I don't know whether I should be encouraged or frightened by the fact that the President and I have the same final four (in my non-risky bracket):

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/09/03/18/March-Madness-At-the-White-House/

Here's hoping we both win big so Jay Kelly can get demolished in our bracket pool. YES WE CAN!

Those of you who have been following the epic takedown of CNBC by The Daily Show host Jon Stewart probably saw this last night, but if you haven't, please consider the following:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/03/stewart-destroys-cnbc-cramer-calls.html

This all started with Stewart's criticism of CNBC analyst Rick Santelli, who criticized bailing out "irresponsible" home-owners who might lose their houses, presumably on the grounds that they could have easily avoided their predicament had they been more careful and/or less greedy. I don't own a home, so I don't really care what Rick Santelli thinks, but if I was taking criticism from some douchebag who probably made a shitload of money on the stock market right before my 401k hit the skids, I imagine my response would be somewhere along the lines of "Go fuck yourself."

Stewart is dead on here, as per the usual. These people got rich, mostly off our 401k(s), mortgages, and insurance policies, and managed to skate on it while we got the biggest (ongoing) financial screw-job in two generations. If heads don't roll on Wall Street before this is all over, we should all be pretty displeased with the the SEC, the Treasury, the Justice Department, and the President.

Though I know most of the country (if not the world) is still seeing things through Obama-tinted glasses, I have to admit that I'm not impressed with the new President's work so far. Call me a heretic if you must. I'll concede that he probably has a larger strategy in mind, but things don't appear to be skillfully handled so far.

Though a certain amount of GOP wagon-circling was expected after such a sound defeat in both the Congressional and Presidential elections, the new administration has basically allowed the minority to dictate terms on the stimulus package in the Senate, and has also been dealt three different (though perhaps slight) body blows with the failed Richardson, Daschle, and Killefer appointments, after having dodged a bullet when Secretary Geithner was confirmed despite his own tax problems.

House Minority Leader Boehner and Congressman Cantor managed to whip up enough "Nay" votes in the House to make sure that no Republican voted for the stimulus package despite the President's encouragement of bipartisanship, and most of the stories written since have been about how the $819 billion package that passed the House is loaded with useless pork projects and much lighter on actual stimulus. ($142 billion for Hollywood?! Really?!) Sen. McConnell has gladly accepted the role of watchdog over the Senate's version of the bill, and to be honest, I don't really disagree with his criticisms. Though I consider myself more fiscally conservative than most Democrats, that should still say something.

So, it would appear that the Obama administration is off to a rough start, but allow me an opportunity to give it a more charitable interpretation, if you will. First, the appointments are bad news, but my guess is that they wanted Geithner more than the other three combined, and so a deal was struck to get him confirmed. Every rich person in America (and especially Washington) has unpaid taxes on something, and it's an easy target to drum up public anger, especially in a time of economic woe. For Sec. Geithner to get confirmed, others had to go.

As for the stimulus, something is going to pass, it's going to be huge and it will have bipartisan support, because the public is now firmly behind some kind of major spending to help end the recession, and we like the idea of spending it on stuff like health care, roads, energy, and tax cuts. Here's what I think might be going on:

1. The administration knew the first (crappy) bill would pass the House without any Republican support regardless, so they let the GOP House delegation look good by not supporting it.
2. They also knew the Senate version would face much more scrutiny, and wouldn't even come to a vote without at least a handful of GOP votes, so they allow the minority to look good by taking out all the BS nobody really liked, and pare down the bill by a couple hundred billion that the administration didn't want to spend anyway. In the end, the Senate bill will be much closer to what the administration really wanted, and once it passes, it will sail through the House no problem.
3. When the stimulus package passes, President Obama has in his back pocket that he let the GOP hammer him on the stimulus so they didn't look too terrible right after getting owned in the election, so when it comes time to pass his health care or education plan, not only do they not have to deal with Sen. Daschle (since his confirmation was sacrificed), but the President can cash in a favor to get the 3-5 moderate GOP votes he might need in the Senate to get cloture and avoid a filibuster.

