From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE
And Now An Important Message from Paul Ryan…
Hello, America. I'd like to address a critical issue with you this morning.
People come up to me at rallies and diners and nursing homes all across this great nation and ask me when Governor Romney and myself are going to start offering specific details about our plans for economic growth, foreign policy, taxes, immigration reform and other issues that affect us all. The American people tell me they have a hunger to debate these challenging issues at election time. We agree.
So today I'd like to make our position clear: yes, we want to want to have a debate about our vision. And I welcome the wanting of the wanting of that debate.
Make no mistake: this is a debate we're hoping to have and wishing to have and we should continue hoping and wishing to have it. Let's spoil for that debate. Let's urge that debate. Let's be jonesin' for that debate. Let's craft a bipartisan Supercommittee to express our fervent desire to crave that debate. Hunger for the debate we must, and hunger for the debate we shall.
But why stop there? Governor Romney and I also want to want to draw lines as we urge the debating of the issues. Red lines and green lines and yellow lines and dotted lines. These are lines we wish to draw and desire to draw. We want lines within lines and lines outside of the lines. No line is off limits except the lines we've drawn indicating the actual limits based on previous lines that we've drawn, which may or may not be retroactively re-drawn if we choose to want that.
So, yes, America, let's move toward wanting to have a debate on the issues during or after this campaign. Let's work toward that goal robustly and openly. We must want to have this debate. We will want to have this debate. On the issue of having this debate, there can be plenty of debate. But on the issue of wanting to have this debate, there can be no debate.
I want to thank you,
Paul
Oops. He forgot to say God Bless America again.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Note: Last call! Tomorrow the bidding begins in the Netroots Nation Fall Auction and it runs through next Tuesday. Proceeds are used to keep costs down for the organization's functions, including the big convention in San Jose next June 20-23. To donate an auction item: Click here and follow the simple instructions. Questions? E-mail Karen Kolber at: Karen [at] netrootsnation.org. Please note that there is a bid limit of seven bajillion dollars for each item, so pace yourself.
-
By the Numbers:
Weeks 'til the general election: 10 9 8 7
Days 'til the Norsk Hostfest in Minot, North Dakota: 7
Amount of median household income that Mitt Romney considers "middle class": $250,000
Current median household income in Maine: $49,568
(Source: Maine Center for Economic Policy)
Students who are enrolled in "virtual schools" in Pennsylvania: 30,000
Percent worse they do in reading and math, respectively, than public school students: 13%, 24%
(Source: The Maine Sunday Telegram)
Rank of Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio on the new list of the best amusement parks in the world: #1
Rank of Dollywood in the categories of friendliness and best food: #1
(Source: Amusement Today's annual survey)
-
Tuesday Words of Wisdom from the Right-wing Blogosphere:
If only Obama could muster half as much righteous anger toward Libyan Muslim murderers as he has shown toward Paul Ryan.
---Michelle Malkin via Instaputz
All together now: 1…2…3…
Classy!
-
Puppy Pic of the Day: This is out on DVD today and I say just give it the Best Picture Oscar now.
-
CHEERS to doin' great in the Buckeye State! If Romney don’t win Ohio, Romney don’t win nuthin'. And President Obama traveled there yesterday to add another point or two to his significant lead. I caught this live yesterday on the teevee and laughed my ass off:
One of these men is an idiot.
"They want your vote, but they don't want to tell you their plan. And the reason is that the plan they've got is the same one they've been offering for decades.
Tax cuts. Tax cuts.
Gut a few regulations, and then let's try some more tax cuts.
Tax cuts in good times.
Tax cuts in bad times.
Tax cuts when we're at peace.
And tax cuts when we're at war.
You want to make a new restaurant reservation or book a flight? You don't need the new iPhone---try a tax cut!
Want to drop a few extra pounds? Try a tax cut!
They've got one answer for everything.
Now, I've cut taxes too---for folks who need it.
Oh… Oh…
Ohhhhhhh baby! Did you feel that? That's the tremor I feel anytime I hear the voice of BHO channeling the soul of FDR. Either that or someone's fracking in our basement.
