2012 GOP Presidential Campaign -- "This individual's going to accuse me of an affair for an extended period of time."

there's been a major structural change w/r/t party ideology since then and we're seeing that w/r/t 'extreme'

also romney and dole are coming from very different places within the gop, romney might be inevitable but he's not 'safe'

I said in the ILE thread that this year only looks bizarre because the Internet has finally caught up with the avarice of journalists who insist on covering "primary season" earlier and earlier.

also would look different if rick perry had half-decent handlers

like I don't find the concept of steve forbes as president any weirder than b-movie film star ronald reagan as president

I do. One nearly embodies the sort of relaxed jocularity Americans tend to like in their Presidents (assuming some minimal baseline of competence, as perceived by not necessarily well-educated), and one is spectacularly lacking in same.

and uh Reagan was a two-term governor and radio commentator.

right and forbes shoulda gone that route

Dole was the closest thing to a viable nominee then

Not necessarily. Unlike this year, there were several serious candidates in '96, though none with especially good political skills. Dole was chosen because he was the highest-ranking figure in a party that then respected its internal authority.

In '88 we had that sane, reasonable fellow Al Haig briefly enter the race. Also: Pat Robertson scared Poppy Bush for a few weeks.

there's no consensus for what you mean by "serious candidate"

I can see similarities between this year and '96--and Buchanan isn't a bad parallel for Gingrich, as a strident ghost from the past returned to centre stage (and with many more differences than similarities)--but '96 seemed much more the normal thing of occasional primaries being won by someone other than the eventual winner. This year has been crazy. Yes, in large part because of the internet and accelerated media cycle, but those are explanations why it's crazy--they don't negate that it's been crazy.

and uh Reagan was a two-term governor and radio commentator

Yes, like George W. Bush, he was nominally experienced, but he mostly fought culture wars while caretaking a state benefiting greatly from the tail end of the postwar economic boom, Southwestern migration, and the massive expansion of defense contracting. I think many would regard Forbes as a brighter guy.

I think many would regard Forbes as a brighter guy.

Which is an insignificant quality for a prez candidate. And he wasn't bright enough to lose that gruesome smile.

Which is an insignificant quality for a prez candidate.

Perhaps to the extent that it overrides likeability. Either way, it's like I said in the parenthetical that subsumed Reagan's governorship.

Which is an insignificant quality for a prez candidate. And he wasn't bright enough to lose that gruesome smile.

again, ask rick perry

about his gruesome smile?

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/2cd51d335b/bad-lip-reading-rick-perry-s-strong-ad

I know that's a dumb site but this made me die

Which is an insignificant quality for a prez candidate

Somehow we haven't been free of Harvard or Yale (plus Columbia and Georgetown) through the last four. Near-last in his class at Annapolis got beat pretty bad.

lol "Somehow"

Such an outrage that Brown U. gets no prezidtnal respect among the ivies.

Bob Dole says Bob Dole likes Mitt Romney

Romney gains two percentage points in Kansas.

lol "Somehow"

last time, I didn't see millions of Americans choose:
NC State/UNC Law (Edwards)
U Delaware/Syracuse Law (Biden)
Providence College/Louisville Law (Dodd)
Tufts BS/MA (Richardson)
CWRU BA/MA (Kucinich)
Manhattan College/NYU Law (noun, verb, 9/11)
Memphis State/Vandy Law (guy who was on Law & Order)
Ouachita Baptist University (guy who hung out with Walker Texas Ranger)
Kansas State/UK Law (dropped out fast)
UW-Madison BA/JD (")
U Northern Colorado (")

this time, Stanford/BYU/HBS/HLS is likely to be nominated over:
Gettysburg College/Duke Med
Emory/Tulane PhD
Winona State/Oral Roberts JD/W&M LLM
Texas A&M
Penn State/Pitt JD
Penn
Morehouse/Purdue MS
U Minnesota BA/JD

maybe us news was right all along

I would say the pattern is more significant w/ the supreme court and if you asked people where most candidates went to college during the nomination process a fair small % would know the answer

whereas w/ the supreme court it's one dude trying to pick people who have 'legitimacy'/'the (ever narrowing definition of a) supreme court CV' and the harvard/yale/stanford stamp plays a role

fairly small*

if you asked people where most candidates went to college during the nomination process a fair small % would know the answer

I certainly don't think people are voting for school brand-names. But the evidence does suggest that intelligence/diligence are relevant criteria.

yeahhh that's evidence that counts dubya as someone w/ the 'intelligence/diligence' stamp

I think many would regard Forbes as a brighter guy.

