Wrong, Stupid, and Unnecessary

As soon as the votes were counted (the first time) showing that George Bush had been re-elected, most pundits and politicians immediately began talking and writing about the coming Battle Supreme over judicial nominations.

Majority Leader Bill Frist who wants to run for President in 2008, and has a reputation for smarts and urbanity, jumped into the fray by loudly proclaiming the possibility of invoking the "nuclear option" (NO).

The NO, as most of you likely know involves the United States Senate voting to disallow use of the filibuster during votes on judicial nominations. If used, the NO would lower the bar from 60 votes to 51 votes to confirm the President's choice.

While today's Democratic Party deserves any dirty tricks that are sprung on them, the Republicans need to think long and hard about this "option". It would be a stupid move, so ill-advised that it could send the GOP back to minority status far sooner than expected.

Wrong

First, it is wrong because it arbitrarily reverses over 200 years of tradition. The Filibuster was conceived to protect the minority from the majority. It is just one of MANY such protections that exist in our law and practices.

Freedom of Speech is primarily about minority rights. Saddam Hussein enjoyed free speech in pre-war Iraq, but no one else did. In the United States we put tremendous importance on the right to say what you wish because it allows a person or group of persons who otherwise have little or no power, to make their case and help guide decision making.

The fact that SOME people abuse that freedom, is no good excuse for REMOVING the right to free speech. The same is true of the filibuster. If the 60 vote rule to stop a filibuster was EVER a good thing, it still is, regardless of the Democratic Party's abuse of the system.

Stupid

Second, it would be a monumentally stupid action to reverse Senate tradition and change the 60 vote rule. Stupid because American's would see that action for what it is: A power grab by a majority, a short cut born of impatience, and an arrogant taking of minority rights.

American's love an underdog even if they hated him last week. No matter that the Democrats have become an odious collection of special interest whiners and ambulance chasers, it is they who in this instance are playing by the rules and it would be the Republicans who would be viewed as bullies and cheats.

Unnecessary

Finally if wrong and stupid aren't reasons enough, the NO is in fact completely unnecessary. A "real" filibuster is composed of two ingredients that are wholly missing from the modern low fat FilibusterLite. Up until roughly 30-40 years ago, a filibuster brought ALL Senate business to a halt. Nothing else could be voted on or disposed of. Additionally, in order to continue, the filibusters had to speak constantly, around the clock, 24 hours, 48 hours, 200 hours, whatever it took and however long they could stand it.

In the present time the filibuster is a pathetic shadow of its former self. Other business goes on, only the specific issue that the filibuster is related to stops. And, it is no longer required to go around the clock, in fact I don't think they have to speak at all. In effect the "filibuster" has become just another parliamentary maneuver. If one side wants to derail anything they don't actually have the votes to stop, they simply declare a "filibuster" and Voila! 60 votes are required to pass the motion.

The solution is so obvious and so simple. Go back to the way filibusters were administered 50 years ago and for many decades before that. Force the Democrats to bring Senate action to a crashing halt and thereby effectively paralyzing the federal government.

The Republican Party is the MAJORITY party again for the first time since Calvin Coolidge was President. Let's not throw it all away with a bullheaded decision that actually empowers and breaths life into the sorry heap of debris that the Democratic Party has become.

The Chile Incident

I am deeply troubled by what happened in Chile Saturday. The attempt by local "security forces" to separate President Bush and his Secret Service contingent is a very serious matter.

Clearly the administration is trying to keep the lid on this incident and not allow it to become a major story. Yet the fact is that this was a very dangerous situation, that could have turned out very badly.

Someday there will be a book written about this episode. Bet on it. The President's quick thinking illustrates very well the fact that he:

A) Is no dummy
B) Is very aware of his surroundings and what is going on
C) Is damn good at thinking on his feet

One quails at the thought of how the great debater John Kerry would have handled this snafu.

The President's men must NEVER allow this to happen again.

Let's not be spun by their spin.

One of the more pernicious phenomenon of modern day America is the way in which certain little nuggets of fact or opinion are often magnified far beyond their true worth or significance.

The media loves a catchy label, a quick and lazy way to package news, events and trends. Reaganomics. The Teflon President. The Great Communicator. The Wimp Factor. Bimbo Eruptions. Watergate, Whitewater, KoreaGate, TravelGate, Iran-Contra. Year of the Woman. Soccer Moms. Angry White Males. Security Moms, and on and on.

Another facet of this approach to reality, is the way in which the media leads us and themselves to focus on something that would have gone totally unnoticed 75 or 100 years ago. I am thinking specifically about how the media has taken to boiling down presidential elections to just a hand full of states and then pretending that somehow the CLOSENESS of those states is significant beyond who eeks out a win.

Much is made of the closeness of the President's Ohio win, yet in the larger state of Pennsylvania that Kerry won, the vote was closer, and almost NO ONE is pointing that out! Ohio gets all the attention because THE MEDIA anointed Ohio early on as THE STATE TO WATCH. So we watch and we watch and we watch. Poor Pennsylvania is not sexy enough to merit attention.

American presidential elections are ALWAYS close when measured against those held in places like China and Egypt. In the U.S. , a 60-40 landslide is a MAJOR threshold that only a tiny handful of candidates have ever reached or even threatened. Yet in real world terms 40% of something is very respectable. For instance, I would love to own 40% of General Motors and if you were to eat 40% of a pie it might well make your tummy hurt.

So when Democrats and the Old Media make disparaging remarks about GWB's 51% victory, the last thing we conservatives should do is agree with them and further enable their dishonest spinning. 51-48 is a solid win. When held up to the realities of 2004, 51-48 is a VERY solid win.

The 2000 election left many ordinary voters (as opposed to Democratic Party hacks) with a distinctly bad taste in their mouths. Because of Florida and Al Gore's decision to dishonor himself and the system, and the fact that Gore "won the popular vote" (yes, I still owe you an explanation on why I set that in quote marks!) George W. Bush had a very difficult starting position RELATIVE to the other successful incumbents of the last 50 years, Eisenhower, Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, and Clinton.

This preamble brings me to my current peeve which is Ohio and the already seemingly set in stone "fact" that "a switch of just 136,000 votes would have made Kerry president". First off you can't just switch 136,000 votes. It is strictly against the rules and would upset people. Secondly however, if the Kerry camp gets to switch 136,000 votes then I insist that we Bushies also be allowed to switch a like number. Let us see.....hmmmm, OK here is how I would do it:

Take away 137,000 Bush votes in Ohio and let Kerry win those 20 electoral votes (EVs) by 1000. (But wait, isn't 1000 votes a LOT less than 136,000 so wouldn't Kerry's NEW win be even more suspect than Bush's? Oh never mind.) Okay back to vote switching, I want to take 99,000 of those former Ohio Bush votes and move them to Minnesota, thus giving the President those 10 EVs. Then I'll take 10,000 votes and move them to New Hampshire thus giving the Pres those 4 EVs. Next I'll move 13,000 Bush votes to Wisconsin so Dubya can claim those 10 EVs. So let's see where we are now: Bush has 290 EVs and Kerry has 248 EVs and I still have 15,000 votes left over to pad Bush's lead in New Mexico and/or Iowa.

See the stupidity and shallowness of this line of reasoning? Many a World Series game is won by a single slender run. The Super Bowl has been won by a single point, or a last second field goal. The Yankees won a couple of blowouts over the Red Sox in the first three playoff games, but they couldn't move a couple of those "excess" runs to Game 4.

Winning is winning. As a party, the GOP must look very hard at the narrowly won "red states" and devise a plan for making them less close in 2008, but in terms of 2004, Bush WON! Period. Mission accomplished.

One final blow to drive the point home: Kerry won Pennsylvania by just 129,000, Minnesota by just 98,000, New Hampshire by 9,000, Wisconsin by 12,000, Michigan by 165,000 and Oregon by only 67,000. 480,000 votes were all that separated Kerry from losing these states and their 69 EVs. Why isn't someone talking about that?

Some "get it" some don't.

Today I've read two interesting columns by two "conservative" pundits. I put the word in quote marks because I consider one of them to be something other than conservative.

Morton Kondrake is a bit of an oddball on the punditry stage. Long thought of as conservative, he more and more appears to be a moderate with inconsistent urges but a general tendency to condescend toward those who are to his cultural right.

Jonah Goldberg on the other hand has become a very reliable conservative, who writes in a style that cuts through the clutter and makes clear the foolishness of his fellow man.

Since November 2, there has arose an unbelievable clamor on the Left unlike anything I have ever seen. Keep in mind that I lived through the elections of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Both of those events saw liberals come unhinged in ways large and small, but nothing like the swinging from the rafters now happening in latte shops across America.

Joe Scarborough on MSNBC has been leading the charge on confronting this nuttiness. The past couple of nights he has engaged Carl Bernstein on this issue.

What is fascinating is how clear it is that Bernstein does not have a clue. He sits there yammering about the intolerant and dangerous right wingers, when it is himself (Bernstein) who oozes intolerance and ignorance.

That is all for today. I am working on two major posts related to the election and its aftermath and I hope to have them up in the next couple of days.

