Mark Kilmer, please forgive me

I asked Mark to "turn in his pundit badge" after predicting an Edwards win, but with a KEDG finish, his EKDG prediction was the closest. Vinny was the only one on my list who picked a Kerry win but his other picks were off. Of course, my prediction was utterly useless.

Spiffy! Command Post has added a 2004 election section. Check it out.

On to the Super Bowl

Go Pats!

Bush Landslide update – Ipse Dixit has a map of the U.S. painted in red and blue depending on how President Bush’s approval/disapproval ratings in each state would determine an electoral win (from Election Projection.)

There’s a lot of red. (Even California???) I know this is mostly bunk at this point, but it sure is fun.

Iowa Predictions

Viking Pundit: DGKE
Bush Blog: DGKE
Between the Coasts: DGKE
Outside the Beltway: DGKE
Left Coast Conservative: DGKE
Mark Kilmer: EKDG
Tomfoolery: DKGE
Ryne McClaren: DKGE
Hedgehog Report: DKEG
Insignificant Thoughts: KGDE
Jonah Goldberg: DGKE
Right Thinking: DKGE
Cornfield Commentary: GDKE
Daily Kos: DGKE
Michael Graham: DEGK
Duck Season: EDKG

This is what I’ve found so far. I’ll update as they come.

If you miss Punditwatch, both Matt Stinson and Martin Devon have roundups of the Sunday morning shows.

What liberal media? Matthew Hoy makes a table of campaign contributions by journalists in a nice piece of old-fashioned reporting.

Great minds think alike: Both the Left Coast Conservative and Outside the Beltway agree with me that it will be: Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Edwards in Iowa tomorrow.

Meanwhile, many other bloggers haven't made a prediction, which seems lame to me. C'mon, we're supposed to be opinionated! Daniel Drenzer limps in with "Kerry wins." He's nuts.

Update: Mark Kilmer guesses Edwards, Kerry, Dean, Gephardt. Edwards? Mark, turn in your pundit badge at the nearest VRWC headquarters.....

Matt Taibbi in the New York Press

Anyone who wants to understand why the Democratic Party (barring a catastrophic implosion by the Republicans) will never win another major election in this country need only read this [NY Times] article. It correctly identifies the core problem of the party, which is this: Voters are repulsed by weakness. What it fails to get right is the fact that the Party, as currently constructed, will never be able to get around this problem. Why? Because weakness is inherent in the party’s ideology.

There are only two ways to appear strong. One is to stand for something. The other is to kick ass. Today’s Democrats most emphatically are not equipped to do either.

Yipes!

Opening skit of Saturday Night Live had a campaign staffer asking a Howard Dean impersonator: "Have you taken any of the medication we got for you?" Heh.

From inside the Dean camp: “Listen, Howard. The Iowa caucuses are in two days. Every time you appear on stage with a washed-up Democrat like Gore or Harkin, you drop in the polls. Please, for the love of God, don’t make any more appearances with feckless, out-of-power, Democrats!”

[Warning: article includes a picture of a black man who says he will vote for Bush. Shocking!]

Are you kidding me? The Des Moines Register, in probably the last poll before the caucuses, puts Kerry at 26%, Edwards at 23%, Dean at 20% and Gephardt at 18%.

I’m sticking my original prediction (Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Edwards) because I believe that organization will play a vital roll in Iowa. Dean got his nutty latte-swilling army while Gephardt has some strong union support. I don’t see Kerry pulling in the caucus votes as efficiently.

Iowa, the Toast-O-Meter, the girl, the gold watch and everything

Steven Taylor’s Toast-O-Meter at PoliBlog gets longer every week. Next month, it will be released on a 4-CD set.

However, I must quibble with his assertion that a second place for Howard Dean means he can “still claim victory.” I think Dean has been up so long, and has seemed so invincible over the past few months, that anything other than a first-place finish will erase that veneer of indestructibility he’s worked so hard to foster. Look at this blurb from the Boston Globe today "Under Pressure, Dean Retools":

The candidate famous for straight talk has cloistered himself inside a private bus and cut his stump speech in half, ending his long practice of taking audience questions and limiting his conversations with voters to a chance encounter afterward.

Can't you just picture his handlers saying: "For God's sake, Howard, SHUT UP!"? So Howard Dean is cutting back on the very thing that has propelled him into front-runner status: his so-called “straight talk.” If he loses Iowa, he’ll be thrown off-balance (think Al Gore after the first debate with Dubya.) Get that man another sweater!

I was going to wait until tomorrow, but here (for now) is my Iowa prediction: Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Edwards. So Dean wins anyway (making everything I just said moot) but not by much.

Take that, Schumer! Bush gives recess appointment to Pickering

WASHINGTON — President Bush installed Charles Pickering on a federal appeals court Friday, bypassing Democrats who had stalled his nomination for more than two years, sources said.

So it's come to this.

Why is Dean slipping?

David Hogberg, live from Iowa, gives his opinion on Cornfield Commentary:

One standard explanation is the gaffe factor, that Dean’s many misstatements have made a lot of Democrats nervous. Undoubtedly, that is a big part of the reason. Here’s another: Dean is bit of a charlatan, and potential caucus-goers are getting wise to it.

