Planet Mitt

I once had a job where I answered phones all day.  It was really fun and when we worked on weekends we'd play spades sometimes when the phones weren't busy.  If you get a bad hand in spades, you can bid nil and then instead of trying to win tricks you're trying to not win any.  There's a bonus if you succeed in not winning any and a penalty if you don't.

I'm wondering if maybe Mitt Romney bid nil on this election and forgot to tell us.  I've been thinking for weeks that people shouldn't rush to judgment so quickly every time Mitt does something stupid.  There's still so much time left, and three debates and all that.  But man, there's a limit to how much stupid you can make up for in debates, especially since the President is awesome at debating and Romney spent a year arguing with that clown car full of idiots (and Ron Paul). 

The other side of the argument is expectations for Mitt in the debates are so low that anything short of setting the building on fire or actually killing a poor person on live TV will be a win for him.  I don't know though, I think he needs some new ideas.  Romney campaign people, get ready to start writing (assuming you can read and write which, judging by the campaign you've run so far, may be a poor assumption).

Idea #1
Replacement Mitt.  Do you know how much I used to hate NFL referees?  If you had asked me, just last year, if I believed trained chimps could do a better job officiating games than the NFL referees, I would have said "of course!  They certainly couldn't be any worse!"

Now?  I mean, holy crap!  I was one of those people who thought I wouldn't miss the referees.  The last time I was that wrong about something I was telling you that Charlie Crist was going to be the next Senator from Florida.  Charlie Who?  Exactly!  How much better would Mitt look if he let Rick Santorum take his place for a couple of weeks?  Rick Santorum makes Mitt Romney look like Franklin Roosevelt.  How do you think Mitt got the nomination in the first place?  There may not be enough time left for Mitt to pull this strategy off successfully, but it couldn't hurt to try.

Idea #2
Helper monkey.  The best part about the helper monkey strategy is Mitt wouldn't have to change anything else.  Look, Mitt's biggest problem is still that nobody likes him.  Now imagine you're watching a Romney speech.  Everything is the same as always.  Mitt's spouting nonsense talking points, not really saying anything, wishing someone would come along and change him into a real boy.  All of that is still happening, but also, there's a little monkey running around getting Mitt juice and holding up his cue cards.  How much more would you like Mitt at that point?  A lot more, you say?  Exactly.

Idea #3
This is a little something I like to call "pulling a Sting".  Remember WCW in the mid 90's after they started the NWO.  Before the NWO, Sting was one of WCW's top stars.  Once the NWO came along, Sting stopped talking for like a year.  He just hung out in the rafters of the building pointing his baseball bat at Hulk Hogan. 

Wouldn't Mitt Romney be better off if he shut up until November and just hung around Obama events pointing a baseball bat at the President and looking menacing?  It certainly couldn't make things any worse.  Although, with Mitt, a regular wooden baseball bat wouldn't really be appropriate.  I'm thinking more like a cricket mallet made of solid gold.  No wait, cricket is a little Europeany for Mitt.  I've got it!  A lacrosse stick made entirely of diamond! Not diamonds.  Just one huge diamond, cut into the shape of a lacrosse stick.

Idea #4
Go to war with Iran right now.  I've watched as much election coverage as anybody who isn't paid to watch election coverage and I only know two things about a Romney administration.  First, he'll cut taxes for rich people.  He's been super clear about that.  Second, we're going to war with Iran.

But why wait?  Mitt's got tons of money.  He could easily put together his own army.  It wouldn't be as good as the US Army, but it'd be better than the Kiss army, and that's probably good enough to deal with Iran.  Or at least good enough to deal with Iran the way Mitt would, which would just be bombing them and waiting for good things to magically happen after.  And even if this doesn't get Mitt elected, he still did half of what he wanted to do.

Idea #5
Mystery candidate.  We'd have to be pretty stupid to fall for this, but luckily, we are pretty stupid.  Mitt drops out of the race and they replace him with a mystery candidate.  It would be just like old game shows where contestants had to choose between the perfectly adequate prize they could see or the mystery prize in the mystery box.

