Close Readings: Herman Cain’s preemptive denial

By Dan Brooks in Close Reading 11 Comments

Not pictured: lower half of Herman Cain

LL Cool H, you guys: Ladies Love Cool Herman. More specifically, they love coolly accusing him of sexual misconduct. Last night, Cain told Wolf Blitzer that soon, someone somewhere would “accuse me of an affair for an extended period of time.” He meant the affair lasted for an extended period of time, but it will probably work the way he said it, too. As you can see, claiming that Cain grabbed your boob or dated you for 15 years or whatever in order to derail his otherwise perfect presidential campaign has become a real fad. You know what else is a fad? Lying. It’s so popular that people don’t even realize they’re doing it anymore, the way you had to tell your friend that he was saying smokin’!  too much in 1994. In last night’s preemptive denial of whatever thing he absolutely did not do with the lady he knew was about to accuse him of something, Cain forgot that not everyone has just watched The Mask. Quote after the jump.

Continue reading

Santorum says single mothers are “base” of Democratic Party

By Dan Brooks in Close Reading 4 Comments

This picture of Rick Santorum comes courtesy of Raw Story. When all other indicators of journalistic neutrality are erased, photo selection will tell us what we need to know.

Speaking last week on something called Today’s Issues, Rick Santorum told Tony Perkins—yup—that single mothers are the base of the Democratic Party. “Look at the political base of the Democratic Party: it is single mothers who run a household,” Santorum said. “Why? Because it’s so tough economically that they look to the government for help, and therefore they’re going to vote. So if you want to reduce the Democratic advantage, what you want to do is build two parent families, you eliminate that desire for government.” First of all, please note that an earlier version of the Right Wing Watch article transcribed Santorum’s remark as “reduce the Democratic appendage,” which was incorrect. Second, if Rick Santorum isn’t careful, his opportunistic political calculations might coincide with human compassion. Video after the jump.

Continue reading

Close readings: Sarah Palin’s discandidacy announcement

By Dan Brooks in Close Reading, Uncategorized 5 Comments

"Did you just say pork burrito? It sounded like you said pork burrito."

I follow three people on Twitter: Ben Fowlkes, Iowa legislator/general nutjob Kim Lehman, and Sarah Palin. Yesterday, SarahPalinUSA directed me to Facebook for a “statement on 2012 decision.” The statement is that she isn’t running. She cites the same reasons that have been drifting through her various word-clouds for the last month: that she wants to help other conservatives get elected, that she doesn’t need a title to “restore” America, that no one who owns a TV or has heard of America would even briefly consider putting her in charge of it. That last one is implied, I guess, but the upshot is that even Sarah Palin knows Sarah Palin can’t be President. Most of her announcement is what you’d expect, except for the first paragraph. That’s actually a work of considerable nuance, or at least insinuation, and it’s the subject of today’s Close Reading. Primary source after the jump.

Continue reading

Steve King against birth control, end of human race

By Dan Brooks in Close Reading 5 Comments

Not the good one

Representative Steve King (R–IA) lobbed another softball into the American media yesterday, arguing that requiring insurers to cover birth control could lead to the death of civilization. The DHS released a new set of guidelines this week that will eventually require health insurance policies to cover birth control without copays. It’s a great way for working moms to kill the tiny babies that live in their husbands’ sperm, and for coeds to slut it up like Gomorrah. I’m paraphrasing, here, but Rep. King’s comments are little more lucid:

We have people that are single, we have people that are past reproductive age, we have priests that are celibate. All of them, paying insurance premiums that cover contraceptives so that somebody else doesn’t have to pay the full fare of that? And they’ve called it preventative medicine. Preventative medicine. Well if you applied that preventative medicine universally what you end up with is you’ve prevented a generation. Preventing babies from being born is not medicine. That’s not— that’s not constructive to our culture and our civilization. If we let our birth rate get down below replacement rate we’re a dying civilization.

As always when one hears more than two Steve King sentences in a row, several concerns leap to mind.

Continue reading

Close Readings: Despicable Wasserman Schultz

By Dan Brooks in Close Reading 6 Comments

Bippity boppity boo.

Tuesday was another brisk trading day for the marketplace of ideas. After Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D–FL) criticized his support for a bill that would cut Medicare spending, Rep. Allen West (R–FL) issued an email to her and several House leaders that read, in part:

You are the most vile, unprofessional and despicable member of the U.S. House of Representatives. If you have something to say to me, stop being a coward and say it to my face, otherwise, shut the heck up. Focus on your own congressional district!

That’s like paragraph two. West’s last imperative is kind of odd, given that A) he lives in Wasserman Schultz’s district and B) the function of the House of Representatives is presumably not for everyone to shut up and focus on his own district. West was angry when he wrote that, perhaps because Wasserman Schultz had just delivered the following remarks from the House floor:

The gentleman from Florida, who represents thousands of Medicare beneficiaries, as do I, is supportive of this plan that would increase costs for Medicare beneficiaries—unbelievable from a member from South Florida.

In Florida, they call that the age card. It’s dirty rhetoric for sure, but there remains a substantial gap in tone between Wasserman Schultz’s remarks, addressed to the gentleman from Florida, and West’s response, which begins with Look, Debbie… There’s also that part about vile and despicable; those are probably not terms we should use to debate one another. They are catchy, though, right?

Continue reading