Sunday, January 18 will be the 97th anniversary of the day Robert Falcon Scott’s British Terra Nova Expedition arrived at the South Pole in 1912.  As many may know, there was a race to the Pole with the Norwegian, Roald Amundsen — a race the British lost.  They also lost their lives, with the weakened, last three members of the five-man team to reach the Pole slowly dying of dehydration, starvation, and gangrene only 11 miles from the  safety of One Ton Depot, where supplies, medical attention, and a relief party awaited them.

At the time, the story of the party’s demise made headlines larger than those for the sinking of the Titanic, because the elements of the story, interpreted in an ever-so-slightly-post-Edwardian way, made for a tragic tale in the heroic literary tradition.  In many ways, those elements still do, but with a twist that is both modern and at least as ancient as Sophocles.

Terra Nova is an utterly marvelous but rarely performed play about the Scott Expedition written by Ted Tally, who won an Academy Award for his screenplay for Silence of the Lambs.  Tally wrote Terra Nova as a graduate project at Yale, and it went on to win the Obie Award for best Off-Broadway play — a nearly unheard of accomplishment for a first-time effort.  The play is currently being produced in Longmont, Colorado through January 24, and this trailer provides some insights into the history, production, and script. Full Story »

The mainstream media is reminding me more and more of football announcers struggling to keep viewers from changing channels.

Bud:  Well, the Bumblin’ Bombers are down by 15 with just under two minutes left, Clint, but the game is far from over.

Clint:  That’s right, Bud.  They have no time-outs left, but if they run their two-minute drill effectively, they can certainly move the ball down the field, get the touchdown, make a two-point conversion, then cover an onside kick, drive for another touchdown, and send the game to overtime.

Bud:  Though the Bombers have been held to only 42 yards in total offense in the second half, this is an explosive team, and they’ve come back from situations like this, before, right Clint? Full Story »

Elizabeth Dole, wife of former Senator and presidential candidate Robert Dole, and Republican Senator from North Carolina (or “Nawth Ca’lina” if you prefer the proper pronunciation), was possessed today by Jesse Helms’ twisted, gangrenous, suppurating soul.  Channeling Helms’ mavericky energy, Dole released an ad accusing her opponent in this year’s senatorial campaign, Kay Hagan, in what has to be the most … well … just watch it.  It’s only 30 seconds.

Full Story »

Conventional wisdom in presidential elections is that they almost always tighten near the end.  Today’s Rasmussen Reports tracking poll, which shows Obama’s lead shrinking to +3, 50% to 47%, not only reflects a tightening, but may reflect deeper trouble for Obama, as well.

Or maybe not.

The Rasmussen Reports poll has been the steadiest of all the polls during this election, primarily because of its methodology.  Unlike most polls, Rasmussen’s is automated, meaning that the questionnaire items are always delivered in exactly the same way.  In addition, Rasmussen’s sample size is larger than most, reducing its margin of error, and this large sampling allows its weighting by Republican vs. Democratic responses to be more statistically meaningful.  Since my last post on the polls, Rasmussen has shown very little movement from the +5 to +7 or so for Obama that it’s been showing for over a month.  Full Story »

Vice-presidential candidate Senator Joe Biden (D-Delaware) ran into a buzzsaw of an interview from Barbara West of WFTV-TV, Channel 9, in Orlando, Fla on October 23.  West is the wife of Wade West, a GOP political and media consultant, and her bias was evident as she made more than one statement of opinion, as though it were fact, then proceeded to ask a question related to that opinion/faux fact.  The exchange making the rounds most often in the blogosphere is this one:

West:  “You may recognize this famous quote:  ‘From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.’  That’s from Karl Marx.  How is Senator Obama not being a Marxist if he intends to spread the wealth around.”

Biden:  “Are you joking?  Is … is this a joke?”

West:  “No.”

Biden:  “Is that a real question?”

West:  “That’s a real question.” Full Story »

Yesterday, an idiot father and and even more brain-dead “instructor” allowed an eight-year-old boy to fire a fully automatic Uzi submachine gun at an event billed as, “all legal and and fun! — No permits or licenses required!!!” Naturally, the gun kicked up, as it is designed to do, flipping toward the child who managed to shoot himself in the head with it.  Since kids’ heads aren’t all that heavily armored, we now have a little boy who will never see his ninth birthday.

So, little Christopher Bizilj is dead, dead, dead.  His father, Dr. Charles Bizilj, director of emergency medicine (if you can believe it) at a hospital in Stafford Springs, Connecticut, got to watch his son bleed out from a head wound on the floor.  And the people who put this little event together have to look at themselves in their mirrors and ask themselves the simple question, “What the FUCK made me think it was a good idea to put a submachine gun in a child’s hands?” Full Story »

Men who commanded other men in the age of close-order battle often wrote of the tell-tale signs of a rout. It seems that, in watching the battle from afar, one could often see a line of men waver as if wind were blowing through wheat, and when that happened, absent a rally or reinforcement, it was usually just a short while before those men would break and run.  A battlefield commander would have to make a determination when he saw the waver:  Should he send reserves to that part of the battlefield, reinforcing the weakness and hoping for a victory on another part of the field, or should he withdraw, using the reserves to cover the retreat in good order, keeping as much of his army intact as possible to fight another day? Full Story »

As usual, I checked out the early polls this morning, spilled hot tea all over myself, and have spent the rest of the day trying to figure out what the @#$% is going on.  As the day has gone on, the polls have only gotten squirrellier.

