Right Side of the Rainbow

We incarcerate more people than any country in the world, including China, whose population is more than five and half times larger than ours:

For the first time in the nation’s history, more than one in 100 American adults is behind bars, according to a new report.

Nationwide, the prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it to almost 1.6 million. Another 723,000 people are in local jails. The number of American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1 adults is behind bars.

Incarceration rates are even higher for some groups. One in 36 Hispanic adults is behind bars, based on Justice Department figures for 2006. One in 15 black adults is, too, as is one in nine black men between the ages of 20 and 34.

Were there any credence to the notion that Barack Obama would ease off the drug war, we might for that reason alone give him a second look, because this liberty-killing shit needs to stop. But there isn’t.

Titled “One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008,” the report, from the Pew Center on the States, is available in pdf.

And why are so many Americans behind bars? In significant part, because of the drug war:

Simple drug possession convictions make up about 5% of the federal prison population and about 27% of the state prison population, according to the federal government’s own figures. Other nonviolent drug offenders were charged with nothing more than “sale or intent to sell” illegal intoxicants to willing buyers.

The legal system’s reach into American life — largely as a result of drug prohibition — extends even farther than the Pew Center figures would indicate. In Probation and Parole in the United States 2006 (PDF), the Justice Department revealed that “About 3.2% of the U.S. adult population, or 1 in every 31 adults, were incarcerated or on probation or parole at yearend 2006.”

That means that police, courts and prison authorities currently play a significant role in the lives of almost 1/3 of the adult population. And most of those unfortunate people are subject to loss of liberty and government supervision because they like to get high or want make a few bucks by helping other people get high. If their choice of “cocktails” were different, we’d call them bar patrons and bartenders. (Bold added; italics in original.)

Were there any credence to the notion that Barack Obama would ease off the drug war, we might for that reason alone give him a second look, because this liberty-killing shit needs to stop. But there isn’t.

Jeffrey Miron makes the case for legalization:

(HT: Megan McArdle)

Posted by Paul at 11:15 PM | Permalink

Prince Harry on patrol in Afghanistan: “I think my mum would be proud of me.”

Is it okay for an American to refer him to as ours? I hope so:

Prince Harry has been fighting the Taleban on the front line in Afghanistan, the MoD has confirmed.

Harry, 23, who is third in line to the throne, has spent the last 10 weeks serving in Helmand Province.

The prince joked about his nickname “the bullet magnet,” but said: “I finally get the chance to do the soldiering that I want to do.”

The deployment was subject to a news blackout deal, which broke down after being leaked by foreign media [read: Drudge!].

As third in line to the throne, Prince Harry is unlikely to ever be king, a mournful fact.

And now, his whereabouts made known, he must leave Afghanistan, before his presence there becomes a danger to others:

Emergency plans to extract Prince Harry from Afghanistan were being drawn up last night after the news leaked that he had been on a secret combat tour in Helmand province since before Christmas.

After being denied the chance to serve with his unit in Iraq, the third in line to the throne was deployed in Afghanistan in mid-December. He has been working in Helmand province as a Forward Air Controller - responsible for providing cover for frontline troops - and has been personally involved in clashes with Taleban guerrillas.

His four-month deployment had been kept secret because of a Ministry of Defence agreement with news organisations, including The Times, but the details can now be made public after the news leaked out overseas and on the internet.

A clip that had been embargoed, until now:

Posted by Paul at 9:15 PM | Permalink

For some, cleanliness is not next to godliness:

Health officials are having crisis talks with Muslim medical staff who have objected to hospital hygiene rules because of religious beliefs.

Medics in hospitals in at least three major English cities have refused to follow the regulations aimed at helping tackle superbugs because of their faith, it has been revealed.

Women medical students at Alder Hey children’s hospital in Liverpool objected to rolling up their sleeves when washing their hands and removing arm coverings in theatre, claiming it is regarded as immodest.

“Crisis talks.” Don’t you love that? How about “get-your-shit-and-get-out” talks? Any of those in the offing? Well, maybe:

Some students have said that they would prefer to quit the course rather than expose their arms, but hygiene experts said no exceptions should be made on religious grounds.