Of course, I could be dead wrong about all of this, but I needed some time to think out loud and rationalize why the process was playing out in this way. Here's hoping there's a much larger strategy to it all.

Anyone who loves March Madness on CBS will appreciate this:



It's too bad that the speech today as no chance of living up to its expectations, but it still should be pretty awesome compared to what we've seen over the last 40-50 years. Bring it on, Big O.

FiveThirtyEight.com, still going strong, has a scoop on one of your favorite TV hosts:

Chris Matthews will run as a Democrat for a Pennsylvania Senate seat in 2010.

As noted in the article, this is Sen. Specter's seat currently.  If he were to decide to run against Matthews for re-election, he would be 80 at the time, so there's at least a decent chance he'll retire.

For the record, I wish it was Russert instead.

There are so many snarky comments I could make about this, but most of all, I'm just disappointed (and more than a little scared). Anyway, this speaks for itself:

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2008/11/10/dnt.ok.no.obama.newspaper.kjrh

This is more for me than you, since I want to have a better written record of what foolish things I thought and said about the election, but those of you not fortunate enough to be following me on Twitter the other night can follow the cut and read all my (random, rambling) thoughts as the night progressed.

START AT THE BOTTOM AND SCROLL UP:

( All aTwitter over the 2008 election... )

A nice clip from one of my favorite media guys, Fareed Zakaria:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/11/07/zakaria.electionresults/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

I am so proud of my country tonight.  After the last two elections, when it seemed like democracy itself was becoming a rare thing in the one place where it should be treasured above all else, we managed to come together and elect the best candidate, the right candidate, Barack Obama to the Presidency of the United States.

The McCain campaign, in it's waning days, tried to scare voters with the question "Who is Barack Obama?"  The answer to that question, Senator, is that Barack Obama is the President-Elect of the United States of America.  He is the first African-American man to be elected to the greatest office in the history of the world.  He is Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr.  He is Robert F. Kennedy, and his brother John.  He is Frederick Douglass, and he is Edward R. Murrow.  He is every community organizer, every union leader, every teacher who worked an 80 hour week for $20,000 a year.  He is the soldiers and sailors who put their lives on the line every day on behalf of an ideal that is bigger and stronger than the fear that intimidates us in our darkest moments.

He is my family, my friends, and my party members.  He is you, and he is me. 

Barack Obama is all of us, and he is the next President of the United States of America.

OHIO DECIDES ANOTHER PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, THIS TIME FOR THE GOOD GUYS!

YES

WE

DID!

This election is over.  Barack Obama will go to bed tonight the President-Elect of these United States.

I can't believe we did it!

Let me be the first to say this, since I'm not sure anyone else has just yet:

If the Democrats retain control of the Senate (which it appears they will), I think they should strongly consider making Sen. Clinton the Majority Leader.  Not that Sen. Reid has done a bad job (and I prefer him to the Speaker, in all honesty), but I think it fits the "Change" motif to have new leadership in Congress, at least at the top.

There, I said it.

Neglecting to disclose whether or not she voted for convicted felon (and Senator) Ted Stevens, Gov. Palin talks about the election and her future:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/11/04/palin-discusses-her-future/

Nice quote:

“I am also exercising my right to privacy, and I don't have to tell anybody who I vote for, nobody does, and that’s really cool about America also,” she said.

Savoring her final solo appearance as a vice presidential candidate, Palin lingered for several minutes in front of local and national media, taking question after question despite multiple attempts by her staff to end the press conference.

But Governor, I thought that you "Strict Constitutionalists" didn't believe in the right to privacy, since after all, there's no right to this supposed "privacy" spelled out in the Bill of Rights.  I thought that the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 9th and 10th Amendments talked about very specific things and did not leave room for lofty ideas like a right to privacy, after all, Justices Thomas, Scalia, Alito, and Chief Justice Roberts all told me so during their confirmation processes.

It is, after all, that mythical right to privacy that forms the backbone of the misguided left-wing argument the Supreme Court gave in Roe v. Wade, that deplorable, awful, sinful, and godless decision that has thrust our country into the depths of immorality, and which you strict constitutionalists hope to overturn just as soon as the most recent ballot issue in South Dakota is passed and eventually challenged in front of the Supreme Court.

