Unwarranted nostalgia. Two instances, one which isn't.

The Arming and Departure of the Knights (of the Round Table), a tapestry.  I feared Uncle Mike was going into the Kennedy at Camelot point of view of things, but he didn't.  This tapestry, as idealized as it is, might serve as a pretty good reflection of the 60s and of the Arthurian legend, which features adultery, armed conflict, and defeat.  Not cheery.

1963: The Last Summer, Part I

I really like Uncle Mike's blog.  It's one of two I have up here by New Yorkers (the other being City Father), and on a website like this you're going to get some nostalgia, like it or not, but it can serve to really reflect how our recollections of the past are pretty messed up in some instances.

Uncle Mike's essay starts off:

The Summer of 1963 was a beginning for some, and an ending for many more. America would never quite be so young again as it was that year.

The essay goes on from there to note a bunch of stuff that happened in 1963, and does a really nice job of it.  I was prepared to condemn it, but I can't upon reading it.  The part I'd still object to is the opening line.  "Never quite be so young again"?

Well, maybe, but in part because 1963 was on the cusp of the real 1960s.  1963, quite frankly, was in the late 1950s, era was.  The 1960s, as I've written here before, actually started in 1964 or 1965.  I guess that means I'm placing myself as being born in the cultural 50s, but I'd also note that the real 1950s featured the Korean War, the Cold War, conscription, and a host of other bad stuff.

A lot of which were going on in the early part of the calendar 60s, some of which Uncle Mike notes.

So the post wasn't nostalgic delusion.

This is political nostalgic delusion:

Nikki Haley

@NikkiHaley

·

Jun 24

Do you remember when you were growing up, do you remember how simple life was, how easy it felt? It was about faith, family, and country. We can have that again, but to do that, we must vote Joe Biden out. #RTM2023

Eh?

The view of the world that seemingly many people have about the past.  Even as this great Rockwell was being painted, the greatest war the world has ever fought was raging, which was part of Rockwell's "why we fight" point.  We'd win, but bring it to an end by using an atomic bomb, something that stained our morality in the cause and which has been a burden on the world every since.  And at the time that this was painted, there was no freedom to sit where you wanted, if you were black, in much of the US.  The "innocence" of our past is never as innocent as we might suppose.

I remember growing up that we were losing the Vietnam War and inflation was destroying my parent's savings. 

I don't like a lot of the way things are headed now, but we weren't living in a Normal Rockwell painting at any point in the past.

Nikki Haley was born in 1972, which means that she's a decade younger than me (thank goodness the GOP has some candidates that aren't 120 years old).  That means that she grew up in the 70s and 80s.

I can recall the 70s and 80s.  Indeed, I've done so here in a series of post on that topic, Growing up in the 1970s, Growing up in the 1980s .

I don't know if I have a more accurate recollection of being young than other people seemingly do, or if I lack a gene which causes us to romanticize the period of our youth.  Either way, the 1970s weren't exactly all skittles and beer, or whatever the proper analogy was.  Inflation was rampant, we lost the Vietnam War, Iran took our embassy staff hostage. . . you recall all that, Nikki?

Life wasn't actually all that simple if your parents were constantly worried about the price of absolutely everything.  The cost of gasoline was a weekly topic.  Watergate's investigations were on the news.

Do I remember how simple life was?

Yes, because I was a kid.  For most kids, life is a joy because you are a kid. Same with being a teenager, really.

I was in my late teens and early 20s in the early 80s.  For part of that time I lived at home, and I hunted and fished as I would.  Sure, life was simple, because I had no financial worries, being a single guy with no responsibilities whatsoever.

Even at that stage, however, your DNA will come in and pull the brakes and levers. Pretty soon you are worrying, or should be, about your future, including your economic future. And you'll start to look for what modern boneheaded lexiconites call "a partner", meaning a spouse.  It's the way of the world.

None of that is simple.

So was that time about faith, family, and country?  Maybe where Nikki lived, but where I lived, probably less so.  Everyone, pretty much, where I lived at the time, and where I still do, was a cultural Christian, and the mainline Protestant churches were still strong.  This was before the onset of Southern Populism brought about by that great Republican hero, Ronald Reagan.  I'm Catholic, of course, but the shift was notable.  To people just a little older than me there was disruption in the Catholic Church as reformers came in and took out the altar rails, etc., but I didn't hear much about that at home really, probably as I was a kid.  Now that I'm far past being a kid, I don't really appreciate a lot that was done to the Church in that period, by which I do not mean Vatican II.

Anyhow, people were at least culturally Christian here, and this is the least religious state in the United States.  People who weren't Christians were likely Mormons.  So I suppose she has a point there.

On family, I suppose, at that time, most families were intact.  Roe v. Wade and Hugh Hefner had started the march to Obergefell, so there were things occurring that were destructive going all the way back to the 1950s, if not before.  The 70s was the real heyday of the Sexual Revolution, and it permitted the entire atmosphere of the culture.  Playboy was sold at the grocery stores in the checkout lines, with the rack designed to camouflage most of the girl on the cover.  Moral decay hadn't set in, in the really perverse ways that would take off in the 1990s, but it had started.

What about "country".

Well, amongst the young, in the 70s, not so much, and yes.  I was in the National Guard for most of the 1980s, but frankly we didn't wear our uniforms off duty if we could avoid it, and we didn't bring it up in casual conversation. Part of that was to avoid getting a lecture from somebody our own age, a lingering aspect of the Vietnam War.  The military recovered under Reagan, but social attitudes weren't what they became later, where everyone was thanking you for your service.  More likely, somebody was going to ask "why?" if you were in the service, or maybe even give you a lecture.

None of which is to say that we don't have a moral dumpster fire going on in our society right now.  But what led us to that was long in coming and will take real work to address.  It isn't as if Joe Biden came in, and it was like electing Caligula.  Our prior President, after all, has a history of behavior that the late Hugh Hefner would have approved of.

The point?

Well, Haley brings up some valid things about the current reprehensible state of affairs.  But it would require a lot more work than voting Joe Biden out.  It's a pretty deep cultural operation, really.

The 2020 Election, Part 5

Part Five?

Yes.

While usually we wait until the last section of a long running series of posts completely fills up a page, we've reached an unusual state of the race in that now we not only have a Presidential election going on, we have a President who is impeached and accordingly facing an impeachment trial.  That's unprecedented and, moreover, each is a factor in regard to the other. So, having passed that point, it was time for a new post.  Indeed, going forward we might treat this all as one topic, or not.  They're certainly intertwined.

First, let's start off where we are.

It's a foregone conclusion, a least right now, that Donald Trump will be in the race next fall running for President as the GOP nominee.  He is not, however, the only GOP candidates. The others are:

1. Perennial gadfly Rocky De La Fuente.
2.  Former Republican Representative from Illinois, Joe Walsh.
2.  Former Governor of Massachusetts and one time Libertarian nominee for Vice President, Bill Weld.

My prediction is that prior to the fall, we'll see some other Republicans throw their hat in the ring.  Having said that, every expectation is that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee in the Fall, absent something really surprising occurring.  This will place Trump in a different position in 2020 than he was in 2016, we should note, as there was widespread Republican opposition to Trump right through and after the last election. That will not be the case this time.

The Democrat race has been, of course, extremely crowded.  It still is, although, as we'll note below, it can be divided between those who have a chance, and those who don't.

Democrats still in the race are:

1. Michael Bennet, U.S. Senator from Colorado.
2.  Joe Biden, long time politician and former Vice President under President Obama.
3.  Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York City.
4.  Cory Booker, first time Senator from New Jersey
5.  Pete Buttigieg, Mayor of South Bend Indiana.
6.  Julian Castro, Mayor of San Antonio, Texas
7.  John Delaney, Congressman from Maryland.
8.  Tulsi Gabbard, Congressman from Hawaii.
9.  Amy Klobuchar, Senator from Minnesota
10. Deval Patrick, former governor of Massachusetts.
11.  Bernie Sanders, Senator from Vermont.
12.  Tom Steyer, Businessman.
13.  Elizabeth Warren, Senator from Massachusetts.
14.  Marinanne Williamson, wackadoodle.
15.  Andrew Yang, businessman.

We'll be conservative in our predictions about who will remain in the Democratic race for much longer, so we'll note that we regard the following as candidates who should pack it in and go home right now.

1. Bennet, who has drawn no interest at all.
2.  Delaney, who is also drawing very little interest to date.
3.  Williamson, who is a wackadoodle.

We'll go a bit further and now that the following candidates are in deep trouble in the Democratic race and probably should seriously consider how viable their campaigns really are.

1.  Booker.
2.  Castro.
3. Gabbard.
4.  Steyer.

Even at that, based upon what has occurred recently, we could go further.  At least right now, the real contenders in the Democratic field appear to be:

1.  Biden
2.  Buttigieg
3.  Klobluchar
4.  Sanders
5.  Warren.

We can't completely discount Bloomberg, who has piles of cash and name recognition at this point, but we can almost do so.  Patrick is a late entry, and we'd note that causes plenty of trouble for him, but we'd also note that that there have been a lot of cases in which late entries rise later on, and so we won't discount him.  Yang has a lot of money, and that can keep him in the race, and he has eccentricity and originality on his side, so while he's a long-shot, we won't discount him just yet.

December 23, 2019

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Well what about those other races?

Other races?

Yes, the two major Wyoming ones. . . the ones for the House and the Senate.

Indeed, the news has been so full of the Presidential race, so early, it's easy to forget but one of Wyoming's Senate seats and the states lone House seat are all up for the November 2020 election.

Regarding the Senate, candidates will be, and are, competing for the seat of Senator Enzi, who is retiring after long service on behalf of the state.  So far the announced Republican candidates are:

Cynthia Lummis
Mark Armstrong
Joshua Wheeler

The Democratic candidates are:

Chuck Jagoda
Yana Ludwig

Armstrong and Wheeler have no chance whatsoever.  Armstrong is apparently a (retired?) geologist with no name recognition.  Wheeler announced early and seems to be campaigning on his status as a deployed Wyoming Army National Guard veteran.  Lummis, of course, was Wyoming's Congressman for many years, leaving office when her husband became ill and was dying.

Lummis has this position locked up and hence the position, if no other major candidates announce.  She'll beat her current GOP contenders hands down and the Democratic candidates presently announced stand no chance at all and indeed, as will be noted, are emblematic of the death of the Democratic Party in Wyoming.  Be that as it may, there are serious rumors that Elizabeth Cheney will announce for the spot.

I would have thought that Cheney would not be able to contend against Lummis, but poll results suggest the opposite.  And Cheney has been quietly hinting she will run.  We have yet to see, but if she does, the primary will be a major race.

The primary right now is no race at all for the Democrats as its candidates don't matter.  Both are symbols of why the GOP, in spite of its present internal problems, absolutely dominates in the state.  If the Democrats can't find better candidates than these for a serious office, they might as well fold up their tent.

