Summations Only

Any big political party is made up of a variety of different ideological strands. This is especially true in the US, where people who'd rather be running as a Libertarian or a Green join the Democrats or Republicans because they know they have no chance on the national stage otherwise. The religious right may be one of the most vocal and noticeable parts of the Republican party nowadays, but it's also the party you join if your political hero is Ayn Rand - one of the most militant atheists the right has ever produced.

That's the first time I've heard Mitt Romney speak. He reminds me of an actor, but I can't quite place who. Try listening to his words without watching the picture and see if you can help me figure out who I'm thinking of.

I don't think we have any call to sit all smug in Europe. Whilst there are certainly absurdities in the US political system, we've got our fair share here, too. As crashfrog pointed out, the PVV got 15% of the vote in the Netherlands two years ago, and they're still the third largest party now. We're talking a party that put up a website allowing people to register complaints about eastern Europeans playing music too loud or being drunk in the streets.List Pim Fortuyn did even better, with some voters expressing the opinion that it would be cool to vote for a dead man.I don't think we're in a position to mock.

This is the first time I've seen the quote in full, and I'd agree wholeheartedly with your analysis.This is clearly a speech made to rich potential donors, in which Romney is trying to explain why he has a good chance of winning despite high polling numbers for Obama. He does so by appealing to their prejudices about lazy goodfornothings leeching off the state, thus simultaneously reminding them why rich people should prefer Romney instead.Successful politicians are almost all habitual liars, and always have been. They have always tailored what they say to their audience at the time - it's simply that this is getting harder to get away with now because so much of what public figures do is recorded and posted on the internet immediately. It used to be much simpler - I think it was in A People's History of the United States where two transcripts from Abraham Lincoln's 1860 election campaign are included. In one he condemns the evils of slavery to a meeting of abolitionists; in the other he expresses his continued support for the institution of slavery to a meeting of slaveholders.

Canadian colours are also wrong. Liberals use yellow - the NDP should be the ones in red. Orange is reserved for social democrats in countries where the Communist party has staked too big a claim to red already.