Okay, then. Ever thought about driving a cab? You can ride around for hours and let that shit ferment in all those crevices. Give it a day or two and you might even get a little cheese going …

Posted by Paul at 12:15 AM | Permalink

If McCain promises to carpet bomb Iran with Hagee’s larded ass, I might reconsider:

Senator John McCain got support on Wednesday from an important corner of evangelical Texas when the pastor of a San Antonio mega-church, Rev. John C. Hagee, endorsed Mr. McCain for president. Mr. Hagee, who argues that the United States must join Israel in a preemptive, biblically prophesized military strike against Iran that will lead to the second coming of Christ, praised Mr. McCain for his pro-Israel views.

[…]

Mr. McCain, who has been on a steady search for support among conservative and evangelical leaders who have long distrusted him, said he was “very honored” by Mr. Hagee’s endorsement. Asked about Mr. Hagee’s extensive writings on Armageddon and about what one questioner said was Mr. Hagee’s belief that the anti-Christ will be the head of the European Union, Mr. McCain responded that “all I can tell you is that I am very proud to have Pastor John Hagee’s support.”

“You do what you do,” Hagee says, “because you are what you are.” Does that mean Hagee’s a cow?

Posted by Paul at 11:40 PM | Permalink

“Government spending on health care could nearly double by 2017 to more than $2 trillion, according to a new federal study, reflecting a surge that promises to complicate the campaign debate about health care,” the Wall Street Journal reports:

Driven by the aging of the baby-boom generation and rising costs of new drugs and medical technology, Medicare, the big federal health program for the elderly, will take up 20.7% of national health spending by 2017, according to the report.

Overall, the report projects health-care spending in the U.S. will hit $4.3 trillion by 2017, nearly double the 2007 amount. That would equate to nearly 20% of gross domestic product. In 2007, health-care spending accounted for 16.3% of GDP, according to the study. But more of that cost is expected to shift to government agencies — even as the federal government struggles to shrink huge deficits.

Your taxes will skyrocket. According to Michael Cannon, Cato’s director of health policy studies, “Even if we were to start immediately, it would require a tax increase equal to 25 percent of wages.”

Mr. Cannon wrote those words in April 2006, almost two years ago. Presumably, the tax increase would be even higher today — and we’re not starting today, either.

Do we have any other reason to take special note of the year 2017? We do:

Social Security spending will exceed projected tax collections in 2017. These deficits will quickly balloon to alarming proportions.

[…]

The billions that go to Social Security each year will make it harder to find money for other government programs or require large and growing tax increases.

You have nine years until it all goes sideways. Live them well.

Posted by Paul at 10:30 PM | Permalink

He died at home while working in his study. He was 82.

ADDED —

New York Times:

Mr. Buckley’s greatest achievement was making conservatism — not just electoral Republicanism, but conservatism as a system of ideas — respectable in liberal post-World War II America. He mobilized the young enthusiasts who helped nominate Barry Goldwater in 1964, and saw his dreams fulfilled when Reagan and the Bushes captured the Oval Office.

To Mr. Buckley’s enormous delight, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., the historian, termed him “the scourge of liberalism.”

Posted by Paul at 11:00 AM | Permalink

This is appalling:

The case of a Christian photographer who refused to photograph a same-sex “commitment ceremony” was heard before the New Mexico Human Rights Division on Monday.

A same-sex couple asked Elaine Huguenin, co-owner with her husband of Elane Photography, to photograph a “commitment ceremony” that the two women wanted to hold. Huguenin declined because her Christian beliefs are in conflict with the message communicated by the ceremony.

The same-sex couple filed a complaint with the New Mexico Human Rights Division, which is now trying Elane Photography under state antidiscrimination laws for sexual orientation discrimination.