Victory is sweet.

This will be short. I will be posting my thoughts on this election over the next few days.

In particular I want to go into the media's incompetence.

I am reasonably pleased with my score on the electoral votes. I missed by 17 votes, and just four states.

One thing I want to note here and now, is how easy it was for me to conduct my own "exit polls".

Simply by firing up my 56K modem, I was able to access the election boards in all the key states and keep track of the actual vote tallies.

By comparing County X 2000 to County X 2004, I knew VERY early that Florida was going for Bush.

That's all for now but I shall return.

State-by-state predictions:

Alabama 9 Bush 9
Alaska 3 Bush 12
Arizona 10 Bush 22
Arkansas 6 Bush 28
California 55 Kerry 55
Colorado 9 Bush 37
Connecticut 7 Kerry 62
Delaware 3 Kerry 65
District of Columbia 3 Kerry 68
Florida 27 Bush 64
Georgia 15 Bush 79
Hawaii 4 Kerry 72
Idaho 4 Bush 83
Illinois 21 Kerry 93
Indiana 11 Bush 94
Iowa 7 Bush 101 SWITCH
Kansas 6 Bush 107
Kentucky 8 Bush 115
Louisiana 9 Bush 124
Maine 4 Kerry 97
Maryland 10 Kerry 107
Massachusetts 12 Kerry 119
Michigan 17 Bush 141 SWITCH
Minnesota 10 Bush 151 SWITCH
Mississippi 6 Bush 157
Missouri 11 Bush 168
Montana 3 Bush 171
Nebraska 5 Bush 176
Nevada 5 Bush 181
New Hampshire 4 Kerry 123 SWITCH
New Jersey 15 Kerry 138
New Mexico 5 Bush 186 SWITCH
New York 31 Kerry 169
North Carolina 15 Bush 201
North Dakota 3 Bush 204
Ohio 20 Kerry 189 SWITCH
Oklahoma 7 Bush 211
Oregon 7 Kerry 196
Pennsylvania 21 Kerry 217
Rhode Island 4 Kerry 221
South Carolina 8 Bush 219
South Dakota 3 Bush 222
Tennessee 11 Bush 233
Texas 34 Bush 267
Utah 5 Bush 272*****WINS!
Vermont 3 Kerry 224
Virginia 13 Bush 285
Washington 11 Kerry 235
West Virginia 5 Bush 290
Wisconsin 10 Bush 300 SWITCH
Wyoming 3 Bush 303

FINAL TALLY:
Bush 303
Kerry 235

Points to ponder:
#1. I have 7 states switching from their 2000 result, which is higher than you will see predicted pretty much anywhere else. Five go for Bush, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Wisconsin, and two go for Kerry, New Hampshire and Ohio.
#2. I have based my switches not so much on polls but more on polls + recent trends. I think Ohio is slowly moving out of the GOP's orbit. I hope I am wrong. But there is a creeping effect from the Northeast, as Pennsylvania as slowly morphed into a Democratic state, and even Virginia shows signs of losing its "safe Republican" label at the presidential level.
3. On the other hand, I see the Upper-Midwest leaving the Dems, and in the case of Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota, finally swinging over to the GOP after a slow migration.
4. Michigan I see as a more questionable long term convert and it may well be THE big swing state of 2008.
5. New Mexico and New Hampshire I see simply as falling into their more natural orbits.

Tomorrow will be a very long day, but I am soooooo glad it is finally upon us.

In which I join the chattering throngs.

In larger amounts than ever before, this election has been filled with "expert opinion" .

Whether on the television shout shows night after night, on the internet, or via newspapers, pundits have held forth with various degrees of hyperbole for well over a year.

In another 36 hours we will know who was right and who was blowing smoke. I think a lot of people who get a lot of "face time" in the media, really are clueless about this election, where it is going and what it means.

Not wanting to get left out, here are my FINAL predictions for 2004.

Popular Vote:
Bush 49.50
Kerry 49.00

Electoral vote:
Bush 303
Kerry 235

Senate:
GOP +4

House
Status Quo + - 2

Next post I will show my state by state electoral predictions.

Al Gore is no Richard Nixon

As political junkies well know, Richard Nixon had ample justification to challenge the results of the 1960 Presidential Election.

John Kennedy won by an exceedingly slender margin and there were serious allegations of election fraud in LBJ's Texas and Mayor Daley's Chicago. There were "irregularities" in other states including perhaps Hawaii where Nixon at first won and after a recount, lost.

Instead of contesting the election, Nixon swallowed hard and presided over the counting of the electoral votes in his role as Senate President. Why did he choose this path? Afterall Nixon was nothing if not a bulldog who when bitten would bite back harder.

I have long felt that Nixon's reasons were two-fold. In which order or in which amount I'll leave for others to decide .

The first reason is the one Nixon himself always (naturally) cited: He did not want to put the country through a long and bitter fight, it would have been dangerous to subject the nation to possible instability at that point in the Cold War etc etc.

The second reason is a cynical/practical one. Nixon realized it would be a longshot to overturn the results and if he failed he would be finished as a national political force. Americans hate a sore loser, preferring fighters that take their lumps like a man. But we Americans also like an underdog, a guy or a team who makes a stirring comeback. In 1960 Nixon was only 47, plenty young enough to wait a few years for another shot at glory.

I strongly suspect the truth was a mixture of the two. Nixon probably honestly felt a legal challenge would not serve the national interest AND he likely understood that the smart political move was to take his medicine and bide his time for another shot at the golden prize.

Al Gore would have done well to have studied Nixon's behavior and actions. Four years ago when Gore "won the popular vote" (why I set that in quote marks I'll explain later) but lost Florida and the Electoral College, Gore put his selfish interests first, last and always.

I in no way blame Gore for asking for a simple recount of the Florida vote. Recounts are fairly common and don't generally cause an untoward amount of problems. It is highly reasonable for a candidate to ask for a recount when only a few hundred votes out of millions cast, are the difference

But Gore went farther, much, much farther. He and his party started a highly sophisticated campaign to discredit the entire election process in Florida. No one was safe, as even officials who were DEMOCRATS (remember Theresa LaPore?) were routinely accused of high crimes and chad abuse.

Gore chose to drag the country though a month long temper tantrum, as he vainly tried to win through political and legal machination, what he lost fair and square at the ballot box.

And make no mistake, GORE LOST FLORIDA in 2000. EVERY count, every recount, even the major media circus that re-re-counted the ballots, all showed that George W. Bush received more votes than Al Gore. No matter how they twisted and turned logic, no matter how they tortured common sense, the answer kept coming up the same: Bush won.

Gore and his fellow travelers like to slyly comment that Gore "won" the 2000 election. They "base" this on two very weak reeds, one of which is the Florida excuse that has been completely debunked.

The other is the fact that Gore "won the popular vote". It is certainly true that Gore received more votes nationally than George W. Bush. It is also true that the Yankees won more regular season games then the Red Sox did this year. Those two facts are almost perfect bookends.

The Gore Whiners pretend that winning the popular vote is filled with some deep meaning and importance. For starters, since "winning the popular vote" was not and is NOT the object of the game, one can't draw any real conclusions from the fact that Gore got 48.4% and Bush 47.9%.

Had "winning the popular vote" been the object of the game, the game would have changed. The game would have been played differently. To use another analogy, the Gore complaint is identical to a football team that loses 21-20 and then yells "Yeah but we had 23 first downs and you only had 22". The dishonesty of the Gore 2000 Revisionism is breathtaking in its scope and chutzpuh.

Gore lost a heartbreakingly close election, but he DID lose. That he will be tortured by it until the day he departs this vail of tears, I fully understand. If he had borne his pain with strength and dignity he could have been an American hero, a shining example for a nation who needs more statesmen. By his self pitying words and actions, he put this nation at risk and damaged our institutions in ways we won't fully grasp for decades.

If America continues it present downward spiral into ever more bitter public discourse, filled with angry words and gestures of violence, we will have Albert Arnold Gore Jr. to thank most of all.

Post Script: I have been working on this piece for a couple of days, both in my mind and on "paper". Imagine my surprise when I saw this on Powerline today while still working on this post. As soon as I publish this I am going here to read the column by Joseph Perkins of the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Good news on the poll front.

Just as a reputed GOP Insider predicted, President Bush has now nudged out to a 3-5 point lead nationally.

Rasmussen has it 50-48, WaPo 49-48, Gallup 51-46, Fox 50-45, and Battleground 51-46. The Battleground poll is huge given that it too pushes Bush up over 50%, and confirms a definate move in the President's direction AND shows him with a 53% approval rating.

Have a GREAT weekend!

A Note on Zogby

Not wanting to be accused of sour grapes, I am purposely timing this post at a point where John Zogby shows Bush leading in the national vote.

Simply put, I think Zogby is full of it, but what bothers me more is how the media fawns over his PREDICTIONS as though he is an oracle.

Giving him the benefit of the doubt, Zogby is at best a very good pollster. Frankly I don't even believe that, but I'm willing to cede it for the sake of argument. However, being a very able pollster does not in any direct way qualify you as a political expert or soothsayer.

