We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
The other day, I dared the Maggie's Valued Readers™ to put it all on the line and issue their election predictions. I noted that I'd post them here, in broad daylight, so that their possible fall from grace would be as publicly humiliating as possible. Even so, a hearty band of readers took up this mighty challenge and spat spake forth the following prognostications.
I also asked you to weigh in on local & state races, so a few of the predictions are only in regards to that. Lengthier replies have been reduced to their summation.
And this is ongoing until Tuesday. Slap your guess in the comments and I'll add it to the list so that you, too, can be publicly mocked, scorned and degraded for the rest of your life should Obama win in a landslide. After the final election results are in, I'll do another post and announce the no-doubt embarrassed winner. The prize will be they get to write an article on any subject they like, which I'll then post here for possibly even more mockification, scornalization and degradationalism.
To wit:
While I expect it to be decisively in Romney's favor, I think there will enough Democratic shenanigans going on to keep it from being a 'landslide'. I'm thinking 50% Romney, 48% Obama, with the usual couple of percent devoted to write-ins. Electoral votes-wise, I'm putting it in the 'barely squeaks by' column. — me
Romney 51% Obama 49% — Lady Tex
A Romney win that will probably be close — Garry
315/223 — Pajak
42% of the vote going to O, rest of the vote to R— BillH
I predict Colorado will go for Romney. — Colorado
I predict an old fashioned thumping, with Romney topping 400 Electoral Votes. — Tom Armstrong
My hunch is that Romney wins big time and captures a huge majority of both the popular vote and the Electoral College. — Tom Francis
Romney 53 - Obama 47, Pubbies get the Senate but only 51-49. Pubbies gain +2 in the House. Waxman gets axed in CA! — Bob in VA
Obama gets his ass kicked up around his collar bone. Romney wins Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa, and my beloved New Hampshire. Oh yeah, Virginia and Florida too. Not quite 1984, but it is gonna be a rough one for the Dems. — Anthony L.
I predict Romney 53% - Obama 46% - 330 EC votes for Mitt. Senate 52 Republicans - 48 Democrats. +3 for the GOP in the House. — altered states
My prediction is that though Romney may have the majority of popular vote nationwide and enough support in the battleground States to win close fights and their electoral votes, I don't think he has enough of a margin to overcome the Democratic cheating and outright theft I've seen too many times to forget. — John
I think Romney will get it but will be a Pyrrhic victory. — chasmatic
Romney 52%, 0bama 47% — Vichris
Romney - 322, Obama - 216 — Chuckles
Romney landslide to a degree that surprises just about everybody. — ahem
I'll go with R 315, O 223 (a la Barone) -- but I say this more in hope than in confidence. — Texan99
...picked R 319 many months back. — Texan99's husband
Election is close…and it comes down to enthusiastic R voters vs D fraud. I think the D fraud loses…this time. — Daedalus Mugged
270-268 Romney - NH, VA, NC, FL, & OH puts him over the top. — Dave
It would be fun to join the Romneyfest here but I checked Intrade today to read the internet's tea leaves. It doesn't look like good news for Team Red, at least as far as the presidential election goes. Intrade doesn't always get it right, of course. But I believe it's right more often than not. — jhc
While that last one isn't an official 'prediction', we now have four presidential elections under our belt since the Internet Age began, so it's interesting to see who's starting to emerge as the predictive leader.
Carolina Panthers fans are likely pretty pleased with their team's ability to win for the first time since Week 2, but one man is likely even happier.
History dictates that the Panthers 21-13 victory over the Washington Redskins at FedEx Field bodes well for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. In the 18 presidential elections that have taken place since the Redskins moved to Washington in 1937, 17 have been predicted by the team's performance in its final home game prior to the election.
My final pre-election post, set for Monday, is currently at 1,175 words. And counting.