If the commission construes New Mexico law to compel Ms. Huguenin’s performance of an act that conflicts with her religious beliefs, then the law is arguably inconsistent with the First Amendment as interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court. See Hurley v. Irish-American Gay Group of Boston, 515 U.S. 557 (1995), and Boy Scouts of America v. Dale, 530 U.S. 630 (2000).

In any event, such compulsion would be inconsistent with Ms. Huguenin’s right to be left alone. I hope she prevails.

Posted by Paul at 11:55 PM | Permalink

We just thought Mama had laid it down. But no, no, baby: That bitch is back! Hahahaha!

Posted by Paul at 9:00 PM | Permalink

BUMPED —

A PhD candidate at Stony Brook University is taking a survey. If you’d like to participate, click here.

Posted by Paul at 6:00 AM | Permalink

Judith Hope, friend and confidant to Hillary Clinton, on Mrs. Clinton’s understanding of the campaign:

“That said, she knows that there will be an end,” Ms. Hope said. “She is a very smart woman.”

Do you have to be smart, much less very smart, to know that the campaign will end? In fact, couldn’t you be an idiot and know it?

Posted by Paul at 12:45 AM | Permalink

Let’s hope so:

From Arizona to Oregon and east to Kentucky, county sheriffs are bracing for stiff cuts in a federal funding program that has helped them battle drug cartels.

Congress in January cut funding for the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant by two-thirds, from $520 million to $170 million for fiscal 2008. Local agencies say that’s a threat to the officers who do much of the law enforcement spadework.

Good. Maybe we’ll see less of this:

Best-known is a case in Tulia, Texas, where a 1999 Byrne-funded investigation led to the cocaine arrests of 46 people, most of them black, on evidence so flimsy that 38 were pardoned by Gov. Rick Perry in 2003. The undercover agent responsible for the arrests was convicted of perjury and the defendants got a $5 million settlement from the state.

Posted by Paul at 4:50 PM | Permalink

So says a member of Israel’s parliament.

Posted by Paul at 1:35 PM | Permalink

But it’s okay. Mama did it only because she loves you. She’ll be fine.

Posted by Paul at 11:35 PM | Permalink

The irony is delightful, even exhilarating.

Back when his campaign had fallen and couldn’t get up, McVain applied for millions in public aid. But now that he can raise cash aplenty by stoking conservative anger at the New York Times, he wants out of the public financing system. What’s more, he says that opting out is … wait for it … his constitutional right!

He-he.

Remember: According to McVain, you don’t have a constitutional right to even mention the gawd damn name of a sitting member of Congress in the sixty days before an election, lest you say something to pollute the sweet purity of our ruling class. And yet he has a right to game the system whenever it suits him. What a hair hole!

But — and hallelujah! — the Federal Election Commission has told him to grab some ankle, and prepare to get fucked all up in that tired ass:

The nation’s top federal election official told Sen. John McCain yesterday that he cannot immediately withdraw from the presidential public financing system as he had requested, a decision that threatens to dramatically restrict his spending until the general election campaign begins in the fall.

The prospect of being financially hamstrung by the very fundraising system he helped create is the latest in a series of bitter challenges for the presumed GOP nominee, who still faces a fractured conservative coalition as he assumes the mantle of party leadership.

By nursing on your tit, McVain agreed to “an overall limit on spending of $54 million for the primary season, which lasts until the party’s nominating convention in September.” He’s spent $49 million already:

Knowingly violating the spending limit is a criminal offense that could put McCain at risk of stiff fines and up to five years in prison.

“If in fact he is stuck with these spending limits, it would be a serious limitation on what he can do,” said Rick Hasen, an election law expert at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

Finance experts compared the situation to the massive imbalance faced by Republican presidential nominee Robert J. Dole in 1996, when he was forced to contend with spending limits while his opponent, President Bill Clinton, was not. (Emphasis added.)

Do you think that’s the only similarity between Dole and McVain? Me neither.

ADDED —

I’m not the only one who’s taking pleasure in McVain’s comeuppance.

