Patterico's Pontifications

5/6/2019

Jim Geraghty on That O’Rourke Guy

Filed under: General — JVW @ 4:26 pm



[guest post by JVW]

One of the drawbacks of being a lazy blogger is that when I finally am inspired to spin up a post on a particular topic I oftentimes see that someone (and quite often, someone at this very site) has already covered the topic at hand and, frankly, done a far better job on it than I would have. Such is the case with the currently stalling Presidential candidacy of Robert F. O’Rourke of El Paso. After a cloying will-he-or-won’t-he dalliance that left his media bobbysoxers swooning, the former three-term Congressman and failed Senate candidate entered the race and raised a whole lot of scratch, yet remains mired in the polls behind a senile has-been who has been rattling around Washington since the Nixon era, an insane elderly socialist tragically trapped in 1962, Chief Bunkum and Hokum, the unaccomplished mayor of a small college town, and Intersectionality Bingo. Over the weekend I saw a pretty scathing piece that lefty media Queen Bee Margaret Carlson dropped over at the The Daily Beast, which takes the Man Who Would be Known as Beto to task:

You can thank, or blame, women who make up almost 58 percent of the primary electorate for Beto’s decline. Disproportionately, they don’t like him.

According to my unscientific poll asking every woman I see, Beto reminds them of the worst boyfriend they ever had: self-involved, convinced of his own charm, chronically late if he shows up at all, worth a meal or two but definitely not marriage material. When he should be home with the kids or taking out the trash, he’s jamming with his garage band or skateboarding at Whataburger. He’s “in and out of a funk” which requires long and meaningful runs to clear his head. Every thought he has is transcendent, worthy of being narrated, videotaped, and blogged. He is always out finding himself. At age 46, the man asking to run the country is currently lost.

So I decided to build a blog post around the idea of where was all of this rational discernment one year ago when the guy was the newest progressive heartthrob who would chase that nasty Ted Cruz from Washington and accelerate the process of turning Texas purple, only to find that over at National Review Online Jim Geraghty had already beaten me to it, and come up with all of the links that I would have spent some time searching for:

As far as I can tell, Carlson never wrote about O’Rourke last year. But last year, various writers at the Daily Beast labeled him a “liberal hero . . . with a penchant for going viral,” that he’s “break[ing] down the walls between candidate and constituents,”that his “fundraising operation is still proving to be a remarkable success, one that some of the top digital operatives in the Democratic Party believe could be foundational for future campaigns,” that his “supporters tout his quite liberal policy positions only after gushing about him as a person,” and they even declared that his dental visit “livestream was admirable in principle.”

Geraghty even takes the time to provide a possible statement that these newly-chastened media outlets might want to release, in order to explain why they acted like teenybopper girls at a boy band concert:

Since the 2018 Texas Senate race ended, we’ve gotten to know Beto O’Rourke better and put simply, we chose to see what we wanted to see that year. He was glib, and we convinced ourselves it was charisma. He looked young, and we told ourselves he was the voice of a new generation. We found his skateboarding and guitar-playing cool when it was kind of silly and juvenile, and we persuaded ourselves that he was an accomplished leader when we now see he was a bumbling slacker who had married up and had his political ambitions carried along by his father-in-law’s wealth and connections. We hate Ted Cruz with the passion of a thousand suns going supernova, and because of that, we talked ourselves into believing that this guy was Lone Star Jesus. We recognize that we have a worsening problem with wish-casting and have checked into a twelve-step program.

I can’t improve on that, other than to point out that O’Rourke got to play the role of pseudo-Latino when challenging the dreaded Cruz, but now that he’s up against the Harrises, Bookers, Castros, Gabbards, Yangs, Warren/Gillibrand/Klobuchars of the Democrat field, he’s back to being an entitled straight white male. And they wonder why us nasty right-wingers are so cynical on matters of intersectionality.

– JVW

44 Responses to “Jim Geraghty on That O’Rourke Guy”

  1. “Intersectionality Bingo.” You guys all guessed which candidate that is, right? Do you like it? I might start trying to popularize that one.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  2. Another fun tidbit from the Carlson essay:

    [O’Rourke] also touched on health care last week in San Francisco in a room that holds 600, when in Oakland a month prior Sen. Kamala Harris drew 20,000. He name-checked her as he put forward his mushy plan against her single-payer one, noting his mother’s conversion from the GOP to vote for him as evidence his split-the-difference proposals can cover all bases.

    Well golly, that settles it! He’s so bipartisan that he got his Republican momma to vote for him.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  3. “Intersectionality Bingo.” You guys all guessed which candidate that is, right?

