The Waiting Room, The Pissing Contest, The Florida Primary

            Florida. It is known as God’s waiting room. And that is most certainly the meaning it embodies as the GOP debate and primary draws nearer every day. This is clearly the most significant vote yet, as the race has been split between the three ways thus far: Santorum took Iowa, Romney won New Hampshire and Gingrich ceased the moment in South Carolina. Elder statesman Ron Paul will be avoiding the Florida primary in hopes of securing victories out west. So what exactly will Florida mean for the three headed monster that remains?

            Florida means different things to all the candidates. If Gingrich were to win, it would strengthen his foothold in the South and probably secure him the remaining majority of the Bible belt. If Santorum were to win, it would blow the breeze of confidence and significance into his flag; his victory in Iowa still seems sketchy at best. Too close to call between him and Romney. But if Romney were to win, it would signify everything we’ve been expecting. If Romney wins in Florida, he wins the nomination. The only person standing in his way (and I can’t believe it’s come to this) is Newt Gingrich. The only place that toadstool is guaranteed votes is in the South, and if Romney can derail that train he stands stronger than ever to win the nomination handily.

            Gingrich has been surging to the naked eye, but if you look hard you will see he’s actually been digging himself a very deep hole that looks harder and harder to get out of. He’s managed to paint himself as a cool handed Christian and Washington outsider, but eventually those colors will run and the voters will call his bluff. He lied to CNN’s John King and the rest of us about “character witnesses” concerning his open marriage with his second ex-wife. He’s passed borderline racism and has developed a blatant sense of infallibility and supremacy. Even Jimmy Carter says Gingrich is racist (sort of). He blows of questions pretending to be unconcerned with petty differences and too mature to let them bother him. While this holier-than-thou attitude worked for a while, it’ll have to catch up sooner or later. You can’t hide in plain sight forever, and Gingrich will learn that the hard way.

            The world will come crumbling down around Gingrich sooner or later, but if Romney can win in Florida he’ll be delivering a fatal blow to the fatally flawed Congressional reject. If Romney can even split the South with Gingrich, then he’ll undoubtedly win the nomination. People like Gingrich and Santorum can’t win in states where the evangelical vote doesn’t matter: namely New York, California and Ohio. Texas could be a wildcard, but Romney has already put himself in good position.

            But what does it matter? Listening to all the candidates, you can’t help but feel that they don’t actually care about what they’re saying, or understand it. They go through the motions that past candidates took, but those motions are emptier and bitter tasting. No one is battling for anything intrinsically important, Obama included. The only thing these politicians care about is a victory, not for some greater vision of America but only to see the other side bleed. It’s all just become a giant pissing contest, and all of us are standing downwind. 

The Good, The Bad, and Rick Perry: The End of the Lone Ranger

            Not all cowboys get to ride off into the sunset. Some go down in blaze of glory, shot down with both guns drawn. Others just get old and die, drenched in whiskey and telling stories about the old days that no one else remembers or cares to hear again. And this is the fate of the last cowboy in the 2012 race for the White House. Texas Governor Rick Perry, the Tea Party creation and the one time Republican flavor of the week, has dropped out of the race. There was no glory, as he didn’t capture the nomination like he thought he could. And there was no grand shootout; Perry just gave up. Rather than stick to his guns and go down firing, Perry hung up his six shooters and spurs and retired to the ranch. Not the ending that any cowboy dreams of.

            Perry’s undoing was all of his own creation. He scared away supporters and donors while spending millions on a lost cause. No one would even come to listen to the once proud former front runner speak in South Carolina earlier today. His stances on taxes (or lack thereof for the wealthy) and social security did him no favors in the eyes of voters everywhere. He seemed unprepared in every step of the race, and was beaten mercilessly by the other candidates. Perry went from good to bad to ugly in a very short period of time.

