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The US Presidential Election: A Race Between The Two Most Unqualified Public Servants In A Century?
While the extreme polarization of our political parties has been discussed often, the upcoming Presidential election is perhaps more notable in another way. Given Obama’s experience as a Senator and Romney’s single term as Massachusetts governor, the 2012 election is as light on 'high-level public sector experience' as we have seen in many decades. The implications are subject to debate, but as JPMorgan's Michael Cembalest points out: there’s no question that it’s an anomaly; or at a minimum, a throwback to the elections of the 19th century, when this kind of thing was more common. At a time when confidence in all institutions (non-financial business, banks, Congress, the Fed, etc) are close to multi-decade lows, this is not a surprise. Why should experience count for anything? Throw the bums out and hand the reins over to outsiders! Still, Michael (like us) finds this chart disconcerting, even though it’s hard to explain why. Do politicians who have not wielded substantial power underestimate the consequences of being wrong? It’s easy to be dead sure about something if you haven’t created a public policy train wreck of your own.
The upcoming election offers voters the least amount of prior “high level public service experience” (as defined in the chart above) in many decades. We started our analysis in 1912 (right before the 1913 adoption of the 17th Amendment providing for direct election of Senators), and added the combined prior experience of both candidates. Given Obama’s experience as a Senator and Romney’s single term as Massachusetts governor, the 2012 election is as light on this front as the 1952 election between Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson. However, the 1952 candidates had a lot more public sector heft than our chart shows. Our methodology excludes Eisenhower’s military background as a senior staff officer for Generals Fox Connor, Moseley and MacArthur in the 1920s and 1930s, and Stevenson’s experience in the State and Navy departments during WW II, and as a member of the US delegation to the UN during its formative years.
So, to find an election this light on public sector experience, you have to go back to the 1924 election between Coolidge and John W Davis, the latter a compromise candidate who had spent 5 years as US Solicitor General. Both Coolidge and Davis had only spent a couple of years as either Governor or in Congress before running. That’s one strange context of the 2012 election: a couple of “one-termers”, with neither having much prior experience at the highest levels of public service (12 years combined, by our count).
The implications are subject to debate, but there’s no question that it’s an anomaly; or at a minimum, a throwback to the elections of the 19th century, when this kind of thing was more common.
Source: JPMorgan
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A joke and a bigger joke....
Bush V. Gore takes the ticket
Giant Douche or Turd Sandwich?
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!
OT: A case for legal gun ownership.
http://lasvegas.cbslocal.com/2012/06/25/14-year-old-phoenix-boy-shoots-a...
Not much of a horserace, is it, between the appetite for blood and fidelity to political conviction.
WTF tyler!
do something besides cembalest's "how i spent my vacation" crap willya?
The 2012 election can be summed up with two words----- GAME OVER
Who can save the world? Mittens can!
more thinking like that & we could close green, C_E!
i think the soupream quart would prefer mittens
he is obviously the most unitard executive imaginable
I Don't think it will matter, but I would guess that Odronema will win the election. Accelerate the spending.
Yeah... the last thing we need in the White House is a turn around specialist.
And if the author wants someone with vast government experience... I question his wisdom.
Both are well versed in blowing banksters. No other qualifications are needed.
True... but at least Mitt will also squeeze their balls until they begin putting money back on the street allowing our economy to recover. He'll also make those standing around with their hand out, pick up a shovel and do some work, or go hungry.
Obama will just blow and blow and blow.... then bend over and grab his ankles for fun. He'll let the leaches continue leaching... and let the bankers take only the cream.
True... but at least Mitt will also squeeze their balls until they begin putting money back on the street allowing our economy to recover. He'll also make those standing around with their hand out, pick up a shovel and do some work, or go hungry.
Obama will just blow and blow and blow.... then bend over and grab his ankles for fun. He'll let the leaches continue leaching... and let the bankers take only the cream.
Vast government experience gave us Joe Biden. Gerald Ford had significant experience in government. Ditto Barney Frank, and I doubt anyone would want him in the Pink House.
We need someone with common sense, not merely experience. At least the president should have enough sense to realize that the government is a hindrance to economic progress and to get out of the way. We do, however, need a president who can deal with international affairs (Clinton's types of affairs don't count) and serve the interests of Americans. Obama can't or won't. Romney is an unknown, but would be hard pressed to be worse than Obama. Even Carter was better.
