Afternoon Open Thread: Romney Calls on Akin to Withdraw from Missouri Senate Race

Posted: August 21, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Mitt Romney, open thread, U.S. Politics | Tags: , , , | 50 Comments

Here’s a first.

Mitt Romney has finally screwed up his courage and taken a stand on something. With only about two hours to go until the deadline for Todd Akin to withdraw from the Missouri Senate race, Mitt Romney’s campaign has sent out a press release calling on Akin to quit. I guess the courage to appear in person and make the statement was beyond Romney’s ability. Here’s the statement:

“As I said yesterday, Todd Akin’s comments were offensive and wrong and he should very seriously consider what course would be in the best interest of our country. Today, his fellow Missourians urged him to step aside, and I think he should accept their counsel and exit the Senate race.”

Early this afternoon Akin said on the Mike Huckabee radio show that he is staying in the race.

“I said one word in one sentence on one day, and everything changed,” Akin said today. “I believe the defense of the unborn and a deep respect for life. … They are not things to run away from.”

The National Republican Senatorial Committee is threatening to withhold financial support from Akin.

NRSC Communications Director Brian Walsh said in a statement that the campaign committee will continue to withhold its “support and resources” if Akin presses on with a “misguided campaign.”

“The stakes in this election are far bigger than any one individual. By staying in this race, Congressman Akin is putting at great risk many of the issues that he and others in the Republican Party are fighting for, including the repeal of ObamaCare,” Walsh said.

But Akin isn’t listening.

Akin reiterated his vow to stay in the race in a separate interview with conservative radio host Dana Loesch. “Let me just make it clear … that we are not getting out of this race. We are in this race for the long haul and we are going to win it,” he said.

Asked why he would stay in the race when prominent members of the GOP want him out, Akin explained to Huckabee that he believes he can continue to be a powerful voice for the sanctity of human life. Among those calling for Akin to step aside today: Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt and several former senators, including John Ashcroft and Jim Talent.

The WaPo has a longer piece: Todd Akin should drop out of Senate race, Romney says. According to the article, Akin told Mike Huckabee:

“I’ve had a chance now to have run through a primary, and the party people said when you win the primary then we’ll be with you. Well, they were with us. Then I said one word and one sentence on one day, and everything changed,” Akin told Huckabee, an early supporter. “I haven’t done anything morally or ethically wrong. It does seem like a little bit of an overreaction.”

He then went on to liken his decision to a type of crusade. “We believe taking this stand is going to strengthen our country — going to strengthen, ultimately, the Republican Party,” he said. “What we’re doing here is standing on a principle of what America is.”

Akin said that his supporters and “good friends, closer than brothers,” had asked him to stick it out. He added that he has received “continuing calls from other congressmen” expressing their support. (He did not name any of these congressmen.)

A few more interesting reads to get the discussion started:

Greg Sargent: Get ready for Todd Akin Unbound.

Time will tell whether the GOP establishment will stick with its refusal to support him if he stays in. But either way, we’re now about to get Todd Akin Unbound. He no longer has to play nice, as the powers that be in the GOP define it; he’ s been cut loose by the GOP establishment, and he’s now on a crusade that seems to be taking on an element of religious fervor.

“We believe taking this stand is going to strengthen our country — going to strengthen, ultimately, the Republican Party,” he said today. “I believe there is a cause here.”

And if an unconstrained Akin does remain in the race, just imagine the implications for the presidential race. It was revealed today that the GOP platform ratifies a Constitutional ban on abortion that makes no exceptions for rape or incest. This might not have attracted much attention if it weren’t for Akin’s comments, which elevated the debate over abortion — and the rape exception — into a major national story. Now the GOP position on abortion is the Akin position. Indeed, Dem operatives are gleefully describing that platform provision as the “Akin plank.”

Meanwhile, national news organizations are highlighting Paul Ryan’s co-sponsorship, along with Akin, of various draconian anti-abortion measures, in the process tying Ryan — and the GOP’s stance on abortion — directly to Akin’s extremism.

