It just wouldn’t be an election year without concern trolls, and one Michael Jenning of Van Nuys skips the blog comments sections, deciding instead to take to the letters page of the Los Angeles Times with the following missive:
A funny thing happens to me every time I convince myself to support the Republican Party, with its emphasis on individual freedom and its championing of ambition: Up pops another one of its politicians to display appalling ignorance. The latest of these “leaders” claims that he “misspoke” when he offered his idiotic musings on women’s bodies.
“Misspoke” is a term that originated, appropriately, in the Nixon administration. I think I’ll remind myself of this whenever I’m about to be conned into believing the GOP’s pieties.
Not bad, Michael, but allow me to give you a few pointers…
First of all, the “disgusted swing voter” persona is a decent way to go, but you can’t lay it on quite so thick. If you want the tourists to buy the idea that you were, like, totes for realsies gonna vote GOP but for Todd Akin tripping over his own dick, consider ditching the scare quotes around the word “leaders” and maybe use the capital-L instead. And when you’re using terms like “conned” and “pieties,” you lose the opportunity to take the moral high ground and affect a pose of head-shaking disappointment.
That brings me to my second critique: Why not go whole hog and claim to be a disaffected Republican? Talk about how you miss the GOP of old. How, say, if Eisenhower or (and I’m just spitballin’ here) Mitt Romney’s late father were here today, they would be just as disappointed as you. With more practice, you can go for the gusto and play the “Reagan couldn’t win the nomination today” card. If you’re going that route, though, don’t bother bringing up Nixon. Actual conservatives never really liked him and nobody but aging hippies really gives a shit about him anymore.
And while you’re trolling, don’t be afraid to use phrases like “as a Christian” or “as the father of [insert number between one and four] daughters” in order to amplify your concerns. Remember, you’ve got to have some skin in this game.
Well, Mike, I hope this has been helpful and that you’ll be convincing weak-willed squishes not to turn up at the polls come November. Until then, like someone else (and I think you know who I’m talking about) you can give yourself a Solid B+.
Bravo
It also doesn’t hurt to get one’s facts right:
“Misspoke” is a term that originated, appropriately, in the Nixon administration.
Doesn’t seem at all true. While the word itself has a 12th century origin, Hendrik Hertzberg claims:
So while the Nixon era provided a useful example, it was not the origin of the term.
Actually, Sean, I think you’re on to something here. Here’s this same “Michael Jenning, Van Nuys” in a letter to the LAT written in 2009:
He likes writing letters to the LAT. Here he is href=”http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jun/08/opinion/la-le-0608-wednesday-20110608″>last summer.
The incessant rewriting of history by those with agendas is nothing new.
Truer words were never spoke. This tool is all in with Belliselles fictions.
Oops – help with the closing tag?
…and he continues to demonstrate his swing voter credentials.
So, when a Democrat gets caught having sex with a 17 year old (boy) that doesn’t make you want to leave the Democrat party? Oh no, that’s not the same thing at all….
http://nation.foxnews.com/rep-kerry-gauthier/2012/08/21/democrat-caught-having-sex-17-year-old-boy-rest-stop
I have to admit, I’ve missed all the “Life long Republicans” who are “disgusted with the current GOP” who have reluctantly decided to support the Dems because the GOP is so far away from its roots.
They’re so entertaining.
My favorite is a friend who SWEARS up and down that he’s a Republican, and yet, funnily enough, his entire political belief system is indistinguishable from the Democrat party line. He insists the Republican Party moved too far to the Right for him (HA!), and mind you, I believe he’s in his mid 30’s (so I have no idea when this vast shift to the right supposedly happened). When I press him on it, he says he’s a “Goldwater Conservative”. I laughed at him and said to actually go back and look at Barry Goldwater’s platform.
I don’t have the slightest idea why he tells people he’s a Republican. 30 seconds talking politics with him will show anyone he’s not (and never has been).
I’d bet because, like so many lefties, he thinks that anyone who disagrees politically is, by definition, stupid.
You should ask your friend if he’s keen on things like diplomatic relations with our sworn enemies, EPA regulations, wage and price controls, and federally-mandated speed limits. Then, when he says those things are all peachy keen, tell him he’s actually a Nixon Republican.
(I know I said nobody gives a shit about Nixon, but it sounds like it’ll probably bug your friend.)
Actually, on foriegn policy, he seems to be a Ronulan.