VOTE, or Maybe Not

By Cole

This is the last post I’ll write about this election. OK, maybe one more, but only if I get to gloat. I promise I won’t whine if Romney gets more votes. (I just can’t bring myself to call him a “winner.”)

Once again, we cats are forced to sit on the sidelines while the fate of our country lies in the hands of feckless humans, just because you have opposable thumbs.

But if cats could vote, I can tell you the only ones who’d be voting for Romney are pampered Persians with a sense of entitlement, and some Siamese who can’t see straight.

The Domestic Shorthairs, the nation’s most powerful feline contingent, which includes most strays and by far outnumbers purebreds, would be voting for the black cat.

So I hope everybody goes to the polls tomorrow to vote, UNLESS…

• You haven’t watched at least 500 TV ads (if you live in a swing state) and rolled in that mud.
• You didn’t bother to watch any of the debates, so you missed seeing Romney’s best flip-flops and outright lies.
• You think the country needs a president who believes there’s magic in his underwear (and I’m not talking about what’s IN his underwear, which all men believe to be magical, but his actual shorts).
• You think the country needs a first lady who’s more empty-headed than Laura Bush and has dedicated her life to breeding, either herself or through her offspring.
• You want to see our Commander in Chief, through sheer tactlessness, totally piss off China, Russia, most of Europe, South America, and Africa.
• You think the Middle East deserves a U.S./Israeli attack on Iran — just because it’s there.

In that case, you are too dumb to vote and you need to stay home watching the Cartoon Network. We’ll let you know how it turns out.

Debate 2: Romney’s Night of Magical Thinking

By Cole

At last night’s debate, Mitt Romney faced a feisty President Obama who wasn’t about to let Republican deceit, dishonesty, and distortions go unchallenged, and it was exhilarating to watch.

Romney’s beef with Obama seems to boil down to a naïve assumption that Obama failed to wave the wand Romney thinks is in the Oval Office’s top desk drawer. Mormons have great faith in magic, especially when it’s in their underwear.

Instead, Obama has been trying to reverse all of George W. Bush’s bad calls the hard way — by trying to work with obstructionist Republicans in Congress who would gleefully destroy this country if it would bring the black cat down.

Romney promises once he’s president, he’ll repeal the Affordable Care Act (on his first day) and replace it with all its good things and even more, create 12 million jobs, cut everybody’s taxes by 20%, balance the budget, get Iran to behave, and make China stop “cheating” (at what, exactly?).

Anybody who believes Romney can do all this without being anointed king is — sorry, but there’s no other way to put it — a f**king idiot.

Pollsters claim Romney’s closing the gap with women voters. WTF? Will they still love him after hearing how he sought out women “qualified” enough to serve on his state cabinet in Massachusetts, and seeming gobsmacked when he was presented with “binders full” of them?

We’re talking about Boston here, home of Harvard and MIT, one of the nation’s hottest hubs of higher education. DUH! Who would have known there’d be any smart women there?

As for Romney’s impressive display of faux concern for the 47% types in the audience, the New Yorker did a great job, so read about that there.

I’m surprised nobody’s picking up on the return of Old Miser Mitt, repeatedly asking Obama if he’d checked his retirement account lately. Obama blew him off by saying his isn’t as big as Romney’s, so he doesn’t check it often.

Didn’t you feel déjà vu to the debate where Romney tried to make a $10,000 bet with Rick Perry? Every time Miser Mitt mentions personal finances with the smug air of a guy who knows he’s got more money than anybody in the room — it makes my fur crawl.

But the best moment came when Romney stepped right into the shit with his closing statement, claiming he cares about “100%” of the people.

Obama sailed cleanly through that opening by reminding everybody it’s recorded on tape that Romney really believes 47% of Americans are lazy mooches.

Romney has backed out of appearing on The View on October 18, but he’s sending Ann alone. Apparently, chatting with a bunch of stupid women is not on his To-Do list — and he’s afraid of Whoopi Goldberg.

