Right Outside Your Door

Mint Julep
Newly-minted presidential candidate Rick Perry got a taste Thursday of the rough-and-tumble nature of presidential politics, with protesters dogging him on the campaign trail, demanding to know whether he thinks Social Security is unconstitutional and begging him to follow through on threats of Texas seceding. (Washington Post, 8/20/2011)


In a "barking dog" story the Washington Post breathtakingly writes that Governor Rick Perry was heckled.....by Democrats!


“He’s appealing to the tea party,” said Larry Drake, a retired federal worker and Democrat who said he came Thursday to show his opposition to the Republican governor. (Washington Post, 8/20/2011)


This is news?


Victims Rights
Leaders are elected to lead (from the front, incidentally). That means dealing with events, not plaintively claiming to be their victim. (Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post, 8/19/2011)


One of RedStateVT's aphorisms is that you get the presidency that you get.  George Bush certainly did not want 9/11, but that is the presidency that he got and those were the circumstances that he dealt with for eight years.  Barack Obama likewise did not want a recessionary economy, but that is what he got.  How has he dealt with it?  Well, so far he has tried the blame game and - when that grew old - he has now switched to playing the victim card.  How unpresidential! 


Repeat After
...he spent his political capital on the largely irrelevant issue of health care. Now he wants to become the jobs candidate, mainly through the repetition of the word “jobs.” (Michael Gerson, Washington Post, 8/19/2011)


Good point by Gerson and one that RedStateVT has made.  Namely, the Left ignored the economy for two years pushing their unwanted health care agenda.  Then, when the polls told them that their flagging numbers were a result of high unemployment, they all start chanting "jobs."  We note that even Vermont's Colonel Sanders has taken time out from his usual calls for wealth redistribution to echo the jobs mantra.  Of course, what the Left wants are more union and public sectors jobs.....