Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Best Attack Line of the Campaign So Far

"Romney cut off kosher food to elderly Jews on Medicare."
- Newt Gingrich (yes, he actually said that).

I am loving this. About a year ago, I told a friend that I was really going to enjoy the GOP presidential primaries; but to be honest, I had no idea they'd be this good. I really like how Santorum and Newt are attacking Romney for being a moderate. I never thought I'd see the day when politically moderate people would be attacked for their lack of extremism, but there it is.

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Fantasy Obama

Inspired by recent Republican debates, I was going to write a post on this exact topic. But Bill Maher said it better than I ever could, so check it out.

My favorite part:
Republicans have created this completely fictional president. His name is "Barack X," and he's an Islamo-Socialist Revolutionary who's coming for your guns, raising your taxes, slashing the military, apologizing to other countries, and taking his cues from Europe, or worst yet, Saul Alinski.

And this is how politics has changed. You used to have to run against an actual candidate. But now, you just re-create him inside
The Bubble and run against your new fictional candidate. That's how Bush won in 2004 -- by running against John Kerry, a French war criminal.

And speaking of Bush, I know conservatives are saying, "Oh Bill, come on -- Democrats did the same thing to him." No. Say what you will about the Left's hatred of Bush. At least we were hating on the real guy. We didn't invent a bogeyman who tanked the economy, took us to war on false pretenses, and tortured prisoners -- that was the actual guy.

But run down the list of complaints about Fantasy Obama: He wants to raise your taxes (even though he's lowered them), confiscate your guns (even though he's never mentioned it), and read terrorists their rights --
yeah, like he did Tuesday in Somalia.
This "Fantasy Obama" to which Maher refers is apparently a big hit with the Barack-hating radical right-wing extremists who attend the GOP debates and who wouldn't vote for Obama if you held a gun to their heads. But do Republicans really think that General Election voters, especially Independents, will buy into this?

Monday, January 23, 2012

So Much For Romney's Florida Firewall (With Update)

From The Weekly Standard:
A new poll from Florida conduced by InsiderAdvantage/Majority Opinion Research finds 34.4 percent of Republican voters going for Newt Gingrich and 25.6 percent for Mitt Romney. Ron Paul has support from 13.1 percent, while Rick Santorum gets 10.7 percent.

The poll is "Among Registered Voters Who Will be Voting in Florida's Republican Presidential Primary," and was conducted the day after Gingrich handily won the South Carolina contest.
The next few weeks are going to be very interesting. Newt's got the momentum, but Romney's got the money and it remains his race to win.

My only concern now is Newt's big mouth, which gets him in trouble every time. But if Newt can avoid saying something stupid just for a few weeks (a tall order, I know), then I think we'll have a real race here.

UPDATE: The latest Rasmussen poll gives Gingrich a nine-point lead in Florida (Gingrich 41% and Romney 32%). Expect to see Romney really go on the attack against Gingrich in tonight's debate.

Friday, January 20, 2012

Bonus Quote of the Week

First Mitt won Iowa, then he lost Iowa? It’s a classic Romney flip-flop.”
- Stephen Colbert

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Quote of the Week

"I get speaker’s fees from time to time, but not very much.”
- Mitt Romney.

The New York Times, however, reports that "in the most recent year, Mr. Romney made $374,327.62 in speaker’s fees, at an average of $41,592 per speech, according to his public financial disclosure reports."

The average working family might find it interesting that Romney considers $374,327.62 to be "not very much" money. I'll bet you $10,000 that this statement will come back to haunt him.