Well Obama saved the gays and Mittens saved the Olympics (from what nobody knows). It's a start. Next they will save AOL and or JC Penny.
Isn't Ron Paul still in the race?
The problem with Ron Paul is that you have to deprogram the sheeple to vote for him and they don't like that.
"The Two Most Unqualified Public Servants In A Century"
The 2 most unqualified "candidates".....please!
We HAVE no "public servants", just self serving crooks.
For decades we have been electing leaders from a pool, pre-screened by TPTB. They are presented to us in a popularity contest that is vastly more absurd (and powerless) than high school student body officer elections. The only thing that makes them less qualified this time are the incredible times we are living in. Neither Obama or Romney will be effective in terms of reform. You are being given a choice of the president with whom you would like to enter WWIII. It is war and/or revolution*
* All rules of how best to gain and store wealth will change.
Jesse Venture was summoned to D.C. and "interviewed" by the CIA, National Security Agency, etc... after winning the MN governorship. He said they just couldn't believe that an independent could be elected to such a high office. He described the panel of people questioning him as being freaked out by his winning.
Really?
This is what we are reduced to?
More Americans get their news form some asshole communist on H.B.lOW,
Bill Maher,
and have no idea just how far the republic has moved closer to the end of the "Overton Window" the progressives have worked on since Woodrow Wilson!
Let us not fail because we chose to sit down!
This is the single,
most important election of our lives and the fact that there is this level of "Dis - Information" / useless lame street media garbage out there,
makes it all the more vital we all WAKE THE FUCK UP!
You only need look, listen, and learn from the words of Obama himself!
This is the product of being raised in the progressive / communist community,
that Hillary so famously coined,"It takes a community to raise a child",
yeah, and this president is the result!
There is no "Social Justice" in the America of our founders!
It is "Equal Justice", not some law of man!
There is no "Collective Salvation",
No sir!
It is all about the individual,
as in,
"Individual Salvation", a choice, not to be made by anyone else but by the "Individual",
SIR!
There is the law of the republic,
the constitution!
This country is based on the "Laws of God",
not the whims of some megalomaniac who touts the "Laws of Man" and so arrogantly dares,
"Fundamentally transform the United States of America?"
We will not comply!
Get registered to vote!
THINK!
THINK!
And THINK SOME MORE!
Then vote with the future of the republic in the scales!
May the good lord watch over this fragile little experiment in freedom / self rule we call America!
Jerry
I'm hoping to vote Quayle 2012...comeon Danny boy!
No, no, no.
What we need is a President with a profound knowledge of rolling bearings. But, I won't run, you will have to draft me. And raise the pay, what you think I would work THAT HARD for a lousy $400k per year? Forget about it!
Just put me in the White House and let me roll! I promise real Black Swans! |;.!
The job does come with perks. For example, you are allowed to kill anyone, anywhere in the world at any time. You get your own helicopter, and two decoy helicopters. Your own plane with custom communications equipment. You get one guy to follow you around with a nuclear football.
And a bunch of other guys to pre-screen your whores when the wifey doesn't accompany you on political jaunts, a la Columbia.
Fletch can be your running mate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hm30l8sqlQw
Nice of you to volunteer. Personally, I'd like to be dictator, but only for a week or two. I'd want to be there to initiate extreme rendition on all the idiots who got us into this mess in the first place, politicians and crony capitalists alike. Then I'd declare all executive orders null and void, followed by all laws passed after the Coinage Act of 1792, including the amendments regarding income tax and senators. My last official act would be to amend the Constitution where it gives Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce. I'd add "No laws may be enacted using this clause."
Then I'd run like hell to get out of town.
Daydreaming is so much fun.
One is the Financial Elite.
The other takes his orders from the Financial Elite.
It's great to have choices!
Bachman / Palin for Prez and Vice Prez in 2016, baby! Running on the " Double Trouble " Ticket! Preceded by their fund raising photo op in Playboy. After the election, a really bad porn movie called "Double Dykes Do Washington Doggie Dildo Style", to keep public interest running at a fevered pitch.
