, Conrad Hilton, and hundreds of others for being rich.

Let me set the Romney’s straight; we don’t hate you for being rich. We hate you because it’s clear that you won’t do anything to help Americans that aren’t rich. We don’t hate you for what you are. We hate you for what we know you won’t do for the middle class. We hate that you’ve lived a life devoid of any empathy, or any attempt at understanding how average Americans live. We hate you for thinking that Americans should just borrow some money from from their parents to get an education, or start a business. We hate you for thinking that we’re assholes for not thinking of that obvious solution. We hate you for being on this earth for over sixty years, and not bothering to understand that this isn’t possible for the vast majority of Americans.

And now, Mitt and Ann we hate you for the disdain you have for us.

RNC Coverage August 28, 2012

August 28, 2012 by Bitchy

Let’s hope this works!

22.32

Can Ann say “love” any more? The agenda of this speech is about as subtle as a freight train.

22.31

Oh Ann, we know – you and Mitt are very warm and fuzzy.

21.35

Fun fact about Ted Cruz; he thinks the government is going to put us all in hobbit homes. Google it if you don’t believe me.

21.27

And there’s the welfare lie again.

21.26

Santorum is anti-gaying it up. Who could have seen that coming? I guess the subtlety is a little surprising.

21.22

“In 1923 there were no guarantees of government benefits”. Yes, and 1923 was a great year for most Americans!

21.19

Is anyone else noticing the sudden influx of brown people in the ads and on stage tonight?

21.16

I spoke too soon. Santorum is next. This will be worth watching!

21.08

It’s going to be over an hour of boring. I’ll be back for Chris Christie around 10:30 EST.

21.07

RT @Wolfrum: When fascism comes to America it will think it built it.

21.02

Is Scott Walker actually implying that he cares about the working man?

20.57

Here’s Bob McDonnell giving Obama some credit for Virginia’s economy;

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/03/bob-mcdonnell-obama-virginia-economy_n_1566093.html

20.55

Brace yourselves, Scott Walker is next. Wow, I can type while vomiting.

20.53

RT @Marnus3: Funny to hear Bob McDonnell talk about small govt with an ultrasound wand in his hand.

20.52

Republican governors cut shortfalls (by taking stimulus checks!)

20.47

Honestly, if they’re going to make this whole thing about the economy, they’re screwed. Most Americans still attribute the crappy economy mostly to W.

20.46

Governor ultrasound!

20.43

I can’t help but notice that this year, the GOP is using a word they never uttered in 2004 or 2008. Anyone want to guess which word I’m referring to? Comment on my Facebook page.

20.40

And by the way, you can’t take credit for lowering the unemployment rate in your state, while asserting that government can’t do anything.

20.39

How are these governors touting low unemployment rates in their states, while asserting that the federal government didn’t have anything to do with it? Don’t make me post pictures of y’all handing out giant stimulus checks!

20.34

Biden lied about being a golfer? Talk about reaching!

20.30

How long is it going to be, before The Black Eyed peas slap a cease and desist on Kasich?

20.19

To be clear Kelly, Obama has created 4.5 million jobs, versus Bush 2.0’s ZERO jobs, and Bush 1.0’s 2.2 million jobs.

20.17

Kelly Ayotte stopped saying that might be remotely true, when she finished the story about snow plowing.

20.00

But let me say, the crowd in the stadium even look bored!

19.59

This is boring. I’ll be back when John Kasich comes on. Hopefully, that should be in the next 20 minutes or so.

19.53

YAY! They found an artist who will let them use his music. Has anyone ever heard of Lane Turner?

19.51

And she went right for the “he’s the other” by saying that Obama doesn’t share the American dream.

19.49

Is this bitch seriously talking about democrats racking up debt? Hello! Reagan? Bush 2.0?

19.47

The government didn’t build it? I assume she’s not referring to the building she’s standing in!

19.45

Shocker! They nominated Mitt Romney!

Motivating The Base

August 11, 2012 by Bitchy

This will be a short and sweet post on my analysis of Mitt Romney’s pick of Paul Ryan to be his VP running mate. The one sentence version is that I think that Mitt is trying to motivate “the base”, which he knows he doesn’t have. I believe that he has some internal polling that shows that a significant chunk of the base isn’t excited, and might not show up.

Why do I think this? Because Mitt Romney just kissed off most independents (and Catholic nuns). A moderate pick like Rob Portman, Tim Pawlenty, or even (yikes!) Chris Christie would have been a play for independents. A play that he would have made, if the base was already locked up.

Presidential nominees always make VP picks based on that that potential VP can bring to the electoral map. VPs are picked to fill the holes left by the nominee on that map. Paul Ryan is not going to turn Wisconsin red in November. So what’s the hole that Romney hopes Ryan will fill? It’s the base. Specifically, the base in Virginia and Ohio where Romney is losing badly.

This VP pick isn’t one that tells me that Romney is coming from a position of strength. It tells me that he’s trying to lock up voters that any other republican nominee would have locked up by now.

No-Doc President

August 10, 2012 by Bitchy

If there’s one thing that republicans, democrats, and independents can agree on, it’s that no-doc loans were a factor in the subprime mortgage collapse in 2008. We need to see documents that verify that what you say is the truth, right?

So why the fuck would anyone want to elect a no-doc president? If Mitt Romney is running on his business prowess, he needs to prove it by showing us his tax returns. He needs to show us his tax returns more than any presidential candidate in the last sixty years, because he’s running on his exceptional skills at running a business.

And to be honest with you, the more he doesn’t want to show his tax returns to me, the more I want to see them. I learned a lesson by seeing the part that no-doc loans played in the financial collapse. There’s no way in hell that I’m voting for a no-doc president.

And to the fucking children on the far right that demand to see Obama’s academic records, immunization records, driving test sores, and whatever else you’re demanding to see before Mitt releases his tax returns, let me say; grow the fuck up. The foundation of your “argument” is based on a childish tit-for-tat. Childishness aside, (I can’t believe this needs to be pointed out) no presidential candidate has ever been asked to provide their birth certificate, never mind their academic records. Every presidential candidate in the past seventy years has provided their tax returns. Mitt Romney does not get an exemption from that tradition.

And frankly, I don’t know why he would want one. He has the opportunity to crush Harry Reid once and for all. All Mitt has to do to prove that Reid is a liar and a buffoon, is to release his tax returns and disprove Reid’s claims once and for all.

If you’re not going to release your tax returns to crush your political enemy Mitt, do it because you know that the American people aren’t foolish enough to elect a no-doc president.

The Triple Mitt Flip

August 3, 2012 by Bitchy

I’m not even sure that I need to comment on this, other than to say that this all happened in a 24 hour period of time. Here are the events in chronological order;

Here’s what Mitt said about the Palestinian culture, while in Israel on Monday.

And here he is on Tuesday morning, denying what he said on Monday night;

But wait, he’s not done! Here’s what Mitt wrote a few hours after he denied saying what he said on Monday.

Here’s a great analysis from The Young Turks, on why Mitt is so willing to look like a complete jackass;

It appears as if Rafalca is not the only pet in the Romney clan, whose only purpose is to dance for an appreciative audience.

Does anyone honestly feel that this man would lead The United States into an era of peace and prosperity? Does anyone honestly have a fucking clue about what a Mitt Romney presidency would actually look like?