Posted by Paul at 10:50 PM | Permalink

Part 1:

Part 2:

Posted by Paul at 9:10 PM | Permalink

Near the end of tonight’s Democratic debate in Austin, Hillary signaled that when she goes down, she’ll go gracefully, and not raucously, as her campaign has led us to believe.

Ironically, had she shown this side of herself more often, she might not be going down.

ADDED —

Marc Ambinder:

This was the night where we all learned that Hillary Clinton understands the moment in history we are in, and that she is smart enough and gracious enough to realize that her party is more important than personal vanity, that there are things she just cannot say about Obama because it would hurt him in the fall, and that more likely than not, she will not win the nomination.

Posted by Paul at 9:55 PM | Permalink

Michael Grunwald is a riot:

Barack Obama beat Hillary Clinton for the ninth and tenth straight time last night, with blowouts in Wisconsin and Hawaii. Needless to say, this means nothing. As Clinton strategist Mark Penn explained yesterday, Wisconsin has a lot of independent voters, so it doesn’t really matter. And Hawaii is practically Obama’s home state, so it obviously doesn’t matter. Anyway, as Penn said recently, “winning Democratic primaries is not a qualification or a sign of who can win the general election.” It’s apparently not even a sign of who can win the Democratic nomination — at least not when the victories are Obama’s.

Enjoy it all.

Posted by Paul at 11:00 PM | Permalink

Her remarks Wednesday were not a clarification of her remarks Monday, but rather a disingenuous recasting of them:

Michelle Obama said Wednesday she has always loved America, seeking to quell the firestorm over her comment earlier in the week that seemed to suggest she is only now proud to be an American.

“What I was clearly talking about is that I am proud in how Americans are engaging in the political process,” Michelle Obama told CNN affiliate WJAR after a campaign event in Providence, Rhode Island.

Uh, no. Here’s what she said when she was telling the truth about her feelings:

On Monday, Michelle Obama told the crowd at a campaign event that “for the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country, because it feels like hope is making a comeback … not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change.” (Emphasis added.)

As Ed Morrissey notes, “That’s simply not a parsable message:”

How can one live as an adult and not take great pride in [our country’s] accomplishments? One has to start from a perspective that sees America as a malevolent force, a viewpoint typical of the hard Left. No matter what good America does, they see the nation as shameful because of its lack of perfection. And they want to gain power so that they can impose the solutions for these perceived imperfections in a top-down, autocratic manner.

Barack Obama knows that he has to push back against this comment, not because Michelle Obama got misunderstood, but because it reveals so much about the Obamas.

Indeed it does. Again, Michelle Obama:

Barack Obama will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed.

Message: Your life is not your own. You are the property of the state.

Posted by Paul at 10:30 PM | Permalink

This “conversation” is over.

He didn’t just win the state by fifteen points, which qualifies as a landslide. He ate into Hillary’s base.

Even before tonight, the two were in a statistical dead heat in Texas.

Question: How does Mama recover from this? Answer: She doesn’t.

ADDED —

Can we scrutinize Obama’s rhetoric now? Yes, we can:

A favorite Obama line is that he will tell “the American people not just what they want to hear, but what we need to know.” Well, he hasn’t so far.

Consider the retiring baby boomers. A truth-telling Obama might say: “Spending for retirees — mainly Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — is already nearly half the federal budget. Unless we curb these rising costs, we will crush our children with higher taxes. Reflecting longer life expectancies, we should gradually raise the eligibility ages for these programs and trim benefits for wealthier retirees. Both Democrats and Republicans are to blame for inaction. Waiting longer will only worsen the problem.”

Instead, Obama pledges not to raise the retirement age and to “protect Social Security benefits for current and future beneficiaries.” This isn’t “change”; it’s sanctification of the status quo. He would also exempt all retirees making less than $50,000 annually from income tax. By his math, that would provide average tax relief of $1,400 to 7 million retirees — shifting more of the tax burden onto younger workers. (Emphasis added.)

Posted by Paul at 10:30 PM | Permalink

Mickey Kaus on Michelle Obama:

If Michelle Obama’s default position is set to “Aggrieved,” it also suggests something personal, no? Maybe, like many strong wives, she wonders why her husband is the one on the top of the family ticket—which might also explain her strange occasional habit of belittling him in public.

