Buh-Bye Mittens

Mitt Romney. photo Stephen Crowley/The New York Times.

Mitt Romney Withdraws From Campaign.

That's it on Romney.

Mitt Romney of Massachusetts withdrew from the presidential race this afternoon.

The New York Times

“This is not an easy decision for me. I hate to lose,” Mr. Romney said. “If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and make it more likely that Senator Clinton or Obama would win. And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign, be a part of aiding a surrender to terror,” he said during the conference. Members of the audience shouted, “No!” as Mr. Romney spoke.

Mr. Romney did not endorse John McCain in his speech. The two have clashed during this campaign over who is the real conservative.

Mr. Romney faced a series of enormous challenges in the campaign, not the least of which was trying to reconcile the moderate political views he espoused as the governor of Massachusetts, a liberal state, with the more conservative views he championed on the campaign. That tension – and his decision to change positions on a number of emotionally-charged issues, including renouncing his past support for abortion rights – led his rivals to continually lambaste him as a flip-flopper.

Then there was the question of his Mormon religion. After the candidacy of Mike Huckabee, a former Baptist preacher, exploded in Iowa, where it was fueled by evangelical voters, Mr. Romney was moved to give a major speech in Texas defending his faith and denouncing the rise of secularism.

And although Mr. Romney, a former management consultant, ran what many described as a textbook campaign, he never really recovered after failing to execute the original strategy of winning the first two contests in Iowa and New Hampshire, and using those wins to build momentum. Iowa went to Mr. Huckabee, and New Hampshire to Mr. McCain, who tried to paint himself as a straight talker to contrast with Mr. Romney’s flexibility.

This leaves only Mike Huckabee between John McCain of Arizona and the Republican nomination.

The New York Times

Mr. Huckabee has proved this year to be an articulate and affable candidate, and his surprise showing in winning a half-dozen Southern states on Tuesday was one reason that Mr. Romney bowed to what was inarguably the inevitable and quit.

But Mr. Huckabee is a candidate with some shortcomings – in particular, his lack of experience in foreign affairs – and, more significant, not much money to soldier on. What is more, Mr. McCain has a big lead in delegates coming out of Tuesday night, and under party rules, Mr. Huckabee would have tough job catching up even if he had the money to do so.

The question now for Mr. McCain is how far he needs go now in reaching out to conservatives who have been wary of him – if not flat out opposed to him – given his history on issues like easing immigration restrictions and changing campaign finance laws. Mr. Romney was arguably Mr. McCain’s greatest threat on the right and his greatest impetus for moving right; now that he is gone, some of the motivation for moving right is gone.

Mr. McCain, who will address the Conservative Political Action Committee later in the afternoon, has a slightly different task now. He cannot win a general election without having the unambiguous support of conservatives around him – especially going up against a Democratic Party that is so, to borrow a phrase from Barack Obama, fired up and ready to go.

But the extent to which he emphasizes conservative positions could complicate his effort to win over the moderate and independent voters who have so long been drawn by Mr. McCain and is one of the reasons why many Democrats view him as the toughest candidate the Republicans have.

It may take a few more contests to settle Huck's hash, but it's a done deal as I see it.

Gear up for McCain.

Now if only it were this clear for the Democratic Party.

There's more...

Mitt Unfortunately Finally Lets The Dogs Out

“If You Don't Know, You Better Ask Somebody...”


Wikipedia: “Cringe Comedy is a comedy genre that uses offensive or vulgar material or (as has been popularized recently) awkward and embarrassing situations to cause audiences to be repulsed or feel uneasy.”

Two of my favorite examples of “Cringe Comedy” are the skit segments on “Late Night With Conan O'Brien” and perhaps best of all, the original BBC version of “The Office” starring Ricky Gervais.

It's a difficult genre to master. But one of the key tenets of it working well is for the protagonist to have pretty much no shame whatsoever.

And folks...when the phrase “no shame” comes to mind, the pen and ink sketch next to it in the dictionary looks a lot like one Willard “Mitt” Romney.