At year three of the first term, a stylish P.R. campaign for re-election ramps up to a crescendo when they finish their first term with the " Fuck America - REAL GOOD! " tour.
This is followed upon their winning re-election for a second term with the passing of the " What's Good For Us Is Good For America " Consolidation Population Act. The 99 percenters get what is " Best For The American People " - all expense paid trips to the FEMA camp of your choice! But wait - there's more - free meds and indoctrination into the Mama Grizzly Tribe! Fuck, yeah! Good Times! I saw it on Oprah - it HAS to be true !
That is the best chunk of writing I've seen in awhile. Keep it up. Nothing like black humor in hard times. Good stuff.
George Bush already has that title. Then Jimmy Carter. Then George Bush's father.
i think i'd put bush senior above the other two (as in he was better). at least he seemed to have some concern for fiscal responsibility. probably more so than reagan...
Does it really matters which one of these two wins?
changes the speed with which it comes to collapse
of course it does. I have to decide now whether to learn Mandarin or learn how to build a house out of cardboard boxes.
It's been done.
$35,000 for a cardboard house? Might as well just buy a trailer home for less.
Is FEMA still running that special?
Build cardboard box home construction kits, translate the instructions into Mandarin and export them to China.
Do something patriotic for American manufacturing.
(Don't forget to include in your business plan the Milton-Bradley Monopoly money it requires to bribe our government officials).
Not at all. Collapse is assured. If Ron Paul was the nominee I could have questioned the possibility of a collapse.
You put too much faith in one man....
I never said Ron Paul could prevent the collapse, only that stopping it could be possible.
It's not that he can prevent it, it's just that he can stop it from happening? Interesting.
Implying that the world's best politician can prevent a bubble economy from collapsing is like implying that the world's best pilot can prevent a plane from landing.
Couldnt have said it better myself. Ron Paul is there to educate, and to get like minded individuals together to actually discuss other political narratives besides the Red V.S. Blue shit we are spoonfed through media. He's done a wonderful job at that, and will soon be riding off into the sunset. I love his message, and I realize he is probably the last time we will see such a public figure.
That being said he was never meant to really make a difference "through working within the system", its been designed to not allow such a thing.
It should be obvious by now.
Precisely. I gave willingly to his campaign, NOT expecting him to get the nod, but rather to support the delivery of a different more relevant narrative. The mantra is about who is electable or who can defeat the incumbent. That is short-sighted but typical of an instant-gratification based society. Regardless of which puppet wins, the public at large continues to lose - no, hemorrhage liberty and the value of their labor.
We are in a pitched asymmetrical war of wit and will for the future of just about everything.
Truth - there's no way to eliminate a ponzi without collapse.
If he'd been the nominee, I would've been completely assured of a collapse. Meaning that "they" would've broken everything and used the MSM to blame it on his "evil" policies, daring him to maintain his small government stance. Case in point, remember the first TARP bailout vote? (back when they felt they still had to ask permission)
"Give us everything we ask for, or we'll tank the market."
Mob rules.
Literally.
there is raging irony in this article....authored by one of jpms henchmen.....funny to see the master discuss his two puppets........
It’s easy to be dead sure about something if you haven’t created a public policy train wreck of your own.....
mr dimon has certainly been complicit in assisting with the public policy train wreck, and yet he still seems to be so dead sure about alot of things......................
YES IT DOES!
Romeny is no COMMIE!
That's no joke!
Obama and his progressiveness is communist in its most aggressive strain!
Obama will have no check on his "Saul Alinsky inspired" POWERS if he wins!
The stain on the republic,
made by a gullible / foolish public in 2008 cannot be repeated again!
Learn from the mistake,
ask forgiveness for being so reckless and then, do the right thing!
Romney Landslide!
2012,
the republic stands or falls with our decision!
Just say no to Jimmy Carter part 2!
God Bless The Virtuous
choose between curly or Larry ( moe controls both)
Oh, wise guy, eh?
*pokes nearest stooge in the eye*
Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk.
Obama winning with an unemployment rate above 8%, would be the first president to do in over 70 years, with an unemployment rate above 9% no one has succeeded.
http://agstock.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/can-obama-do.html
I suspect there is a whole group of people who would like to remain unemployed that might support him anyway.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5tqH7UrzOw
Just saying. And this video is funny as Hell.