____________________________

Which is an insignificant quality for a prez candidate. And he wasn't bright enough to lose that gruesome smile.

― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, December 19, 2011

otm. appearance is key. stop being creepy, steve forbes. don't look so bumbling and faux-friendly, rick perry. don't look so f--g crazy, michelle backmann.

I'm not one for posting fb convos, but the source & direction of this one is jarring. This is among the responses to me posting Chait's "RP is crepey" NYmag bit.

Her: He's not racist. This is a smear campaign that's been brought up time & time again. It's the ONLY thing they can ever find on the guy & it's been refuted 100 million times. Evidently he hired bad ghost writers a long time ago or it's just a blatant fabricated smear campaign. You gotta listen to what he's saying. He's never said anything remotely racist. & Yeah, he seems crazy because he wants to do away with every single government bureaucracy but really, aren't they all just all totally corrupt and useless at this point anyway? Isn't it better to start fresh? Wouldn't it be nice to get rid of the wars, the drug laws, the endless spending (because we're completely insolvent you know), the Patriot Act, the TSA up our asses at the airport?? & give power to the STATES to make their own decisions. Ron Paul is everything I want in a president.

http://youtu.be/RKBlk1Vpeuw

http://youtu.be/OGhv3paNz6U

Ron Paul addresses charges of racism on CNN
www.youtube.com
reason editor Matt Welch discusses the controversy surrounding Ron Paul on CNN's...
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about an hour ago · Like ·

Me: The newsletter bit is only a minor point, tho one must wonder about his powers of delegation & judgement to let the people he hired put out such hilariously racist shit in a thing that literally had his name on it for several years without actually saying, "yeah, you guys can stop doing that now."

Also, this is the guy who wants to end FEMA, the EPA, and anything even approaching sane reproductive laws.
about an hour ago · Like

Me: But again, moot point. Dude has a partial shot at winning maybe one primary, and that's it for the show. He'll wind up in a cush talking head spot like the rest of 'em.
58 minutes ago · Like

Her: He was a doctor delivering babies, running for office & doing like 9 million things at once. You can't catch everything. (Even SNL has horrible writers. Who let's that crap slide by? & they aren't even doing anything important except trying to make people laugh.) I've been hired to write letters and blogs for corporations before & these companies have no clue what I put out there either. Also, like I said- this could be a blatant smear. Someone could've made the whole thing up. You have to look at his overall character. He's obviously not a racist.

FEMA, EPA- I'm sorry but we can do better than all this. These are totally corrupt bureaucracies. I'd be glad to see them go. It's useless spending. It's money we don't have.

Abortion? Please, we have bigger fish to fry than caring that abortion would be a state's decision. He doesn't want to "end" abortion he just doesn't want the federal gov involved. Big deal, that makes sense to me. You want abortion? Well, move to California. You don't want abortion then move to Arkansas.

We've had wars that have killed thousands & thousands of innocent people for a decade here and our economy is totally screwed! Ron Paul might be the only person who can save us at this point. He wants to implement the Austrian school of economics vs. Keynesian which have completely failed us! Think about becoming a BLUE Republican!
38 minutes ago · Like

Me: Ah, well then.
22 minutes ago · Like

yeahhh that's evidence that counts dubya as someone w/ the 'intelligence/diligence' stamp

Yes, he sufficiently met the minimum standard demanded by his (arguably less-demanding) party (as measured against last-in-his-class at Annapolis, among others) that allowed him to go forward and win on "likability." I think it's fair to say that despite his great stubbornness, incuriousness, and anti-intellectualism, he compares favorably in the intelligence/diligence department to Perry, Cain, and perhaps/probably Bachmann.