As a pollster Zogby can perhaps tell you who is leading RIGHT NOW but this does not enable him to reliably predict who will actually win on November 2. Political prognostication is part information, part art and part knowledge.

By information I mean such things as how many new voters have registered in Locality X, how did locality X vote in 2000 or 2002 or 1998 etc.

By knowledge I am referring to a well rounded understanding of political history, past trends, and how various factors affect voting patterns etc.

The art comes into play in how one combines the information with the knowledge and then leavens the concoction with an accurate sense of the mood and temper of the voters. This last part is VITAL to having a meaningful opinion. Will Republicans vote in higher numbers than 2000? Lower numbers than 2002? Will Bush get 9% of the Black vote or 12%? 18%?

John Zogby has not shown that he has any expertise beyond polling, thus it is a waste of everyone's time for TV talking heads to ask him who he THINKS will win on Election Day.

Zogby has wavered all over the map, saying months ago that Kerry would win, then apparently telling Robert Novak that Bush will win, and now evidently doubling back and saying Kerry will win. None of his predictions matter because he is a pollster not a prophet.

If it LOOKS like Desperation...

and SMELLS like Desperation, there is a real good chance it's DESPERATION.

I am referring to NYTrogate and the "missing explosives" that John Kerry has made such a huge deal of the past couple of days.

Kerry's harping on this story was raw political opportunism but it was also incredibly stupid. Handed an "issue" like this, the Kerry campaign should have relied on outside operatives to press the "Bush is a futz" line. The candidate should have looked grave and concerned, indicated that he did not feel he should discuss such a vitally important event until all the facts are known, and gone about his business of pressing his CORE issues.

What Kerry did was drop all the talking points he has honed over the past month (that seemed to be working to some degree) and allow himself to crawl WAYOUT on a limb to make a dubious charge out of rumor and hearsay. Dick Morris strongly points this out in today's NY Post.

Now he is starting to pay for this blunder. I suspect the polling numbers will start to move decisively in W's direction the rest of the way. This was one flop by Flipper too many.

Rasmussen Update

Yesterday I showed the last several days worth of the Rasmussen tracking poll that appear to show a Bush Trend. Today's numbers don't belie that notion.

Date Bush Kerry Movement Cumulative
Oct 22 49.1 45.9 Baseline
Oct 23 48.0 46.7 Bush -1.9
Oct 24 47.6 47.2 Bush -0.9 -2.8
Oct 25 46.4 48.4 Bush -2.4 -5.2
Oct 26 47.8 47.8 Bush +2.0 -3.2
Oct 27 48.8 47.1 Bush +1.7 -1.5
Oct 28 48.9 46.9 Bush +0.3 -1.2

So the "Bush Trend" continues as the President has regained a 2% lead on Kerry and putting the race back to within 1.2% of where it was last Friday. Compared to Monday's numbers, Bush has gained 4% relative to Kerry. When "leaners" are included Bush goes to 49.7 tantalizingly close to the magic number of 50%.

The reason I key on Rasmussen is simply because he is there. I don't personally put a great amount of faith in this or ANY poll, when the numbers are this close. However a trend is a trend is a trend.

Strengthening Rasmussen's case is the fact that both TIPP (47B-44K) and Zogby/Reuters (48B-46K) are showing almost identical numbers.

I don't have much faith in ANY of these three polls but I'd rather be leading in all three than trailing in all three!

Polls and predictions.

This bit of information comes from over at CrushKerry.com and purportedly are the words of a longtime Republican insider who worked in the Reagan campaigns:

"In the next couple of days you will see a trend that shows Kerry taking a small but consistent lead against President Bush. I'm talking one or two points. And then, almost without warning or explanation, you will see the President open up a four- to six-point lead on or around Thursday. And that trend will carry the President through Election Day."

What is interesting to me is that this was in a post from this past Friday. So far he is hitting it pretty close. Kerry in fact did inch ahead in several polls released Sunday and Monday. Now we are starting to see Bush re-gain some traction.

Take Rasmussen for example. Many people swear by him and just as many swear at him, but as far as I know he uses consistent methods from poll to poll and thus while he may or may not be accurate, you can at least compare his polls to each other and get a sense for how things MAY be moving.

Let's look at his numbers for each day, starting on Friday (the day of the prediction by the GOP insider) and through today October 27.

Date Bush Kerry Movement Cumulative
Oct 22 49.1 45.9 Baseline
Oct 23 48.0 46.7 Bush -1.9
Oct 24 47.6 47.2 Bush -0.9 -2.8
Oct 25 46.4 48.4 Bush -2.4 -5.2
Oct 26 47.8 47.8 Bush +2.0 -3.2
Oct 27 48.8 47.1 Bush +1.7 -1.5

So what you see is a very clear movement toward Kerry and then just as clear a movement back toward Bush, just as predicted by Mr. Insider. Bush relative to Kerry is still 1.5% behind where he started on Friday, so the next two days of polling will be highly interesting to see.

One cautionary note, I have been told that Rasmussen had one day of polling that was clearly an anti-Bush outlier, however over that period from Friday to Monday, there was steady movement that went well beyond a single "bad poll day".

Very striking is the fact that the Rasmussen poll shows a huge 3.7% swing in just two days, from Kerry +2 to Bush +1.7.

When Rasmussen adds in the "leaners" the numbers go to Bush 49.5 and Kerry 48.1 meaning that Kerry is getting roughly 63% of undecideds who admit which way they are leaning.

Another 1.9% say they are still completely undecided and according to Rasmussen probably 50% of those will not even bother to vote. All of which, if correct, makes for a VERY steep hill for Kerry to climb.

All of that for what it is worth.

New links with more politics!

Just recently I've stumbled across a couple more excellent blogs. The Horse Race Blog is simply incredible. Jay puts a lot of effort into breaking down the various polls and inspecting their methods and numbers. I am very anxious to see how correctly he predicts this election. His statistical analysis is fascinating stuff and strikes me as likely to be closer to the real world numbers than anyone else's. His blog is crammed full of outstanding stuff for the political junkie.

The other new link is to Daly Thoughts, another really interesting site. It is chock full of electoral polls and predictions and Gerry updates each state as new polls roll in. The site layout is a little bit quirky but well worth the time it takes to learn your way around.

Both of these blogs seem to be well grounded and not prone to going overboard with the optimism or pessimism. Two really fine sites that I heartily recommend.

A full weekend.

Not many years ago weekends were mainly a down time in the news cycle. Sure there were the Sunday morning network political shows and the Sunday paper, but otherwise Saturday and Sunday were given over to yard work, BBQ's, family outings and watching football or baseball on TV.

In the new age of the Internet(s?) the news ( and most importantly the campaign news) just barrels ahead without the slightest pause. I spent a good part of Sunday sifting through a lot of information and opinion and I am left with a very good feeling for where this presidential race is headed.

To cut to the chase, President Bush is ahead and probably becoming more unbeatable with each passing day. John Kerry is just too much of an opportunistic and plastic man to win the office. The Washington Times this morning broke a story that reveals again that Kerry suffers from a debilitating case of Algores Syndrome. In other words he exaggerates (lies) about what he has done and who he has talked with etc.

Kerry is probably the least accomplished major party candidate since Warren G. Harding in 1920. In fact Harding at least ran the family newspaper fairly well. What has Kerry EVER accomplished aside from winning elective office? Now winning an election IS an accomplishment, but Kerry has NEVER done anything once he got into office. Nothing. Twenty years in the U.S. Senate and NOTHING to show for it. The man is a cipher, a chameleon, the sole actor in a one act play entitled Me Me Me.

I have a lot of respect for David Broder. Broder is a throwback to a time when reporters and pundits behaved in manner Lawrence O'Donnell could never understand. While Broder is unquestionably left of center, he is honest and generally fair. His latest column is damning for John Kerry. At first blush Broder seems to diss both candidates, but it becomes clear when one sums it up, that while Broder considers George W. Bush to be greatly flawed, he finds John Kerry to be COMPLETELY lacking in the essential qualities needed to be President.

The closing paragraph of Broder's column is telling: "Viewed in this light, the choice for the country becomes one of confirming an executive with visible and even fundamental shortcomings or entrusting the presidency to a man whose habits of mind and of action are far removed from the challenges of the White House." That, my friends, is a stake through John Kerry's election hopes.

For a concise reason as to why Broder (and millions more) feel this way about John F. Kerry, ponder the quote in the concluding paragraph in the Times UN story:

"In an interview published in the new issue of Rolling Stone magazine, Mr. Kerry was asked what he would want people to remember about his presidency. He responded, "That it always told the truth to the American people." "

While certainly "truth" is a laudable goal for any politician, I wonder what Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, or Ronald Reagan would have thought of Mr. Kerry's choice?

Good news a plenty.

Almost all the polling numbers being released today are good for the President. The fact that he is still campaigning in Pennsylvania is also a good indication that Karl Rove sees strong movement in the GOP's direction.

Naturally Pennsylvania could be a feint intended to force Kerry out of Ohio and Florida to defend a Gore state. However I doubt it. I strongly suspect that Rove senses weakness and is moving aggressively to exploit it.