    Not me. Still don’t. I thought you meant the women. And I just now guessed that Chief Bunkum and Hokum is Pocahontas.

    nk (9651fb)

  4. I think it’s spelled Geraghty, JVW.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  5. Robert is not in the John Kerry gigolo class.
    Yet.

    mg (8cbc69)

  6. I think it’s spelled Geraghty, JVW.

    Goddammit! Thanks. Fixed.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  7. Papa o’Rourke a rich investor from Chicago who sits on 10,000 acres around el paso.

    Narciso (b87980)

  8. 7… for all I know it may be valuable, but from memory, that is a bleak looking part of Texas from a passenger jet window seat.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  9. Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys playing Western Swing, Col.

    mg (8cbc69)

  10. O’Rourke has apologized for an almost 30-year-old review of play he wrote as a Columbia University student in which he said the actresses’ “only qualifications seem to be their phenomenally large breasts and tight buttocks.”
    Weinstein University graduate.

    mg (8cbc69)

  11. Cory Booker?

    nk (9651fb)

  12. To mg#5 – in terms of brand and exoticness, no. But at least he didnt get this one “used”.

    urbanleftbehind (166e4c)

  13. Well, shucks: I guess Intersectionality Bingo isn’t as nifty a name as I thought it would be. Back to the drawing board.

    (nk, it describes the candidate who checks the boxes for black, Asian, and woman. Maybe I should go with “Intersectionality Trifecta” instead?)

    JVW (54fd0b)

  14. To mg#5 – in terms of brand and exoticness, no. But at least he didnt get this one “used”.

    There’s also something more traditional (and therefore, to me, less unseemly) about marrying a woman whose father is rich rather than marrying a woman whose deceased husband was rich.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  15. Shyamala Gopalan!

    nk (9651fb)

  16. Beto got traction against Cruz because Cruz is unlikeable and (IMO) tainted by association with Trump. And (IMO) Enough Texans are tired of Cruz and wanted to try a shiny new thing. Cruz is in many ways a decent guy (Trump sycophancy and evangelical-pandering notwithstanding) who declined to play hardball on the drunk driving accident. Anybody who did play hardball on that would eat him alive I think.

    JRH (52aed3)

  17. And if the 2004 version of the IL GOP was running things nationally, if faced with Gopalan, Naomi Rao would be the opponent they chose.

    urbanleftbehind (fa96ef)

  18. Television is visual and aural medium; it appreciates motion and projects emotion but endless jerking about both physically and verbally on camera by Beto is just too tiring to the senses. It’s cartoonish. He’s just too difficult to watch, hence the messaging gets lost.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  19. In actuality, Cruz v. O’Rourke was a battle between kept men…how ruthless could either get.

    urbanleftbehind (fa96ef)

  20. My sister was married to a musician for a time. I know the type. Attention span of a gnat, fun to be around when he’s “on”, but don’t expect him to be making regular money.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  21. Senator Bingo is, I think, from California.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  22. (nk, it describes the candidate who checks the boxes for black, Asian, and woman. Maybe I should go with “Intersectionality Trifecta” instead?)

    Oh. There it is. It would be better if she were gay, but I suspect not.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  23. because Cruz is unlikeable

    The beard helped him, as it helped Lincoln.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  24. haha I guess it did, come to think of it.

    JRH (52aed3)

  25. 16… Cruz should’ve been the nominee in 2016, he was my choice, but I fear he might’ve lost if he had been.

    Many of us are making the best of the hand reality dealt us. Some can’t overcome their distaste, others their out and out hatred. I have nothing but pity for the latter.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  26. @23. The beard has helped him…

    From just plain unlikable to Snidely Whiplash sinister.

    Yeah, that’s an upgrade to Tedtoo’s style. Next look- Frito Bandido.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  27. Many of us are making the best of the hand reality dealt us.

    Which is why Putin keeps bluffing his way to winning big pots with a pair of deuces.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  28. I, too, didn’t figure out who Intersectionality Bingo was. I dont think I even have exactly the right idea what Intersectionality is.

    We see here:

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersectionality

    Intersectionality, also referred to as intersectional feminism, is a branch of feminism which identifies how different aspects of social and political discrimination overlap with gender. It is an analytic framework that attempts to identify how interlocking systems of power impact those who are most marginalized in society.

    Anyway, I think you mean Kamala Harris.

    Donald Trump’s nicknames are shorter and pithier, although maybe less educated sounding..

    Sammy Finkelman (30b6b6)

  29. an insane elderly socialist tragically trapped in 1962

    I ould understand 1935, but 1962?

    Maybe 1969 would be better.