I still think Dean will win Iowa, but the people that David spoke to don’t seem overly thrilled with the doctor.

Understatement, overstatement, and denial

I caught this Oliver Willis post: “The Dems do badly in this NBC poll, but considering there’s no nominee yet the real shocker is that only 51% say Bush should be re-elected.”

Only 51%? That will suffice, you know. As for the Dems faring “badly” – whew! In a head-to-head matchup, the best Dem candidate would lose to Bush by a crushing, humiliating, 17% gap.

Burns: Honestly, Smithers, I don't know why Harvard even bothers to show up. They barely even won.
Smithers: Their cheating was even more rampant than last year, sir.

This will be the script for the Democrats on November 3rd.

One step backwards in Iran

The Economist has a good column on the battle between reformists and conservatives (read: clerics) in Iran – “While reformists protests, the conservatives are relentlessly gaining ground.” Pejman (who has Persian roots) has more (here and here) on the crisis in Iran and the squashing of democracy there.

BushBlog has a “Deanism” Nice.

Via Jane Galt: Dean for America???

Dean’s N.H. lead shrinks to nine – Here’s the skinny from the Boston Globe this morning: “Dean slips, Clark gains in N.H.”

A barrage of criticism from his rivals appears to have taken a dramatic toll on Howard Dean's advantage in New Hampshire, and retired General Wesley K. Clark is benefiting from questions about whether the former Vermont governor is the best candidate to handle the war on terrorism, according to a new Boston Globe/WBZ-TV poll.

Globe columnist Scot Lehigh writes: “A frontrunner fading in the stretch.”

Five bucks for a Big Mac in Switzerland: The Economist has their latest Big Mac Index showing "purchasing power parity" [PPP] throughout the world. An interesting economic comparison.

Do you mean THE Avra Siegal? Slate has a list of the lamest press releases of Campaign 2004.

What the? Remember when I said "no way Kerry is leading in Iowa"? Zogby begs to differ: Kerry opens up a five-point lead in Iowa. Kerry is at 24% in the tracking poll, with Dean and Gephardt tied at 19%.

With the sky-high expectations of the Dean candidacy on the line, a second (or third!) place finish in Iowa could be disastrous for Howard.

Update: Nick at Duck Season justifiably chastises me....

Slip Slidin’ Away

Wow – these polls may be wildly inaccurate (for example, no way is Kerry leading in Iowa) but there’s no denying that Dean is suffering a mini-meltdown in support here.

Zogby’s Iowa Tracking Poll
ARG’s New Hampshire Tracking Poll

Check out New Hampshire: four days ago, Dean led Clark by 17% - that’s now down to 5% in a regular loss of 4% a day. Wow.

The pathology of the House of Saud

It’s been a while since I’ve written an “Our enemy: the Saudis” post, but there are a number of new articles today worth a look. First, Austin Bay has a piece called “The House of Saud fights for its life.” Then on my morning check on Rantburg, I found this Denbeste post which is largely an abridged version of this Lawrence Wright article in the New Yorker titled “The Kingdom of Silence.”

Getcher motor runnin' - Heard this on NPR this morning (and confirmed here): Before rolling off the landing ramp, the Mars rover Spirit was "awakened" by Mission Control by Steppenwolf's "Born to be Wild." Spirit then peeled out for a rip-roarin' tear of....10 feet. What a long strange trip it's been.

Viking Pundit's popularity plunges! Wow - my Sitemeter counter says there have been zero visitors this morning. So I guess you aren't reading this. (Everyday it's something else.....)

Wednesdays are for W

MoveOn made the headlines this past week less for their commercial contest than the half-crazed presenters at the ceremony. Never forget that these dim bulbs are supported by billionaire George Soros who re-iterated his intention to spend all his riches to defeat President Bush.

So, once again, I’ll spend this Wednesday asking you to visit the George W. Bush re-election web site, Bloggers for Bush, and the various other supporters of the “Wictory Wednesday” effort. Pledge time or money for your future. We need to get out the vote (GOTV) in November; the time to support Bush is now. Thank you.

Remember that?

William Saletan in Slate today:

I can't stress this enough to Democrats who opposed the Iraq war. Terrorists killed 3,000 Americans on 9/11. The first thing Americans want to know from a prospective president is how he's going to protect them from such enemies. If you don't answer that question, nobody will care that Bush exaggerated Iraq's weapons of mass destruction or Iraq's connections to al-Qaida. The only difference voters are going to see is that one party is serious about getting those bastards, and one party isn't.

Not good: Iran's Reformists threaten to quit

Workers dream of being exploited

Coming on the heels of this Ryan Lizza blurb on how Democrats are using “free trade” as a term of derision in Iowa is this brutal Nicholas Kristof article in the NY Times called “Calling all Democrats”:

[Protectionism] would hurt American consumers. But it would be particularly devastating for laborers in the poorest parts of the world. For the fundamental problem in the poor countries of Africa and Asia is not that sweatshops exploit too many workers; it's that they don't exploit enough.

Hold on...gotta pander to the labor unions first.