Michael Tomasky: The Only Big Idea Coming Out of the Romney-Ryan Camp Is the Big Lie. Romney and Ryan are opening up new frontiers in propaganda–pushing big lies with not even a grain of truth in them.

These guys may not be able to count, but they can read polls, and so they know very well that if they gave the county the honest debate we were told we were going to have about Medicare, and for that matter about taxation, they’d wake up Nov. 7 with about 120 electoral votes in their pockets and conservatism in tatters.

They know this. They know that the truth would crush them electorally. And so it follows that they know they must lie. They must lie about their Medicare plans. They must lie about the effects of their tax plans on average people and rich people. And they must tell a number of lies about Obama, all the better if they involve race, as the welfare lie does.

So this will be the entire point of the Romney-Ryan campaign. Lie lie lie. Muddy the waters. Turn day to night, fire to water, champagne to piss. Peddle themselves as the precise opposite of what they actually are. That is clearly the m.o….

The Democrats’ job, of course, is to expose this charade for what it is and make Romney and Ryan defend their actual positions. The Obama campaign was a little slow to respond on Medicare, and even then the ad wasn’t as forceful as it might have been. It’s probably true that there’s a reservoir of good faith there—that is, most people simply aren’t going to believe that the Democrats want to harm Medicare. That should work to the Democrats’ advantage, but still, the Obama campaign and the Democrats generally have to nail these guys to the wall on what their actual positions are and what the impacts of their policies will be. Romney and Ryan are terrified of a real Big Debate. Obama and Biden need to drag them into one.

Boston Globe: Republican Party approves strict anti-abortion platform.

So why are they objecting to Akin’s position? Oh, right, because they hope the American people won’t find out they all agree with him.

Politico: Scott Brown objects to GOP platform language on abortion.

Brown says the GOP should be a “big tent” party. Hahahahahahahahahha! That ship has sailed!

Romney Claims He Never Said Anything about Palestinian Culture

Posted: July 31, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, A My Pet Goat Moment, Mitt Romney, open thread, Republican presidential politics, Surreality, U.S. Politics | Tags: , , , , , | 35 Comments

In a super-snotty, smirky interview with Fox News’ Carl Cameron, Mitt Shady attempted to control the damage caused by his gaffe-tastic speech in Israel by telling a few of his trademarked bald faced lies. He claims that he:

“did not speak about the Palestinian culture or the decisions made in their economy.”…..“That is an interesting topic that perhaps can deserve scholarly analysis but I actually didn’t address that,” Romney said. “I Certainly don’t intend to address that during my campaign. Instead I will point out that the choices a society makes have a profound impact on the economy and the vitality of that society.”

Sigh….

Talking Points Memo once again recounts what Romney actually said:

Romney’s insistence that he was not addressing Palestinian culture seems at odds with his lengthy and detailed speech at a fundraiser in which he offered up a direct comparison between the per capita GDP of Israel and the Palestinian territories before launching into an explanation of why he thinks culture and perhaps a little divine help are so important to the stronger Israeli economy.

“I was thinking this morning as I prepared to come into this room of a discussion I had across the country in the United States about my perceptions about differences between countries,” Romney said at the time. “As you come here and you see the GDP per capita, for instance, in Israel which is about $21,000 dollars, and compare that with the GDP per capita just across the areas managed by the Palestinian Authority, which is more like $10,000 per capita, you notice such a dramatically stark difference in economic vitality.”

Romney grossly overstated the Palestinian per capita GDP (it’s about $1,500) while underestimating the per capita Israeli GDP (about $31,000), but the juxtaposition was clear as he segued into an explanation of his “perceptions about differences between countries” based on a Harvard history professor’s book.

“Culture makes all the difference,” Romney said. “And as I come here and I look out over this city and consider the accomplishments of the people of this nation, I recognize the power of at least culture and a few other things.” One of the additional factors he cited was “the hand of providence.”