Which candidate do you want?  You want the one in the mystery box!  You know you do.  Nobody can resist the mystery box!  We'll be disappointed when we find out that it's still just Mitt in the mystery box, but by then it'll be too late and we'll be kind of relieved because at least it wasn't Newt Gingrich.

Idea #6
New ideas.  Mitt could start learning stuff and embracing policies and ideas that actually make sense.  He could start saying intelligent things and acting normal.  He could....I'm sorry...no...this definitely won't happen.

Idea #7
Free iphones.  Everyone who votes for Mitt gets a free new iphone.  It's just that simple.  I'm surprised he hasn't thought of this yet.  I'm pretty sure Karl Rove's super pac has enough money to buy everyone in America an iphone.

Idea #8
Bacon.  Did you hear about the upcoming bacon shortage?  I don't know if it's real or not, but I'm pretty sure millions of Americans are terrified.  If Mitt can present a comprehensive plan to save us from a baconless future, he'll win by 10 points.  Now, Mitt has yet to present a comprehensive plan about anything, but bacon is simpler and more delicious than the economy, so maybe he can pull it off.

Idea #9
The Republican party could engage in a long term strategy of voter suppression focusing on minority communities, young people and other core Democratic constituencies.  Maybe some kind of weird push for new voter ID laws based on completely false claims of voter fraud.  Something like this, if done effectively, could easily push states like Ohio and Pennsylvania over into Mitt's column.  I wonder why nobody in the Republican party has thought of this.  Hmmmm.

Idea #10
Planet Mitt.  This one is pretty self-explanatory.  Mitt can use his fortune to turn Mars into a habitable planet and then move all of his supporters there, where he can be president of them.  Actually, this might work out pretty well for everyone.  Let's go with this one.

Let Them Eat Tax Cuts

I'm supposed to be surprised, right? 

Mitt Romney doesn't care about poor people who "think they're entitled to food".  Mitt Romney knows that if starving people are just too lazy to ask their butler to go downstairs and tell their personal chef to fix them some breakfast, it's not the government's job to bail them out.  Get an intercom, jerks!  Or even better, just have a standing breakfast order with your personal chef and then you don't have to tell him to make you breakfast every day, he'll just bring it to you.  If starving people weren't so lazy and stupid, they'd be less starving, like Mitt.

But why am I supposed to be surprised by this?  This Presidential election has been going on since 1914.  Can you tell me one time when Mitt said something that made you believe that he thinks anything other than what we now have video of him saying?  I honestly can't.  There's no magical time before today when I can remember thinking Mitt Romney had any compassion for poor or working people, or any plans or ideas for how to help them. 

It's been a tough couple of weeks for Mitt.  His opportunistic and unbelievably stupid reaction to stuff being on fire and people being dead was a catastrophe, even for him.  It wasn't so much that he jumped on a national security crisis to try to score political points before it was even over.  It wasn't so much that he did it on September 11th (after all, Barack Obama didn't take a day off from emailing me and asking me for money on September 11th, which I thought was pretty stupid).  It was really two things.

First of all, Mitt failed so miserably at capitalizing on a national security crisis.  Nothing he said even made sense.  Listening to Mitt Romney talk about foreign policy is like listening to a four year old tell you where babies come from.  It's just rambling and incoherent and makes you wonder why his parents would bother telling him anything.

More importantly, Mitt doesn't have anything valuable to say about foreign policy at all.  That's what makes his little adventures into stupidity so infuriating.  Anybody can say something stupid, but when you don't have positions to fall back on that people can look at and say "well, he wasn't on his game today, but he's clearly not an actual moron", people start to wonder about you. 

Take Mitt's other comments about how maybe there's no peaceful solution between the Israelis and the Palestinians.  If someone smart said that, my reaction would be "shit, maybe they're right".  But when Mitt says it I just think "Middle East peace is hard, huh?  Thanks for the update captain dumbass."

But, again, I'm not surprised.  At no time during the 600 Republican primary debates did Mitt say anything that suggested his interest in foreign policy went beyond talking tough and promising not to apologize for things that nobody ever suggested apologizing for.  I just don't think he cares about it that much.

