The primary change I'd like to see
Scott Alister McKinley
strangely silent.
A few thoughts I'll throw out there:
* Geaux Tigers! I'm actually a bit disappointed Ohio State didn't
play a little better. I suppose that's like a parent watching his two
kids play each other for the first time and you wish they could
somehow both win. (But of course, I really only wanted to LSU to
win.)
* It seems as of this morning that my favorite candidate from each
party is poised to win not just New Hampshire, but the full
nomination: Barack Obama and John McCain. But this in no way
changes my mind that letting Iowa and New Hampshire have this much
impact is outrageous.
I understand the novelty that the smallness of the landscape allows
poorly funded candidates to compete (Mike Huckabee), but outside of
Wyoming -- which was granted the SECOND Caucus by the GOP -- I don't
think we could find a less representative set of people than these
Iowans. And the people in New Hampshire have just no excuse. They
take such pride in being independent and political trend-setters, and
yet they wait until Iowa validates their opinions to change what they
tell a pollster?
When it comes down to it, the sin of the 2004 election is that
Democrats were obsessed with which candidate is "electable". In 2008,
they did it again. It's bizarre that people so readily give up their
own favorite choice to this kind of meta-voting, but I think it's a
direct product of the fact that Iowans and New Hampshire people are
aware that everyone else is voting based on their votes.
If we must have a first-in-nation state, it should be Ohio, or
Florida, or some other bellwhether.
* Did any of y'all see the New Hampshire ABC News debate? Charles
Gibson has replaced Jim Lehrer as my favorite debate moderator.
* Happy 2008 y'all! And by 2009, we might actually have a President
that most of us could live with.
Scott
Brandon Downey
throwing their weight around to try to abuse states who dare do
anything differently.
It's an open question what would constitute "fair" though -- there
really is something that's gained by having a location where most all
voters have an opportunity to see and interact with the candidates.
Certainly, if you're a Republican, a lot less is gained if most of
your voters are evangelical nuts who put their religion over the
future success of the party (and, of course, the country).
One suggestion is to take the low population states and rotate between
them -- but it's still biased by the fact that small population states
may end up being unrepresentative of the country as a whole. My
favorite idea is to take cities (or districts) in representative
states (or at random), and tell candidates "campaign here first". I do
not think, however, that this is likely to solve the sort of 'winner
take all' effect where if a candidate wins the first 10% of the
voting, he or she is extremely likely to win *all* the voting. Maybe
there's some sort of voter power law at play -- which seem
frighteningly common in systems with huge information flows such as
the media torrent that surrounds the presidential election.
Of course, if you're a cynic, you can take all this as evidence that
democracy as practiced here simply does not scale to the size of our
population -- there's no way you can be expected to make an informed
decision unless you're a die-hard political junkie. Thus there's a
case for returning to something like the electoral college as
originally intended -- both for the primaries and for the national
election. Then there's the question of the fact that the primary
process itself constitutes a subsidy of our reigning political parties
-- a sort of potential well that sucks the life out of any third
party, but solving *that* problem is even harder.
*
I would argue that the Democrats *claimed* to be concerned about
whether their candidate was electable in 2004, when in reality what
they chose was a candidate who was safe, but unelectable even in the
face of what may be the worst US President since Andrew Jackson.
This year, Clinton was the 'safe' bet -- a political dynasty, tried &
true experience, ideologically tested and a flavor most Democrats were
used to. As a non-Democrat, it was obvious to me that the party was
about to do it again -- to vote for someone who had not the faintest
chance of being elected President. To those who doubt Hilary would be
'polarizing', you have to only look at the storm of right wing media
celebrating around her downfall even as we speak. Her presence in the
race would have guaranteed massive right wing turnout and backlash
against her, just as polarizing voter initiatives on gay marriage did
in 2004.
*
Well, there's that, and Clinton ran smack into the wall of history.
I don't believe in an invisible Man in the Sky guiding our destiny,
and for similar reasons I've come to discount most theories that
promise historical inevitability or assign some sort of purpose to
history grander than the random walk. But when I heard Obama speak at
Google some months back, I felt the first rumblings of a Movement. At
the time, I equated it to the fact that many of Obama's positions
matched strongly with my own, and that resonance when you encounter
someone who "gets it" as an intellectual.
