Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Disenfranchisement in LA County.
This is not good for democracy. Please click, read and sign the petition to get all votes counted. And I'm talking to all three of my readers. Don't shirk.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Juggernaut?
If I weren't such a skeptic at heart, I'd say that Obama is now as unstoppable as Gen. William T. Sherman's march to primo beach-front property in Savannah, GA. But despite the rah-rah tone of this blog lately, I am a skeptic at heart; never more so than when my team is up 17 with a buck-thirty left to go in the fourth quarter. Next metaphor, please.
So he swept all the weekend contests by surprising margins. So he's getting his message across more and more effectively. So HRC's campaign seems to be going through some pain, both in money and leadership. So people are beginning to understand that Obama is not only style, but substance. So what? Napoleon's Achilles heel: Waterloo. Obama's might be working-class folks of Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Might.
Tomorrow's contests in D. C., Virginia and Maryland all favor Obama. No one expects an upset by HRC here despite her heavy campaigning in Virginia. And judging by the comparative joy of their supporters and the Jackson-Jefferson event the other night, HRC is certainly in big trouble in the short-term. I guess the real question is whether or not she can regain any momentum before those big March contests.
Most of the punditocracy and the number crunchers think that HRC is going to have a hard time overcoming the BHO-mentum, but as they say: that's why they play the games. [What is with me and these crappy metaphors, BTW? It's like I've been taken over by a pre-adolescent Dennis Miller or something.]
I think that time heals all wounds so to speak, and time has been Obama's friend. The more time passes, the more people get to know him, the more they see him as a viable alternative to HRC, 'the name they know'. It helps that his policies are logical and well-founded and pragmatic. My generation, at least, finds pragmatism very appealing - especially in the face of political gridlock.
Let's bring on a few more crushing defeats, if we can though. That's what a juggernaut would do...
(PS - Yes, we can.)
So he swept all the weekend contests by surprising margins. So he's getting his message across more and more effectively. So HRC's campaign seems to be going through some pain, both in money and leadership. So people are beginning to understand that Obama is not only style, but substance. So what? Napoleon's Achilles heel: Waterloo. Obama's might be working-class folks of Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Might.
Tomorrow's contests in D. C., Virginia and Maryland all favor Obama. No one expects an upset by HRC here despite her heavy campaigning in Virginia. And judging by the comparative joy of their supporters and the Jackson-Jefferson event the other night, HRC is certainly in big trouble in the short-term. I guess the real question is whether or not she can regain any momentum before those big March contests.
Most of the punditocracy and the number crunchers think that HRC is going to have a hard time overcoming the BHO-mentum, but as they say: that's why they play the games. [What is with me and these crappy metaphors, BTW? It's like I've been taken over by a pre-adolescent Dennis Miller or something.]
I think that time heals all wounds so to speak, and time has been Obama's friend. The more time passes, the more people get to know him, the more they see him as a viable alternative to HRC, 'the name they know'. It helps that his policies are logical and well-founded and pragmatic. My generation, at least, finds pragmatism very appealing - especially in the face of political gridlock.
Let's bring on a few more crushing defeats, if we can though. That's what a juggernaut would do...
(PS - Yes, we can.)
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Lunch Links: Rush to the rescue?
Not for McCain. Not for the now-departed Romney. A fundraiser for HRC. What have I been saying? Repubs want HRC. They can beat her.
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
Dirty, dirty money. Only it's clean.
Super Tuesday? Super Hangover. (Everything is relative.)
Oy. Where to start?
The Dem race goes on and after everything, I'm still optimistic. By some counts, Obama is within a few delegates, even including the (disgustingly oligarchical) Super-delegates. Now, for Feb. 12, he'll have to shine as he did in Iowa, S. C. and the other early states. He kicks butt when he gets to introduce himself to the locals over a period. It allows people to see not only his truly inspirational persona, but that he has the substance on issues that many HRC voters seem to think he lacks. (Really - do they think Obama's running for POTUS with no well-thought out plan in mind? They must think he spends his time spinning in circles, laughing and saying “Gee, a substantive plan on policy? [smacks side of head] Why didn't I think of that”? Come on - even Ron Paul has policy answers for everything - crazy and potentially amoral as they might be.)
