A family member (who can claim credit for this if he/she would like) attended the Hawaii Democratic Caucus at my goading. Here is the email he/she sent back describing the experience: Read more »

You’re campaigning in DC and you don’t get your donuts from Krispy Kreme? For shame.

Picture via My Way.

In honor of today’s big primaries, here’s a quick snapshot of CNN’s Exit Polls from the recent Florida Republican primary:

Notice a theme? Even Ron Paul couldn’t get above N/A. Where’s Alan Keyes when you need him?

Everywhere you look today there’s a story about how Obama’s huge victory in South Carolina “transcended race” or how voters were “not swayed by racial politics.” Maybe those people are looking at different exit poll numbers than I am, because when Obama takes in 80% of the black vote and comes in last in the white vote he didn’t transcend race — he was lofted to victory almost exclusively ON race.

Now that race has become an issue (which it wasn’t in Iowa), I’m curious how he’s going to play in white America.  Could this sweeping victory actually be Barack Obama’s campaign’s death knell?

Daniel Kells points to this 3 minute NPR clip in which people are asked to describe various presidential candidates in one word. I’d like to see this question incorporated into polls, it makes for an intriguing perspective on voters’ overall perceptions of a candidate.

Guess which candidate this was: Mayor, 9/11, 9/11, Tough…

On the topic of Presidential candidates’ children, Nacho pointed out Ben Romney’s MySpace page which includes this clueless, yet entertaining message from “Republican Headquarters“:

Sep 13 2007 5:05 PM

Dear Reader thanks for being a proud member of the Republican Party, your participation through this process in the next election is greatly needed. Please pick a Republican canidate you feel is the best and send us back a comment stating just the canidates name.

thank you,

Your Republican Party

I wish, so badly, that that were the real Republican Party MySpace page.

The Wall Street Journal ran a piece today speculating that Lou Dobbs might run for President on a third party ticket. They accompanied the story with a stipple drawing of Lou Dobbs that I’m fairly certain was traced from an old Newt Gingrinch image. I found the idea compellingly train wreck-y and was excited to see Lou Dobbs responding to the speculation on CNN’s Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.

Here’s Lou Dobbs discussing whether he’ll run for President in 2008. I filmed this with my digital camera so the sound and video quality are poor (turn up your speakers).

Blimpy bastards.

The Ron Paul blimp actually raised enough money to get off the ground (hyuck, hyuck). They’ll be flying over Washington, D.C. on December 10th at 3pm. I’m there.

I’ve mentioned Ron Paul a lot, including my recent comparison of him to Snakes on a Plane, but I think I’ve finally pinned down a major Ron Paul problem, his unfavorables. Here are some results from the most recent Rasmussen poll in Iowa:

Among those likely to take part in the Iowa Republican caucuses, Romney is viewed favorably by 77%, Huckabee by 76%, Giuliani by 68%, and Thompson by 71%…

As for unfavorables, just 20% offer a negative assessment of Huckabee. Twenty-one percent (21%) have an unfavorable opinion of Romney, 24% say the same about Thompson, and 30% have a negative opinion of Giuliani.

McCain’s numbers have fallen since the previous Rasmussen Reports survey. Among Republicans likely to participate in the caucus, 54% have a favorable opinion of the Arizona Senator while 44% have an unfavorable view.

Ron Paul is viewed favorably by 39% and unfavorably by 52%.

Notice that bit at the end there? Ron Paul has an UNFAVORABLE rating above 50% That basically means that no matter what, more than 50% of Iowa Republican caucus voters will not vote for him. Money, media and message can do a lot to fix a public’s lack of knowledge about a candidate, but they can’t do much to fix a public’s established negative perceptions of a candidate.

A hundred November 5ths (or Tea Parties) won’t do Ron Paul any good if his unfavorables stay above 50%. And while those events raise a lot of money, they won’t do a lot to change negative perceptions. Of course, the commercials paid for by that money might help, but it hasn’t done so yet.

Libertarians against Ron Paul.

I’ve had it with this motherfucking Ron Paul in this motherfucking election.

