The Good News is Gay Rights are Human Rights, the Bad News is Mitt's New Campaign Song is a Kid Rock Song
NEW YORK—It's the 70th anniversary of Pearl Harbor today, a day that has indeed lived in infamy, providing us with our annual reminder that you can all probably take those "never forget" bumper stickers off your cars because human beings are actually pretty good at remembering terrible things that have happened to them, thank you very much.
And now for the news, which, BREAKING: Alec Baldwin got kicked off an airplane yesterday and it's all anyone can talk about today and isn't our media just the best because really where would our democracy be without such a discriminating and responsible fourth estate to ask all the truly important questions we have to wonder?
(We kid, obviously.)
So! Democrats all across the country are peeing themselves this morning after the Obama re-election effort kicked off in full force yesterday in Osawatomie, KS (pronounced oh-suh-WAHT-ah-mee) (you're welcome). The President delivered a speech reminiscent of the Obama the Campaigner we all know and love, one of only a handful of sightings we've had during three very long and mostly kind of meh years of Obama the President. And while we'll admit we're as delighted as anyone to hear the President hitting all the right populist notes, we're also still feeling a little burnt from the last time the President gave a bunch of inspiring speeches and won the election and then when he was on his way to the capital he stopped off at the Goldman Sachs boardroom to put together an economic team. So, fool us once shame on we won't be foo—er, whatever, this is all to say the President's speech really only registered a 6.4 or so on our Hopey Changey index.
Historic, amazing, truly heartwearming stuff yesterday out of the State Department, as Hillary Clinton delivered a beautiful speech in which she pledged to tie American foreign policy to a broader definition of human rights, making the latter one and the same with gay rights. The Advocate has a good wrap-up of some of the more feel-good bullet points from her speech, such as: "This recognition did not occur all at once. It evolved over time. And as it did, we understood that we were honoring rights that people always had, rather than creating new or special rights for them. Like being a woman, like being a racial, religious, tribal, or ethnic minority, being LGBT does not make you less human. And that is why gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights." We also appreciate the nod Ms. Clinton gave to the ongoing struggle for gay rights here at home, because when we first saw the President's memorandum yesterday we thought it was a bit odd that a man who has said he's "still working on" how he feels about letting domestic gays get married would start talking big game about international gays, but Hillary went out of her way to say that "we, like all nations, have more work to do to protect human rights at home," so, you know, hooray for self-awareness.
Mitt Romney is grabbing all the headlines today in the GOP primary race after distinguishing himself as the only grown-up in the room willing to turn down an invitation to this calamitous mockery of a debate being hosted by Donald Trump (our sincerest apologies to Messrs. Huntsman and Paul, both also also grown-ups who just so happen to be dogged by the fact that there aren't very many grown-ups answering the phone when Republican pollsters call). Now between the lines it's a completely different story, of course, considering Mitt's the only candidate in the race right now sitting on an actual war chest, meaning he's the only candidate who has the luxury of being able to turn down Trump's offer of free airtime because he can just drop a few mil to flood Iowa's airwaves with a few more ads putting John McCain words in the Preisdent Obama's mouth.
Though! We'll admit we may be entirely off point here, because if Mitt's really got all the money he needs to dominate the airwaves then we're just left scratching our heads over his decision to make his first Sunday television appearance in nearly two years on... Fox News ? As in, the network that just beat him up last week?
But in any event, this is serious: Newt Gingrich now absolutely has to win the Republican nomination, because Mike Allen reports this morning that Mitt Romney has selected Kid Rock's "Born Free" as his campaign song and none of us will survive eleven months of hearing Kid Rock this can't be happening, seriously, he must be stopped if we're to save the Union.