With that, witness the entry of a NEW deity into the “Cringe Comedy” pantheon of greats. (via Pam's House Blend and The NYT)

Mr. Romney, the Republican candidate from Massachusetts by way of Michigan and Utah who enjoys a milkshake at the end of a long day, stopped by a staging area for a Martin Luther King Birthday parade here. In his dress shirt and tie, and with his unwavering smile, he walked over and posed for photographs with a group of black youngsters. Putting his arm around a teenage girl, he waved to the cameras and offered, “Who let the dogs out?” He added a tepid “woof woof.”

Somewhere, the Baha Men, the Bahamian group whose 2000 song the candidate was referencing, must have been shuddering.

I mean...

...Jesus.

“Who Let The Dogs Out?”

They stopped playing that song in minor-league ball parks in 2002, lest fans damage the P.A. system speakers with tossed beer cups and stale pretzels.

What madness overcame this transistorized, lacquer-headed disingenu-ite? Was he so uncomfortable around young Black folk that he felt he just had to break the unbearable tension with a crunk, gully reference?

I mean..,shit, “crunk” and “gully” ain't been “in” since '04, and this sad, starch-blooded clown trots out a Baha Men tune from 2000—that Black folks played for about a month before declaring it “done, son”. Could someone please send Hugh Hewitt a copy of “Now That's What I Call Music” dated later than 2001 so he can hip his boy, jest a touch?

The nervous laughter from the assembled young people in the clip is priceless, too. It was definitely of the “Henh-henh. I won't clown you now because that would be embarrassing. Really embarrassing, but wait till I get home, go online and rag your vacuum-formed ass out on Bossip. I have heard Romney described as a panderer before...and it's one thing to read a compare and contrast piece that highlights his shameless, windblown conviction-choosing. But to see it happen right there before your “WTF”-ing eyes, so nakedly, and oh-so-Goddamned badly just hammers that truth home with piledriver force.

Here's the hint Mitt—if you are around a bunch of folks of a different background than yours, and you are clearly uncomfortable, it is better to shut your $40,000 veneered mouth and smile than it is to dig into that Bryllcreem-leeched mind of yours for a “when in Rome” cultural reference that lets everyone know “you're hip...not!” You could have just gotten the photo-op, said “Thank you” and hopped your ass onto the campaign bus and power-washed the Black off your hands like you wanted to.

But you wanted to “be down”...and you all of a sudden thought you were the cool White guy on the train whose iPod headphones bleed out enough that you can hear Ghostface Killah or Jadakiss spittin' rhymes over the subway din.

You were not him. You are Willard “Mitt” Romney—who already fucked up on “Thangs Dr. King” when you lied about marching with him in the sixties. Now, you've compounded your “ghetto fabulism” with a lame attempt at cool that went over just a little bit better than if you'd deigned to sing “De Camptown Ladeez”, or “Ol' Man River” to the assembled.

I want to say, “Just...shut your fucking mouth, Mitt”, but your every gaffe is comedy and campaign-killing gold, so I won't.

Just make sure to say, in your best Jimmie “J.J. Walker voice “Ah-Dy-No-MITE!” when you want to punctuate a point during speeches on these visits to Blackfolkland.

And playing the super-funkee “Celebration” by Kool & The Gang and asking us to “Git dowwwwwwwwnnnnnnn!” during your entrances won't hurt either. Word.

Lastly, is it just me or is there a strange irony in hearing the man who tied his carrier-penned dog to the top of the family wagon and drove hundreds of roof-shit inducing miles now stiffly squawking about “Who Let The Dogs Out”?

God, I wish I'd been there. Just to yell “Not you, motherfucker!”

There's more...

No Thank You For Your Patronage

“Hey! There's Mitt...right there! Next to that pole In Section 19, And look down in front! There's Jackie Gleason, and Sinatra, J. Edgar Hoover, and Toots Shor, and oh yeah...The Tooth Fairy, too!”

This post's not about sports per sé. But I think one of the major sporting moments of the last century is a good jumping off point for the discussion at hand—on what I will hereby dub ”Son-Of-A-Bitch-Whistle-Politics”.

THE TIME: October 3rd, 1951

THE PLACE: The Polo Grounds, New York 155th Street and 8th Avenue

THE EVENT: The final game of a 3-game playoff to determine baseball's National League champion between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants.

