In two minutes, courtesy of Slate:
Friday, November 14, 2008
Vote for Facebook
Much has been made of the fact that the Obama campaign had a kick-ass web presence, as well as possibly the best marketing strategy in the history of political campaigns. But check this out:
A student at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire ran for Country Treasurer and rode the Obama wave to victory using $50 in Facebook ads targeting students at Dartmouth and nearby Plymouth State University. She won by just 586 votes.Incredible! The girl who won is 20 years old and beat an opponent 48 years her senior. Read more of this story here.
They Met
Obama and Hillary did indeed meet yesterday in Chicago to talk about a role in his administration:
Hillary being named to the Cabinet, though, would be the topic du jour of several news cycles, and would certainly satisfy the media's craving for something new.
I'll tell ya one thing: it would probably push that bespectacled governor from Alaska out of the spotlight for a little while.
The meeting took place at Obama's transition offices in the mid-afternoon.Interesting. Keep in mind that the Obama transition has already told us not to expect any Cabinet appointments before Thanksgiving. I for one was disappointed by that, as I guess I'm just so desperate for news tidbits and information now that the campaign is over.
It did not appear on the schedule that's distributed to Clinton staff and handlers.
One knowledgeable source said that the meeting was "not an interview." The source would not elaborate.
Hillary being named to the Cabinet, though, would be the topic du jour of several news cycles, and would certainly satisfy the media's craving for something new.
I'll tell ya one thing: it would probably push that bespectacled governor from Alaska out of the spotlight for a little while.
Scenes From "The West Wing"
"You got a best friend?"
"Yes sir."
"Is he smarter than you?"
"Yes sir."
"Would you trust him with your life?"
"Yes sir."
"That's your Chief of Staff."
After all these years, and countless viewings, that exchange still brings tears to my eyes. God, I love this show.
"Yes sir."
"Is he smarter than you?"
"Yes sir."
"Would you trust him with your life?"
"Yes sir."
"That's your Chief of Staff."
After all these years, and countless viewings, that exchange still brings tears to my eyes. God, I love this show.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Gold Star Winner: November 13, 2008
Newt Gingrich (R-GA)Former Speaker of the House
Here's the former Congressman in an interview with Politico:
"The Republican Party right now is like a mid-size college team trying to play in the Super Bowl. It is pretty hard to say our losses were because of John McCain’s campaign. McCain performed way above plausibility compared to where the Republican president was in the polls. We have to look honestly at what went wrong.”
He may not have a perfect record (far from it), but Newt scores a touchdown with that political analysis. Way to go, Mr. Gingrich, and congratulations.
Man, we've got a little Republican Gold Star streak going on here at The 'Festo, don't we?
Don't Buy Those Hillary Exit Polls
There are some exit polls circulating that show that if Hillary Clinton had been the Democratic presidential nominee, she would have (gasp!) beaten John McCain by even more than Barack Obama did!
My advice? Don't buy it. Nate Silver, who is WAY smarter than I or anyone else could hope to be when it comes to these matters, has this to say:
Furthermore, I think that the contrast between Obama and McCain was one that worked heavily in the Democrats' favor. Obama, with his name, background and relative greenness to Washington, was a convincing agent of change and had great appeal to independents. He was the first Democrat to win independents in a generation.
Even if she had been the nominee, and even if she had won anyway, I would bet you a lot of money that there is no way in hell that Hillary Clinton would have won independents, and certainly not any significant number of Republicans. Hillary Clinton is very popular with two groups of people: women and Democrats, who are, by and large, one and the same (meaning the majority of women are Democrats, and the majority of Democrats are women).
Could Hillary have won? Probably, though no one can say for sure. Is it a certainty that she would have beaten McCain by more than Obama did? Not at all, and I dare say it's more likely that the election would have been a squeaker.
My advice? Don't buy it. Nate Silver, who is WAY smarter than I or anyone else could hope to be when it comes to these matters, has this to say:
If America had woken up last Tuesday morning and magically found Hillary Clinton's name on the ballot in lieu of Barack Obama, might she have won by 11 points? Perhaps. She certainly proved herself to be an exceptionally compelling candidate, even if her execution and staffing decisions were sometimes wanting.These kinds of hypotheticals are ridiculous, and should not be taken seriously. Later on in his post (which I would have included here but didn't for the sake of space), Silver also mentions the most obvious thing that would have been different had Hillary been the nominee: there would have been no Sarah Palin. It is almost unfathomable that John McCain would have picked Palin as his running mate had the Democratic ticket been headed by another woman who also happened to be much smarter and much more qualified to run for national office.
But what would Clinton's numbers have looked like if she had actually endured ... you know ... a campaign?
