Bissinger is featured in an extended chat with Jamelle Bouie at New York magazine. Buzz was seriously pumped by Romney’s performance at the first debate: “Romney was strong, showed leadership, and I believe that he is moving to the moderate he always has been.”
Excuse me, but how do you show “leadership” by aggressively repeating talking points about an egregiously fraudulent tax “plan” that is 1) egregiously fraudulent and 2) guaranteed to have no meaningful impact on the current economic malaise? Also—and I guess this is “3)”—how do you ignore the howling hordes behind Mitt? Repeatedly, Buzz complains that Obama can’t work with the Republicans: “He is not politically adept. He is not good at crossing the aisle. I can only go on what I have read, but he does not like politics and all the gab and bullshit. Politics is gab and bullshit. So I think Romney has a much better chance of appealing to Dems than Obama will ever have appealing to Rs. Yes, they are obstructionist pricks, but they also detest him. And he has added to that.” Yes, when people detest you, and try to destroy you, it is all your fault.
Buzz says that Barack should be a first-class schmoozer, like that Clinton guy—you know, the guy who didn’t pass health care, and who got his schmoozing ass impeached by the Republicans, who clearly detested him as they detest Barack Obama. And so I guess that was Bill’s fault too.
“But take a look at Romney’s record as Mass governor,” says Buzz. “He was not some crazoid conservative. He crossed party lines. He provided the template for Obamacare, for God’s sake.”
Yes, he did. And what does Buzz think of Obamacare? “Obamacare is admirable but was a politically terrible decision, the wrong thing at the wrong time.” Even if we give Buzz the benefit of the doubt, and assume that he meant “the right thing at the wrong time,” what he’s really saying is “I know I ought to be in favor of universal health care, but, well, I’ve got health care, and I’m not really crazy about paying for someone else’s. Obama shouldn’t have put me on the spot by enacting something that I only pretend to believe in.”
But wait, there’s more. After complaining about the fact that Obama enacted health care, he complains that “his record on poverty and helping those in the greatest need is atrocious. Basically, the last two years have been nothing.” Excuse me, passing universal health care, expanding the Food Stamps program, extending unemployment insurance, suspending the payroll tax, which taxes millions of people who don’t pay federal income tax—all of that did nothing for poverty? Obama and the Democrats provided massive aid to the poor. Buzz is mad because Obama didn’t do enough to help people like him. Also, he made the Republicans detest him. If people detest you, it’s your fault.
Okay, I’m getting a little frothy here, aren’t I, on behalf of a guy I’m never going to vote for either, although on entirely different grounds. Let’s listen to Katherine, interviewed at Salon, who’s benefited greatly from Obamacare—“That’s been really critical, especially for me. I’ve had some medical things that I’ve had to get tested and had to go to the doctor fairly often.”
Yeah, but then there’s that debt. “$16 trillion in debt is a huge figure.” And, at the debate, neither Obama nor Romney really knocked her out: “I asked for new solutions, not what they’ve already done.”
So how to decide whom to vote for? “I can only speculate, but if I had to guess, gosh, my gut says President Obama. Based on the fact that he has said, I know he has two daughters so the cause is close to him. Governor Romney has granddaughters, that might help.”
See, Barack? You should have had three daughters. Then people wouldn’t detest you so much.
Afterwords
Naturally, neither Buzz nor Katherine had a word to say about civil liberties. Which is why neither Barack nor Mitt is talking about them either.
