Healthy dose of ridicule in order

Here is a good read from James McPherson on the Republican Party candidates’ many gaffes:

Think for a minute–as much as some people hated George W. Bush, can you imagine any of those folks openly and proudly insulting Laura Bush? In fact, to find such boorish behavior toward a First Lady you have to go all the way back to … Hillary Clinton. The worst example? Another Democratic First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson.

And when people are working as hard as the current crop of GOP candidates to look stupid, it’s difficult to conclude otherwise. Perhaps it’s simply a Wall Street plot to get Obama re-elected, despite all the reasons he shouldn’t be. See a couple of the more humorous recent examples–or at least they would be funny, if these weren’t people seeking to lead the free world–below.

When it comes to knowledge of world affairs, “no news is better than Fox News,” according to a study by researchers at Fairleigh Dickinson University.

Sadly, that’s old news. Even sadder, as columnist Kathleen Parker (once considered a conservative, though now even Ronald Reagan wouldn’t qualify) has pointed out, the relative ignorance common to heavy watchers of Fox News is driving today’s Republican Party. Or, as Paul Begala has termed it, “the Stupid Party.”

I hesitate to paint with a brush so broad, though I have previously noted some activities by conservatives that seemed at least unenlightened. But presumably these are some of the same folks who actually booed the First Lady over the weekend at a NASCAR race (an action that the voice of the GOP, Rush Limbaugh, actually defended).

Here is one video:

Embarrassing. And another embarrassment:

Colbert stumps with Herman Cain

Just … wow:

Stephen Colbert and Herman Cain, together at last:

All was going swimmingly until the former candidate took the stage.

Apparently the only person who missed the joke, Cain segued into a version of his stump speech, itself rehashed on Thursday for the South Carolina Republican leadership convention. The crowd shuffled awkwardly and wondered if it would be OK to leave before the encore. Satire threatened to fall apart in the face of grim reality as a candidate not famed for self-awareness appeared to be under the impression the crowd was there to hear about cainconnections.com

Thankfully, Cain remembered to make a point, perhaps the most genuine of the event, given the audience of the young and largely apolitical. Urging the collected to disobey Colbert and NOT to vote for him, he said, “I am going to ask you NOT to vote for Herman Cain because I don’t want you to waste your vote. Your vote matters.”

!facepalm.

This also shows how silly some suffrage laws are in South Carolina, since some people who have already withdrawn from the race (Bachmann, Cain) will be on the ballot in that state.

Cain, blackness in America, the GOP primaries

The Bloggingheads portion of The New York Times website is running an interesting discussion between John McWhorter, with The New Republic, and Glenn Loury, with Brown University, on [[Herman Cain]] and the possible shift that he represents in politics, particularly in black America and within the GOP.

Embedding has been disabled on the video, but here’s the link:

Bloggingheads: Herman Cain’s Blackness

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GOP poll: Romney on top, Cain in third

If this new poll can be trusted — it does come to us from FOX News after all — Mitt Romney is in first place in the Republican primary race thus far, while Rick Perry is in second. Herman Cain, who has apparently hurled himself out of obscurity, is now in third.

Here is the condensed list. Thanks to Chris Good with The Atlantic for paring it down to the top eight:

Mitt Romney 23%
Rick Perry 19%
Herman Cain 17%
Newt Gingrich 11%
Ron Paul 6%
Jon Huntsman 4%
Michele Bachmann 3%
Rick Santorum 3%

For all her media exposure, we can be quite thankful Michele Bachmann is only at 3 percent and even more thankful that Sarah Palin isn’t in the race at all, for if she was president, I would be the first emigrate. It is also rather surprising that Mitt Romney, who will overwhelmingly carry the Mormon vote of course, leads the most right-wing group of GOP hopefuls we have seen in recent memory.