First Debate: Mitt Gone Wild

By Cole

Just about everybody concedes that Mitt Romney “won” last night’s debate on the economy. Republicans are positively giddy.

Mitt’s bravura performance proved beyond any doubt that he’s the quintessential department store mannequin. Change the window-dressing, change the man. He has no genuine core.

Last night his handlers dressed and prepped him to be Elmer Fudd in camo, out to stalk and bag that “wascally wabbit,” Obama.

And Mitt did. So eager to make his points, he flouted the rules by repeatedly refusing to let moderator Jim Lehrer speak and keep things on track, and even talking over Obama.

At one point, Mitt even had the nerve to say, “Mr. President, you’re entitled to your own airplane and your own house, but not your own facts.”

This from the man with 5 houses and several Cadillacs with their own elevator, representing the most fact-free political party in history.

Mitt was so stuffed with numbers (few of which contained his actual PLANS), they exploded from him on every topic.

Obama and Lehrer found themselves playing with a statistical piñata.

Had Obama sunk to responding tit for tat, they’d have been ping-ponging so many incomprehensible figures, the audience would have tuned out.

By trying to keep it simple, Obama came across as “weak.”

What’s indisputable is that Obama got VERY bad advice as far as not calling out Romney on his everlasting bullshit or bringing up anything he’s ever said or done that might embarrass him (like dissing the 47%, or decimating American companies like KB Toys and raising employment in China while at Bain).

And Romney pounced on and gleefully rolled in those concessions like a dog in shit.

It seems Romney thinks he’s running to be anointed king. In his first term…

• He’ll repeal the Affordable Care Act, yet keep all the good parts — and replace the rest with WHAT?
• He’ll lower taxes 20%, but eliminate loopholes and deductions (WHICH ones?) — which may result in tax INCREASES for the middle class.
• He’ll to create 12 million “good-paying” jobs — HOW? Doing WHAT?

And Congress doesn’t exist in RomneyWorld. He’ll just wave his golden scepter and POOF! — instant Utopia where nobody’s unemployed, health insurers aren’t unfair, and the budget always balances.

Unfortunately, Obama handed Romney this one on a silver platter, and I hope today he’s kicking some of his re-election “experts” to the curb before they try to hog-tie and gag Joe Biden when he faces Paul Ryan on October 11.

Michelle to Ann: Checkmate

By Adele

The Republicans’ Obama Bash was so long on lies and short on specifics except, “We’ll undo everything Obama did,” it was encouraging to see the Democrats come back swinging.

Massachusetts’ current governor, Deval Patrick, did a good job of explaining why Romney doesn’t brag about when he had that job.

But the real showdown was between Michelle Obama and Ann Romney.

Ann spoke at length about how desperate and downtrodden everybody is — especially women. Not that she would know. But she unwittingly revealed more than she intended in talking about life with Mitt…

“All at once I’m 22 years old, with a baby and a husband who’s going to business school and law school at the same time, and I can tell you, probably like every other girl who finds herself in a new life far from family and friends, with a new baby and a new husband, that it dawned on me that I had absolutely no idea what I was getting into.”

And addressing the myth of her “storybook” marriage…

“Well, in the storybooks I read, there were never long, long, rainy winter afternoons in a house with five boys screaming at once.”

Now let’s cut to Michelle, who spoke of her daughters only in loving terms, never alluded to feeling overwhelmed, isolated, or possibly even abandoned in her marriage. She clearly saw herself and Barack as partners every step of the way.

Talking about the pre-White House years…

“And the truth is, I loved the life we had built for our girls…I deeply loved the man I had built that life with…”

And about him during the White House Years…

“Well, today, after so many struggles and triumphs and moments that have tested my husband in ways I never could have imagined, I have seen firsthand that being president doesn’t change who you are — it reveals who you are.”

Ann Romney personified the meek, obedient, perpetually-pregnant stay-at-home woman Republicans would like all females to become.

