Everybody in the Tank for Lizzie

Dear Dr. Bones,

Well entanked are the mainstream Blue Blazers, that is, who piously account St. Elisabeth of Warrenbuffet ‘strong’ with the particular cerulæan species of strength which their Blueships just happen to like best themselves. One might uncharitably, but not, I think, inaccurately, speak of the ’GBH gentry’s _Kraft-durch-Geistesfundament_ approach to ungrounded collective self-esteem.

H*rv*rd has much to answer for, but that is another story. At the moment we may prescind from root causes and go mostly for the pragmatic capillaries, meaning the "Karl an’ Lizzie Show," another product from roughly the same wunnerful volks who gave us Harry an’ Louise. As you know, I have my doubts about _le ouarrenbuffetisme en Amérique_, yet Her Beatitude undoubtedly is well-advised to overlook poor Sen. Fratboy and go straight for rich Karl, Firstlord Rove. I mean, ¿Why fool around? Take out Edgar Bergen, and the New McCarthyism will instantly become a used-truck joke rather than a menace.

His firstlordship is no contemptible opponent, however. Comrade Charley, who most likely has not been on the MBTA in thirteen years going on thirty, speaks of "preposterous Rovery." Not very respectful, is that, of his firstlordship’s exalted rank an’ station. [1] More important, however, is that jesting Charley may underestimate the freelordly grasp of political strategy and operations [2] and tactics.

With this we arrive at our _droitisme du jour_, which, like a great deal of what appears on the op-ed pages of _The Wall Street Jingo_, is thoroughly Rovan in its substance, an’ likely Rove-inspired, in the sense of bein’ a demonstrable consequenc of his firstlordship’s Master Plan

POLITICAL DIARY DECEMBER 10, 2011 Scott Brown’s Strategy The Massachusetts senator faces a tough re-election challenge from Elizabeth Warren. By ALLYSIA FINLEY This week Senate Republicans blocked President Obama’s nomination of former Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Only two Republicans broke ranks -- Olympia Snowe of Maine and Scott Brown of Massachusetts -- and both senators are up for re-election next year. Ms. Snowe should win handily if she isn’t toppled by a primary challenger. Mr. Brown’s re-election prospects, by contrast, are shakier. Two new polls show the GOP freshman trailing Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard law professor who helped establish the CFPB and is expected to be the Democratic nominee. The University of Massachusetts-Amherst gives Ms. Warren a four-point lead and a University of Massachusetts-Lowell/Boston Herald poll has her up by seven points. Three months ago, most polls showed Mr. Brown slightly ahead. The senator’s approval rating has also fallen by eight points to 45%, though his favorables are still in positive territory and exceed Ms. Warren’s. While the poll results may be disconcerting for Mr. Brown and Senate Republicans, they’re not unexpected. Ms. Warren’s campaign has spent $1.5 million on an ad that portrays her as a defender of the middle class. And the League of Conservation Voters has dumped $2 million on spots that tar Mr. Brown as a Washington insider. The real surprise is that Mr. Brown still leads Ms. Warren, 53-37, with independents. Because Republicans constitute less than 15% of the Massachusetts electorate, Mr. Brown will probably have to win more than two-thirds of the independent vote and probably pick up some Democrats as well. [3] Mr. Brown might feel the need to bolster his credentials as an independent thinker by voting with Democrats on some issues. These occasional defections may irritate Republicans, but they’d do well to ask themselves if they’d rather have a Scott Brown in that seat who votes with them 90% of the time -- or an Elizabeth Warren.

Her freeladyship does not spell out that the notorious ratfinkess Snowe of ME did not actually vote for Comrade Cordray’s confirmation, she only barked ‘Present’. It is a little surprising to me, by the way, that Senator Fratboy did not do the same. Charley-on-the-Great Blue Hill could claim with some plausibility that Fratboy’s handlers an’ Funders must be gettin’ really scared.

I draw your attention to her freeladyship’s "real surprise ... that Mr. Brown still leads Ms. Warren." I incline to think that is disingenuous, but would like your opinion since my own is wobbly. Of course one presumes that no Jingo seriously believes that money cannot buy elections, and equally it will be a problem for Freedame Finley that the money she speaks of has been spent by the forces of unwhighteousness, who presumably ought not to be able to pull off a trick ideally reserved to the Jingo Class.

The neocomradology hereabouts gets complicated, however: naturally the WSJ freedame does not trouble us with any utterly irrelevant information about how much has been spent in the path of Fratboy’s reëlection. Pretty plainly the _Jingo_ consumer is bein’ solicited to wallow briefly in selfpity that $3,500,000.00 can have been deployed on behalf of manifest unwhighteousness. The wallowin’ is easier if one tosses in a little _suggestio falsi_ to the effect that poor Fratboy has hardly anythin’ to spend except maybe a small mark-up on those baseball bats over to his e-store. [4]





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[1] The ’GBH gentry are in much the same pickle, rank-and-stationwise, as were the Airstrip One Republicans of 1641-1660. Always in danger, I mean, of inadvertently giving their own tenants and clients unfortunate notions along Col. Rainsborough’s lines.

With Her Beatitude, to be sure, anything of the rabble-rousing "poorest she that is in Massachusetts " sort would indeed be an inadvertance, for of course most of our poor [s]he’s cannot afford to specuvest in anything classier than lottery tickets. (Plus now maybe slot machines: "¡Thank you, Governor Paddy!") To offer them "consumer protection" againt "Wall Street" is not merely the proverbial refrigerators for Esquimaux, it is velvet gloves and carpet slippers for quadruple amputees. So to speak.

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[2] ¿Would you happen to know, O Bones, exactly what this "operational level" that with-it violence pros always stick in between the strategy and the their tactics nowadays actually amounts to? I am happy enough to pick it up like a jackdaw and throw it at anybooby who seems to need thrown at, but I would not positively object to knowing what I am doing.

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[3] The Party neocomradess estimates her ideobuddies in MA at fifteen percent, which is probably optimistic fudge to some extent. Until proved otherwise, therefore, I shall continue to subtract four points and speak of ‘ElevenPercenters’, opposed, naturally, to us fiends of "The Eighty-Nine Percent."

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[4] Ye Olde Fratboy Paraphernalia Shoppe is a scribbleworthy topic in itself. Indeed, I am thinking of an epic poem . . . .

Meanwhile, and confined to prose, I guess that the Funders of Fratboy insisted that Master Scott have a storefront lest the "small people" fail to take him seriously, solicitationwise. They don’t need their smallies to actually buy anythin’, they only (as I conjecture) want’em to feel at home on the website

On the other hand, if you would kindly click here , Dr. Bones, you may discover exactly what mark-up the Fratboy Funders have decided on. Not to give away the ending and spoil your own fun and your mouse’s, I shall say no more here than that they could in theory rake in a significant number of _sh'qálîm_. ASSUMIN’, that is, that any significant number of Fratboy groupies crave to possess a "personally autographed" whight wingbat.

(( It would be fun to think of gear that Her Beatitude might countermarket with -- granny glasses, or, if clubs be trumps, a rolling pin , or ¿how about . . . ?

(( ¡Alas!, there will be nothing of the sort. Her Beatitude is out for a rather more upmarket market niche, a better slice of smallies who want their steak so bad they can dispense with the sizzle. ))