The same is true for Mitt's comments about 47% of Americans.  It wasn't that Mitt was saying things that were condescending and arrogant.  Barack Obama says condescending and arrogant things all the time, it's one of my favorite things about him.  The problem is that Mitt's actual economic policies square up with what he was saying so perfectly.  If your economic situation can't be significantly helped by tax cuts, then Mitt Romney doesn't really understand why you're bothering him. 

But again, there's just nothing surprising about this.  Mitt believes in the magic power of tax cuts.  If you're struggling to feed your family, Mitt's going to cut your boss' boss' taxes.  If you don't have a boss because you don't have a job, then Mitt's going to cut the taxes of some guy in your town who owns a business, and maybe he'll hire you...probably not though.  If your house is on fire, Mitt's going to put it out with tax cuts. 

And if that doesn't work, well, Mitt's pretty much out of ideas, and so is the rest of his party.  Well, except maybe jesus can help out too, that's always Republican plan B.  But he can't really help out, because he still isn't real.  I don't know if Mitt's mormon god, or gods, or whatever it is he believes in, are the kind of gods that are supposed to help with stuff, but unless Mitt's willing to lend you his magic underpants, I wouldn't hold my breath.

This is what Republicans believe in now.  Magic and fantasy.  If it can't be fixed by tax cuts or praying, then it can't be fixed by Republicans.  People are always whining about how Mitt doesn't give any specifics.  He doesn't have any!  It's like asking a magician to give you specifics about how he made the elephant appear out of nowhere.  He can't give you specifics, because that shit didn't actually happen.

And the people left in the Republican party with working brains are starting to chirp about the amazing lack of substance, common sense and basic competence from the Romney campaign.  Some of them have a right to complain, but most of them deserve to be blamed.  They embraced Sarah Palin.  They embraced the tea party.  How exactly did they think this story was going to end?

Last week, Rick Santorum said at their little apple pie and gay bashing rally that the "smart people" will never be on their side.  You said it, Rick.  

Big Government Conservatives

Mitt Romney is lying to you.  I know, I know...I'm going to need to be way more specific.  Mitt Romney would have you believe that you have a choice in November between small government conservatives (yeah!  look how small our government is!  Isn't it adorable?) and big government liberals (oh no! look how big that government is! It's going to get us! Run!), but I see almost no evidence for this being the case.

Republicans aren't for small government.  They're for super big intrusive government.  They just want their big government to do different things than the Democrats want the government to do.  Nowhere is this more obvious than in the area of social issues.  That's why Republicans didn't want to talk about social issues in Tampa (well, that and because Republican positions on social issues are indefensible).

Take same-sex marriage.  Now, there are a dozen perfectly good arguments for marriage equality, and Republicans should be ashamed of themselves for opposing it.  But even if you don't agree with me on that, any impartial observer would agree that the Republican position on marriage is the big government position.  Republicans are the ones who want the government to tell you who you can marry.  Democrats are the ones saying marry whoever you want and try not to kill each other (well, most of them are saying that, some of them are still cowards).

Women's issues are the same way.  Republicans are the party that wants the government to restrict choice.  Republicans are the ones who want the government to limit access to birth control.  Republicans are the ones who introduced legislative language that would have put the government in the position of deciding between "forcible" rape and, I guess, the other kind of rape?  Republicans are the ones who want to require women to wear ankle-length dresses at all times including when they're sleeping.  OK, that last one is just Rick Santorum, but still.  Big, big, big government.

Sidenote:  I haven't really mentioned the whole Todd Akin thing because some things are just too stupid for words and I don't like to use the word fuck too much in any one post.  But seriously, what the fuck is wrong with that guy?  I've often said Republicans believe in magic, but I had no idea they believed in magic lady parts that protect themselves against rape semen (there's a word I never wanted to use in this blog, fuck you Todd Akin).  And don't tell me he misspoke.  He's a 65 year old man who said exactly what he's believed ever since some moron taught it to him and he didn't bother to find out if it was true or not.  He's an idiot, and he still might be a Senator.  Don't make me come over there Missouri!

Anyway, it isn't just social issues.  Mitt Romney wants to increase Defense spending by around 2 trillion dollars.  Trillion.  Now, I don't know if you know this, and I don't know if Mitt knows this, but the Defense department is a department of the government.  It's true, I looked it up on Wikipedia.  Mitt wants to make it 2 trillion dollars bigger.  Mitt also wants to make the Navy bigger, because you never know when the Spanish armada might show up.  The Navy works for the government too.