Palestinian officials said Romney’s remarks were offensive not only because they implied the Israelis were inherently superior as a people, but because they ignored that the Palestinian territories have been under military occupation for decades and residents face major restrictions on their movement and ability to conduct trade.

Before you laugh hysterically, go over and read Charlie Pierce’s latest Romney post. Here’s the gist:

Romney continues to stubbornly refuse, in the face of a general outcry from within his own party, to release more than two years of his tax returns. He is the most easily mockable candidate in decades. (By contrast, it took real work, and a lot of money, to make John Kerry look ridiculous.) And, most spectacularly of all, only four years after the excesses of unregulated vulture capitalism nearly ate the world, stealing everything it could steal and wrecking what was left behind, with 25 million Americans either underemployed, unemployed, or vanished from the statistics entirely, the Republicans not only have chosen as their nominee a guy who made almost every dime of his money in the legalized freebooting that passed for a business community over the past 30 years, but also they have decided to run him as the guy who will fix the broken middle class, and return the country to full employment, by re-instituting all the policies that created the disaster in the first place.

And, by and large, it’s working.

As should be clear by now, the forces that make Romney a formidable candidate are far stronger than the forces that make him a ridiculous man. Nothing he does to embarrass himself in public is bad enough to overwhelm the power of what a truly remarkable liar he has become. No misstep is bad enough that it cannot be disappeared from our collective mind by a few dozen more commercials. The memory hole in this election is located in Sheldon Adelson’s wallet. His is the most purely cynical campaign in recent memory, selling to a battered economy the very policies that battered it in the first place, and doing so confident in the knowledge that the country has forgotten, or has become completely confused, about what was done to it. And cynicism sells best to the cynical.

Please let him be wrong!!

This is an open thread.

Sunday Afternoon Open Thread: Is Mitt Romney A Wimp?

Posted: July 29, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Mitt Romney, open thread | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 26 Comments

Michael Tomasky at Newsweek:

He’s kind of lame, and he’s really … annoying. He keeps saying these … things, these incredibly off-key things. Then he apologizes immediately—with all the sincerity of a hostage. Or maybe he doesn’t: sometimes he whines about the subsequent attacks on him. But the one thing he never does? Man up, double down, take his lumps.

In 1987, this magazine created a famous hubbub by labeling George H.W. Bush a “wimp” on its cover. “The Wimp Factor.” Huge stir. And not entirely fair—the guy had been an aviator in the war, the big war, the good war, and he was even shot down out over the Pacific, cockpit drenched in smoke and fumes, at an age (20) when in most states he couldn’t even legally drink a beer. In hindsight, Poppy looks like Dirty Harry Callahan compared with Romney, who spent his war (Vietnam) in—ready?—Paris. Where he learned … French. Up to his eyeballs in deferments. Where Reagan saddled up a horse with the masculine name of El Alamein, Mitt saddles up something called Rafalca—except that he doesn’t even really do that, his wife does (dressage). And speaking of Ann—did you notice that she was the one driving the Jet Ski on their recent vacation, while Mitt rode on the back, hanging on, as Paul Begala put it to me last week, “like a helpless papoose”?

Yes, of course Willard is a wimp. Hey, he doesn’t even have the guts to admit to use his own first name! The only time Mitt feels tough is when he’s beating up on someone weaker than he is–like his opponents in the primaries. He’s still just a prep school bully who’s overcompensating for his own insecurity.

Back to Tomasky:

In some respects, he’s more weenie than wimp—socially inept; at times awkwardy ingratiating, at other times mocking those “below” him, but almost always getting the situation a little wrong, and never in a sympathetic way. The evidence resonates across too many years to deny. What kind of teenager beats up on the misfit, sissy kid, pinning him down and violently cutting his hair with a pair of school scissors—the incident from Romney’s youth that The Washington Post famously reported (and Romney famously didn’t really deny) back in May? The behavior extends, through more sedate means, into adulthood. The Salt Lake Olympics remains his greatest triumph, for which he wins deserved praise. But to many of those in the know, Romney placed a heavy asterisk next to his name by attacking the men he replaced on the Olympic Committee, smearing them in his book, even after a court threw out all the corruption charges against them.