There's no need for an intervention, kingfish. The cult will end soon enough.

should just lock the thread, since mitt romney is the INEVITABLE GOP NOMINEE and the next president of the united states of america.

right but your point was 'wow look at what the ivy league does for you' not 'these are some human beings with the minimum standard of intelligence demanded by the GOP'

ron paul is probably a racist; there's enough evidence to tell me that he is, even if the case is 'arguable'. more importantly, ronpaulism, as a subset of old-line goldbug austrian political economics, does have its punitive anti-cosmopolitan and white nationalist attractions. it's not a constituency that i'd want to have a beer with.

but, all that being true, if you were to shut down the american carceral state, you'd be a liberator of millions regardless (where is hoos to otm this post)

B*r*ck Ob*m* is certainly a killer, there's enough evidence to tell me that he is, even if the case is 'arguable'.

surprised you'd deign to quote the arguable part there!

right but your point was 'wow look at what the ivy league does for you' not 'these are some human beings with the minimum standard of intelligence demanded by the GOP

My point was that a perceived problem-solving capacity, whether as a matter of raw intelligence (as perceived by a voting population a substantial portion of which is not college-educated) or hard work, has been for at least the last 20 years a relevant (not determinative) criterion in Presidential politics. George W. Bush was certainly dumb in many respects, but smarter than a great many of the people who voted for him and also smart enough on paper for people who may have recognized a problem in that department to overlook it. And many other people who went to the schools he did both go in and come out fairly smart.

B*r*ck Ob*m* is certainly a killer, there's enough evidence to tell me that he is, even if the case is 'arguable'

While he's certainly the highest decision-maker in the land, his decisions are constrained by many other current and previous political actors as well as by the public he represents. In some sense, virtually everyone in America no matter the nature of their political participation, yourself included, is a "killer" of present and future people, many of them non-American, and Obama is merely the guy who appends his signature to the political decisions that are adjunct to our economic and other social activity.

My point was that a perceived problem-solving capacity, whether as a matter of raw intelligence (as perceived by a voting population a substantial portion of which is not college-educated) or hard work, has been for at least the last 20 years a relevant (not determinative) criterion in Presidential politics. George W. Bush was certainly dumb in many respects, but smarter than a great many of the people who voted for him and also smart enough on paper for people who may have recognized a problem in that department to overlook it. And many other people who went to the schools he did both go in and come out fairly smart.

like who

are we really having this conversation...again

"In some sense," again, the President can be seen as the guy who tries to kill the fewest people. Obama's performance in this regard has not necessarily been great, but has probably been better than any available alternative would have been.

What matters to voters is the mysterious way in which they end up liking a candidate, which inspires them to look for ways to defend their choice: he writes good books, is a terrific speaker, looks good on a parasail, etc.

unlikely to apologize after shooting friend in the face

wouldn't execute man who raped/murdered wife

willing to buy children adorable puppy

unrepentant receiver of blowjobs

It was the "Keynes"/blue republican bits that kinda thru me off at the end. This again, this is the same chick who's posted anti-vaxxer stuff on my wall before.

What matters to voters is the mysterious way in which they end up liking a candidate

There is no single relevant criterion. "Likability" may well be the closest, but I could argue that trustworthiness (to protect the individual/state and their interests) is closer. Intelligence is certainly relevant to the latter capacity, for better and for worse (Mitt Romney's problem). Another important factor on both scores may be simple cultural appeal - which candidate is most like the individual voter (as a matter of regional/ethnic/historical cultural patterns). This too is a problem for Romney within the GOP, and one he will seek to overcome on the competence(/intelligence) factor.

Are we supposed to believe that 40-50(-70)% of the GOP favor Romney and Paul (and Gingrich) simply because of their personalities?

lol kingfish for some reason I've always assumed Paultards/libertarians are male

xp