Ron Paul’s supporters are everywhere. I recently spotted this one at the Griffith Observatory above Los Angeles:

There’s nothing particularly noteworthy about this car or its slogans, but it’s indicative of the dozens and dozens of small but loving Ron Paul support signs I’ve seen over the past year. I’ve seen more support for Ron Paul in real life than I have for all the other candidates combined (I’m not entirely clear why), and that’s not even counting his online phenomenon which completely blows the other candidates out of the water.

The problem is, Ron Paul is Snakes on a Plane.

During the run-up to Snakes on a Plane, everyone was shocked by the amount of excitement and support the film had garnered online. Running Snakes on a Blog, I had a unique perspective on the actual number of people involved and could have told you that the buzz was being created by a relatively small number of extremely vocal, web-savvy people. The media focused on the fact that there was excitement, not on the number of people who were creating it. When the movie was actually released, the ticket sales were disappointing. The people who were excited about the film all went to see it, but that didn’t lead to dramatically improved sales among the general population. A small, vocal community doesn’t always transfer into general, real world results.

Ron Paul’s support appears to be similar.

Ron Paul’s supporters are, like Snakes on a Plane supporters, very web savvy and very vocal. They also appear to be very few in number (also like Snakes on a Plane supporters). With the exception of a recent bump in a few states, his numbers over the last year have lingered in the one to three percent range across the country. His people can sure as hell draw attention to themselves, and they can make some noise, but they aren’t numerous. Ron Paul raised $5 million on a single day, but he’s still not causing a major stir in the polls… this has all the hallmarks of being another cause that is unable to transfer its online enthusiasm into real world results.

Like Snakes on a Plane supporters after its Hollywood premiere, I expect that there’s going to be a lot of disappointment among Ron Paul supporters after the first few primaries. The excitement online just doesn’t necessarily translate into real world success and there’s no indication that Ron Paul is going to shake Snakes on a Plane syndrome.

There are 44 candidates that will be listed on the New Hampshire primary ballots. Three men, at the bottom of the list, are listed as running for Vice President: William Bryk (Democrat), John S. “Jack” Barnes, Jr., (Republican), and Raymond Stebbins (Democrat).

I mocked the idea that a no-name candidate would go through the trouble of placing himself on the primary ballot and not go for the gold. Why run for VP when you could just as easily (and just as futile-y) run for President? A quick googling revealed the answer:

A state senator is sure he’ll win the Republican race for vice president in New Hampshire, but he doesn’t expect to actually be vice president. Sen. Jack Barnes, R-Raymond, is the only Republican on the New Hampshire ballot for vice president of the United States. That’s why he expects to win. But vice president is a strange office to run for because after the winner is announced, “nothing happens.”

“Nothing. Absolutely nothing. We just announce who won and that’s that,” said Karen Ladd, New Hampshire’s assistant secretary of state. The actual vice presidential candidate is chosen by each political party’s nominee for president, not by voters on primary ballots.

So the two Dems are going to have to fight for a meaningless victory, but Jack Barnes is guaranteed one. Go Jack Barnes! I’m going to write him in on my local primary ballot.

John Edwards has a funny house.

Besides being the most expensive house in Orange county, North Carolina, having indoor basketball and handball courts, a parking lot bigger than my middle school’s, and the obligatory indoor pool, it also has one super strange design element.

Click to big-ify.

This is John Edwards’s house from afar. It looks as though it was constructed in two parts. On the left is a mansion-like, green-roofed home, and on the right appears to be a red barn.

Clearly the barn isn’t a traditional barn.  If it ever was a standard, horse-bearing barn it has long since been remodeled into something more fitting the modern politician. One would obviously guess that that’s where the Edwards family keeps the basketball and handball courts (who even plays handball?). The truly odd part of this house, however, is what’s between the house and the barn… can you see it? I’ll make it a little bit more obvious.

That. What the heck is that? John Edwards appears to have connected the house to the barn by building a series of sheds, each immediately next to the one before it, of varying sizes, shapes, colors and angles. Who would build that? It’s like there’s a shantytown connecting the house with the barn.

It looks like he had the house and the barn, but didn’t have enough money to connect them so he built the connection in installments. Every time he got a paycheck, he had the builders throw another extension onto the house, knowing that eventually they’d make it all the way to to the barn. When they had more money, they built bigger sheds; when they had less, they built smaller ones.

