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Thingish Things

Campaign Ad, Cain

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 26•11

http://youtu.be/S6VnTqpTqvQ

Most of you have probably already seen this.  But I had to post it anyway. It’s Herman Cain’s first real TV spot, and it’s…bizarre. 

I can’t decide if I love it or hate it. If I decide to love it, it won’t because of the ad itself, but for the testes Cain shows in airing something so out of the ordinary. I mean, in some dark editing room, Cain and his handlers actually said, “It’s a wrap; let’s go with it.”  I find that kind of exhilarating.  Cain’s wink of a smile at the end is classic, too.

As a political ad I think the spot may be useless, but as a branding tool it probably has some value. But what is Cain branding himself for? Whatever it is, he has my attention. 

I think I may love it.  But I wouldn’t have authorized it. 

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Dumb-Ass Republicans

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 26•11

from the-coveted.com

Of all the Republicans I know — and I know a lot of them — only about, say, one percent of them are among the top one percent of income earners in this country. So why are the other 99% of Republicans Republicans?

It’s an essential question that doesn’t get asked enough. If the top one percent of earners are so pernicious, and if Republican policies are designed to enrich them, why would anyone other than they be members of the Grand Old Party? And why would the 99% of Republicans fight against “millionaire and billionaire” tax hikes they would never have to pay themselves? Are the 99% stupid? Masochistic? Daft pawns in a larger chess game, as some of the Left suggest?

A New York Times/CBS poll reports today that 70% of Americans believe Republican policies favor the rich. I don’t doubt that statistic for a minute. Yet Republicans have been making electoral gains in the most heavily Democratic areas of the nation. Huh? What’s that about?

And, here’s the doozy: If the richest of the rich in America disproportionately enroll as Democrats — and they do — why on earth would struggling, partisan Republicans fight in the trenches to help them?

There must be something more to this.  It’s what the Republicans candidates for president should be talking about.

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Perry Lays ’em on the Table

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 25•11

Don’t count out Rick Perry just yet.

The Lone Star State governor laid his tax reform cards on the table today, and it’s a humdinger:  A simple-to-understand 20% flat tax that Perry and his economic advisors say will spur massive job growth in the country. I have had the pleasure of working with one of those economic advisors, the brilliant and affable economist David Malpass, and I don’t doubt he’s right.

Mr. Perry’s new plan puts him back into the spotlight. It is his chance to shine again, and whether he can build momentum around this plan will be crucially important to his chances in the early primary states.  There is a distinct anybody-but-Romney constituency out there, but who will it choose, Perry or Cain?

Based on this plan, and the quality of the advisors Mr. Perry has chosen, it very well could be the former. I particularly like Governor Perry’s retort today on criticism that the pan would benefit “the rich.”  “I don’t care,” Perry said, explaining that wealthy Americans and businesses are the ones that create jobs. A true grit answer. 

As they say in Texas, giddyup.

 

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Rhode Island, Canary in a Coal Mine

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 25•11

Bankrupt Central Falls, RI

No one understands the state-by-state pension time bomb in America better than Mary Williams Walsh of The New York Times. For several years now, Ms. Walsh has been studying and chronicling the crisis.  Her latest piece, in case you missed it, is on the pension underfunding disaster now descending on Rhode Island. It should terrify all members of the public, but particularly those in public employee unions.

The bottom line, as these pages have written before, is that states and municipalities have promised — in ink — more to public employee retirees than they can afford, and their future revenue estimates have been grossly inflated to make things add up on paper.  Now, the math is unraveling.

That means two things:  Entire networks of social programs will have to be defunded to meet growing pension costs, and, ultimately, as we are beginning to see in California, Rhode Island, and other states, municipalities will go bankrupt to shed their promised pension obligations, badly hurting fixed-income unionized retirees and destroying the ability of municipalties to borrow in emergencies. 

The charade continues, though.  Unions continue to call for more, and state pension funds continue using fuzzy math to make all seem right.  And day after day, the dark and lurking crisis grows worse. It’s madness. 

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Green Eye-Shaded Anarchists

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 23•11

Funniest story of the day by the wonderful Ginger Otis at The New York Post. It details squabbling among protesters over — wait for it — the $500,000 in wealth they have accumulated.

With quotes like these from “occupiers” it’s hard not to laugh:

“The other day, I took in $2,000. I kept $650 for my group, and gave the rest to Finance. Then I went to them with a request — so many people need things, and they should not be going without basic comfort items — and I was told to fill out paperwork. Paperwork! Are they the government now?” 

And with explanations like these from members of said “Finance” committee:

“We don’t have the power for that. They have to go to the General Assembly. If it’s approved, we pay out that amount and make sure everything is accounted for,” he said.

Within the next few days, the Financial Committee will release a detailed report, he said.

Yesterday, a huge flat-screen TV went up in Zuccotti Park for a movie night and pajama party with popcorn.

This is beginning to sound more Lord of the Flies than Hegelian utopia. 

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Occupancy Wanted

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 23•11

Is it possible to rent a Wall Street Occupier?  I’d be willing to pay, say, $49 per hour — a dollar less than I just got socked to park on West 76th Street — for an angry protester with a drum and a tent. 

If the Occupiers really want to after bald greed, I can put them on it: Beacon Parking, West 76th Street between Broadway and whatever that avenue to the east of it is. It’s the lot with the “$6.76 Hour Parking Special”sign, across from the other $50 lot with the same sign.

