Tagg: Mitt Romney “wanted to be president less than anyone I’ve met in my life”

By Dan Brooks in Republican Candidates 0 Comment
Like when Stimpy was about to cry

Like when Stimpy was about to cry

Miracle Mike Sebba sent me this long postmortem of the Romney 2012 campaign, in which the candidate’s son says:

He wanted to be president less than anyone I’ve met in my life. He had no desire to . . . run. If he could have found someone else to take his place . . . he would have been ecstatic to step aside. He is a very private person who loves his family deeply and wants to be with them, but he has deep faith in God and he loves his country, but he doesn’t love the attention.

That’s saying something, since Tagg Romney meets only people who might plausibly become president. Why is Mitt Romney so much more likable in defeat? Call it the Citizen Kane effect: a rich person who wants more is a scary monster, but a rich person who has been disappointed is the human condition.

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Romney and Obama both claim to be winning

By Dan Brooks in lying 2 Comments

Cedric the Entertainer’s dad enjoys early voting in Florida.

Only one week until the election—have you gone insane yet? David Brooks has; today in the Times, he argues that given Republican intransigence, the best way to ensure bipartisan reform is to elect Mitt Romney. Brooks’s bold ideas for the future always involve universal Republican governance. He can be forgiven his quadrennial hysteria, however. Not even the candidates themselves know who’s winning—or if they do, they ain’t telling. Both the Obama and Romney campaigns have declared victory in the general election and unquestioned dominance of several swing states, where their own spending is going to work and the other guy’s is a sign of desperation. It kind of puts the voter in an odd position.

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Grassley calls President “stupid” via Twitter

By Dan Brooks in Contemporary Media 5 Comments

Pictures into which harmonicas must be Photoshopped immediately

The last time we checked in with Senator Chuck Grassley’s (R–IA) Twitter account, his message to his followers was “Barb made oatmeal.” That was in 2009, on the morning his Senate committee abandoned its attempt to reach bipartisan consensus on health care reform. Grassley operates in the Iowa tradition of laconic hicks who are secretly genius assholes, and he uses Twitter accordingly. Like Basho, his poetry is in what he does not say. It was therefore surprising to see him issue this long-winded rebus on Saturday:

Am they? Oh, wait—that’s “American people” who r not stupid.

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