BrunOpinions

      At the AP Annual Luncheon on Tuesday, President Obama was still joking about his open mic tit-for-tat with Russia’s president last week when the two were in South Korea.
    Not to be outdone, Mitt Romney had a rehearsed open mic moment of his own on a radio program in Wisconsin last week that fell equally as flat.
    Mitt told the listening audience that he was going to tell a funny story (first mistake.) The levity Mitt promised turned out to be a story about his daddy George, who was head of American Motors in the 1950s, moved a company from Michigan to Wisconsin, putting 4,300 people out of work.
    Have you stopped laughing yet? Wait, that’s not the punchline. This is: Turns out dad got all red in the face when there was a parade in his honor in his beloved Michigan and the band didn’t know the Wolverine fight song and instead played “On Wisconsin.”
    Alright, you can stop rolling around the floor with laughter.
    Romney humor. The only time he laughs is when it’s all the way to the bank.
    The firing gene doesn’t fall far from the trees that are just the right height in Michigan. Guess Mitt got carried away with trying his hand at humor after coming off a “Tonight Show” appearance the night before.
    Unintentional humor seems to, uh, dog Mitt. His wife Ann, she of the two Cadillacs, is the latest proponent. Monday, Mrs. Mitt was on a radio show (here we go again) and the host asked her why her husband seemed so detached from everyday people, and why he was so stiff and robotic and pretty much lacking a personality.
    Without missing a beat, Mrs. Mitt said, jokingly, “I guess we better unzip him and let the real Mitt Romney out.”
     Isn’t that what got Bill Clinton into trouble?
    Ann Romney is Mitt’s “secret weapon.” That’s the term female anchors and pundits on cable TV news networks call every wife of a presidential candidate. Gives them the image as a more powerful force than they really are in getting their hubbies elected.
    Nowadays women are portrayed in strong roles, as opposed to where they were, say, in the 1960s.
    Which brings us to the Emmy-winning drama series “Mad Men,” which takes place in that era.
    On Sunday’s show, a character in the series, who is supposed to be an advisor to Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, delivered a dig against Mitt’s daddy George. He tells someone on the phone to keep his candidate out of Michigan because “Romney is a clown.”
    An ironic inside joke that links the past to the present, or a liberal Hollywood dig at  the current Romney on the verge of becoming the Republican presidential nominee in line to take on their candidate, Barack Obama?
    Obviously the latter, although the former is poetic license, no matter if those would argue it’s a license, like George Romney himself, that has expired.
    The “Mad Men” zinger caught the attention of Mitt’s son Tagg (Tagg?) who Tweeted on Monday that dad is fair game but “lay off granpa.”
    You know, if Tagg (Tagg?) ever decided to run for political office, he has a built in campaign slogan at the ready: “Tagg, you’re it!”
    That one might not pass the muster with Don Draper, but some of the more hip ad execs on “Mad Men” might dig it.
  