            The Lone Ranger is expected to endorse Gingrich later today. He has already dismantled his anti-Gingrich website. The same people who demanded early on that he enter the presidential race were clamoring for him to drop out the past few days. As it turns out, Perry was never the gunslinger he thought he was, but rather just another gun for hire in a town full of whores, drunkards and bandits. He was forgettable. He was replaceable. And most of all, he was a failure. He set out to destroy Mitt Romney, and the best he could do was bow out and endorse Gingrich.

            So adios, Rick Perry. He goes on now to join the likes of Herman Cain, Tim Pawlenty, Michele Bachmann and Jon Huntsman. Freaks and losers of the GOP nomination race. People who never stood a chance but were dumb enough to try anyway. This is what happens to cowboys who set Mitt Romney in their crosshairs and miss. They get no redemption, no glory whatsoever. They just get run out of town like disease ridden dogs, beaten raw and forced to live on the fringes, covered in dirt and their own blood. 

Out of the Hunt

            He never really had a chance, and perhaps that’s what made Jon Huntsman so compelling. Sure, he was a dull candidate; but he became the kind of political icon we all adore. He was the free falling loser who could do whatever he wanted before he hit the ground. He called out the stupidity of the other GOP candidates and of far right ideologies by claiming that global warming was real and that he himself believed in evolution. He went on Letterman and played rock and roll piano. He became a media darling for things he stood for but could never accomplish. He was the candidate we all really liked but would never bet on. And he’s doing himself a disservice by backing Romney.

            The two are polar opposites. Romney is the archetypal presidential hopeful who walks away from questions he doesn’t like. Huntsman broke the mold this election season by admitting he doesn’t believe all the crazy things everyone else in the GOP says they believe. Romney has been eyeing the White House for years with the goal of electing more Republicans; Huntsman served as Obama’s ambassador to China. Romney only wants to win, but you get the feeling that Huntsman actually wanted to help the American people. Sure, he's greedy and very well off. But Huntsman stood for something that neither Romney nor the rest of the GOP hopefuls could ever stand for: a type of conservatism founded by actual beliefs and not merely partisan differences. I honestly believe that Huntsman was in it to do some good, and not merely see the other side lose.

            He was everything we could have wanted in a real candidate, not just a Republican candidate. And that’s why he never caught fire, except for a spark here and there. He wasn’t even the least bit polarizing. He wasn’t contentious. He wasn’t the norm. He wasn’t as interesting as Herman Cain, Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann. He didn’t have the name recognition of Newt Gingrich or Mitt Romney. He was just Huntsman, a well to do western politician who couldn’t cut it with the big dogs but hopped into the ring anyway.

            So goodbye to Jon Huntsman, the patron saint of the coulda-shoulda-wouldas of the world. A hero to the losers. A guy we’d all like to have a beer with. Not a real candidate, but a guy who could have been a halfway decent president. And that's all we can really ask for these days.

The Results Are In, And They Are Meaningless

            And so it was that a mere matter of days into the New Year, Mitt Romney stomped his foot on the presidential terra. He went toe to toe with all the others in Iowa and came out victorious. But it was not an easy victory. It was a hard fought battle, and Romney only won by eight votes. Romney may be one step closer to locking down the nomination, but if Iowa proved anything it’s that Romney isn’t commanding the support he once thought he had.

            It has been an up and down season. All the candidates have seemed to have had their fifteen minutes in the spotlight. But the one that no one took seriously up until now was former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum who surged to the front to battle with Romney like a frothy whirlwind. If nothing else, his minor defeat by less than a dozen votes gives Santorum the ability to present himself as the clear cut alternative to Romney.

            New Hampshire is next, right around the corner and Romney has that under lock and key; he’s been campaigning there for what seems like years. Rick Perry has apparently also thrown in the towel, given up and gone back to Texas to “assess his candidacy.” He finished in fifth place with 10 percent of the vote, behind Gingrich’s 13 percent and Ron Paul’s 21. Michele Bachmann, who many thought could do some serious damage in her home state, wound up with only 5 percent of the vote.