If only he could extend 99 weeks of unemployment to 198 weeks of unemployment.
No one has ever had a Media so in the tank for one Candidate, Obama, ever before, too.
Remember how "BAD!!!" the Mainstream media told us 4.8% Unemployment was in 2006?
Why, it was "THE WORST ECONOMY SINCE THE GREAT DEPRESSION!!!!" -Pelosi, April 2006 (unemployment 4.6%)
Puppet war...
aside from ron paul, cant do better than gov. veto............gary johson 2012......................the guy walks the talk
I was an early supporter of GJ and I like his approach to persoanl liberties. Have to say though that his public speaking leaves quite a bit to be desired of and his handle of economic issues is pretty poor. Makes one realize how rare of an individual someone like Ron Paul is.
i didnt know that one has to speak well to veto an unbalanced budget. im not looking for a showman, im looking for somebody to take ACTION. REAL ACTION..........
Gary Johnson FTW
Charlie Munger said Obamney were two of the best. He should know he's one of the only people that can afford them.
Yay. for American Exceptionalism.
The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.
-Plato
Yeah, but one of them has magic panties...
the magic underwear should allow us to cut back on secret service defense.
Unfortunately magic underwear only protects one from reality.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cd/Garment.jpg
Do they have skid-shields? Cuz, ya know, skiddin' up the wonder panties is bad mojo.
amature hour?
A prudent man (or woman) would not want that job.
Someone who actually understands the problems would not want that job.
"Any man who wants to be president is either an egomaniac or crazy." - Dwight D. Eisenhower
Why keep on electing the slow witted who choose a career in politics. I think we make it a rule that career politicians can't run … the best and most concerned for this nation don’t actively seek to lord over all
All anyone needs to be President of the United States of America today is order-taking, ass-kissing experience. Any further experience impairs the President's ability to perform the aforementioned functions.
Author is a Moron. Romney is one of the most successful business people in history looking at how much money he made and as quickly as he made it. He then went in to be a successful governors and turnaround artist for the olympics. I would say Romney is THE MOST qualified candidate we have seen in 50+ years.
My jaw dropped while reading, but then I saw it was "Roadkill" who was writing it and it all made sense. You've been trolling here long enough man, how about you get an avatar so I can recognize your posts?
Blue I think Roadkill is right. Mitt is ultra-qualified at destroying middle class jobs, industry and families. Only Bernie Madoff made money faster so he must be more qualified but unfortunately he's unavailable right now as he's at the "club."
Moron, Mormon what's the difference, anyway I agree.
And he will make some of us much much more as Prsident.
That is a good sheep, I am sure Rhomney will never let his financial supporters (the same financial firms and banks that got Obama elected in 2008) fail. Still don't recognize fascism do you?
That's a good sheep. I'll be impressed when I see either candidate talk about prosecuting the fucking fraud and restoring the rule of laws and contracts. Both avoid this discussion because both are funded by the same people (banks and financial firms) that keep re-writing the fucking law so they can keep stealing and getting bailouts.
Pretty clear exactly who the "morons" are, oh wait, that' roadkill, troll on.
I agree, however right now we have a facist President whom has the MSM reciting his gospel without a single fact check. If a republican is in the WH there will be plenty of opposition from the MSM to keep him honest.
Bullshit, the MSM, just like the president is a mouthpiece for TPTB, nothing more. The real power is in congress, the courts, and the administrative handlers/insiders.
Follow the fucking money. Nothing will change so long as the fraud reamins unprosecuted and there is no rule of laws and contracts. After or during that you need to end lobbying. The fuckers do not speak for you or I or any business that isn't big enough to buy a politician.
Wake the fuck up.
LOP , to prosecute the fraud they would have to take down the entire Rothschild empire. Because if we do not destroy the syndicate they will just start the fucking thing all over again. All physical assets that they have stolen through their fiat fabrication MUST be confiscated for the PLANET and spread between all Nations. Some assholes will probably be screaming that's world socialism.
I call it stolen property recovery.
Then the planets monetary system can then be determined by the Nations not a FUCKIN PRIVATE Organized Crime syndicate.
