Pizzas and Pessimism
By FRANK BRUNI
NYT
BEING surprised by something nutty from Herman Cain’s presidential campaign is like balking at an autopsy in a “CSI” episode: certain things go with the territory. Still, you had to pause and peel your jaw off the ground after watching an Internet ad for Cain that prompted considerable conversation last week.
In it Cain’s chief of staff, who comes across mostly as an untidy salt-and-pepper mustache with a rumpled politico attached, delivers the needless reminder that Cain has “run a campaign like nobody’s ever seen.” To prove the point he glowers meaningfully at the camera while sucking manfully on a cigarette. Alligators as border-patrol agents and nicotine for all: that’s the Cain agenda. The candidate appears in close-up at the end of the commercial, flashing a grin that’s two parts demented to one part demonic. Were there a thought bubble attached, it would say, “In my wildest dreams I never thought you people would actually buy this pizza.”
Meanwhile Rick Perry, who would trade his five best pairs of custom-made cowboy boots for just one of Cain’s percentage points in the polls, tried to steal the dubious thunder of the Herminator’s 9-9-9 tax hallucination by announcing an either-or, multiple-choice tax phantasm of his own. It would compel you to hire an accountant to figure out whether you’re best served by the existing code or by a 20 percent flat tax designed to spare you the accountant. If you go the 20 percent route, Perry said, you can file your returns on a postcard. I think he should add a deduction for taxpayers whose postcards promote national pride. I’ll pick one with the Statue of Liberty. You can do Mount Rushmore or the Washington Monument.
In the midst of all this, two attention-commanding sets of numbers were released. One, from the Congressional Budget Office, confirmed an increasingly uneven distribution of wealth in this country, noting that the inflation-adjusted incomes of the most affluent Americans had grown much, much faster over the last three decades than the incomes of the middle class. The other, from a New York Times/CBS News poll, showed that 74 percent of Americans think the country is on the wrong track and 89 percent do not trust that government will do the right thing.
(More here.)
NYT
BEING surprised by something nutty from Herman Cain’s presidential campaign is like balking at an autopsy in a “CSI” episode: certain things go with the territory. Still, you had to pause and peel your jaw off the ground after watching an Internet ad for Cain that prompted considerable conversation last week.
In it Cain’s chief of staff, who comes across mostly as an untidy salt-and-pepper mustache with a rumpled politico attached, delivers the needless reminder that Cain has “run a campaign like nobody’s ever seen.” To prove the point he glowers meaningfully at the camera while sucking manfully on a cigarette. Alligators as border-patrol agents and nicotine for all: that’s the Cain agenda. The candidate appears in close-up at the end of the commercial, flashing a grin that’s two parts demented to one part demonic. Were there a thought bubble attached, it would say, “In my wildest dreams I never thought you people would actually buy this pizza.”
Meanwhile Rick Perry, who would trade his five best pairs of custom-made cowboy boots for just one of Cain’s percentage points in the polls, tried to steal the dubious thunder of the Herminator’s 9-9-9 tax hallucination by announcing an either-or, multiple-choice tax phantasm of his own. It would compel you to hire an accountant to figure out whether you’re best served by the existing code or by a 20 percent flat tax designed to spare you the accountant. If you go the 20 percent route, Perry said, you can file your returns on a postcard. I think he should add a deduction for taxpayers whose postcards promote national pride. I’ll pick one with the Statue of Liberty. You can do Mount Rushmore or the Washington Monument.
In the midst of all this, two attention-commanding sets of numbers were released. One, from the Congressional Budget Office, confirmed an increasingly uneven distribution of wealth in this country, noting that the inflation-adjusted incomes of the most affluent Americans had grown much, much faster over the last three decades than the incomes of the middle class. The other, from a New York Times/CBS News poll, showed that 74 percent of Americans think the country is on the wrong track and 89 percent do not trust that government will do the right thing.
(More here.)
Powered by Blogger
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home