Jogoda isn't a Wyoming resident, but one from California.  That says all you need to know about him.  Ludwig is a left wing Laramie community organizer and stands just about as much chance of being taken seriously as Jagoda.

There are some hints that Dave Freudenthal, the former Governor, might toss his hat in the ring, but I doubt it.  If he did, I still think he'd loose to Lummis (and I'll be he thinks that too) but he might stand a chance against Cheney.  Rumors are also circulating that Gary Trauner, who has done well in two prior general elections, might run, but as he's been in a prior failed Senatorial bid, I doubt that's true.

The House race is obviously uncertain as everyone is uncertain what Cheney intends to do. Right now no Republican has registered to run, as they're obviously waiting to see what Cheney will do.  She's waiting to let her attentions be known, which may prove to be smart one way or another.

One Democrat, Carol Hafner, is running and is again a symbol of Democratic Party dysfunction in the state.  She's a resident of South Dakota, not Wyoming, and in the last general election she ran in Alaska.  She's a candidate of the extreme left and includes in her platform abolishing ICE and refusing to take money from the coal and oil and case industries. She stands less than no chance at all of being elected.

What these races demonstrate is that even this early on, unless some major names join in the race on the Democratic side, the Republican primary is the real state election.  The Democrats are utterly failing so far to make a presence as those who announce for Democratic slots are less than a presence. Therefore, ironically, in an era in which the GOP is having trouble itself and should be vulnerable, it isn't.  This likely encourages the branch of the party that leans towards strict right wing rigidity, as it is not the case that voters really have anywhere else to go.

December 24, 2019

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I just listened to the weekend shows yesterday while working on my truck.

The took radically different approaches to their topics.  This Week was a conventional show, but Meet the Press was a special on, well, lying.  The show, lead by Chuck Todd, was a detailed examination of political misinformation focused on Putin and Trump.

For some time Todd has been departing from the Press's usual position that its neutral to being a clear opponent of Trump's.  In this one, it's made very plain and the view is that it's the Press's duty to directly confront disinformation.  He's taken on basically the role that the press openly had during the Watergate era, in effect, and in doing so is openly opposing the President.

Todd has been headed in this direction for some time, and now by being so open about it he deserves some credit.  Generally the news media attempts to maintain a "considering all sides" position, but Todd is openly declaring that the press has a duty to go after and expose disinformation and to punish those who disseminate it.

No matter what a person's view is on current politics, it's worth listening to in no small part because Todd's guests have really studied current disinformation and even exonerate and entity that keeps getting mentioned in current news stories.  It's a frankly disturbing episode, which is all the more reason to listen to it really.

January 2, 2020

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With so much news this past week its been easy to forget that there's also an election going on and that we're actually getting close to the first primary, so we've failed to update this.

Since we last posted Julian Castro dropped out of the race.  Castro was receiving so little attention recently that we'd almost forgotten the was still running, but even fairly recently he was in Iowa seeking support.

Perhaps indicating that he was getting out, while in Iowa Castro criticized the process that causes Iowa to be the first state to have input into the Democrat's choice.  His point is that Iowa does not reflect the diversity of the nation, which is correct.  Beyond that, however, the entire system is frankly wacky in lots of ways and in serious need of reform.  It has been for decades.  Castro deserves credit for noting that, although as noted probably only a candidate who is bowing out can do that.  Now he's departed the race.

A couple of week's ago Christianity Today ran a cover story that President Trump was unfit for the office, thereby signaling that some evangelical protestants are disenchanted with Trump.  Trump downplayed the story and claimed that the newspaper was a liberal publication (I have no idea one way or another), but what that does bring out is the struggle that a lot of religious voters have in this era.

Quite a few deeply Christian voters have been placed in the position in recent  years of being unable to vote for Democrats as the Democrats have an absolute litmus test on abortion.  This is particularly true of Catholics with there being a large number of serious Catholics who hold the view that voting for candidates who support abortion rises to the level of a mortal sin in at least most circumstances.  At the same time, a lot of the same voters actually deeply dislike Trump.  In the last election, in Catholic circles, this resulted in raging debates about how to approach the election, with some holding that voting for Trump was a moral must for that reason and others going to third parties while some tried to qualify why voting for a Democratic candidate who supported abortion didn't rise to that level.

All this makes it obvious that if the Democrats weren't so beholding to abortion, which has been losing support dramatically over the past twenty years, they'd seriously undercut some of the GOP support in some quarters.  Their allegiance to it has actually almost rekindled a "Catholic Vote" which hasn't really existed since the 1960s, and their position on this and other matters certainly causes the Protestant Evangelical Vote to go for the GOP.  They've made no effort to address this however and at best simply try to ignore it.

In other news impacting the election, the impeachment trial hasn't commenced and Mitch McConnell is threatening to start the process in the Senate unilaterally without the House resolution actually having been sent over.  And a situation is developing with Iran that threatens to make Trump a wartime President with an additional war, although how that develops has yet to be seen.

In the category of sort of oddball news, former President Jimmy Carter revealed that Donald Trump called him last weekend to discuss China.  Carter and Trump get along fairly well and Carter has defended Trump in the past, holding that his treatment from the Press is uniquely unfair.  Perhaps that's why Trump calls Carter, as it would seem that he wouldn't receive that much of a reception from the other former Presidents.

At any rate, Carter attributed China's economic rise, which Trump is reportedly concerned about, to it having stayed out of wars since 1979.  That would be the year of its unsuccessful invasion of Vietnam.

There's some merit to Carter's view, but only a little.  China spends a lot on its military and is really belligerent to its neighbors.  It has avoided war, to be sure, but its not exactly pacific, and in spite of its global rise its not really capable, yet, of projecting its military power beyond its borders.  It's economic rise, moreover, has a lot more to do with having had a large population that's making the conversion from a third world communist economy to a first world command capitalist economy.

Anyhow, there's something odd about Donald Trump and Jimmy Carter talking on the phone, although perhaps its nice.  There's also something odd about President Carter giving advice on anything, given that his Presidency was a uniform failure in every respect.  He's a very nice person, to  be sure, but he wasn't a successful President.

January 8, 2020

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This past week Cory Booker dropped out of the Democratic race.

Booker's campaign had been in trouble for some time and so his departure is no surprise. With that departure its now the case that only Deval Patrick, who entered the race late, is an African American, so the Democrats, who pride themselves on their diversity, are once again on the verge of not reflecting that in their candidates.  Of course, having said that, Patrick, having just gotten in the race, is not likely to soon leave it.

Booker, like Kamala Harris, had trouble attracting African American voters which would suggest that the electorate is much more sophisticated in how it votes than some would like to suppose. With Booker leaving the Democratic race the field is now rapidly narrowing down to a handful of strongly competing candidates and a couple of wild card candidates.

January 14, 2020

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The House finally voted to send the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate yesterday and the Senators will be sworn as impeachment jurors today.  Just before that seven House impeachment managers will walk over to the Senate and read the articles.  The managers, which NPR claims all have strong legal backgrounds, are Hakeem Jeffries, Sylvia Garcia, Jerry Nadler, Adam Schiff, Val Demings, Zoe Lofgren, and Jason Crow.

Schiff is the only widely known name right now, due to his role in the Impeachment inquiry in the House.  That role is likely why he was chosen, although he strikes a lot of people the wrong way, including myself, due to his pompous demeanor.

January 16, 2020

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In big news in the state, Liz Cheney announced she's running for the House and will forgo a run at the Senate.  In doing so, she cited a feeling that she would be more effective remaining in the House where she has in fact risen in power rapidly, so her calculation is now without merit.

Cheney came strongly out against the Democrats in Congress with her announcment, which stated, according to the Tribune:

Nancy Pelosi and the Socialist Democrats in the House of Representatives are threatening our freedom and our Wyoming values every day. They must be stopped, our nation is facing grave security challenges overseas and the House Democrats are working to weaken our president and embolden our enemies. Socialists in congress and among the presidential candidates are threatening our liberty and freedom.  I believe I can have the biggest impact for the people of Wyoming by remaining in leadership in the House of Representatives and working take our Republican majority back.  I will not be running for the Senate in 2020. I plan to seek re-election to the House of Representatives.”

This means that the Wyoming race for the House is over as Cheney will secure reelection.  Republicans who were waiting on the sidelines for her decision will now fold up their tents and go home or, in some cases, ponder entering the Senate race. The only Democratic contender for the race so far, Carol Hafner, isn't even a resident of the state and is wasting everyone's time, including her own, by being in the race.  No serious Democrat will now enter it.

This means that Cynthia Lummis has the Senate race all sewn up absent a really serious GOP contender entering the picture, which remains a possibility.  Former Governor Mead just went back into practicing law, so he no longer appears to be a possible contender for that position.  Some of the more right wing candidates that ran for Governor last go around, however, might still enter that race.

Nationally, in the Presidential race, wackadoodle Marianne Williamson dropped out of the Democratic race.  That leaves:

1. Michael Bennet, U.S. Senator from Colorado.
2.  Joe Biden, long time politician and former Vice President under President Obama.
3.  Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York City.
4. Pete Buttigieg, Mayor of South Bend Indiana.
5. John Delaney, Congressman from Maryland.
6.  Tulsi Gabbard, Congressman from Hawaii.
7.  Amy Klobuchar, Senator from Minnesota
8. Deval Patrick, former governor of Massachusetts.
9.  Bernie Sanders, Senator from Vermont.
10.  Tom Steyer, Businessman.
11.  Elizabeth Warren, Senator from Massachusetts.
12. Andrew Yang, businessman.

Yup, some of those folks you probably didn't realize were still running.  The race really seems focused on Biden, Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg, and Klobuchar right now.  Biden and Sanders seem to be neck to neck in Iowa.

Two of the front runners, Warren and Sanders, have been having sort of a tiff, although frankly the press reporting on it doesn't strike me as accurate. Basically, Warren is having a tiff and Sanders is ignoring it.

Warren, whose recollection of past events has occasionally been strained (recall her claims of Indian heritage and her claims to have been fired for being pregnant) is claiming that Sanders told her in a private conversation some time ago that a woman couldn't win the office of President.  Sanders says he never said such a thing and flatly denied it.  Warren's statement seems to be taken as undoubtedly true by the press but there's no reason to believe that Sanders is lying so he's either probably failing to recollect the conversation or it didn't happen.  Warren may be failing to recollect it accurately.

On Warren, and interesting episode of The NPR Politics Podcast detailed her rise in politics.  That podcast has been exploring the backgrounds of all the Democratic front runners.  Warren apparently went from being a highly business oriented law professor to a very liberal one.  She's always been a bankruptcy professor.  Her evolution is apparently based on her feelings regarding the bankruptcy laws.