People keep forgetting the big picture, they control the world now and if the 6 billion of us do not take it back then humanity will just continue being livestock to these CRIMINALS. These are not BANKERS just fucking criminals.
Correct, nothing short of complete collapse fixes it now.
I'll give you one thing. I'd rather give Romney money to manage or run a business than Obama. Not sure if this qualifies him to run the country but it does make him the less unimpressive candidate. Neither one of these guys does anything positive for individual liberties which is extremely disappointing.
I'll give Romney my dick so he can suck it.
Then I'd have people who don't have a job take turns waterboarding him. Traitors all of them potus and all of DC current and past puppets still fucking alive, plain and simple.
Romney is an extraordinarily gifted businessman at making money, I'll give him that. What I won't give him is my vote for President of the United States of America, because the purpose of a business is to make money, and America is not a business. I want someone in charge who will leave my money the fuck alone, not someone who will take my money with the excuse that they can "manage it better". Social Security, anyone?
You Romney surrogates are pathetic. You're all over the internet like roaches on every blog. The Romney campaign has set up phoney conservative blogs that act as 'Romney Shrines' to push the candidate & his agenda using proxy domains that are hidden so you don't know who the owner is. If you think you're fooling anyone, guess again; you're not RoadKill. Romney is Obama lite; both are Progressives. Both are Fails as the financiers that run them want the dumbest candidates possible as their sock puppets.
The Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson not only offers more executive experience, he doesn't flip-flop on every issue continuously. You can have the duopoly candidates & stick 'em where the sun don't shine. Never will I vote for either duopoly candidate.
RoadKill,
Are you a survivor of road kill? If so, run back to the site of the accident and gather up as much remaining grey matter as possible. Then you will need a re-implant specialist. Good luck.
puppets don't need experiance
Right, about that choice. The banks and financial houses win either way, period. I'll write in Ron Paul and sleep well.
Let’s see if I understand this. You need to have had a long term in public office to be a good President? Well Clinton was a long term politician and a full-fledged disaster if not for Newt Gingrich so that fails on its face. Romney knows how to make money and create wealth; Obama knows how to create dependency, which is your choice so make it. So far the dependency route has done well in Italy, Greece, France, Portugal, and Ireland, want that in America??... Reelect Obama and it will happen in short order. That however is not where it ends, he has plans to take the country over by use of the military and enslave you, so tell Michael know it all above to get fucked, we need this clown out.
Was this the same clinton that left office with a surplus? Oh course the banks also overturned Glass Steagal and begin breaking 200+ years of contract law by separating notes from property and "creating" MBSs.
Still think you have choice fucknut? How come no candidates talk about prosecuting the fucking fraud?
The answer is simple, there is only one party, for the banks and financial houses, by the banks and financial house.
Wake the fuck up already.
I love you LOP, and always agree with your meme that "people need to be held accountable" for any reconstuction to ever take place.
Just a minor correction, Clinton's surplus was a deception.
Once again, just more trickery by the banking class.
Yeah, I know the surplus was bullshit, but what does anyone expect with "mark to fantasy" accounting?
The only way "we the people" get justice and true representation back is after total collapse. Paper promises no longer mean shit, this is why the Euro will never get fixed and then the U.S.S.A. will have to deal with it's own shit.
Should get interesting and be ripe with opportunity for those who are willing to make the effort.
Very true. People don't realize that reported deficits and the change in the level of debt aren't the same thing. Total debt outstanding increased evey year under Clinton. Albeit by the least amount in a long time.
Clinton clearly did the best job on the issue of the debt. Of course he had the help of a Republican Congress and boom time revenues from the internet bubble.
Are you fucking kidding me? Clinton did the best job on debt? Clinton is responsible for a little piece of legislation called NAFTA that basically handed our economy over to China on a silver platter.
Talk to Rhomney and Bain Capital, that is precisely how you "turn around" a company, by convincing the workers to work for chinese wages.
But, rumor has it Clinton had the best tasting cigars inside the Beltway...
No, Clinton didn't do anything except sit in a seat at the right time. You need to understand the graph of total systemic debt in order to understand why the government budget was almost balanced while Clinton filled the Presidential seat.
