Theater of the Absurd

I think this new Mitt Romney plan for a "Reagan Zone of Economic Freedom" may be dumber than the CIA's terror-busters logo:

I don't, however, think it beats Islamofascist Awareness Week.

Comments

One of the many idiotic things about this is that Canada is listed as joining the "zone" in 1994 (the year NAFTA came into effect) rather than 1988 (the year the original US-Canada free trade deal came into effect, and when Reagan actually had something directly to do with it).

Posted by GC | October 23, 2007 3:55 PM

GC made this comment a little less pertinent, but a person looking at the map might note that none of the relevant agreements were concluded less than five years after Ronald Reagan left office. This is only marginally less accurate, historically, than naming it the Alexander Hamilton Zone of Economic Freedom.

Posted by You Can Call Me Al | October 23, 2007 4:26 PM

Soooo... no free trade agreement with any member of the Europe Union? Nor, in fact, any country occupying the European continent? Nor Japan? Seems, I don't know, short-sighted.

Posted by Toady | October 23, 2007 4:47 PM

Well, if you just look at the big red circles, rather than the tiny, irrelevant little arrowheads, you'll see that this Zone covers the entire world! (Especially the oceans.)

Posted by Vance Maverick | October 23, 2007 4:50 PM

What? No Iraq?

Geez - we invaded a country, and we don't even have a stupid FTA to show for it. What a waste of taxpayer money.

Posted by Jay Andrew Allen | October 23, 2007 4:53 PM

Why am I suddenly reminded of the Marklar aliens from South Park?

Posted by Ron | October 23, 2007 5:41 PM

I have the annoying suspicion that come the general election (against anyone other than Hillary) he'll rename it the Bill Clinton Free Trade Area. Moderate. Bipartisan.

Sleazy.

Matt, this is basically why you're wrong about Romney. You have a pretty good idea of where Giuliani, McCain, Thompson, or Huckabee might go wrong, and so will a Democratic Congress. They'll aggressively pursue initiatives you think of as wrongheaded. Fine; (a) we're all wrong sometimes, and (b) when someone openly pushes a piece of legislation you think of as wrongheaded, this is a democracy. You get to try and beat them.

You have NO IDEA where Mitt Romney will go wrong, especially in a second term. All you know, based on his public record, is that if he woke up tomorrow morning in Pakistan, he'd declare himself a candidate for President and run on a radically anti-American, fundamentalist Muslim platform. Huckabee is running against the Club for Growth. McCain is running against anti-immigrant sentiment in his own party and the rest of the country. Thompson is running against Americans' increasing desire to have a President who knows what he's doing. Giuliani is running against Jerry Falwell, and Americans' traditional desire to have a President who knows whether he's going to dress as a man or a woman on a given day.

Mitt Romney has the popular position on every issue at any given time. In 1994, in Massachussets? Anti-Reagan. Today? Wants to name half the world after Reagan. In 2002, in Massachussets? Pro-choice and pro-gay. In 2007, in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina? Anti-choice and anti-gay. In Michigan, a son of Michigan. In Utah, a Mormon. In New Hampshire, the ex-governor of Massachussets.

This isn't to say that he would or wouldn't necessarily be the worst President of the bunch (that's probably Gravel or Paul), but seriously, Matt, doesn't it give you pause that you have no idea what he stands for except it's always convenient? What if 50.00001% of Americans support nuking London? What if he's got the opportunity, as a lame duck, to loot Fort Knox and escape to Bimini in Marine One? What if he's forced to face one of the millions of hard ethical questions that face a President annually without polling data at hand?

Don't tell me 'everybody does it,' either. Barack Obama built his political legacy opposing a war everybody else was for, including you. John Edwards is running on poverty above all else even though we know income correlates positively with likelihood to vote. Hillary Clinton pushed national healthcare when it was unpopular and stuck by her plan later when that plan was even less popular. Joe Biden voted for the partial-birth abortion ban even though he was going to have to run in a Democratic primary in 2008 and won't make some of the votes Democratic primary voters want on Iraq bills because he doesn't believe in them. Bill Richardson stood up for Alberto Gonzales, even though he was running in a Democratic primary. Chris Dodd's for a carbon tax. Dennis Kucinich certainly does not poll anything he says. Mike Gravel may not even know what he's saying.

In short, I can come up with at least one stand from every other candidate that isn't convenient. I can't for Mitt. If you can't, why doesn't that make you nervous?

Posted by You Can Call Me Al | October 24, 2007 12:18 AM

Other than letting Giuliani off way too lightly, YCCMA gets this 100% correct. I'd have described Rudy as running against smiles/sanity (take your pick).

Posted by jhupp | October 24, 2007 9:33 AM

On the one hand, the breathtaking transparency of Romney's pandering is really amusing to behold.

On the other hand, is it so clear that the transparency is apparent to the voting public?

Is it obvious, but effective? (One assumes that Mitt is not trying to woo Matt's or my votes.)

Posted by Sean | October 24, 2007 12:13 PM