No no, Governor, there's no privacy here, not when the government can tap your phone without getting a warrant or letting you know, and yes, they promise they'll only do it when it's definitely justified.  Privacy is for terrorists and people who have something to hide.  And as we all know, if you've got something you want to keep from the government, you must have done something wrong.

My hope, Governor, is that tomorrow morning you wake up with a whole lot more privacy, that you wake up still the Governor of Alaska, but that's it.  My hope is that the majority of this country demonstrates that they do not support your half-cooked notions on the Constitution and public policy.  My hope is that you remain a punchline and nothing more.

I may be completely wrong about this, but I think the turnout and influence of my generation is going to be significantly underestimated when the day's voting is completed. Let me give you a few reasons why:

1. Al Gore is our guy now, but he mostly wasn't in 2000.  President Clinton was Generation X's candidate, and Vice President Gore's campaign was so closely associated to all things Clinton that those of us who grew up in the 1990s and didn't really understand the efficiencies of the Clinton administration at the time never really bought in to adopting Gore as our candidate.  It definitely didn't help that he selected Sen. Lieberman to be his running mate, since no one outside of DC and Connecticut under the age of 50 knew who he was.  The youth vote simply wasn't interested in Al Gore.

2. That goes double for John Kerry in 2004.  What does a 18-29 year old care about a middle-aged rich Senator from Massachusetts who windsurfs?  They at least tried to reach out by grabbing Sen. Edwards for the VP spot, but he was so god awful in that role that it ended up being a wash.  The DNC complained about the youth vote, but you can't blame young voters too much for not supporting a candidate who doesn't speak to any of their values.

3. Young people hate George Bush.  In 2000, they just didn't know him yet.  In 2004, many of them had come around, but the war was still up in the air, and Sen. Kerry didn't inspire them.  I don't have numbers on Pres. Bush's unfavorables among the 18-29 demographic, but I think it's fair to assume that they are higher than the average (though that's not saying much at this point, considering how high the unfavorables are).

4. Sen. McCain has largely failed to entice younger voters.  As had been said ad nauseam, the nomination of Gov. Palin for the Vice Presidency was directly aimed at the base of the Republican Party who came out in droves for Pres. Bush in 2000 and 2004, with the hope of repeating that process.  The net gain of young voters due to that is marginal at best, since most if not all of those voters would either have supported Sen. McCain anyway (for 'values' or national security reasons), or not voted.  Outside of (maybe) Gov. Palin's nomination, I can't think of anything Sen. McCain has done to capture the interest of younger voters.  In large part, they gave up.

5. Sen. Obama's campaign brought in HUGE numbers during the primaries, which younger voters tend to avoid.  Check this out:

http://www.blog.rockthevote.com/Young%20Voter%20Primary%20Turnout%202008.pdf

That's a 109% increase in youth voter turn out (Both GOP and Dem) in this year's primaries over 2004 in the states which have data for both.  Democratic youth voter turnout increased in every single primary state for which there's data, even in states with low-influence primaries.


Those are just five reasons.  I think Sen. Obama has capitalized on another larger trend, this time among first or second time young voters, who are looking for a candidate that speaks to their values and wants to help them take care of their own future.  Green energy has been at the center of the Obama campaign, which is huge for young voters, and younger voters are by nature less concerned with pragmatism and thus more idealistic, probably the biggest difference between 18-29 voters and their elders.

This, by the way, does not even begin to include the technological advantages the Obama campaign has built up by use of the web, text messaging, and a host of other gadgetry that make it really easy for the techno-saavy young crowd to be involved.

Make no mistake, young voter turnout will increase significantly in this election, and may make the difference between a win and a loss for the Democrats.  Hopefully Sen. Obama won't forget that if he does in fact win the White House.

Four years ago, I spent an entire Plato class checking election results online via CNN's website, hoping and praying that enough people in my home state would choose Sen. Kerry for President. The process then was fairly straightforward, and required a lot of refreshing.

