And They’re At The Gate And Ready To Go

And with only a few days to go, it’s turning into a horse race … Mitt an Ron are neck and neck … Newt is fading to the pack … Oh What Is This! Santorum is surging round the last turn! Oh boy I am hoping for a photo finish 🙂 My guess, polls aside, is given the strong turnout by the batshit social conservatives that it will be Ron Paul (a quadrennial favorite in Iowa), Rick Santorum, and Mitt Romney in that order.

So what cuteness abounds

• LMFAO – So, Bachman’s campaign co-chairman in Iowa, Kent Sorenson, switches sides to Ron Paul at the last minute … then she accuses the Ron Paul campaign of essential bribing him to do so … then her Iowa political director comes out in defense of Sorenson.  Oh lady, you are so done.  Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on your way out.

• Well here is an endorsement that should automatically disqualify Newt.  Art Laffer, of the Laffer Curve and an architect of supply side economics,

“The purpose of economic policy is growth, jobs, and prosperity,” supply-side founder Art Laffer told me today. As such, Laffer has endorsed Newt Gingrich and the Gingrich 15 percent flat-tax plan, which includes the 12.5 percent corporate-tax reform. “It’s nothing against the other candidates,” Laffer said. “But Newt’s plan is right, and therefore endorsing him is the right thing to do.”

which means Newt’s plan will screw us all

• And it is all just so worth it to hear the likes of Krauthammer, eating their own

“It is, and I don’t think it can be explained by anything that the president has done in a positive way,” syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer said about President Obama’s rising approving ratings. “I think it’s explicable by two things. The first is the ridiculous way that the Republicans have conducted themselves in the Congress, particularly in the last couple weeks where they were given a victory early on, and they kicked it away and achieved really nothing in terms of cutting spending or any of their real objectives, but suffered politically, making Obama look like at least a grown-up.

• Erick Erickson hates Rick Santorum. Who would have guessed?

• Remember Jon Huntsman? Didn’t think so …

• Perry?  He is so yesterday.  But he keeps pissing away his constituents money

 

It’s Getting Good

• A little publicized provision of ‘ObamaCare” has gone into effect this month, and it it is one of the bigger deals of the legislation.  Starting this month insurers are being required to have a medical loss ratio of 80/20  What that means is that insurance companies must spend at least 80% of your premiums on actual *gasp* health care.  Needless to say, conservatives are aghast at this.  Republican controlled states such as Michigan and Florida have requested waivers for this provision, but these have been solidly denied by Feds. A good summary over at Balloon Juice here

“President Obama claims the new healthcare reform law will decrease healthcare costs for Americans,” said Coffman (R-CO). “However, the new Medical Loss Ratio included in the law may have the opposite effect by forcing insurers to increase— not decrease— premiums, because insurers will be discouraged from investing in administrative services, such as anti-fraud or anti-waste services, that could save consumers money…

Are you fucking kidding me?

• The pummeling of Newt continues even as his bubble seems to be bursting.  And now that Ron Paul is ascending in Iowa, the knives are coming out here, here, and here.  The Republicans are dead set on making Mitt the 2012 Bob Dole.

• Apparently the EU did not learn from our fuck ups here

• There is already a plug-in for Firefox to circumvent SOPA should it become law.  Technology, or more importantly, geeks, will always come up with ways to circumvent the laws.

• And today the House Republicans are still dead set on making themselves look like assholes.  This one just kills me.  I personally am against the payroll tax cut itself, it is just a political ploy and has the potential to undermine Social Security if continued ad infinitum.  The Republicans should be all over this because A) it’s a tax cut B) if they continue to push it year after year they could ultimately get their wish and undermine Social Security.  But no, Obama wants it, therefore no tax cut.  They are making it glaringly obvious with this simple maneuver that all they care about is denying Obama ANYTHING and that they don’t give one wit about the middle class and the poor.

 

No Love for Newt

Watched just a little bit of the 9,423rd Republican debate.  This whole thing has turned into some wierd, mutant version of American Idol.  If only Hunter Thompson was alive to see this, he would have a freakin’ field day, though Matt Tabbi has done a fine job (1) (2) (3)

Poor Newt can’t get any lovin’.  Democrats loathe him (obviously) and even the ‘establishment’ Republicans hate him. They couch it in terms of electability, but it is pretty clear that it is personal.

• Ed Kilgore in the New Republic, “…my money is currently on Gingrich pulling off a repeat of 1964.” That would be Barry Goldwater’s disastrous campaign.
• Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.): “There’s all types of leaders, leaders that instill confidence. Leaders that are somewhat abrupt and brisk. Leaders that have one standard for the people that they’re leading and a different standard for themselves. I just found his leadership lacking, and I’m not going to go into greater detail than that.”
• Rep. Peter King: “Newt Gingrich was a disaster as speaker. Everything was self-centered. There was a lack of intellectual discipline.”
• Jim Talent, the former senator from Missouri: “If the nominee is Newt Gingrich, then the election is going to be about the Republican nominee, which is exactly what the Democrats want.  If they can make it about the Republican nominee, then the president is going to win.’’
• Charles Krauthammer: “Gingrich has his own vulnerabilities. The first is often overlooked because it is characterological rather than ideological: his own unreliability. Gingrich has a self-regard so immense that it rivals Obama’s — but, unlike Obama’s, is untamed by self-discipline.”
• David Brooks (who likes him): “He has every negative character trait that conservatives associate with ’60s excess: narcissism, self-righteousness, self-indulgence and intemperance. He just has those traits in Republican form.”
• And while I cannot stand this woman, Ann Coulter can be hilarious: “At the end of Gingrich’s first year as House speaker, his endless, nutty pronunciamentos — in addition to his plan to entrust Republicans’ legislative agenda to an old couple whose living room VCR continuously flashed “12:00″ — had driven his public approval numbers into the dirt.”

It will interesting/entertaining/painful to see how the primary pans out.  Anything is possible.  But if I could have two small wishes in it all, they would be 1) Ron Paul wins the Iowa caucuses (the man deserves a win)  2) Gingrich implodes in a spectacular and epic fashion such that he barricades himself in his home and is never heard from again.

 

(Belated) Sunday Reads

Sorry for the delay, but a few belated Sunday reads

• Of the Republican field I have to say that I really do like Ron Paul.  Not because I agree with his policy positions, in fact I disagree with many of them.  But I respect the fact that he is consistent in what he says, and that he does actually believe in what he says.  He may be the only honest man in the Republican party. Five Myths About Ron Paul

• Now on the other side is Newt Gingrich.  One of the more repulsive figures of Republicandom who’s political fortunes have risen from the dead like the zombies in the Walking Dead.  Five Myths About Newt Gingrich
  
  

• Rick Perry’s homophobic “Strong” ad is on track to be one of the most disliked videos in You tube history.  Seems it is currently it is in third place with 600K+ dislikes as of 10pm EST.

• Ross Douthat says Gingrich is to Republicans what Kerry was to Democrats in 2004, and has this Great closing line,

Conservatives may want catharsis, but the rest of the public seems to mainly want reassurance. They already know Barack Obama isn’t the messiah he was once cracked up to be. What they don’t know is whether they can trust anyone else to do better.

• Besides the fact offering to make a $10,000 bet kinda ruins that whole “guy next door” thing for Mitt, doesn’t Mormonism frown upon gambling?