What about economics?  Well, the Republicans want to use the government to protect privilege.  Republican economic policies (tax cuts for the wealthy, eliminating the estate tax, etc) are designed to use the Federal government as a tool to allow privileged people to stay that way and keep everyone else outside the gates where they belong.  Now, if you believe the Democrats want to use the government to create more economic equality, that's big government too.  But the point is, it's not a debate between big and small, it's a debate between what they want to use big government to do.

It's still a choice.  Voters need to listen to both sides and decide what they want their big government to do.  If you want your big government to protect privilege and enforce your religious beliefs, then you should vote Republican.  Really, you should.  But every time Mitt Romney tells you that a vote for him and Paul Ryan is a vote for small government, he's lying to you.

75 Reasons I'm Still Single

Whenever I talk to my mom, she either asks me if I'm seeing anyone, or I can tell she wants to but she doesn't because she already knows the answer.  I often joke about why I'm still single, and then I thought, is there a blog in there?  And then I thought, of course there fucking is, because I don't get paid for this and whether 0 or 1,000 people read this has no impact on anything else in my life and I can write about whatever the fuck I want.  So there.

75 Reasons I'm Still Single
1) I'm given to understand, from movies and such, that women like a sense a humor.  That has yet to be my experience.
2) Maybe my sense of humor is more of an acquired taste.
3) Maybe me just telling people I'm funny doesn't make it so.
4) I'm not that good-looking.
5) I think I'd look better with a beard, but
6) Something from my vague memories of childhood tells me that growing a beard would make my mom a little too happy.
7) The rational part of my brain is mostly sitting this one out, because it doesn't really care why I'm still single, but it chimed in here to suggest that perhaps my refusal to grow a beard for that reason should shed a little more light on this whole topic, #waytoofuckingstubborn.
8) Yeah, my brain uses hash tags now, we're trying a new thing.
9) Shut up brain, nobody asked you!
10) Sleeping when there's somebody else in the bed is damn near impossible for me.
11) Seriously, who in history decided that couples have to share a bed?  I'd like a word with her (or him, but not really).
12) Speaking of sharing, I suck at that.
13) Maybe #10 would be less of a problem if my body hadn't decided that the best time for me to sleep is between 5AM and Noon.
14) I can't really stop myself from making a face at anybody who tells me they believe in god.
15) Turns out, lots of people believe in god.
16) When I was a kid, I was naturally good at a number of things.
17) school...
18) sports...
19) being awesomely rational.
20) For example, I wanted to play guitar, so I picked up a guitar...
21) I wasn't immediately awesome at playing the guitar...
22) I never picked up the guitar again.
23) Same thing happened with my keyboard.
24) There's a lesson in here somewhere about not being willing to try at things that aren't immediately perfect.
25) Also, some people aren't wild about #19.
26) I'm told that I always need to be right.
27) Apparently that's annoying.
28) I don't always need to be right, I just am right.
29) It's not my fault, I don't make the facts.
30) Rational brain wants to make another editorial comment.
31) I'm not allowing it.
32) My friend Sadie says I may or may not be a sociopath.
33) I might have made up the "may not" part of #32.
34) You can't grow the economy and cut the deficit by cutting taxes again...
35) Because you don't actually have magic powers.
36) OK, #34 and #35 don't have anything to do with me, but...
37) I feel obligated to mention that in every blog entry until people stop believing it.
38) I have at least 6 fantasy football teams.
39) It seems like people like to talk about books.
40) Unless Ernest Hemingway wrote it, there's about a 102% chance I haven't read it.
41) If I did have a girlfriend right now, she'd have to listen to me complain incessantly about those new Maker's Mark commercials with James Carville and his awful wife.
42) Seriously, I've never seen a worse ad campaign.
43) It's like they want me to hate their product.
44) It also makes me want to punch James Carville in the face...
45) Because I feel like he knows better.
46) I wanted to do 100 reasons why I'm still single...
47) But I'm only up to 47 and now I'm pretty bored...
48) I get bored really easily...
49) Probably another lesson in there...
50) Shut up, rational brain!
51) Online dating still seems weird and unnatural to me
52) No offense, but...
53) The people in those eHarmony commercials seem like the kind of couples that would do eHarmony commercials.
54) I don't want to be in that kind of couple.
55) Rational brain says maybe if I wasn't so fucking judgmental...
56) I said be quiet, brain!
57) The Yankees look pretty much done.
58) #57 isn't about me either...
59) but I'm pretty sure I'm right about it.
60) There's a very small chance that I'm going to find you interesting.
61) The fact that you don't find me interesting either doesn't change that.
62) If you're reading this, there's a decent chance you now know more about me than several people with whom I'm been in actual relationships.
63) Hmmmmm
64) I'm a pathological liar.
65) No wait, that's Paul Ryan.
66) My bad.
67) People think I'm quiet...
68) Because I can't make fun of you in my head and talk to you at the same time.
69) Eventually people find that out...
70) They don't love it.
71) #68 is a lie...
72) I absolutely can do that.
73) I spent two hours on a Saturday doing this.
74) Because it seemed like a good idea two hours ago...
75) See #7