Michelle Obama came across as a confident career woman whose job today is to complement her husband and serve as a role model to her daughters that there’s more to life than going forth and multiplying. (The Romneys have 18 grandchildren and counting.)

The Obamas and Romneys are both wealthy families, but  unlike the Romneys, neither of the Obamas came from money. Barack made much of his fortune from his books. And the Obamas don’t own multiple houses, a fleet of cars, and Olympic-class horses. They openly pay their fair share of taxes and don’t bank in the Caymans.

As Michelle said…

“Barack knows the American Dream because he’s lived it…and he wants everyone in this country to have that same opportunity, no matter who we are, or where we’re from, or what we look like, or who we love.

And he believes that when you’ve worked hard, and done well, and walked through that doorway of opportunity…you do not slam it shut behind you…you reach back, and you give other folks the same chances that helped you succeed.”

If Mitt Romney ever were to reach the Oval Office, you can be sure he’d slam the door shut behind him as a “Mission Accomplished” and forget all about who put him there.

Romney’s Worst Enemy: Innate Secrecy

By Cole

Virginia is considered a swing state, so Obama and Romney have been slinging serious mud in TV ads.

Obama accuses Romney of 1) outsourcing jobs, 2) lying about his tenure as CEO of Bain Capital, 3) hiding money in the Caymans, Bermuda, and Switzerland.

Romney says Obama is lying, but Romney has yet to present a single reassuring fact. Romney was raised to be secretive, and it’s worked for him so far.

Mormonism (like Scientology) is a religion steeped in mystery. Catholics, Baptists, Jews, even Buddhists will let you walk into their places of worship and observe.

Not so with Mormons. Ann Romney’s own parents were kept out of her “sealing” (wedding) to Mitt because they weren’t Mormon.

Romney refuses to confirm if he wears Mormon temple garments (underwear). But to be considered a worthy Mormon, he must.

I don’t care about Mitt’s undies, but I think they reveal this pattern:

When Romney won’t own up to something, he’s probably doing or has done it.

SEC papers state Romney ran Bain until 2002. Romney says it was 1999, although he was paid and signing official documents for Bain after that. But if Romney wasn’t CEO, who was? Nobody seems to know.

Bain apparently had idiots submit SEC filings full of personnel errors, and the company operated as a beast without a head for 3 years until Romney decided to run for governor of Massachusetts in 2002 and make a formal break with the firm.

Seriously, would Romney just walk away from the company he built and leave it to founder without leadership?

It sounds like Sarah Palin and Alaska.

When Romney ran Bain, his focus was on profit, not public office. It’s reasonable to assume he didn’t even notice those pesky worker ants he shook out of the failing companies he gobbled up. Those guys never do.

And what did Romney do with his profits? Since we know he paid less than 15% in taxes and refuses to release tax returns before 2010, it’s evident he milked every loophole and dodge to avoid paying his fair share.

I’m not saying Romney’s a criminal. All his actions may be perfectly legal, but they’re morally bankrupt. The last thing the middle class needs is a president lacking the empathy gene.

The biggest secret Romney can’t tell is that he has never given a damn about paying taxes, the deficit, or jobs. He used to care about healthcare, but changed his mind.

Romney’s running for president on ego. He’s probably already made a list of ways to cash in on the title for the rest of his life.

Obama Pounces on Cantor

By Cole

After making his big jobs speech to Congress, President Obama hot-footed it down to Richmond the next day — the heart of Congressman Eric Cantor’s district.

Cantor had said he agreed with some of Obama’s proposed tax cuts for small businesses (no doubt scheming to make them trickle UP to his beloved big-business fat cats), but Cantor objected to the “all-or-nothing” tone of the speech.

“Is he going to work with us?” Cantor plaintively asked.

Obama probably has no intention of giving Cantor any more photo ops where he gets to flounce out of negotiations mid-session like a peevish brat.