A friend in need...

The other day I needed my buddy at work to drive me to Town Fair Tire to drop off my car. And, of course, he agreed. But why? Why should he be inconvenienced to take time out of his busy day to help me out? It seems silly to point it out but here’s why: someday he might need a ride and he knows I’ll help him out. Generically speaking, that’s called “goodwill” and it’s something we don’t think about in a personal setting. It’s just something you do as a “good neighbor” or a “friend.”

Dean Esmay has a passionate commentary today on the issue of “Squandering Goodwill” in response to a reader in Europe. Bottom line: why do Democrats certain Americans harp on how we’ve “squandered” the goodwill of the world after 9/11 when it’s these countries who have squandered our goodwill by failing to reciprocate all the help we’ve offered over the years?

But I'm sick of apologizing to people like you. We aren't an empire. But you really should start wondering why YOU are so willing to squander OUR goodwill. Because many of you around the world have done exactly that.

Read the whole thing, as they say.

"Go it alone" Dean

Everybody's got this Howard Dean letter urging President Clinton to take unilateral action in Bosnia. Robert Tagorda has a good follow-up analysis.

I still haven’t found what I’m looking for

This morning, Tim Blair pointed out this “cautious, dispassionate, thoughtful analysis of George W. Bush’s presidency, from a liberal viewpoint.” I don’t know…the whole thesis was a little too nuanced for me.

Stephen Green crunches the electoral vote numbers based on certain assumptions of presidential popularity. I thought this statement was telling: “You'll note that when the Republican candidate loses 47/52, he loses by 138 electoral votes. But look above again, and you'll see that when the Democratic candidate loses by the same figures, he loses by 180. In other words, without Ross Perot around, the Democrats remain electorally challenged.”

The last refuge of crybaby Deaniacs: Media bias

All the lefty bloggers are in a froth over a Salon article by Eric Boehlert claiming that Howard Dean is a victim of bias by the corporate-conservative press.

Oliver Willis gets paranoid: “Today's story from Salon shows how the media and their right-wing bretheren [sic] are on the edge of controlling another election for us.” Kos darkly intones: “This is probably the most important piece written about Dean's media coverage to date. Read it. Even if your guy isn't Dean. Our nominee will receive the same treatment regardless of who he eventually is.” Atrios: “Dean's the frontrunner so they're doing it to him, mostly, but the press is just picking up right where they left off in 2000 with Gore. It's a sad, sorry, pathetic state of affairs.” The aptly named Not Geniuses says: “But the only thing crazier than not getting some news from mainstream media is getting all news from it.”

Ah, yes, remember how the media hammered endlessly on Al “I invented the Internet” Gore? They focused on his sighing during the debates! They nitpicked on his earth tone suits! Bias! Except here are the results from a Pew Research Center study on how Americans viewed the media’s preferences in 2000:



So by a 2-1 margin, Americans felt that the national press wanted Gore to win the election. Yet, to believe the Kos-Krowd, the press was biased against Gore. Sure.

Fox News (and their ever rising ratings) drives the liberals insane. So much so that they forget the rest of the media which has been well-established as a bastion of left-wing thought, reporting, and bias:

Evidence of how hard journalists lean to the left was provided by S. Robert Lichter, then with George Washington University, in his groundbreaking 1980 survey of the media elite. Lichter's findings were authoritatively confirmed by the American Association of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) in 1988 and 1997 surveys. The most recent ASNE study surveyed 1,037 newspaper reporters found 61 percent identified themselves as/leaning "liberal/Democratic" compared to only 15 percent who identified themselves as/leaning "conservative/Republican."

Read much more in this Media Research Center special report: Media Bias Basics. Here, for example, is a 2001 breakdown of journalists political leanings from a Kaiser Family Foundation study:



The “conservative” media complaint a fallacious excuse used whenever liberals don’t get their way. It was untrue for Gore and now it’s untrue for Dean. Suck it up, Deaniacs.

Survivor All-Stars cast revealed - Rupert is back! Awesome. Plus, the fine talents of Jenna M. and Amber B. It looks like they're going to be separated into three tribes of six: Chapera, Saboga, and Mogo Mogo. No word yet on where, but judging by the tribe names, I'm guessing somewhere in the South Pacific.

Matt Stinson runs some quotes through the Dean-to-English translator. Heh.

William Saletan of Slate has a rundown of the Dems’ “Brown and Black” debate, which Mickey Kaus characterizes as a “humiliating panderfest”.

GOP United, Dems Divided

Here's David Brooks in today's NY Times in "The Bush Democrats":

The events of the past three years have brought to the foreground issues that divide Democrats, and pushed to the background issues that divide Republicans.

There's more, but Brooks notes that President Bush enjoys extraordinary support from his party, while the Dems seem vexed by the Dean/Clinton schism in their party.

It's national security, stupid

John Ellis (Dubya's cousin) makes the case that the war on terrorism will trump all other issues in 2004 and beyond:

Whatever one thinks of Bush's counterterrorism strategy, it does have the advantage of being grounded in reality.