First, the overall picture is that Obama has gained a bit.  The Real Clear Politics average is back up to a 6.9-point lead for Obama after dropping down to nearly four.  That’s the average.  But the spread on the most recent polls is stunning. Full Story »

You can see it in liberals’ eyes and in their white-knuckled grips on their hammers and sickles.  They read the headlines.  The polls are softening for Barack Obama.  Could it happen this year, too?  Will the Democrats once again snatch defeat from the jaws of victory?

In a word, “no.”  And here’s why.

The polls

There may have been a very slight movement of the national polls towards McCain, but it’s hard to be sure.   Some of the most widely reported polls in Obama’s favor were outliers to begin with and never should have been given much credence.  The high-quality polls — those that have tended to do a good job of predicting final results in the past — have been fairly steady for weeks.  Real Clear Politics is still reporting a +6.8 lead for Obama nationally; not that it matters much. Full Story »

I feel really bad for Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher, aka “Joe the Plumber.” Here is a guy, minding his own business, playing football on his front lawn with his 13-year-old son, when he looks up and sees a candidate for president walking down his street.  This particular candidate is tall, well-spoken, extraordinarily well-educated, accomplished, and black.  Joe is a Republican, so he figures he’ll confront a Democrat he doesn’t much care for.  He goes over to him and … well … embellishes a little bit, as we are all wont to do on occasion.

He tells the candidate he’s trying to buy a business that brings in more than $250,000 a year, and that would mean he would have to pay more taxes, wouldn’t it?  The candidate probably should have probed Joe a bit about whether he meant that the business charged a total of $250,000 or whether that was the profit, but he probably figured that Joe was a businessman and didn’t want to insult his intelligence.  So, the candidate from Chicago told him it would, but that tax savings for those earning less than he does would benefit others who could then afford his services more easily, meaning he could make more money from getting them as customers in a Keynesian “spreading the wealth around.” Full Story »

Today’s polls, so far, show McCain tangibly making up ground nationally.  While methodology has given us very wide spreads on polls to date, the average has been around five to eight points in Obama’s favor for the past two-to-three weeks.  Real Clear Politics, which gathers polls and smooths them over time, has dropped Obama’s lead from just over 7 points yesterday to 6.8 points, today.  There are some oddities in the new poll numbers, however (all of which reflect opinion prior to last night’s debate).  Zogby and GWU/Battleground, both of which have tended to lean towards McCain, are actually showing increases in Obama’s lead to six points.  Gallup, which has generally been leaning towards Obama, has closed from a high of 11 points a few days ago to six points today, or only two if you accept their “traditional” likely voter model.  Rasmussen, on the other hand, which has been very steady, has reduced Obama’s lead to four points, 50% to 46%. Full Story »

Dear Joe the Plumber,

Welcome to your 15 minutes of fame. It’s not everyone who gets his name mentioned 286 times in a presidential debate.  If you haven’t already, you simply must change your business’s name to Joe the Plumber.  That’s just good marketing.  Oh, and don’t forget to add the tag line, “As seen on TV!”

OK, Joe, so you had a conversation with Barack Obama and, while media reports are very sketchy about exactly what your circumstances are (not surprising), it appears you want to buy a business that “brings in” more than $250,000.  I have yet to find out if “brings in” means $250,000 in revenue or profit (a very important distinction, Joe), but let’s assume for a moment that it’s profit we’re talking about.  Under Barack Obama’s plan (as sketchy as it is on his website), a good guess would be that you would go into a higher tax bracket, paying about 3.6% more in taxes on every dollar you earn over $250,000, for a total marginal tax rate of 39.6% — exactly the same as it was in the 1990s.

But let’s take a closer look at your situation, shall we Joe? Full Story »

The polls and the debate

Today’s morning polls are out, including the Gallup daily tracking poll.  Overall, it appears that the race may be tightening a bit.  As expected, initial reaction to negative campaigning usually works against the attacker, but continued attacks tend to soften support for the victim.  Negative advertising works and both campaigns know it.  The issue is timing.  McCain may have waited too late, after most people had committed, to launch his attacks.  But maybe not.  Obama has a funny name and he’s black.  It’s possible that white people, who make up the majority of voters, will be more likely to turn on him than they would on a white candidate.

We shall see. Full Story »

Today’s polls are beginning to show Obama pulling away in what were once toss-up states.  SurveyUSA, which fivethirtyeight.com rates as a high-quality poll, puts Obama up five points in Ohio and 15 points in Pennsylvania.  Quinnipac/Wall Street Journal/Washington Post, a better-than-average poll, puts Obama up by 16 in Michigan, nine in Colorado, 11 in Minnesota, and 17 in Wisconsin.  An average survey, Public Policy Polling, gives Obama a three-point lead in North Carolina.  Assuming these numbers are close to being correct, and given past Democratic/Republican voting patterns, it’s probably safe to say that Pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin are out of reach for McCain, and Colorado is a very long shot.  Though there are no recent polls, I would also put Washington out of reach based on past voting patterns.