The Cult of Personality

Tonight, Comrade Obama will speak at the DNC and, if crowd reaction from the first two nights is any indication, the democrats will riot and burn Charlotte to the ground.  So, before this impending tragedy takes all the funny out of the Democratic convention, I've got a point to make about why I don't think the Republicans can win this election.

First of all, did you see the audiences for each convention?  The Republican convention looked like the state of Florida's AARP convention.  No wonder they all liked Paul Ryan so much.  He was ten years younger than anyone else there, they all wanted to eat him and steal his life force.

I don't even know what to say about the Democratic convention audience.  It's like they rounded up a bunch of people in Penn Station at 3AM on a Wednesday, but honestly that doesn't even begin to cover it.  I've seen (and heard) babies in the audience at the DNC.  Honestly, babies.  One was crying while some lady was talking about how Republicans want to repeal the Affordable Care Act, thereby allowing insurance companies to deny people with pre-existing conditions, including sick babies.  Seriously, that happened, right there on my TV.

Who brings a baby to a political convention?  And people wonder why I refuse to register as a Democrat.  Diversity aside, I give the advantage on audience to the Republicans in terms of which crowd I'd rather be standing in.  Old boring people are exactly who should be at a political convention.  If you're under 30, you should be outside chanting things and throwing stuff and getting arrested. And if you're under 18 months, you should be nowhere near anything like a convention, and you shouldn't be on my TV.

Having said that, in a voting contest between "boring old white people" and "everyone else", I'd still put my money everyone else.  I think.  Old white people do like to vote.  No, I'm sticking with everyone else.

Then there's the actual talking.  I'll give the Republicans this, their message was certainly more simple.  Barack Obama is destroying America, and we're going to save it with tax cuts, because tax cuts are magic.  That's three days of Republican bloviating summed up in 19 words. 

Instead of spending three days calling the Republicans stupid (which is probably the way I would have gone), Democrats have decided to fight fire with fire by spending three days talking about how Barack Obama is actually the most awesome person in the history of awesomeness.  During Bill Clinton's speech last night, I lost count of the number of jobs he said the President saved or created somewhere around eleventy billion. 

Now, on the surface, the Democrats may seem to be at a disadvantage, what with getting bogged down with all their "facts" and "numbers" and "things that actually happened".  But I think, in the long run, the whole "telling the truth" and "not just making shit up" strategy is going to pay off.

Most important, I think, is the tone.  If the Republicans are the cult of tax cuts (and they absolutely are), then the Democrats are the cult of personality.  They believe in Barack Obama.  The speakers all talked about it, the talking points all echoed it, the pundits all noticed it; they believe.  In contrast, you'd barely know if any of the Republican speakers other than his wife had ever met Mitt Romney.

The RNC was fueled by hate.  Hate for the President, hate for certain types of people they don't like, hate for government.  The DNC has been fueled by belief.  Believe in Barack Obama, belief in what he can do, believe in what good government can do.  I'm not making a value judgment on who's right here, just stating the facts.  And I'm not blaming the Republicans for going negative, they can do what they want.