In other campaign related news, the very day that the Impeachment indictment went over to the Senate an indited Russian born witness claimed first hand knowledge of the Ukrainian events and claimed that it was always an effort to get the Bidens.  This has been treated as explosive news by the Press and even more explosive by left wing Twitterites.

The problem with that is that so far its being met with sort of a collective yawn nationally and it doesn't seem surprising so it's not clear how much of an impact this really makes. Additionally, the news coming in the form of a Rachel Maddow interview of an indited person makes it a bit problematic, rather obviously.  I doubt it'll have much of an impact on actual proceedings when they get rolling.  On those proceedings, we still don't really know what they'll be like.

Finally, in other election news that's related to Wyoming, Lincoln Chafee, former Senator from Rhode Island and former Governor of that state, but now a Teton Village resident, has joined the race for the nomination for Presidential candidate for the Libertarian Party.  There are just about as many announced Libertarian candidates as there are Democratic ones, none of whom stand a chance this year absent something really wild happening, so we'll stop with that entry here rather than delving into that topic further.

January 17, 2020

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Well, that didn't take long.

Only a couple of days after Liz Cheney ending the suspense on whether she would, or would  not, run for Congress (not) Foster Friess has strongly hinted that he will and has announced a tour of the state to assess what he can do for the needs of the state.  By making that assessment, he presumably isn't seeking to find out where he can invest his private funds in private life or anything like that.

Friess came in second in the 2016 Gubernatorial GOP primary and then spent some time brooding about his loss, suggesting that cross over Democrats may have stolen the nomination from him.  A University of Wyoming professor analyzed the impact of cross over voting in Wyoming primaries and came to the conclusion that didn't occur, something that we here rejected as a hypothesis prior to that. The real surprise, from the prospective of this blog, is that he did as well as he did, something that may be at partially attributable to this vast financial resources.

Whatever the case may be, this has to be unwelcome news for Lummis as Friess has the money to make his campaign a serious one no matter what.  It should also be unwelcome news for the GOP as the GOP is already having a lot of infighting regarding how far right of center the party is and how much tolerance it will allow its members.  Lummis represents the traditional Wyoming GOP which is conservative in general but middle of the road on many things.  Friess represents the insurgent tea party wing that has traditionally done poorly in Wyoming but which has captured several of the counties.  Friess, in fact, last time ran a campaign which sometimes brought in arguments that sounded somewhat more like they'd come from a race in the US South rather than a local one.

At any rate, Friess' tour probably simply proceeds his announcement as fact finding tours of that type tend to draw your own supporters and exaggerate the number of your supporters, giving the candidate a confirmation bias that the candidate can win.  Not too many rank and file Republicans, that is, can be counted on to go to a Friess event to tell him that he just ought to stay home, wherever that is.

While the Democrats have virtually no chance of winning the Senate seat this year, the introduction of Friess does open up a small chance for a really good candidate from their party.  If a candidate like Mary Throne or Kathy Karpan (or if David Dodson crossed over) was pondering running, which so far seems unlikely, this might give them a chance.  The Republicans will divert to the right in a primary race if Friess runs which will disturb the middle, which is where most Wyoming Republicans are located.  A middle of the road Democrat would have pretty smooth primary sailing and if Friess emerged as the candidate a centrist Democrat might actually stand a chance.  Indeed, it's notable that in 2016 Throne did take two Wyoming counties, one being Albany County where the University of Wyoming is located, and the other being Teton County where Friess hangs his hat at least part of the time.

January 18, 2020

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While I doubt that it matters much to Iowa Democrats, the New York Times has endorsed Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar for the Democratic Iowa Caucus.

In other news, headlines are reporting that Elizabeth Warren made the comment in Iowa; "How could the American people want someone who lies", which relates to her recent spat with Bernie Sanders.  The argument is over whether Sanders stated to Warren that a woman couldn't win in a Presidential race.  Sanders completely denies making the statement.

This whole flap is a really weird one.  For one thing, if Sanders did say that, it doesn't make him sexists as plenty of people have made that same observation over the years, including recently.  Sanders says he didn't say that and doesn't believe that, and frankly I credit Sanders truthfulness here.  I think the observation that a woman couldn't win would be flat out wrong in 2020, and was wrong in 2016, but if Sanders said it, I'd believe that he doesn't recall saying it and that he is not lying.

Indeed, his statements that anyone who knows him would know he didn't say that also strikes me as credible, frankly.

Which takes us to Warren. Warren was first heard confronting Sanders on this with her shaky elderly sounding voice and that's a bad look.  It makes her look like she's too ready to take offense.  And beyond that, right now she doesn't have a good track record for veracity herself in some areas.

Everyone is familiar with her earlier claims to be a Native American, which perhaps she believed.  But more recently she claimed to have been fired from a job for being pregnant when records show she resigned.  Moreover, while not lying in the election sense, her position on medicare for all at a bare minimum isn't supported by any ability to pay for it which she's been called on, even though she claims that her plans are good to go financially.

In short, calling Sanders a liar is risky as, no matter what a person may think of him, he sure doesn't have that reputation and when done by somebody who has exaggerated, at a bare minimum, some things she's said in the campaign, is riskier yet. So far she seems to be getting away with it, but a person has to wonder if that will continue.

On other election related news one of the panel on Meet the Press stated that the Iowa Caucuses won't tell us who will be the nominee, but who won't be.  That seems about right.

On the Impeachment, Trumps team rolled out and tested their defense, which is that whatever Trump may have done was bad, but it's not illegal, and therefore not impeachable.  Democrats dissed that argument but frankly there's at least something to it.  Following this impeachment trial that may very well end up being the standard for the process when the results are combined with the earlier Andrew Johnson impeachment trial.

January 20, 2020.

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The Democrats are getting testy with each other.

First, Elizabeth Warren called Sanders a liar, and now Hillary Clinton, in a documentary, is slamming him as well.

He was in Congress for years.  He had one senator support him.  Nobody likes him, nobody wants to work with him, he got nothing done. . . He was a career politician.  It's all baloney and I feel so bad that people got sucked into it.

Ouch.

Sanders replied that he was focusing on the Impeachment Trial right now so he didn't comment.

That trial started yesterday but it was all motion practice that went late into the night.  Justice Roberts admonished the lawyers for both side for the nature of their remarks about their opponents.

January 22, 2020

And also, on the same date as the entry immediately above, comes the news that Tulsi Gabbard has sued Hillary Clinton for defamation.

This is a  result of another Clinton interview of some time ago in which Clinton made remarks suggesting that Gabbard was some sort of Russian "asset" and that the GOP was grooming her to run as a third party candidate.

Clinton may not be running this year (yet. . . it's still early), but she's certainly making news in the Democratic primary.

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Here are the rules for the Impeachment Trial being held in the Senate:

Rules.

I think they've actually been somewhat modified from this form.  The argument that was originally to be delivered over two days, for a total of twenty-four hours, is now to be delivered in three days.

That's for each side.  I.e., each side presents their arguments over a three day period. That's basically the meat of each side's case.

Reporting on this has been somewhat inaccurate, as the press has been referring to these arguments as "opening arguments", such as occur in trials. They are not.  This is basically a gigantic motion hearing in front of a jury of Senators with the evidence being whatever it already is, as generated in the House.  There will be no additional witnesses and the testimony won't really be presented by the parties in a normal fashion, but rather through their arguments.  It's frankly a bizarre way to conduct proceedings of this type, but that's the way they are doing it. As such, it's not really a trial.

After the arguments the Senators may question the parties for up to sixteen hours, which also isn't much.  Following that, there will be arguments again with each side being given four hours.

So this "impeachment trial" is really one long impeachment hearing argument with some ability to present questions by each side.

January 23, 2020

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The Wyoming Democratic Party has announced that its' gong to ranked voting for the its 2020 Presidential Caucus.  How this works is somewhat difficult to explain, but basically those Democrats participating in the process will be allowed to pick a favorite candidate and the 2nd, 3rd, etc. choices.

The party describes it in its manual on choosing its delegates for 2020 as follows:

B. Description of Delegate Selection Process

1. Wyoming shall use a proportional representation system based on the results of the caucus for apportioning delegates to the 2020 Democratic NationalConvention.
2. The “first determining step” of State’s delegate selection process shall occur April 4, 2020 with a caucus and convention in every county.
3. Voter Participation in Process (Rank-Choice Ballot, voters will rank up to five candidates) 

a. Wyoming voters will be using a Rank-Choice Ballot throughout the process. 

b. Participation in Wyoming’s delegate selection process is open to all voters -3- who wish to participate as Democrats. All persons residing in the county and registered to vote as Democrats - as declared in the public voter registration records maintained by the county clerk - at least 15 days prior to the county caucus/convention may vote at the county caucus/convention and be elected as delegates to the State Convention. Any citizen of the United States who will be at least 18 years of age on the day of the next election, who is a bona fide resident of Wyoming, who is not currently adjudicated mentally incompetent, and who has not been convicted of a felony (unless their voting rights have been restored) may register to vote in person at the office of the county or town clerk in the county where they reside, or by mailing a notarized registration oath to the office of the county clerk where they reside, or by appearing in person at their polling place on Election Day.(Rules 2.A. & 2.C. & Reg. 4.3.)  

c. At no stage of State’s delegate selection process shall any person be required, directly or indirectly, to pay a cost or fee as a condition for participating. Voluntary contributions to the Party may be made, but under no circumstances shall a contribution be mandatory for participation.(Rule 2.D & Reg. 4.4) 

d. No person shall participate or vote in the nominating process for the Democratic presidential candidate who also participates in the nominating process of any other party for the 2020 presidential election. (Rule2.E)  

e. No person shall vote in more than one county caucus/convention. (Rule3.E & Reg. 4.6) f. In order to assess and improve participation with respect to presidential preference and delegate selection contests and procedures, an attendee may submit a surrogate form if religious observance, military service, disability, illness or work schedule prevents an attendee from participating in person at the county caucus/convention. Official “Surrogate Affidavit” forms for religious observance, military service, disability, illness or work schedule may be downloaded from the State Party website at wyodems.org by March 28, 2020 (Rule 2.I) Education materials will be available to all voters to view on the wyodems.org website on January 17, 2020. 

It's an interesting idea to address a concern that those participating in such systems have long had, that being that they end up wasting their votes if they vote for their real favorite.  Not that it doesn't have downsides in and of itself.

The Iowa Caucus works on a similar system in that if the candidate that you physically caucus with does't draw a sufficient number of participants, you have to leave them and go caucus with somebody else.

January 25, 2020

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The Iowa Caucasus are set for Monday and the Democrats are hard at work in Iowa, hampered a bit by the ongoing impeachment trial.  Polls have shown Bernie Sanders pulling ahead.

The Iowa Caucus is statistically important for Democrats in that the winner almost always goes on to take the nomination. The Iowa Strategy was pioneered by President Jimmy Carter, who was a lousy President but a good strategist in that regard, and its been viewed as vitally important to win it ever since.  Having said that, a person really has to wonder how much of that is really a statistical glitch.  It hasn't worked that way for Republicans.