The fact is that at the intersection of terror and advanced technology lies the distinct possibility of catastrophic destruction. A catastrophic event in the United States would do terrible damage not only to its victims but to the national and the global economy, shattering investor confidence, which is the lifeblood of the capitalist system. Without a vital economy there can be no expanded health care coverage, job creation, or yet more money for seniors.

So everything rides on preventing a catastrophic event from occurring in New York or Washington or Los Angeles. Counterterrorism policy isn't an issue in this campaign. It's the only issue.

Here, Ellis makes the case that national security is economic security; apparently, this is a lesson that must be reviewed.

Jews support Democratic candidates…less than before

The AP is carrying a story headlined as “U.S. Jews back Democratic Candidates”:

NEW YORK - U.S. Jews would overwhelmingly support any major Democratic candidate over President Bush if the election were held today, according to the 2004 Annual Survey of American Jewish Opinion.

But David Bernstein on the Volokh Conspiracy looks deeper into the numbers and titles his post “Bad News for the Dems”:

In one-on-one matchups with the president, Howard Dean, Wesley Clark, John Kerry and Richard Gephardt would each receive about 60 percent of the Jewish vote, compared to about 30 percent for Bush, according to the survey conducted for the American Jewish Committee and released Monday.
30% would be about double Bush's total in 2000 among Jews….

Also, the article notes a "slight" increase in Jewish identification as Republicans from 9 to 16%. That's not slight, that's almost double!

Another example of “liberal cocooning” or just sloppy reporting? You decide.

Fred Barnes surveys the Democrats’ plans for taxes and comes to an obvious conclusion: “Watch Your Wallet”

Andrew Sullivan on last night’s Dem debate: “There wasn't a nano-second in which any candidate said anything to suggest that minorities can do anything to benefit themselves without more government help, more money and more white condescension.”

I agree: the hyper-pandering last night was thoroughly depressing.

It’s a joke, right? Freedom of Thought has a great pic of the latest patches for U.S. soldiers.

10 for 10 - a laughably easy Simpsons quiz in the Guardian. (Hat tip to Oxblog).

Mo' Money

From Fox News story on Dems Iowa debate:

State senator Ken Cheuvront of Arizona said he's tired of the Dean attacks. A member of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, Cheuvront said after the debate that he has decided to endorse Dean because of all the criticism. "It's starting to look petty," he said. "He's the only viable candidate who can win, who has the money to beat Bush."

The all-purpose Terry McAuliffe strategy for the Democratic Party.

Wesley Clark emulates his hero

“They took the bar!”

“They’re very anti-media”

Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine has a summary of the Meet the Press discussion today on blogs - he’s not happy with the characterization. So in that sense, one panelist was correct with the quote above.

One sidenote: John F'n Kerry and his new haircut were on Meet the Press this morning. That guy is so tiresome. Repeatedly, Russert tried to get Senator Splunge to explain his position on Iraq but all that came out was a laundry list of catch phrases ("fraudulent coalition", "I wanted to hold Saddam accountable", etc.) that only makes you wonder how he was ever considered the front-runner. I wouldn't be at all surprised if Lieberman jumps ahead of Kerry in the latest New Hampshire poll based on this superfluous performance.

The Hollywood bubble

You may know actor/playwright Wallace Shawn from many movies from My Dinner with Andre to Clueless; in my mind, he’ll always be the guy who says “inconceivable” in The Princess Bride.

In the Sunday NY Times Magazine section, Shawn demonstrates that even pseudo-intellectuals can fall under the spell of liberal self-importance that suffuses every celebrity in La-La Land:

Well, there is a reason my brother and I are taking care of our own mother first, before we worry about your mother. It's great to love your own mother, but I sincerely believe that if Bush and Cheney recognized the full humanity of other people's mothers around the world, they wouldn't commit the crimes they commit.

Wow. To read and believe this statement, you would have to believe that the liberation of Afghani women from the Taliban was less desirable than the “crime” of American intervention. What other crimes do ya got, Wallace? Deposing Saddam Hussein? I’m sure that Bush is tossing and turning every night thinking about how he failed to “recognize the full humanity” of Uday’s mom.

We're in an emergency situation. The United States has become an absolutely terrifying country, and I would hope that I could participate in some way in stopping the horror and the brutality.

As Dennis Miller said: “The Left is so busy saying John Ashcroft is Hitler, and President Bush is Hitler, and Rudy Giuliani is Hitler that the only guy they wouldn’t call Hitler was the foreign guy with the mustache who was throwing people who disagreed with him into the wood-chipper.”

Wallace, if this land of horror and brutality becomes too terrifying for you, I suggest you leave. Spend some time in North Korea or Zimbabwe. You’ll be back when you discover there are very few countries willing to afford you livelihood by jabbering over dinner in front of a camera.

The new Toast-O-Meter is out. I guess the most interesting theory is that the media is helping Clark to be the #2 guy in part because of the spectacular implosion of Kerry's campaign.

Political commentary will resume as soon as the Patriots defeat the Tennessee Titans. Thank you for your patience.