        There he goes again. To the ranks of the unemployed.
      Keith Olbermann, the liberal TV commentator got fired from yet another gig. This time it was from the upstart Current channel, run by former Vice President Al Gore.
      Olbermann originated “Countdown” on MSNBC (where he was also fired) and brought it to Current, liberal bias intact.
     The show was easy to watch because of Olbermann’s witty and sardonic handling of any and all stories. The writing was almost always sharp, and his commentaries were well thought-out, if a bit pompous at times.
      Olbermann showed early signs he was fed up at Current. His usual sign-off at both MSNBC and Current was “Good night, and good luck,” which he borrowed from one of his broadcast TV idols, Edward R. Murrow, a news broadcasting titan in the Golden Age of Television, the 1950s.
      For several weeks prior to his firing, he signed off with “Congratulations for getting through another day of this crap.” If you wondered whether he meant that to mean all the news items of the day or the show itself, you have your answer now.
      Worse, after Rush Limbaugh calling Sandra Fluke a “slut” last month, Olbermann showed how he wears his bleeding heart on his sleeve: For the sake of civility, he put his trademark “Worst Persons in the World” segment on hiatus. It was arguably the most popular segment of his show. Think David Letterman no longer doing his Top Ten Lists.
      Speaking of Letterman, Olbermann has been a frequent guest on his “Late Show” over the past year, and Dave always joked about Keith’s over-sized head. Apparently he needs one to house his giant ego.
      Olbermann is in the tank for Obama, but the politician he might most resemble ego-wise is Newt Gingrich.
      Olbermann’s image is that of a sarcastic personality who is too smart for his own good. He came to celebrity as an ESPN sportscaster (“They’re not gonna get him!”) and had a cult following with “Countdown” over at MSNBC. Before going there, he worked briefly as a host of a Fox Sports show.
      You guessed it. His ego conflicted with Rupert Murdoch’s ego. End to that story.
      Olbermann brought his arsenic-laced criticism of Fox News and Murdoch with him to both “Countdown” ventures.
      True, Fox News dismembers the facts and deserves to be attacked and often. But the fact is, Foxholes are persistent and consistent. Sure they drink the Kool-Aid and they’re corporate lackeys, but they’re reliable and never let their fan base down.
      On Tuesday, one of those Fox News lackeys, Sarah Palin, will co-host the “Today” show and “Countdown” won’t be there Tuesday night to rake her over the coals.
      Olbermann keeps making the mistake that it’s him and not his show, which is a unique news program that’s smart, witty and controversial.
      So is there life for “Countdown” somewhere else? Spike TV? BBC America? Bravo?
      Maybe Keith Olbermann can find new life on Oprah’s network.
      It’s called OWN. As in no fault but his….

    The flight was supposed to be from New York to Vegas, but it was re-routed to Texas because it was a JetBlue airliner.
    The jinxed airliner was the one that kept passengers grounded on a tarmac last November and didn’t give them water or permit them to use the bathrooms. JetBlue was also the airliner where a flight attendant got snippy with a passenger and then suddenly up and quit and walked off the job while the plane was preparing for take off.
    But the worst incident for JetBlue happened last week when the pilot went berserko grande while the airliner was in flight. Passengers had to subdue the pilot, who kept ranting about al-Qaida, Iraq, Afghanistan, and even told passengers to start saying The Lord’s Prayer.
    He panicked like the passengers did in “Airplane!” when the stewardess matter-of-factly asked if anyone on board knew how to fly an airplane.
    Where’s Ted Stryker when you need him?
    Upon landing in Texas, the pilot was carted off in a strait-jacket. That’s the bad news for him. The good news is he passed the audition to be a commentator on Fox News.
    Excuses the pilot gave for going bananas:
       1. Upset that the Supreme Court could find Obamacare constitutional.
       2. Invested all of his money in “John Carter” movie merchandise.
       3. Wanted to re-enact his pitch to network execs — the next reality TV show “Survivor Mile High Club.”
       4. Finally cracked after hearing air traffic controllers say “niner” instead of “nine” one too many times.
       5. Went over the edge when he found out in mid-flight that Liza cancelled her Vegas gig.