JEERS to a bad start. September 9: Shell starts drilling in the Arctic, using the latest safety equipment that will guarantee everything goes smoothly. September 17: Shell stops drilling in the Arctic for the entire season when their safety equipment breaks. On the bright side, the company assures us it's nothing that a little super glue and a multi-million-dollar PR TV blitz won’t fix. Cue the actors in lab coats with beakers and shit-eating grins…
CHEERS to a happy compromise. In light of the (no-longer) secret video of Mitt Romney harshing on poor people, and knowing it could well do irreparable harm to his campaign, I've decided I don’t need to see his tax returns anymore. Really. I don’t. Not as long as he answers one question publicly and directly:
Mitt's response is
in the bubble above.
"What is so important about the vice president's job that requires Paul Ryan to turn over ten years of tax returns to your campaign's VP-vetting team, but the president's job is only important enough to require that you turn over two years of your tax returns to the president-vetting team, which is the American people?"
Romney has until October 15 to release his 2011 federal returns. Until then, the crickets will be working round-the-clock in shifts.
JEERS to Occupy Catch-22. Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of the first Occupy protest in Manhattan's Zuccotti Park. But by the media coverage I saw, you'd think that the movement, which forced the income-inequality issue to the top of the nation's consciousness in a matter of weeks, is on its deathbed. The reports seemed to spend most of the day wondering why turnout appeared to be so low. And in other news, yesterday in lower Manhattan the cops arrested anybody that moved. Might be a clue.
JEERS to adding heat to the fire. If you thought things were tense enough between us and Libya, along comes this to make it worse: the highest temperature ever recorded is no longer the famous 136 degrees recorded in El Azizia, Libya back in 1922. The World Killjoy Organization says the jury-rigged thermometer used at the time was unreliable. So the new hottest day on record is the 134-degree reading at Death Valley in 1913. But cheer up, Libya; you'll always beat the pants off us in one category: trapping brutal dictators in culverts.
Issue #1
CHEERS to learning something new every day. On September 18, 1851,
The New York Times came out with its
first issue, published by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones who said: "We intend to issue it every morning (Sundays excepted) for an indefinite number of years to come." And while doing a little research I discovered that Times Square is named after the paper (Really!) and the first New Year's Eve ball drops were done from their 42nd Street headquarters starting in 1907 (Really!!!). Now I'm scared, because whenever something trivial enters my brain it means something important gets kicked out. Which probably explains why I just got a sudden urge to gnaw the lead paint off my toys and vote for Mitt Romney. Now you know why I keep a team of neurologists on speed-dial.
-
Five years ago in C&J: September 18, 2007
CHEERS to plucking the chickenhawks---legal edition. Last week Erwin Chemerinsky was "un-hired" as the dean of the new UC Irvine law school because conservatives thought he was too gosh darn liberal. ("Elbow patches in the classroom? Never!") After a faculty revolt and a lot of bad press, he and Chancellor Michael Drake reached an agreement that allows him to stay. In a nutshell: Chemerinsky becomes the dean and the conservative whiners go screw themselves. I like happy endings.
JEERS to organ failure. Keith Olbermann was rushed to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy Sunday night (he'll be back in action soon). His last words to doctors before the anesthesia took effect: "Good night and good luuuuuu..." [9/18/12 Update: Last night Keith surfaced to release a Special Comment on SecretVideoSexPartyGate. Watch it here. Too much to expect a Worst Person In The World segment tonight?]
-
And just one more…
CHEERS to previews of coming attractions…in EmancipationVision! Steven Spielberg's Lincoln---which opens in two score and 12 days---is either an over-the-wall-and-into-the-parking-lot home run, or a very good-looking misfire. Hard to tell. But with Daniel Day Lewis in the lead role, a dynamite supporting cast and John Williams penning the score, I'll go all-in that it's the former. Here…take a look:
How strange that the Party of Lincoln bears little-to-no resemblance anymore to the Party of Lincoln. I bet that pisses him off.
Have a nice Tuesday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
-
Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"We will never have the elite, smart Bill in Portland Maine on our side."
---Rick Santorum.
-