A person also has to wonder how much that's a good thing, if it isn't a statistical glitch.  As Julian Castro pointed out prior to his dropping out of the race, Iowa doesn't look like much of the country so, if there really is something about Iowa that boosts Democratic candidates who win there, maybe that's a bad thing for the Democrats in the general election.  Frankly, it's widely believed that if Bernie Sanders is the nominee in the fall, the reelection path for President Trump will be much easier than it might be against a different candidate.  Additionally, a person has to strongly wonder if Sanders would be like Carter, who was another really idealistic candidate, and turn out to be an ineffective President if elected.  That might in fact be a gift to the GOP as, if it looses to Sanders, it will be given four years to build a post Trump party when the current party has been put into real disarray due to Trump.

The Democrats are in a state of some disarray also.  At a recent Sanders campaign event Representative Rashida Tlaib actually booed former Democratic candidate and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  Clinton was a terrible choice for the Democrats in the last general election but she deserves more respect than that.  Congressman Tlaib's comments probably came because of remarks that Clinton had made about Sanders which were themselves blunt, stating, as noted above:

He was in Congress for years.  He had one senator support him.  Nobody likes him, nobody wants to work with him, he got nothing done. . . He was a career politician.  It's all baloney and I feel so bad that people got sucked into it.

Clinton's remarks were surprisingly frank, but they weren't rude.  And frankly it is worth noting that while many people view Sanders as an outsider, he's been in Washington for a long time.

Tlaib hasn't been and so far she's making a real record for herself as being a crude jerk.

Clinton's comments, which were noted above, are interesting in that a person has to wonder if she's now playing the same role as Biden was last election, that being of a person who is flirting with getting in the race.  Iowa or no, had Biden jumped in the race in the later stages he would have almost certainly taken the Democratic nomination and he'd likely be the President now, something that likely lead to his decision to enter the race this season.  Biden is now having a much tougher time than it was thought he'd have, with Sanders preforming better than he did in 2016.  Clinton, meanwhile, is probably well aware that if she were the 2020 candidate she'd likely beat Trump this go around, and she may be seriously considering entering the race.  If she's not doing that, she may be positioning herself to be Biden's running mate, in which case criticizing Sanders might be a good move.

February 1, 2020
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John Delaney, who was the first Democrat to announce for the 2020 election, back in 2017, dropped out over the weekend.  He'd been campaigning in Iowa right up to the announcement.

February 3, 2020

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The Iowa Caucasus, which in the Democratic case means that charming process preserved from an earlier era which assumes that everyone in the modern world can spend all day sitting around in a room waiting to be counted, was held yesterday.

And the results were. . . nobody knows.

In an embarrassing spectacle for Iowa, the Democrats have been unable to report who won.  It's been a counting debacle that they hope. . . hope, to sort out today.  They couldn't have started off the actual primary voting in a worse way.

Pete Buttigieg claimed victory, based upon internal campaign counting apparently, and joyfully claimed that Iowa "shocked the nation".  It may have, but not for choosing Buttigieg, which we don't know that it did, but for botching the process.

Republicans meanwhile, who use a different system where people come in and choose their candidate and then can go on about their business, which is probably to their business, chose Donald Trump as their candidate.

There's been increasing commentary to the effect that Iowa going first makes very little sense and frankly the concept of any party's internal choice being ahead of any other states makes very little sense.  I suspect that the long term loser, therefore, this time will be Iowa itself.

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February 4, 2020

Yesterday and the day before Bernie Sanders fans, confident of a Sanders sweep in Iowa, were decrying Pete Buttigieg as "Pete the Cheat" on Twitter.  Well, Buttigieg must have had good exit polling, as it appears so far that his claims of victory were in fact correct, although not all of the Iowa results are in yet due to the titanic vote counting mess, and Sanders is right behind him.

So far, with 71% of Iowa's Democratic precincts now in, it appears the results are as follows:

Buttigieg:  26.8%, for 10 delegates
Sanders:  25.2% for 10 delegates
Warren:  18.4% for 4 delegates
Biden:  15.4% for 0 delegates
Klobuchar: 12.6% for 0 delegates
Yang: 1% for 0 delegates
Steyer:  .3% for 0 delegates

That may change as the remaining 29% of the Iowa Democratic returns come in, but anyway a person looks at it that puts Buttigieg arguably in the category of front runner.  Sanders did well, but it wasn't the blow out that some were believing it would be.  Biden did quite poorly for a candidate who has been regarded by some as the presumptive likely nominee for the Democrats.  Klobuchar, who got a late rise, still didn't do as well as some might have hoped, but coming from behind she did pretty well. Everyone else is now at the point where they should seriously consider dropping out, save for Michael Bloomberg whose vast sea of cash will keep him in the race until the very end.

The Iowa front runner is usually, but not always, the Democratic nominee, but there's already a lot of speculation that this year that won't prove to be true.  The next primary is next week, in New Hampshire where quasi native adopted son Sanders has a pretty healthy lead in the polls so far.  This week's early results, of course, may change that a little. Buttigieg has been polling third behind Biden, and even if Iowa doesn't boost Buttigieg up to Sanders level, a person has to wonder if it might place him in second, a position which would be a good one for him to be in. Biden needs to start placing well pretty quickly, as does Warren.

One of the people who probably hope that Sanders will pull out cleanly ahead is President Trump, as Sanders base is deeply dedicated to him but he doesn't appeal to a lot of regular voters due to his self declared Socialist status.  President Trump took a shot at Socialism in his State of the Union address that was delivered last night and as that speech was likely written prior to any knowledge of the results of Iowa's polling a person has to wonder if that was sort of a rock thrown at Sanders.  There's been some glee in GOP camps at the thought of Sanders being the nominee as he's regarded as a weak candidate against Trump.  Having said that, Biden has also been regarded as the likely nominee, but so far early results are suggesting that presumption might be in error with Democratic moderates gravitating towards Buttigieg, who hasn't always been a moderate.  Warren appears to be in serious trouble as her likely supporters are pretty clearly going to Sanders.

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February 6, 2020

The final Iowa results are now in and they don't differ much from the ones reported above. They are:

Buttigieg:  26.2% for 11 delegates
Sanders:  26.1% for 11 delegates
Warren:  18.2% for 5 delegates
Biden:  15.8% for 0 delegates
Klobuchar:  12.2% for 0 delegates

So Buttigieg went down a tad and effectively Sanders and Buttigieg tied.  Warren went down just a little bit and Biden went up just a little bit.  Klobuchar went down just a little bit.

Biden declared yesterday that his campaign had been hit hard by the results but they were now diligently working to reverse things in New Hampshire.  Pundits feel that Biden's first real promising contest at this point if South Carolina, which has a large population of black voters, as Biden is conceived of having strong support in the African American population.  Current polling puts Biden in third place, behind Sanders and Buttigieg, in New Hampshire.  Current polling puts Biden up in South Carolina, with Sanders trailing and Steyer and Warren trailing, with Buttigieg, who is not popular with African American votes, polling only 7%.  If that's correct, South Carolina will be interesting as it should be the first Biden victory but Sanders should do well, while Buttigieg will do badly and Steyer will at least show up in the polls.
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February 7, 2020

And corrections are still coming in.  So far, the delegate count is, as adjusted, due to the Iowa results:

Buttigieg:  11
Sanders:  11
Warren:  5
Biden:  2
Klobuchar:  1

Iowa has 49 delegates, of which 8 are super delegates in the Democratic system.

2,376 delegates are needed to win, which would suggest that Iowa isn't nearly as important as people would like to suggest.

Upcoming New Hampshire has 33.
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February 8, 2020

Joe Walsh, a Republican conservative who is adamantly opposed to President Trump, ended his campaign yesterday following its completely failure in in Iowa.  Walsh announced that people who are of his views should seriously consider supporting the Democratic candidate, whomever that may turn out to be, which shows just how opposed to Trump he is.

The Democratic Party has launched an investigation on the botched caucus reporting in Iowa.

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February 11, 2020

And then there was New Hampshire, the results of which seemed to shock and amaze overwrought pundits, but which in reality were perfectly predictable to anyone paying attention to the recent news and, also, who has a memory of 2016.

The results were:

Sanders.  25.7%:  9 delegates
Buttigieg.  24.4%:  9 delegates
Klobuchar.  19.8%:  6 delegates
Warren.  9.3%:  0 delegates
Biden:  8.4%:  0 delegates
Steyer:  3.6%:  0 delegates
Gabbard:  3.2%:  0 delegates
Yang:  3.2%:  0 delegates.
Patrick:  .4%:  0 delegates
Bennet:  .3%:  0 delegates.

So, in the delgates race so far, the overall totals are:

Buttigieg:  22
Sanders: 21
Warren:  8
Klobuchar:  7

Yes, now that the mess of Iowa is sorted out, Warren and Klobuchar both have delegates from that race.

With these results a lot of the lighter weight pundits were declaring Sanders the front runner and the results an amazing defeat for Biden and a blistering rise for Klobuchar.  In reality, these results should cause a lot of stress for Sanders who is doing poorly in comparison to 2016.  It is good news for Klobuchar, but the back story of that should be distressing to Democrats looking forward to November.

In 2016 Bernie Sanders emerged from the Iowa Caucasus with 21 delegates and 49.59% of the vote.  Hillary Clinton took Iowa with 23 delegates and 49.84% of the vote.  In comparison, this year, Sanders only pulled down about 25% of the vote.  Something must be different about delegate numbers this year as the numbers don't exactly equate, but the significant thing is that neither of the top two vote getters this year had anywhere near the support that the top two vote getters did in 2016 in what, of course, was essentially a two candidate race.

Attendance in this years Iowa caucuses was light, which should also distress the Democrats which are counting on a massive angry turn out to defeat Trump in November.

Turn out was apparently good in New Hampshire, but in 2016 Sanders picked up 15 delegates through 60% of the vote.  This time he finished in a statistical dead heat with Buttigieg.

Indeed, there's a lot of heat and a little light shed on the "whoever wins Iowa" analysis among the pundits, but in reality nobody won Iowa and nobody won New Hampshire.  Rather, what's really occurred is that about 1/4 of the Democrats are voting for the really radical candidate, Sanders, and the remaining 3/4s are splitting their votes among candidates perceived as more moderate.  Buttigieg, who started off his political life as a radical has moved to the center left where Biden and Klobuchar already were.  Warren is dead in the water in the radical left, sunk by the wake of the Battleship Potemkin, um Bernie.  Stepping back from that, Biden, Buttigieg and Klobuchar are, right now, along with stalled Bennet and not yet started Patrick, splitting Democratic moderates.  That makes it pretty clear that if there was only Biden, only Klobuchar, only Buttigieg, only Bennet or only Patrick, they'd be getting 75% of the delegates easily.

