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

if rich people knew they could 'buy a presidential election', then republicans would have 10x as much money as obama, because there really is a lot on the line for them. $1 billion isn't very much money put in perspective of how much is on the line.

first you compared him to Dubya (lol) and now you're comparing him to Nixon (megalol)

but guess what, another billion dollars of romney posters doesn't do anything

I like the idea of posting steadily more despairing prez election result maps.

Santorum hasn't been President for four years and running CREEP, "ratfucking" the opposition etc gtfo

i had forgotten all about this:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2005/jun/23/selling-washington/?pagination=false

For over ten years, but particularly since George W. Bush took office, powerful Republicans, among them Tom DeLay and Senator Rick Santorum, of Pennsylvania, have been carrying out what they call the “K Street Project,” an effort to place more Republicans and get rid of Democrats in the trade associations and major national lobbying organizations that have offices on K Street in downtown Washington (although, of course, some have offices elsewhere).

The Republican purge of K Street is a more thorough, ruthless, vindictive, and effective attack on Democratic lobbyists and other Democrats who represent businesses and other organizations than anything Washington has seen before. The Republicans don’t simply want to take care of their friends and former aides by getting them high-paying jobs: they want the lobbyists they helped place in these jobs and other corporate representatives to arrange lavish trips for themselves and their wives; to invite them to watch sports events from skyboxes; and, most important, to provide a steady flow of campaign contributions. The former aides become part of their previous employers’ power networks. Republican leaders also want to have like-minded people on K Street who can further their ideological goals by helping to formulate their legislative programs, get them passed, and generally circulate their ideas. When I suggested to Grover Norquist, the influential right-wing leader and the leading enforcer of the K Street Project outside Congress, that numerous Democrats on K Street were not particularly ideological and were happy to serve corporate interests, he replied, “We don’t want nonideological people on K Street, we want conservative activist Republicans on K Street.”

...

b-b-b-b-ut John Mitchell ran CREEP!

Nixon was also a pretty moderate Republican in his own time, right? compared to like Goldwater?

if rich people knew they could 'buy a presidential election', then republicans would have 10x as much money as obama, because there really is a lot on the line for them.

the problem is they're squandering their money on a field of candidates while Obama's rich folks are falling in line. If the GOP financiers unified behind a single candidate they could convince the proles to vote for, they WOULD be buying this election. But there's too huge a disconnect between the moneybags and their actual voters this time around.

xp

I like the idea of posting steadily more despairing prez election result maps.

http://uspoliticsguide.com/images/Presidents-history/1988-electoral-map.gif

George Herbert Walker Bush & J. Danforth Quayle

yet, somehow, it's just impossible that Rick Santorum could get elected

b-b-b-b-ut John Mitchell ran CREEP!

I knew you were gonna say this

yet, somehow, it's just impossible that Rick Santorum could get elected

Santorum is not the VP of one of the most popular presidents ever.

just fyi

I first heard Matt Taibbi's name when he wrote a series of stories on the K Street Project.

If you think campaign money is all going into yard signs and bumper stickers, I've got some keyrings to sell ya.

he's sort of the leftover frothy mixture of the least popular president ever

xpp

And also, to compare President Obama to McGovern and Dukakis is a bit ingenious.

aero, you're starting to sound like Matt or clemenza. Would you like me to sing "Oh Susanna"?

lol Shakey has an explanation of why every horrible president with zero personal charisma & a likeability factor of nil are somehow not comparable to Rick Santorum

the problem is they're squandering their money on a field of candidates while Obama's rich folks are falling in line. If the GOP financiers unified behind a single candidate they could convince the proles to vote for, they WOULD be buying this election. But there's too huge a disconnect between the moneybags and their actual voters this time around.

how exactly do they convince millions of people w/ this extra money? the candidates will both have enough money to run as many ads as they'd ever want.

nixon was a d-bag but he was, for better or for worse, more 'viable' than santorum. he'd been vice president, he'd been in the spotlight as a major player for a long time. i don't think santorum has the same clout and i think his more virulent positions might bring him down. however, i don't think he *can't* get elected. it's pretty pathetic that the right is far gone enough to consider him a good choice and as a result it may be therefore possible for america to vote him into office in a general election.

