Gobbledygook

Wow. CNN’s gotten so bad, I trust local news more.

We begin tonight’s self-medication with a fine bottle of Newcastle.

This debate brought to you by Nojo’s brand-new MacBook Pro, which is totally fucking awesome.

For the record, the Idiot CNN Anchor is Erin Burnett.

@nojo: Gotta love those bid-ness deductions!

@SanFranLefty: Makes up for the fucking self-employment tax. Spend it before the government does!

What is tonight’s ostensible topic?

CNN foreign-policy intro fails to include clip of Shrub reading My Pet Goat.

@Dodgerblue: Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran.

ADD: “National security debate”.

I saw a black face in the audience!

Rick Santorum walks onto the stage like PigPen trailed by a frothy mix.

Star-Spangled Banner sung by cast member of Jersey Boys, who provides an excellent advertisement for skipping the show.

Candidates already scribbling on notepads, even though no question has been asked. I vote for a Debate Jeopardy Edition.

“I’m Mitt Romney, and yes, Wolf, that’s also my first name.”

First lie of the evening goes to Willard.

“I’m Newt Gingrich, and my father spent 29 years in the infantry.”

Newt, on the other hand…

First question from “the honorable” Ed Meese.

Second lie of the evening.

And just like that, Newt tries to scare the shit out of us by mentioning a terrorist nuke hitting an American city.

Ron Paul: “The Patriot Act is unpatriotic.”

Damn, he’s always fun to have on stage.

Ron Paul: “You can prevent crimes by becoming a police state.” Argues against sacrificing liberties for protection.

Crazy Eyes: Obama has “outsourced” terrorist investigations to ACLU. Same CIA line she’s used before. Says Underwear Bomber was Mirandized within 45 minutes. And this was a problem, how?

Huntsman: “No longer can we compartmentalize Intelligence.”

Ten years in, and that’s still a problem? And who had seven years to deal with it?

@nojo: Shurrup

Deranger Rick: “Privatize TSA and get rid of those unions.” That’s his answer to airport pat-downs.

@nojo: Al Jolson?

@nojo: Ha!

Frothy Mix cites Lincoln’s abuse of civil rights as precedent, because what’s happening now is just like Civil War.

@nojo: O_0

@nojo: Wow.

Thanks for taking one for the team.

Ron Paul: “Too much carelessness in the use of words, that we’re at ‘war’.”

If only he wasn’t a crazy old fart…

@nojo: Right ‽

Everybody’s calling for privatizing the TSA. Nobody’s calling for privatizing the Army.

Huntsman asked about using drones in Pakistan, responds with DC getting its house in order.

ADD: Finally gets around to agreeing.

Haqqani! Drink!

Crazy Eyes: Paki nukes are an “existential threat”. To us? Or India?

Crazy Eyes: Pakistan “is too nuclear to fail.” That almost makes sense.

Deranger Rick: Defund Pakistan. Crazy Eyes calls him “highly naive” because of threat of loose nukes — which could end up in Washington, DC!!!

Take that, Newt. Crazy Eyes can scare the shit of us, too.

@JNOV will never finish this fucking sweater!: Bear in mind, it’s 5:35 PT. I’d be eating dinner anyway. No sweat watching this.

Not my idea, but: Could Wolf ask the candidates to find Pakistan on a map?

Huntsman and Mittens are getting into a Mormon slapfight.

Forty minutes in, and Newt has yet to accuse someone of asking a stupid question.

Camera cuts to Mrs. Newt III. Something inside me just died.

Frothy Mix: “We are not fighting a war on terrorism. Terrorism is a tactic…”

Yayyyyy!!!

“…We are fighting a war against radical Islam.”

Oh.

This endless series of phony “debates” should guarantee that only the most vociferous Tea Baggers turn out for the GOP primaries. By January nobody else will still be paying any attention to Republican presidential candidates. Except for nojo, who eats this up with a spoon.

Wolf: “Our coverage of this historic debate continues in a moment.”