I'm happy to say that those rumblings were the precursor to a
political earthquake which _if we are lucky_ turn our country away
from the brink of the madness of the last seven years.
I don't say this lightly. I was pulling into a parking lot listening
to talk radio (a regrettable vice of mine), and they broke in to give
Obama's victory speech after the Iowa caucus. I had parked and was
about to leave, but I stopped, and literally could not leave the car I
was so riveted. You could literally feel the course of being history
being changed as he made his speech. I'm now old enough that I've
heard enough political speeches and sermons in my life that I doubted
that I could be moved about such a thing.
I was wrong.
Obama's riff on hope is not, as some cynics have pointed out, trite.
My belief is that it taps into something very near the core of
American-ism (viewed as a movement) -- the idea that things *can
change*, and that they can change *for the better*, is so pervasive in
our culture that it's always shocking to me when I travel to places
like Europe, where the default assumption is "If we rock the boat,
things will get worse", or "This is the way things Have Always Been".
The idea that someone could stand up in front of a crowd, and say,
"Hey, it's ok to hope for something better, *because we're going to
make it happen*", and there even being the slightest chance that he's
not a charlatan is still a radical one, especially when viewed on a
historical scale, and still a thoroughly American conceit.
It shows, too -- in Obama's victory speech, you can actually hear a
crowd of people chanting, "USA! USA! USA!". When's the last
_Democratic_ rally where you heard that?
The best description of this is a quote from the Washington Post today:
"In 1960, the articulate Adlai Stevenson compared his own oratory
unfavorably with John F. Kennedy's. "Do you remember," Stevenson said,
"that in classical times when Cicero had finished speaking, the people
said, 'How well he spoke,' but when Demosthenes had finished speaking,
the people said, 'Let us march.'"
At this hour, Obama is the Democrats' Demosthenes."
- Brandon
Randy Cresap
> My belief is that it taps into something very near the core of
> American-ism (viewed as a movement) -- the idea that things *can
> change*, and that they can change *for the better*, is so pervasive in
> our culture that it's always shocking to me when I travel to places
> like Europe, where the default assumption is "If we rock the boat,
> things will get worse", or "This is the way things Have Always Been".
> The idea that someone could stand up in front of a crowd, and say,
> "Hey, it's ok to hope for something better, *because we're going to
> make it happen*", and there even being the slightest chance that he's
> not a charlatan is still a radical one, especially when viewed on a
> historical scale, and still a thoroughly American conceit.
I think you've hit the nail on the head regarding tapping into
something very American -- i.e., the genuine positivity / idealism.
But there's also something else going on that hasn't really been
articulated -- the generational difference.
Gen. X and below have been ignored by the media and the politicians to
this point. The entire political scene -- and how it's reported -- is
all about the 60's -- conservatives vs. hippy liberals. The fight is
so tired that basically both sides are sloganeers, without any real
grounding in reality -- that is, the discourse is so far removed from
the actual concrete facts and issues that gave rise to the current
landscape decades ago that it really doesn't mean much of anything.
Gen. X, Y, etc. grew up seeing this PR fight between two movements
without actually seeing what all the fighting was about -- by the time
they started paying attention, it's all about vague identification
politics that doesn't have any real concreteness to it. It's all
slogans like "smaller government," "lower taxes," "family values,"
"race," "equal rights," etc. without any of th nuts and bolts like
crunching numbers to see what can be paid for, deciding which programs
need to stay and which need to go, etc. To their parents, it's all a
continuation of fights that happened in the 60's, so they don't really
ask the honest questions -- they're on mental autopilot. The kids see
a politics that exists for itself, and are suspicious of the whole
process. It seems all cynical to them -- politicians caring more
about being pro-conservative or pro-liberal than actually governing
and addressing the real issues.
Of course, this ties into a bigger generational trend -- Gen Xers and
Y are all about authenticity. That's what grunge / indie music was --
musically, it kind of sucked and was very amateur, but it was genuine,
unlike the stuff being promoted by teh big companies. Same with film,
reality tv, etc. -- being fake is the biggest crime to a Gen Xer, not
being on the other side's political affiliation.
