Saturday, April 21, 2012
What Mattered This Week?
As I said earlier, I'm a bit preoccupied today, so I'm not even going to try. Instead, I'll just open it up and see what I get. What do you think mattered this week?
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Startling revelations that Pres Obama loves eating dogs (and possibly other housepets? Also maybe people?) will irrevocably damage his standing with centrist voters who care exclusively about the deficit. joking!!
ReplyDeleteMaybe Jon should change this feature to What (Didn't) Matter This Week. And then we can all discuss the political stories that were in the news that week.
DeleteHah, you're right. That's a problem.
DeleteExcellent suggestion, Drew. Then he could change his questions "for" Libs or Cons to question "on" or "about" or "regarding" or something, so we could participate without either intruding or committing.
ReplyDeleteThe somewhat sketchy economic data -- which made me wonder if Obama is going to get the recovery he needs for re-election.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the Secret Service or GSA scandals will amount to much in the end, at least in how they affect Obama.
The Bo Xilai scandal is intriguing, but I don't know enough about China to judge.
The French presidential election, inasmuch it will affect the Eurozone crisis.
I second the mention of the French presidential election. It's only round one, but it's majorly important. It sets the tone for what comes next. And it gives politicians throughout Europe more looks at how people (especially those not directly in crisis countries like Spain, Greece, etc) are reacting electorally to the eurozone upheavals.
DeleteThe Wal-Mart/Mexican-official bribery scandal might matter; particularly if it's found that such scandals are common to give large corporations an edge in foreign markets.
ReplyDeleteToo Early To Tell.
French Presidential Election: The "right wing" candidate, Marine LePen took 20% of the vote. Sarkozy got about 25% of the vote. French politics are really interesting. Sarkozy (who is probably liberal by U.S. standards) was the standard-bearer for a center-right government that advocates a lot of the things the center-right advocate for here (fiscal austerity, lower taxes, tough on crime-things like that). Marine LePen is not what we would consider right wing here. She is basically the Tea Party without the Koch money; a candidate for people skeptical of globalization who want a more industrial economy with less immigration. It's basically a call for simpler, better times with a heavy nationalist appeal. Why does Marine LePen matter? Because the Republicans are trying to build their party as a libertarian, center-right party with softer views on immigration and social issues. Marie LePen's score shows that many of the Joe (or Jacques) Sixpack working class white people out there just aren't buying it. The Republican "fusion" strategy- keeping blue collar working class voters interested in free market fundamentalism- ain't getting any easier. And this is the reason why we will see an incredibly dishonest campaign from the GOP and Mitt Romney this fall.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to be the quiet before the storm this past week. To me the following might be candidates.
ReplyDelete-Orrin Hatch having to face a primary and from what I gather his supporters went all out and even did well in their opponents home ground but still has to face a primary. The Bennett failure to get nominated two years ago in Utah was a signal. The Hatch failure to get renomination the insider route is another signal that toeing the ideological line matters more than anything. Incumbents in the GOP have little room to maneuver.
-April 15 came and went and given that there wasn't a giant hullabaloo, it may have been a lost opportunity for the GOP.
-The calm before the political junkie storm of the long long awaited next installment of the Robert Caro book on Lyndon Johnson coming out next Tuesday (covering from '58 to '64 in the LBJ political career).