38 thoughts on “Our next Republican presidential candiate?”

      1. Seconded. I saw that Rolling Stone piece last week. Scary shit. I have little doubt of Bachmann’s electability were she to win the nomination. Mock Michele = mock Christianity, so every time we laugh at her, she gets stronger (to paraphrase).

    2. Yes, against Palin she looks sane and well-informed, and I fear too many Americans will see nothing wrong with that video.

        1. Whatever Shuggy may think on the matter, Bill Maher seems to agree with you because he said that Bachmann appeals to those for whom Palin is too intellectual.

  4. I’m completely flabbergasted… the crowd is rocking back and forth like, like… they’re participating in some cult ritual (ok… so it is a cult) rather than a government function. Is it that pervasive in the republican party?

    I think Harper’s core group here in Canada are the same, they just have to hide it.

    1. Yes, Harper would love to unleash his Christian side. With the majority, I’m surprised I haven’t heard of some ridiculous shit yet. Except for the fighter jets. Fuck him.

      I was not told about God when I was a kid. When my friends would talk about God, I would imagine they were speaking metaphorically, just “pretending” that God existed. But no, my friends actually believed this crap.

      But no, those top-end political figures believe this crap.

  5. I disagree with you emphatically about whether or not she can win. She can. Many days, I am not so cynical as to think this, but today is not one of them. This is a country that nominated Sarah Palin for vice president. We like our leaders attractive, religious and dumb as a box of rocks. Bachmann wins the trifecta.

  6. “The good news: Michele Bachmann can’t win.”

    You underestimate the brainwash-ability of the fundie/right/non-metropolitan voting base. In 2004 I argued with famous ecologist Bob Paine and famous fisheries biologist Ransom Myers (now deceased) who claimed there was no way Bush would get re-elected. Obama’s wishy-washy approach on so many issues makes me unwilling to automatically presume victory against any of the GOP wackaloons except maybe Palin now.

  7. Taibbi on Bachmann:

    “Michele Bachmann … is one of the scariest sights in the entire American cultural tableau. She’s trying to look like June Cleaver, but she actually looks like the T2 skeleton posing for a passport photo. You will want to laugh, but don’t, because the secret of Bachmann’s success is that every time you laugh at her, she gets stronger.”

  8. I thought she had a litle more common sense than Palin, but no, so you are right. But, I do have to put her a little above the Miss America candidates and Miss America.

    1. Actually, after reading the article I felt that she was worse than Sarah Palin, which was a shocking idea. If I had a choice, (and I won’t) I would prefer Palin to Bachmann, and then get myself a bunker in the hills.

  9. *Sniffing the political winds… phew*

    Just as I, and I’m sure many others, enjoyed a measure of satisfaction when a black man was elected President, there are many (including me, with caveats) who will feel similarly when a woman becomes the Commander-In-Chief of our military. (Oops, one of my sexist caveats just slipped out, sorry.)

    Bachmann is TV friendly, and she is a conservative, religious woman. These in fact are her great political strengths. Are they enough to beat Barack Obama, or even Mitt Romney?

    No. But in 2016 the Dems better be thinking woman, or else I’m moving to Shanghai.

  10. It’s been said before in another thread, but bears repeating…

    “When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross” — Sinclair Lewis, 1935

    Would any politician use this against Bachmann?

    /@

  11. Next year’s election already has the feel of an appalling slow-motion train wreck. As an outsider and non-participant, I can’t avert my eyes and I find it fascinating, amusing, and frightening in equal measure. And in the long term, what? If some crazy evangelical doesn’t win this time, they might in 2016, 2020, unless somehow America collectively gets a grip on reality and embraces the concept of evidence-based politics.

    1. Americans, present company excepted, are not interested in evidence, they want belief. If things aren’t going well it’s because you don’t have enough faith, in yourself, in the process, in providence. They have been fed so much crap about the power of positive thinking that they imagine that if you say it loudly and often enough you can make black into white and day into night. I am very grateful not to live in the USA, it must be very dispiriting. I hope our new Chinese overlords treat us as well as the Yanks did. Seems unlikely.