Hillary Clinton doesn't "get" it in that she tries to triangulate,
talks about Republican attacks (us vs. them mentality), calculates her
positions, manages her image, strategically leaks info, etc. She's
playing the Bush game, and treating it like it's still the 60's --
liberals vs. conservatives. And in the process alienating the youth,
who see the whole political argument that's she's participating in
with the Republicans as detached from reality, and view her as a fake.
A realignment of the issues between the parties has been coming for a
long, long time, and it looks like the current crop of candidates may
allow this shift to happen. When it does, the political discourse
will accurately reflect the issues, and have a grounding in reality.
Thus, you see Jindal, Obama, and the other candidates be successful
who don't even engage in the liberal vs. conservative debate, but who
instead try to present an "honest" politics. They're also the ones
who are able to connect with younger voters.
****
With respect to Iowa and New Hampshire, I don't have too much of a
problem with them, due to the fact that having those two states first
requires candidates to make their first impressions up close, and not
through the generic media advertising. Voters see them up close.
They have to visit the small towns to caucus in Iowa and to win the NH
primary, shake hands, answer tough questions, etc. Seeing them up
close and personal is a lot more effective in reading a candidate than
in something like a managed TV debate. This is possible because of
the peculiar town meeting -style election procedures / tradition in
these two states, and both are small enough to where the candidates
can logistically canvas teh state and appear personally across the
state. As I understand it, the Iowa system requires the grass roots
efforts, and rewards this kind of "personal" politics. Other smaller
states may be small, but have less of a procedural focus on the
candidates actually doing the up close campaigning. They may also
have less of a small town forum -style political culture than NH or
Iowa.
I like the rotation idea, but the states would have to be vetted first
to see if not only their size, but also their election procedure and
political culture allows for this grass-roots style politics.
Otherwise, it'll give more weight to whoever has the most money and
whoever has teh national party backing, and can spend the most on tv.
Randy Cresap
wrote that really, really fast. I'm used to dictating
Brandon Downey
officially eat crow!
Obama did really well in NH, but he still lost to Clinton. I guess the
race is still on; but I think what I said about Obama still stands.
Scott Alister McKinley
think Obama can pull this off, but in order for it to happen, he needs
to get the black vote in South Carolina to swing his way, the same way
it did in the last minute in Illinois in his Senate race. Again, it
infuriates me that states like Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina
get to have this much influence.
As far as New Hampshire goes, we weren't crazy to assume Obama was
going to win. It was a 12% swing from polls executed just two days
ago. The key constituency for Hillary seems to be women, who swung
18% in those two days.
I'm reminded of the Chris Rock joke about women's suffrage: "I mean,
how did we lose that vote?"
I kid!!! (kind of)
I was also disappointed on the Republican side. Ron Paul failed to
break 10%, which means he'll be written off, and more importantly,
he'll be kept off-stage for the rest of the Republican race. And
perhaps even more seriously, Mitt Romney garnering 32% means he's
still alive. It means Romney might still win Michigan, and without
Michigan I don't see McCain being able to re-establish himself as the
establishment candidate (which is a good thing on the GOP side).
There's still time for Obama to make his case. Ultimately, California
is going to have to move his way, too. The last poll I've heard of
from Ca. was Dec.17, and at the time it was 50% to 22% Hillary over
Obama. Obviously much has changed, but who's knows what LA and San
Francisco are thinking now.
Last thought for the night ... John Edwards is facing a real crisis of
conscience. He's perilously close to becoming the Ralph Nader of this
race. It's seems to me that he stayed in the race and teamed up with
Obama in the ABC debate in the hope of killing Hillary's campaign in
NH. If you look at the exit polling, it's pretty clear that without
Edwards in the race, Obama wins going away. If Edwards is serious
about anything he's said about the issues during this campaign (and
he's been _very_impressive from time to time) then he needs to realize
that he needs to get out of Obama's way. Edwards is splitting the
anti-Clinton vote.
More to come, but in the mean time perfecting my recipe for Creaux Etouffe',
Scott
Brandon Downey
most of them were predicting a double digit victory for Obama. I have
to assume that the polls were in some way badly systematically wrong.
Whether that was independents breaking for McCain (which did seem to
happen), warm weather driving out the older vote, or some sort of
backlash against media inevitability, I dunno! I think it now becomes
a long slog, which favors Hilary -- she has superdelegates in her
pocket, a giant war chest, and the party machine. The best hope is now
the rest of the nation has seen her at her worst -- observe the
frankly dishonest things B. Clinton said about Obama today, or the
transparently 'tears' moment yesterday.