I learned something about myself as I watched the crazy national returns come in: as fun as it's been to get behind a great candidate and blog about it, I don't have the stomach for this politics stuff long-term. When Dem voters failed to meet my own (admittedly outrageous) expectations for them (i.e., they didn't vote more heavily for Obama), I headed to the kitchen to do the dishes. FYI and FWIW and BTW - I friggin' hate doing dishes. But on the bright side, since the dishes are now done, I'll have more time for video games and other important matters. What was I saying? Oh, yeah. I think over the long hall, I'd rather use this blog to talk about philosophy and scientific philosophy. And of course those pithy anecdotes about life on the Blue Line; like yesterday, when a homeless guy refused food because he said he didn't eat meat. Never again let it be said that beggars can't be choosers. See? That was better than politics, right?
Anyway. This morning, on NPR, they were running some interviews with Dem voters in the hotly contested state of Missouri. The bad logic and willful ignorance on display was breathtaking. This is where I heard a woman - I think she was a scientist or lawyer - voting for HRC because she wanted to see a woman in the White House. This is a terrible reason to vote for a candidate for POTUS. I didn't vote for Barack because he's a black man. I didn't vote for him in spite of his being a black man. I'm voting for him because I believe that he'll be transformative and substantive both here and abroad. I'm not a single-issue voter, but neither do I expect or require him to hit all my buttons. That's not possible (because of infinity, but that's another blog). Another man - union - basically said that HRC was the more experienced candidate. I think he said that that 'old lady' had been around forever and had experience. So did Bush. For me, the experience argument fails to play. McCain is old and has a bunch of experience, but I don't want him to be POTUS. Within reason, it's a bad criteria. Obama has plenty of experience and the mental faculties to delegate properly and inspire his designees to great heights of achievement. Name recognition is a terrible criteria, too.
I get that most people are looking for the easy way out when they vote. That doesn't mean it's not irritating for those of us who put in the time.
Wow. I think I've rambled enough. I'll try and locate my coherency later.
The Dem race goes on and after everything, I'm still optimistic. By some counts, Obama is within a few delegates, even including the (disgustingly oligarchical) Super-delegates. Now, for Feb. 12, he'll have to shine as he did in Iowa, S. C. and the other early states. He kicks butt when he gets to introduce himself to the locals over a period. It allows people to see not only his truly inspirational persona, but that he has the substance on issues that many HRC voters seem to think he lacks. (Really - do they think Obama's running for POTUS with no well-thought out plan in mind? They must think he spends his time spinning in circles, laughing and saying “Gee, a substantive plan on policy? [smacks side of head] Why didn't I think of that”? Come on - even Ron Paul has policy answers for everything - crazy and potentially amoral as they might be.)
I learned something about myself as I watched the crazy national returns come in: as fun as it's been to get behind a great candidate and blog about it, I don't have the stomach for this politics stuff long-term. When Dem voters failed to meet my own (admittedly outrageous) expectations for them (i.e., they didn't vote more heavily for Obama), I headed to the kitchen to do the dishes. FYI and FWIW and BTW - I friggin' hate doing dishes. But on the bright side, since the dishes are now done, I'll have more time for video games and other important matters. What was I saying? Oh, yeah. I think over the long hall, I'd rather use this blog to talk about philosophy and scientific philosophy. And of course those pithy anecdotes about life on the Blue Line; like yesterday, when a homeless guy refused food because he said he didn't eat meat. Never again let it be said that beggars can't be choosers. See? That was better than politics, right?
Anyway. This morning, on NPR, they were running some interviews with Dem voters in the hotly contested state of Missouri. The bad logic and willful ignorance on display was breathtaking. This is where I heard a woman - I think she was a scientist or lawyer - voting for HRC because she wanted to see a woman in the White House. This is a terrible reason to vote for a candidate for POTUS. I didn't vote for Barack because he's a black man. I didn't vote for him in spite of his being a black man. I'm voting for him because I believe that he'll be transformative and substantive both here and abroad. I'm not a single-issue voter, but neither do I expect or require him to hit all my buttons. That's not possible (because of infinity, but that's another blog). Another man - union - basically said that HRC was the more experienced candidate. I think he said that that 'old lady' had been around forever and had experience. So did Bush. For me, the experience argument fails to play. McCain is old and has a bunch of experience, but I don't want him to be POTUS. Within reason, it's a bad criteria. Obama has plenty of experience and the mental faculties to delegate properly and inspire his designees to great heights of achievement. Name recognition is a terrible criteria, too.
