Friday links! Richie Richer edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links, Uncategorized 5 Comments

Just do the right shoe—no, the left! Never mind; do them both. Hang on a second. What do you think?

God, I love it when Mitt Romney does things. Yesterday the presumptive Republican nominee went to London the way your aunt goes to a new Olive Garden: critically. While most of his remarks about the 2012 Olympics have been positive, he told Brian Williams that reports of logistical problems before the games were “disconcerting.” I hope you’re happy, Mitt Romney, because your wife’s horse is screwed now. Today is Friday, and rich people around the world will take a half day but get no less money. It’s a fantastic time to be wealthy, even if you are an asshole, and today’s link roundup is bedazzled with cash and anuses. Won’t you get it but not get it with me?

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Romney keeps it surreal in the Hamptons

By Dan Brooks in Republican Candidates 3 Comments

“We removed it to make his mouth more efficient!”

My favorite aspect of the 2012 presidential election is the micro-genre of news story in which Mitt Romney does some Richie Rich shit. This weekend was delightful, as Romney held a trio of fundraisers in the Hamptons. You may remember the Hamptons from such experiences as client invites you to his summer home to reinforce the idea that he is your boss, or this. That was hilarious when I was twelve, but now that I am older I prefer the sort of sardony you can only get from the New York Times:

A woman in a blue chiffon dress poked her head out of a black Range Rover here on Sunday afternoon and yelled to an aide to Mitt Romney, “Is there a V.I.P. entrance. We are V.I.P.” No such entrance existed.

Well played, Michael Barbaro and Sarah Wheaton. But for the prize pig Romney donor quote of the weekend, you’ll have to click on the jump.

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Oh thank Christ

By Dan Brooks in health care 3 Comments

The United States Supreme Court

I’m as surprised as you: the Supreme Court has ruled to uphold the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. The individual mandate is constitutional, albeit on the grounds that it is a tax and not a mandate. But no matter—minus some sticky stuff about federal coercion of the states to expand Medicare, health care reform stands, kit if not caboodle. “It is painful to recognize that the liberties which our forefathers fought a revolution to secure have been lost,” Karen Harned of the National Federation of Independent Businesses writes, “But it is clear that our original constitutional system has been thrown out, and we are left with only the democratic process to preserve our rights.” Let the hyperbole begin continue!

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Leonhardt on the national age divide

By Dan Brooks in Baby Boomers 1 Comment

I’d better turn out to be really good at this thing.

As anyone who saw me gallivanting around Missoula with my mother will tell you, many Americans are much older than us. Some might argue that age is a continuum, with several Americans in fact younger than even we are, but that seems far-fetched. It ignores the monolithic concentration that is the Baby Boomers—those people who invented rock and roll, who ride around the farmer’s market on Harley-Davidson motorcycles, who can be found at the post office screaming that Social Security is unconstitutional. Sorry—everything but Social Security is unconstitutional. The increased conservatism of the Boomers accounts for much of the country’s rightward shift over the last few years, as David Leonhardt suggests in his excellent Sunday Times column.

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Friday links! Straight shootin’ edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 0 Comment

Pictured: much radder American flag, same old Mitt Romney.

I’m a straight shooter. I tell it like it is, by which I mean I tell it like I think with little regard for other people’s opinions. People don’t like to hear the truth. It follows that what other people don’t want to hear must necessarily be true. Society may not always welcome a plainspoken truth-teller like me, but that’s the price I pay for being honest. It’s certainly better than admitting that I am a dick. Today is Friday, and we’ve got a whole mess of uncurved shooting in our link roundup. Much of it is not what strict rhetoricians call true, but the gun still fires with an impressive bang. Won’t you peer down the barrel with me?

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