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?get_gallerynr=3123
Now, look at that chart and tell us all if you can identify the time when the government almost had a balanced budget.
You can't. The chart is basically a continues exponential curve - at least until it breaks in about 2008.
So what does that tell you? It tells you the banksters TARGETED that exponential trajectory. That was no accident.
Hoe did they do it? By using adjusting government debt. Why did the government debt almost even out in 1999-2000? What else was occurring in 1999-2000.
Hmmmmmmm...
Would that be a MASSIVE ORGY OF PRIVATE DEBT CREATION to blow a massive stock market bubble? Yeah, that's the ticket.
As private debt skyrocketed, the Fed told their puppet government to back off of spending in order to track their predetermined exponential growth curve.
Clinton didn't do chit, people. He just smiled and took credit while fooling the ignorati that he actually ran something.
Now that private debt is cratering, government deficits are exploding.
No, they aren't trying to fix the economy - you can't *fix* exponential growth. They are looting ahead of the collapse the system demands. Why won't they change the system? Well, if they did that, they wouldn't be able to seize most of society's chit before hyperinflating to "balance their books" post world's largest white collar crime spree in history.
If you think the banksters will hyperinflate while they hold trillions in cash and trillions in debt and you still own that fat, juicy mortgage, you got another thing coming.
I wish it weren't so... that my neighbors will be JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Citibank, Bank of America (some mega banks might get sacrificed to wipe out depositors), instead of people like those who frequent ZH, makes me feel queezy.
Well now it becomes perfectly clear why they are charging people to leave this country and not enter it
The low score for 1988 surprised me, what with "the man with the longest resume in the Western world" up against,...oh.....that's right;.. Dukakis. That dude could drag down anyone's average.
It doesn't matter who the president is. What substantive issues do either of the candidates differ on? Especially on the issues that the presidency has significant power over like foriegn policy, military deployments and trade? Its not an election its a selection.
I'll take "6 of one, half-a-dozen of the other" for a $400.00 SNAP card Alex.
in the grand scheme it doesnt really matter..taxes go up and down but im the one responsible for my own sucess and failures not the elected puppet on tv..
True, as long as you are a part of the 14% taxation club romney is in, The same man who openly admits that taxation should be somewhere between 20-25% for "other" people.
Correct, but without action on your part, the confiscation of all wealth and power will continue and you may find that your "success" will be as group leader at your local FEMA re-education camp. Still believe "it can't happen here", wake the fuck up, and wake up as many as of your neighbors as you can.
Income that you can spend should be considered fucking income, period. Everyone should pay the say ta rate on income. Really think Rhomney pays the same amount on money that he can spend? You are beyond stupid.
We need a thorough vetting of someone's resume before they get to bail out their buddies and butcher Third Worlders. lol meritocracy
You would seriously have to be a total moron to want that job ... looks like we have prefectly qualified candidates if you ask me ...
Public servants? Surely you jest.
thing one and thing two and their sidekick the cat in the hat diamon
No wonder America is keen to ram "demoicracy" down any foreign dissenters throat so they can install a sympathetic socipath kleptocracy
THAT'S WHY THE PLAN IS TO FOCUS UPON TAKING BACK CONGRESS!!! See www.nar2012.com, and hopefully by the end of the week, the website for the new Super Pac, Elect A New Congress at www.electanewcongress.com. Taking back America one vote at a time until we reach all 162,000,000 registered American voters. Viva la' Revolucion'
Yea that's what this country needs, a second chance to fuck it up again. There's a reason why certain people run this country. Last thing we need is more retards like Maxine Waters running this show.
Does experience matter when they are just doing what the real owners of this country tells them to do?
From what I understand, Romney has a good amount of executive leadership experience--in the private sector. Its a flawed argument to adopt the unstated premise that the best presidential candidate will be a successful creature of government with plenty of years of working the system.
Now, I suspect Romney is no more of a libertarian than Bush II, but that has nothing to do with experience in government.
Election 2012
"You cannot be serious!"
The blame for this can be placed squarely on the shoulders of the idiots that put Obama in the oval office in the first place.
Lowest. Common. Denominator.
The big banks and financial firms? Funny how these are the same folks supporting Rhomney now. Will any candidate address the issue of fraud and the rule of law?