Ohio is still very winnable. Full Story »

I sometimes post opinions that I know will get my head taken off.  This is one of them.

The media is wrong about AIG.  The $400,000-plus retreat that has everyone so outraged was not for failed executives, but for top-producing salespeople.  Events like this one are common across the US for top salespeople, and there’s a very good reason for it.

I’ve been around way too many salespeople in my life.  They aren’t the most likable bunch unless your idea of a good time is hanging out with greasy gladhanders wearing outsized jewelry who’d sell their children into slavery for a $1.95 order of paper clips.  But I don’t have to like them to understand that they are necessary to keep the money coming in, the economy humming, and the rest of us employed. Full Story »

Republican Representative Candice Miller of Michigan has a truly marvelous idea for getting the economy back on track:  lie through your teeth.  I suppose this shouldn’t be surprising, since it seems to be the first option for Republican politicians everywhere.

So, let me explain what she wants to do.  Currently, accounting rules require banks to value assets (like mortgage-backed loans) at their current market value.  Miller wants to allow banks to … well … value them differently … somehow.  I mean, it’s not what you can actually sell those assets for, it’s what you can … ahm … pretend you can sell them for!  If you can pretend those assets are worth more than they are,  you can make the bank look as though it’s more solvent than it is.  Then, if the other lenders are butt stupid, they’ll lend money to you based on what you say about your bank’s solvency instead of what the situation really is.

What a great idea!  Let’s convince lenders to lend money based on underlying value that isn’t there.

Oh, hey, haven’t we done that already????

I am in my 50s.  In my lifetime, I have seen partisan politics become increasingly bitter, increasingly childish, and increasingly focused on personal, political wins at America’s expense.  When the chairman of the Federal Reserve and Warren Buffet tell me that the American financial system needs an influx of capital in order to keep from collapsing, I tend to believe they believe it, and if they believe it, given their level of expertise, I would generally take their advice.

Today, American politics passed a threshold.  If anyone thought that our politicians, especially in the GOP, still care more about America than their own re-election campaigns; if anyone thought they still had a core of political courage that could, in extremis, overcome their own, petty rivalries; if anyone thought there was still a kernel of greatness in an American political landscape that produced the likes of Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and Abraham Lincoln, I doubt they still believe today.  Their OWN PRESIDENT, their PARTY LEADER, came to the House Republicans and told them that this is a grave crisis, and even then they scuttled the agreement. Full Story »

Yesterday, Senator John McCain announced that he was suspending his campaign to return to Washington to provide leadership in the effort to save the American economy from what George W. Bush says will be a “long and painful recession.”  By yesterday afternoon, Senate leadership had announced that they were very close to a bipartisan agreement on the Bush Administration’s plan to buy up bad debt, thereby freeing capital markets to continue to provide crucial lending to businesses and consumers; lending that many call “the life’s blood of the economy.”

Senator McCain, Senator Obama, President Bush, and congressional leaders met yesterday afternoon with the congressional leaders thinking they were near a deal.  By the end of the meeting, there was no deal, participants were visibly upset, and an attempt by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to convene an evening meeting failed, as the House minority leadership refused to send a negotiator. Full Story »

Political polls give us joy or despair.  Rabid sports fans understand this.  They often subject themselves to emotional roller coaster rides, watching games where the score is too close even for desperate toilet breaks.  For those of us following this year’s presidential election closely, each morning can bring good or bad news as the latest national polls are posted.

In the fever sweats over which candidate has posted a 2% lead across the nation today, it’s all too easy to forget that presidential elections are won in the Electoral College.  Candidates must win states.  They can win most states by a single vote (theoretically) and take all its electoral votes.  They can lose the popular election count and win the White House, as George W. Bush did in 2000.  What really counts is how the polls add up to enough electoral votes to win.

So, today, I take a close look at what Obama and McCain must do to win sufficient electoral votes (270) to take the White House, some of the scenarios that can get them there, the odds, likely campaign strategies going forward, and who is really in the lead. Full Story »

John McCain’s campaign advisers have made a potentially election-changing, tactical error.

They’ve started lying.

Lying in campaigns isn’t new, of course. The GOP has made big lies central to their campaigns since Nixon and Harry Dent, refining the technique with Reagan and his campaign manager, Lee Atwater, and have since kicked it up 20 or so notches in the Rove era. Most of us know about Rove, but he learned at Atwater’s knee, and it’s Atwater who accused Kitty Dukakis of burning an American flag and Dukakis, himself, of being treated for mental illness.

Generally, campaign lying works. The GOP knows that. The Democrats know it, too, and they’ve done some lying of their own. Unfortunately for them, they’re just not as good at it as the Republicans, so their lies tend to be smaller and less prolific, aimed at a constituency that is very different from the GOP one. In other words, lying doesn’t work as well for them. Full Story »