What I'm saying is, I don't think they can win with negativity against all the positivity and optimism we've seen in Charlotte.  I don't think you can be as successful getting your base out to vote for hate as you can be getting your base out to vote for hope.  I just don't think it can be done.  I guess we'll see.

Words Don't Matter

I've only watched the Republican convention in bits and pieces.  The conventions aren't worth watching if you've been paying attention to the campaign before now.  They're just week-long infomercials for the party talking points.  What's that you say?  The Republicans think Barack Obama is a bad President?  And they think Mitt Romney would be less bad?  Stop the presses! 

I don't need to spend hours watching TV to find out that the people speaking at Mitt Romney's convention are mostly in favor of voting for Mitt Romney.  I wanted to watch Chris Christie, just to see if he was able to get through a 20 minute speech without taking a snack break, but I honestly forgot it was happening.

Having said that, the little bits of Republican convention I've seen have been really strange.  Tuesday night I watched my old buddy from the primary debates Rick Santorum run his mouth for a while.  I just couldn't resist.  My blog and I miss Rick so much.  I tuned into MSNBC literally about 4 seconds before Rick started, just in time to hear Rachel Maddow say "he's not telling the truth.  Let's listen".  Now, I'm sure Rachel was finishing a sentence that went something like "If Mr. Santorum says (insert stupid Republican talking point here) during this speech tonight, he's not telling the truth.  Let's listen", but it was still hilarious and a perfect introduction for the man who the second half of the 20th century forgot.

Anyway, Rick rambled and rambled about his god and all that.  He didn't mention Mitt Romney a whole lot, which seemed strange.  I wonder if they've told Rick that Mitt won.  Or maybe Rick won't believe it until his god tells him personally.  Then Rick said America holds out a loving hand to all of his god's children.  He forgot to add "except if you're gay, or black (or really any minority for that matter), or not super into jesus, or if you're a lady who doesn't understand that men are supposed to be in charge of your lady parts.  If you fall into one of those categories, well fuck you, but loving hands for everyone else".  They must have left that part off the teleprompter. 

Like I said before, I completely missed Chris Christie, but I'm given to believe that he didn't start a fight or eat anyone, so I guess he more or less nailed it.  I don't know why I'm so mean-spirited about Christie, well except for the fact that whenever I see him on TV he's belittling someone or yelling at a reporter.

Wednesday night was even stranger, and I honestly only watched a total of like 12 minutes.  I caught about half of John McCain's speech.  The Republcan party is supposed to be the fiscally responsible party, but Senator McCain's speech would have been shorter if he had given us a list of countries he doesn't want to invade.  Unless he thinks we're going to find buried treasure in Iran or Syria (which is funny, because that was essentially the Bush administration argument about oil in Iraq), we're going to need a way to pay for John McCain's ever-growing list of fun new wars.

Quick McCain sidenote:  Everyone on MSNBC's convention coverage panel after McCain's speech felt obligated to heap the praise on McCain for not playing ethnic politics with Barack Obama during the 2008 election.  First of all, I seem to remember some crazy lady from Alaska running around trying to paint then Senator Obama as "pallin' around with terrorists".  I'm pretty sure she was connected with the McCain campaign in some ancillary way.  More importantly, is the bar really that low now?  Is not stooping to the lowest possible level now all you have to do in politics to get praised as a great guy with tons of integrity?  Sigh.

Anyway, then I watched like three minutes of Condoleezza Rice.  First of all, with her and Herman Cain, the Republican party now has two black friends.  Two!  And I'm not even counting Michael Steele, who's more of a high school acquaintance that the Republican party is facebook friends with, but wouldn't actually go hang out with.

Secretary Rice talked about education and the importance of good schools and good teachers.  It sounded really good, but also highly suspect coming from a party that:
1) has spent the last two years busting teachers unions in every state they control.
2) has spent the last 32 years demonizing science, learning, knowledge, facts and the very idea of being educated.
3) has ruined textbooks for the whole nation by doing stupid things in Texas.
4) wants to cut the entire Department of Education.
And I realize that they think #4 will actually help, but the fact that they think parents and local school boards know more about education than, ya know, professional educators, just circles right back to #2.