Remember, in order to win, Kerry MUST capture Pennsylvania's 21 electoral votes, Bush doesn't.

The most shocking poll today is the Detroit News showing Bush with a four point lead in Michigan. If Michigan is truly in play, John Kerry is in deep, deep, trouble. A possible explanation for the Bush lead is the fact that "state ballot Proposal 2 defining marriage as strictly between one man and one woman [is] winning easily, with a 67 percent to 24 percent margin."

If 67% of Michigan voters are opposed to same-sex marriage, then it much more likely that this poll is not the outlier it is being treated as.

Hell hath no hissy like a Sodomite scorned

Andrew Sullivan is widely linked to by conservative blogs because he has obtained a reputation as a not totally anti-GOP homosexual. Some of Sullivan's impulses are in a logical direction, so this earned him quite a bit of attention from some conservatives.

It is time those conservatives drop back and reassess. Sullivan is a typical liberal screw who is simply not quite as mindless as some of his fellow travelers. Sullivan actually indicated early on in the campaign, that he was likely to support Bush. However, once George W Bush came out against same-sex marriage, Sullivan has been throwing a massive temper tantrum and attacking the President at every turn.

Now Sullivan has decided that Pat Robertson (of all people) is telling the absolute truth and is correct to the tiniest detail, on the idiotic notion that Bush thought there would be no casualties in Iraq. If anyone doubted what a disgusting person Sullivan was before, this episode should clear up their confusion nicely.

Like most Republicans I don't care what two consenting adults do in their free time. Whatever my personal opinion of morality, the habits of other adults are for God to sort out not me. But there comes a moment when a great political party MUST take a stand on the major issues of the day. Freedom of speech. Slavery. Abortion. Deviant sexual behavior.

The time is well past that Republicans should waste any time coddling the homosexual lobby. Call sexual deviancy by its correct name and then just get on with life. Presumably the GOP opposes adultery, but that certainly does not preclude adulterers from being Republicans. Any whinny brats like Sullivan who decide to put the issue of acceptance of their bedtime jollies ahead of national security, deserve the Democratic Party and vice versa.

Good riddance girls and boys.

Two weeks and a day

Man, this waiting is killing me. I have never been on pins and needles over a presidential election like this one. The polls are gyrating like I have never seen them before. Zogby for instance goes from Kerry ahead by 3, to Bush up by 4, to Even, all in one week!

What does it all mean? For one thing I feel fairly strongly that some funny business is going on with SOME of the polls. One poll that seems much more even is Rasmussen. He has had the race within Bush up 2 - Kerry up 2, for weeks now. That is likely where the race actually is.

The most famous poll, Gallop, seems to be as loony as any, going from Bush way up to Even to Bush way up again. I just find it hard to believe that the electorate is THAT undecided. In fact I think 95% of the voters are "decided" and another 3-4% are virtually "decided". I suspect only 1-2% are still actually unsure of who will get their vote.

MaryGate continues to generate news and comment. While I doubt that many Kerry voters will switch to Bush over this issue, I do think it could cause some of his soft support to stay home or vote for Nader.

I base this observation on what I think is one of Kerry's and the Democratic Party's biggest weaknesses. His support is made up of dozens of splinter groups. What's left of the Unions, what's left of the feminists, radical gays, peaceniks, what's left of the civil rights era black groups, tree huggers, trial lawyers, various socialist nuts organizations, ditto utopian dreamers organizations, and 10 or 15 pre-Carter Democrats who never got around to leaving the Party 25 years ago.

Some of these people are very weird. They move about in a world where up and down are the same thing. Common sense and practicality are constructs with which they are unfamiliar. Little comments like Kerry's Mary Cheney gaffe will cause some of them to throw their hands in the air, stomp off in a dander and vote for Nader or maybe just stay home and be sad on Election Day.

From news reports and from my own experience, the people most offended are women. I spoke with one woman over the weekend who is a life-long Democrat and she was withering in her criticism and denunciation of Kerry.

Ticking off women is the last thing Kerry needs at this point.

17 Days

Just over two weeks away and the election is seemingly tight as a tick on flea bitten hound dog.

Here is a quick synopsis of how I THINK we got here.

1. 2000 election extremely close and controversial, thus 2004 likely to be also.

2. 9-11 refocused Americans' minds and priorities.

3. Bush did very well in the months following 9-11 and gained much respect and support.

4. Americans generally supported both Afghanistan and Iraq wars.

5. When the Iraq war continued after the 4th Quarter ended, inevitably many left of center Americans started getting cold feet and backed off from their "support" for the President.

6. As the Democratic Party went through its nomination process, many more Democrats returned to the fold and made this a close race.

7. The Democratic Convention was in hindsight a mess, but it gave the Kerry campaign a brief appearance of momentum and perhaps a small lead.

8. August was an unmitigated disaster for Kerry, with the Swift Boat Vets dominating the news.

9. The GOP convention was a distinct success and Bush started to build a lead.

10. RatherGate further damaged Kerry and boosted Bush into a considerable margin of from 6-12 points.

11. The first debate badly damaged Bush. Perhaps his greatest strength is his folksiness as contrasted with Kerry's aloofness. In the debate Bush appeared to many as grouchy, rude, and petty, and the polls were suddenly showing a near dead even race.

12. In the last two debates Bush recovered nicely and while perhaps "losing" on style, actually won on substance. Most Americans can tell the difference and Bush opened a 1-3 point lead.

13. MaryGate jumped up out of the bullrushes to bite Kerry's posterior and give Bush a further nudge of perhaps another full point.

That is where we stand today.

I think Bush currently has something between a 2-4 point lead. More importantly he appears to lead in enough states to reach 270 electoral votes.

The next two weeks will be most interesting.

They have no shame

My wife had ABC's morning show on TV as I gulped my coffee at about 8:15. I was lending only half an ear to the background noise until I heard this:

"Teresa Heinz Kerry is benefiting from the Bush tax cuts" blah blah blah.

So, in a story revealing that zillionaire THK paid a paltry percentage in federal taxes, she is neatly left off the hook because it is all George Bush's fault.

Apparently ABC is hewing closely to Mark Halperin's edict to screw the Bush campaign no matter where the truth lies.

Media Bias

If there is a more objectionable person, posing as an unbiased member of the media, than Lawrence O'Donnell of MSNBC, I'll be a Deaniac if I know who it is.

Last night on "Scarborough Country" with guest host Pat Buchanan, I got my first, and with luck last, look and listen to O'Donnell. Also joining the discussion was Bob Zelnick, former ABC News Pentagon correspondent and presently the chairman of the Journalism Department at Boston University.

I have always liked Zelnick and considered him an honest broker of the truth in his years at ABC. I assumed it would be a fairly straightforward discussion about the final debate.

You can read the transcript by using the link above and scrolling down, so I won't bother with a blow by blow description. Instead here are some of O'Donnell's most absurd words for your perusal. Keep in mind that O'Donnell is billed as "MSNBC SR. POLITICAL ANALYST".

The following comments are regarding John Kerry's "Mary" answer Wednesday night.

Totally Unbiased Major Media Guy Lawrence O'Donnell:

"I don't think he crossed the line.
There's a Gallup poll that indicates that his win in the third debate was just about the same size as his win in the first debate, enormous win, 52-39. Now, that's who is judging the debate. It doesn't matter what we think.

.....that line did not seem to jar the public, who gave a huge win to Kerry in the polling on this debate."

In response to a question about Lynne Cheney's angry-mom comments:

"That's a 100 percent political reaction, 100 percent. She was sent out there to say that, and she did it. "

"Her response has no substance."

And then this incredible exchange:

BUCHANAN: She does not think her daughter's sexuality ought to be brought up by a presidential candidate in a national debate.

O'DONNELL: It wasn't brought up by a presidential candidate.

(CROSSTALK) .

O'DONNELL: It was brought up by Bob Schieffer.

A barefaced lie pure and simple.

And then O'Donnell crawls inside the brain of George W. Bush:

O'DONNELL: "It's pretty clear that this president has never had a conversation with any gay American anywhere on the question of, is this a choice? "

So for the President to have a valid opinion he first must have "a conversation with a gay on the question of is this a choice"? What a clueless twit.

Maureen Dowd of all people, says in today's New York Times:

"Mr. Kerry showed the bite in his overwhitened, overeager "I'm smarter than you but I'm trying not to show it" grin when he strategically dragged Dick Cheney's gay daughter back into the debate, a dead-wrong thing to do."

Irrefutable evidence that someone farther removed from reality than Miss Dowd actually exists.

Other than the absurdity of his words, the most striking thing about O'Donnell was his almost zombie like appearance and delivery. If he had been hypnotized and instructed to defend Kerry no matter the cost, he would not have looked differently. He hardly even reacted to Zelnick's comments (which were pitched almost perfectly in my opinion) but stuck to the line that essentially equaled "Kerry Good, Bush Bad".

And people wonder why Fox clobbers MSNBC every night.

Unprecedented?