And what kind of presidential candidate whines about a few attacks and demands an apology when the going starts to get rough? And tries to sound tough by accusing the president who killed the world’s most-wanted villain of appeasement? That’s what they call overcompensation, and it’s a dead giveaway; it’s the “tell.” This guy is nervous—terrified—about looking weak. And ironically, being terrified of looking weak makes him look weaker still.

Romney claims the Newsweek cover doesn’t bother him even a tiny little bit. It’s the first time he’s been called a wimp, he says. Really? See here and here.  The meme is catching on.  If Willard weren’t a wimp, he’d release his tax returns tomorrow and dare the media to find anything to be ashamed of. But he can’t, because he’s terrified.

Psychoanalyst Justin Frank, author of the books Bush on the Couch and Obama on the Couch, provided a first pass on Romney’s psychology at Salon. Frank notes the way Romney frequently responds to situations by seemingly speaking without thinking ahead.

When Brian Williams asked him what he thought about the London games, Romney first tried to answer the question directly – something most politicians usually don’t do. He said, “It’s hard to know just how well it will turn out.” He then began to talk about his own work running the 2002 SLC winter Olympics in what seemed like a canned response. What strikes me is the confidence with which he spoke and the remarkable lack of thought he exhibited. This has become a pattern for him, and not just on this trip. But it is more noticeable than before because he is largely left to his own devices, without prepared remarks that he could use in informal conversation.

In many cases, Romney ends up having to walk back his initial comments as he did in London with his criticisms of Britain’s preparations for the Olympics. Frank’s assessment of Romney so far (emphasis added):

I think the force behind this behavior is massive anxiety, pure and simple. He is anxious about revealing who he is and about interacting with people he doesn’t know. He appears to have much less experience than Obama in interacting with people from all walks of life. Basically, he is uncomfortable except within his own family and in the presence of those who share his wealthy background and Mormon faith. There are many ways to defend against overwhelming anxiety, one of which is to act certain about every answer given.

What comes out besides this sense of smiling certainty are signs of anxious contempt toward others – whether it is how the British run their Games or saying that kids who can’t afford college should borrow money from their parents. Put together, these and many similar statements – his pleasure at firing people or his belief that corporations are people (is that why he can comfortably bankrupt some?) – are all evidence of a hostility not dissimilar to stories about his bullying of others during his prep school days. At this stage, I suspect Mitt Romney is too anxious to be an effective president.

James Holmes’ Psychiatrist at U. of CO Specializes in Schizophrenia

Posted: July 27, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Crime, Media, open thread | Tags: , , , , , | 50 Comments

Lynne Fenton MD

From the Washington Post:

The shooting suspect in the Colorado theater rampage was seeing a university psychiatrist specializing in schizophrenia in the weeks before the July 20 attack, according to court records released Friday.

James Holmes was seeing Lynne Fenton, the director of student mental health services at the University of Colorado and a medical school professor. Holmes was a first-year graduate student in a neuroscience Ph.D. program.

Fenton is the person to whom Holmes sent a notebook containing drawings supposedly related to Aurora, Colorado theater massacre. Fenton’s university home page is password protected, but the WaPo says she “has written numerous papers and launched research in the area of schizophrenia.”

The judge in the case, William Sylvester, has ordered that all documents in the case, including the notebook and the defendant’s university records are “off-limits” to the media. Colorado is an open records state, but the prosecution asked the judge to hold off on any release of information to the public.

“The People have not had access to the defendant’s records from the University of Colorado, but are of the belief that disclosure of such records to the media would be contrary to the public interest,” the motion asserts.

In his response, Sylvester, the 18th Judicial District’s chief judge, agrees. He writes: “This court orders that the University of Colorado shall not disclose information about the defendant…”

The order goes on to stress that the DA’s office and the legal team representing Holmes will be able to see all this stuff, but that’s it won’t be made available to the wider public until the court vacates this decision or the final judgement of the case is rendered, whichever comes first.