Since Monday will be our last chance to either (1) sound incredibly precognitive or (2) look like complete bozos, I'm inviting you, the Maggie's Valued Readers™, to publicly have a say. Along with my article, I'll also post an article with any predictions you leave here in the comments.
My only request is that you put your official prediction in quotes, to differentiate it from anything else in the comment you'd care to blather on about. If no quotes are used, I'll post the whole thing. Management reserves the right to correct any blatant typos. I'll collate them Sunday evening.
There are actually a handful of predictions in play. In regards to the presidential race, you could predict the outcome by states, by Electoral votes, or just wimp out and resort to safe phrases like "landslide" or "barely squeak by".
There's also the question of the congressional races, both locally and in Washington. We presume we'll keep the House, but the pundits say we won't have enough to take back the Senate. Is this true? Could the much-anticipated October Surprise turn into a November surprise?
Do you remember what happened in 2010?
Then there's the side issue of Obama's so-called 'firewall' states; states that are so heavily 'blue' that there's no sense even campaigning there. Or is there? Are Pennsylvania (Obama 54% in 2008), Michigan (57%) and Minnesota (54%) actually in play? We'll discount California (60%) and New York (62%) outright, but it all adds up.
And then there's my current home state of Florida. While Ohio has gotten the most press as the official 'swing state' this time around, of the four states with the most Electoral votes, Florida is the only one in play. It was 50.9% for Obama in 2008 compared to McCain's 48.4%, which is damn close. The fourth state is Texas, which went 55.5% for McCain, so we'll figure that one's already in our column. Florida will be the one to watch this Tuesday.
So have it, Maggie's Valued Readers™. This could be your 15 minutes! I've seen some fairly opinionated, vociferous comments in Bruce's and my political posts, so here's your chance to prove to everybody how right you were.
I'm on the road and using my laptop (barf) so this'll be short. Just a reminder that the third and final (praise be) presidential debate is on tonight. Showtime for the event in 9 pm Eastern. More info & a streamcast here.
By the way, in case you were out of the country planet last week and were wondering who won the debate, you'll be interested to know that both sides won. Democracy in action! Obama won the 'Overall Likeability' contest (which counts for half, as I understand it) but in every issue-oriented question ("Who do you think will best improve the economy?" e.g.), Romney won it walking away.
I think we'll see a general repeat of last week tonight. Three things will happen; both candidates will be at their best, the moderator will make damn sure Obama is protected from the slings and arrows of outrageous truth, and the MSM will pick one single Romney quote ("binders") to go nuts over. The usual stuff, in other words.
Current affairs afficionados like me - and like many of our readers - are probably on the thin end of the bell curve of voter information. Since we usually talk to roughly equally informed and interested people, we need to remember that many people are minimally-informed or not very interested in public affairs or policy.
Fox news interviewed some "WalMart Moms" this morning, and the Moms agreed with this statement: "We don't really know enough about the candidates yet."
I suppose this is why image, identity, and emotion are so important, especially in national elections. I suspect that this was true even before TV. I wonder what percentage of voters occupy the "low information" category.
The Pirate found these great examples of low-information voters, not at WalMart but at university:
Obama is 1/2 black (half-cool), of seemingly ambiguous sexual orientation (cool), wants to be friends with Jihadists (double-cool), and wants to make the grown-ups give us youths free stuff (triple-cool). It is literally a "no brainer."
I was that unwise in my callow youth, but I knew more than these morons who probably could not locate Libya on a map. How did these bozos get into college?
Statists well understand that you don't need a president-for-life if you've got a bureaucracy-for-life. Sometimes your team has to take a time-out for a couple of years, but, even when they do, all the departments and agencies and bureaus are still in place, hyper-regulating away. I mean, how often does the party of small government actually abolish anything?