      The pope wore a sombrero in Mexico.
    Tim Tebow will play for the New York Jets.
    The Supreme Court is about to perform an exorcism on Obamacare.
    The hand of God is at work and Rick Santorum had to go and ruin everything by using a swear word in front of his daughter when he was verbally reprimanding a New York Times reporter.
    News commentators were saying that Santorum lost his cool. This is shocking. Not that Santorum lost his cool, but that there are people out there who think Rick Santorum is cool. If you said this sentence aloud: “When Rick Santorum campaigned in Puerto Rico, the weather was not balmy but unseasonably cool.” That would be the first and only time Rick Santorum and the word cool were used in the same sentence.
    And that’s no bull – - – -, Rick.
    Meanwhile, the Manchurian Candidate in our White House is in South Korea (yes, Princess Photo-Op Palin, there is a North and South Korea, and the South is the good part.) President Jesus Hater is making deals with the Ruskies. He told Russian president what’s-his-name that once he gets re-elected he’ll divulge Top Secret info and make us all Stalinists, because socialism was so first term.
    Obama was caught in an open mic moment with his Ruskie co-hort and Mitt Romney went all John Wayne in a 1950s movie “I Married a Pinko” mode. Someone want to dig up the dead bones of Dick Nixon, please?
    Mitt’s “Red Menace” nostalgic moment wasn’t even met well with House Speaker John Boehner, who said while a president is overseas, you don’t knock him ‘cos you’d be knockin’ the country. A diplomatic moment on Boehner’s part. Let’s hope that by tomorrow, Thursday at the latest, he doesn’t back-track on the statesmanship because he was pressured by Fox News and America’s Bully, Rush Limbaugh.
    There’s no question that Romney, whose health care law while he was governor of Massachussetts was the template for Obamacare, isn’t saying much about the health care debate in the hallowed chambers of the Supreme Court.
    Don’t expect the justices to side with the president on this one. They’re likely to declare it unconstitutional. This is the same court that gave the nation Citizens United, which spawned the Super PAC, which is in the position of buying the presidency for the wealthy so they can gut Medicare and, well, you know the rest.
    Besides, Chief Justice John Roberts got a “no, don’t confirm him” vote from then Sen. Barack Obama.
    Payback time. It’s the opposite of a classic line from “The Godfather”: It’s not business, it’s personal.
    But the pope wore a sombrero in Mexico.
    OK, he might have looked silly because he wears what some (I’m talking to you, Bill Maher) think are funny hats all the time.
    Better than wearing a “hoodie.”
    That’ll get you shot if you’re a black kid in certain sections of Florida.
    And it’ll be your fault because you dress like a gangsta, according to Geraldo Rivera.
    You’re just as guilty as the guy going all point blank on you.
    Geraldo has since retracted his idiotic, Fox Newsness. His son told him he wears a “hoodie” and is dark-skinned and could himself get shot by a “Stand Your Ground” patriot.
    A little different when it could hit home.
    It would be a unique sign of solidarity and would bring the country closer together if the justices showed up on Wednesday for the final arguments over Obamacare dressed not in robes, but “hoodies.”
    Too soon.
   

    Mitt Romney’s birthday was a week or so ago, but it’s he or his surrogates who keep giving gifts to his competition for the Republican presidential nomination, as well as the Democrats.
    From “I like firing people” to “I’m not concerned about the very poor” to “Ann has a couple of Cadillacs,” the GOP frontrunner seems as distant as the Milky Way to middle-class America and independent voters.
    Wednesday started off well for Romney, who easily won the Illinois Primary the night before. Then he picked up the  important endorsement of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, however reluctant (Jeb Tweeted it and then mentioned in passing that he had no plans to campaign for the GOP’s presumptive nominee.)
    But all that good news was quickly overshadowed — like it had been written on an etch-and-sketch and then turned upside down and shaken. It was replaced with a metaphor for Mitt Romney the aforementioned retro-toy etch-a-sketch.
    Romney communications director Eric Fehrnstrom, answering a question on CNN about his candidate being pulled farther to the right in the primaries, casually said the campaign will hit a reset button for the fall. He added the campaign will “shake it up and start all over again” like “an etch-and-sketch.”
    The gaffe had the immediacy of a tornado touching down on a trailer park.
    Romney’s challengers to the GOP throne, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich, pounced on it like a cougar at a singles bar for 21-year-olds. Newt and Rick each had an etch-and-sketch in hand on their campaign stumps.
    The retro-toy is the perfect metaphor for Mitt. Or in this case, a Mittaphor. The toy is a flip-flopper’s dream and it’s made of plastic. Like Romney.
    A real stroke of genius matching the candidate to an inanimate object that perfectly describes him. Why didn’t someone think of this before? No campaign wizards working for Romney’s compeition or the White House for that matter could’ve ever come up with this one. Not even late show comedy writers had that in their gag bags.
    Romney, trying to downplay the gaffe later on Wednesday, looked more shaken than stirred.
    Six degress of the etch-a-sketch as it relates to Mitt Romney (accomplished in four steps):
       1. The etch-a-sketch toy has been around for generations.
       2. The retro-toy is still sold at Toys ‘R’ Us.
       3. Toys ‘R’ Us is owned by Bain Capital.
       4. Mitt Romney fired people and shipped jobs overseas while he was a honcho with Bain Capital.
    Mitt Romney once said “I like being able to fire people who provide services to me.”
    If he’s a man of his word, and thus far in the campaign he hasn’t shown that to be the case because he keeps changing his position on an array of issue, then his communications director is on very short leash. This gaffe is going to dog Romney.
    If Fehrnstrom isn’t fired, he should at least be punished by riding on the roof of one of Ann’s two Cadillacs.
       Movies retitled with etch-a-sketch in mind starring Mitt Romney:
       1. “The Seven-Year Etch”
       2. “Retro-Toy Story”
       3. “Etch-22″
       4. “Sketch Me if You Can”
       5. “To Etch His Own”
   
