2012 republican presidential nominee III: can romney get santorum out of his hair?

I'm not sure how much he's aware of the fact that any love given him at the convention will be less "We have come to recognise you as a holder of a vital strain of conservatism which we had tragically forgotten" than "Please please please don't run third-party"

Paul comes across as such a non-power broker kind of guy, though. He's 76 years old, he seems like the rare politician who doesn't crave power (or else he hides it really well), and he doesn't appear to have much use for any of the people he's running against. He clearly wants his ideas to be adopted by the party, but I have a hard time imagining him caring about who ultimately gets the nomination.

Yes--they'll eventually have to thread the needle in making sure he doesn't run third-party (which apparently he won't do for the sake of his son).

but god his son is such an anus

Rick Santorum launches: Conservatives Unite Moneybomb. Seriously: https://www.ricksantorum.com/unite/

Hahah brilliant.

he just has no self-awareness this guy

http://www.allamericanblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/dwightgingrich.jpg

The GOP Establishment will torpedo Newt. They have to.

And indeed, Morbz:

http://www.redstate.com/erick/2012/01/22/money-for-santorum/

http://i41.tinypic.com/ra11g9.png

I kind of think this is awesome

santorum's CUM-bomb is the funniest political name i've heard in a long time

https://www.ricksantorum.com/unite/images/quote-gb.jpg

man, gop really going into hyper-mcgovern mode, except nixon wasn't beatable

― buzza, Saturday, January 21, 2012 11:23 PM

I see what analogy you were going for here, but George just left a flaming bag of shit on your porch. And I had to talk him outta kicking you in the balls.

http://www.allamericanblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/dwightgingrich.jpg

i know ilx is a tough crowd for this kind of thing but this image only makes me think of

http://www.mtv.com/shared/promoimages/movies/z/zodiac/ruffalo/281x211.jpg

are we a tough crowd bcz we don't know who that is?

but, color me pessimistic, a future of grey-vs-brown politics sounds completely fucking miserable to me. if the 'new deal coalition' finally snaps forever and any organized unionized (groan) white working class disappears into palinism and kulturkampf, doesn't that sound like a future of shitty racebaiting fox news youtubes beamed into a human face forever?

reading about the south carolinans who voted for newt keeps making me think of this

Morbs, have you been up all ngiht?

Morbs, you know who all three of those people are.

santorum's CUM-bomb is the funniest political name i've heard in a long time

I can't even with this name.

schlump otm, that's the first person that came to mind

Translation needed: one of the topics of discussion on This Week today has been whether the bigger problem with last night's second-place finisher is his "Romneyness" or his "Mittness."

I think that's code for "no one likes him."

i wonder if it's code for "mormon"

also the argument that gingrich could be elected president of the united states through his sheer brilliant ability to destroy obama in a series of debates? to rational observers this is 100% nonsense. it only works if you inhabit a parallel universe of far-right-wing spin in which obama needs a teleprompter at every appearance because he's just the food stamp president who is actually not very smart or qualified. no coded language there, nah...

I just realized that Ron Paul looks remarkably like Hector on Breaking Bad.

http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.138919!/img/httpImage/image.jpg http://cdn.videogum.com/files/2011/10/hahacrazysal.png

also the argument that gingrich could be elected president of the united states through his sheer brilliant ability to destroy obama in a series of debates? to rational observers this is 100% nonsense. it only works if you inhabit a parallel universe of far-right-wing spin in which obama needs a teleprompter at every appearance because he's just the food stamp president who is actually not very smart or qualified. no coded language there, nah...

is there not a danger, though? we've already seen that gingrich is unabashed about inserting himself into as much of the political history of the last 30 years as he can, and that he loves to pretend to have historical knowledge to establish his authority. the problem wouldn't be that obama would fall apart, it would be that gingrich would be so self-confidently mendacious and sophistical that for many viewers he would make his rongness irrelevant. and i think obama might still have a problem with not wanting to sound like he knows what he's talking about when he knows he doesn't - professorial/lawyerly hedging. gingrich, on the other hand...