Probably not, but the 2004 presidential elections continues to surprise with it twists and turns. The race now appears to be......well, all over the place. National polls are coming out daily that flatly contradict each other. Today Gallop has Kerry up by 1 while WaPo/ABC has Bush up 6. Yesterday Rasmussen had Bush up 4 and Zogby had Kerry up 3.

These all (except WaPo/ABC) fall within the MOE and the "internals" become all the more vital. There are all kinds of yak-yak going on about which polls are "fair" and the methodology of each poll.

My sense is that Bush is still ahead but that we are at a tilting point. Think of the election as being balanced on a pivot. Currently Bush controls the action, but any miscalculation could see Kerry move out in front, and not just by a little. If Kerry ever starts to actually surge, look out. Thus far Kerry has not polled above 50%.

I still believe that Karl Rove knows what he is doing. The only elected incumbent Republican to lose a re-election effort since 1932 was GHWB, and he lost because he had no Karl Rove. Lee Atwater died between the '88 and '92 campaigns and the contrasting results showed how valuable Atwater was.

In the final "debate" Bush needs to continue the progress he made in second one, and if he does so, he will be well positioned to win on Election Day.

The race tightens

Recent polls continue to show the margin narrowing between President Bush and John Kerry. This was expected and predicted by most pundits and experts and thus is slight cause for gnashing of teeth by Republicans.

When the polls are disected and their internals sifted, and then applied to the reality of the individual state polls, it becomes ever more apparent that GWB is headed for a narrow but decisive victory.

Tomorrow night's debate is important. It gives Mr. Bush a chance to beat back the impression that Kerry clobbered him in their first encounter. While I don't believe that the debates will determine who wins or loses, they may well have a considerable impact on the final margin. For instance, I would now say that my prediction of a couple weeks ago of perhaps a 55-45 landslide seems out of reach. 52-48 seems more likely from this post-debate vantage point.

The time grows short, with less than four weeks till Election Day.

Post Debate thoughts

I did not watch the debate. I have read, extensively, the opinions of those who did see it. Putting those comments together with the early post-debate polling data, I've reach a few conclusions.

Kerry stanched the bleeding and probably saved himself from complete embarrassment on Election Day. Bush appears to have been poorly prepared which just flat out amazes and angers me. No excuse for it.

Karl Rove should have grabbed W by the ears and shouted in his face after that performance. Showing "annoyance" by making faces and behaving like a high school freshman is incredibly immature and stupid.

Come on Mr. President, be the man you have been since 9-11, not the irresponsible party boy you were 40 years ago.

I like George W. Bush, but he needs to rise above the limits of his father and become a true man of the people. A man who can take a poke in the rhetorical nose, maintain his calm and use his sense of humor to diffuse the moment.

This is still W's race to lose. I think the polls will loosen back up over the next few days, but the President needs a solid performance in the next debate to regain lost momentum.

Is a Landslide possible?

I think the answer is emphatically YES!

Political campaigns are deeply bound by tradition and generally follow along well worn paths. Many folks are reluctant to break out of habits well learned until they actually step into the voting booth. An election that illustrates this very well is 1980.

All through that campaign, the polls showed a relatively tight race. Reagan was considered by the chattering class as too much of a cowboy, dangerous, reckless etc. Many Americans thus kept their intention to vote for him to themselves. I have long felt that this explains why polls generally under count the GOP's support.

On election day Reagan destroyed Jimmy Carter. Reagan got 51% of the vote in a three way race and lead Carter by 10 percentage points. With the exception of Reagan's dismantling of the hapless Walter Mondale four years later, no presidential election since then has seen a margin anywhere near that large.

George W. Bush came into office under less than ideal conditions. He lost the popular vote (for what that is worth, more on that in a future post), and he won the electoral vote by the barest of margins and only after a several weeks long Gortantrum. Many pundits along with the Democratic Party, assumed this would cloud Bush's chances for a second term.

Then September 11, 2001 happened. In a single morning of horror, the earth shifted and politics as we knew it ceased to exist. That single fact, barring a bizarre and unprecedented meltdown by George W. Bush in tonight's debate, will re-elect the President and by a margin outside that which is suggested by current polls.

When voters across the nation enter the voting booth and prepare to pull the lever (or punch the screen, or whatever) the last thought they will have, the last image they will contemplate will decide their vote.

It won't be Social Security, or unemployment, or gay marriage, or tax cuts, or Vietnam. Enron won't matter nor will Halliburton or Damn Rather. Milk price supports, wind surfing, idiots from Hollywood, and gas prices won't matter.

What will rise before the mind's eye and fill Americans with resolve, will be two towers burning and falling, a national symbol with a plane embedded in one of its five sides, an open field in Pennsylvania where good men confronted evil.

I believe that when Americans make this most important of choices, a surprisingly large number of them will vote for George W. Bush. In five weeks we will know for sure, but at this moment I suspect the president will gather something on the order of 55% of the popular vote, well over 300 electoral votes, and John Kerry will join George McGovern, Walter Mondale, and Michael Dukakis as men who ran for the wrong job against the wrong man at the wrong time.

The Road to 270

Alabama 9 Bush 9
Alaska 3 Bush 12
Arizona 10 Bush 22
Arkansas 6 Bush 28
California 55 Kerry 55
Colorado 9 Bush 37
Connecticut 7 Kerry 62
Delaware 3 Kerry 65
District of Columbia 3 Kerry 68
Florida 27 Bush 64
Georgia 15 Bush 79
Hawaii 4 Kerry 72
Idaho 4 Bush 83
Illinois 21 Kerry 93
Indiana 11 Bush 94
Iowa 7 Bush (a switch) 101
Kansas 6 Bush 107
Kentucky 8 Bush 115
Louisiana 9 Bush 124
Maine 4 Kerry 97
Maryland 10 Kerry 107
Massachusetts 12 Kerry 119
Michigan 17 Kerry 136
Minnesota 10 Kerry 146
Mississippi 6 Bush 130
Missouri 11 Bush 141
Montana 3 Bush 144
Nebraska 5 Bush 149
Nevada 5 Bush 154
New Hampshire 4 Bush 158
New Jersey 15 Kerry 161
New Mexico 5 Kerry 166
New York 31 Kerry 197
North Carolina 15 Bush 173
North Dakota 3 Bush 176
Ohio 20 Bush 196
Oklahoma 7 Bush 203
Oregon 7 Kerry 204
Pennsylvania 21 Kerry 225
Rhode Island 4 Kerry 229
South Carolina 8 Bush 211
South Dakota 3 Bush 214
Tennessee 11 Bush 225
Texas 34 Bush 259
Utah 5 Bush 264
Vermont 3 Kerry 232
Virginia 13 Bush 277*****
Washington 11 Kerry 243
West Virginia 5 Bush 282
Wisconsin 10 Bush 292
Wyoming 3 Bush 295

Bush 295
Kerry 243

These are very close to numbers I put out back in January. I have moved New Mexico back into Kerry's court, while switching Nevada back to Bush. Both states have five votes and thus offset each other.

The huge news, and the only changes I have made from the 2000 results, is Iowa and Wisconsin moving strongly into the Red State column.

Several states are really too close to call, including Minnesota, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire. I would not be shocked to see all four go to President Bush on election day.

In my next post I will explain why I believe the President will actually win by an even larger margin.

Hilarious

http://www.beecy.net/frank/

And-so-well-done!

Misled?

CBS and Dan Rather have now brought themselves to allow as how maybe they were misled.

What poppycock. "Misled" of course gets them cleanly off the hook. After all, slick salesmen "mislead" people. When your Granny paid $2000 to that fellow to asphalt her driveway and then she never saw him again, she had been misled. Get it? It was NOT her fault!

By merely admitting to being "misled" and expressing "regret" CBS continues to try to ignore, sidestep, and spin this whole imbroglio.

CBS needs to admit they committed a major journalistic mistake and then compounded it by refusing to admit any wrongdoing until today.

Then, they need to open themselves up to an independent investigation to address the appearance of improper practices.

Don't hold your breath. With their behavior over the past two weeks, CBS has shown total disregard for truth, honesty, fairness, and accountability.

Only their name is to be trusted. When you watch Dan Rather and the CBS Evening News, you do indeed see BS.

A dime's worth of difference.

Someone famously said that "there's not a dime's worth of difference" between America's two major parties.

While perhaps true at one time or another, today there are stark differences between the donkeys and the elephants.

After boiling all the yap-yap blather down to the bare bones, I find two extremely important differences.

The Democratic Party thinks most Americans are victims, of one kind or another, who must be "protected" from everyone (except maybe terrorists). Since the beginning of the Democratic Party in the 1820's, one of the overarching prime principles they have argued for is that "the people" are a weak lot, helpless, hapless, taken advantage of and powerless to fight back.

In contrast, the Republican Party has maintained from its genesis, that America is made up of individuals, and thus INDIVIDUAL liberty and responsibility is the only true hope of this nation.
Democrats used this difference to their advantage for most of the 20th Century. They convinced large segments of voters that THEY were for the little guy, while the GOP was for the rich. The facts are somewhat different.

