Day: January 8, 2008

New Hampshire: Clinton Leads at Start

Jon Ponder

At 5:15 p.m., Hillary Clinton has a slight lead over Barack Obama, who was ahead in every poll leading up to today.

5:48 p.m.: MSNBC has Clinton still in the lead by 2,000 votes or so.

5:55 p.m.: With 24 percent reporting, Clinton has 40 percent, Obama 36 percent.

6:16 p.m.: With 37 percent counted: Clinton 39 percent, Obama 36 percent.

6:28 p.m.: The MSNBC panel hated McCain’s performance in his victory speech. I didn’t watch it.

Olbermann says the Democratic race is now 39 percent Clinton, 37 percent Obama.

6:32 p.m.: According to exit polls, Clinton has a double digit (47/34) lead among women.

6:50 p.m.: Clinton 39 percent, Obama 37 percent.

7:20 p.m.: Clinton 39 percent, Obama 36 percent.

7:32 p.m.: Clinton declared winner.

God Scorns Mike Huckabee in New Hampshire

Jon Ponder

Mike Huckabee, the former Baptist preacher and governor of Arkansas, who recently asserted that “the same Power that helped the little boy with two fish and five loaves feed a crowd of 5,000 people” was behind his campaign’s success, has been projected to lose the New Hampshire primary tonight.

At 5:15 p.m., NBC has called the race for Sen. John McCain, with Mitt Romney second and Huckabee a distant third.

5:48 p.m.: Romney’s conceding. Just occurred to me that he has all the worst qualities of John Kerry and Al Gore but none of their virtues.

Now the burning question is, will Chuck Norris be standing behind Huckabee tonight like he did in Iowa. He and his big white teeth, not to mention his trophy wife, completely upstaged Huckabee during his victory speech in Iowa last week.

5:59 p.m.: Huckabee concedes with Chuck Norris nowhere in sight. I guess Norris doesn’t do losers. Not surprisingly, Huckabee does not mention God’s hidden hand and its possible relationship to his loss.

UPDATE: Good news from heaven for Rev. Huckabee this morning – Poll: God Puts Huckabee in Lead in Florida – Also Leads in S.C., Home of Christian Exodus

Quote du Jour

Buck Banks

War, which is simply the subjection of all life and property to one momentary aim, is morally vastly superior to the more violent egoism of the individual; it develops power in the service of a supreme general idea and under a discipline which nevertheless permits supreme heroic virtue to unfold. Indeed, war alone grants to mankind the magnificent spectacle of a general submission to a general aim.

— Jakob Christoph Burckhardt (1818-1897) Swiss historian

Clinton Sniffles, Takes a Drubbing, But Nobody Criticized Bush for Crying

Jon Ponder


Sen. Hillary Clinton did not actually cry in New Hampshire yesterday but she did choke up when a woman in the crowd asked her how she was holding up.

This non-crying moment nonetheless led the news throughout most cycles yesterday. It was even the first item up on Keith Olbermann’s “Countdown,” and was the first bit of news mentioned on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal” yesterday.

Funny though, where was the same attention to a story in September in which macho-man George Bush admitted that he cries all the time and apparently at the drop of a hat?

“I’ve got God’s shoulder to cry on. And I cry a lot,” Mr. Bush says in “Dead Certain: The Presidency of George W. Bush,” which was released to U.S. bookstores [Sept. 3, 2007]. “I do a lot of crying in this job. I’ll bet I’ve shed more tears than you can count, as president. I’ll shed some tomorrow.”

He also confessed to a friend that he once saw ghosts in the White House:

Perhaps the oddest revelation is an episode from 1992, when his father was president. The younger Mr. Bush found the White House a “creepy place,” [John] Draper writes. After exercising in a White House gym one evening, he told a friend he froze in his steps while approaching the Lincoln Bedroom. Mr. Bush insists “he saw ghosts – coming out of the wall,” according to the friend.

H/t: Philosoraptor

After Years of Republican Control, US Standard of Living Sinks Below Britain

Jon Ponder

The Republican Party has been in control of the government since 1994, and now our standard of living has fallen below that of the United Kingdom, where the liberals have been in charge for 11 years:

For the first time in more than 100 years, British living standards have risen above those of Americans, a report has declared.

Increasing incomes, longer holidays and “free” healthcare have all contributed to making Britons better off than our friends across the Atlantic, according to the respected Oxford Economics consultancy.

The feel-rich factor is calculated using the gross domestic product (GDP) per citizen – an indicator of average incomes – which in Britain will be £23,500 this year, compared with £23,250 in America, it predicts.

Even today, the Democrats took nominal control of Congress in 2006 but Republican have used their veto-proof majorities to remain in control.

Bottom line: the conservative movement is a sham and has been a disaster for America.

Campaign Changelings Need to Change the ‘Change’ Message

Buck Banks


Change Management theory for a perfect world

change vt., to put or take (a thing) in place of something else; substitute for, replace with or transfer to another of a similar kind (to change one’s clothes, to change jobs)

Barak Obama started it by saying he had the audacity to do it. Hillary Clinton says she’s been doing it for 30 years already, and John Edwards says he’s the only one who knows the best way to do it to benefit the average Joe. But when Mitt Romney started saying it, you knew it was just over for change. Poor change is now the most over-used and most meaningless word in the campaign for the presidency.

It’s just the word du jour, the phrase o’ the moment, an iota for Iowa, a mantra for Manchester.

The problem with change is, it’s inevitable. Short of a quickie constitutional amendment orchestrated by Karl Rove, the Worst President Ever will leave office next January, leaving a slime trail of abuse, arrogance and excess in his wake. And whether (heaven forfend!) a Republican or (praise Jesus!) a Democrat swears on the Bible to uphold what’s left of the Constitution, there will be some kind of change.

So what do the candidates mean by change? Nothing. It’s just the word du jour, the phrase o’ the moment, an iota for Iowa, a mantra for Manchester. It plays on the campaign trail because the news scribblers and talking heads dutifully repeat it every time it’s said, the crowds clap for it and the candidates can all pronounce it.

But it doesn’t mean anything. Come next January, not much will have changed, except more soldiers will have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, the economy will probably suck even worse than it does now, the housing crisis will be worse still and Britney Spears or her sister still will probably be making headlines.

Fast forward to 2010, and there’s a slim chance that we will be in the process of withdrawing our troops from Iraq, the economy will likely still suck and the United States will still be on the bottom of the world’s popularity list, no matter who gets elected.

My point here is that the change meme is so over before it even starts that if the candidates continue to hammer on it, we should all just boycott the election and let Dennis Kucinich win by default. Now that would herald some real change.