If this scenario looks familiar to anyone, it should.  This is the GOP race of 2016.

In 2016 Trump was the GOP radical and all the GOP moderates split the vote between them, in the end handing the nomination to Trump.  That means, right now, there's a very real chance that all the Democratic center left candidates will split the vote between them and Sanders will take the nomination.

That's exactly what Republicans are hoping for.  Republicans figure, probably correctly, that Sanders is such a radical that Republicans, a large share of independents, and rank and file Democrats, will all vote for Trump. And they're likely correct.  In 2016 quite a few independents and rank and file Democrats voted for Trump.  And its been reported that a hugely attended Trump rally in New Hampshire that just occurred in fact drew quite a few Democrats.

Indeed, both Sanders and Trump are almost two sides of the same coin.  Trump is not a traditional Republican and under his leadership the party has come to resemble a much more radical version of what it was in the 1920s and 1930s.  Sanders isn't a Democrat at all by his own admission, and is running in the Democratic race under a flag of convenience.

Indeed the Trump era has had the impact of making the Republicans not themselves and the Democrats not themselves.  Lots of center Republicans feel that they don't have a home in the GOP anymore, as a former New Hampshire Senator noted in a NPR interview yesterday, but lots of Democrats feel the same way about their party, which has taken a hard, hard left turn.

All of the Democrats running in 2020 are much more to the left, save for the eclectic Tulsi Gabbard, than any that have run since the 1970s.  For this reason Biden, or Bennet, who are generally in the center, should be really successful candidates this year.  They aren't as the overall turn to the left in the Democratic Party is muddying the waters and likely driving voters out.  In 2016 the Democrats weren't talking about gun control, radical overhauls to the health care system, full acceptance of alternative gender concepts, or basically supporting abortion on demand.  Now all of those positions, except for radical overhauls to health care, are Democrat absolutes.  Those positions alone will be driving a lot of Democrats to the GOP in the Fall and are causing Democrats to struggle to chose an alternative to Sanders now.  Those on the radical left, who seem to represent about 1/4 of the Democratic Party, have settled on Sanders.

From here on to South Carolina.  The present candidates seem all set to continue, although at this point its pretty clear that Yang and Bennet are going nowhere at all.  Michael Bloomberg is now the secret super monied hope of the Not Sanders bunch, but my guess is that he'll do poorly in South Carolina where his record as Mayor of New York will be of no help.  It's bee widely held that Biden will take South Carolina, but now he's in a position where he must do so.  Indeed, he flew directly from New Hampshire last night to a rally there, as did Warren.  Warren might as well admit her candidacy is over, with her supporters, such as they were, going to Sanders.

Both Sanders and Buttigieg will have trouble in South Carolina, which has more black voters than white.  Those voters are economic Democrats, not social ones, and a lot of the liberal or even radical social policies the Democrats espouse are not popular with them.  Democrats would do well, accordingly, to not even mention them, but in Buttigieg's and Sanders's cases, they can't escape them.  The race in South Carolina, therefore, will be between Biden and Klobuchar to a surprising degree, which is something that wasn't supposed to happen to Biden.  Klobuchar is a later starter so she may very well not do well in South Carolina.

Still, even there the moderates are, in the polling, splitting their choices.  Biden is only polling 27% and Sanders is coming in second, in polls, at 17%.  The radicals are shifting some support to Warren there with 7.6% going to her right now, behind Steyer who has been investing in South Carolina (10%) and Bloomberg (8.2%).  Buttigieg is way behind at 6.7% and Klobuchar at 2.6%.

If Klobuchar does that badly in South Carolina she'll have proven to be a flash in the pan.  But beyond that, if that's all the better Biden does this may actually go all the way to the Convention or end up given the nomination to Sanders with minority support.  Sanders, we'd note, is leading Nevada right now with 23%.

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February 11, 2020, part two

After writing this I read that Andrew Yang has dropped out of the race.

Yang was a young candidate and by far the most original of them.  I'm not in anyway suggesting that I agreed with him on everything or even a lot of things, but frankly, he was the only original thinker in the race this year and the only one to take on topics involving  the futures, such as oncoming automation and its impact on workers.  Given that, I wish he'd done better in the race and his subtraction from it is a loss.

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February 11, 2020, part three

And Bennet has also dropped out.  I'm frankly surprised he stayed in this long.

Real questions are raised in my mind if Patrick will stay in.  If he does poorly in South Carolina, I very much doubt he will.  And frankly there's very little point to Gabbard's race at this point as well, which has been obvious for some time.

Up to date results on New Hampshire put Klobuchar at 20%.  Adjusted overall, that really puts, no matter what any one campaign my claim, Sanders, Buttigieg and Klobuchar in a statistical dead heat.
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February 12, 2020, part four

An example of the press bias on Sanders which we noted above, from a New York Times opinion piece.

Bernie Sanders, front-runner

Eh?

How can you be proclaimed to be the front runner when you have fewer delegates than your nearest rival?

If there's a front runner in the Democratic contest, it's Buttigieg.  He, not Sanders has the greatest number of delegates so far.

And if its based on performance, it's still Buttigieg.  Granted, it was basically a two person race in 2016, but Sanders is under-performing, so far, compared to 2016.

If you have a grasp of statistics, and take the long view, there is  no front runner at all as Buttigieg and Sanders are in a dead heat.  If you only look at New Hampshire this is still true, but basically Buttigieg, Sanders and Klobuchar are in a dead heat.

Sanders isn't the front runner.

No, what this means is that he has, as he's always had, the fascination of the press, and that may make him the front runner. To a degree, that's what occurred with Trump.  The press hated Trump, but they were fascinated with him, and that fascination translated into outsized attention, which in turn elevated him in the contest.  The press is likewise fascinated with Sanders, so even though Buttigieg has preformed very unexpectedly well, and Klobuchar is starting to, they're regarding him as the front runner as he interests them.

Reporting does impact the race and, ironically, bad reporting, which this is an example of, does it more than good reporting.

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February 18, 2020

In more local news, Converse County Commissioner Robert G. Short announced that he'll join the race for the Republican nomination to replace outgoing Senator Enzi.

That places the Converse County businessman in a race against front runner and former Congressman Cynthia Lummis, as well as Joshua Wheeler, Patrick Dotson and R. Mark Armstrong.  Wheeler announced early and seemed to be running on his deployed National Guard status.  Patrick Dotson is a candidate about which almost nothing is known.  Armstrong is an Albany County resident and a retired geologist who is a native Wyomingite with city council experience, but he's generally unknown as well.

Short is extremely personable and its hard not to like him.  He faces an uphill battle against Lummis, but as a dark horse candidate he might stand a shot at the nomination.

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February 19, 2020

Just one day after Converse County Commissioner Robert Short announced his candidacy for the GOP Senate nomination, outgoing Senator Enzi and Senator Barasso endorsed his opponent, former Congressman Lummis.  The timing could be coincidental, of course, but Short was the first real competition that Lummis had.  The endorsement of both Senators will make it all the tougher for his long shot candidacy to succeed.

Interestingly, Congressman Cheney, who had been considered earlier on a potential candidate for the same office, hasn't endorsed Lummis and used the excuse that she's not endorsing anyone right now.  Perhaps that's really her reason and she's waiting to see if another candidate will announce, perhaps Freiss or Hageman.  Or perhaps she's not happy with Lummis for effectively blocking her path to Enzi's seat, which Cheney tried and failed to gain prior to her obtaining the House. My suspicion is that she'll endorse Lummis in the end.
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February 20, 2020

I actually saw the better part of the Democratic debate last night for the first time.  I've heard one on Meet The Press that was repeated in podcast form, and I've seen bits and pieces of others, but this one I actually saw most of.

That'll be interesting, for me, in part because it'll let me compare my reaction against the pundits.

Anyhow the debate was rather odd, to say the least.  All the candidates, except for Michael Bloomberg and Pete Buttigieg, appeared to have drank too many Red Bulls before going on stage and were basically in a hyperactive yelling mode directed against Sanders and Bloomberg.  Perhaps over caffination explains why they all shot off stage so quickly at the end, except for Joe Biden, who unsteadily walked forward towards the pundits.  He must have wanted to talk to one of them.  Amy Klobuchar exited so quickly she didn't shake anyone's hand at the end.

Anyhow, with the race in a dead heat right now between Sanders and Buttigieg, but with polls showing Sanders pulling ahead in the next two states, a lot of effort, and fairly effective effort, was directed at him to pull him down.  And with Bloomberg just entering the race, a lot of effort was directed at him to keep him from rising.  Probably neither effort stands to be successful but at least the blows delivered on Sanders did connect.  Much less so with Bloomberg.

Indeed Bloomberg, whom I otherwise don't like much, did pretty well in the debate and was right on the mark when he called Sander's socialism "absurd".  Bloomberg's rise is probably demonstrated by what he stated there when he flatly stated that nominating Sanders is nominating somebody who won't win in the Fall.  That's probably right on the mark.

Biden started well and his performance should have been the kind that would have kept him in first place if he was there, but I doubt it will do so now.  His points were somewhat similar to Bloomberg's on many things actually. So were Buttigieg who has tacking to the right trying to get into the space occupied by Klobuchar.  Buttigieg and Warren both denounced socialism this go around which previously only Klobuchar was willing to do, so clearly the candidates sense that the bloom is off the red rose of socialism at this point and they better stop scaring people who aren't on the far left with it.  Klobuchar, who apparently did really well in the last debate, did okay in this one, but it was really probably Buttigieg, followed by Bloomberg, who had the best night.

An interesting thing that is coming up is the specter of experience with some candidates, which Warren, who prior to becoming a U.S. Senator, was in academics since 1976.  Since she's a 1966 high school graduate her pre academia experience, particularly if time spent in law school and undergraduate school is counted, is really light, although she's big on claiming experience outside of the law and did so again last night.  Anyhow, she took a really hard swing at Bloomberg over statements he's made in the past, and actions as Mayor of New York, and on his money.  Bloomberg did a fairly good job of parrying them and noted at one point that he's the only candidate who has started a business.  He's largely a self made man in terms of wealth and didn't apologize for that.  Interestingly, if he were elected he'd be the first Jewish President of the United States, but that's received no press at all so far from a press that likes to talk about "firsts".  It hasn't received much comment from racist quarters yet either, but it likely will at some point.

Anyhow, Bloomberg is exposed for various things he's said and done in the past.   Amy Klobuchar is taking hits for her prior role as a prosecutor in her home state.  It didn't occur last night, but Buttigieg has taken hits for early terminations and policies of his as mayor in his city as well.  Whether any of this is registering with anyone, particularly with black voters, whom the press now calls "voters of color" so as to include Hispanic voters, who actually have separate concerns, isn't clear, but it doesn't appear to be.  The interesting counter to Warren, who was aggressive in bringing it up in regard to Bloomberg, is that she hasn't had the opportunity to make policy mistakes as she's never had to make any, although it could be noted that she, like Bloomberg, was once a Republican and held views that she'd condemn now.  Bloomberg prior wouldn't generally disavow his prior political views at large.