What would happen that day is simply one of baseball's supremely legendary moments, for it was on that fall afternoon in Harlem when The New York Giants Bobby Thomson ripped a sinking line drive over the tall fence in left field for a walk-off, two-run homer, giving the Giants an incredible come-from-behind 5-4 victory over the crosstown rival Brooklyn Dodgers, and thus capping off an astounding stretch run at the season's close. How astounding was it? The Giants overcame a 13 1/2-game August lead (!) to overtake said Dodgers for the National League crown and go on to the World Series.

Thomson's homer was forevermore dubbed “The Shot Heard 'Round The World”, and by God, it seemed according to the attendees at hand who would speak on it later to have had just about that level of significance.

Big event, big time. It was spectacularly chronicled in the bravura opening of Don DeLilllo's 1993 classic “Underworld”. Frank Sinatra, a stomach-sickened Jackie Gleason, FBI head J. Edgar Hoover, and noted barkeep and friend to the connected, Toots Shor are seated in Section 19 just behind the Giants dugout as what seems like all of New York has turned out for the historic game. Leaping from the pages is the garrulous “Great One”, wolfing hot dogs and cup after cup of ballyard suds, a plotzed-from-the-night-before-and-bemused Shor, a prickly, but game Ol' Blue Eyes, and a fussy, fish-out-of-water Hoover, along with a seeming nobody—the teenage local Cotter Martin, who ditched school and turnstile-jumped to gain entry into the rumbling stadium, who by fate's decree manages to nab the prized home-run ball amidst the crazed scrum in left field.

DeLillo's breathless recap/re-telling/re-imagining of the events of the day through the fictional Martin's eyes and the eyes of the four giants he placed there in Section 19 is one of literature's modern marvels. And as he (DeLillo) is famously protective of his words, I cannot run an excerpt here. Get thee to a library or a friend's house where the book lay and read that rollercoaster chapter.

Read it and you will feel as if You. Are. There. Standing at the bustling, head-spinning intersection of real-life and amazing fiction. You would think from DeLillo's pulse-pounding prose about that afternoon at the old four-based horseshoe nestled there at the foot of the 115-foot high Coogan's Bluff uptown that every single one of the 56,000 seats were filled.

But that was not the case that day.

The Polo Grounds held at capacity close to 56,000 people.

Only 34,000 people are documented as having actually attended the game on October 3rd.

The reasons for the light attendance in spite of the game's import are numerous. The Giants were the number three team in town behind the Yankees and the Dodgers and thus, the fan base was a bit smallish. What's more, Brooklynites weren't all that keen on being caught so far away from home to see their beloved Dodgers (as New York baseball was quite territorial) uptown, so their numbers didn't swell the park either. The series also occurred in the midst of an incredible five-title run by the mid-century Yankee dynasty, so in addition to the other detriments, the city's National League attendance was somewhat depressed.

Again, a mere 34,000 people showed up in a 56,000 seat house.

The joke in town though is that if you took the word of every person who pontificates on that day's amazing events, not only would every seat at the Polo Grounds have to have been been filled, but you'd have had scores of thousands more peering down from craggy Coogan's Bluff and from the shoulder of the Harlem River Drive with binoculars and such.

Run an ad in the New York Times asking for remembrances of that day, and damned if you wouldn't get a hundred-and-fifty thousand people responding with tales of old Uncle Ned, their dad Mort, Mom, big brother, a fiancé or a random childhood pal's having warmed a wooden seat that chilly October afternoon while witnessing Thomson's mighty swat.

Everyone wants to have “been there” when history goes down...but in reality, very few actually ever are.

And that grasping “everyone” includes one Willard “Mitt” Romney and the totally self-inflcited recent “scandal” involving his claims of his father, the former Michigan Governor George Romney's having “marched alongside” Martin Luther King as he watched.

Romney, to his eternal, lacquer-headed fucking stupidity trotted that lame-ass line around for months, making the dopey claim as some sort of “Hey! Brother!—we weren't down with all that anti-colored people horse-hockey!” cover for his Mormon faith's up-until-1978 White supremacist teachings.

