Though I don't think much of him, I had to feel sorry for John Boehner last night, sitting there behind Obama and therefore always on camera, looking all orange and ornery, like he hadn't had a satisfactory bowel movement since the Bush administration. Maybe he just needed a cigarette. What has gone wrong in the ten weeks since he and his party were on top of the world? The official Republican response by the new junior senator from Iowa--yikes:
Hi! I'm Joni! I grew up in a small town in Iowa! When it rained, my mom tied little plastic baggies around my one good pair of shoes! That's what all the moms did! Obamacare, the EPA, and the Department of Education have to go!
I'm guessing she was around half through her corn pone recitation when my wife, trying to elevate the discourse piping into our living room, switched to "The Big-Titted Solipsists of Orange County." Thinking on the question of who speaks for the Republicans, I was reminded of a snippet from one of the Sunday shows I was watching recently. The gas bags were gassing about Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney, the buzz around will-they-or-won't-they, and the Republican mouthpiece expressed the opinion that "it's time to turn the page, and talking about Bush and Romney isn't turning the page." True, but would it really help their cause if the talk was about--Marco Rubio? Rand Paul? Ted Cruz?
Mentioning Rubio reminds me of the debacle following upon him being tapped to respond to an Obama State of the Union. It's always said that it's the president's night and that the opposition's spokesperson has an impossible task. That's what they say about refereeing football games, too, after referees have just manifestly blown it. I don't think it's true, anyway. Here is Jim Webb, Democrat of Virginia and a prospective (albeit second-tier) candidate for the Democratic nomination for president in 2016, responding to a SOTU of Bush the Younger:
This is not a man determined to provide Jon Stewart with material.
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