Michelle Obama rubs a lot of people the wrong way, and these solipsistic remarks are one example why. Her husband would do well to shut her up.

By the way, what is it with the Democrats and their spouses?

Posted by Paul at 12:40 AM | Permalink

Obama backer Robert Holeman, on Bill and Hillary Clinton:

He had eight years to do what he was supposed to do. All the things he said that she’s gonna do, he had the same authority that he wants her to have. Now if one Clinton, the male Clinton can’t get it done, how is Ms. Clinton [going to]? (Emphasis added.)

ADDED —

Innocent remarks, or an insinuation that when Hillary is riding the white pony, she’s an unstable bitch?†

†Although Mrs. Clinton is 60 and therefore presumably post-menopausal, Obama’s allusion, if it is an allusion, is not to the physiologically technical.

Posted by Paul at 6:30 PM | Permalink

Terry Michael, a self-described libertarian Democrat and a former press secretary for the Democratic National Committee, on Hillary Clinton’s exploitation of race:

Stipulated, I am a partisan of my fellow Illinoisan Obama, who I believe is transcending race in this campaign.

But, putting on my media critic hat, I would urge those whose business it is to interpret our politics, the press corps, to carefully observe how Clinton Inc. plays the “brown-black” race card as the campaign moves toward Texas. That extra scrutiny was earned by trash talk from the Supreme and Un-Fireable Manager of Clinton Inc. (our “first black president”) between Iowa and South Carolina.

All of this could have been predicted for a political party (I lament it is mine) that has been playing identity politics with a vengeance for the past several decades.

With an unfortunate focus on granting entitlements based on tribal affinity rather than celebrating the rights, liberties and personal responsibilities of individuals in a pluralistic democracy, strengthened by civic cultural assimilation, we Democrats have been courting racialist warfare for a long time.

As I tell my students, if you want to end race consciousness in America, stop being race conscious.

Posted by Paul at 3:35 PM | Permalink

You will be assimilated.

Resistance is futile:

A top Hillary Clinton adviser on Saturday boldly predicted his candidate would lock down the nomination before the August convention by definitively winning over party insiders and officials known as superdelegates, claiming the number of state elections won by rival Barack Obama would be “irrelevant” to their decision. (Emphasis added.)

Meanwhile, the number of votes cast for Obama in New York’s Democratic primary appears to have been “understated:”

Black voters are heavily represented in the 94th Election District … Yet according to the unofficial results from the New York Democratic primary last week, not a single vote in the district was cast for Senator Barack Obama.

That anomaly was not unique. In fact, a review by The New York Times of the unofficial results reported on primary night found about 80 election districts among the city’s 6,106 where Mr. Obama supposedly did not receive even one vote …

Posted by Paul at 9:35 PM | Permalink

Here’s my question: Instead of calling for water, why doesn’t the Messiah lay on hands? After all, anybody can call for water. But only the Messiah can revive you with his touch.

Also, if he can raise Heath Ledger from the dead, I will vote for him.

Posted by Paul at 4:15 PM | Permalink

As Gallup notes, “preferences on this question can shift substantially in the course of an election year,” and shift they must if Republicans are to avoid heart-stopping losses.

Posted by Paul at 3:30 PM | Permalink

Posted by Paul at 1:25 AM | Permalink

Hugh Hewitt, conservative blogger:

Senator Obama is part of the left’s political elite that believes the U.S. is the problem, and that the U.S. government is not to be trusted to treat its citizens fairly or to use intelligence tools responsibly or act against terrorists prudently. (Emphasis added.)

Isn’t it a tenet of conservatism that, indeed, government is not to be trusted, especially with extraordinary powers?

I support renewal of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Protect America Act [Fixed. —Ed.], and I’m not defending Obama’s policy views. But the charge that a man is reluctant to trust government is usually one that’s leveled at conservatives, not by them.

(True, Obama’s reluctance is selective. But that doesn’t undermine my point.)