Both parties actually favor "the rich". Life on this earth itself is geared toward the powerful. Money and power have many more options than poverty and weakness. This outstanding essay from William F. Buckley illustrates this beautifully.

Where the difference resides is in that while the Democrats would eternally enslave poor people and ensnare them in a net of never ending dependence, the GOP insists that EVERYONE be given a chance to stand or fall on their own.

As a core principle, Republicans believe that only through rigor can there be vigor. Patting folks on the head and giving them something today, does not prepare them for tomorrow, and more importantly does not allow them to become valuable and contributing members of society and co-owners of America's wealth and power.

The Democratic Party of 2004 finds itself firmly stuck in the ideas and problems of the 1930's. Because many Americans needed help during the Depression, the Democrats think they always will need that same level of "help". They have never caught on to the fact that the patient is much better and no longer needs the level of services that the New Deal provided.

To his ever lasting credit, Bill Clinton largely ended welfare (as we knew it for roughly 30 years) but his party can't seem to learn the lesson and move on to the new world.

The other clear and huge difference between the two parties is related to foreign policy and the use of America's power. Unlike the first difference, this one is of much more recent vintage.

Partisan squabbles are supposed to end at the water's edge, and generally speaking did for many decades. That is not to say that there weren't violent arguments about war and peace down through the ages, but through it all one principle was agreed to by America's leaders: American power should be used justly, wisely, sparingly, but at all times.....In America's Best Interests.

Today's Democratic Party is dominated by people who believe that American power is bad. Not just bad but evil. (What amazes me is how any GOP criticism of John Kerry's positions, immediately brings counter charges that the Republicans are "questioning my patriotism". Huh? No what Republicans and conservatives are "questioning" are your loony ideas. Ideas that if put in practice would endanger our nation and freedom around the world.)

Kerry Spot at NRO (scroll down to the 9/16 5:37PM entry) has referenced a Pew Research finding that suggests that 51% of Democrats blame the United States for 9-11.

That's what I'm talkin' about. Incredible.

The Democratic Party of FDR, Truman, Scoop Jackson and Joe Lieberman, no longer exists (Joe has not figured that out yet). In its place we have a pasty faced pack of fools who, riddled with guilt and cowardice, tries to appease murdering thugs by scorning the nation of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Reagan, and you.

George W. Bush's Republican Party is too liberal and too wedded to big government, but on the two items discussed above, the GOP is still the only choice for conservatives.

Goodness!

It has been almost six months since my last post. I promise that won't happen again. I will be posting each Monday and Thursday and otherwise as the spirit moves me.

I have had a very hectic Spring and Summer but now I am ready to get down to it again.

The presidential race is shaping up much as I thought it would. The Kerry campaign however has been much more incompetent than I could have hoped.

I really am beginning to suspect that it is being systematically sabotaged from with-in.

My prediction from back in January still stands. Bush in a narrow but clear victory.

I will be reevaluating my state by state predictions before the end of the month.

Kerry begins his fall

As I have steadfastly maintained, John Kerry is looking less "presidential" every day.

The fact is that Bill Clinton has more class and grace than this product of Bahstan blue bloods.

John Kerry is a jerk. A self centered, ego maniacal, me first, jerk. Now he has added cussing a Secret Service agent for bumping His Highness, to his resume.

He brings NOTHING to the table beyond his desire to be important. A Kerry presidency would be a disaster that would make conservatives long for the Clinton Administration.

In fact I will go farther: President John Kerry would make Jimmy Carter look good.

Again, barring some horrific event, this election will be won by George W. Bush. What I have seen of the Bush campaign thus far, convinces me that Karl Rove is in full possession of his faculties, and will roast Mr. Kerry as he richly deserves.

A double dose of good news for the President.

The economy continues to roll as the fourth quarter numbers have been released and show a growth rate of 4.1%.

This paragraph buried deep inn the AP story is enlightening:

"The economy's performance in the second half of last year marked the best back-to-back quarterly performance since the first two quarters of 1984."

In other words, since Ronald Reagan was president. Or put another way, better than Slick Willie ever managed. Do you suppose Peter Jennings will point that out on the news this evening?

The second bit of happy news is that the National Journal has just released its rankings of the members of the U.S. Congress, and one John Kerry is the MOST LIBERAL Senator. Yep, more liberal than Teddy K and more liberal than Barby Boxer. This is stunning stuff and Karl Rove MUST be drooling with thoughts of the ads he can run this Fall.

I will say it again, Bush will win re-election, and he will do it fairly easily.

Four More Years.

I am increasingly of a mind that George W. Bush will sweep back to power with a much larger win than 2000.

A race between two non-incumbents is much more unpredictable than when an incumbent is present.

Public opinion polls that purport to measure approval and disapproval can be tweaked in any way the poll taker wants the results to go. However the more questions that are asked, the harder it is for a dishonest polling effort to cover its tracks.

For instance, a poll that shows President Bush has only a 48% approval rating on foreign policy, yet also shows 65% support the Iraq War, almost by definition is unreliable.

When reading poll results, always read the full list of questions, find out what the sample number were (how many Dems, how many GOP etc), and when the poll was taken.

George W. Bush will win in November barring some huge disaster. My earlier prediction of a very narrow victory for Bush is still operative, but I now think Bush will collect closer to 350 electoral votes than the minimum of 270.

Drudge claims in question.

The news that Wesley Clark has now endorsed John Kerry calls in to strong doubt the Drudge Report story regarding possible Bimbo Eruptions in the ultra-liberal Senator's campaign.

Drudge had quoted Clark as predicting that "Kerry will implode over an intern issue." It seems very unlikely that even a quack like Clark would endorse Kerry if he thought he was going to "implode".

As I noted yesterday, Drudge and facts often go their separate ways and this may well be the latest spat between the two.

Here we go again.

I thought it was odd that Howard Dean was attacking Kerry with such ferocity the past few days. Given that Dean racked up 8% or so of the votes in states like Virginia and Tennessee while Kerry was at or over 50%, I naturally expected the other candidates to start kissing up to the apparent nominee.

I chalked Dean's comments up to the fact that he is Dean. Now however, it looks like there may be more to it than that. The Drudge Report has a high wattage alert that suggests that John Kerry's campaign is about to blow up over charges of "recent alleged infidelity".

Drudge admittedly has an uneven track record. There have been numerous times when he has totally missed the fact train. However, this report has a whiff of believability to it. Among other things, it maintains that "A serious investigation of the woman and the nature of her relationship with Sen. John Kerry has been underway at TIME magazine, ABC NEWS, the WASHINGTON POST and the ASSOCIATED PRESS, where the woman in question once worked."

The next few days may well turn the Democratic race on it ear. Again.

The love that won't shut up..

That is a hilarious line in a recent Powerline post from The Big Trunk.

Ever so often a short and simple phrase will sum up your feeling in way that 10,000 words could not.

The Good News that is all bad.

We live in strange times. Take this report from the AP for instance.

Unemployments drops to 5.6%, 112,000 new jobs added last month as opposed to only 12,000 added in December, yet it is bad news.

Why?

Because economists were PREDICTING that even more jobs would be added, that's why.

So because some economists misread their crystal ball, we should all wring our hands in despair. Right? Well not really.

The economy continues to exhibit signs that it is in a moderate but steady march in the right direction. Brick by brick the recovery is being built. By Summer I believe John Kerry will be twisting and turning in the strong wind of a full blown expansion.

The Fat Lady warms up.

Last night's win of five states by John Kerry pretty well finishes the race. John Edwards needed to win at least two states in order to maintain a strong position. He barely missed doing so in Oklahoma, losing by less than 1500 votes out of over 300,000 cast.

I still feel that Kerry is probably the weakest frontrunner that I have seen over the last 30 years. By this I mean that a TON of voters still chose someone else last night. Edwards and Clark drew respectable numbers and so did Dean and Lieberman considering they were the 4th and 5th place duo.

With only Lieberman dropping out, this race still has possible pitfalls for Kerry, but I suspect he will manage to avoid them. When preaching to the choir an experienced pol like Kerry will manage to hold the lead 99% of the time.

What was most impressive for Kerry was the fact that he carried states in all regions. Delaware, Missouri, Arizona/New Mexico and North Dakota.

Given the way this race has unfolded, I think a Kerry-Edwards ticket is very likely, with one caveat. IF the Democrats decide to "give up" on the South (except for Florida), then Edwards is far less attractive and Kerry may opt for a more experienced face from a swing state.

I still believe that Kerry has a record that the Bush Campaign will simply destroy, and I expect that 10 months from now the Democratic Party will once more be plunged into a round of intensive navel contemplation.

A pair of ninnies

Two very bad political decisions came to light today.

First, Howard Dean has announced that he will run no TV ads in the seven states voting on February 3. Instead he will save his dwindling resources for Michigan, Washington, and Wisconsin. Bad idea.

Kerry has a huge head of steam built up. If Dean does not knock it down ASAP then it's Katie Bar The Door.

Dean's best (in fact only) chance to win in the latter three states, is to exceed expectations on Tuesday. No way will he do that if he does not run all out in the next round.