Update: Like I said - Pats win 17-14

I’m a huge nerd

Last night, I was at an all-night trivia game which is held twice-a-year at Williams College, Williamstown, MA. In May, I played on a team called “Click Here to get Huge” (based on the spam reference) and we “won” the game. I add the scare quotes because the “prize” of victory is hosting the next game, which is no small task. Anyway, the game runs from midnight til 8 a.m. and I’ve been sleeping all day.

If you want a taste of the tradition and insanity of Williams College trivia, check out the Williams Trivia Contest Depository, which is chock full of questions, puzzles, and other assorted nonsense.

More bad news for Dean

I missed this one the other day, but Gallup has a study: History Shows January Front-runner Often Does Not Win Democratic Nomination

Is the Clark surge part of history repeating itself? Hmmmm.....

Homeland Security lowers terror threat level to yellow

Unemployment rate falls to 5.7% but only 1,000 non-farm jobs created.

Over three grand! Via Bill Hobbs (and the Club for Growth) comes the Howard Dean Tax Calculator.

Holy cow - over three Gs in additional income tax. I know this may surprise some of you, but I'm going to vote for President Bush.

Fark Rundown

Only pub in Austalian Outback’s hottest town closes

Kobe Bryant booed in Denver – “guilty, guilty”

Woman tries to use “Get out of Jail Free” card

Former NYC mayor Ed Koch is Bolting for Bush

From Forward magazine:

I am a lifelong Democrat. I was elected to New York's City Council, Congress and three terms as mayor of New York City on the Democratic Party line. I believe in the values of the Democratic Party as articulated by Presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson and by Senators Hubert Humphrey, Henry "Scoop" Jackson and Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Our philosophy is: "If you need a helping hand, we will provide it." The Republican Party's philosophy, on the other hand, can be summed up as: "If I made it on my own, you will have to do the same."

Nevertheless, I intend to vote in 2004 to reelect President Bush. I will do so despite the fact that I do not agree with him on any major domestic issue, from tax policy to the recently enacted prescription drug law. These issues, however, pale in importance beside the menace of international terrorism, which threatens our very survival as a nation. President Bush has earned my vote because he has shown the resolve and courage necessary to wage the war against terrorism.

John Kerry: one toke over the line

To be fair, he was in Vietnam. So I hear.

Captain’s Quarters thinks that the lax security at Vermont Yankee could break Howard Dean. If the economy picks up and the war on terrorism becomes the top concern in America, it’s sure not going to help. (Hat tip to Pundit Filter).

Mark Steyn surveys the Democrats in New Hampshire and their inability to cope in “The Last Refuge of the Defeated.”

Maguire is back from a mini-break and providing some bloggy goodness.

John Cole points the way to this snarky Jay Caruso counter-point on a particularly silly Kevin Drum post, claiming that liberals are really winning the culture war. Whistling past the graveyard, Kevin?

Will you stifle?!?

Here’s the concluding paragraph from an article in The Hill titled “Dean can’t beat Bush”:

USA Today’s cartoonist summed up Democrats’ dilemma last week with a picture of a thousand dollar check written to the Dean campaign by Bush-Cheney ’04. The memo tells Dean to simply “keep talking!!!!”

This was followed up this morning by a NY Times article: “In Shift, Dean Starts Watching His Words.” Heh.

From Slate: “General Electric – Why is Wesley Clark so excited? He’s being attacked by Howard Dean”

Damn - U.S. Black Hawk Crashes in Iraq; 9 Dead – no word yet as to whether hostile fire was involved.

It’s those other big corporations dragging down America!

Here’s the very first question from the Democrats’ recent radio debate (the pie-chart one):

The first question is for Governor Dean.

Forty years ago, in his State of the Union address, President Lyndon Johnson declared an unconditional war on poverty. Both Democrats and Republicans have controlled the White House and Congress since then. Why are so many Americans still living in poverty?

DEAN: I think a lot of it has to do with the extraordinary corporate alliances and rapaciousness that this president has encouraged since he's been president.

Let’s take a moment to process the vapidity of that response. OK? OK. Now, some quotes by P.J. O’Rourke in “Parliament of Whores”

You might think big business would be hard to define in this day of leveraged finances and interlocking technologies. Not so. Big business is every kind of business except the kind from which the person who’s complaining about big business draws his pay. Thus the “Rock around the Rain Forest” crowd imagines record companies are a cottage industry. The Sheen family considers movie conglomerates to be a part of the arts-and-crafts movement, something like the Morris dancers. And Ralph Nader thinks the wholesale lobbying of Congress through huge tax-exempt advocacy groups is similar to being a migrant farm worker.

Business and industry – trade and manufacture – are inherent in civilization. Every human society, no matter how wholesomely primitive, practices as much trade and manufacture as it can figure out. For good reason. It is the fruits of trade and manufacture that raise us from the wearying muck of subsistence and give us health, wealth, education, leisure and warm, dry rooms with Xerox machines that allow us to be the ecology-conscious, selfless, committed, splendid individuals we are.

Here’s more from P.J. in the chapter on ecology (this Amazon feature is amazing!)

I always cringe when I hear populist types like Al Gore and Howard Dean try to the paint “big business” as the scourge of society. Big business is society. Mammoth corporations make that sheetrock on your wall to keep you warm. Oil companies provide the gas for your VW touring van. And if you get sick, thank heaven those pharmaceutical companies developed a drug to help treat your illness.