Do you think it’s all one big hallway in there? Or is it a series of small, oddly shaped rooms? I’d love to take a tour.

Tom Tancredo is trying to elbow his way into the Republican primary top tier by pulling an LBJ with his new, clearly intended to be shocking, ad. Tancredo’s traditional “be afraid of immigrants” was not proving as effective as he had hoped, so he’s playing the foreigners-will-bomb-us card in his new commercial. Only he’s not playing it well:

Feel familiar? It’s a low quality re-hashing of Daisy:

But Tancredo seems to have missed what actually made the Daisy ad effective: stark symbolism without overwrought and exceedingly dull explanation. If you’re going to shock America into paying attention to your message, you don’t do it with a lengthy verbal build up and explanation. This is television, use the medium. The Daisy ad shocked by skipping over all the explanation, all the details… it was a straightforward “vote for me or everybody dies” pitch. The Daisy ad was shocking, the Tancredo ad is boring.

It’s probably just as well.

This license plate requires some serious dedication:

Do you think he switches it up every election cycle, or do you think he’ll have the same license plate 15 years from now? Or maybe he’s had that license plate since ‘04, or ‘00, just waiting for the time (and Al Gore) to be right? Whatever, this is the sort of partisanship I can get (and drive) behind.

There is some level of irony in having a Gore ‘08 license plate on your LL Bean special edition Subaru Outback SUV getting a whopping 17 city miles per gallon.

Hyuck, hyuck.

Via Eternal Recurrence.

Glassbooth is another answer-a-few-questions-and-we’ll-tell-you-which-2008- presidential-candidate-is-right-for-you site. I liked the way this one was set up, it seemed more sensible than most, but it led to the unlikely trio of Kucinich (75%), Richardson (74%) and Gravel (73%) as my recommendations. I don’t think any site that gives me those results can be very accurate.

FYI, I’m apparently least like Duncan Hunter (31%).

I’ve commented in the past that Ron Paul’s supporters, when they swarm, can be a little bit difficult to deal with. It seems that actual political sites have felt this effect much more strongly than I have. MSNBC asked the Ron Paul people to stop emailing them. RedState (like Kos for the right) has gone so far as to ban them from participating.

I like how a quasi-mainstream libertarian candidate can create havoc in a campaign.

A few months ago CrazyMonk wrote about Dennis Kucinich’s odd speech at an early Democratic forum in which he twirled around chanting “no strings attached.” It was weird.

Anyway, in rewatching an old episode of the Simpsons I noticed that maybe it wasn’t so weird after all. Dennis Kucinich claims that he has “no strings attached,” but as he’s whirling, whirling, whirling toward freedom, is he right? This short video focuses on whether Dennis Kucinich has, in fact, been taking his marching orders from the Simpsons’ writers all along:

Here’s the .wmv for when YouTube/Fox improperly DMCA me.

Is there any way for me to see yesterday’s Republican debate, in its entirety, online? If not, why not?

Time and Beliefnet bring you this election’s journalistic innovation: The God-o-Meter.

The God-o-Meter provides consistantly updated tracking information on where the candidates stand with respect to god on a scale of one to ten (one being an ungodly, sodomite heathen and ten being Mother Theresa). The scale currently runs from Barack Obama at a beatific nine to Rudy Giuliani at a lowly two. He must be desecrating crosses before debates or something.

It’s interesting to see a Republican at the lowest point of the spectrum and a Democrat at the highest. That goes against expectations, which I always appreciate.

The election is currently missing any candidate willing to hang out at the ‘one’ end of the spectrum. This election needs more Bloomberg.

The two candidates I’m most intrigued by, Ron Paul (libertarian, though potentially crazy) and Joe Biden (the only candidates who wants to split Iraq in three) are, unsurprisingly, at the bottom of the fundraising barrel.

This race needs more Bloomberg.

Via APNews.

Yet another 2008 candidate selector, this one is fairly quick. Here’s where I stand:

1. 21 - Ron Paul
2. 18 - Joe Biden & Rudy Guiliani
3. 17 - Chris Dodd & Dennis Kucinich
4. 16 - Obama & Clinton
5. 14 - McCain

Ah, Ron Paul. Now that I’ve used your name I’m sure your minions will arrive to call me stupid… like last time.