There's no danger. The vast majority of voters (who remain more or less a minority, regardless) are small-c conservative, and once this primary freakshow runs its course will likely not respond to cynical batshittery. Like, the last election, it didn't matter how loud the tea party folks or birthers got, they didn't play much of a role in the general. Local elections, on the other hand, are another matter. Maybe Newt, having rebranded himself as a viable ... anything, will run for Senate somewhere after he loses the White House and win small, which could, ironically, be a bigger win, in terms of potential for Washington troublemaking. Though I suspect he will go the more lucrative Palin route and use his increased visibility and notoriety to cash in. As they say, Newt is not dumb.

That said, I would happily watch a reality series about Newt training for and competing in snowmobile races.

the debates aren't going to involve subjects about which Obama wouldn't know more than Newt.

I DON'Trecognize guy in plaid suit

Soto, about once a week I can sleep more than 4-1/2 hrs w/out getting up

the question isn't about their relative knowledge, it's about their relative capacity for littering the stage with irrelevancies.

I DON'Trecognize guy in plaid suit

M. Ruffalo in Zodiac

romney releasing taxes on Tuesday. would this have still happened if he had won sc? we don't know how the Obama campaign is gonna be run, but it seems likely they wouldn't be openly trolling him on this issue the same way Gingrich is.

obama's debate performances were all very solid and consistent and that was before he had the experience of being president for four years. Gingrich might get some zings in but even when he 'won' he'd still probably be losing votes because his personality turns off pretty much everybody except 3 women.

I hope Newt uses his new level of celebrity to score a whole new level of trophy wife, or least bring some new smut to the public eye. Maybe hook up with Heidi DeJong Barsuglia, of "so messy!" fame.

haha if this campaign season doesn't end w/newt getting a new wife I will be v disappoint

A Kardashian, perhaps?

a quarter of votes may have already been cast in Florida making it difficult for newt to ride the momentum http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/01/for-newt-danger-and-opportunity-in-florida.php

Heavens! So many hopes being pinned on debates!

Winning a presidential debate is mainly a matter of meeting the objectives of your campaign strategy and making the right kind of connection with your potential voters. It has nothing to do with making your points more cognently than your opponent.

In Newt's case, this would mean demonstrating that he is more passionate than Obama about the issues, or whatever passes for 'issues' by that stage of the election, while reassuring the undecided voters that he would be a reasonably competant president. For Obama, it would mean painting his achievements in the most glowing colors possible, demonstrating a sufficient amount of passion, while not trying to outdo Newt, and politely stirring up deep doubts about Newt's leadership capabilities. As president, Obama need not throw any haymakers. Newt, by nature, will try to throw a lot of knockout punches.

iow, the usual boring crapfest.

Roffle:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/post/an-open-letter-to-republican-leaders/2012/01/21/gIQA9abjGQ_blog.html

If conservatism becomes a movement of anti-media bashing and hyperbolic rhetoric, it will cease to be a force in American politics.

o rly

We’d be looking at four more years of Obama’s economic policies, four more years of strained relations with allies, several new Supreme Court justices and an unprecedented power shift to the executive branch.

Hi I write for the Washington Post and I don't know what the word "several" means

It's a day for unsolicited advice!

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/288866/how-mitt-lost-south-carolina-charlotte-hays

weird seeing 'strained relations w/allies' wheeled out by someone on the right; i can't think what it means beyond israel?, & would've thought that anything that made allies plural would be referring to a relationship that wasn't gonna get better under gop rule

These guys are pathetic:

[Approved commenter] Rook
: 01/22/12 15:11

LOL, I've not talking about brie-eaters. I'm talking about relatively educated, non-evangelical suburbanites, many of whom probably eat cheddar and mozzarella.

Yay for food-based stalinism!

At some point, you want to go to the local Safeway or Meijers or Walmart even and stand in the grocery aisles, pointing at each item on a shelf and ask these people if Real Americans(tm) would eat that flavor.

"So, the arugula is out but the romaine is in? what about the iceberg?"

Really? Asking Haley Barbour to run? Maybe that WAPO writer should ask Mike Huckabee why he's not running and go from there.

Maybe Haley made those obnoxious last-day pardons to draw a couple of lines under "I'M NOT RUNNING, GET ME?"

http://gifsoup.com/webroot/animatedgifs4/1324222_o.gif

I'M OUT! *klunk*