Morning Briefing for October 19, 2011

RedState Morning Briefing
For October 19, 2011

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1. Nostalgia & Decline

Apple has out a new app in its App Store — Cards. You can take a picture on your phone, design a card, and have it sent via the post office to someone. Think about that for a minute. In an age of digital communications, text messages, emails, and cell phones, Apple has produced a product that harkens back to one of the earliest message transmission methods — snail mail as the kids these days are calling it.Siri, the assistant on the iPhone, kindles fond memories of growing up in the age of Star Trek for the thirty somethings out there.A friend of mine two nights ago showed me an awesome app he works on called Goba. It’s available for the iPhone, Android, Windows Mobile, etc. It lets you plan an offline gathering of friends and manage sending texts and emails and the replies thereto. An app for the phone designed to facilitate a gathering of friends off line and unplugged.My neighborhood is pretty new. Almost every house has a relic of an earlier time — a front porch. My wife, me, and our kids sit on the front porch in rocking chairs or the kids play on the porch. On sites like Etsy, people are getting back to early American crafts — typography, quilts, homemade soaps, arts, etc. Like with Apple’s Cards program, people are trying to reconnect to a past that exists in our dreams. Part is real and part is not real. But we are trying to connect to it.At this time, as so many perceive a decline in the country, there is a profound sense of nostalgia for a past era. Successful technologies from Apple or this Goba program or others are those technologies that actually help us realize, in some way, some part of that past. From getting a card in the mail to meeting friends on a front porch in the evening for a drink, Americans want to turn back to a simpler time or at least a time that they perceive to be simpler.This is why the Republicans will lose next November to Barack Obama.Please click here for the rest of the post.

2. The CNN Debate: Where Has This Perry Been?

1. Where has this Rick Perry been? Finally, the guy showed up with unscripted, from the gut answers. The few scripted answers fell flat (see e.g. Jeffres). The rest were good. He’s not the best debater. But he certainly did not lose that debate.2. Rick Santorum is too angry to be President and came across as a jerk to everyone. Rick Santorum conveniently forgot to mention he got his butt kicked in Pennsylvania, was not a fiscal conservative, and endorsed Arlen Specter over Pat Toomey.3. This debate hurts Mitt Romney more than anyone else. Why? Because the candidates started piling on him. A lot of polling seemed to indicate that voters were getting ready to settle. This pile on and the Newt-Santorum-Cain-Perry pile on of Romney “lying” will keep voters from settling for him. He got flustered tonight for the first time. Perry got under his skin. I don’t know where so many enthusiastic Romney supporters came from, but though he was cheered on stage by the crowd, he was clearly flustered.4. As the candidates were piling on Romney for Romneycare, Captain Stubing . . . er . . . Michele Bachmann . . . interjected and totally shut down that line of attack. Was she returning the favor for Mitt’s lifeline at the last debate?5. Herman Cain continues to shine as the great optimist. He stayed upbeat with a sense of humor. But this debate showed his serious weak point — foreign policy. He is going to have to seriously, seriously beef up by the next CNN debate, which will be a foreign policy debate.6. Newt Gingrich, hands down, won the debate. He was confrontational, but polite. He was good on faith issues. He really hit every answer out of the park, though nuclear power is his and everyone else’s ethanol.I suspect Perry saved himself tonight. Gingrich will go up a bit, probably drawn from some Cain votes. Romney will stagnate. Santorum and Bachmann will go down. Paul will hold steady.Please click here for the rest of the post.

3. Herman Cain, Gilad Shalit, and Emptying GITMO in Exchange for One Captive Soldier

Herman Cain is taking a beating – at least judging by my email inbox – over a line he uttered in the interview below with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.The synopses of this I’m seeing are some variation of “Cain said he’d release all Gitmo terrorists in exchange for one American P.O.W.” and “Cain would release all gitmo detainees for one soldier.” However, that’s not what happened at all – and I don’t share the outrage at this point that some of my very good friends and colleagues do over this statement. Here’s why.Please click here for the rest of the post.

4. Meet #OWS ‘Crisis Creator’ Lisa Fithian: The Radical Extremist Helping To #OccupyAmerica

“When people ask me, ‘What do you do?’ I say I create crisis, because crisis is that edge where change is possible.” — Lisa FithianTo say that Lisa Fithian is just a paid-professional protester would be to undersell her radical accomplishments. True, she’s received compensation from the SEIU and the SEIU’s labor federation Change to Win as a consultant. However, her war on the free market goes well beyond that. Last year, Fithian helped the UAW shut down Bank of America branches and, now, is helping the #OccupyWallSt protesters wage their occupations all across America.Please click here for the rest of the post.

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