Friday finally and what a week — life don’t suspend itself, however, just because Saturday and Sunday is time off.
Shit has no clock.
Early this morning, poo poo is still blowing across the Middle East, still flowing from Mitt Romney’s mouth, but out in the blackness of deep space, earth again dodged a bad-shit bullet: At 1:10 a.m. Eastern Time (ET) on September 14, QG42 will pass our planet only 7.5 times farther than the moon’s orbit (about 1.7 million miles, or 2.8 million kilometers).
This QG42 thingy was roughly the size of a 14-story building — talk about some stir, and Romney most likely would have screamed the impact of the asteroid was all President Obama’s fault — too soft on earth defenses.
(Illustration found here).
National Geographic (the link above) reported QG42 is running with a partner, call-sign QC8, and were only spotted the last week of August — not much maneuvering room there:
According to orbital calculations, QG42 poses no danger to Earth on this flyby, but this will be the asteroid’s closest approach in the last hundred years, and it could be a threat in the future, said Don Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
“We know of roughly 1,700 PHAs of this size or larger, and one of this size is expected to strike the Earth every 40,000 years on average, with an equivalent impact energy of 140 megatons of TNT,” Yeomans said.
“The resulting crater would have a diameter of about 1.9 miles [3 kilometers].”
One is sometimes happy with ignorance — this morning is the first I’d heard of the near-miss asteroid, and apparently the thing cruised on out of our neighborhood.
Meanwhile, back among the bat-shit crazy, Romney campaign craters are boiling open for potty-mouth Mitt (i.e., lying) and the GOPer focus has turned on the media.
From BuzzFeed (h/t Daily Kos):
“I love all these reporters saying that they thought the Democratic convention was better,” said one senior adviser sarcastically.
“Of course they did.
It’s like a steak lover saying they like a steak house.
They served what 90 percent of reporters love.
And they liked it? Shocking.”
…
The adviser, granted anonymity to criticize a press corps the campaign still relies on every day, went on to blame a “green room, green zone kind of divide,” saying the national press, most of whom live in New York or DC, “pockets of prosperity,” are isolated from the realities of the harsh economy — and therefore, unable to grasp Romney’s message.
Instead, they are preoccupied by concerns akin to war reporters relaxing in the green zone: “Too much chlorine in the pool, the parties are going on too late, why can’t we get the right flavors of Haagen Dazs?
Most people aren’t living in that world.”
Another adviser expressed frustration with horserace reporters declaring Romney’s campaign fatally behind, as President Obama pulls ahead in the polls.
He said he suspects the press is projecting their own hopes for an Obama re-election at best — and purposefully cheerleading the incumbent, at worst.
“I mean, I was expecting this narrative in October,” he said.
“You know, the polls are close, and so the media starts cheering on their guy, saying Romney’s doomed.
But I didn’t expect it to happen this early.
They just seem really eager.”
…
Blaming the press is often a first reflex for campaigns eager to deny bad public polls and rally their supporters against a common enemy.
Still, one plugged-in Republican who spoke with top advisers earlier this week, said the campaign’s frustration with the press is unfeigned.
“Boston is a bit amazed,” the Republican said.
“Experienced political operatives say they’ve never seen the press be so unhinged and determined to write ‘Republican in disarray’ stories.
Many conservatives concerned this is becoming a self-fulfilling prophesy are urging Boston to change the tone and the topic; they think the best way is to go on offense and be substantive, talk about the big issues.”
Blame the same messengers that up to now never pushed back on any of the bullshit lies, half-truths and distorted images flowing from Republican pie holes — in Mitt’s position this week, even his own people think he was an asshole.
From Media Matters:
Peggy Noonan, a speechwriter for President Ronald Reagan who writes a column for The Wall Street Journal’s opinion pages, said on Fox News that he had opened himself up to accusations that he was “trying to exploit things politically.”
“I belong to the old school of thinking in times of great drama and heightened crisis, and at times when something violent is happening to your people, I always think discretion is the better way to go,” she said.
“I don’t feel that Mr. Romney has been doing himself any favors…. When hot things happen, cool words-or no words- is the way to go.”
Word.