Tonight promises to be more of the same (though hopefully not McCain-style more of the same), but CNN upgraded their setup nicely with a "Your Races" tool that lets you track your House, Senate, Gubenatorial and Presidential races, and even some miscellaneous ballot issues.

You can set it up by going here:

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/your.races/index.html

It's going to be a busy night, but I'm looking forward to it.

As promised, here are Nate's 10 Reasons Why You Should Ignore Exit Polls:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/11/ten-reasons-why-you-should-ignore-exit.html

Waited an hour at 6:30am this morning to vote, probably because there were only three voting machines, and paper ballots could be cast only one voter at a time. It's going to be a long night for election volunteers across the country, so keep them in mind when you're hitting "refresh" on CNN.com a hundred times a minute.

A million pundits and a billion internet users have issued a trillion opinions on who should be the next President of the United States of America. This is one of those opinions, so take it with that preface in mind.

In 24 hours, we will be well on our way to knowing who the people of this country have elected as their next President. It's going to be an interesting night no matter what happens, because the young Senator from Illinois has managed to put together one of the most organized and effective (and wealthy) campaigns that this country has ever seen. Regardless of your political preferences, the support for Sen. Obama has been impressive, in both volunteers and finances. Given the abject disaster that is the Bush (43) Presidency, people across this country are hungry for change, no matter what that change looks like.

Many Republicans will (hopefully) complain after the election that Sen. McCain suffered because Sen. Obama capitalized on negative feelings towards Pres. Bush. A lot of that point of view is based truth, but I think it's a much smaller part of the electorate than the GOP would have you believe, because this change is not so much about being against President Bush as it is about being against the direction in which this country is apparently heading. That of course is due in no small part to the last eight years, but not entirely.

This country was founded, and not always administrated, by the idea that we are all in this together, that every person's rights are valued, that every man or woman should have the opportunity to pursue their dreams without fear of being disenfranchised. In more than 232 years, we have struggled to reach that goal and live out the promise of our ideals, but throughout our history there has been the prevailing idea that things will get better. Unfortunately, that idea gets tested at least once a generation. A generation ago, Dr. Martin Luther King and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy were killed in one of the most tumultuous years in American history. The Democratic National Convention in Chicago became a riot, and millions across the country went with the "safe" choice and elected Vice President Nixon. We all know how that ended.

That was perhaps the most important election of our parents' generation. Setting hyperbole aside, this is perhaps the most important election that my generation will face. Not simply because we have the opportunity to elect the first African-American president, a clear demonstration that this country has taken a huge step forward in healing its great racial divides, but because we have the opportunity to demonstrate that this country and its elected representatives will not support the politics of fear, the politics of repression, of xenophobia, and that we cannot and will not support candidates who pander to the worst of what this country has to offer.

I am voting for Senator Barack Obama because I believe that the promise of this country is greater than its past. I am voting for Sen. Obama because I believe that the middle class is being marginalized by the crippling Bush tax cuts, and most Americans ought to be able to afford decent health care and send their kids to college. I am voting for Sen. Obama because I believe that all children should be able to go to the doctor whenever they're sick, and that prevention and not treatment should be the focus of our health care industry. I am voting for Sen. Obama because I believe that the United States has to be a leader worldwide in the diplomatic process, in clean energy production, and in making trade as free and fair as possible.

I am voting for Sen. Obama because after the last eight years, with the country as divided as perhaps it's ever been, with a world community that views this country as reckless and dishonest, with an economy slowly tearing itself apart, and in the face of 232 years of history that say a black man could never be President, he makes me and millions of others young and old around this country and the world have the courage and the optimism to believe in three simple words:

"Yes we can."

We're all friends here. I know some of you love hearing about all my political musings, and others would prefer that I just go straight to hell with all my bleeding heart whining about "fairness" and "truth," and "not being crazy right-wing racist nutbags." I get it, I really do.

So, if there's one piece of advice that I can give you political addicts (read: alysunrae) in this last day and a half before we know who the next POTUS is going to be, it's this:

PAY NO ATTENTION TO TOMORROW'S EXIT POLLING, ONE WAY OR THE OTHER. JUST DON'T DO IT. EXIT POLLS ARE NOTORIOUSLY UNRELIABLE. YOU CAN PAY ATTENTION TO THE ACTUAL VOTE COUNTS, BUT IGNORE THE EXIT POLLS.