Mitt's double fuck-up is that he was too bold the bullshit artist to ever try to nuance the claim, yammering about his father's marching with Dr. King, apparently as a tow-headed version of himself looked on proudly—through glistening, equality-welled eyes at his dad's blazing, sole-scuffing courage, or some such mealy-mouthed bullshit. When reporters checked the historical record and started calling Romney the Lesser on it, he then fudged on having actually seen his big, brave, Atticus Finch of a daddy march, and now it turns out that Romney the senior may not have ever been at a fucking march with Dr. King. in the first place.

The historical record on Papa Romney's participation is pretty clear. In spite of Mitt's claim, and several hagiographical, half-assed, real-time reports (unsurprisingly, “The Village Idiot” David Broder is responsible for one of them), Papa's “presence” can't be verified. A spate of 21st century digging has unearthed fairly conclusive documentary evidence that he wasn't at any march with Dr. King—in spite of a couple of hazy, last-minute “eyewitness” reports being trotted about as tepid corroboration.

The record on Mitt's having been present to see his father Rockette-kicking alongside King and Abernathy and Rustin is even more clear-cut. He lied through his Chiclet™-perfect teeth.

“You know, I speak in the sense of I saw my dad become president of American Motors. I wasn’t actually there when he became president of American Motors, but I saw him in the figurative sense of he marched with Martin Luther King. My brother also remembers him marching with Martin Luther King and so in that sense I saw him march with Martin Luther King.”

----------------------------------------

He added, “You know, I’m an English literature major as well. When we say, ‘I saw the Patriots win the World Series, it doesn’t necessarily mean you were there — excuse me, the Super Bowl. I saw my dad become president of American Motors. Did that mean you were there for the ceremony? No, it’s a figure of speech.“

So, Mitt lied. Imagine that—a politician shading the truth so hard it leaves a razor-sharp tan line on his ass during the campaign season. And by the by, cats can't drive for shit. Tell us something we don't know.

Well, okay. Allow me to lay something out—something very clear and very simple for probably way too many of you. A something you should understand about...the laughable superficiality of this discussion of race by Romney:

For Black folks, when a White politico on the racial defensive throws the “I marched with Martin Luther King” line out there, it scans as exactly what the fuck it appears to be—namely, damage-control shorthand for “I've got problems with Black people or have allied myself with folks who have problems with Black people, and I'm trying to shut you up about what I'm doing now by citing something I may have done back in the day.”

Let me also put on my Al Sharpton conk-wig for a moment and speak for what I think is the majority of Black folks as I let you in on another little secret:

We laugh up our Goddamned sleeves when that shit gets trotted out. Laugh, laugh, laugh like we're front row at a Richard Pryor concert circa 1974 while getting our ribs tickled with feathers. Because it's used as a a crude “shut-you-up”, a silencer—as opposed to a door-opener to a discussion of America's nagging, debilitating fever that is racism. The hasty, verbal magic bullet of the claim is designed to supply an inoculation against one's present-day ties to groups or policies that are patently bigoted. On the surface, it should almost work. It's very easy to claim that you or someone you knew once walked arm-in-arm with a forty-years-dead historical icon who's no longer here to corroborate said person's attendance. The trouble is that said dead historical icon in spite of the best efforts of historical revisionism was actually reviled by a huge swath of White folk in this country up until the day he died, and his death was openly celebrated by that same huge swath with more than a few highballs and frosty-cold Ballantines being gleefully tipped back.

You need only look at the clowns who try to run that bullshit to understand why the claim is never taken seriously by those who it's directed towards.

Take one look at the crazyfuck, and increasingly retrograde Charlton Heston you know and cringe at today. He just loves to throw his “Hey, I walked with Dr. King, so get off of my back” bona-fides from back in the day out there. But he only very noticeably began to negro name-drop “big time” as soon as he started being questioned and then summarily ridiculed for his proudly standing shoulder-to-sunburned-shoulder with the über-batshit bigwigs of the National Rifle Association's hierarchy. It's crystal-clear where his allegiances lie these days, and it damn sure ain't in the interests of the people who his extremist gun-nut pals routinely find themselves on the wrong side of. And mind you—pics exist of Chuck's ass actually at King marches. He was there. By God, he was really there, but guess what? His latter-day dumbfuckery trashes whatever “legacy” he may have had in that respect.