            All of it seems somehow meaningless though. To majority of the public there was never a doubt that Romney would win the nomination eventually. And for many others there has never been a doubt that Romney will lose in November. It is only been on the fringes that there has been hope for Ron Paul and Herman Cain and Michele Bachmann and Newt Gingrich. This has proven to be an utterly lost season, perhaps foreshadowing that 2012 will in fact be the year the world ends.

            It all seems more about the ritual than the results, more about the pomp than the circumstance. Not only Iowa has seemed to have lost its meaning, but the whole process seems to have become unimportant in the eyes of the voters. People all around on both sides seem indifferent or unenthusiastic about the prospects of 2012. Is this the year that role of President of the United States finally becomes unimportant? Only time will tell. So until then, buckle up, because the journey is almost over. I feel it will have a very Vonnegut style ending. We will crown the Republican nomination not with a whimper or a bang, but simply with a shrug. 

What I Learned From Newt Gingrich

            Newt Gingrich is a lot like a nearly washed up boxer. He’s not as light on his feet anymore, he’s slower to get up after being knocked down and he’s not the one to come out swinging anymore. But even though his agility has failed him and his right hook isn’t what it used to be, he’s always had a puncher’s chance because he knows the game. Gingrich is a lot like a nearly washed up boxer because he’s not done yet, and he might just make you pay if you bet against him.

            Newt has taught us a lot over the past few months. He’s taught us that it doesn’t matter how smart you are. That it doesn’t matter how many times you’ve fucked up royally in your past. That the number of wives, mistresses and affairs you’ve had really don’t matter when the chips are down. That no matter how many times the experts say you’re doomed to fail, you can still laugh and tell them to eat shit. Gingrich has taught us no one is taller than the last man standing.

            His has been a career highlighted by minuscule achievements and crushing defeats. Sure he served as United States Representative for 20 years, and he was even Speaker of the House for four of those years. But he went toe to toe with Clinton and lost almost every time. His small victories came only when he broke down and compromised. He shut down the government and suffered because of it. He had 84 ethics charges filed against him for his term as Speaker. When things got bad, Gingrich packed up camp and moved out. The smartest thing he ever did was to quit before the House could kick him out.

            And yet for all his failures, for all his colossal disappointments and monumental betrayals, here he is at the front of the GOP pack. He’s leading the polls ahead of Vegas favorite Mitt Romney and Texas embarrassment Rick Perry. He swooped in and took the support that Herman Cain once proudly boasted. He’s picked up key endorsements along the way, and stands secure enough to probably win Iowa in a short matter of weeks, barring any setback. How is this possible? It’s all thanks to that puncher’s chance. Veteran experience goes a long way, regardless of how much of an asshole you are.

            Gingrich is a lot like a virus. He’s resilient. He’s adaptive. He knows at some point he’ll have to make changes, or else he’ll face extinction. And he spreads like wildfire. He was there when all the other candidates fell, slowly picking up the pieces not at all once, but gradually so that no one would see him until it was too late. Now he’s not just the common cold of the GOP; he’s influenza, contagion in all sense of the word. Oh sure, he’ll probably get beat sooner or later. But how many innocent will fall before experts find the cure?

The Little Engine That Could: The Last Tango for Herman Cain

Herman Cain may be out for the count. The pizza mogul turned politician told senior staffers at a conference call this morning that he is reassessing his campaign and will decide whether he stays or goes in the next few days. Cain has been plagued by numerous accusations of sexual harassment, womanizing and extramarital affairs in the past few weeks. A woman named Ginger White told Fox 5 Atlanta that Cain ended their 13 year affair shortly before he began his campaign. His numbers have plummeted and his base has seemingly disappeared. How did it all unravel so fast for the little engine that could?

