Think of this as a slow-motion commentary on the Republican debate from last week. None of this is particularly in-depth, but I think it’s worth raising a few points about certain participants.
Lindsey loves Georgie. At the kid’s table, Lindsey Graham got a little carried away over his bro-mance with ex-president and hopefully future convicted war criminal George W. Bush, saying in essence that he misses W and wishes he were still in office to handle the big-as-the-sky threat known as ISIS, which Lindsey previously said wants to “kill us all!!” Not hard to work out why Senator Graham’s poll numbers, even in a highly reactionary GOP primary race, hover somewhere between zero and zero point five. Not a majority position.
War of the Cubans. Whoa – someone waved a red rag between Senators Cruz and Rubio. Either that or somebody called somebody else’s mommy a commie. Fascinating how the supposedly “establishment” candidate Rubio is working hard to outflank Cruz on the right (!) with appeals to nativism and McCain/Graham-like warmongering.
Meet the King. Note to the often wrong, never in doubt Chris Christie: King Hussein of Jordan is long dead. It helps to know these things when you’re running for president. I still think anyone who wants to be president should have to fill in the names of countries on a blank map on live television, then tell the audience some relevant thing about our foreign policy with respect to each one they name.
He said what? It’s the law of a stopped clock being right twice a day. Trump’s comments about the Iraq war – at least the first portion of them, before he talks about “taking the oil” – were hard to argue with. It’s interesting that the majority of Republican party voters seem to back candidates who are skeptical of the notion of regime change. Carpet bombing, sure, but no regime change. (Interestingly, Cruz appears to think you can selectively carpet bomb combatants, as if they will voluntarily stand out in the open when your bombers fly by.)
That’s all I’ve got. This is kind of long in the tooth, but again … it’s been a long ten days. More later.
luv u,
jp
Starting with the debate, probably the most telling moments of that sorry spectacle were the attacks against the event moderators – the calls of unfairness most effectively delivered by Ted Cruz, who (as Sam Seder has pointed out) really owns that sense of grievance that has become such a central part of the Republican/Tea Party narrative. There goes the “liberal” media, ripping into us after having given the Democrats the kid gloves treatment. Several of them – Christie, Trump, Carson, Huckabee – took turns revealing their inner Gingrich, whining at such a pitch that their grievance grew legs and very nearly derailed the entire GOP debate schedule in the days that followed. Pauvre petit!
I think the part that’s most flabbergasting is the level of hysteria over the Iran deal. You expect to hear overheated rhetoric at an event that features Michelle Bachman and some dude from “Duck Dynasty,” but this was way the fuck over the top. Ted Cruz suggested that the Iranians, once they have acquired the nuclear weapon they so LUST after, will blow it up off the coast of the U.S. to create an electromagnetic pulse, shutting down our electrical grid and killing MILLIONS! What. the. fuck. What a fantasy! And this from a sitting Senator.