His compatriot in CYA / Dr.King spooning is the disgusting, sanctimonious creep of a Senator from “The Nutmeg State”—one Joseph I. (“I” as in, “Is it any wonder this droopy gonad-faced worm has abandoned any pretense of progressivism?”) Lieberman. When pressed on his increasing coziness with melanin-hating wingnuts, he too goes to the “I marched with Dr. King” mattresses.

But of course, a mattress gone to by Ol' Lyin'-Ass Joe is going to have that certain smell to it, isn't it? Shit...right down to its rusty non-supportive coils.

Folks who are hip, and really, that's anybody with more than half-a-Goddamned-cerebrum—are sophisticated enough to grasp the reality of these cipherous charlatans claims. It's a dodge, pure and simple—and a patronizing dodge at that. It's reminiscent of another classic dodge in Blackfolkland. Go to a school or church talent show and oft-times you'll see at least one lousy singer screeching and over-melisma-ing a popular song to beat the tone-deaf band. But said singer never wants to be booed off the stage by a displeased crowd, so to inoculate themselves against vocal criticism, the performer will invariably name-check Jesus with an ad-libbed whoop or a holler somewhere near the end of the song. This generally gets a mild applause and semi-effectively “Teflons” the song-mangler from the audience. You see, no one wants to come off as the person who razzed the singer who name-checked Jesus. In those small, slice-of-life cases the dodge can work.

But in the grander scheme of things where we're electing people to high office, said scam just comes off as cowardly and laughable. And not just to Black folks, either. It's such an outdated pander that the only people it “works” on are those already in that politician's camp, allowing them a “See, he respects darkies!” moment of bullshit zen before rushing back to the fundraiser where copies of “The Bell Curve” book-on-tape are stuffed in the out-the-door goodie bags.

And ironically enough—and almost sadly too, for Mitt Romney, his having been caught like a big fat spider in his own sticky web of lies on this issue is actually the secondary trouble for him. You see, even if the statements about the King marches had been true, he'd still have been scoffed at for the shameless, ineffectual pandering of it all.

And let's be real folks...the charge of “shameless, ineffectual pandering” isn't exactly one that Mittsie has much of a defense against, is it?

What he's found in this exercise in spin futility is that the ugly stain of good old American racism is a tough one to remove, especially when those most anxious to wash it away are often the most obviously compromised by it. The “King March” claims were only going to end up as what they ended up as—hot sparks in his dry hay wagon of a campaign. He was either going to set off the blaze of when we looked at how his father reconciled “supporting” MLK while living a faith that openly considered him a lesser human being (a direct contradiction of King's message) were the march statements true—or, now that we know they were at the very least, considerably stretched, torch himself yet again as a man who's known to say pretty much anything to cover his ass at any given moment.

He was damned if he did, and damned if he didn't.

The tears of relief he supposedly shed in '78 when the Mormon bigwigs reversed the faith's racist stance in the face of multi-million dollar suits read as so much salty crocodile effluence no matter how you slice it. Bullshit or pandering—bullshit and pandering.

It's a two-fer fer losers. Which uh...makes Mitt a...well, you can read the polls, can't you folks?

But open that Pandora's Box of disingenuously discussing race if you must, Mittsie. I mean, you're already deemed untrustworthy in general by folks for your Zelig-esque policy tendencies. All you've done here is set yourself up Rudy-style for a bit of investigative digging that's not going to go well once the first big shovelful comes up. You managed to dodge the bullet when this ugliness first started to surface eight months ago.

But back then you were the hunt-er, remember? Now buddy...you're the hun-ted.

What to do? What to do to shore things up a little?

Oooh! You can always claim you taught Richard Pryor that pinch-corded “White Guy Voice” when you met him backstage at a concert in '71 or something. Rich's dead too, so he's not gonna deny it.

Or, you could say you played trumpet overdubs on James Brown's “Get On The Good Foot” in '72. Again, no James, no denial.

Hey! Guess who ghost-wrote sizable chunks of “Roots” for the late Alex Haley?...

There's more...