Would she have handled the financial crisis with as much aplomb as Obama did? Probably. Would she have been so capable and reassuring in the debates? Almost certainly. Would she have had an easier time resonating with working class voters in places like Missouri and West Virginia? Yes.
But would she have managed the media as deftly as Obama did? Perhaps not. Would Republican attacks on Bill Clinton and Kazakhstan been as counterproductive to their cause as their effort to link Barack Obama and Bill Ayers? Maybe -- or maybe not. Would she have matched Obama's field organization and raised as much money? Doubtful.
Would her campaign have had the same steely confidence as Obama's did after the Republican convention bounce? Unlikely. Would she have delivered as strong a speech as Mr. Obama did in Denver? Iffy. Would she have catalyzed near-universal turnout in the black community? No.
Furthermore, I think that the contrast between Obama and McCain was one that worked heavily in the Democrats' favor. Obama, with his name, background and relative greenness to Washington, was a convincing agent of change and had great appeal to independents. He was the first Democrat to win independents in a generation.
Even if she had been the nominee, and even if she had won anyway, I would bet you a lot of money that there is no way in hell that Hillary Clinton would have won independents, and certainly not any significant number of Republicans. Hillary Clinton is very popular with two groups of people: women and Democrats, who are, by and large, one and the same (meaning the majority of women are Democrats, and the majority of Democrats are women).
Could Hillary have won? Probably, though no one can say for sure. Is it a certainty that she would have beaten McCain by more than Obama did? Not at all, and I dare say it's more likely that the election would have been a squeaker.
Flop of the Year Alert
I've been saying for weeks, and will say again here, that I have the distinct feeling that Baz Luhrmann's epic Australia is going to be a massive flop. And now, just a few days before its premiere in... Australia... the film isn't even finished yet:
Luhrmann renewed the debate over exactly how unfinished the film is on the LAT's The Envelope blog, revealing that at the end of the "emotional cinematic banquet" there will be a death of some kind, even if he's not quite sure yet who buys it. Meanwhile, Fox co-chairman Tom Rothman tried to dismiss the controversy over the $130 million dollar film's "six endings." This barely counts as optimism when it comes to the film's still-ongoing editing process. Since they are shutting down a street in Sydney for the premiere, should the local authorities prepare for a riot or can Luhrmann deliver in time?Seriously, though: apart from Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge, when is the last time Nicole Kidman was in a hit movie? To Die For?
Why Sarah Palin Still Haunts Them, Too
The aforementioned Andrew Sullivan:
Let's be real in a way the national media seems incapable of: this person should never have been placed on a national ticket in a mature democracy. She was incapable of running a town in Alaska competently. The impulsive, unvetted selection of a total unknown, with no knowledge of or interest in the wider world, as a replacement president remains one of the most disturbing events in modern American history. That the press felt required to maintain a facade of normalcy for two months - and not to declare the whole thing a farce from start to finish - is a sign of their total loss of nerve. That the Palin absurdity should follow the two-term presidency of another individual utterly out of his depth in national government is particularly troubling. 46 percent of Americans voted for the possibility of this blank slate as president because she somehow echoed their own sense of religious or cultural "identity". Until we figure out how this happened, we will not be able to prevent it from happening again. And we have to find a way to prevent this from recurring.And from later in his post:
Her candidacy, in short, was indefensible. It remains indefensible. Until the mainstream media, the GOP establishment, and the conservative intelligentsia acknowledge the depth of their error, this blog will keep demanding basic accountability.And here's Kevin Drum's take:
Despite all the grief she's gotten, I continue to think that the selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate represents the breaking of a consensual cultural barrier far more fundamental than most people realize. It's not just that she was inexperienced (Spiro Agnew and John Edwards weren't much more experienced than Palin when they ran for VP) but that she was — obviously, transparently, completely — uninterested in and uninformed about national policy at nearly every level. We've simply never seen someone so completely unmoored from the normal requirements of national office before. She was chosen purely at the level of celebrity, and an awful lot of people seemed to be just fine with that.
Why Sarah Palin Still Haunts Me... And Why She Should Still Haunt You Too
And, honestly, I don't think we should let her simply disappear for a couple years. We can't. And I'll tell you why.
Yeah, it's great that McCain/Palin lost last week. In fact, "great" doesn't begin to explain the magnitude of the gigantic bullet that this country dodged by not electing the Republican ticket. John McCain returns now to the Senate, where he'll probably make some amends and retire when his term expires in two years. But Sarah Palin, as is evident by her round-the-clock media bonanza the past few days, isn't going anywhere. And that scares me.