Speaking of photo ops, did you catch Cantor entering the congressional chamber right behind Obama? Cantor was all smiles, glad-handing like he was the one giving the speech. He was probably thinking, “I can Photoshop Obama out of this and pretend it’s me in 2017 at my first State of the Union!”

In Richmond, Obama continued to talk about jobs to a mostly appreciative crowd of about 8,900 at the University of Richmond. He begged the audience to make Congress “do the right thing.”

“I want you to call… email… tweet… fax… visit… Facebook, send a carrier pigeon. I want you to tell your congressperson: The time for gridlock and games is over.”

He said everything but, “Tell Eric Cantor to GROW UP.”

Cantor was also in Richmond that day, to pay a pointless visit to a ready-mix concrete plant (or maybe Cantor was ordering Obama a new pair of shoes for Christmas), a company that has lost nearly half its employees due to the recession. Cantor spoke to 35 of the survivors, and the only substantive thing the local press said he offered was a pledge to fight any proposed regulations to the building materials industry.

Yeah, right. Over the past few weeks, Cantor’s district has gone through a major earthquake, Hurricane Irene, and flooding from Tropical Storm Lee, all of which wrecked homes and businesses. So the LAST thing Virginia needs is anyone insisting on stronger, more durable structures.

That little weasel just doesn’t get it on any level.

We’re so happy Obama got right up in Cantor’s face. Now it’s up to the voters of Virginia to “do the right thing” and give Cantor a new career path — out of politics.

Trump vs. Obama

By Yul

The mouth-breathing birthers can remove their tin-foil hats now. Obama’s signed birth certificate is out there, and the family of his doctor (now deceased) has verified the doctor’s signature.

Donald Trump wasted no time taking all the credit, “proud” and “honored” that he succeeded in bringing this to light, naming the Clintons as some of those who “failed” previously.

Funny, I don’t recall Bill ever fretting over Obama’s citizenship, nor Hillary courting votes from the right-wing nut fringe.

Also funny that the “people” Trump claimed he had snooping in Hawaii also failed to unearth the paperwork, with Trump’s riches available for bribes and such.

Obama kindly alluded to the billionaire buffoon as a “carnival barker” who’s distracting the country with “silly” issues.

But Trump’s already a step ahead. Now he claims that Obama faked his way through Columbia and Harvard (graduating magna cum laude from Harvard notwithstanding) and Trump wants to see transcripts.

I say, if Donald Trump is so keen on full disclosure, let’s start with the top of his head.

How can anybody take the man’s tough talk seriously when he can’t bear to face his own reflection? Does he really think he’ll restore America’s glory when nobody can look at his “crowning glory” and keep a straight face?

It’s ironic that such a colossal windbag lives in eternal dread of sudden gusts. I guess it’s a given that, as president, he’d never champion wind energy (“I said, NO photo ops of POTUS with windmills!”)

President Trump would always be surrounded by a platoon of goons to keep photographers from getting behind him and blowing his cover. Literally.

My theory: What’s on top is actually coming up from his collar, growing from his back.

Trump’s been doing a live job interview with voters on Celebrity Apprentice, demonstrating his macho, convoluted logic in discarding good people, and how he relishes the use of fear to maintain his façade of authority.

I wouldn’t trust Trump to scoop my litterbox.

Obama’s New WTF Strategy

By Yul

If a ditz like Sarah Palin can figure out that Obama’s new slogan, “Winning the Future,” abbreviates to WTF, you just know the morning after his State of the Union speech, Obama was incredulously asking, “Didn’t anybody realize that?”

(Note to Palin: WTF is not an “acronym” because it doesn’t form a pronounceable word. But I bet you call all abbreviations acronyms, don’tcha, because you think it makes you sound smarter.)

Although I’m still proud there’s a black cat in the White House, my reaction to “winning the future” is WTF?

Think about it.

“Losing the future” means dying, so “winning the future” means not dying. But you know the politicians intend to spin it to mean anything. Circular gibberish is partly what got the U.S. into a mess in the first place. Shoveling another slogan on top isn’t going to help.