    On one of the Sunday interview shows, Bernie sanders was asked who he thought was the best president in his lifetime (I think it was)

    He answered it this way: Lyndon Johnson did a lot domestically, although there was this problem of the Vietnam War.

    Sammy Finkelman (30b6b6)

  30. The little bit of Beto I’ve seen i’ve liked, because:

    * unlike many on my side he seems willing to listen to and take seriously and validate the concerns of those with whom he disagrees

    * he’s a master at explaining the liberal viewpoint to non-liberals.

    that said, I also *completely recognize* the criticism you opened with.

    aphrael (3f0569)

  31. @20 Kevin
    Beto reminds me too much of my 28 yo daughter’s boyfriend; and you pegged it with attention span of a gnat etc. I might also add the “sticktoitivness” of Slick 50

    Angelo (8c336d)

  32. aphrael (3f0569) — 5/6/2019 @ 9:50 pm

    Yeah. It’s a shame when a candidate is obviously very talented in certain areas, yet woefully lacking in certain other areas. It’s certainly not always the case, but in politics slow and steady seems to nose out flashy and flaky most of the time.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  33. I could understand 1935, but 1962?

    I won’t bore you with the details that led me to that off-the-cuff quip, Sammy, but in general I think 1962 is more apt because 1935 was in the midst of the Depression with lots of people out of work, so the kind of malarky that Sanders is peddling today would have been more understandable then. But 2019 seems to me to be more apt to 1962, coming out of the post-War years with a strong economy and high employment rates. Sanders of 2019 is the sort of guy lounging around Greenwich Village coffee shops 57 years ago trying to score a date with Mary Travers, sitting with a bunch of disaffected young people who don’t believe in capitalism and somehow think that what’s going on in Cuba or the Soviet Union is a way better system. Then as now, that’s a level of ignorance that is really quite astonishing.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  34. @33. … and Don Draper walks in… 😉

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  35. JRH’s comment at #16 is astute. I’d say Cruz is “off-putting to some” rather than unlikable, but those who find him off-putting are often very emphatic in that feeling. He cannot conceal his awareness that in almost any given room, he’s the smartest guy there, and certainly the most articulate and glib. He was a champion debater, born to it, and anybody with that natural skillset so constantly on display is going to rub some folks very wrong on an almost subliminal basis.

    The “everyone’s worst boyfriend” line about O’Rourke cracks me up. But that wasn’t at all what they were saying during the swooning romance. The wisecrack and its source almost leads me into musing about the women who are affirmatively attracted to bad boys, but it won’t, because that would be wrong-think and wrong-speech for me, a cis white male who may not have any opinions about anyone else except to reconfirm that we cis white males are bad.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  36. How many of you never trumper free trade libertarian conservatives care so much about the good economy you will vote for trump? as for democrats the economy was just as good in november 2018 democrats only lost senate seats in north dakota, missouri and indiana. Floriduh had ballot irregularities as usual so nelson voters had problems voting. good luck in 2020 with voter suppression!

    lany (de7301)

  37. @35. No. Decidedly unlikable:

    ‘Ted Cruz’s Daughter Doesn’t Want To Be Around Him Either.’

    https://www.thecut.com/2016/04/area-daughter-refuses-hug-from-father.html

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  38. Anybody who has a problem with Beto, you should not take it up with him — your quarrel, gentles, is with his Creator.

    nk (9651fb)

  39. If Beto gets any sort of traction his Cult of the Dead Cow screeds and hacking exploits are going to show up in the mainstream press. Sure he was just an edgy teenager in a particularly edgy message board, but some of the CdC’s schtick was actually criminal.

    Xmas (eafb47)

  40. Weird OT, but since there is intersectionality mentioned in general, what is worse in the eyes of voters- white gay married guy or white bisexual woman? Noting the subject of that question votes border security and tends to be part of the Manchin-Jones cluster on other votes.

    urbanleftbehind (fa96ef)

  41. The intersectionality I’m looking for is
    Patriotic
    Intelligent
    Educated
    Responsible
    Mature
    Emotionally balanced

    How you register on the light meter or what tickles your gender bits is between you and your Creator. The Wise Latina notwithstanding, neither will make you a better President, but they might make you a bad one if you carry a chip on your shoulder for a society which has marginalized you.

    nk (9651fb)

  42. O’Rourke isn’t qualified to carry Cruz’s jock.

    David Longfellow (8cba7a)

  43. 29. 33. 34.

    So

    an insane elderly socialist tragically trapped in 1962,

    means nobody’s listening to him, except around his own little world.

    Sammy Finkelman (30b6b6)

  44. You mean political writers tailor their opinion pieces to suit political convenience.

    I am shocked!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjbPi00k_ME

    Bored Lawyer (998177)


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