New York City is such a rip-off.

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The Scarce Candidate

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 23•11

George Washington Busy at Work

I’ve often wondered what would happen if a popular presidential candidate stopped showing up at events around the country, instead relying 100% on surrogates to extol his advantages.  “John Smith is qualified, busy — and he’s not a blow-hard.” That would be the essential message.

That’s the way campaigns were waged in the old days, when self-promotion was considered base. I’ve wondered if that can be revived. Could it add supreme gravitas to a candidacy, mystique even? I thought about that a lot during John McCain’s ill-fated presidential campaign, where the demands of constant travel showed his age more than anything else. While Barack Obama did card tricks with a tele-prompter, what if McCain had stayed in Washington or Arizona for the entire campaign and worked? (He did that for a week to his detriment; but it was done poorly.) 

The idea is probably preposterous: Candidates need to show up places to drive local news coverage, and funders want to see candidates in person at fundraisers.  But still, I love the idea — for the right candidate. (Mitch Daniels might be able to pull it off, for example.) 

I don’t think that candidate is Herman Cain.  He’s too unknown; he needs to beat the hustings as much as he can.  But I thought about the concept this morning again while reading this Salon story about Cain leading in Iowa polls, but not showing up in the state.  It is a paradox that has a lot of people scratching their heads.   

There is something to be said about the unseen celebrity. He grows stronger and taller with every non-appearance.  

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The [Steve] Jobs Plan President Obama Ignored

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 21•11

Fascinating read in the Huffington Post this morning on a meeting between the late Apple chairman Steve Jobs and President Obama. Mr. Jobs, who was a vocal Obama supporter in 2008, reportedly told Mr. Obama that he would be a one-term president, in part because of his anti-business policies.  Jobs also harshly criticized America’s teachers unions. 

Writes HuffPost: 

“You’re headed for a one-term presidency,” [Mr. Jobs] told Obama at the start of their meeting, insisting that the administration needed to be more business-friendly. As an example, Jobs described the ease with which companies can build factories in China compared to the United States, where “regulations and unnecessary costs” make it difficult for them.

Jobs also criticized America’s education system, saying it was “crippled by union work rules,” noted Isaacson. “Until the teachers’ unions were broken, there was almost no hope for education reform.” Jobs proposed allowing principals to hire and fire teachers based on merit, that schools stay open until 6 p.m. and that they be open 11 months a year.

Jobs is a giant among hip, left-leaning Americans for his chic  irreverence and independent spirit. But he was also one of the most successful corporate executives in U.S. history, in part because he knew how to bottle that irreverence. One wonders if some of his final thoughts will be adopted or discounted by contemporary historians. One has to sadly assume it will be the latter. 

 

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Go, Hillary!

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 20•11

President Obama and NATO will receive due credit for the long-overdue dispatching of crazy, Libyan strong-man Mohammar Gadhafi.  But the real credit, objectively, belongs to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

It was Mrs. Clinton who went out on the line — way out on the line — to convince the President that airstrikes in support of the Libyan rebels were worth the risk. She ruffled a lot of feathers doing it, and today she is vindicated. (Let’s just pray Libya doesn’t get worse post-Mohammar.) Had the U. S. not intervened when it did — which was almost too late in the game — the rebels would be hanging from lampposts in Tripoli today, no question about it.

Crazy Colonel Gadhafi has been a thorn in the side of the U.S. for so long  that it’s almost hard to think of the world without him.  But what is even stranger to think — in sort of a deliciously funny way — is who ended up being responsible for Gadhafi ‘s demise.

Can you imagine someone telling you 20 years ago that it would be Hillary Clinton? Bespeckled, Wellesley-educated, Watergate Committee staffer Hillary Rodham Clinton? Can you imagine telling Muhammar Gaddhaffi that back then? He probably would have found it so unbelievably funny that he would have spared your life. Almost as unbelievably funny as someone telling me 10 years ago that I would one day write the following two words, and mean them to the depth of my soul: Go, Hillary!

What a strange, strange world we live in. 

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Stark Raving Joe

Written By: William F. B. O'Reilly - Oct• 19•11

Persistent rumors have abounded — and have been shot down with equal persistence — that Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton might swap positions for the 2012 elections. The argument is that Biden adds nothing to the 2012 ticket — and that he yearns to be Secretary of State — while Mrs. Clinton singularly could save President Obama from electoral defeat. 

Reading interviews like this one shows why such a move is an utter impossibility. What President in his right mind would unleash bizarre Bidenisms across the globe?  They are bad enough here in the U.S. 

In his latest tirade, Biden suggests that sexual assaults will occur across the country en masse if President Obama’s latest “stimulus” package isn’t adopted.  And then, in speaking about opponents of that borrowing binge of a plan, Biden crosses further into the surreal-speak for which he has become infamous: “I wish they [Republicans and other opponents of the borrowing scheme] had some notion of what it was like to be on the other side of a gun, or [to have] a 200-pound man standing over you, telling you to submit.” 

A 200-pound man standing over you, telling you to submit? Say what? Did our Vice President really just blurt that out while talking about a “stimulus” plan? 

God bless Joe Biden, but he’s got some serious issues.  Better off keeping him as VP where he can do no real harm. 

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