'The Stench' Quandary

I'm with Krugman: "if this Politico piece is to be believed" (my italics) ... wherein Roger Simon relates that, reportedly--and that's a major advisory--Paul Ryan "has been marching around his campaign bus, saying things like, 'If Stench calls, take a message.' "

The problem with taking Simon's reported reporting seriously, rather than as second-hand sarcasm, is that the "stench" piece also presents a brief, straightforward history of PowerPoint's origins:  

PowerPoint was released by Microsoft in 1990 as a way to euthanize cattle using a method less cruel than hitting them over the head with iron mallets. After PETA successfully argued in court that PowerPoint actually was more cruel than iron mallets, the program was adopted by corporations for slide show presentations.

I'm inclined, as any survivor of one of those godawful PP assaults would be, to accept Simon's history, and so accept The Stench. On the other hand, I would then have to allow Paul Ryan a few molecular synapses of lucidity; and there, I just cannot freely and fully go.

Comments

[japa21]

Since Ryan sees himself as some sort of boy wonder (it is not always good to believe what everybody writes about you) and that he is immune to anything that could possibly damage his career, I tend to believe the story.

What he doesn't realize is that any national party does look down upon disloyalty. Palin went rogue, and even was proud of that fact. Where is she now? Except for a small segment of a rapidly shrinking Tea Party, she is nowhere. Ryan' only saving grace is that he is in the House and will undoubtedly be reelected. However, if the Dems take back the House (increasingly likely) his power base will rapidly shrink and there will be those that include him in the blame for the GOP's defeat, no matter how much he tries to distance himself now.

[Janicket]

Aw, Krugman's now saying, at the same link, that it was all satire.

But what does it say about Ryan and the RR campaign that one could be in any doubt?

[Peter G]

Read that same piece last night and the same paragraph caused all present to howl with laughter. My wife was nearly Power Pointed to death at a conference in San Francisco last week. Thank the government agents, Fire Marshals and wise laws that forbid the locking of exits, that escape was possible.

[Peter G]

Btw Janicket it is a shame that was only satire because, as apples of discord go, that was a beaut.

[Chris Andersen]

The Romney campaign has entered that phase that no political campaign wants to enter: the phase where everyone starts to believe the worst about them based on the least amount of evidence because it fits the pattern of past behavior.

So, when Romney joked about wishing he could crack the windows on his jet, a lot of people thought he was actually serious. And now a piece that was apparently meant as satire was, for a while, taken as serious reporting (I guess Simon didn't put enough emoticons in his article).

Al Gore experienced the same thing in 2000. The "serial exaggerator" narrative took on a life of its own and every remark he said for the final weeks of the campaign was examined with a fine tooth comb to see if it was yet another example of Gore exaggerating his past.

No campaign wants to enter this stage because it is virtually impossible to leave it. Once the narrative is accepted as fact, everything becomes fair game.

[Janicket]

That's spot on, Chris. The Romney campaign is entering its death spiral, buffeted by gales of snorts and guffaws.

[Peter G]

Yes indeed Chris, The Stench had the aroma of truthiness.