A couple of additional observations.

These debates have a bad format and may very well be ineffective.  A 45 second reply to a question is absurdly short.

Last night's field looked incredibly old, and somewhat ill, save for Buttigieg.  Buttigieg was the only candidate who didn't look either ill or ancient.  In fairness, Warren didn't either, but she didn't look as healthy as Buttigieg.  Klobuchar looked like a makeup artist had very heavily applied makeup prior to the debate, which presents badly.

Sanders literally looked like he was on death's door.  People have touched on this but perhaps not to the degree he should.  His appearance is so bad that frankly a betting person would likely place odds on him passing away within the next four years unless his health starts to really improve, which perhaps it might if he were elected. Assuming a Republican Senate (and if he's the candidate, I'd question on whether there might be a slight GOP resurgence in the House) he'll have to contend with the GOP and Mitch McConnell and frankly, I don't see his constitution as being up to it.  Indeed, this race alone looks as if it's accelerating his final clock quite a bit.

Biden doesn't look great either and his gait is that of an ancient man.  Bloomberg, age 78, looked the most vigorous of the septuagenarian men on the stage (Warren, who is in her early 70s, is by far the most fit appearing of the 70s year olds running) but even he had a gray pallor, although his shoulders aren't sinking like his near contemporary Sanders.  They're all in the same age bracket as Trump, who has never looked to be physically fit but who doesn't appear to be ill like they do.

I'm noting that as the decline in Sanders appearance is shocking and for the first time in the race he's really taking direct blows.  Clinton has stated that nobody likes him.  Biden is noting that in his time in the Senate he hasn't gotten anything done.  Bloomberg directly replied to him when criticized about Bloomberg's taxes, which of course Bloomberg didn't write the law for, with a question of why he hadn't done something about it which left Sanders befuddled.  Bloomberg spelled it out for him and he looked stunned, as if he didn't expect anyone to hold a record of legislative inaction or failure against him. Bloomberg went so far as to reference Socialism in the context of Communism, which is a very GOP thing to do that probably only he could get away with, and which did provoke a reaction from the audience, but which probably signals that he knows where he can make Republicans comfortable with him, his wealth thereby not being as much of a detractor in a general election.

All that is to note that there's some big campaigns in the next thirty days to be followed by a long hard fight up to November.  There's real reason to suspect that in an era in which morality seemingly isn't accorded any consideration in choices that the nation may very well see the impact of aging, lifestyle and stress on one or more of these very old candidates.  This is not to wish that, but everyone steps into that "good night" and some of the folks in consideration for the nation's top office are pretty close to the barque as it is, and based upon their appearance, may be much closer than anyone is seemingly willing to accord.

February 20, 2020, part two

That'll be interesting, for me, in part because it'll let me compare my reaction against the pundits.

Well this has been interesting.

According to a lot of the punditry Bloomberg was beat up and beat up badly, including by Elizabeth Warren.

Watching it at the time, while I agree that Warren threw some hard blows at Bloomberg, I frankly don't know that they connected all that well. And I don't think it was the Bloomberg disaster the pundits said it was.  Bloomberg's open criticism that nominating a socialist is reelecting Trump was a solid point, and he reiterated it today in Salt Lake.

I do agree with a commentator from Meet The Press who noted that Buttigieg, who oddly polls well with older Democrats when Sanders does younger ones, seemed to be the most in command of himself.

Beyond that, in thinking of it, it appeared to me that Sanders did quite poorly and came across, at least in his physical appearance, as an extremely ill man.  Biden came across as past his day as well.  Klobuchar didn't rise to the level she apparently did in the last debate.  Warren turned in her best performance, but she's oddly hindered by a lot of the same protests that she raises in an odd flipside sort of way.

The New York Times noted that the Democrats seem to be throwing all their effort against Bloomberg when they really ought to be against Sanders, and, for those who don't support Sanders, that's seems quite correct.  Another commentator noted that the Democrats are ripping themselves apart to Trump's benefit, which may or may not be correct but they are, right now, campaigning against each other, not Trump.

NPR openly wondered if anyone pays any attention to these debates at all.

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February 21, 2020

Following up on the pundit pondering on the debate, it's being widely reported that it was a Bloomberg disaster. As a lot more people will read about what occurred in one fashion or another, often superficially, it'll be interesting to see if it that has more of an impact than the actual debate.

Bloomberg, as noted, spoke in Salt Lake City yesterday and declared Trump the winner of the debate.  It has to be noted that all of the candidates spent a lot of time trying to rip Bloomberg down even though it appears obvious at this point that some of those candidates, or at least one of them, has no chance of emerging the candidate.  Elizabeth Warren's performance is being hailed as the return of "a fighter", but she didn't spend any time punching the candidate who is getting her votes.  So the irony of this debate is that it may have done nothing more than serve Bernie Sander's interest, in which case Bloomberg's warnings that the Democrats are about to nominate a candidate who can't win may prove to be prophetic.

Indeed, an irony of Sanders run that's been pointed out recently is that he still isn't actually a registered Democrat.  Further ironies, however, are that Bloomberg started off life as a Democrat, became a Republican, and now has reemerged as a Democrat.  Warren was also a Republican early in her professional career.

Further ironies abound, as noted.  Individuals like Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Bloomberg are being condemned for earlier actions in their occupations, which shows the hazards of having done something.  Sanders has been a Senator for so long, and with so little of a record, that he's largely immune from that, although he has an extensive early history of being a political radical.  Warren, in spite of claims to have done various common jobs at one point or another, has been a law school academic since 1976. . . and she's a 1966 high school graduate, meaning that most of her life has been spent in school in one fashion or another.  Prior American academics who occupied the White House had a difficult time overcoming that profession and seemed to believe that lectures equaled action.

None of the punditry at this point are commending on the appearance of any of these candidates, which is strange, or an intentional omission in an era in which there are certain things that are simply supposed to be beyond the pale of conversation.  Biden and Sanders are both showing real signs of age and Sanders is very clearly in ill health.  In just about any prior year a candidate presenting as Sanders does would be provoking a lot of commentary about his obviously ill appearance, but nobody is mentioning it.  A race of this type really risks demonstrating why running candidates in their 70s is a poor idea and with the three septuagenarian male candidates now in the race the assumption that men of their age, who have all exceeded the American male life expectancy, will occupy their office for long if elected, or even escape the natural consequences of aging let alone the vigor of a campaign through November may prove to be a pretty poor one.

February 21, 2020, part two

College Inn in Douglas.  Dropping in here might be a better way to go to assess your chances in the primary.

More locally, Foster Friess, who is assessing his chances for the 2020 GOP Senatorial nomination, is in Casper today on his assessment tour.  He'll be checking in for breakfast at Eggington's at 8:00 a.m.

His chances are poor and he doesn't have a chance of getting the nomination, particularly now that Senators Enzi and Barasso have weighed in for Lummis, who of course was recently Wyoming's Congressman.  Indeed, Elizabeth Cheney, who hasn't endorsed Lummis yet, only occupies that seat because Lummis stepped down during the illness of her late husband.  Cheney, who took a run at the departing Senator Enzi's seat earlier, and whom was bumped out pretty early in that race when Enzi ran again, was widely supposed to be harboring renewed hopes for a run at Enzi's seat and her failure to endorse Lummis is notable.  She's announced that she's staying in the house, but there may have been an element of having to stay there, once Lummis gained GOP establishment support.

Friess wouldn't have that and would be running far to Lummis' right in a quixotic campaign that would stand no chance.  Friess, however, has his name appear on this blog for the second time today as he harbored some sour grapes over the results of the last gubernatorial election when he made some comments to the effect that he felt the nomination, and hence the governorship, was stolen from him when Democrats crossed over to vote for Gordon.

The University of Wyoming, as has been noted here in other threads, looked at the impact of Democratic cross over and concluded their wasn't any impact. . . Democrats just aren't that numerous here . . . but Friess, who is a wealthy migrant to the state and who lives in Teton County, seems to have come away with the impression that he's a lot more popular than he likely really is. Rather, his support comes for the GOP insurgent camp, rather than the rank and file and the establishment GOP, but that's no doubt easy to miss if you don't have very long experience with the state.

Doing a tour to assess your popularity is a good idea, but I can't help but wonder if announced stops in places like Egginton's, which I do like as a restaurant, don't mess that up.  If you just dropped into coffee shops in Casper, Riverton, Lander, and more particularly, in this state, if you popped into the Beacon Club, the Horseshoe, the Buckhorn, the Lander Bar, and the like about 11:00 p.m. on a Friday night or 7:00 p.m. on a Thursday.  In other words, an assessment tour ought to bear more resemblance to a cavalry reconnaissance than a victory tour in advance.  By announcing where you are going you probably draw your supporters who tell you what you want to hear and you'd come away with the impression that you have massive support even if you don't.

February 21, 2020, part three

There's a lesson in here.

Elizabeth Warren, continuing in her efforts to drag Bloomberg down, even as her own campaign sinks, has announced that she used to teach contracts and has drafted a release so that women subject to nondisclosure orders associated with Bloomberg can speak.

This is a really odd event and is a lot like throwing rocks at a coyote that's sitting off a few feet while a bear is eating off your leg.  Yes, the coyote will come in and eat your remains, but you are going to be dead long before that of bear.

It's additionally odd, in my view, to see a law school academic take this approach.  Unless she's licensed in the jurisdiction of the non disclosure agreements, which is unlikely, she'd now be practicing law without a license.  As law school academics rarely practice law in the first place, perhaps its not surprising that such a desperate act would be done, but getting around to the practice of law in your 70s, in a campaign, is just peculiar.

Additionally, its serving overall, even if a person doesn't like Bloomberg, to convert the Democratic campaign into one of character assassination and one that is rocketing leftward.  Sanders is already in the extreme left and Bloomberg's entry is bringing out the "eat the rich" language in him.  Warren is beating up on Bloomberg when her real rival is Sanders.  With Biden looking ineffective Sanders is rising in the polls and its up to Klobuchar and Buttigieg, so far, to try to gain some ground and keep the Democratic bus from going off the left side of the road and into a ditch.

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February 22, 2020

The House Intelligence Committee received a briefing from US intelligence figures the day before yesterday informing them that Russia was set to again meddle in the U.S. election.

The briefing further revealed that the Russians are favoring President Trump and their efforts are aimed to help him secure reelection. Additionally, their efforts are aimed at assisting Bernie Sanders secure the Democratic nomination.  Finally, they are aimed at simply discrediting the US election process, something that their 2016 election meddling has been successful at doing.

