Monday Open Thread [2.6.12]
“The biggest victim of [Friday’s] blowout jobs report — aside from the millions of Americans who still lack jobs, of course — is Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. Romney has rested his entire case for election on the sluggish economy… Romney’s campaign seems to have been stunned into silence, taking an unusually long time to come up with any reaction at all. But I think going all-in on economic pessimism remains Romney’s strongest chance. […] In any case, it’s all Romney has. Obama remains personally well-liked. Romney is personally unpopular. The Republican Party is extremely unpopular. Obama has had no major scandals, and his foreign policy has been highly successful to date… He simply has to keep plugging away at his theme, because his only real winning scenario involves winning on the back of a bad economy.” — Jonathan Chait.
REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY
COLORADO (PPP): Romney 40, Santorum 26, Gingrich 18 and Paul 12.
MINNESOTA (PPP): Santorum 29, Romney 27, Gingrich 22 and Paul 19.
GENERAL ELECTION–PRESIDENTIAL
NEW HAMPSHIRE (WMUR Granite State Poll ): Obama 50, Romney 40
U.S. SENATE
OHIO (PPP): Sen. Sherrod Brown (D) 47, Josh Mandel (R) 36.
And some neat graphs and charts from the Washington Post / ABC Poll we discussed this morning:
The thing that gets me is the widespread belief among Republicans that Obama is universally hated. Not disliked, hated. And not by some, but by all Americas. I find it odd talking to wingnuts because the idea that Obama isn’t the most hated figure in the history of the Republic is so ingrained in their minds, that it is simply a given. It is a part of life that is worthy of less thought that breathing.
If Obama wins re-election it is going to be such a jolt to these people that a billion new conspiracy theories will bloom and backwoods revolutionaries will scheme. There will be no other way to reconcile the mass cognitive dissonance that will ensue.
Tim Tebow: Politics could ‘be something in my future’
I love it when the rethugs show their true feelings about racial minorities.
Here is a must read: George Monbiot on how liberals keep letting the worst instincts of conservatism win. Liberal Constipation — as they say, go read the whole thing.
Oh my. I got this far in Monbiot:
“Self-deprecating, too liberal for their own good…”
Progressives are not extreme leftists or “too liberal.” That is a Republican meme; thanks for spreading it.
Today’s progressives will be happy with a handful of solid Democratic kitchen-table issues: protect Social Security and Medicare, taxes where the rich pay their fair share, protect unions, fund education, support the unemployed. Nobody is out there demanding punitive taxes or single-payer health care or unilateral disarmament or Abortionplexes. Hell, we even stopped asking for a War On Poverty.
I guess I better go read the rest of it now.
You should read the whole thing. He isn’t spreading a GOP meme, he is taking to task the liberals who won’t stand for anything.
Okay, yes, I agree with the rest of Monbiot’s point: Democrats have an instinct for the capillary.
Today’s progressives are just regular ol’ Democrats who got left behind in the Democratic party’s cash-slicked lurch to the right.
I got this far in Monbiot:
“Self-de…