Tag: clinton

Review: O: A Presidential Novel

O: A Presidential NovelO: A Presidential Novel by Anonymous
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

What a mess. “O” fails to live up to the standard (which really wasn’t that high) set by its obvious inspiration “Primary Colors” as a wink-wink fictional account of the 2012 election campaign between Obama and Romney. Even though it’s non-fiction, “Double Down” by Mark Halperin creates a more exciting narrative of the race, and that’s without the freedom to create any series of events one desires, since fiction doesn’t have to correspond to real events.

The story itself is a wandering mess. Point-of-view changes occur back and forth mid-chapter in an odd fashion. Despite being billed a book about “what O(bama) is really thinking,” he’s surprisingly absent for most of the book. Instead, we spend a lot of time looking over the shoulder of campaign manager Cal Regan and spend a lot of time going back and forth over the same issues of campaigning. Over and over.

Though it owes its existence to Primary Colors, O suffers in every comparison. Perhaps it’s because the Clintons, love ’em or hate ’em, are larger-than-life characters even in real life, with drama and scandal and intrigue. Contrast Bill Clinton with “No Drama Obama” and you see why the best the author can do is come up with a tepid “donor tries to share dirt about campaign rival” storyline that isn’t interesting, isn’t intense, and never actually turns into anything. Considering how little the story actually seems to follow the 2012 campaign, it’s a wonder why the author didn’t invent something more dramatic. The Republican opponent, Tom Morrison, seems to be a fusion between McCain (war hero) and Romney (businessman), so . . . maybe we’re just reading some guy’s political fan fiction about the hypothetical candidate he wishes could have existed to run against Obama?

Instead, we get side references to the fact that Obama likes to smoke, wishes he could play more rounds of gold, and swears sometimes. Riveting stuff.

If you want a more exciting political fiction novel that is based (loosely) on real people, read Primary Colors; it holds up better, and this is from someone who wasn’t overly impressed with that book, either. If you want a narrative that actually managed to be interesting, and has the added benefit of being true, look at Mark Halperin’s works, “Game Changer” and “Double Down,” about the 2008 and 2012 campaigns respectively. They’re good stories, and both have the added benefit of being based on actual events.

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I Did Not See That Coming (Political Edition)

I’ve been pretty quiet on the subject of politics this year, having burned myself out on the subject back in 2013. It was my prolific year on this blog, but also the most frustrating, in part because I ended up politi-blogging so much that I ended up seeking out content that infuriated me just so I’d have something to write about. That ain’t no way to go through life, son. I also wanted this blog to really focus on fiction more, hence the shift in content.

That said, I’m in a rare mood today and I’d really like to go on the record for just how badly one of my predictions turned out, so here are my thoughts on this bit of news: candidate Scott Walker is going to drop out of the race for the Republican presidential nomination.

I didn’t write a post about this (see the previous paragraph about political blogging), but I had opinions and predictions. And when the Republican primary process kicked into gear earlier this year, I predicted Walker would be the eventual nominee.

If we could rewind to a few months ago (circa April 2015), here’s what a slightly younger version of Matt would say:

On the subject of the Republican candidates: It’s going to be Walker vs. Clinton in 2016. He’s an obvious choice: he’s from a Democratic stronghold state (Wisconsin has voted blue in every presidential election since 1984) and his big claim to fame is union-busting, which is abhorrent to me, but it’s the kind of thing that can win broad appeal without alienating too many demographics, especially since blue-collar Republicans vote against their own interests so often. He’s not doing great in the polls right now, but let’s look at his competition and you’ll see why I think he’s going to be the guy (not to mention polls this early are basically worthless anyway; just ask President Cain or President Gingrich).

Walker doesn’t have a last name with a ton of baggage like Bush.

He’s not too religious, which gives him more moderate appeal than Jindal or other religious conservatives, but still seems religious enough to win over the base.

Huckabee might be in the lead right now, but that’ll never last. Ditto Santorum.

Christie is damaged goods after the bridge thing.

