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David Harcourt
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Posted: 4 Apr 2007 02:10 am |
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| More Doonesbury lampooning of Mitt Romney: Attached Image (viewed 104 times):
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David Harcourt
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| Joined: | 31 Dec 1969 |
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| Posts: | 1127 |
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Posted: 10 Apr 2007 06:00 am |
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A Washington Post columnist, Joel Achenbach, posted this piece on 5 April:
The Secret Life of Mitt Romney
Mitt Romney, we've just realized, is Walter Mitty.
He says he's a longtime hunter, but has been on only two trips, one as a 15-year-old when he hunted rabbits, and then last year, when he "hunted" quail in what sounds like one of those places where they keep the birds in a cage until the rich guy, having been driven to the spot in a jeep, is ready to fire. One of those Dick Cheney shoots-his-friend-in-the-face arrangements.
Here are some other Romney claims:
He is a longtime pilot. On many occasions he has manufactured, and tossed, paper airplanes while making appropriate sound effects.
He has spent many years as a submarine captain. He loves to command the ship to surface amid heavy suds, and then attack the hapless and unwitting rubber duck.
He has been an astronaut. Though he hated those long lines at Space Mountain.
You've heard of Bowdlerized literature. This is called Romneyized personal history.
Attached Image (viewed 101 times):
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 6 May 2007 09:12 am |
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Newsweek magazine has published some interesting results from polls over 2-3 May:
* Clinton 49%; Giuliani 46%
* Clinton 50%; McCain 44%
* Clinton 57%; Romney 35% [!]
* Obama 50%; Giuliani 43%
* Obama 52%; McCain 39%
* Obama 58%; Romney 29%
* Edwards 50%; Giuliani 44%
* Edwards 52%; McCain 42%
* Edwards 64%; Romney 27%
Given the extraordinary length of the Presidential campaign, these polls are very significant because if candidates can't stake a clear and credible claim to substantial electoral and financial support at an early stage there's a real risk that their campaigns will wither away before the Primaries begin.
So far things are looking good for the three leading Democratic candidates, and bad for the Republicans. Romney and McCain's campaigns, in particular, look very sick. Maybe the Democrats can win after all!
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 19 May 2007 12:31 am |
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| Here is a marvellous graph from Wikipedia, showing the results for all Democratic and Republican candidates for polls going back to 2004. The trend is unmistakable. Attached Image (viewed 89 times):
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jaybee2003
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| Posts: | 272 |
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Posted: 28 May 2007 01:35 am |
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Have you seen the InTrade website? - stock markets based on political or current events, including the 2008 US Presidential Election.
http://www.intrade.com/jsp/intrade/contractSearch/
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 29 May 2007 10:52 pm |
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A very strange site that, Jo.
Meanwile, back on the hustings, I see that in the last four polls in which Democratic candidates again Rudy Giuliani the Republican has lost every time. Here are the reults:
Edwards/Giuliani - 47%-45%
Clinton/Giuliani - 49%-46%
Obama/Giuliani - 50%-43%
Edwards/Giuliani - 50%-40%
If Giuliani packs it in, who will the new White Hope for the Republicans be?
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 14 Jun 2007 03:12 am |
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And, of course, because this is America we're talking about, anything is possible including the emergence of veteran actor and sometime lawyer Fred Thompson as a straight out of left field presidential candidate for the Republicans.
There's already some Thompson polls out: Obama leads him 47% to 44% in a poll conducted on 4 June; Hillary Clinton led him in two polls in May.
A poll just three days ago has the four (not three, now Thompson is on the scene) leading candidates ranked like this:
Giuliani - 27%
Thompson - 21%
McCain - 12%
Romney - 10%
My pick Mitt Romney is doing very poorly. Ask yourself this: if you were Giuliani, McCain, Romney or another of the Republican candidates, how would you feel having some Freddy-come-lately turning up and grabbing all the media attention?
Fred Thompson, looking Presidential
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 1 Aug 2007 10:55 pm |
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Since the emergence of Fred Thompson I've lost a lot of interest in this election.
It's nothing to do with Fred, who would probably make as good a president as, say, Ronald Reagan, and a much better president than, say, Richard Nixon.
It's just that it's hard to maintain interest in a process which is such a complete joke.
I mean, don't take take politics too seriously, whatever you do, but don't go too far in the other direction and make the court jester king. That just makes the whole thing a farce (which is maybe what many Americans want, for as many different reasons, but it doesn't make American politics interesting for outsiders).