New York City has been governed by liberals for generations. Surely if blue policies could produce an egalitarian utopia with a strong middle class, we would see it in New York before we would see it anywhere else. If liberals were good at running cities, people from all over the world would be coming to study New York’s public schools, marveling at the extraordinary success with which unionized teachers were transforming the lives of low income kids. Our transit system would be the envy of the world as well; awestruck visitors from benighted places like Shanghai and Tokyo would come to gaze in amazement at the speed, cleanliness and economy of the New York subways. Small business formation would be booming as the bustling economy of manufacturing start ups created opportunities in the inner cities.
Yet, somehow, this isn’t happening. It’s great mystery.
NYC thrives and is vibrant despite its government, not because it it. It's just lucky enough to be a people-magnet. A magnet for talented and/or ambitious young people from all over the world.
Tonight will be our one chance to see Ryan and Biden face off. Unlike the last debate, where every MSM op-ed in the Central Galaxy predicted an Obama slam-dunk, I note that no one is predicting such an outcome tonight.
Because two things are true:
1. As everyone knows, Romney is extremely gaffe-prone. Just ask any objective, independent MSM reporter. But Romney won't be there tonight.
2. As everyone knows, Biden actually is gaffe-prone, and just because the protective MSM won't admit it doesn't make it any less true. It could pop out at any second.
Personally, if I were a Democratic operative, I'd be terrified.
I wonder if we'll see the words "draw" or "tie" tomorrow. If I were an MSM writer, I'd already be composing my "It was a draw" article. You know Ryan won't actually 'lose'; the only question is whether or not Biden will, and as long as he doesn't say anything too outlandish or (as they'll say in future elections) pull an Obama, they'll figure a tie is more than satisfactory.
One thing I think we'll see tonight is how much more of a 'regular guy' Ryan is, as referred to the heartless number-cruncher he's usually portrayed as. We'll need that since Biden's 'Regular Joe' persona is well crafted. Despite it being a complete lie, he really does come across as the working man's best friend in Congress.
If I were his press agent, I'd have the Callous Lady come in to rub small callouses on his hands. Then I'd have a cued reporter ask him about them at the next televised press conference.
"Say, Joe, are those callouses on your hands?"
"Uh-yup! I got dem choppin' me up some firewood!"
Whutta guy!
The show starts at 9 Eastern. More details here. It should be streamed from both that link and YouTube. On the subject, I would note that there are different streamcasts available. The first one I tried during the last debate was plastering these insipid Twitter comments across the bottom of the screen. I hunted around and found a 'clean' version.
For your reading pleasure, I highly recommend this article. That's the kind of post that actually sways voters.
I love this pic I found while searching for "presidential debate":
It shows the aloof, condescending Obama in his most typical state — and shows an angry, frustrated Romney railing against the system in his most untypical state. Just the way we like it.
And do you know what?
I bet it was posted by a Lefty. He wanted to show Obama as calm and reasoning and Romney as totally unhinged.
Such is the eye of the beholder.
Stage 1: The Primaries
I don't think anyone reading my Republican debate posts was surprised that Romney took the nomination. It wasn't for naught that Mitt won the prestigious 'Most Presidential' award after every debate save one, where he shared it with Jon Huntsman. He speaks a solid platform, he enunciates well, and, more elusively, he acts like a president should act. That's why he kept winning the damn award.
Stage 2: The Conventions
Bottom line? We got a meme out of it ("empty chair") — and the Dems got nothing. Hah!
Stage 3: Rise of the Tea Party
Lurking in the shadows. Waiting in the wings. Step right up, pick yer metaphor.
Personally, I think it's going to be 2010 all over again. For those of you scoring at home, we had a mid-term election two years ago where the Repubs totally clobbered the Dems, taking back the House, almost taking back the Senate, and putting the fear of two words — Tea Party — into every Democrat's heart.
The good news is that you haven't heard a peep from them since then.
Good news, because the MSM didn't get the opportunity to liken them to the Wall Street Occupiers when they were having their fling, and good news because it appears the MSM has forgotten all about them at this point of the game. This false complacency is just fine with us.