So historic, I wonder who will remember it next week.

Commercial break: No boners so far. Then again, Deranger Rick has only had one or two questions.

@nojo: It’s called an election erection.

@Dave H: Spoons don’t fit in beer bottles.

@Dave H: I remember Nojo and I totally enjoying the Dem convention roll call. Wish I could see this, too.

@nojo: You need a Little Mickey’s.

Local cable ad: The problem isn’t illegal immigration, it’s legal immigration.

This ad not brought to you by California farmers.

Okay — into the breach. See you on the flip side.

And we’re back — with a Bomb Iran question!

Cain!: Iran is “a very mountainous region”.

It was more fun the first time.

Ron Paul, quoting Mossad leader who just retired: Bombing Iran “would be the stupidest thing to do in the world.”

I’m glad I’m not on the AIPAC mailing list.

Cain!: No, really — Iran has mountains.

Camera cuts again to Mrs. Newt III. I think my appendix burst. And it was removed twenty-five years ago.

Question from Paul Wolfowitz. Alas, my TV is not insured against shoes being thrown into it.

Mittens: We’re cutting money from defense and putting it into Obamacare!

Oh. And that’s a bad thing. Right.

Nobody’s mentioning that we have a higher “defense” budget than the rest of the world combined. Or whatever the factoid is.

Another clever line that isn’t mine: Newt is a stupid person’s idea of a smart person.

CNN keeps cutting to Callista. Does she have a promo deal with Tiffany’s?

Almost 70 minutes in. We’re entering the Deranger Rick Danger Zone. But nobody’s asking him questions.

Deranger Rick: “I’ve been the Commander-in-Chief of the 20,000-plus National Guard troops we have in Texas.”

Sarah Palin callback!

Also: Calls for Leon Panetta’s resignation. Not sure why. But why not?

Commercial break: Still no YouTube Moment. But coming up: The Border!

CNN shows live shot from Tahrir. Nobody has talked about Egypt.

Not to cast aspersions on the bang-up job you’re doing, Nojo, but tonight’s prize has to, once again, go to the Guardian live blog:

“Newt Gingrich says America can bring Iran to its knees within a year by cutting off its gasoline sources. Yes, as always with Newt’s brain, it is really that easy. Sabotage an Iranian oil refinery? Sure, piece of cake. And Newt likes cake from the looks of things.”

Border question: Nojo, you’re sitting fifteen miles from Mexico. Why aren’t you freaked out?

@karen marie has her eyes tight shut: I have no problem ceding the floor to professionals. I’m just an amateur blogger thinking of opening his fourth beer.

Ron Paul favors medical marijuana. And alcohol and prescription drugs are “deadly” — they kill more people than dope.

Not quoted: Whatever he said at the Fascist Forum over the weekend.

Crazy Eyes quotes Steve Jobs. Is that smoke coming from my brand-new fucking awesome MacBook Pro?

All this talk about “ten million illegal immigrants”, no talk about what they do for a living.

Georgia, hello!

Fucking illegal-immigration magnets! How do they work?

Minute 98: Deranger Rick answers a question without stumbling. Personal best!

Are illegal immigrants taking Wall Street jobs from Americans? No?

This part of the debate brought to you by America’s Frackers. Light your fire!

@nojo: I’d go with an all-illegal starting 5 if UCLA can beat fucking Kansas tonight.

Illegal immigrants would take all the jobs from a part-time Congress.

Hello, I’m David Addington, and I still walk the Earth.

Deranger Rick: Fuck you, this time I read the policy briefs.

Huntsman: “We missed the Persian Spring. The President failed on that front.”

Follow-up question? Anybody?

Ron Paul on Saudi military bases: “If you want to inspire Al Qaeda, just meddle in that region.”

Can we vote for half of him?

Also still walking the Earth: Marc Theissen.

Ron Paul: Taliban want to rid their country of furriners, “just like we would if anybody tried to occupy us”.

Red Dawn!