Posted by Paul at 1:15 AM | Permalink

Mark Penn, chief strategist for Hillary Clinton:

Could we possibly have a nominee who hasn’t won any of the significant states — outside of Illinois? That raises some serious questions about Sen. Obama.

What serious questions does it raise? Is Penn suggesting that, as the Democratic nominee, Obama wouldn’t carry New York and California in the general election? If so, that’s risible. If not, what is he suggesting? Does he even know?

Among other things, political strategists are paid to spin convincingly. Mrs. Clinton’s campaign has paid Mark Penn’s firm more than $4.3 million. She’s entitled to at least a partial refund.

Posted by Paul at 6:20 PM | Permalink

If this is the best creative work that even gay men can do for her, then we know why Hillary’s campaign is all but over. To borrow a line from the Matrix, “Nothing this weak is meant to survive.”

HT: Hot Air

Posted by Paul at 11:00 PM | Permalink

Don’t scoff. In Texas, our dead do have a history of voting.

Posted by Paul at 6:00 PM | Permalink

With the GOP’s presidential nominating contest effectively over, Republicans in Texas may decide to freelance, and for good reason.

Posted by Paul at 12:30 AM | Permalink

The Glacier melts:

Hillary Clinton’s most senior advisers are in a state of “panic” about her presidential prospects and are plotting to enlist Democrat leaders in Congress to thwart her rival Barack Obama’s ambitions.

The Clinton camp is braced for Mr Obama to win a series of primary elections over the next three weeks, which they fear could hand the Illinois senator unstoppable momentum in the race for the White House.

Meanwhile, Frank Rich describes Clinton as “a once-invincible candidate” who’s been “crippled by poll-tested corporate packaging that markets her as a synthetic product leeched of most human qualities.”

Posted by Paul at 2:15 PM | Permalink

Mike Huckabee delivered two embarrassing defeats Saturday to presumptive Republican nominee John McCain.

NO NEED TO WAKE HIM: Barack Obama will be in the White House before John McCain rouses from his nap.

Huckabee won the GOP’s presidential caucus in Kansas and its primary in Louisiana, and trailed McCain in the caucus in Washington by a scant 242 votes, with 87% of the votes counted.

Meanwhile, “… Mitt Romney narrowly beat John McCain, 35 to 34 percent, in a straw poll of conservative political activists gathered Saturday in Washington …” Romney, it must be noted, is no longer a candidate for president.

McCain is certain to win the Republican nomination. He holds such a commanding lead in the race for delegates that it’s almost mathematically impossible for Huckabee to overtake him. But as his pitiful showing Saturday demonstrates, McCain is a divider, not a uniter.

Some conservatives will never vote for John McCain, while others, perhaps most, will vote for him only reluctantly. And of those, you have to wonder how many will write a check to, or volunteer for, the Bullshit Express.

Having wisely decided to opt out of the public financing system, Barback Obama will face no shortage of cash. He won’t be short of volunteers, either.

I like Obama’s chances.

Posted by Paul at 6:00 AM | Permalink

A majority of Congress filed a brief Friday urging the U.S. Supreme Court to invalidate the District of Columbia’s ban on handguns.

Joined by Vice President Dick Cheney, 55 senators and 250 representatives told the court that “Congress has a long history of protecting the right of the people to keep and bear arms. Like the rest of the Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment was proposed to the States by the Congress in 1789. On several occasions, in different epochs of American history, the Congress enacted statutory texts which explicitly declared its understanding of the Second Amendment as guaranteeing fundamental, individual rights.”

Along with a majority of Republicans in both chambers, sixty-eight Democrats in the House and nine in the Senate signed on to the brief:

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Tex.), who led the effort to file the friend-of-the-court brief, said her staff could not find another instance in which such a large portion of Congress had taken a position on an issue before the court.

“This court should give due deference to the repeated findings over different historical epochs by Congress, a co-equal branch of government, that the amendment guarantees the personal right to possess firearms,” their brief contends.