And I still listen to Obama, and think, "here's someone who gets it"
-- it smarts a bit to come so close, and then to realize the
destination is further away than we may think.
*
As for the Republicans, McCain is still the best of the lot. He's pro
election reform, has a relatively open immigration policy, *hates* the
idea of us employing torture, and at least seems capable of waging and
running a war effectively -- not that I want one, but if we're going
to have a Republican who thinks we should be at war, better at least
to do it right.
As for Ron Paul, I'm sad to see his ideas about the war in Iraq go,
but his conspiratorial hatred of the Federal Reserve and insistence on
the gold currency mark him as a loon to most voters (and to me).
Further, as of today the news broke that the 'Ron Paul newsletter',
which ran for about twenty years, is full of racial invective and
paranoid fears about the triliateral commission.
Actual (and fun) quote:
"My wife Carol, and our children and grandchildren, join me in wishing
you and your family a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year. May we
start to confound the plans of the Trilateralists and other
big-government types, making American freer and thus truer to her own
heritage, in 1991".
This, in the same issue that he intimates that MLK was a pedophile!
Who knows if Ron Paul actually wrote this, but it at least confirms
what I suspected -- many of his backers are conspiracy nuts and
racists, and by not disavowing them (and letting them run his
letters), he tarnishes the strong libertarian ideals he holds, which I
am sympathetic to.
For Paul at his best, see the debate on Saturday. All the major
Republican candidates not only refused to repudiate the Bush doctrine,
but all of them swore up and down that 9/11 had _nothing whatsoever_
to do with previous US foreign policy. Paul was the only one willing
to stand up and say, "no, this is clearly nuts. People don't just blow
themselves up for no reason -- here's what we did that pissed them
off." That it takes a guy who believes in the trilateral commission
and black helicopters to speak what is not only a matter of historical
record but it is _also in the 9/11 report_ is a sign that the
Republicans are intellectually bankrupt.That the only one willing to
espouse this was a guy who's a poor public speaker, a nut, and who ran
a racist newsletter for twenty years is a tragedy.
*
The whole thing does sort of beg the question -- if we can end up with
so many bad candidates from one party, does that imply that there are
structural flaws in the system that *invariably* do this? Or is just
that the Republicans have run out of philosophical steam, having
dumped excess religiosity and jingoism into the mix, causing the whole
thing to stall? I do know this -- almost every 'Republican' blog I
read is in deep denial about reality -- and I'm *not* talking about
opposing social security or health care. I'm talking about having the
basic grasp of history to understand what's going on in the world.
For a taste of the Republican party of yesteryear, I found this
comment in a recent article by George Will, a holdover from the days
when Republicans could get away with being smart:
"Barack Obama, who might be mercifully closing the Clinton parenthesis
in presidential history, is refreshingly cerebral amid this
recrudescence of the paranoid style in American politics. He is the
un-Edwards and un-Huckabee — an adult aiming to reform the real world
rather than an adolescent fantasizing mock-heroic "fights" against
fictitious villains in a left-wing cartoon version of this country."
- Brandon
Erik Miller
http://nationaljournal.com/voteratings/sen/lib.htm
While very liberal socially, Hillary Clinton has been very moderate on economic and foreign policy issues. Despite his fabulous rhetoric, I see little evidence that Obama will be much of a "post-partisan" president.
The Senate race in 2008 is looking like a potential Republican bloodbath. The Democrats are only defending 12 seats, with all 12 incumbents running. The Republicans, on the other hand, are defending 23 with 5 of the incumbents already announcing their retirement. I'm guessing that the Democratic Party will have a lock on the legislative branch for at least the next two years, if not longer.
In the interest of having some checks and balances in place, I'm currently hoping that McCain will win it all. Unfortunately, he's the only Republican on the docket that doesn't nauseate me. Between Clinton and Obama, I trust Clinton more to keep the Democratic party from going wild once they get control of the whole government. For this reason, I'm hoping that she wins the Democratic primary. Obama doesn't seem like a bad candidate, either, but I think people have gotten overinfatuated with him.
Erik
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