The New Republic endorses Joe Lieberman

Here's an excerpt:

In late 2002, with the Bush administration threatening preemptive war in Iraq, Democratic strategists developed a remarkable plan for the midterm elections: Ignore national security. One year after the bloodiest foreign attack on U.S. soil, and on the eve of one of the most audacious foreign policy gambles in U.S. history, Democratic candidates campaigned on the sluggish economy and prescription drugs. And Bush and Karl Rove ripped them to shreds.

From that humiliation, the Howard Dean revolt was born. In early 2003, the former Vermont governor began captivating the Democratic base with his thunderous attacks on Washington Democrats. But, in their righteousness, Dean and his supporters have embraced an analysis potentially even more damaging than that of the party leaders they seek to depose. We are not speaking primarily about Dean's general-election prospects (though they are grim, and their potential consequences for the House and Senate even grimmer). The problem with Dean's vision of the Democratic Party is more than electoral; it is intellectual and moral. And the candidate who offers the clearest, bravest alternative is Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman.

Wow, Kos is right: TNR really hates Howard Dean.

Bush faulted on no-bid contracts

"The government waste our audit has uncovered is shameful and inexcusable," the audit report stated.

Oops! My bad.

Kerry = Kaput

He’s now third in New Hampshire, behind Clark. The Washington Post piles on: “He has lurched from one vapid slogan to another, constructed an unwieldy and duplicative campaign structure, and fired his campaign manager in midstream.”

David Broder on Dean: “It is hard to recall another challenger who has simultaneously outdistanced, out-organized and outmaneuvered the other candidates as thoroughly and swiftly as Dean has done, and at the same time has so thoroughly demonstrated a penchant for embarrassing himself.”

New poll: Bush up, Dean down

This USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll is stunning on so many levels (story, poll results). First of all, the attacks on Dean are taking some steam out of his campaign and now Wesley Clark has pulled into a statistical tie. Meanwhile, Bush’s approval ranking is at 60% and satisfaction in the way things are going in the United States (Q #14) is at a nine-month high of 55%.

There is an undeniable trend in the Democratic field for favorable/unfavorable/”never heard of” numbers: as the “never heard of” numbers go down with time, the “unfavorable” numbers go up. In other words, the more Americans know about the Democratic candidates, the less they like.

For example, in November 33% of Americans said they’d never heard of Howard Dean; in this latest poll, that’s down to 17%. But the undecided vote went emphatically into the “unfavorable” column: in the same time period, Dean’s “favorable” rating went up 2% and his “unfavorable” went up 15% (from 24% to 39%). The trends are similar for the other candidates, with Clark doubling his “unfavorable” number from 13% to 26% between September and January.

Another question (Q #13) sure to please Karl Rove: in a Bush/Dean matchup, 47% of likely voters said they were certain to vote for Bush, but only 20% said the same about Dean. Although I’m sure Democratic voters will coalesce behind their nominee, that’s a wiiiide margin of support.

Wednesdays are for W

Last night I was reading the transcript of the Democrats’ radio debate and Howard Dean was trying to explain his rationale for repealing all of the Bush tax cuts, including those for the middle class. If I may paraphrase, his argument went something like this: “The middle class got almost nothing…and I want it back.” This morning, the Boston Globe reports that a Dean flip-flop is in the making: “Dean may support middle-class tax cut.” So, in the end, after all the empty rhetoric about standing up for Democratic beliefs, Dean is going to bury his unpopular positions and say whatever is necessary to “win.”

Stand up for a true leader: President George W. Bush



After you’re done, sign up for the “Wictory Wednesday” blogroll and join the other great bloggers who are Blogging for Bush.

Check out the latest Carnival of the Vanities at American RealPolitik.

The continuing humor of the NY Times Corrections page

The Television column on Dec. 28, about "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," quoted a dialogue passage incorrectly from a November episode. Ms. DeGeneres asked Robert Downey Jr. what he was thankful for on Thanksgiving, not what his plans were. To which he replied: "Oh, so much. Let's see. I'll be going to Palm Springs and I won't be getting arrested while I'm there." — not "and getting arrested."

An understandable mistake!

How nutty is Kucinich? Exhibit A: Kucinich Shows Pie Chart on Radio Debate

Goodbye Mr. Frost

To be honest, I’m not crazy about the Texas redistricting case, since I’d be screaming bloody murder if the roles were reversed. The judges in the case made it clear that while they thought mid-decade redistricting was perhaps unfair, it certainly wasn’t illegal.

But then I thought about how the Democrats have blocked President Bush’s judicial nominees on the Senate floor, also reversing a long-standing practice for their own political advantage. So, tough luck, Martin Frost – bon chance in the private sector.

I refer to Futurama for all my sociological analyses

Dean Esmay posed this topic for discussion:

Women have always been enormously powerful, throughout human history and especially in Western history. Those who fail to recognize this are guilty of misogyny.