Second, President Bush's horrible decision to up the funding for the execrable National Endowment for the Arts. This may well be the straw that breaks the conservative camel's back (or rather its spirit). It is amazing beyond my ability to manipulate the English language, that W is repeating the same politically stupid arc that his father did.

Like the Adams, it appears the Bush family is intent on a double dose of single terms.

Incredible.

The Fat Lady Has Not Yet Sung

Arizona, Delaware, Missouri, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina. That is a daunting mixture of states if you are a liberal from Massachusetts who can easily be linked with the most famous liberal from Massachusetts.

While John Kerry has clearly earned "frontrunner" status, I think maybe we should all step back and take a deep breath.

For starters, Kerry has yet to break the 40% barrier, and if you combine the vote of Dean, Edwards, and Clark, you reach exactly 50%. (In the FINAL count, Dean edged up to 26%, 12% behind Kerry.)Put another way, 62 percent of John Kerry's next door neighbors refused to vote for him.

John Kerry and his ultra-liberal track-record, will not play in those seven states I listed above, like he has in Iowa and New Hampshire. North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, are in the most conservative tier of states. Arizona and New Mexico have been trending more in the Democratic direction in recent years, but they are a completely different kettle of fish than either Iowa or New Hampshire. Delaware is solidly Democratic and the most likely one to be a pushover for Kerry. Missouri will be VERY interesting, especially if Richard Gephardt decides to make an endorsement.

The biggest point in Kerry's favor is the fact that his strongest opponent till now is also a liberal from New England. Howard Dean will also be on unfriendly terrain.

Clearly this coming Tuesday is THE big chance for Edwards, Clark, and Lieberman to make a strong showing. Lieberman is being written off by just about everyone, but he still has a chance to play the spoiler.

The expectation game is also a worry for Kerry. What if in a state like Oklahoma, Kerry comes in 4th? Or 5th? How will that play in the national media if results are mixed across the other states?

If I had to bet the ranch, I'd bet on Kerry, but given the choice I wouldn't wager on this race at all.

New Hampsire in their rear view....

With John Kerry's strong showing in both Iowa and New Hampshire, we now move into the meat of the primary season. The question on everyone's mind is: Can Kerry be stopped?

I suspect the answer is NO. While Dean has money, he has lost the traction he generated early on. Michael Barone made an interesting case on Fox last night, when he traced the beginning of Dean's collapse to the incident on January 11, when he had a run in with a questioner in Iowa.

The older gentleman, who was described as a Republican, requested that Dean treat "his neighbor" George Bush, with more kindness. Dean wound up telling the man to shut up. According to Barone, the tracking polls the very next day showed Dean losing support.

Edwards also has the money to go on, but I agree with many others who have pointed out that there is something about Edwards that seems less than ready for prime time.

Clark is hopeless. Arrogant and stupid is a bad combination.

Lieberman may actually begin to finish ahead of Clark when the action shifts to the more conservative South and Midwest.

At this point I think a Kerry-Edwards ticket seems a very likely outcome.

The Great New Hampshire debate

I watched (or more accurately listened to) a fair amount of last night's debate while installing a phone jack in the island of our kitchen.

The clear winner I thought was Kerry. He was smooth and believable. He did not come off as arrogant or puffed up after his sudden change of fortune.

Lieberman did well but it is doubtful it really matters.

Edwards did well on certain questions but stumbled around on others. I did note that he took at least one opportunity to kiss up to Kerry. It is never too soon to start positioning for Veep.

Clark showed further evidence of his loony cluelessness. This guy is easily the scariest of the five "serious" candidates.

Dean did fine, but he is in deep trouble and "fine" probably won't do more than stop the bleeding. He may have held onto to second place but I don't think he will mount a serious challenge to Kerry.

I thought Kucinich and Sharpton came off even loopier than I anticipated. My opinion of Peter Jennings ticked up a notch in light of his question to Sharpton regarding the Federal Reserve. Clearly Jennings used that question to reveal the Reverend Al to be the buffoon we all knew he was.

One moment that I thought was hilarious was when a member of the panel asked Kucinich about the "No Child Left Behind Act". The questioner started asking the question and then as an aside said something like "The No Child Left Behind Act" which I think you voted for" he then kind of paused to get a response, and the camera showed Kucinich with a look like a deer caught in headlights. Kucinich barely nodded his head, agreeing that he voted for the act. However, I suspect he really was not sure. When you are involved in thousands of votes, many times voting on several different versions of the same bill, it is easy to lose track of how you voted on the final bill. But no one would want to admit on national television that they don't remember how they voted. Not even Dennis Kucinich.

Return to the Electoral College

It has oft been said that if George W. Bush simply wins the same states he won last time, he will increase his margin due to the impact of the 2000 Census on the Electoral College.

I have done a quick overview of the states and find that this election in my mind will again be very close. Assuming John Kerry is the Democratic Nominee, I see very few states changing hands. Below is a list of the states, their 2004 Electoral Votes, who I pick to win, and a running tabulation of each candidate's total vote.

Alabama 9 Bush 9
Alaska 3 Bush 12
Arizona 10 Bush 22
Arkansas 6 Bush 28
California 55 Kerry 55
Colorado 9 Bush 37
Connecticut 7 Kerry 62
Delaware 3 Kerry 65
District of Columbia 3 Kerry 68
Florida 27 Bush 64
Georgia 15 Bush 79
Hawaii 4 Kerry 72
Idaho 4 Bush 83
Illinois 21 Kerry 93
Indiana 11 Bush 94
Iowa 7 Bush (a switch) 101
Kansas 6 Bush 107
Kentucky 8 Bush 115
Louisiana 9 Bush 124
Maine 4 Kerry 97
Maryland 10 Kerry 107
Massachusetts 12 Kerry 119
Michigan 17 Kerry 136
Minnesota 10 Kerry 146
Mississippi 6 Bush 130
Missouri 11 Bush 141
Montana 3 Bush 144
Nebraska 5 Bush 149
Nevada 5 Kerry (a switch) 151
New Hampshire 4 Bush 153
New Jersey 15 Kerry 166
New Mexico 5 Bush (a switch) 158
New York 31 Kerry 197
North Carolina 15 Bush 173
North Dakota 3 Bush 176
Ohio 20 Bush 196
Oklahoma 7 Bush 203
Oregon 7 Kerry 204
Pennsylvania 21 Kerry 225
Rhode Island 4 Kerry 229
South Carolina 8 Bush 211
South Dakota 3 Bush 214
Tennessee 11 Bush 225
Texas 34 Bush 259
Utah 5 Bush 264
Vermont 3 Kerry 232
Virginia 13 Bush 277*****
Washington 11 Kerry 243
West Virginia 5 Bush 282
Wisconsin 10 Kerry 253
Wyoming 3 Bush 285

Bush 285
Kerry 253

You can see that I have only three states switching from their 2000 result. Nevada moves to the Democratic side and New Mexico and Iowa go for Bush. If we take New Mexico and Iowa away from Bush and give them back to Kerry it makes the vote:

Bush 273
Kerry 265

Under that scenario imagine that New Hampshire, which went for Bush by only 7000 votes (Bush got 48% to Gore's 47%), switched its 4 votes to Kerry. That would bring about this result:

Bush 269
Kerry 269

I suggest we all fasten our chin-straps, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

The issue that dare not speak it's name.

Of the many special interest groups who exist today on the U.S. political stage, homosexuals are one of the most unusual.

How a person feels about homosexuals is a product of upbringing and personal belief. The coalitions in favor of and opposed to, according homosexuals full rights in American Law, are both made up of unusually diverse groups.

The time draws near when the Republican Party will need to come out of the closet and take a stand one way or the other. For many years, the unofficial position of the GOP has been one that is against homosexual rights, while at the same time carefully avoiding making that a major issue in any campaigns.

The reasons for this are obvious. Most importantly, many swing voters are of the belief that what two adults do is their, and their alone, business. Also, there are homosexual conservatives, and naturally the GOP has desired holding on to their votes and money.

The homosexuals however are getting restless. The time is near when there will be a major push to legalize marriage between two men and between two women. When that moment comes, there can be no fence straddling by the Republicans. The decision made at that point will define the future of American politics for many years.

If the GOP comes out against homosexual marriage, they will lose virtually every homosexual vote from that point forward. Additionally, they will lose a good size chunk of cultural liberals/fiscal conservatives who will be uncomfortable supporting an anti-homosexual Republican Party.

If the GOP instead takes a stand in favor of homosexual marriage, the party will lose massive amounts of support from Bible believing Christians, and many other cultural conservatives. Additionally, they will fail to pick up support from traditionally Democratic, but culturally conservative groups, who might move toward the Republicans if homosexual marriage becomes an issue that defines the differences between the two major parties.

Andrew Sullivan, a homosexual and sometimes conservative, illustrates the impatience that ever more characterizes the homosexual lobby. On his blog he writes:

".....the president wants the credit of being tolerant without talking the real talk, let alone walking the real walk. If gay people have dignity and value in God's sight, why are we unmentionable? Why are we talked about as if we are some kind of untouchable? Why in three years has this president not even been able to say the word 'gay' or 'homosexual'? The reason: because Bush will not confront bigotry outright. He wants to benefit from it while finding a formula to distance himself from it. That's not a moral stand. It's moral avoidance."

