Symmetry required it: 2012 american general election thread #2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_6vnKiowzk

Also, the simple fact that Clint Eastwood felt comfortable riffing about how Obama’s got to go, has to help others get over that psychological barrier — which was a big theme of the whole convention — is a significant cultural breakthrough.

yep, big cultural breakthrough getting a speaker at the RNC to riff about how Obama should not be reelected.

newsflash: nothing matters, ppl are stupid, end thread now

glad we cleared that up

I watched this in a mcdonalds and the guy next to me asked who was on tv during the romney speech

if we ensure that republicans aren't voting for obama then we're getting somewhere!

People who hang out at McDonalds for free wifi and/or lack of anything better to do might not be representative of the electorate.

they're prob more representative than people itt

Whose company do you prefer?

eh

would you like friatees with that

McDonald's have TV sets? and TV sets broadcasting the convention?

yeah lotsa large mcdonalds have tv sets, almost always w/ fox news

would you like lies with that

Not sure if the photo here is meant as a sly joke or not.

http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/08/a-poem-for-friday-2.html

You can never start your Christmas shopping too early.

http://www.tnr.com/blog/electionate/106822/the-rncs-sneak-preview-the-coming-republican-primary-bloodbath

yeah lotsa large mcdonalds have tv sets, almost always w/ fox

For real?? If you're not in a severely red state then that is kind of fucked up

Was in one in Virginia with Fox News on a few weeks ago.

you'll see it throughout purple states, depending on the political orientation of the business owner

Almost all McDonalds have large flatscreens in them now.

Driving cross country in 2010, NYC to SF on 80 - I was struck by how many public places in smaller towns, rec rooms and lobbies in hotels motels, chain restaurants, gas stations - all had official looking televisions installed, loudly blaring. And at least 80% of the time, they'd be tuned to Fox news. Not even entertainment; the cable news station. You'd literally be in a room for 25 seconds before you'd hear Obama criticism. It was eye-opening; when you live there, its consensus reality.

Yup. Every chain hotel I've hit in the U.S. in the last 1.5 years has the lobby screen set to cable news, and 4 out of 5 times or more is Fox. Similarly, screens in rental car joints are always on cable news.

"Yeah, it's annoying, but the manager wants us to put it on here"

i catch espn on public tvs more often, but when it's a news network it's definitely fox news

yeah i've had the same experience with everyone re: fox news. Assume everyone boring enough to open a franchise of something is conservative enough to enjoy fox news.

Romney is proposing an executive order requiring all costs from future regulatory measures to be offset by cuts to existing regulation and declaring that all new measures will require congressional approval:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/mitt-romneys-rage-regulation/story?id=17128454#.UELaWlRV47A

well that will certainly reduce government and streamline processes

that is RIDICULOUS

so sick of this nonsense

2012: Chairs We Can Believe In

Ryan answered that he “hurt a disc” in his back, so he doesn’t “run marathons anymore.” Instead, he said, he just runs 10 miles or less.

yeah I don't run marathons anymore, meaning I've run one marathon in my life.

I'm past the marathon-running phase, which lasted a day.

iatee

what were you doing at mcdonalds

i had also wondered this

Perfect Chairs and the Absent President

An essay on Eastwood's insightful demonstration of the impossibility of the platonic ideal of the Presidency, and the necessity of compromise in voting.

there is a huge mcdonalds a block away from me and sometimes I go there when my stolen wifi goes down or when I want to watch fox news.

I don't eat the food other than dollar sundaes but its a weirdly interesting place. it sorta operates as a lower class starbucks.

the son of the inventor of psychodrama:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/01/opinion/what-the-chair-could-have-told-clint-eastwood.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

"Here is a very important thing to keep in mind when attempting to make sense of the bursts of ugliness that occur throughout the conventions: A lot of the people you are watching are drunk. Really, really drunk."

http://www.ginandtacos.com/2012/08/30/useful-information/

bored and drunk really really bored and drunk

btw if u leave a cable news channel on all the time the ticker totally gets burned into the screen haha mcdonalds u really did it this time

Irish wedding drunk

i was gonna but tbh

McDonalds CNN burn-in:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/97/Emerson-McDonalds_CNN_Burn-In.jpg

u got to change the channel sometimes folks

theyre just folks tho how would they know

they were gonna change the channel but u must remember they were v likely drunk

Our mcdonalds flatscreens are on nickelodeon, the bastareds.

I'm tired of David Axlerod, but he started with a good moment on Fox this morning; Chris Wallace asked him something to do with all the promise and excitement of four years ago, and, very dryly, Axlerod said something like, "I'm glad you look back on that time with so many good feelings, Chris--I share them."

After that, though...he and Plouffe seem stymied by the most basic question in the world: are people better off today than four years ago? The question seems to come as a complete surprise to them, and they immediately start doing the Jackie Gleason. Can they not simply reframe that as three years and six months ago rather than four? Not perfect, I know, but grounded in common sense, and at least it would neutralize the then-and-now numbers that the questioner throws on the screen as they start rambling.

I come across ESPN the most, Fox most often in hotels (generally muted). Often CNN, though. And no one os ever paying attention. It's so gormless. "I guess we should put the TV on, give people something to stare at..."

I once had an early appointment at a doctor's office and was relived to find the TV off in the waiting room. Sat down and perused a Readers Digest when at the crack of eight o'clock, the goddammed TV turned on by itself. <ptherfuckers; Eric Blair would've been proud.

Every time I go to the dentist they very proudly hand me a remote control and show me my private pivotable TV. I always tell them that there's nothing good on, which is why it's being broadcast at 10 in the morning. They always look at me like I'm crazy for saying no, like I'm turning down a free milkshake for breakfast or something.

every time I go to the dentist he very proudly hands me a bill.