Is it even worth going to the polls? I mean other than not spitting in the face of those who faught for that right, wouldn't my time be better spent at home buying gold or something?
Well yeah, you have the option of writing in the candidate of your choice. It won't make any difference, but sometimes it feels good to lob a spitwad on Goliath's shoe.
Look, I love bankers as much as the next guy, but with Mittens in the House we got a fighting chance at a new bubble, I mean boom. Call it the Mittens Revolution. It will be all about glamor and shopping, all about an ownership society and a parabolic bull stock market.
How much experience does one need to become a Puppet?
Lots. You think TPTB hand those puppet strings over to just anyone? Nuh-uh. You have to have a long history of looking the other way, selectively enforcing rules and regulations, and stabbing people in the back when you can't get caught. TPTB need to have someone they can trust in those puppet strings, bub.
In Strauss-speak: the US needs a stolid Elder Prophet to see it through this Fourth Turning.
I don't see either as playing that role.
But then, the question is who will step up to be that Prophet?
obama has the most experience of any candidate or president as an indonesian citizen and a not natural born citizen as required by the goddamned piece of paper
and romney has the most experience since nixon in shredding records and general sleaze
I think their methodology screws Coolidge. The man simply shot up the chain. He went straight from State Legislator to Mayor, then Leutenant Governor to Governor, then Vice President to President. There should be something to be said about climbing the ladder over a 20+ year political career.
"Public Servants"
seriously? US president a public servant?
pragmatic - I had to right my chair after tipping over backwards with uncontrolled laughter at the goofiness of the title...
Rothschild servant
This seems like an odd article for ZH.
Why does this arbitrary chart have any merit? Why is only 12 years combined of "high level service" mean that we are "certainly" in a "throwback" situation? Why is that implicitly bad? The last time I checked the Constitution, the only requirements were being a natural-born U.S. citizen, at least 25 years of age who had resided in the U.S. for the last 14 years. It does not say anything about being an unproductive, parasitic career bureaucrat prior to running. It does not say we should only elect philosopher-kings. It does not say anything about gender, race, creed, religion, etc.
I guess if the article came from a JPM employee that's all I really need to know; this article is mental masturbation at its worst (or best, depending on your point of view).
If government service is a must, then Biden would be perfect.
Nonsense
Romney did good work with the Olympics, he did what he thought was right in MA...note well his were efforts at a State level...they were not national in scope. The States have the right to experiment (and indeed should) whereas Obamacare is a disaster because it violates theConstitution when forced through on a national level.
MR is not my #1 choice but grow up! In politics you don't always get your #1 guy.
Many here read Rand Paul's endorsement as a betrayal. Again nonsense!!! We now have a good candidate telling us Romney is OK. I read this to mean Romney has signaled to RP things he cannot say publicly. Our president is elected by the great unwashed who tune in on Labor Day of election year and never read a paper for the next 4 years. It is this middle mass who must be convinced and you cannot scare them. I'd love Romney to come out swinging and say he is for all the things I hold dear BUT if he did he would be branded as a heartless conservative. This is modern politics in 2 team America. I supported Paul with dollars. That Rand Paul says Romney is OK is all I need to hear. Yeah yeah yeah I'd like more but as I said. I want my values to triumph.
Then vote for Ron by writing him in.
Too bad Rhomney won't address prosecuting the fucking fraud. He would have to indicte his own supporters (who supported obama in 2008).
Rand wants to survive, that is all. I will write in Ron Paul and sleep well. Integrity still means something in our house.
LoP, I'm right with you on the captured government protecting ther criminals.
I have to call Ron Paul out for running interference for the criminals as well. No, he isn't their lap dog, but he portrays the patently false narrative that they are "misguided academics" when the are cold blooded criminals.
Paul has had plenty of opportunity to ask the following:
"Ben, Bernanke, you know that Section 2A of the Federal Reserve Act requires you to keep credit and monetary aggregates 'commensurate' with the long term production potential of the country. In spite of this law, you took credit and monetary aggregates parabolic to actualized production. That's a criminal act. But you know that, which is why you lie about your mandate beign a dual mandate when it is a singular mandate with more than one expected outcome from following the singular mandate. Arrest this criminal."
But he won't.