I get that most people are looking for the easy way out when they vote. That doesn't mean it's not irritating for those of us who put in the time.
Wow. I think I've rambled enough. I'll try and locate my coherency later.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Whaaaa...?
Now I really don't know what to say. The Hangover is going to take some time to develop. I have to figure out what the hell is going on...
Help... me...
I drank some Airborne, and I'm feeling a lot better now - except that my little brain is getting crushed by all the info that's being vomited into my apartment by my TV.
I ended up choosing CNN. Wolf's way too busy to be annoying. I'm not sure what to say, yet. Early on, things look good for Obama. Where he's losing, he's losing reasonably close. That momentum he had seems to be helping. But I'm betting that we won't really see any surprises tonight...
I ended up choosing CNN. Wolf's way too busy to be annoying. I'm not sure what to say, yet. Early on, things look good for Obama. Where he's losing, he's losing reasonably close. That momentum he had seems to be helping. But I'm betting that we won't really see any surprises tonight...
Stupor Tuesday.
I know a lot of you have written in, wondering if I'm okay. I know I haven't blogged about the primaries recently, but life's been busy. Here we are though: I'm home from work, just voted for Barack (and voted 'No' on a crapload of Ballot Props), I feel like I'm getting a cold and I have one important decision to make - MSNBC or CNN? Chris 'Barack Hussein Obama' Matthews or Wolf 'Silver-Haired Bastard' Blitzer? Not my most important vote of the day...
I'll post on and off tonight. Right after I order a new computer!
I'll post on and off tonight. Right after I order a new computer!
Friday, February 01, 2008
The most important endorsement of all.
One of our generation's greatest authors makes his heart-felt choice.
The Clumping of the Morons: An Informal Study in Non-strategic Thinking.
I type up a lot of stuff on the train. Blogs, essays, the book I'm working on, so I've developed a carefully vetted strategy to get the seats that are conducive to using a laptop. I won't bore you with the details. So you might think that the following might be unfair, but I don't care. The Blue Line tried its best to kill me recently, and naturally, I'm still bitter.
A Blue Line train is comprised of three cars with four evenly-spaced doors apiece. The platforms are pretty long and at most stations, they can only be entered at the ends. This causes an annoying phenomenon I like to call “The Clumping of the Morons.” See for some reason, some people - more than enough of them to make this post necessary - can't be bothered to move to the middle of the platform to get into the comparatively empty middle car. They walk onto the platform, and, apparently worn out from the effort, stand there, unable to proceed to an area of the platform that will enable them to get a seat. They then act surprised when they get on an end car and find that there are no seats. Even controlling for the 2-5 people per stop that run hard to catch the train and are forced to enter the first door they get to, that's a lot of morons that may or may not be lazy as well.
So now there are clumps of people just inside every door of the end cars, slowing everything down because people can't get their asses (a high percentage of which are spectacularly enormous) on and off the train fast enough. Some of the drivers get irritated and remind people that there are in fact 12 total doors on the train and would they mind using them all, pretty please? That just causes the people on the outside to push a bit harder to get in. I'd probably be less irritated if they'd also deign to stop bumping my laptop and reading over my shoulder. Morons.
A Blue Line train is comprised of three cars with four evenly-spaced doors apiece. The platforms are pretty long and at most stations, they can only be entered at the ends. This causes an annoying phenomenon I like to call “The Clumping of the Morons.” See for some reason, some people - more than enough of them to make this post necessary - can't be bothered to move to the middle of the platform to get into the comparatively empty middle car. They walk onto the platform, and, apparently worn out from the effort, stand there, unable to proceed to an area of the platform that will enable them to get a seat. They then act surprised when they get on an end car and find that there are no seats. Even controlling for the 2-5 people per stop that run hard to catch the train and are forced to enter the first door they get to, that's a lot of morons that may or may not be lazy as well.
So now there are clumps of people just inside every door of the end cars, slowing everything down because people can't get their asses (a high percentage of which are spectacularly enormous) on and off the train fast enough. Some of the drivers get irritated and remind people that there are in fact 12 total doors on the train and would they mind using them all, pretty please? That just causes the people on the outside to push a bit harder to get in. I'd probably be less irritated if they'd also deign to stop bumping my laptop and reading over my shoulder. Morons.
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