The overall purpose of their aims may include the last factor to a large decree.  Putin is a major anti democrat and he sees himself as some sort of a nationalist czar. Discrediting democracy in general and that of the world's only remaining superpower (let alone the world's only major democratic power near that status) is a prime goal.

Beyond that, Putin simply seems to favor Trump, and Trump for his part is oddly comfortable with the anti democrat Putin.  Favoring Sanders may seem odd, but chances are that Sanders is regarded as a weak opponent against Trump and therefore aiding Sanders is aiding Trump, something the more sober Democratic candidates and pundits have also been warning about.  Beyond that, should Sanders win, he shares a position of isolationism, oddly enough, with Trump, and therefore the Russians likely regard him as a potentially ineffective President or at least one who would be likely to give him a free hand on the international stage.

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February 23, 2020

Because the votes are still being tallied this morning, the end delegate count is still in a state of flux, but what is clear is that Bernie Sanders dominated in the Democratic caucus in Nevada, exceeding expectations.  Only 50% of the vote was actually counted as of this morning, but those results showed, up to that point, Sanders getting something like 46.6% of the vote and taking, by most counts, seven delegates.  The same results showed nobody else getting any.

Joe Biden came in second with around 19% and Buttigieg came in behind him with about 15%.  Warren trained behind Buttigieg and Klobuchar, who had done well in New Hampshire, failed in Nevada, coming in with just 4.5%.

In "new" candidates, Deval Patrick showed up for the first time, but only received .1%, as few votes as Yang who is no longer running.

The net result of this is to like mean that Sanders becomes the actual front runner with 28 total delegates to Buttigieg's 22 right now.  All of this is subject to change as Nevada has 34 pledged delegates.  This could therefore give Sanders an actual statistically significant lead, and probably will.

At this point, this is being regarded by the Democratic establishment as a disaster.  Joe Biden was expected to be the nominee but his campaign so far has produced poor results and he needs a major victory this week in South Carolina to reverse that. That did appear to be coming but now Biden is polling only slightly ahead of Sanders, with Steyer polling third at 15%.  There's a real chance that Nevada could provide a "boost" for Sanders that puts him in the lead in South Carolina.

The added problem with South Carolina is that Sanders remains such an improbable Democratic nominee. . . he's not even a registered Democrat, that it discourages those running who are trailing from dropping out.  Even now, depending upon the final results, Sanders hasn't taken more than 50% of the vote in any state and in most he's taken at best 1/4. That means in most places his combined opponents are out polling him.  But there's a lot of them, and right now candidates like Buttigieg and Klobuchar are splitting the "moderate" vote and they appear about ready to split it even further with Steyer and Bloomberg. The only hope for the centrists in the party, which is most of the party, is for a brokered convention, which is highly unlikely.

Chris Matthews, a liberal pundit, compared Sanders victory to Germany overrunning France in 1940.   What's unclear about that is whether he meant both the analogy to Germany sweeping France in April 1940 as well as Germany's following 1945 defeat, but there's real reasons to suspect that both of those analogies might be right. Not too surprisingly, therefore, one of the parties congratulating Sanders yesterday, by Twitter, of course, was President Trump, who tweeted:

Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

Looks like Crazy Bernie is doing well in the Great State of Nevada. Biden & the rest look weak, & no way Mini Mike can restart his campaign after the worst debate performance in the history of Presidential Debates. Congratulations Bernie, & don’t let them take it away from you!

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February 25, 2020

As noted here earlier, I didn't watch the last debates, so I was surprised when I heard that Elizabeth Warren declared during them that if she was elected, on her first day, she'd issue an Executive Order preventing drilling on public lands.

Statements like that are the reason that the Democratic Party is nearly dead in Wyoming.  Indeed, over the past week I've heard Michael Bloomberg's reference to Communism in regard to Bernie Sanders used again and again.  Prior to that people felt some restraint about calling Sanders a Communist, which he isn't, but they don't now.

Warren's line about using an Executive Order to halt drilling on public lands will definitely come up again and again, and frankly it's now legitimate fodder.  Natural forces are working against the coal industry which was one of Wyoming's major industries as recently as a decade ago, but Hillary Clinton's statement about putting coal out of business still crops up regionally from time to time.  A Democratic Presidential candidate flat out declaring that she'll stop drilling on public lands will really circulate, as well it should.  It would destroy Wyoming's economy.

Perhaps ironically, we're noting this today on the centennial of the passing of the Mineral Leasing Act which brought the current leasing system into being, prior to that, oil prospects were located under the Mining Law of 1872, as we earlier noted on this blog.

Today In Wyoming's History: February 25, 1920

Today In Wyoming's History: February 25:

February 25

1920  Woodrow Wilson signed the Minerals Leasing Act of 1920. This act created the modern system of leasing Federal oil and gas  and coal interests, which previously had been subject to claim under the Mining Law of 1872.  

 Grass Creek Wyoming, 1916

The extent to which this revolutionized the oil, gas and coal industries in economic terms can hardly be overestimated.  Prior to 1920, these fossil fuels could be exploited via a simple mining claim, and the land itself could be patented after the claim was "proved up."  The 1920 act ended this practice as to these resources (the 1872 Act continues on for other minerals, in a very modified form, to the present day).  The leasing system meant that the resources never left the public domain in absolute terns, and the payment of the lease was a huge economic boon to the state and Federal government.

February 25, 1920. The Oil Leasing Act becomes law

The Casper Daily Tribune was exactly correct, the measure built the way for the oil industry in Wyoming.

Prior to the Oil Leasing Act oil prospects were located, where the Federal government owned the resource, though the Mining Law of 1872.  The act changed the location system to the benefit of both production companies and the Federal government by allowing the resource to be leased through the much simpler leasing system.  Ultimately, this benefited the state through allowing this simpler system to be utilized and by allowing non appropriated lands to remain solidly in the Federal domain, as the Mining Law of 1872 allowed lands to be patented and become private through location.

This is, of course, still the system that's used today.

Something worth additionally noting is that Warren most likely wouldn't get done what she claims she would do.  That would most likely be an illegal use of an Executive Order, and frankly Presidents have been crossing the line on such orders for some time.  This election season has seen the Democrats repeatedly claim widespread authority to be able to resort to Executive Orders, with the prior most notable example being Kamala Harris claim that she'd address gun control in this fashion.  Joe Biden rightfully rebuked her on it, showing that he knows the Constitution better than Harris apparently was willing to.

Warren's proposed use would also likely be illegal as well, which as a law professor, she should know if she doesn't.  It'd definitely be very rapidly tested in court, as western governors would have no choice but to do so.

It'd also give a massive boost to the movement to move Federal lands to the states.

On Warren, it's been noted the degree to which she went after Bloomberg in the last debate.  It'll be interesting to see if that occurs again. A NPR commentator had the astute observation that Warren doesn't care if she's President, or if Sanders is.  Thinking on that, I think that's correct and would explain why she lead the charge against Bloomberg rather than turn on Sanders in the last debate.  It's now universally acknowledged that other candidates doing that amounted to a massive tactical error.  It's Sanders that's their problem, not Bloomberg.

They need to turn on Sanders now as he now threatens to sweep the field.  If Biden can't turn in a good performance later this week in South Carolina his campaign is effectively over and Sanders may be the nominee, with that likely meaning a Trump victory in the fall.  Democratic figures are now openly worrying that a Sanders ticket will mean the loss of the House as regular voters turn against a Sanders whose views will become more and more openly discussed.

If there is a Sanders ticket, I'm wondering now if Warren might be on it.  As noted, Warren isn't going after Sanders at all, and perhaps she can't as their views are pretty similar.  Be that as it may, Sanders has been uniform in his views and not, if you will, very political about them.  Conventional wisdom, which hasn't so far really been exhibited in his campaign, would hold that he'll choose a moderate to address more centrist Democratic fears in the fall.  But he might very well not, as so far he hasn't taken that approach in general.  If so, Warren might be his choice, thereby picking a VP candidate who was a major candidate in her own right and whose views are on the same field as his own.
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February 27, 2020

I didn't watch the last Democratic debates, so all I know about them is what I read or heard, so I'm back in the relying on pundits category this time, so far.

On pundits, one of the interesting things this weeks is that the weekend shows won't really get a chance to comment on the debates as South Carolina will hold its primary on Saturday. Therefore, the impact of those debates, and there does seem to be some, will be felt before they can chip in their tso sense.

On that impact, seemingly missed by the news medial, Joe Biden received a big jump in the South Carolina polls after them.  As much as 15 points or more.  If that holds, and it might, South Carolina might turn into sort of an upset for Sanders, who will come in a distant second.  Steyer seems slated to come in third.

If that's the case it'll be because everyone is now, oddly enough, paying attention to Sanders for the very first time. Sanders, except on gun control which he once opposed and now supports, has been remarkably consistent in his views for eons, which his supporters cite as one of his virtues but which others would cite as the hobgoblin of little minds, or which W.E.B. Dubois would cite as the definition of a fool.  Under fire, Sanders has even publicly defended his statements about Castro raising the literacy rates in Cuba following his Communist revolution, which is no doubt true, but then Lenin and Stalin no doubt raised the literacy rates in Soviet Russia as well.  Shoot, Mussolini made the trains run on time. All that's beside the point, really.

Soviet literacy poster.

The point is that Sanders is in the far left and he's been given a complete pass in the Democratic camp up until now.

The problem that presents is that it may well be too late to stop Sanders in which case he will go on to be the nominee for the Democrats.  Republicans have been somewhat overjoyed by that thought, but its not impossible, as everyone seems to think except Sanders supporters, that Sanders might win.  We'll take a look at the things that might mean in a later post.

In significant news for Biden, he received the endorsement of South Carolina's Jim Clayburn, a South Carolina politician and Congressman who is a member of the state's majority African American population and who is so influential in South Carolina that he's regarded as a "king maker"

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March 1, 2020

As everyone by know no doubt knows, Joe Biden not only won in South Carolina yesterday, it was a complete blowout in favor of him.  In the end, he took 48.5% of the vote, a total that's so far above any that any other Democratic candidate has received in any prior contest this year that its virtually not comparable.  Indeed, in order to do that you'd have to compare the totals of the top two vote getters in any of the prior races of the year.

That's a major victory and there's a lot that it suggests.

For one thing, Sanders percentage of votes remains remarkably consistent.  He was down in South Carolina, receiving 19.9% of the vote, but only barely down.  What that should tell us is that Sanders can consistently poll in the Democratic primaries at around 20%, but he's hardly sweeping the field.  He's come in second now twice at that approximate number, and first twice at that approximate number.  He's not a big vote getter and has done barely better than those who are closest to him up until now.

The results are also telling for the remaining candidates.  Tom Steyer took 11% for third and then quit the race.  There was a lot of press speculation that he was proving to be an appealing candidate to black voters.  He wasn't.  He realized, to his credit, that the game was over and got out.