  

  In last year’s “X Men: First Class,” the superheroes thwarted the Cuban Missile Crisis, but President Kennedy wasn’t part of the Marvel-ous group.
  Graphic novels have featured presidents like Obama and women in politics like Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin as superheroes. But Hollywood is taking it to a whole ‘nother level.
  Coming this summer to a theater near you, “Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter.”
  Honest.
  OK, Abe doesn’t have fireballs shooting from his stove-pipe hat (at least that wasn’t in the previews of coming attractions) but he fights the undead with precision, like a gattlin’-gun ballet.
  There’s just no way to kill these vampire-themed movies. And since these bloodsuckers have been around for ages, they were here four score and seven years before the Gettysburg Address. In fact, the movie isn’t filmed on the famous battlefield in Pennsylvania, but rather in Transylvania.
   Look for Abe to fight Confederate Army vampires headed by Count Robert E. Christopher Lee.
   As long as we’re rewritting history here.
   Former GOP presidential candidate Michele Bachmann should be a fan of the film. At last she’ll be able to brag that she was right all along that the Civil War wasn’t fought over slavery, but the destruction of vampirism before it sucked the Union’s bone marrow dry.
   Naturally, the undead were destroyed by the first Republican president.
   Lincoln is such a respected figure, almost regal, dare we say spiritual, that him as a vampire hunter seems a bit too surreal.
   Still, we tend to cast our most famous presidents as movie stars. They and other politicians have embraced entertainment and have been and still are entertaining.
   Gosh, we twice elected a former actor turned politician to the presidency.
   And the two have been impossible to differentiate since.
   Mitt Romney looks like he stepped out of central casting to play a president.
   But how about Mitt as Batman? He’s a multi-millionaire who lives in stately Wayne Manor.
   Rick Santorum could be Robin, his ward.
   Wait a minute. That sounds a tad gay, Rick. A man living with a younger man he calls his ward.
   Better make that Florida rookie Sen. Marco Rubio as Robin.
   Then the movie could be remade as “Fratman and Ruben.”
   Besides, Santorum would look silly in sweater-vest and tights. Though he might have to change his strategy if he’s still running for the nomination and plans to win the New York Primary.
   He got thumped by Romney in the Illinois Primary.
   Illinois, the Land of Lincoln (and birthplace of Saint Ronald Reagan.)
   Romney is a Republican and so was Abe. And Romney once owned two Lincoln Town Cars.
   Lincoln had a dog he often put on the roof of his horse and buggy when taking a road trip.
   In another movie, Republicans could try to resurrect Abe from the grave to battle the modern day Obamacare vampires, but after seeing what his party has become, Abe wouldn’t be able to stop spinning in his grave.