Fred isn't doing too well in the latest polls, however, which have John Edwards and Barack Obama thrashing him and Hilary Clinton beating him by a narrower margin. Giuliani is still the front-runner among the Republicans, although McCain and Romney are still performing well. On the Republican side it may simply come down to where the big money decides to go. Unlike the Democrats, where several candidates may do quite well with funding for quite a long time - particularly if it looks as if a Democrat candidate may win - the Republicans' sorting hat is likely to produce one clear front-runner comparatively early, I feel.
As I reported earlier, Wikipedia has been running an interesting analysis of poll results (below), which continues to show a steady gain in support by the Democrats, and commensurate loss in support by the Republicans. If you can navigate your way through all the dots you will see that the Democrats (blue line) started ten percentage points behind the Republicans and are now, roughly two and a half years later, five points ahead of them.
Much can (and will) happen yet, of course, but I think there is going to be more volatility on the Democratic side than among the Republicans. As the Chairman of the Galilee Society of the Blind said on his way to the Messiah, we shall see.
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 5 Sep 2007 10:47 pm |
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The most interesting theoretical contest in the election remains that between Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani (see table below).
Clinton is gradually making progress and it seems increasingly likely that she will win the Democratic candidacy, even though Obama would be a much stronger candidate against front-runner Giuliani. Giuliani's survival to this point is a remarkable achievement, although the Republican contest is still wide open.
An issue which adds to the complexity (especially for a complete outsider like me) is the extent to which some ostensible presidential candidates are in fact positioning themselves for a vice-presidential slot. Fred Thompson, for example, who from this distance looks like a complete joke as presidential material (the same kind of joke as Ronald Reagan, I hear you cry), may well be lining himself up for a vice-presidential candidacy, in tandem with Giuliani, John McCain, Mitt Romney, or - well - anybody, really.
Vice-president of the United States sounds like a really good job to me, provided your boss doesn't get shot, or die in office. You get paid to do SFA except eat well and shoot your friends. Sounds like heaven on a stick.
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 22 Jan 2008 04:45 am |
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Four and a half months on and, amazingly, it looks as if it might be Clinton versus McCain.
Americans seem to be getting used to the idea of a woman president, which astonishes me, and Republican voters seem undeterred by the prospect of a president who if he was inaugurated in January 2009 would be 75 years old when he completed his first term.
If he completed his first term.
This, too, is amazing.
But what has happened to my candidate (i.e. the candidate I was picking to win, as opposed to the person I want to win): Man For All Seasons Mitt Romney?
It seems that all the other Republican candidates + everyone in the media simply loathe Romney. This was never a disqualification for public office in America, of course, but there are much stronger positions to start from. Whether Romney is finished we have yet to see. Perhaps we won't know the answer until his money runs out.
The self-arranged total eclipse of the revolting Rudy Guiliani has been pleasing to watch, and his efforts in the coming weeks to revive his dying campaign promise to be highly entertaining.
As for the buffoon Thompson, his departure begs the question: why did he bother? I rather doubt whether he knows himself.
From this distance the major question in my mind is the extent to which the entertainment values are grafted on. Yes, everything in America has to come with a coating of sugar (Have I told you about American bread? No? It is incredibly sweet; almost like cake. But I digress...) and a amateur band playing the works of Sousa, I do understand this. But is this also true of presidential elections? Are they ridiculous because those involved set out to make them so? Or do they start out sensibly and end as farce? Did Adlai Stevenson fail because he was too bland, and Nixon succeed because the electorate could see that he was palpably an angel of Satan, come to earth to steal, wreck and kill, and voted for him to see what the worst he could do would be like?
I think we should be told.
John McCain, born 29 August, 1936, would make an eminently suitable Republican Party candidate, and a frightful president: so awful, in fact, that Americans would lament the passing of George Bush. McCain is even older and more unpleasant than I am, if you can imagine this.
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David Harcourt
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Posted: 7 Feb 2008 08:33 pm |
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And then there were three: Clinton/Obama and McCain.
I hope Clinton wins. I have a feeling that the Obama miracle would run out of magic in a campaign against McCain, whereas if Obama drops out and liberal America unites behind Clinton McCain would be well beaten, despite the current polls.
But what do I know? Nearly a year ago I picked Romney to secure the Republican nomination and beat the Democratic candidate, whoever she/he might be.
Now it looks as if the Democrats will win. The extent to which they can fix the mess which is America in two four-year terms let alone one is debatable, but at least someone is going to have a try.
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