(Not so much…)
As I write this piece, Herman Cain is having the worst fucking date night of his life. I must say that I empathize with the man: not his philandering mind you, or even his complete lack of understanding of the world writ large, but rather the anticipation of doom he must have been feeling, riding down I-85 toward his home of Atlanta, Georgia, thinking of his wife, his alleged 13-year mistress Ginger White, the umpteen other women who have made sexual harassment claims, and most-importantly to him, his terminal campaign. I am reminded of Spring of 1996. I was sixteen, and I had just been arrested for Vandalism and “Driving with Measurable Alcohol.” The latter of the charges is not a DUI (My blood-alcohol was under the legal limit); however, in West Virginia, if you are under twenty-one, it is illegal to drive with any measurable amount of alcohol in your system. That clarification having been made, let me get to the worst part of the whole ordeal, and it wasn’t my crying mother picking me up from the police station at four in the morning. It was the fact that my father was in California on business and wouldn’t be back for three days. Now, I don’t know about other families, but mine is from the Old School, which, translated, means I wasn’t above a good old fashioned ass-whipping. That having been said, the anticipation of the Old Man’s adjudication for 72 hours was far worse than the actual sentence would ever be. I have a feeling that’s where Herman Cain was at some point earlier today, flowers in hand, his entourage rapidly approaching his crusty destiny. But, alas, I do not weep for Herman Cain. The candidate for whom I weep is Willard Mitt Romney. ”Why do I weep for Governor Romney?” You might ask. Because, in my world, there is nothing more devastatingly depressing than a man at his most pathetic, especially when the man in question is entirely ignorant of it.
The Politcos will read this and scoff. ”Clearly, Romney is best suited to take on Obama,” They’ll proclaim. Indeed, every cable news pundit falls comfortably back on the Romney-mattress, in spite of the fact that he has never gotten above 30% average in National Primary Polls with the current, fully-declared field. Granted, Romney is clearly the choice of the Republican establishment, given his solidly consistent fundraising and the mainstream media’s continued assumption of his inevitable nomination. Also, Chris Christie, Governor of New Jersey and establishment darling, throwing his weight behind Romney along with Tim Pawlenty chairing his National Election Campaign illustrates just how much the GOP brass has invested in making sure that ol’ Willard gives that fateful acceptance speech in the humid, hellish clown-show coming to Tampa, Florida in late August. But, much to the establishment’s chagrin, as was illustrated in last year’s Senate Races in Nevada with Sharon Angle, in Delaware with Christine O’Donnell, and in Connecticut with Linda McMahon, the nuts are running the nut-house, and they will burn the house down before they compromise.
Republicans are a particularly fed-up and idealistic lot as of late. If the pundits would get out of New York City and the D.C. Beltway, they would make this observation. Your average southern or mid-western Republican not only disapproves of President Obama, they think he is either a fool with wretched policies or, more diabolically, an instrument of a well-organized Communist plot to destroy America from within. These folks held their nose and voted the “lesser evil” that was McCain in 2008, many of whom wouldn’t have been able to stand the stench if it wasn’t for the addition of Sara “Social Conservative Red-Meat” Palin. Say what you will about the former half governor from Alaska, but her supporters (and many detractors, including myself) largely think her to be sincere and steadfast, qualities Senator McCain lost along with his libido years ago. Now, Republicans are faced with Romney or “McCain 2.0 Without the War Hero Thing.” He’s a Republican Mike Dukakis, or, more poignantly, a one-way ticket to Loserville, USA.
I’m from the South, and I talk politics with friends and family who are registered Republicans, and let me be blunt: they will vote their hearts and lose before they vote for a compromised, inept candidate. This is not to say that they won’t vote for Romney if it was their only choice against Obama. This is to say that they will not cast their primary vote for a mendacious, shape-shifting, trust-fund child from Massachusetts who feels and acts like he’s entitled to the nomination.
Listed below are five reasons Mitt Romney doesn’t stand a chance at winning the nomination:
1. HE’S A MORMON.
(Magical Mormon Underwear)
SIMPLY PUT: A Mormon cannot win the Fly-Over states, especially in a Republican primary. Southern and Midwestern evangelicals, whether right or wrong, view it as a cult, will always view it as a cult, and will NEVER vote for a Mormon when there’s another warm body on the ballot that regards Jesus Christ as his or her personal Lord and Savior. Mark it down: it won’t happen. This is the dirty little secret that I’m surprised isn’t better polled, though Pew recently did some work on this: 54% of Republican-Leaners believe Mormons are Christian while only 35% of White Evangelicals agree. More damning, 53% of White Evangelicals believe Mormons ARE NOT Christian. And the cherry on top: half of Americans are ignorant about Mormonism. Politics is a dirty business, so don’t be surprised if some third party literature about Magical Mormon Underwear, polygamy, and getting your own planet after death starts to appear in Iowa mailboxes sooner rather than later.
The suds-factor is a major plus in GOP primaries and in American politics in general. Asides from the fact that drinking alcohol is strictly against his religion, people don’t like Mitt Romney, so why would they want to have a beer with him. Despite Obama’s historically low approval ratings, 59% of voters still like the guy. This is a huge advantage, and, arguably, one of the major reasons George W. Bush was able to defeat Al Gore (Supreme Court ruling aside) and later John Kerry. People often said, “He seems like the kind of guy I’d like to have a beer with.” Granted, people that would want to have a beer with a recovering alcoholic are either mean-spirited, enabling motherfuckers, or perhaps both, but this misses the point. To this day, in spite of his eight-year reign of terror, I still regard George W Bush as an amicable human. Mitt Romney: not so human, not so likeable. With Romney currently at 20.4% in the primary polls, a recent PPP poll shows that Newt Gingrich, an egomaniac that’s had two affairs and served his wife divorce papers while in the hospital for cancer treatment, is more lovable than the humanoid from Massachusetts by 74 points. Who let the dogs out?…
Even though she’s since recanted, I agreed with her when I saw her CPAC speech this year.
For someone who has been the “presumptive nominee” since he declared, Mitt Romney has avoided the Sunday shows and media in general like the plague. Then, this week, he reared his perfectly-combed, dubious head to go on the hard-hitting Fox News Channel’s Special Report with Brett Baier. Baier lobbed him reasonable softballs, and Romney appeared pompous, squirrelly, and generally hard to watch in the most Nixonian of fashions. The video speaks for itself:
“Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice… Not gonna get fooled again,” spoke George W. Bush. Okay, not one of the most intellectual lines ever spoken, but it rings true in the GOP primary this year. As previously stated, the Republican base would rather vote their hearts than their minds in 2012, even if it means losing. They will not make the McCain mistake again. The Right craves a bulldog, someone who will tear Obama to shreds, devour him, regurgitate the carcass, then gobble up the vomit, and look good doing it. That man is Newt Gingrich. Regardless of your politics, the man has proven to be the best debater in the field and would be the most formidable, articulate candidate to challenge Obama. In spite of his serial infidelity, the $1.6 million in fees he received from Freddie Mac as a “Historian,” his sacrilegious climate-change commercial with Nancy Pelosi, and his ardent support for Ethanol subsidies, at least he speaks well. I know this is a comment usually bestowed upon retarded children, but he looks good on TV too. Oh, and he’s found Jesus, so all that fucked-up shit he’s done in the past: forgiven. This is why, right now, the former Governor of Massachusetts is soiling his magical underwear and why Newt Gingrich is humming “Hail to the Chief” while shaving, thinking about that inexplicable shit-show that will take over Tampa, Florida for a few days in late August. God help Florida…