The debate is set to fire off at 9 pm Eastern. More details here.
Despite what Bird Dog and many others view as the evil of pagination (spreading a web post over multiple pages), I am purposefully going to split up this post into two parts right here and now.
(And thus 'Doc Scofflaw' once again spits in the eye of convention! He's back, folks!)
A pal had never heard of Murray. Here's an introduction. I find his thoughts about "social capital" most interesting but, on many topics, he is a hard-headed, liberty-oriented thinker.
Here are a few of our Murray links from very recent years:
Why Capitalism Has an Image Problem - Charles Murray examines the cloud now hanging over American business—and what today's capitalists can do about it.
It is no surprise that investigations into voting fraud yield no meaningful results. Why should they? Whoever is looking into it is ignoring the fraud their own party perpetrates, while seeking only the least likely forms employed by their opponent. The idea is to give the perception of doing 'something' about a problem so you look responsive. The hint of a problem is all you need to focus voter attention.
Eric Holder (of all people) once said "You constantly hear about voter fraud...but you don't see huge amounts of voter fraud out there." Maybe. It's unusual a comment of this sort would emanate from Holder. After all, Democrats often claim the Republicans are seeking to disenfranchise voters, and that's just fraud in another format.
Perhaps that suspicion of fraud enhances the flavor. ~C.S. Forester
Maybe politicians are just looking in the wrong place? Fraud is best performed out in the open, where it won't be questioned. Like a magic show. Misdirection and illusion. Paying people to vote, providing transportation to the polls in exchange for votes, blocking access, even having the dead vote are all versions of fraud which are time-honored.
It seems unlikely fraud is happening on a wide scale. But at a local level it could happen fairly frequently, and in ways which are pretty visible. We tend not to question what we see everyday, or that with which we've become comfortable.
The Times Of Israel has published my piece, "A liberal rabbi's wake-up call for liberal Jews." The central theme of the rabbi's wake-up call is that "with great power comes great responsibility", focusing upon Iran and upon the anti-Semitic and anti-Israel diatribes and harrasment that frequently occurs on US college campuses. Liberal Jews in the US cannot afford to avoid or look away from directly and vigorously confronting these existential threats. Jews must use the historically recently-won power to defend ourselves. Otherwise, the almost two-millenia of fear and hiding, of slaughter, can return.
If the Commerce Clause power had been upheld, not only would the enumerated powers scheme have gone away, but Congress could have changed the law to punish this or any future mandates by very extensive penalties, like high fines and even imprisonment. One last way of explaining the difference: Imagine that all the drug laws were justified under the tax power and not under the commerce power. All the drug laws we have are Commerce Clause power. But imagine they were only justified under the tax power, under the principle that Chief Justice Roberts identified. That would mean the only thing the government could do to you for violating the drug laws would be to charge you a reasonable, modest tax. They couldn’t even charge you a punitive tax, and they certainly couldn’t put you in jail. If we actually achieved that reading of the drug laws, it wouldn’t be a perfectly libertarian solution, but you’d have to open up the jails and let millions of people out under that reading of the Constitution.
It includes some good, friendly discussion of social equality vs. economic equality, and of economic mobility which I see as one of the wonders of American society.
Here's one bit from Voegli, speaking to Noah:
I close by remarking on your wistfulness about the absence of internal radicals or external Communists who might prod us to equalize incomes. It is in keeping with your hopes, now certainly flagging, that Occupy Wall Street would catalyze a politically irresistible redistributive movement. In your book's final sentence-"The worst thing we could do to the Great Divergence is get used to it" - you are trying to say something to the Americans indifferent to that great crusade. But perhaps they, in their reluctance to enlist, are trying to say something to you about their abiding desire for economic vigor and absolute mobility, and their abiding fears about the power and decency of redistributive government.