Is he ignorant of the mandate and the crime spree or is providing cover for the world's worst white collar criminals in human history?
Um...weren't the Salt Lake Olypics riddled with corruption?
You're forgetting all Romney's "experience" he glamed from his governor daddy (much like Bush whom gleamed his "experience" from his dad), his dad was the origianal Michigan Socialist, Romney's dad served up the "coup de grace" on Detroit and Michigan over 70 years ago with the policies he spearheaded, Daddy Romney laid the foundation for today's Detroit, he even used to be a Detroit resident.
If Detroit isn't a public policy train wreck I don''t know what is, Ironic Romney's daddy laid the foundation for today's Detroit-which Obama owns.
I'll be writing in "Porky Pig!"
"Tha's-a, that's-a, that's-a, a-beeya,a-beeya All Folks!"
Massive write in campain for Ron Paul.
3% Roll Call.
Smart men who refuse to have there reputation smeared will not run for President. This is what you are left with, talking heads for the men behind the curtain.
Tyler what's your idea of a "qualified candidate"? What a bunch of non-sense you write here. It's not the candidate ythat runs the show as much as it's the party and their experts they hire to advise.
We've all seen what the Democrats have offered since 2006.
Time for a change.
unqualified from what perspective? To serve the Oligarchy they are picture perfect!
Its not about public sector executive experience, higher professional education, highest position attained, racial inclusion or born with a silver spoon in the mouth. It is about the full sum of life experiences that most of us deal with as we go through life and these two have no concept of.
Namely: Struggling to get thru college without a scholarship or education trust fund, being sponsored into your first job without having to send out hundreds of resumes, being protected on the job without having to worry of the perceptions of performance, steered and protected professionally through their mid professional years of work and sponsored politically by powerful vested interests within the two party system.
They do not know what it means to be poor, or have been middle class earners, or to have poor prospects, saving for the down payment for a car or home, nor lived a normal life in a community. Negotiated for a loan, asked for a raise, changed jobs and generally have had to live with the mistakes that they have made. Nor have they had to produce or perform something for a living without advisors, staff or others available to take care of the little and mundane things in their life.
They are both Americas Anointed Princes of Positive circumstances. All we are merely asked to do is pick one or the other based on the quality of their respective slogans.
Waste of time. Good or bad Presidents can only be determined in hindsight. Sometimes the guy looks like no match for what he's facing (Lincoln, Truman) and does well. Sometimes what is assumed he'll be facing turns out not to be (Bush 2, Hoover). No way to tell how it will play out for whoever wins.
"While the extreme polarization of our political parties has been discussed often"
Let me stop you right there. We are becoming aware both of these parties are basically no different from each other where it really counts. We argue about abortion and immigration while we're being stolen from, and both parties work really hard to try and sell the fake differences between the parties to an unsuspecting and dumb American public.
I believe a vote for a Democrat or a vote for a Republican is a vote for the status quo, but I admit I may be dead before most Americans agree with me.
No American presidential candidate has received a majority of the eligible voter vote. 7 percent of the time the presidential candidate who receives the most votes doesn't win and this has happened in our lifetime. I'm 25 and no president within my lifetime has received more votes than the amount of eligible voters who didn't even vote at all. Democracy is pretty much seen as a farce and a sham by I would say 40 to 60 percent of Americans. Why else do you think turnout is so low? Why does the average citizen think all politicians are corrupt and purchased? Why is Congressional approval in the teens if Americans love democracy so much?
30 percent turnout, the winner gets 55 percent of the votes cast in a LANDSLIDE!!! Congratulations. Senator Goldman Sachs just won 17 percent, rounded up, of the eligible voters. Isn't democracy grand?
Public servants??? Public PARASITES is more like it.
At least housing has hit a bottom.......
or at least until the next set of nut-numbing number plunge comes out.
I'm not Romney fan or Obamabot, but as far as qualifications go, Romney has them over Obama big time. Let's face it, whether one agrees with Romney or not, he a successful businessman and former governor. Obama is a 1/2 term Senator and community organizer who has never done an honest day's work in his life. These kind of fatuous comparison are so simple-minded as to be worthless and merely show the author's political bias instead of offering insight to ZH readers. NEXT>>>>>