Primaries

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I'm not aware in what areas - outside the military or other security issues - he's promising to spend so much money. Care to elaborate?

 

Huckabee certainly did better than expected, but I remain unconvinced that he's going to do well nationally. The states that he won were Bible Belt states, and until he shows he can start capturing a larger segment of non-evangelical republicans, I don't see his campaign gaining much steam. The wins he had in Georgia, West Virginia, Alabama, Tennessee and Arkansas will certainly keep him in the campain - if he didn't get a few wins yesterday I believe he would have dropped out today - but what yesterday really showed is that McCain is going to be the Republican nominee. It looks now like it is no longer a question of "if", but "when" McCain secures the nomination.

With the Democrats, we don't really know much more now than we did before yesterday's primaries. I don't think there were any really big surprises. Hillary still holds a delegate lead when you count super delegates, although I believe her lead is a little smaller than what it was going into yesterday. But both Democrat campaigns are very much alive.

 

NOG was correct - Huckabee did do better than expected. Instead of losing a very distant third, now he'll just lose a rather distant third. I don't mean that as a dig, it's just a fact. Romney will hang on for a little while longer, but with over half the total delegates McCain is the nominee now, I have no doubt. The only way Romney can win at this point is if Huckabee GIVES him his delegates, and that's unlikely. The good news for Huckabee supporters is that if all the behind-the-scenes-deal chatter is correct, McCain will take Huckabee as is running mate. I don't know how much that will help McCain come November (I'm betting not much, since nutter James Dobson pretty much came out and called him the anti-christ yesterday) - but as of now it's the most likely scenario.

 

He's the worst kind of taxer, Montresor - the one who will leave the next generation with all the debt. The older generation certainly has taken care of itself, (just as GWB has taken care of all his rich cronies), while leaving the next one with a huge mess to clean-up and pay for. It's an entirely despicable matter that the "GWB generation" has sold out all its values for almost no good reason. Someone will have to pay the piper for all the incompetence and carelessness of these people. Young people need to start picking up the political fight and defending their interests against what the Bush regime has done to them.

I think the Dems are up to the challenge. Both Obama and Clinton are more than intelligent and competent enough. I agree that it will take more than just competence to recover from the war mongering, Bush, spendo-maniacs, but I believe that Obama and Clinton have strong appeal to younger people, for it will take the goodwill of the American people to put things back together again, especially the young people who will have to shoulder a lot of the burden. Especially Obama - it seems he is giving people a sense of renewal and purpose as well as the spriritual energy to restore order to a system that has completely run amuck.

The first order of business will be to end the war and cut-off all the government welfare that has been going to the war proifteering coporations, as Ilmater points out. They have been like huge parasites on the country and its resources. But that will still leave the trashed economy that Bush is leaving behind, which will be much harder to repair.

Of course, there is always the chance that McCain will win the general election, now that he has just about locked-up the Republican side of the race. In that case the endless war will still go on, but hopefully McCain will demand better accountability than what's been going on now. I get a sense that the big money Republicans are afraid of McCain. They have done a lot to keep him from the presidency, so McCain may have a few axes to grind with those who have been trashing him since 2000, if he does manage to win the election.

Just countdown the days to January 20th, 2009. It appears, at the least, that better days are coming.

 

I know, Montresor. I hope I did not come across too harshly.

 

I find it very telling about Romney's chances that McCain's supporters at the West Virginia caucuses were willing to flip to Huckabee, just to prevent Romney from getting the win. However, if deals like that are going to result in Huckabee becoming McCain's running mate, I'm definitely voting Democrat in November - no matter which one takes the primaries!

 

I've heard the chatter of McCain/Huckabee as well -- but I think a McCain/Guilanni ticket is much more likely.

 

Well, there's NBC, ABC, CNN (well, maybe CNN's just more money-grubbing than actually leftist). Fox is the closest we have to moderate, and they're really just a mix of extremists. You all may not notice it so much because so many of you are rather left wing, but a conservative like myself notices it a lot more.

Do you all remember the Florida Election controversy in '04? How many of you heard of the democratic election officials that had voting machines in their vans and were churning out votes by themselves? They were big in the local news down there (cities and counties, I don't think many even reached state level) and they ended up going to jail over it, but I'll bet you never heard a peep unless you lived there.

 

NOG, don't make me laugh. The "liberal media" is a myth perpetuated by your heroes James Dobson, Rush Limbaugh and their ilk. Survey after survey has shown that while reporters lean to the left on social issues, where fiscal policy is concerned, they lean to the right just like most other people who make more than 70K per year. More often than not, the press votes republican. You are also forgetting about who determines what stories their reporters are allowed to cover (and how they cover it). The media is only as liberal as their conservative owners allow, after all.

 

Hukabee's critics on his tax record

I'm not a big fan of USA Today, nor of taking information from NGOs, but it's basically reiterating what I've read in my state newspaper and the New York Times. He's more of a throw back to the Dixiecrats, minus the blatant racism.