Fourth place went to Buttigieg at 8%.  Buttigieg has been unpopular with black voters and the writing should be on the wall for him as well.  His main popularity has been with older white Democrats but no that he's competing in the main, his numbers are dropping.  Fifth place went to Warren at 7%, who probably in this race mostly took votes from Sanders, but so few of them as to not have it matter.  Unless Warren is intentionally acting as a spoiler for some reason, or she's campaigning for Vice President, her race is now over as it is clear that she has no real chance and her support is dropping.

Klobuchar, who did well in New Hampshire, took a pounding in South Carolina, coming in at 3%.  That would suggest that at this point her race is also over.

Of course, just because it appears that way from the outside doesn't mean it looks that way for candidates who are looking towards Super Tuesday next week.  Particularly if they listen to the Press.

And here the Press really has to be questioned.

The Press declared Sanders the front runner coming out of Iowa, which he came in second in.  By any rational calculation there was no front runner coming out of Iowa or, if there was, it was Buttigieg who came in with more delegates to everyone's surprise.  Indeed, Sanders had less support in Iowa in 2020 than he did in 2016.

By New Hampshire the press build up for Sanders was even higher, even though the results there were not much different.  Sanders became the technical front runner at that time but only barely.  But to listen to the Press on it, he'd demolished his opponents.  The candidates went into Nevada with that drumbeat and he did well there, but once again, not anything like Biden did in South Carolina.

Now the Press story is "well. . . Super Tuesday". But is that fair?  Frankly, Sanders has never pulled anywhere close to a majority of the votes anywhere in this election and has been at parity with his nearest competitor up until Nevada, and now he's far behind in the count in South Carolina.

Sanders, like Trump, fascinates the Press, and he benefits from that.  As with Trump in 2016, you hae to wonder how much of Sanders primary support is due to press fascination.

Okay, here's the current delegate tally. Remember, they need 1,991 to secure their nomination.

Sanders:  56
Biden: 48
Buttigieg:  26
Warren:  8
Klobuchar:  7

Now, granted, those numbers are all a long way from 1,991, which suggests that "it's all over", isn't correct.  But what we are seeing now is that Biden is within eight delegates of Sanders virtually overnight.  If Biden's, Buttigieg's and Klobuchar's tallies are added to Biden's, which they would have been had there been one "centerist" candidate against the left, represented by Sanders and Warren, that candidate would be far ahead.

Now, Super Tuesday is this Tuesday, March 3.  1,334 delegates will be awarded on that day.  There's a chance that somebody will be within spitting distance of the nomination at that point, and some campaigns may very well be crushed by the results.  It'll be the first time that Bloomberg, who is betting in Super Tuesday, will be on the ballot and given the results of yesterday, he has the chance to be either a major spoiler or a major flop.  He likely won't emerge the front runner, but he's hoping to.  Polls taken earlier last week show Sanders leading in most of the Super Tuesday states, some by huge margins (enough that it should cause concern over how divided the nation will be no matter what after the election) but they also show Bloomberg already acting as a spoiler in a couple of them.  Without Bloomberg, Biden, based on early polling results, might take a couple of state that he likely will not.

On interesting advanced polling, which may or may not prove to be accurate, one notable thing is that in really conservative states Sanders does well, as he also does in really liberal states.  That makes sense doubly, even though it seems counter-intuitive.  California looks to be a blowout, right now, for Sanders, but it's become highly left wing.  Utah, however, also looks to be, but Utah is a very conservative state. Why? Well, in very conservative states, like Utah and Wyoming, most of the Democrats abandoned the party long ago and only a small left wing is left.  This argues, it should be noted, against this particular system.

Also of note is that Sanders, last week (but maybe not now) is actually neck and neck with Klobuchar in her own state, which would be a major embarrassment for her if she does not take it.  Having said that, her presence in her own state does stand to prevent Sanders, maybe, from taking it, which is a good argument for her remaining in the race, assuming that she doesn't want Sanders as the nominee, through Tuesday.  She appears to be non competitive in every other state which means that, if her goal is in part to keep Sanders from getting the nomination, her running through Tuesday might serve that goal.

Warren, in contrast, appears likely to get trounced by Sanders in her own state, which suggest that she should likely bail out to avoid the embarrassment.

FWIW, if the polling holds, the candidates will come out of Super Tuesday with Sanders in front place, followed by Biden within 282 delegates (he'd have 305, Sanders 587) and Bloomberg with 211.  Looked at that way, the only thing Bloomberg can do is act as a spoiler.  Biden probably needs, however, Klobuchar to act as a spoiler to Sanders.  Buttigieg would be a spoiler to Biden, and Warren would emerge with 132 delegates that likely will go to Sanders in the convention.

Which assumes any of the polling is correct, which it very well may not be, or which may very well no longer be relevant following yesterday.

March 1, 2020, part two

It's days like this that make me frustrated with pundits or which make me wonder why I don't have a high priced punditry job.

What leads me to state this is that this afternoon I listed to the Meet the Press podcast in which Pete Buttigieg was interviewed. Right away, it was obvious what he was saying.  He was dropping out of the race and, moreover, he hopes to have (and may already have secured) Joe Biden's VP slot.

Chuck Todd and the rest of the Meet pundits blew right by this and didn't even notice.

What the heck?

By the end of the day he had dropped out.

Buttigieg saw the handwriting on the wall and knew he couldn't secure the nomination.  Amy Klobuchar knows that too.  Buttigieg doesn't want Sanders to get it, and sometime between Saturday and today he and Biden, or maybe his people and Biden's people had a heart to heart.  He's out, and he's tossing his delegates to Biden.  Not right now, but at the convention.

And he'll be Biden's VP nominee.

Indeed, if you just add Buttigieg's delegates to Biden's right now, which you can't really do, Biden is the front runner.

Klobuchar has had a conversation with Biden as well, I'm quite sure.  That conversation is different, however.  Klobuchar needs to stay in through Super Tuesday for Biden's sake.  She needs to win Minnesota and keep Sanders from taking it.  That doesn't push Biden over the top, but it does help keep Sanders from taking the nomination.  After Tuesday, she'll drop out.  And if Biden is elected, she'll have a place in the administration.  Possibly Secretary of State, but more likely, in my view, as a Supreme Court Justice.

So, once again, here's the math right now:

Sanders:  56
Biden: 48
Buttigieg:  26
Warren:  8
Klobuchar:  7

So if you add Buttigieg to Biden, which you can't officially do, it'd look like this:

Biden:  74
Sanders:  56
Warren:  8
Klobuchar:  7

After Tuesday it'll look different, but how different?

One thing that might make it look different would be if President Obama endorsed Biden, but so far he hasn't.  Indeed, it seems to be the case that a conversation on that score occurred today and the official story is that he feels an endorsement from him would do more harm than good for Biden.

Baloney.

Obama isn't endorsing anyone on purpose.  He's not that loyal to his former VP and he's hanging around on the sidelines until the process is over, at which time he may endorse who ever comes out on top.  It's odd.  And it suggest an element of bad blood, somewhere, between him and Biden.

And Bloomberg remains the complete wildcard.  One of two late announcing candidates (Devel Patrick, whose might as well not be running at all, was the other), nobody knows if his vast investment in his own campaign will do anything, but more and more it looks as if it will at best hurt Biden while not advancing Bloomberg.  It appears very unlikely that he'll drop out prior to Tuesday but it might not really matter.  The Democratic campaign appears to be rapidly narrowing to a two person race.

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March 2, 2020

What a difference a single day can make in this campaign. The South Carolina primary certainly proved to be the case that way, and Super Tuesday might.

After New Hampshire, in which Sanders did worse than he had in 2016 but was none the less declared by the press to be on a roll, things were beginning to look desperate for any other Democratic contender except, maybe, Bloomberg, who had yet to compete, and who still has yet to compete.  Then came Nevada and Sanders was beginning to be declared to be unstoppable.

But then in South Carolina Biden not only did well, he soundly trounced Sanders and every other candidate.  Tom Steyer, widely mentioned as somebody who might come in a near second, if in fact not even beat Biden, went down soundly in a third place defeat and then dropped out of the race later that day.  The next day Buttigieg conceded that his star had fallen and his race was run, although in doing so he in an interview with Meet the Press in which the press was unable to pick up on what he was saying, he also broadly hinted that he was wanting the VP slot under Biden.  Later that day, he made his withdrawal official and more or less indicated he would be endorsing Biden.  Now he has endorsed Biden.

Today, to my surprise, Amy Klobuchar, whom I supposed to be staying in the race in order to keep Sanders from taking Minnesota, also dropped out of the race and also endorsed Biden.  At the same time Bloomberg, who as recently as late last week was ahead in a couple of the Super Tuesday states in which Sanders was not, is  hardly being mentioned and lots of pudits are claiming this race is now a "two man race".

It actually isn't.  It's a four person race between Biden, Sanders, Warren and Bloomberg, although Warren is only competitive in her home state, where polls place her neck and neck with Sanders.  Warren is no longer a threat to any of the candidates and her reason for remaining in the race isn't clear.

And some of those Super Tuesday state have dramatically changed in the last couple of days. The big two states are Texas and California and Sanders was leading in both a couple of days ago.  Now Biden is one point ahead of Sanders at 30% in the polls.  Bloomberg is showing well at 19% and Warren at 13%, showing that Bloomberg is scrubbing off a lot of Biden's support in Texas but then Warren is scrubbing off a lot of Sanders'.  In another poll Sanders is still ahead in Texas, however.  Biden's fortunes rose in quite a few of the Super Tuesday states, but Bloomberg, in polls, remains pretty strong in more than one and is effectively hurting Biden.

Or so the polls say. Tomorrow, the actual results will come in.

The race won't wrap up then, but if Biden has a strong day, his nomination becomes likely.  Most of the national polls show Biden doing well against Trump, although contrary to the common wisdom, they show, right now, Sanders barely prevailing over Trump as well.  Polls on the fall election, however, don't really mean much right now.

In other news the Tribune reported that a local GOP Pac has formed in a declared attempt to bring civility back into the internal debate within the GOP, but when carefully read it clearly intends to represent the local GOP mainstream against the recently rising GOP right wing. Some of that latter group was less than thrilled by the development, based upon the Tribune article on it.

Also apparently less than thrilled by the news, so to speak, was Foster Friess who declared that his recent tour of the state caused him to determine not to run for the Senate, a good decision on his part as he was not likely to prevail.  He declared instead that he'd attempt to influence the state through his private organization which he thought a more productive route.

And this concludes Part 5 of this series.  This one is getting too long and pushing other probably more interesting things off the first page of the blog  Part 6 will start with the Super Tuesday developments.

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Prior Entries.

The 2020 Election, Part 1

The 2020 Election, Part 2

The 2020 Election, Part 3

The 2020 Election, Part 4