Sullivan is correct that President Bush is still attempting to finesse the issue. No surprise there, since politicians of all stripes finesse as many issues as possible. But Sullivan points out a very important fact. President Bush has to date failed to take an up or down position on homosexual marriage, and he likely will be able to continue with that non-position through the 2004 election.

In future national elections however, it becomes increasingly likely that the Republican Party will be forced to take a stand. Just as it did on abortion a quarter century ago. Just as it did on slavery a century and a half ago.

Moral issues don't go away. Moral issues can't be ignored forever. Moral issues eventually demand that both major parties take an official stand.

The decision made by the Republicans on homosexual marriage will be the most defining position taken by the Party since it became the defender of the unborn in the late 70's and early 80's.

Looking back at Iowa

I have spent the past 40 hours cogitating on the result in Iowa. I was thoroughly flabbergasted over the last week as Kerry and Edwards surged from the basement to the penthouse.

I still am not sure that anyone really has explained what happened. Many pundits point to this or that and proclaim the answer found. I think they are all right and all wrong.

Let us consider the fact that of the four serious candidates in Iowa, two moved up and two moved down. Had it simply been a case of John Kerry catching fire (something that is hard to imagine) then one might think that this was nothing more than outstanding political operations on his part. But Edwards too? And how to explain the tandem free-fall of Dean and Gephardt?

The major factors that I think brought about the current alignment are as follows:
1. Dean began imploding in December, with his idiotic statements on various international issues.
2. The capture of Saddam Hussein hastened the process as Dean began to look loony even by liberal standards.
3. Gephardt paid dearly for his unstinting (for a Democrat) support of the Iraq War.
4. Old-line union support ain't what it used to be.
5. Kerry and Edwards were the comfortable middle ground left between the old hat, boring, pro-war Gephardt and the manic, angry, anti-war Dean.

Americans are moderate when gauged against worldwide standards of conduct, even our loony left. In the end the Iowa voters opted for what they saw as the calmer, nicer, liberal but not nutty, against the war but not totally, choices.

Then, Howard Dean proved that they were right about him. He proceeded to go nuts and act like a mad dog. Caucus night he bounced out on stage, whacked Sen. Tom Harkin a violent high-five, handed Harkin his coat, yanked the microphone from him, and went into an enraged tantrum of weird behavior before the nation's eyes.

Dean is finished. At this point a Kerry-Edwards ticket seems likely. Stay tuned.

This commentary induced by the recent PBS series on the Civil War, is the first really disappointing piece I have read on Powerline.

It is bellicose in tone and ignorant in content. I won't bother to refute Deacon's comments point by point but I will use a couple for illustration. He mentions a certain "Marshall Twitchell, a union officer who installed himself in upper Louisiana after the Civil War, became a wealthy planter, saw most of his family killed by a white gang, and lost both arms in an assassination attempt before escaping to the North. PBS found the great-great grandson of the leader of the gang that drove Twitchell out. This guy couldn't suppress his pride in his ancestor or his glee in Twitchell's fate. I couldn't help wondering whether there was any way to prosecute this yahoo for his great-great grandaddie's crimes."

Whoa! This type of namecalling and anger toward "this yahoo" is more in line with how liberals view the world than the conservatives on Powerline. What Deacon casually ignores is: How did a union officer "install himself"? Was it legal? Or was Twitchell just another crook using the cover of war to enrich himself? That he "installed himself" AND became a "wealthy planter" suggests that Mr. Twitchell was no saint. Perhaps he richly deserved what the yahoo's ancestor dished out.

Deacon's treatment of Andrew Johnson is also execrable, referring to him as "the racist egomaniac Andrew Johnson". While Johnson will never rate high on anyone's list of great presidents, he in fact carried out much of Lincoln's plan for the South. To make anything out of the fact that he was "racist" is absurd. Virtually every white person on Earth was racist in that time. Abe Lincoln himself was racist. When judging the people of the 1860's, one can not superimpose modern day feelings about race. In the time he lived, Johnson was a moderate who sided with the Union in spite of being a border state Democrat.

Finally, Deacon exhibits a pollyanna mentality when viewing the "white Northerners" of the Civil War period. Read any good book on the presidency of Lincoln, and you will find that "white Northerners" darn near drove him over the edge. Nothing Lincoln did made more than about 30% of the "white Northerners" happy at any one time. You had the abolitionists who demanded that Lincoln free the slaves NOW!, regardless of how many border states that action might deliver to the Confederacy. You had the other extreme, who demanded he NOT free the slaves because they believed the North would be flooded with Negroes (although that is not the "n" word they typically used). And there was a middle ground that disliked slavery, and wanted it contained to the South, but were unwilling to accept blacks as anything approaching equal.

The Civil War was brought about by stupidity and greed. On both sides. The vision of Lincoln was to preserve the Union, heal the wounds and get back to "normal" as soon as possible. Lincoln understood that it was slavery and the South's leaders who were rotten, not the common people. Cut off the corrupt head and the average people could be brought back into the fold.

What liberals (and seemingly Deacon) want, is to forever re-fight the war. Continue to punish the South and rub its defeated nose in the dirt. Pretend that the North was all sweetness and light, and the South was all venal and greedy.

Perhaps the most puzzling thing is why Deacon would swallow PBS's version of any serious subject matter in the first place.

Clark is cooked.

If this report just put out by Drudge is correct, it is difficult to imagine Wesley Clark surviving this revelation.

Clark is really worse than Dean. More unprincipled and more of a liar. I would imagine that it is unprecedented for a "serious" contender for a major party nomination, to be so clearly undeserving of it.

I am not a Democrat, but I hope that if I was, I would be grossly offended by this man's deceit and bald opportunism.

This combined with what is starting to come out about Howard Dean's past opinions on use of force, should make Gephardt and Kerry look like principled statesmen by comparison to the Wes & Howie vaudeville act.

The Race Tightens

I am shocked at the latest set of polls coming out of Iowa. Not so much that Howard Dean is falling back, but that John Kerry is apparently surging. The new numbers from a Zogby Poll reported by WHO-TV in Des Moines, show Kerry is now in the lead at 22 percent. Dean and Dick Gephardt are tied at second place with 21 percent. John Edwards is fourth with 17 percent. The margin of error is +/- 4.5%

My assumption all along was that Dean would move back and Gephardt would take the lead. I thought Kerry was dead, done for, toast. If Kerry can win in Iowa, he suddenly turns this contest into a very interesting race.

How Does Dean Aim To Win? Conclusion

My impression of Howard Dean (have you noticed that the N.Y. Times almost ALWAYS refers to him as Dr. Dean?) leads me to suspect that while he is clearly a savvy politician, he falls into an all too familiar trap: He believes his own PR.

I think Dean really believes that he has caught lightening in bottle. That he has found something no one else knows about, and that he is therefore unstoppable. Dean has the ability to come across as "honest", but as with many "honest" people, you quickly realize that honesty in this case is just Howard saying whatever pops into his skull.

Suggesting President Bush knew about 9-11 ahead of time was not honest, it was stupid.

Prattling on about his fight with a church over a bike path was not honest, it was stupid.

Saying the U.S. was not safer because Saddam Hussein was captured was not honest, it was stupid.

Going to some pains to defend Osama Bin Laden's right to a fair trail was STUPID.

Saying it did not matter who tried Bin Laden, was STUPID.

Howard Dean is a walking talking trash can who can't help himself. What should terrify all intelligent Democrats is the prospect of a Dean/Clark pairing. That would rival Mondale/Ferraro and McGovern/Shriver as the worst major party ticket of the last 100 years or so.

Now back to the issue of how Dean might run after sewing up the nomination. My educated guess is that:

1. He will track back toward the center on one or two major issues. Gay marriage is a likely target, along with maybe a pronouncement on race echoing Bill Clinton's Sister Soulja episode during 1992.
2. He will move his few moderate positions such as guns, front and center, and harp on them incessantly.
3. He will continue to hammer President Bush on the Iraq war, the deficit and tax policy.
4. He will maintain a number of very liberal policy positions to keep his base fired up AND because he actually thinks that helps him.

Now the match-up. I think Bush vs Dean is an outstanding match-up for Bush. Beside Dean, Bush will appear very serious and presidential. I think Dean's manner will wear on the American Public after a while. Actually I think his star is starting to dim already, ten months before the election. Chihuahuas can be fun but their constant yapping gets on your nerves after a while.

As has been pointed out by many, if Bush wins the same states as in 2000, he will increase his margin due to reapportionment. At this point in the game, my assumption is that Bush *will* win every state he carried in 2000. By the same token I simply don't see Dean holding every Gore state. Thus I see comfortable victory for Bush if no cataclysmic event intervenes.

Bush will win on LIKEABLE, QUALIFIED, and IDEAS. A clean sweep. Dean has not a prayer except prayer, and I seriously doubt that anyone will be listening to him.