 

Sigh. That's pretty much what I thought you'd say, though I was hoping otherwise.

ABC, who is owned by Disney, produced that ridiculous 911 movie and broadcasts Sean Hannity's radio program. Hardly leftist. Ditto for CNN, who gave Glenn Beck of all people a daily prime time show. Fox News wouldn't know moderation of it was sitting on their face, and even THEY now admit that they're laughably biased. CBS and MSNBC I'd probably give you, and I've heard strong arguments that the Associated Press is overly leftward - but you chose not to mention them, strangely enough. You notice what you choose to notice, I guess. And that you think Fox is even remotely moderate disqualifies you as serious. A balance of extremists? Moderate libs Alan Colmes and Kirsten Powers - even if they packed on a kilaton each - wouldn't even balance out that douchebag John Gibson, let alone Hannity, O'Reilly or rest of their extremely conservative lineup. I won't even get into the accuracy of their reporting (or lack thereof), which is well documented. The only explanation I can figure here is that you get your news exclusively from Fox and talk radio - who obviously have a vested interest in getting people to believe there's a liberal media bias - because there's really no way that a rational observer would reach such unfounded conclusions on their own.

I really want you to think about this: If the mainstream media were leftist, they'd be busting Bush's balls 24/7, over waterboarding, the enormous deficit, no WMDs, all his signing statements which piss all over the constitution, etc. Wouldn't they? They've given him a free pass these past 7 years. And anytime he's asked so much as a follow-up question to one of his dumbass statements, the reporter who asked it is demonized as an unhinged Move-On operative by the very people who've been telling you to be wary of the evil liberal media. In the last 10 years from the Lewinsky scandal to now, who's honestly been the beneficiary of the media's biases? It sure as hell hasn't been the left.

Lest you accuse me of drinking the kool-aid: I am politically moderate (socially liberal, fiscally conservative). I listen to NPR in the morning (unbiased), Rush Limbaugh during my lunch hour (right), varied blogs and news sources throughout the day (both), and cable news shows when I'm at the gym, including Fox (both). I get a little of everything, deliberately. I can tell who's actually biased an who isn't, because I'm actually paying attention. It's really not hard to figure out who leans where.

The least you could do is say "Fox caters to conservatives, I am one, they tell me what I want to hear and don't challenge my beliefs, and I'm ok with that." At least that's honesty I could respect. Either that or you really just don't know. As it is it's really difficult to take you seriously.

EDIT: Just realized how off topic this is, so - I think I've said all I need to.

 

Tell us how you really feel DR... don't hold anything back now....

I'd say ABC and CNN are just to the left of moderate. Fox firmly on the right. NBC and CBS certainly support the democrats. Although CBS not so much as they used to be now that Dan Rather is semi-retired (and yes, he did get the first Bush elected on a blatantly stupid bit of interviewing).

I tend to rely more on CNN than any other stations. I think they give a more neutral assessment.

Not all of us conservatives fall into the catagory: "Fox is biased to conservatives, and I am one, they tell me what I want to hear and don't challenge my beliefs, and I'm ok with that."

 

Heh, yeah. Sorry if that was a bit off-sides, but this just happens to be one of my pet peeves. The more the "liberal media" nonsense gets floated around the more it seems to stick, and some begin to accept it as a common truth (see NOG's post) and then people start shutting their brains off to things they don't want to hear when it comes from "teh librulz." Kills me, because it's incredibly easy to debunk. And I know not all conservatives subscribe to the idea, which I appreciate. But most do.

Anyway, I'm starting a new thread on this so we can keep this focused on the primaries...

 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22419475

According to MSNBC - when you look at just the delegates earned and don't count the super delegates, Obama actually has a slim lead - 838 vs 834. Hillary has about 100 super delegates more than Obama, so if you want to count them, then Hillary is ahead.

 

So does MSNBC -

Romney's out

 

I was reading about the superdelegates -- the whole thing is rather confusing to me. It appears the Democratic Convention can choose to ignore the superdelegates (not count their votes) or the superdelegates can change their votes at any time. It is unlikely those superdelegates will shift support from the Clintons, but it is possible.

The superdelegates consist of the democratic members of congress, democratic governors, and members of the democratic national committee. Also former chairs of the democratic national committee, former democratic presidents and vice presidents, former leaders of congress (minority, majority, speakers, etc.) ... am I missing any?

As far as Romney: Is he supporting McCain or Huckabee? The race is over if he throws his support to McCain. I've felt that either Romney or Huckabee had a chance to beat McCain, but not when they are dividing the conservative votes. There is a chance for Huckabee if Romney throws support his way.

I wonder if Romney is going to be taking a major position in the Mormon church....

 

Nah, Huckabee is behind Romney. Romney basically said in his speech that he's suspending his campaign because he thinks it's even more important for the party to stick with their guy and defeat the evil liberals, so it's basically 'go support McCain'.