Sarah Palin is someone that must never be allowed to come anywhere near the White House. She is a fanatical, fundamentalist kook lacking not only in ideas, but in intellect. Yes, I said it: the woman is against thinking. She carries a disdain for, well, smart people that is painfully obvious, and totally unfit for a potential PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
John McCain lost this presidential election, thank God. And we will not have to suffer through another four or eight years of a George W. Bush-like presidency. But the real damage McCain did was that, in choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate, he turned her into a national figure. Over 56 million people voted for her to be their next vice president. A recent Rasmussen poll showed that GOP voters liked Palin more than McCain. Rasmussen also found that 64% (!) of Republicans want her to be their party's presidential nominee (!!) in 2012.
So, you see, therein lies the problem.
Let's say she runs in 2012. In fact, barring some kind of unforeseen event (like she loses her 2010 re-election bid for Alaska governor), Palin will indeed run for president in four years. She will have legions of devoted supporters right off the bat. And she will indeed begin the race as the prohibitive favorite to win the Republican nomination. Okay, fine. Those are just Republicans, you might say. Well, yes - but there's more.
The main reason Sarah Palin was dumped by independents and some Republicans is not because they saw her as the braindead farce that I - along with many others - saw her as, it's because she was seen as "not ready." That's all it was. "Not ready." Not "you're a crazy, scary bitch and you will never be competent enough to even go on a White House TOUR." No, just "not ready" - meaning that, with three or four years of "executive experience", along with some clever political posturing to engage her in issues that actually matter, come 2012 a great deal of people are more likely to see her as "ready" to do the job.
And that's my fear. My fear is that, by virtue of the fact that she'll have four more years doing... whatever it is that she does up in Alaska under her belt, she'll have a far easier time convincing enough of the American electorate that her biggest weakness this time around - her readiness to serve as president - is no longer a weakness. In fact, she may even be able to turn it into a strength. No joke.
This is why I will not stop talking about her. This is why Andrew Sullivan and Kevin Drum and others will not stop talking about her either. She is too dangerous, too fundamentalist, too stupid, quite frankly, to ever - ever - be on a national ticket again - not in four years, not in eight years, not in 20 years.
Never. Again. Not if I have anything to say about it, at least.
Yeah, it's great that McCain/Palin lost last week. In fact, "great" doesn't begin to explain the magnitude of the gigantic bullet that this country dodged by not electing the Republican ticket. John McCain returns now to the Senate, where he'll probably make some amends and retire when his term expires in two years. But Sarah Palin, as is evident by her round-the-clock media bonanza the past few days, isn't going anywhere. And that scares me.
Sarah Palin is someone that must never be allowed to come anywhere near the White House. She is a fanatical, fundamentalist kook lacking not only in ideas, but in intellect. Yes, I said it: the woman is against thinking. She carries a disdain for, well, smart people that is painfully obvious, and totally unfit for a potential PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
John McCain lost this presidential election, thank God. And we will not have to suffer through another four or eight years of a George W. Bush-like presidency. But the real damage McCain did was that, in choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate, he turned her into a national figure. Over 56 million people voted for her to be their next vice president. A recent Rasmussen poll showed that GOP voters liked Palin more than McCain. Rasmussen also found that 64% (!) of Republicans want her to be their party's presidential nominee (!!) in 2012.
So, you see, therein lies the problem.
Let's say she runs in 2012. In fact, barring some kind of unforeseen event (like she loses her 2010 re-election bid for Alaska governor), Palin will indeed run for president in four years. She will have legions of devoted supporters right off the bat. And she will indeed begin the race as the prohibitive favorite to win the Republican nomination. Okay, fine. Those are just Republicans, you might say. Well, yes - but there's more.
The main reason Sarah Palin was dumped by independents and some Republicans is not because they saw her as the braindead farce that I - along with many others - saw her as, it's because she was seen as "not ready." That's all it was. "Not ready." Not "you're a crazy, scary bitch and you will never be competent enough to even go on a White House TOUR." No, just "not ready" - meaning that, with three or four years of "executive experience", along with some clever political posturing to engage her in issues that actually matter, come 2012 a great deal of people are more likely to see her as "ready" to do the job.
And that's my fear. My fear is that, by virtue of the fact that she'll have four more years doing... whatever it is that she does up in Alaska under her belt, she'll have a far easier time convincing enough of the American electorate that her biggest weakness this time around - her readiness to serve as president - is no longer a weakness. In fact, she may even be able to turn it into a strength. No joke.
This is why I will not stop talking about her. This is why Andrew Sullivan and Kevin Drum and others will not stop talking about her either. She is too dangerous, too fundamentalist, too stupid, quite frankly, to ever - ever - be on a national ticket again - not in four years, not in eight years, not in 20 years.
Never. Again. Not if I have anything to say about it, at least.
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