Bullshit Candidate

If there was ever any -- any -- remaining doubt that Mitt Romney is a joke candidate with no core convictions (other than love and respect of wealth), then this statement from his campaign spokesperson, Eric Fehrnstrom, has made it clear that he's the emptiest of empty suits:

Is it a gaffe if all you're doing is revealing the truth behind your campaign curtain?

I think this one is going to stick, especially coming on the heels of a big Primary win (Illinois) and repeating his snatch-defeat-from-victory pattern of following wins with gaffe's. There's already a website up with Mitt's Etch-a-Sketch position changes -- just click on the words to see yet another example. Both Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich brandished an Etch-a-Sketch today, and the political ads just write themselves.

Here's Romney (a terrible candidate to begin with) trying to put the genie back in the bottle later in the day:

You have to bet that his approval ratings will fall further, and maybe this is the big opening that Santorum needs to scoop Romney in the upcoming state contests.

BTW, I love the Etch-a-Sketch product and have since childhood. I love that it's been owned by the same company that created it for over 50 years. I love the statement they put out today and, most of all, hope their sales rocket skyward...as the Romney campaign tumbles towards hell.

Tally Oh!

Interesting developments over in England where the governing Labour Party, damaged by former Prime Minister Tony Blair's acquiescence to George W. Bush's duplicitiously conceived and clumsily executed Iraq War, now finds itself potentially dropping to third place in the upcoming election behind the anti-charismatic PM Gordon Brown.

While Tory leader David Cameron has been preparing for Downing Street by rebuilding his party's image in a kinder, gentler fashion (he's maybe slightly to the right of Obama) and poised to win, both Cameron and Brown have been upstaged in Britain's first televised Prime Minister election debates by Nick Clegg, telegenic leader of the smaller Liberal-Democratic Party. Clegg has been compared to Obama in that he's both something of a breathe of fresh air as well as offering a third way between or besides the other two parties.

The polls currently have the Conservatives in the lead, followed by the Liberal Dems and Labour trailing. But what just happened today could be the deathblow to Labour hopes of retaining control of even a coalition government, as Gordon Brown committed one the all-time worst campaign gaffes in that country. Brown was doing some rare campaigning amongst the electorate, had a conversation with an older woman last name Duffy, and was caught on mic disparaging her as a bigot as he got into his car (transcript via Andrew Sullivan's blog):

Duffy: We had it drummed in when I was a child with mine … it was education, health service and looking after the people who are vulnerable. But there's too many people now who are vulnerable but they can claim and people who are vulnerable can't get claim, can't get it.

Brown: But they shouldn't be doing that, there is no life on the dole for people any more. If you are unemployed you've got to go back to work. It's six months.

Duffy: You can't say anything about the immigrants because you're saying that you're … but all these eastern European what are coming in, where are they flocking from?

Later, as he was leaving

Brown: Very good to meet you, and you're wearing the right colour today. Ha, ha, ha: How many grandchildren do you have?

Duffy: Two. They've just got back from Australia where they got stuck for 10 days. They couldn't get back with this ash crisis.

Brown: We've been trying to get people back quickly. Are they going to university. Is that the plan?

Duffy: I hope so. They're only 12 and 10.

Brown: Are they're doing well at school? [pats Duffy on the back] A good family, good to see you. It's very nice to see you.

In the car

Brown: That was a disaster. Well I just ... should never have put me in that woman. Whose idea was that?

And since they're doing American-style debates, why not American-style YouTube gaffe documentation:



Welcome to our world, Gordon Brown.

McPhil

Per Max Bergmann, this should have been the week that ended McCain's Presidential hopes -- so many gaffes, indications of sub-par skills, knowledge and judgment.

But the finest has to be McCain's Jimmy Carter "malaise" moment, when his economic adviser, Ex-Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX) who's part of the sub-prime debacle at UBS and who's wife did quite well on the Enron board, had this to say about our recession:

“You’ve heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession,” he said, noting that growth has held up at about 1 percent despite all the publicity over losing jobs to India, China, illegal immigration, housing and credit problems and record oil prices. “We may have a recession; we haven’t had one yet.”

“We have sort of become a nation of whiners,” he said. “You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline” despite a major export boom that is the primary reason that growth continues in the economy, he said.

Easy for a multi-millionaire to say! UPDATE: Video version:



At first the McCain campaign supported the statement, then came the flip-flop as McCain claimed:

"I strongly disagree" with Phil Gramm's remarks, McCain told reporters in Belleville, Mich. "Phil Gramm does not speak for me. I speak for me."

Then why send him out today to the Wall Street Journal to speak for you?

The fact is, multi-millionaire McCain has previously said that our problems are psychological, making me wonder if he's going a little "psychological" himself.

As for Obama, it must have been a relief to take up this gaffe after a bruising FISA week, and he seems genuinely loose, funny and (most importantly) connected again:



For comparison, McCain's response:



Which one looks ready to lead America and the World out of the reactionary Cheney-Bush years, and full-blazing into the 21st Century?