Paul and Cruz might be serious contenders, but I think they’ve been on the stage too long and people are tired of them.

Of them all, I’d say Rubio could be the strongest candidate for a general election, but I don’t think the current Republican party can handle someone with his background (i.e. non-whiteness) and relative youth, even though he’d be a great candidate to field against the Democrats, especially if he can peel away Latino voters.

Trump is just this cycle’s Herman Cain. Or this cycle’s Trump. Take your pick.

In short: I predict it’ll be Walker vs. Clinton 2016, in which case “go Hillary!”

Yeah.

Obviously, I was wrong; thoroughly, utterly, completely wrong. Walker is the second drop out after Rick Perry resigned a few weeks ago. He was the guy I’d have bet money on. Keep in mind that he’s not the guy I’d have voted for; I’m not a Republican and even if I was, I’m far too pro-union to like the guy. But he seemed like a solid pick at the time, certainly a more sane choice than Trump (who wasn’t even running at that point and was just doing his Trump thing of talking a lot).

Of course, I’d also predicted that Hillary would basically run unopposed, with Bernie Sanders providing a token opposition in an effort to push her platform in a more left-leaning direction. And maaaybe there would be a Biden run, because why not? And now there are a few polls showing the Bern in the lead? Craziness! At this point, I’ve already been so wrong that I’m just going to throw out all my previous predictions and start making new ones.

So, here goes: you saw it here first, I’m calling it for President Bernie Sanders in 2016. Woo, feel the Bern!

But you might not want to take my word on it; after all, my track record for predictions so far has been pretty terrible.

The Irony Singularity

You’re familiar with the singularity, right? Basically, a point of mass so compact and so massive that it creates a black hole from which not even light can escape. There are other uses for the word singularity, such as the potential technological singularity, but I think the gravitational singularity is perhaps the most well known.

I would like to propose the creation of a new type of singularity: the irony singularity. They are caused when a statement is so ironic that nothing else could ever achieve a greater level of irony; we might say that this statement is infinitely ironic.

Now, research on the existence of irony singularities is still very much in its early stages, seeing as how I only postulated their existence a few minutes ago. Nevertheless, I believe we have a viable candidate that may prove the existence of irony singularities. Further research needs to be done, but take a look at this:

 GOP strategists are trying very hard to remind potential voters in the 2016 presidential election that Hillary Clinton (who hasn’t even decided whether to run yet) will be old when she hypothetically assumes office. Like, really old.

The article goes on to note that Ronald Reagan was a year older when he assumed office than Hillary would be in 2016, John McCain was three years older (although this was something we did criticize him about, to be fair), and Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole was four years older when he ran. So, you know; just throwing that out there for your consideration.

So, let’s parse this out: the Republican party, which is the party of old white men,  is trying to point out that a candidate is too old. The Republican party, the conservative party, wants you to know that “voting for Hillary Clinton would be like going back in time,” even though the very definition of conservatism is the promotion of traditional ideas in opposition to progressivism.

If the irony were any more massive, it would already have its own gravitational field. Maybe it does. Further research is required.

I can’t think of a better example that shows how off-kilter conservatism is in this country when they feel it’s politically sound to paint their opponent (notably an opponent who hasn’t even announced an intention to run) as having the same problems and weakness that they themselves have. “Don’t vote for her,” they are saying, “she’s old, just like us and we all know you hate us. So . . . vote for us instead?”

Okay. It all makes perfect sense to me now.
Source: Elf Only Inn

 

Of all the strategies to use to try and turn voters away from a potential candidate, why go with this one? Did you think we wouldn’t notice the median age of your own candidates? Seriously?

The frustrating part is, if you’ll allow me to be serious for a moment, I think it’s really unfortunate that conservatism has run into a reef and is sinking quickly. A revitalized Republican party that catered to a larger demographic than Tea Partiers, old white men, and the religious right might actually have a few good ideas. As it stands right now, though, whatever good ideas their members do have are lost in a sea of noise and reactionary bullshit. I’d like it if that changed, but I don’t think it will. At least, I don’t think it will in time for 2016.