I'm not really sure how Condoleezza Rice got stuck being the one who had to talk about education, but I guess when you're the Secretary of State you kind of have to know about everything. 

Then Paul Ryan started.  I thought he was supposed to be all energetic and exciting.  He looks like a muppet and I was still bored.  I spent the first three minutes thinking of new Romney/Ryan campaign slogans, like "Hey ladies, Mitt and Paul would like to have a word with you about your uterus." or "you might as well vote for us, because if you're planning to vote for the other guy, we're not even going to let you register".  Catchy, no?  Anyway, after three minutes I went back to watching Almost Famous on cinemax, and I had already missed the airplane scene.  Stupid Paul Ryan.

I'm not planning to watch Mitt Romney tonight.  It's going to be dull, and I already know what he's going to say.  Plus I hear he's going to try to tell us who Mitt Romney the person is and let us get to know him a little, and I really couldn't be less interested in that.  But mostly, I'm not watching because the words don't matter.  Conventions are about stagecraft.  It's four days (or, if you decide to have your convention in Florida during hurricane season, sometimes three days) of patriotic backdrops, silly songs, weird video packages and mindless cheering. 

I'm told the Republican party has a platform that they've agreed upon.  I'm also told Mitt Romney doesn't agree with some of it, but I'm told that doesn't really matter.  Other than the tax cuts (which I swear is the only thing Republicans really believe in) I haven't heard much about this so-called platform.  The actual Republican platform, the one about outlawing all abortion and telling poor people to go fuck themselves if they get sick and cutting taxes but never actually getting around to the whole cutting spending thing, that's sort of like Republican fight club.  They all know about it, but they're not going to talk about it.  It's like how Barack Obama is going to take away everybody's guns in his second term, but he's not saying it now, because he's all smooth and shit.

And this is why I'm not watching Mitt Romney, because the words don't matter.  It's all nonsense.  Mitt Romney isn't going to stand there tonight and tell me what he's going to do as President, I'm not sure he even knows yet.  He'll sit there and tell me about his family background or whatever, and he'll talk about all the terrible things Barack Obama has done in the alternate Republican universe, and he'll make uncomfortable jokes that uncomfortable delegates will laugh uncomfortably at, but he won't actually tell me anything.

I honestly don't know if the Democratic convention will be any more informative (I doubt it).  Sometimes I wonder why I bother paying attention.  I was watching Chris Matthews as I was finishing this up, and he played a clip of Paul Ryan from last night talking about "the strong protecting the weak" and "caring for the least among us".  Now those are some good talking points.  So what if his economic policies do the exact opposite of those things?  I mean, his mom thinks you should vote for him, and look how cute his kids are!

Alchemy 2012!

So Mitt Romney finally has a running mate.  I can't wait to find out who Barack Obama decides to pick (what?  Is it still Biden?  Well, OK then).  Get ready for three months of soundbites from conservatives that basically boil down to "well, I mean, sure Mitt Romney sucks, but, but Paul Ryan!".  Conservatives are excited about Paul Ryan, like kids on Conservative Christmas.  Conservative Christmas, by the way, is a lot like regular Christmas, only instead of giving toys to all the good little girls and boys, Conservative Santa takes all the toys from the poor kids and gives them to the rich kids who really deserve them.  Those poor kids need to get a job, or an inheritance.

Personally, I like this pick for the Republicans.  Honestly, I do.  First, let's start by comparing him to the lowest possible running mate standard, which is obviously Sarah Palin.

Paul Ryan understands enough about the federal budget to, ya know, propose a budget.  Advantage Ryan.
Paul Ryan comes from a state where people actually live.  Advantage Ryan.
Paul Ryan possesses the ability to speak in full sentences.  Advantage Ryan.
Paul Ryan is, at least, vaguely familiar with reality.  Advantage Ryan.

Next, what's the worst thing about Mitt Romney as a candidate?  I know it's hard to choose, but I think you'd have to say it's the fact that nobody likes him.  He's just a really unlikable guy.  When he's talking, instead of listening to what he's actually saying, most people are just daydreaming about running up onto the stage and punching him in the face.

