Maureen Dowd: Is Paul Ryan merely a younger Dick Cheney? (Lame, even for her)

The Silicon Valley Mercury News / The New York Times ^ | August 18, 2012 | Maureen Dowd

[2ndDivisionVet]

What happens when you realize you are the machine you're raging against?

Tom Morello, the Grammy-winning, Harvard-educated guitarist for the metal rap band Rage Against the Machine, punctured Paul Ryan's pretensions to cool in a Rolling Stone essay rejecting R&R (Romney 'n' Ryan) as R&R (rock 'n' roll).

"He is the embodiment of the machine that our music has been raging against for two decades," Morello writes, adding: "I clearly see that Ryan has a whole lotta 'rage' in him: A rage against women, a rage against immigrants, a rage against workers, a rage against gays, a rage against the poor, a rage against the environment. Basically, the only thing he's not raging against is the privileged elite he's groveling in front of for campaign contributions."

In my experience, when a presidential candidate needs an outside force to animate him -- Michael Dukakis needed Kitty, Bob Dole needed C-Span, Willard needs Paul -- it spells doom.

The fresh Gen X vice-presidential contender -- like Sarah Palin, he favors the exclamation "awesome" -- has had mixed reviews in his debutante cotillion.

Howard Fineman wrote in The Huffington Post that "Ryan turns out, upon closer inspection, not to be a purifying ideologue, but rather a young, power-hungry, ladder-climbing trimmer."(continued)

[2ndDivisionVet]

I doubt if it’s millions anymore, but I take your point, she makes more than most of us.

[John O]

OK I’ll admit it. I never read Maureen dowd columns. I just skip ahead to the pictures of CZJ

[utahagen]

Great call! And the answer is...yes.

[elcid1970]

Excepting CZJ, MoDo’s worst nightmare is a dream for the rest of us:

Dick Cheney reincarnated. Dare we hope?

[paudio]

Is Catherine Zeta Jones a younger version of Maureen Dowd?

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

BLESS YOUR HEART!

[Perdogg]

Paul Ryan just went up another notch.

[Vigilanteman]

Other than the fact that Dick Cheney never represented a congressional district which the GOP managed to win in only one of the last six election cycles, their electoral history is similar. Cheney won reelection to his seat five times at margins ranging from 34.4% to 49.2%. Ryan won reelection to his seat eight times at margins ranging from 25.4% to 38.1%.

IOW, both served the people who elected them extremely well.

[sjmjax]

I could not care less about anything Maureen Dowd has to say.

I'm only here for the pictures!

[grey_whiskers]

Instead of Cheney,

we got Chain-ey:

Cheers!

[PA Engineer]

Every time I read her I need to reach for antiacids....

I just throw up and get it over with.

[SuziQ]

Tom Morello, the Grammy-winning, Harvard-educated guitarist for the metal rap band Rage Against the Machine, punctured Paul Ryan's pretensions to cool in a Rolling Stone essay rejecting R&R (Romney 'n' Ryan) as R&R (rock 'n' roll).

Tom ain't too S-M-R-T is he? Paul Ryan wasn't looking for 'cool points' when he mentioned the music he liked, he just answered a question. Tom could have kept his mouth shut, and potentially reaped a financial windfall from conservative who might have given his music a listen, because Paul Ryan likes it. But I guess not saying anything would ruin his 'lib cred'. Instead he has to spout the typical crap about Paul Ryan put out there by the Democrats and their lapdogs in the MSM.

[Old Sarge]

Chicks with swords...

[Trod Upon]

Dowd is still alive? Whoa.