The average US income, per person, in 2011 was about $45,000. Make that an income cap, with anything above taxed at 100%. As a start, I suggest that this example of equality begin with Washington politicians and federal employees. It might catch on.
Why stop with income? Let's address assets too, which are much more important for economic equality. The average American's net worth in 2011 was $77,000. Let's bring the pols and bureaucrats down to that too, and take the rest away from them for equality and the Common Good. Bernanke, too, and Obama, Harry Reid, John Kerry, The Clintons, Elizabeth Warren, etc. Maybe throw in Krugman, Warren Buffet and Bill Gates just for giggles, and confiscate all trusts.
I suggest that the same apply to the owners and staff of The New Republic and The NY Times. If it requires force, so be it.
For my plan to work, obviously the government will need to set the prices of everything because otherwise nobody could afford stuff. Hey - it might just work!
That's what Lucianne said re Romney's fund-raiser talk.
Seems non-controversial to me. When he said "I'm not going to worry about those people" he was referring to getting their votes, with the implication that they are already bought. (I think he is wrong about that, BTW.)
Moral of the story? Never say anything that, when taken out of context, sounds bad. Of course, that is impossible to do. And for the MSM, everything Conservatives say is a gaffe.
At Drudge, as of now, 1 in 16 Americans are taking Disability. If 1/16th of America is really disabled to work, we're in big trouble. And what % use EBT cards now?
I'm a fan of Cory Booker. I do not share his politics, but there is much to compliment him on at a local level. I can appreciate how he has improved Newark, a city very close to where I live, and how he has created a strong working relationship with Chris Christie, the Republican Governor of New Jersey.
When he goes national, though, he tends to put his foot in his mouth. Most recently, there was his commentary on Bain Capital, calling out Obama's campaign.
Now he's given a speech at the DNC which makes a claim that is outlandish.
"being asked to pay your fair share isn't class warfare—it's patriotism. But we all know—it's common sense—that for an economy built to last we must invest in what will fuel us for generations to come."
...the truth needed to make the world a better place is a "public good" that private markets cannot easily supply. Foundations have spent many millions of dollars financing private, market-oriented think tanks in an effort to compensate for the damage being done by academia. But while these think tanks have had an influence at the margins, the vast majority of college-educated Americans continue to rely on the information provided by elite universities and mainstream media rather than the think tanks that espouse classical liberal thought.
Can market forces provide the creative destruction needed to solve this problem?
It took a while to get here, but it's been a fun run. I enjoyed every minute of the debates, the primaries were quite interesting, as was pondering who would grab the VP slot. Now that the convention's over, it's time for the main event to get under way.
At this point, I like our chances. Along with gauging audience reactions, I also like gauging the overall feel of the comments on non-political sites. That is, if I'm on some site selling dog brushes, and someone mentions Obama in the site's forum and, the next thing ya know, there are regular, non-political people screeching about Obama & company all over the place, this is a good sign, and I see it all the time.
As for last night's show, the Reagan tribute was pretty cool:
On a local note, we have proof that Mitt Romney's son, Craig, reads Maggie's Farm. Hi, Craig! In my wrap-up yesterday, I suggested it would have been a smart move for Gov Martinez to talk to her fellow Hispanics en Español for an entire minute, just to show them that they really meant something.
So what did Craig Romney do tonight? Spoke in Spanish for an entire minute.
Thank you, thank you — I'll be here all week. Try the veal.
Ultimately this division — clerisy and their clients versus yeomanry — will decide the election. The patricians and the unions will finance this battle on both sides, spreading a predictable thread of half-truths and outright lies. The Democrats enjoy a tactical advantage. All President Obama needs is to gain a rough split among the vast group making around or above the national median income. He can count on overwhelming backing by the largely government dependent poor as well as most ethnic minorities, even the most entrepreneurial and successful.