            His was a political rags to riches story that even Horatio Alger would marvel at. A man with no real political background who shot to the forefront of the GOP race seemingly from nowhere. He portrayed a more common man than Romney and a more daring man than Perry. Republican voters could identify with him because, while he wasn’t exactly like them, he wasn’t a politician either. He was some kind of strange middle ground, but it’s obvious now that his luck is just about run out.

            It all started just as soon as it began. At least four women – two who chose to remain anonymous – have come forward with claims of sexual harassment from the candidate. Ginger White is the only person to claim a long lasting affair with Cain. Throughout October he was leading the Republican polls, but towards the end of the month the allegations began to come forward. One he could hide from, two he could settle. But when the third and fourth came, Cain started to sweat around the collar. Ginger White was the proverbial nail in the coffin.

            The really disturbing part about all this is that the support that Cain once had now belongs to the next Republican flavor of the week: Newt Gingrich. The thrice married adulterer Gingrich, a would-be career politician if he hadn’t been voted out so long ago, stands to profit from the sexual misconduct of Herman Cain. If that’s not irony, I don’t know what is.

            Regardless, the Cain Train has run its course right off the tracks. He seldom really knew what he was talking about (see his thoughts on Libya), he worked his hardest at eradicating the middle class and he believed with all his might that he could get away with anything. And while it’s not official yet, Cain is sure to throw in the towel and call it a day.  The little engine that could found out the hard way what happens to people who think they’re invincible: they get crushed and tossed aside like an empty beer can you see lying in a gutter. 

A Debt Deal That Never Was: How No One Cares About Congress Failing Anymore

A deal was in place. Two sides that have been biting and clawing at each other’s necks seemingly since 2008 were acting bipartisan and agreeing. The finish line was in sight. Then, for no particular reason at all, the deal came crashing down and everybody involved just shrugged their shoulders and went back home.

            It was another deficit deal that should have happened but just didn’t. Members of the special Congressional committee on deficit reduction – including at least one Republican siding with the Democrats – had all tentatively agreed on a plan that would cut trillions of dollars from the national debt by means of tax rates (including raising taxes), revenues, spending cuts and changes to Social Security and Medicare. This supercommittee fell short just before the deadline, and decided to throw in the towels and blame somebody else.

            Worst of all, the two sides couldn’t even agree on where the talks went wrong. Democrats say the Republicans backed away from their initial willingness to accept revenue increases in exchange in cuts in the growth of entitlement projects. Republicans, who seemed to be in agreement with the framework of the deal less than a week ago, point their fingers at the Democrats for being wishy washy and never really committed to a plan.

            Maybe we shouldn’t blame Congress for failing to a reach a yet another debt deal. Maybe we need to blame ourselves. For being overly optimistic that anyone in this Congress could agree on anything and for giving them yet another chance. Because time and again every elected official has proven to us that the last thing they deserve is one more chance, but somehow they keep getting it.

            A key aspect of the breakdown was the Jason Voorhees-esque Bush Tax Cuts. They’ve been slated to die for years now, but somehow keep coming back for sequels. They’re slated to expire in 2012, but some 11^th hour deal will most certainly come through for the salvation of the legacy of George W. Bush.

            Democratic Senator Joe Macnhin said of the deal “We cannot accept failure.” But somehow that’s all we’ve been asked to accept for quite some time. I think by now we’re used to the flavor of defeat. Of the negotiation breakdown, John Kerry said “If this weren’t so serious I might laugh.” Honestly, Kerry I’d go ahead and laugh if I were you. By now it couldn’t really hurt. We’ve reached a critical moment in our history, and we stand at a fragile crossroad. Never before have elected officials done more harm to their own country, and never before have the voters cared less.

            It’s tough to place the blame here, but it’s no longer a simple Democrat-Republican divide. Now it’s between the powerful and the powerless. It’s an us against them situation, and it doesn’t look good for us. Because we’ve given away any power we had by being indifferent. We’re headed for a crash, and we really only have ourselves to blame.