Nate "baseball and politics go hand in hand" Silver will give you a much better explanation why later today on http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/, but for now, just trust me on this. I'll post Nate's explanation when he divulges it, but just promise me you won't freak out over exit polls tomorrow, OK? Good.

Feel like being depressed right before the election? Go read this:

http://bailoutsleuth.com/

(hat tip to the one and only Jay Kelly for the link)

The bottom line is that the government will always take care of Wall Street, even when they don't really need to be taken care of. Goldman Sachs has no reason to be getting any money from the government, from what I can tell. There are many others too, but reading about that one made me particularly pissed off.

I'd say the chances of that changing under a McCain administration are basically zero, and the chances of it changing under an Obama administration are "slim," which is better than zero, but still crappy.

When you feel down, remember that there's always beer and fatty foods. I consumed so much grilled meat while tailgating this morning (though it was necessary to keep eating hot food to stay alive in the cold temperatures), my chances of having a heart attack tomorrow went from "minimal" to "wouldn't be surprising" in the span of about two hours.

On a similar note, I'm still laughing about "Yo Mama's so fat...she authorized a 700 billion dollar bailout of Dairy Queen," which I first read about two or three weeks ago.

48 hours (hopefully) until we know who the next President is. My money's on the guy who hangs out with Springsteen. GOBAMA!

Check out this release from Public Policy Polling today on Colorado (bearing in mind that if Sen. Obama wins PA, VA, and CO, and no other states flip, the election is over):

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_Colorado_1031424.pdf

The best part of that is this breakdown (the three numbers are "Favor," "Already Voted," and "Not Already Voted"):

McCain: 44% (41%/50%)
Obama: 54% (58%/47%)
Undecided: 2% (1%/3%)

Obviously, the early voting favors Sen. Obama, but what's hilarious is that among the 2% of voters who consider themselves "Undecided," ONE PERCENT ALREADY VOTED. Doesn't voting imply that you already made a decision? I'm sure that means "I voted for someone other than Obama or McCain," but it struck me as funny when I read it.

This page has stats on almost all the early voting states:

http://elections.gmu.edu/early_vote_2008.html

If you scroll down to the Ohio section, more than 30% of the TOTAL ballots cast in 2004 have been early votes this year. There were more than 250,000 absentee ballots issued for Franklin County (Columbus Metro Area), which has a population of just over 1 million. That's a HUGE percentage when you consider that a chunk of that 1 million is not old enough and/or registered to vote. I'm telling you, get ready to hear all about early voting on Nov. 5th.

This election is being won right now. Change is coming, so get ready.

In case anyone thinks I'm crazy when I talk about Sen. McCain having huge ground to make up, go check this out:

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/calculator/

That's CNN's fancy electoral map, where you can change the winner of each state at your whim. Right now, CNN has Obama winning the election if he holds all his "Lean Obama" states. Their tossup states are NV, CO, MO, FL, OH, and NC.

So, what that means is that in the next week, Sen. McCain has to take either Pennsylvania or Virginia out of Sen. Obama's column, two states where he is still polling in the high single or low double digits ahead, AND then win all the toss-up states (except Nevada) as well.

Personally, I would count Colorado as a "Lean Obama" state since McCain hasn't led in any poll there since 9/24, not to mention that Sen. McCain hasn't led a poll in Nevada since 9/28. Both Colorado and Nevada are also early voting states, and we've covered that earlier this week.

I said to my mom earlier tonight that you can tell at this point who is winning the election and who is losing by the ads each campaign is running. The winning candidate runs ads about their issues (you see Sen. Obama on TV talking about the economy at length), and the losing candidate runs ads about the other guy. I keep saying it, and it's still true: Sen. McCain has a lot of work to do before Nov. 4th. Let's hope that he keeps doing a crappy job of it.

Oh yeah, and I met Gov. Bill Richardson today, so there's that.