   Since Mitt Romney is adept at pandering to every faction of voter out there —- like down South y’all where he enjoyed “cheesy grits” and “catfish” — his next group should be the Irish, in honor of St. Patrick’s Day.
   It will come naturally to the pragmatic panderer. And here’s what he can tell those Irish eyes smiling at his candidacy:
         * “I’m a Romney. I am a pot of gold.”
         * “This is the second time I’ve had cheesy corn beef and cabbage. I like it. But Ann wouldn’t sit too close to me on the jet.”
         * “My religion doesn’t permit me to drink alcohol. But I’m good friends with the owners of Anheiser-Busch and Coors.”
         * “I love dogs. Especially Irish setters. They’re fun, aren’t they? They’re playful and affectionate. And they don’t mind riding on the roof of cars.”
   How long is Mutt, uh, Mitt going to be in the doghouse with voters over this putting Seamus the dog on the roof of one of the family’s two Cadillacs when they took a road trip to Canada?
   That was 1983, dog-gone it.
   Hey, an urban legend like this one can fetch a lot of punchlines. And it’s endless. Like running Palin gags. Come to think of it, Romney is slowly but surely becoming the Princess Photo-Op Palin of this election cycle.
   Imagine if he loses the nomination because of this stupid human trick. What a pet peeve. The man who said “I like to fire people” and “I’m not concerned about the very poor” or made the blunder of wanting the auto industry to go bankrupt may be done in by dog lovers voting against him.
   New theme song to Mitt’s campaign, one made famous by the Drifters but now with a new title: “Pup on the Roof.” Or maybe a reworking of an Animals hit with the new song title “Doghouse of the Rising Sun.”
   Remember Mitt, when the urban legend becomes fact, embrace the urban legend.
   Come on people, throw him a bone here.
   Or a Frisbee.
   And Mitt, capitalize on it. You’re a capitalist. Make light of it. Here’s how: go on Letterman again and do a Top Ten List with the topic being Famous Movies with Canine Titles (and dedicate it to Seamus):
     Top Ten Movies now with Canines in Mind:
       10. “Dog on a Hot Car Roof”
         9. “Pup in the Air”
         8. “A Roof with a View”
         7. “Corporate Raiders of the Lost Bark”
         6. “Rebel Without A Paws”
         5. Al Poochino in “The Dogfather”
         4. “Yankee Poodle Dandy”
         3. “Pup Fiction”
         2. “Raging Bulldog”
      And the number one movie with canines in mind:
         “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woof”

    While the contenders for the Republican presidential nomination were courting grits-eatin,’ catfish-catchin,’ Southern belle-lovin’ votes in Alabamy and Ole Miss, former Vice President Dick Cheney was having trouble up north. Way up north. As in the Great White North.
     Cheney said it’s too dangerous to visit Canada.
     Ya, if you’re Dick Cheney.
     Dick, have a Molson, eh?
     Apparently security wouldn’t be able to protect the former Veep from protesters who would surely demonstrate against his presence again this year if he would show up for a speaking engagement.
     Last fall in Vancouver, Deadeye Dick’s speaking engagement met with hundreds of people who didn’t like the fact that he used waterboarding and sleep deprivation on who he thought were suspected terrorists.
     Human rights groups in Canada want Cheney brought to justice for crimes against humanity.
     He’s, how you say it, persona-non-grata.
     What the h-e-double hockey sticks.
     And to think, our next president of the United States, that cheesy grits lovin’ Mitt Romney, had the post of ambassador to Canada in mind for Cheney.
     President Willard Mitt will have to fall back on his second choice now.
     Are you ready to represent the United States in Canada, Miss Kardashian?
     The reputations of Cheney and his very angry daughter Lizzy Borden Cheney proceed them.
     This looks like a dirty deed to be done dirt cheap job for Fox News.
     The Cheney legacy must be defended, if not fabricated to extremes.
     Fox has got to start Canada hatin’ and get the frightened ones who tune in religiously to despise it as well.
     Get Hannity and all those other little weasels to start the hate-fest with lying-through-their-baked-bean-little-teeth talking points like:
        America needs to go to war with Canada because America deserves to have full control of Niagara Falls.
        None of this American side and Canadian side. The Falls is an American wonder of the world.
        The Canadian side is too neat and tidy.
        Candadians are wusses. They follow the Queen, don’t they?
        And they say “aboot” instead of “about.” How annoying is that? Still, it would work when interrogating a possible Canadian trying to pass off as a real American.
        It would be easier than making them get IDs and have to show them. They are, after all, all white.
        But the French-Canadians are sneaky and suspicious and they’re building a bomb. Or they have weapons of mass destruction. Either one works.
        The Canadian Army consists of Mounties in loud uniforms on horses. Easy to defeat and convert to conservative American.  A bunch of Dudley Do-Rights. C’mon, have you ever seen one of his cartoons?
        Recall Canadian bacon. It’s a threat to American bacon. Besides, It’s not even bacon, it’s freakin’ ham!
        Drill into the frightened minds that in 2008, thousands of Canadians snuck across the border to illegally vote for Obama.
        Finally, let’s deport some Canadians. Start with Mike Myers. He hasn’t made a good Austin Powers movie in a long time.
        Do it for Dick Cheney, America’s Grouchy Uncle with the bad ticker.
        We haven’t come to his defense in a long time.
        Isn’t it aboot… about time we did?
       

