Year: 2012
Majority of GOP Voters Want a New Candidate
58%
Of Republican primary voters want more presidential choices, while just 37% say they are satisfied with the current field, according to a new CBS News poll. The percentage of Republican primary voters that wants more choices has increased 12 points since October.
Bush to Blame for GOP’s Crummy Candidates
A successful Presidency can produce a new crop of future Presidential candidates for the party that controls the White House. The vice president and cabinet officials, as well as governors and senators elected over the course of the administration, are historically major sources for a party’s next round of candidates. The Bush years had the opposite effect. It was unthinkable that his vice president would run for higher office and much of his cabinet left Washington tainted by the President’s unpopularity. Moreover, Bush helped sink his party in the 2006 and 2008 elections, thus depleting the ranks of potential Republican candidates for 2012.
— Ryan Lizza, writing in the New Yorker, blaming former President George W. Bush is at fault for the exceptionally weak field of Republican presidential candidates.
Even Taken in Full Context, Romney Lied When He Implied That Individuals Can’t Fire Insurers Under ‘Obamenycare’
“I like being able to fire people,” GOP presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney said during a campaign stop in New Hampshire yesterday.
Under “Obamacare,” which is based on “Romneycare,” which was based on a right-wing Heritage Foundation plan, individuals who don’t like what an insurer does can “fire them,” go back to the exchange and choose to purchase insurance from another private company
This assertion certainly aligns with Romney’s record. As head of Bain & Company, he made millions — we don’t know how many millions because he refuses to release his tax returns — by buying businesses, laying off employees and then re-selling the companies at a profit.
Romney’s statement yesterday was, of course, taken out of context. The statement, in full, went like this:
“I want individuals to have their own insurance. That means the insurance company will have an incentive to keep you healthy. It also means that if you don’t like what they do, you can fire them. I like being able to fire people who provide services to me. You know, if someone doesn’t give me the good service I need, I want to say, ‘You know, I’m going to go get someone else to provide that service to me.’ “
Romney appears to be proposing replacing the current employer-based health-insurance system — in which, by the by, the employer not employees, choose insurance providers — with an Ayn-Randian “every man, woman and child for himself or herself” system in which individuals purchase health insurance on the “free” market, the way they buy car or homeowners insurance.
What he’s describing is the failed system we have. Premiums for individual policies are the most expensive on the market. The people who most often need these policies — minimum-wage workers, self-employed creatives, the unemployed — can’t afford them.
Hillary for V.P.?
Nobody is thinking very hard about what’s next for Laura Bush.
Bill Keller, in a New York Times column urging Pres. Obama to draft Hillary Clinton as his running mate later this year. Keller argues that Obama should have Vice Pres. Joe Biden swap places with the Secretary of State.
60 Percent of Republicans back Romney for Nomination
6 in 10
Republican registered voters, nationwide, now believe Mitt Romney is the candidate most likely to win the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, up from 39% in December. Rick Santorum places a distant second, named by 11%.
Struggling to Understand How Rich Mitt Romney Is
It’s hard for most of us to imagine being worth a few million dollars. That’s serious greenbacks, putting us beyond worry and squarely in the land of comfort. But if we were Mitt Romney, who is worth a quarter-BILLION dollars, that would be chump change.
And while all the presidential candidates are in that comfortable, worry-free zone, Romney’s wealth, according to a fascinating piece of research in the Tampa Bay Times, blocks out the sun.
Romney refuses to say how much, if anything, he pays in income taxes
For every $100 personally owned by Romney, President Obama has $4.20, Newt Gingrich has $2.70 and Ron Paul has $2. And Rick Santorum, closely trailing a victorious Romney in last week’s Iowa caucus, has but a single buck.
But wait, there’s more.
French & Saunders Read the English Translation of an Interview with Madonna in Hungarian
Off topic, but if you watched that sad excuse for a debate among the Republican presidential candidates on NBC yesterday, you probably need a good laugh to start the week.
Here are Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders, the creative team behind “Absolutely Fabulous,” on their radio show, reading an English translation from the original Hungarian of an interview with Madonna about her movie, “Evita,” as it appeared in USA Today.
H/t: Andrew Sullivan
Tony Blankley, Right-Wing Propagandist, Dead at 62
On the show, the “left” was and is represented by Robert Scheer, formerly of the Los Angeles Times and now editor at Truthdig. The “center” was and is represented by the show’s host, Matt Miller.
After Huffington finally came to her senses and revised her ideology toward the center, she continued to participate in an essentially left-leaning but officially non-aligned position. She was replaced on the right by Tony Blankley.