The court will hear argument in District of Columbia v. Heller on March 18.

Posted by Paul at 10:45 PM | Permalink

Mitt Romney announced Thursday that he was withdrawing from the race for the Republican presidential nomination.

Had he shown as much heart on the campaign trail as he showed when announcing his decision to step aside, Romney could have avoided defeat, and Republicans could have avoided a cluster fuck. Still, he left gracefully, and he’s well-positioned for 2012.

For those conservatives willing to regroup behind McCain, the question now is whether to fundraise for Hillary. She needs the money, and McCain needs for her to win the Democratic nomination — unless, of course, McCain seeks the Democratic nomination for himself. (See the text on the screen capture below.)

Questions presented:

• Before McCain can persuade conservatives to rally to him, doesn’t he have to persuade them to stop booing?

• Should McCain eat his vegetables, or has he filled up on the recommended daily allowance of tepid support?

My position is that I will still vote for McCain if he is our candidate.

But it’s hard to ignore the fact that the man has a history of financial scandal; has said the Bush tax cuts benefitted the wealthy at the expense of the middle class; has derided Sam Alito as too openly conservative; has supported amnesty for illegal immigrants (and then lied about it); has said that we shouldn’t drill in ANWR because it’s “pristine;” has misrepresented the positions of Republican candidates; wants to close Guantanamo; has spoken of sending “greedy people on Wall Street” to jail for their roles in giving subprime loans; has been endorsed by the New York Times; supports blatantly unconstitutional limits on free speech; and is hated by Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, and Michelle Malkin …

That sounds like the ideal candidate for one of the parties — just not the one called “Republican.”

If you think libertarian conservatives have been unforgiving of McCain, consider Christian conservative leader James Dobson: He wants to tack the man to a cross.

Posted by Paul at 12:45 AM | Permalink

No, really:

“Part of me was thinking it does sound stupid enough to be true,” said Amy Carlton, who had serious doubts but went ahead and voted anyway.

You won’t be surprised to learn that her vote, among others, was not counted.

Posted by Paul at 9:45 PM | Permalink

Congressional Quarterly:

Democratic voters’ strong enthusiasm for their presidential contenders led to record-high numbers of primary and caucus participants for the party on Super Tuesday, while Republicans saw a spotty mix of increases and dropoffs for their own party’s presidential nominating contests.

Questions presented:

• Come November, how many of these 8.9 million Republicans won’t show up for John McCain?

• Assume that Romney and Huckabee presently quit. Shouldn’t McCain encourage his supporters to crossover and vote for Hillary in the remaining Democratic primaries, to salvage her nomination and his viability?

• If you’re a McCain-loathing Republican, shouldn’t you also crossover, but for Obama? And don’t Obama’s eager but clueless supporters need the help anyway?

Posted by Paul at 8:35 PM | Permalink

Democratic turnout outpaced Republican turnout by 2-1. And that’s before counting California.

ADDED —

I thought California might break 3 to 1 Democratic, but it did not. It was 2 to 1 Democratic. I’ll post turnout detail later.

Posted by Paul at 11:35 PM | Permalink

See all top ten ads.

Posted by Paul at 11:55 PM | Permalink

Yeah, I’ll vote for John McCain — when the pope becomes a Protestant.

Hawkins’ best argument is that the new president will probably make at least two Supreme Court appointments:

That means a number of important cases, including Roe v. Wade, will probably be decided once and for all by the Supreme Court appointments of the next President of the United States. May God forgive us if we condemn a million plus children a year to death by abortion because we’re angry at John McCain.

Roe has been decided. It was decided 34 years ago, in 1973. No motion for rehearing is on the court’s docket.

How does Hawkins know that McCain would appoint justices who would vote to reverse Roe? He doesn’t know. He assumes.

McCain himself can’t know how his appointees would vote. For both ethical and political reasons, no nominee can say. And with Senate Democrats in the majority, rejection awaits any nominee who’s even suspect on Roe.