gys dont u see just look santorum is electable totally i have a map

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c4/ElectoralCollege1840.svg/345px-ElectoralCollege1840.svg.png

lol Shakey has an explanation of why every horrible president with zero personal charisma & a likeability factor of nil are somehow not comparable to Rick Santorum

And you're drawing comparisons to people who ran against HUBERT HUMPHREY.

lol Shakey has an explanation of why every horrible president with zero personal charisma & a likeability factor of nil are somehow not comparable to Rick Santorum

dude I'm not making this shit up. Sitting presidents have real historical and logistical advantages (Nixon in 72), as do the VPs of incredibly popular presidents (GWHB in '92), well-financed scions of powerful families also have certain advantages (GWB in '00). These are real, quantifiable things that Santorum does not have.

xp

nixon did not have 'zero personal charisma & likeability' you fucking hippie!

I agree general with you there omar but have you seen de Antonio's Millhouse? A worthwhile watch for anybody who ever says, of anyone, "this clown could never get elected"

Now when I think of personal charisma, I think of Sen. Metrodome.

Nixon's problem, as omar and Shakey have said, is that he was in '68 too well-known: everyone knew his political convictions, insofar as he had any.

Santorum's problem is that he's got six months for the general public to acquaint himself with his positions before they vomit on his lap.

anyway, that nyrb story features the sentence “Santorum has begun discussing what the consequences are for the movie industry.”

this thread made me think of this band

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJc7F3vhx4U

like, all those dudes were huge figures in their party who had been around for decades, had extensive networks of supporters, had put in their time hewing to the party line and building national campaign apparatuses. Santorum is not those dudes.

xpp

he hopes that's vomit.

xp

guys i have a map and an italian movie

I got popcorn!

i think talking about whether or not you personally like a presidential candidate is a really valuable rubric for figuring out that candidates chances

idk i have a good way of stating this but in 68 and 72 nixon's 'unlikeability' was one of this strengths (if perlstein reads history right anyway) while santorum's unlikeability in 2012 is just unlikeability

More relevant:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/14/ElectoralCollege1844.svg/350px-ElectoralCollege1844.svg.png

dude I'm not making this shit up. Sitting presidents have real historical and logistical advantages (Nixon in 72), as do the VPs of incredibly popular presidents (GWHB in '92), well-financed scions of powerful families also have certain advantages (GWB in '00). These are real, quantifiable things that Santorum does not have.

incumbents do have a 'real quantifiable advantage' and well-financed scions are more likely to have found a path to political office than yr average joe.

santorum doesn't have much political support in the gop at this point in the game, and that does matter a lot. and romney does have a financial advantage in the primaries. but once you're in the hundreds of millions of dollars it just *stops mattering*, campaigns spend on the stupidest shit.

2012 republican presidential nominee IV: i have a map and an italian movie

NEEDS MORE BOOING

^^^I have raised a lot of money for that thread title, it better fucking win

I even bought yard signs and shit

i think talking about whether or not you personally like a presidential candidate is a really valuable rubric for figuring out that candidates chances

is this inverse correlative or are you accusing me of liking Rick Santorum because if so sir we must have words

the problem is they're squandering their money on a field of candidates while Obama's rich folks are falling in line.

I'm pretty sure the Koch brothers could drop $100mn apiece in the general and plan on getting a healthy ROI. GOP backers squandering their money early does not seem to be much of an issue tbh

http://wiki-images.enotes.com/thumb/f/f4/ElectoralCollege1888.svg/350px-ElectoralCollege1888.svg.png

GOP backers squandering their money early does not seem to be much of an issue tbh

we'll see. dunno how eager these guys are to throw good money after bad.

uh yeah, exactly

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/02/what-are-democrats-for-santorum-thinking.html

well will what are you thinking, plz tell jonathan chait

dems predicting half a billion funneling into gop super pacs in the general, so itll prob end up twice that, god save all american tv watchers

PPP intriguingly finds that 55% of the Santorum Democrats actually like him, against 40% who are just messing with Romney.

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