Romney’s imperative will be to rouse the yeomanry by suggesting the clerisy, both by their sheer costliness and increasingly intrusive agenda, are crippling their family’s prospects for a better life. In these times of weak economic growth and growing income disparity, the Republicans delude themselves by claiming to ignore class warfare. They need to learn how instead to make it politically profitable for themselves.
Ron Paul supporters, you have my sympathy. That video they showed was just pathetic. I thought the big guy, hisself, was going to speak, hopefully issuing a small tut-tut to the conventioneers to keep their collective eye on the fiscal ball, but no. All we got was a campaign commercial. Hmph.
Remember, by the end of the debates, a lot of people saw what I meant when I said at the beginning, "I completely agree with 75% of what he says. The other 25% scares me to death." In many, if not most ways, he really does have the right answer, but in the general election, every vote for Ron Paul is most likely a vote taken from Romney. That stuff's fine during the primaries, but we're trying to win the big one here. The best thing we can hope for is that the press (continues to) completely ignore him. The less press, the less votes. The less votes, the greater our chances.
Remember Ross Perot in '92? Result? A Clinton dynasty.
Say, I've got a good idea. How 'bout an Obama dynasty? Cool idea, huh?
Day one of the convention went pretty much as I expected it to go. A whole bunch of boring speeches, albeit with a few exceptions, ending with two fabulous speeches performances by Ann Romney and Chris Christie. If you missed them, the links are below.
The one big 'disgrace' — to pick a word — was the delegates casting votes for Ron Paul. I'm not sure what kind of kooky message they were trying to deliver, but 'unity of the party' certainly wasn't on their agenda. Michigan cast the majority of its votes for Ron Paul.
Delegates are ethically but not legally compelled to cast their ballots based on the results of primaries and caucuses conducted in their state.
Well, sure. That makes sense. There's certainly no reason to pay any attention to those pesky primaries if just a handful of people can make the decision. Thank goodness for abbreviated democracy!
On the up side, the person at the podium was only repeating the votes for Romney, so when the Michigan rep said, "Thirty-three votes for Ron Paul (wild, maniacal screaming from the 127 Paulbots in the audience), six votes for Mitt Romney, one vote for Rick Santorum", all the person at the podium said was, "Mitt Romney, six votes". Big statement to the world you made there, Michigan.
A lesser disgrace was the six states that had their vote number reduced because the morons governing the state races decided to hold their primaries before the date the RNC had allowed. My home state of Florida, which, being the 4th-largest state in the union, should have had near as many votes as California's 172, was allotted a paltry 50. Hmph.
One other small disgrace were the 'abstention' votes. Nevada had five. Please tell me how a person can become a Republican delegate and find none of the candidates acceptable — on a write-in ballot!
Pics, links, and more unabashed blather below the fold.
For those of you without a TV, YouTube is doing a constant streamcast of the convention here.
It's been on for an hour or so and it appears to mostly be short speeches by various local dignitaries and the occasional live band. The real action begins tonight at 7. Two schedules to check are here and here.
I suppose the highlight of the evening will be Governor Chris Christie's speech at 10. After all the feisty videos we've seen of him at some small-town function, it'll be interesting to see him in a 'formal' setting. I imagine he'll try to keep his natural boisterousness toned down, but his charismatic personality will still shine through.
I also look forward to seeing Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker. He was my original choice for the VP slot when the primaries got under way.
The other day, I 
I'm on the road and using my laptop (barf) so this'll be short. Just a reminder that the third and final (praise be) presidential debate is on tonight. Showtime for the event in 9 pm Eastern. More info & a streamcast 
Ron Paul supporters, you have my sympathy. That video they showed was just pathetic. I thought the big guy, hisself, was going to speak, hopefully issuing a small tut-tut to the conventioneers to keep their collective eye on the fiscal ball, but no. All we got was a campaign commercial. Hmph.
Day one of the convention went pretty much as I expected it to go. A whole bunch of boring speeches, albeit with a few exceptions, ending with two fabulous 
And they're off and running...