Hawkins also assumes that the court already has four votes for upending Roe. But no one knows how Roberts or Alito would vote. Even conservative justices might be reluctant to overturn a bad precedent that’s more than three decades old. Legal conservatives value stability in the law.

And Hawkins is just wrong when he suggests that overturning Roe would prevent a million abortions a year. The question of abortion rights would simply return to the states, many of which are pro-choice. (Do you think California, New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and Massachusetts, among others, are going to ban abortion? If so, get help.)

Next, and astonishingly, Hawkins cites immigration reform (!) as a reason to vote for McCain:

… we know McCain is just dying to put the illegal immigrants in this country on a path to citizenship. However, he has pledged to secure the border before he does that.

Well, if he’s pledged …

As recently as last week, McCain indicated he’d sign a replica of McCain-Kennedy, the “amnesty” bill that doesn’t secure the border first, and that a new, more heavily Democratic Congress would look upon favorably.†

Hawkins closes with pablum. He says a President Clinton or a President Obama would, among other things, allow “Al-Qaeda to run wild.” Wild, I tell you! Wild! What does that even mean? Are we suppose to believe that if Islamic militants fly another jetliner into an architectural landmark, killing thousands, that Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Obama would just shrug?

Republicans in Congress — the ones left after the election, that is — will resist the liberal initiatives of a Democratic president. But they will either acquiesce to, or be divided and demoralized by, the liberal initiatives of a Republican one. As David Frum put it, “[McCain is] not interested in the project of saving conservatism and the Republican Party. He is really trying to build a personal movement with the Republican Party as its vehicle.”

For years conservatives have railed against John McCain’s numerous and grievous betrayals. If we nevertheless support him with our votes, we’re telling him, and every other Republican politician, that such behavior carries no penalty.

America has had Democratic presidents before. She even waged war and prospered under a few, and she survived all. She will survive the next one.

† It isn’t amnesty if they pay a fine, and we’re not going to deport millions. But before regularizing people who are here illegally, we must secure the border. His own statements suggest John McCain cannot be trusted to do that.

Posted by Paul at 6:00 AM | Permalink

If you’re a disaffected Republican looking for a reason to vote for Clinton or Obama, Newsweek provides it: John McCain is psychologically unstable.

Posted by Paul at 1:10 PM | Permalink

Good luck.

ADDED —

Let’s review the theory of the two electorates.

If you read this or any political blog, or watch political programming on cable, you belong to the informed electorate, one of two electorates in America. The informed electorate is a minority.

Most voters belong to the other electorate, the vast electorate, and have only a shallow knowledge of politics. These voters don’t look up to see what’s happening until a few days before the election. Their understanding of the candidates and the issues is necessarily superficial.

When the vast electorate goes to the polls on Super Tuesday, it will have tuned in just long enough to see John McCain receiving major endorsements and favorable media coverage. The benighted voter may rely upon these signals in making his selection.†

Among the informed electorate, i.e., people familiar with his execrable record and malignant personality, John McCain is almost universally despised.

That’s not true of Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani, or Mike Huckabee. It’s true only of John McCain.

If the Republican presidential nomination was decided by the informed electorate only, McCain would have never even been a viable candidate. But that’s not how our democracy works, which is why Don Surber is right: It’s over.

†According to the exit poll, 43% of Floridians said Gov. Charlie Crist’s eleventh-hour endorsement of McCain was important to their decision.

Posted by Paul at 9:15 PM | Permalink

Newsweek: “Some prominent Republicans have caught Obama fever.”

Posted by Paul at 2:55 PM | Permalink

With John McCain’s lock on the GOP nomination now only hours away, the reactor leak on the right begins:

Though I will never vote for John McCain, I don’t plan to vote for Clinton or Obama either — unless McCain picks Huckabee as his running mate. That would unhinge me.

But Hillary isn’t as awful as some center-right Republicans make her about to be. Like McCain, she holds many policy views that conservatives abhor. But you can’t fairly conclude that she would fail to protect our security interests.

Posted by Paul at 1:35 PM | Permalink

Not that I expect any answers …

Posted by Paul at 5:45 PM | Permalink