Paul Ryan, on the other hand, is genuinely likable.  He has an ability very few 2012 Republicans have, the ability to sound reasonable.  When you see Paul Ryan on TV, even as he's saying things you completely disagree with, he doesn't make you want to throw things at the TV, or, I don't know, spend an hour writing an entire blog post just making fun of the things he's saying http://somethingclever13.blogspot.com/2012/07/your-arguments-are-bad-and-you-should.html

Now, Democrats are pretty excited about Paul Ryan too, and I understand why.  Yes, Paul Ryan believes that the rights of women are less important than the rights of religious institutions to impose their values on everyone else.  Yes, Paul Ryan believes you can budget cut your way out of a recession. And yes, Paul Ryan is an economic alchemist.

All 2012 Republicans are economic alchemists.  They believe they can magically turn tax cuts for the wealthy into a thriving economy for everyone.  It's just like how you build a house starting with the roof.  The roof is the shelter creator.  Without the roof, your house is just a small park with high walls.  So you build the roof first and just wait for the roof parts to fall down and magically form the rest of the house.  That's how you build a house, right?  I don't know, I've never done it.

You can't blame Mitt Romney for choosing a Republican to run on the Republican ticket with him.  And, in 2012, you can't really ask Mitt Romney to find a Republican to run with him who doesn't believe things that are stupid.

I also think the Romney campaign deserves some credit for picking someone who really does seem interested in talking about policy.  We'll see if I'm right when he starts making campaign speeches, but I've always seen Paul Ryan as a guy who is much more interested in having an honest policy debate than he is in suggesting that Barack Obama is a secret Kenyan muslim terrorist.

I don't know if Ryan helps the Romney campaign win any states, but I don't think that's the point.  Selecting Ryan represents a decision to make this an election about base and turnout, and I think that's the right move for Romney.  The Republicans don't have policies that appeal to truly independent or moderate people, they just don't.  They need to win this election with base energy and turn-out.  Paul Ryan helps with that as much as anyone, and he does it with much less negative baggage than you'd get with someone like Santorum or Palin or Gingrich.

For Ryan, this is obviously great.  I don't think Romney wins, he's just too unlikable (I know it wasn't that long ago that I said I thought Romney had a better than 50% chance, but have you seen how they're running his campaign?  Right now, I think Romney would do better if he spent the next three months traveling around the world and avoiding the media).

So Ryan gets national campaign experience and he gets to blame the loss on Romney.  After the election, he'll be in the same position Sarah Palin was in four years ago.  Palin had the opportunity to go away for a while, learn stuff, and come back as the clear favorite for the 2012 nomination.  Now, Palin possesses neither the ability to go away nor the ability to learn stuff, so that didn't really work out for her, but she had the opportunity, and Paul Ryan will have the same opportunity.  And he doesn't have to go all the way away, he just has to stop himself from chasing every TV camera he sees for a couple of years.

In 2016, Paul Ryan can be the clear favorite for the Republican nomination for an election that's wide open on both sides.  Additionally, since this country is really too stupid to stick to a budget, our debt is only going to be worse four years from now, which only makes Ryan (who, whether you like his ideas or not, is one of the few people to at least suggest something) more attractive in four years.

I'd be really interested in a debate between Barack Obama and Paul Ryan.  I think it would be fascinating.  Unfortunately, unless Romney goes back to his planet soon, we're still stuck with three horrible Romney/Obama debates and one semi-fascinating Biden/Ryan debate (people forget how smart Biden is because he's so goofy, but he's a bright guy).  So, I'm not sure this choice makes the election any more watchable, or tolerable, but it does bait an interesting trap for the Democrats.

I've said before that Republicans are stupid for making constant personal attacks against Barack Obama because he's so likable.  I think the same is true for Ryan.  Democrats seem to be getting ready to tell you that Paul Ryan eats babies for fun (and, since he's from Wisconsin, he fries them and covers them in a thick, cheese-based sauce, which is even more cruel and delicious), but when you meet him, he'll seem like a good guy, and the Democrats will just look mean and stupid.

I probably would have preferred Tim Pawlenty, just because I kind of like Pawlenty, he seems like a nice guy, but Paul Ryan was probably the right choice.  Don't worry, I'm sure the Romney campaign has already fired whoever it was that actually did something right.