According to the New York Daily News, Holmes is now claiming he doesn’t remember anything about the night of the shooting and doesn’t understand why he’s in jail.

Feel free to use this as an open thread. I’ll update if I can find any more information on Fenton. Her university home page is password protected, but they spell her first name “Lynn.” The media is calling her “Lynne.” I’m not sure which is correct yet.

UPDATE: CNN has a little more information on Fenton:

Fenton is the director of student mental health services at the University of Colorado’s Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, and an assistant professor, according to a resume posted on the school’s website.

As director, a position she’s held since 2009, Fenton sees between 15 and 20 graduate students per week for medication and psychotherapy, coordinates a team of four mental health clinicians, supervises some residents who treat students, and lectures. She also serves as a psychiatrist for between five and 10 patients, the resume states.

She’s held many jobs over the years. Fenton worked as a physician in private practice in Denver from 1994 to 2005, and was chief of physical medicine with the U.S. Air Force in San Antonio, Texas, in the early 1990s, according to the resume. Since 2008, she has won various grants and contracts to study schizophrenia.

Fenton did her undergraduate work at the University of California, Davis and earned her medical degree from Chicago Medical School in 1986.

Lazy Sunday Open Thread: Talking Kat Head Edition

Posted: July 22, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: New Orleans, open thread | Tags: , , , , | 20 Comments

…because, frankly, I’m tired of the current news chatter ….

Here’s what’s up in New Orleans Today:

They brought down the House at Grand Palace Hotel today … you could really feel it

Trombone Shorty played at my big 5-0 party at Vaughn’s right after Katrina.  He’s doing really well, with that funky Nawlins, jazzy, brassy sound …

We’ve had epic rain and now we learn we’re coming back in population.  There goes the parking spot in front of the kathouse again!  You needed a pirogue to navigate the French Quarter two days ago. I stupidly went out to get groceries and got blocked at nearly every turn.

NBC says “New Orleans tops fastest growing cities in America list”.  Finally, we’re at number one for something other than our murder rate.  BTW, Ralph, Austin is #2.   …

1. New Orleans, Louisiana

  •  Change in population: 4.9 percent
  •  Population in July of 2011: 360,740
  •  Population in April 2010: 343,829
  •  Average annual city unemployment (2011): 8.8 percent
  •  Increase in jobs (2010 to 2011): 6,900 (1.3 percent)

Continuing to rebound from the effects of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans had the highest population growth in the country for any city over the size of 100,000. The city’s rate of population growth (4.9 percent) is more than six times the national average of 0.73 percent. The Big Easy’s MSA (New Orleans-Metairie-Kenner) had significant growth in information jobs and education and health services, at 7 percent and 3.6 percent respectively. Despite this growth, the city’s population is at just 80 percent of pre-Katrina levels.

Here’s something to cool you off for dinner tonight!  It’s the recipe for Brennan’s Bananas Foster.

Bananas Foster
(Serves 4)

  • 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1/4 cup banana liqueur
  • 1/4 cup dark rum
  • 4 scoops vanilla ice cream
  • 4 bananas, cut in half, lengthwise, then halved

Combine the butter, sugar and cinnamon in a flambé pan or skillet. Place the pan over low heat on an alcohol burner or on top of the stove, and cook, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Stir in the banana liqueur, then place the bananas in the pan. When the banana sections soften and begin to brown, carefully add the rum. Continue to cook the sauce until the rum is hot, then tip the pan slightly to ignite the rum. When the flames subside, lift the bananas out of the pan and place four pieces over each portion of ice cream. Generously spoon warm sauce over the top of the ice cream and serve immediately.

Just in case you’re not feeling it yet, I’m going to plug a reality show that’s got me completely addicted right now: Cajun Justice.  I just grab a 6 pack of Abita, some boiled crawfish and corn, and watch our crazy neighbors go at it.  Where else but south of the I-10 cher, aieyyyyeee?

So, what’s up in your neck of the bayou woods?

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