Except for WTF, Obama’s State of the Union was breathtakingly devoid of facts, specifics, and eloquence. About 18 minutes in, he said…

“We need to teach our kids that it’s not just the winner of the Super Bowl who deserves to be celebrated, but the winner of the science fair.”

…and got a standing ovation. Clearly, some barrel-bottom-scraping was going on.

That applause was particularly hurl-worthy when we all know some of the bastards who clapped will turn around and try to decimate education spending because they believe book-larnin’ ain’t gonna fix what ails this country — but letting every redneck and psycho pack an assault weapon will.

(BTW, Obama must have ad libbed that Super Bowl/science fair comment because it’s not in the official text. Too bad he didn’t ad lib the rest.)

His other gem was, “This is our Sputnik moment.”

Sputnik!? WTF indeed.

Obama even fell flat sprinkling in those little stories about the nobodies he had planted in the audience for their 15 seconds of fame.

But what he did give us was a non-pharmaceutical cure for insomnia. Tonight, if you have trouble sleeping, watch this. You’ll be sawing logs within minutes. Guaranteed.

Alaska Made the Lower 48 Look Dumb

By Yul

Alaska voters rejected Joe Miller, the never-elected neophyte hand-picked by Sarah Palin and the Tea Party. Instead, they took the trouble to write in moderate Republican Lisa Murkowski in Tuesday’s Senate election.

As you’d expect, Joe’s unable to comprehend defeat and screaming for a recount, although Lisa led 41% to his 34% when the polls closed.

Palin must have promised Joe support from the same multitude of invisible voters who seem to be propelling Bristol Palin and her beginner dance routines into the finals of Dancing with the Stars.

Alaskans should be proud they “refudiated” the governor who blew them off to pursue personal power and wealth.

But the rough estimate is that Palin’s picks won 70% of the time elsewhere. Fortunately, two of her nuttiest protégées, Christine O’Donnell in Delaware and Sharron Angle in Nevada, lost.

The Republicans have zero new ideas — and the Tea Party even fewer. They just intend to shred everything Obama has touched and turn the clock back as far as they can — ideally, to when rich white males called all the shots.

Anyone who thinks their anti-Obama vote helped to “take the country back” actually helped misogyny, homophobia, racism, and greed put down new roots.

Here’s a news flash about all those fresh-faced, naive, anti-government candidates who won…

They’re now part of the problem. Once they get a taste of lobbyist boot-licking and legislating their own raises and perks, rotsa ruck on getting them to represent the trusting saps who sent them to Washington.

Did Obama’s “Daily Show” Appearance Help?

By Yul

We’ll find out tonight when the election returns start rolling in, but it’s not looking good. Last week, Jon Stewart turned over an entire Daily Show to President Obama. We were so excited, we all stayed up late to watch, but it left me shaking my head like my ears were full of mites.

The White House wishfully declared Obama’s appearance a success the next day.

In case you missed it, here’s the full episode.

I doubt Jon Stewart expected Obama to remain firmly behind his mental podium, and probably envisioned a pithy exchange of ideas, in down-to-earth language sprinkled with humor, that would re-energize Obama’s youthful base so they’d turn out in force and help him keep his Democratic majority in Congress.

Instead, Stewart got 30 minutes of Obama reciting the laundry list of his (sometimes dubious) accomplishments over the past two years that we’re all sick of hearing.

Obama evaded Stewart’s repeated attempts to get him to lighten up, to the point of sidestepping right into some Bush-vintage doo-doo by claiming economic advisor Larry Summers is doing “a heck of a job.”

Stewart pounced the unfortunate phraseology, but you had to wonder why it was in Obama’s head in the first place. Columnist Kathleen Parker had an interesting take on tha moment.

Stewart told Obama his term so far seems “timid.” That’s exactly what I would call his Daily Show appearance. He had the audacity to show up, but once there, he entrenched himself deep in campaign mode, talking at — rather than to — voters and not saying much of anything.