My response comes from the episode of Futurama where the men are prisoners on the all-female planet of Amazonia:

[Scene: Outside Basketball Pitch. The group watch an Amazon bounce a basketball.]
Thog: Here stadium, where our women basketball teams play.
Kug: We no can dunk, but good fundamentals.
Ornik: That more fun to watch.
[Zapp, Fry and Bender laugh.]

Leela: Femputer, be reasonable. Sure men are annoying and they wreck up whatever planet they're in charge of. But most of these men are sorta my friends. They don't deserve to die.
Femputer: Hmm. Perhaps men are not as evil as Femputer thinks.
Thog: But they make fun women's basketball.
Femputer: What?! Did you explain how the women's good fundamentals make up for their inability to dunk?
Ornik: Yes. They still laugh.
Femputer: The men must die.

Oh yeah, what about him? I was just wondering what's going on with Saddam. Actually I was hoping it involved a cattle prod, but Rantburg has the details.

Song parody: Ah, I love these. Here's "Dean's a Believer" to the tune of "I'm a Believer". (Hat tip to Country Store).

A new Bonfire of the Vanities is up at Boots and Sabers.

Krugman turns bathetic

I imagine that Paul Krugman has a bulletin board in his office with 3x5 cards of potential topics for his semi-weekly column. I also imagine that every week, he’s forced to remove two or three cards because some piece of good news undermines an unformed diatribe. Stock market up? There goes my screed on devalued 401(k) accounts! Libya and Syria are seeking better relations with the U.S.? So much for my foreign policy rant!

With the economy and jobs coming back and improving prospects in Iraq and Afghanistan, Krugman’s board must have been bare. The result is today’s sad excuse for a column called “Rubin gets shrill” but could have been titled “Shrill like me” or “Rubin believes me!” Here’s the entire article condensed into one paragraph:

Those of us who have suggested that the irresponsibility of recent American policy may produce a similar disaster have been dismissed as shrill, even hysterical. (Hey, the market's up, isn't it?) But few would describe Robert Rubin, the legendary former Treasury secretary, as hysterical: his ability to stay calm in the face of crises, and reassure the markets, was his greatest asset. And Mr. Rubin has formally joined the coalition of the shrill.

Q.E.D. – Rubin is a genius. Rubin agrees with me. I’m a genius.

This is sad in a humorous way (hence the term “bathetic”). After scores of columns about how the economy is heading into the dumpster, Krugman is forced to defend his persistently incorrect predictions by seeking like-minded allies. Whatever, Paul, but I’d really like you to get Robert Rubin to say that America is just like Argentina.

The fellowship of latte-swilling social liberals

Ryan Lizza examines the “house party” strategy of the Dean campaign and finds that it’s geared toward young professionals of the Seattle persuasion. Here’s the concluding graf:

Whether fair or not, if the election next year is defined as a contest between people who go to the coffee house versus those who go to the coffee shop, those who buzz their guests up versus those who talk to their neighbors over the fence, Dean is going to lose.

How’s this for a straightforward title? Mort Kondracke has an article titled “Dean is McGovern, Mondale, Dukakis – A Trifecta of Losers.” (Courtesy of my daily read Real Clear Politics).

Bad money in – bad money out

Robert Torricelli can’t do anything honestly. From today’s NY Post Page Six:

January 6, 2004 -- DISGRACED former New Jersey Sen. Robert Torricelli is trying to win over Democratic White House wannabes. "The Torch" - who dropped his re-election bid in 2002 after being implicated in a gifts-for-favors scandal with businessman David Chang - gave the maximum allowable donation of $2,000 to both Sen. John Kerry and Rep. Richard Gephardt, according to The Post's Stefan C. Friedman. Federal campaign-finance documents reveal that Torricelli tried to give Gephardt an extra thousand bucks, but the Missouri congressman returned it because the donation would have violated the $2,000 cap.

Oh boy.

Happy Happy Joy Joy

Now that Republicans control both Congress and the White House, 95% of Americans declare themselves “happy.” According to this Gallup poll, “contentment today is historically high.” The Democrats know why: we’re all stupid.

He wants to be like Superman

NEW ORLEANS Jan. 5 — Singer-songwriter Ray Davies of the celebrated British rock band the Kinks was shot in the leg while chasing thieves who snatched a purse from a woman he was with, police said Monday. He was not seriously injured.

This is Captain America calling...(calling!)

Humor break - A decade-by-decade comparison of math education in America

Rich Lowry has 16 questions for Howard Dean.

The trajectory of hyperbole

It’s a good thing the Democrats’ Iowa debate was only two hours long. Who knows how many people would have lost their jobs by the end:

Early in the debate: (narrator on video) “On this point, Iowans agree with the rest of the nation, where an estimated 2.3 million jobs have been lost since 2000.”

Later: “We've lost over 3 million manufacturing jobs in this country.” – Kucinich

And then: “The worst president on the economy, in terms of jobs, 6 million jobs lost.” - Carole M-B

Hmmm…better update my resume.

NY Times letters on the United Nations

A couple of days ago, the Times ran an editorial called “A Wounded United Nations” that (in my opinion) blamed all of the U.N.’s woes on the United States. Here are some letters to the editor in response with a slim majority more critical of the U.N. (and thus the editorial) than supportive. Naturally, I agree with the reader who states that “The United Nations’ wounds were self-inflicted.”