     Unhinged televangelist Pat Robertson has come out in favor of legalizing marijuana. Apparently because the war on drugs has failed.
   This makes sense because of the many comments in the past Robertson has made have had a lot of people wondering if he isn’t high on something.
   Marijuana  legalization, huh? Maybe Robertson might want to look into having the theme to his 700 Club changed to “Jesus is Just Alright” by The Doobie Brothers.
   In a drug-related issue, there’s a renegade medical report suggesting that LSD could help treat alcoholism. What’s next, cocaine can cure nasal decongestion?
   But back to Robertson and the legalize marijuana comment. He might be right, because if Rick Santorum is ever elected president we’re all going to have to be high to get through it.
   Santorum just can’t shake the social issues that drive him batty. They’ve all been well-documented, from homosexuality is equivalent to man on dog, to college indoctinates the young into liberalism to women and what they should do with their bodies to avoid burning in hell.
   And, oh ya, Satan is attacking America.
   The guy is so paranoid he even gets phobic about the little things. Like movies. Here are some movies Santorum won’t watch because the titles are so misleading he thinks they should be banned by the Catholic Legion of Decency:
         1. “Of Human Bondage”
         2. “The 400 Blows”
         3. “Jules and Jim”
         4. “The Bank Dick”
         5. “Octopussy”
         6. “Eating Raoul”
         7. “Howards End”
         8. “The Thing”
         9. “Rear Window”
         10. “Eight Men Out”
   Words Rick Santorum won’t use because they sound gay:
         1. Ambience
         2. Fabulous
         3. Cabaret
         4. Tofu
         5. Fierce
         6. Nuance
         7. Bona fides
         8. Liza
         9. Closet
         10. Greco-Roman wrestling

      Speaking of words, the words fear and loathing could be the mottos of Alabama and Mississippi, where the two Republican primaries will be conducted on Tuesday.
    Alabama and Mississippi. The only signs you see for President Obama in those two states are WANTED! posters.
    A recent poll found that 52 percent of people in Alabama think Obama is a Muslim. In Mississippi it’s 45 percent.
    The only poll higher in Mississippi would be the number of people who have never been to the dentist.
   

   President Obama’s re-election campaign is releasing a 17-minute documentary about his years in the Oval Office.
    Tom Hanks is narrating the movie. Rumor has it, to make the film more mainstream there’s a scene with him as Forrest Gump, who somehow managed to be with the Navy SEALs when they took out Osama bin Laden.
    To which Forrest voice overs: “The evil man blew up some buildings in New York City or something. When we got to his man-cave, he was watchin’ videos of himself and eatin’ goat. Then he got shot. And that’s all I have to say about that….”
    OK, that part’s not true. But conservatives and Fox News can have some fun with the Gump angle and come up with the tag line to the movie: “Stupid is as stupid does.”
    They could have more laughs (does Fox News have a sense of humor?) by coming up with titles to the Obama re-election film, using real titles like:
        1. “Rosemary’s Baby”
        2. “Touch of Evil”
        3. “Apocalypse Now”
        4. “Clueless”
        5. “True Lies”
       Or name the documentary with these new titles of famous movies:
        1. “Born on the Fourth of July (in Kenya)”
        2. “The Baracky Horror Picture Show”
        3. “Tinker Tailor Socialist Spy”
        4. “Obama Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”
        5. “Old Yellow”