Newt mentions “electromagnetic pulse attack”. WorldNetDaily just creamed.

And, scene!

Thank god, no YouTube Moments. They’d only be wasted on a long holiday weekend.

@nojo: What time do you eat lunch?

The bottom of that boy’s voice was not pretty. The top was truly dreadful.

Bachman seemed to be made up to play Norma Desmond.

Frothy: You cannot wear a blue-black suit with a red tie and red-brown shoes. IT IS NOT ALLOWED. You can wear flannel grey, verging on charcoal, with tan shoes and be welcome anywhere.

Was Calisita sitting beside her hairdresser?

Noje, I’m sjocked (Impressed but shock.) You missed Cain calling Wolf B Blitz. Twice. Called him Blitz. I was waiting for Prancer and Dancer to appear. Then he caught himself and there was an adorable round of jokes on the topic of human frailty.

Mittens lied about his name. The country is in shock. This coupled with admissions of youthful indiscretions, while it makes me feel he’s more like me apart from the M$250 issue, I need to be able to feel that my Commander in chief is telling me the truth about when the muslim hoard is going to vaporize NYC.

Newt is truly evil.

@mellbell: Honestly? One meal a day. Slow metabolism.

@Benedick: The Blitz line wasn’t worth it.

Actually, none of it was worth it, but still.

@nojo: Used to turn CNN on in the morning on my way out the door – that ended in 2006. Used to turn MSNBC on in the morning, but that ended when Joe Scarborough opened his mouth. Now I rely on TPM, but that assumes that I don’t just stop following politics altogether due to the present state of our Not-Democracy.

@blogenfreude: These days, you expect CNN to tilt Right while pretending to be middle-of-the-road. And you expect Wolf to defy all known standards of broadcasting. But Erin Burnett was a fucking dimwit. Not dumbing down her act, but actually dumb. It made me respect Rick Sanchez.

@nojo: Wasn’t worth it? Sounds like someone around here’s got some standards and I’m pretty sure it’s not me. I was only allowed to watch on the strict understanding that I was not allowed to talk back to the contestants. I’m told that this is an annoying habit that reflects ghetto thinking. Then I was asked if we could turn it off after 15 minutes. I said, Sure. If you beg me.

@blogenfreude: It’s essential that we don’t stop caring. Or the children will die. Or something. No, but really, if we need to know why we must never stop caring then we must read Les Miserables uncut and marvel again at the absurd egoism and thrilling narciscism that enabled Hugo to write all 15,000 pages of that farrago that thrills one to one’s very taint. It is our job to be dissatisfied; it’s our job to despair. It was ever thus. Money talks: morals keeps the peasants in line; and arts picks out the wallpaper. They were talking like this in Rome.

@nojo: Shurrup!

@nojo: Dude. Obama has deported more people than the last, what, three or four administrations combined? I’m not thrilled about it, but how can this be an R issue? Obama stole their lunch.

@nojo: Wutᔆ‽

ugh

win?

no

third try is the charm‽

Yezzzzzzz

@Benedick: I’m told that this is an annoying habit that reflects ghetto thinking.

Tell him it’s call and response in the digital age. A throwback to the cradle of civilisation and music of old (read: jazz).

@JNOV will never finish this fucking sweater!: You tell him. I’m tired of trying to explain blogs.

@Benedick:

[I]f we need to know why we must never stop caring then we must read Les Miserables uncut and marvel again at the absurd egoism and thrilling narciscism that enabled Hugo to write all 15,000 pages of that farrago that thrills one to one’s very taint. It is our job to be dissatisfied; it’s our job to despair. It was ever thus. Money talks: morals keeps the peasants in line; and arts picks out the wallpaper. They were talking like this in Rome.

I love you.

@nojo: Erin was hired because she can read the lines written for her – no more, no less. And she looks good doing it, so no one will object.

@blogenfreude: See, that’s the problem: She’s also supposed to “chat” offscript. And she’s no Gretchen Carlson.