How the Democrats shafted themselves – a great article in today’s Opinion Journal called “Unintended Consequence: How Terry McAuliffe and James Carville created Howard Dean.”

Democrats “debate” and agree to spend more money

I tried to watch the Dems Iowa debate today but, much like Chris Lawrence, “every time I switched it on I almost immediately felt like throwing something at the screen.”

The purpose of a candidates’ debate is to differentiate opinions and clarify positions so that a voter can make a choice. According to this crowd, there’s nary an issue that could not be solved by more spending. A real Hobbsian choice of solutions: we’ll try anything to solve America’s problems as long as it requires more money.

Another distraction: please stop prefacing every answer by saying that you wouldn’t do what Bush did. That is obvious. Tell me what you’d do. At one point, Kerry was asked what he’d do to save Social Security and he responded (working from memory): not privitize it, not raise the retirement age, and guarantee benefits for everyone. I think that leaves “ignore it” or “raise payroll taxes.”

Follow up (1/5) – William Saletan has a review of the Iowa Debate in Slate today including this quote:

Most surprising candor. Edwards: "Everybody on this stage is talking about spending money. They're talking about spending money on education. They're talking, in varying degrees, about spending money on health care. … There is a tension between spending money and reducing the federal deficit."

Here come the taxes.

Britney Spears marries Jason Alexander

You heard it here first!

Awesome! Rover signals Earth after Mars landing

Viking Pundit’s one-year blogoversary

For much of my life, I’ve been exasperating friends, neighbors, and my wife with stem-winders on politics, government, music, society, television, sports and politics. Apparently sensing my need to vent, Moe Freedman at Occam’s Toothbrush set up a blog for me and, boy, I’m glad he did. The past year has been great and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the outlet to write on all matters floating through my brain. Thanks to everyone for the support (e.g. links) and kind comments.

Best,

Eric

Who is Eric Lindholm?

In celebration of my one-year blogoversary here, I thought I’d let everyone know a little more about me.

I was born Valentine’s Day, 1968 in New Jersey.
I’m (nearly) 6’3” and I used to play a lot of playground basketball.
I grew up in North Arlington, New Jersey and attended NAHS.
I broke my collar bone, my foot, and my arm before I got to high school. After I broke my arm throwing a football (true story), I decided that maybe God didn’t plan for me to be an athlete.
After graduation, I attended Rutgers University in 1986.
While there, I met my wife. As legend has it, we were having a party and my roommates warned her to “stay away from me” while inebriated since I tend to argue politics – loudly. She was instantly smitten.
I graduated in 1991 with a B.A. degree in English and a B.Sci. degree in Ceramic Engineering (a branch of materials science.)
Got a job as a fiber optics engineer at a company in Massachusetts.
Proposed.
We honeymooned in Egypt.
Moved to Western Massachusetts.
In 1996, took a job as a fiber development engineer in Connecticut; long commute.
In 1999, published my first paper on carbon deposition for hermetic coatings; presented at a conference in Atlantic City.
Last year, published my second paper on zero-stress aging behavior of optical fibers; presented at Orlando.
Also last year (a good one for the career), invented a coating die to dramatically increase line speeds – filed with U.S. Patent Office.
My paper proposal on fiber reliability has just been accepted for a conference in France. My wife has suddenly indicated a great interest in this field of study and wishes to accompany me to the conference.

Favorite fiction book: “A Confederacy of Dunces” by John Kennedy Toole
Favorite non-fiction book: “The Prize” by Daniel Yergin
Currently reading: “Quicksilver” by Neal Stephenson
Favorite movie: “This is Spinal Tap”
Best movie I’ve seen recently: “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King”
Favorite TV show: “The Simpsons”
Favorite beer: Sam Adams Cherry Wheat
Favorite meal: Steak Au Poivre (with pepper – very hard to find)
Favorite baseball team: Boston Red Sox (adopted upon move to MA)
Favorite football team: New England Patriots (ditto)
Favorite artist: Elvis Costello
Favorite CD: Impossible to say…”Ben Folds Five” maybe (first)
Last CD I got that I really like: “Dear Catastrophe Waitress” by Belle & Sebastian
Last really good concert I saw: Aimee Mann at the Calvin in Northampton.
Favorite Republican: Abraham Lincoln
Favorite Democrat: n/a
Favorite diversion: Civil War history
Favorite quote: “Giving money and power to politicians is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys” (something like that) by P.J. O’Rourke.

Whew – that’s all for now. You ladies can see what you're missing: scroll down for a picture of me here.

Via Betsy Newmark: The TimesWatch "Top 10 Lowlights of The New York Times in 2003"

Re-write! I was checking my Smarter Harper's page (which I really need to update) and caught this line: "Where's the weapons of mass destruction? He's hiding in a basement in Tikrit right now."

Yeah, well in the words of Paul Bremer: "We got him."

Welcome another to our Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy! Rep. Ralph Hall switches to Republican party

Here's the press release from "Number One."