  13. Even with only a college psych 101 course as my only credentials, I can see that Bachmann is one seriously disturbed woman. She positively reeks of paranoia, and as for her religiosity – well, I have a hard time accepting that people like her really, truly believe the biblical platitudes they spout. I think the best we can hope for is that somewhere along the line she will lose it and go completely bonkers so that even the most brainwashed will see her as the batshit wacko that she is (remember – liberal wackos are moonbats; conservative wackos are batshit).

    As to a Bachmann/Palin or Palin/Bachmann ticket, I see a number of alternatives. One is that it would end up being a case of the Kilkenny cats – if this is the way it goes, it will either self-destruct halfway through the campaign or (ceiling cat forbid!) shortly after taking office. Another is that they will be so concerned with grabbing the spotlight that it will never get off the ground. Yet another is that Palin will quit partway through.

  15. No, she can’t win, and she won’t. What a pitiful state (North) American politics is in where you’re scared that such an ignornant – and relishing it – person could even be considered as President.
    She is “a laughing matter”. We can, and will, laugh at her. At least Bush (jr), though elected twice, never revelled in his stupidity.
    Hey, USA, you’ve got a clever President now. And yeah, “clever” isn’t all it takes, but he’s much smarter than his dumb, divided, opposition.
    Let’s all unpray that he gets her as the Reblican candidate.
    In the meantime, laugh your socks off – hey, wear sandals even – at the wackallooniest candidate since Palin.
    Stop giving this idiot anything other than scorn.
    But do give her scorn.
    Not the next President

    1. Also, someone seems to say “Jesus” in a rather non-devotional way at 1:38 – maybe the guy who stands up behind Bachmann? Kinda funny…

  18. It just so happens that I have clean hands, a pure heart, am righteous and don,t deserve anyone’s wrath. So therefore I don’t need forgiveness.

  21. She’s beautiful enough to win. Wouldn’t be surprised. Wonder how Hillary will feel that someone like MB could be the first female president! What an insult.

  22. The thing that’s going to hurt Palin is that as a full blown teabagger, she’s not going to have as much luck appealing to moderates and independents as George W did. Her peculiar brand of insanity is on display for pretty much everyone to see, and she somehow manages to be even worse about it than Georgie did, which ought to help out in the number of people who go for President Obama instead.

  23. It’s not totally impossible, but I still think pretty highly unlikely that she could win. Alot of the people that stayed home or hesitantly voted for Obama because Palin was on the GOP ticket (like David Frum) are gonna be just as weary about Bachmann, and perhaps even more-so because she would be at the TOP of the ticket. And I highly doubt too many Obama supporters would vote for her. The biggest worry is that Obama voters don’t turn out to vote either thinking he’ll win easily, or because they aren’t happy with what he’s done and want to teach him a lesson by staying home. That would be a mighty costly lesson as a Bachmann presidency would be a disaster on the level of W, all over again.

  24. I’m not sure what’s so spectacular about this video. Yes, if you don’t share their faith, it looks weird, but all faith is weird from a rational point of view. There wasn’t anything in it that seemed all that extreme. Granted, I was raised in a “Charismatic” Pentecostal environment, so my gauge for extremes may be a little skewed, but what she prayed was pretty boilerplate Christian rhetoric (a lot straight from the Bible).

    It’s not her religion that bothers me as much as her complete lack of historical accuracy. Every president we’ve had has been religious to a certain extent. The true mark of a good leader is knowing where we’ve been to know where we’re going and how to get there. Unfortunately, she’s one of those people who likes to rewrite history to fit her ideology, and that sort of ignorance is dangerous.

  25. american Taliban…

    I like the dude drinking his coffee while communicating with God.

  26. Oh politics! Imagine my problem. I am a hard-core fiscal conservative. I am also a hard-ass skeptic that accepts only scientific and mathematical arguments as valid. Who the Hell am I going to vote for, morons like Bachmann or financial imbeciles like Obama? Our ruling class is simply third rate to the core. I cannot think of a single person in government that I respect for their stellar intellectual or other achievements. It really is time to purge the body politics of these losers.

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