Pennsylvania minus three weeks

Another week, another Pennsylvania countdown thread. I owe Andrew Bolt a link, so see here for a revealing view of the Gallup poll trend as the Reverend Jeremiah Wright affair fades from view.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,141 comments on “Pennsylvania minus three weeks”

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  2. Some Hitchens context. His response to 9/11:

    “In order to get my own emotions out of the way, I should say briefly that on that day I shared the general register of feeling, from disgust to rage, but was also aware of something that would not quite disclose itself. It only became fully evident quite late that evening. And to my surprise (and pleasure), it was exhilaration. I am not particularly a war lover, and on the occasions when I have seen warfare as a traveling writer, I have tended to shudder. But here was a direct, unmistakable confrontation between everything I loved and everything I hated. On one side, the ethics of the multicultural, the secular, the skeptical, and the cosmopolitan. (Those are the ones I love, by the way.) On the other, the arid monochrome of dull and vicious theocratic fascism. I am prepared for this war to go on for a very long time. I will never become tired of waging it, because it is a fight over essentials. And because it is so interesting.”

    What a fat, self absorbed prick. Because it is so interesting. That is his public response.

  3. Hitchens rants against either candidate should be dismissed, purely because he is a completely politically discredited moron, who assumes that a purple pen is a worthy substitute for a brain. He can no-longer wage his upper-class trotskyite wars so has fallen in with the other bad-boys because of some sort of personal insecurities that require him to behave like a pompous bellicose fool. He has no credibility whatsoever.

  4. 403
    Pancho

    That’s the unctious side of Hitchens that truly revolts me, and how he gets from that ‘war of civilisations’ (which it IS NOT), to a tragic invasion and occupation of Iraq is beyond me.

    But speaking of Iraq, and of course the general election in November, let’s remember that before November comes October, when elections are supposed to be held in Iraq.

    Now, some people have assumed that Maliki’s ‘pre-emptive strike’ against the Sadrists in Basra was to nobble them well before the election, and so get some control of the south where currently he has very little. It’s also argued that Cheney put him up it, but I’ll leave that for history to decide. What we can say, categorically, is that it was an unmitigated disaster for Maliki and it’s raised Muqtada’s stocks even higher.

    But here comes the point: if Maliki tries to veto the Sadr bloc from even contesting the election (which he’s threatening to do!), all hell will break lose, and once again, the US will be propping up the undemocratic forces (hmm, sounds like familiar stuff), and all this will be coming right in the lead to the US election.

    Can’t have that, eh? So, the strategy is becoming apparent: call night day, and to paraphrase: “blame,blame,blame…blame,blame Iran”.

    To this end, Petraeus and Co. are about to descend on Washington to tell us the most improbable pack of lies, ie that Iran is backing Sadr! Anyone who knows even the most basic facts of Shiite sectarian differences will be able to tell you that this is absurd, and that Iran’s proxy in Iraq is the major groups who form the government. al Sadr’s Mahdi army is NOT, never was, and probably never will be Iran’s instrument.

    Get ready for the propaganda to start flowing like water from the MSM, because if they cannot innundate Americans with this utter falsehood, then they are in all kinds of strife convincing them that there’s any ‘progress’ or even a discernable goal to achieve there.

    Watch this space, it’s going to get very interesting.

  8. #404 Amigo – [Hitchens rants against either candidate should be dismissed…. He has no credibility whatsoever] – i asked this question before to KR to which he did not answer.

    Now let me ask you. In order to spare our feeble, debilitated, delicate, effete, enervated, enfeebled, faint, frail, infirm, languid, low, prostrate, prostrated, sapped, slight, soft, softened, tender, torpid, unsubstantial, wasted, weakened, wimpy mind from contamination, corruptrion and pollution.

    Please give us a list of commentators that you think we should follow, read and worship. And another list that we should avoid, eg: The Hitch, at all costs. very much oblige.

  10. Finns, do and quote whatever you want. Spice of life and all that. Despite your wayward analysis and misplaced support of Hillary, I wouldn’t dream of giving you any sort of list to follow. Your struggle and arguments are amusing (to me, anyway). But the liberal impulse which doesn’t want to offer a list for you to follow, is the same part of me that reserves the right to critique garbage. I happen to despise Hitchens – that is my opinion. Above I made an attempt to contextualise why. I paid no attention to the bilious crap that he wrote about about Hillary, and haven’t to this latest serve about Obama.

    I also think it is disingenuous to be attacking a guy one day and quoting him the next. This is not what I am accusing you of, in case you’re thinking of getting touchy again. But Hitchens has popped up on both sides of the ledger of late (generally with qualifications). So for the record, my position is laid out above. I think he is an intellectually compromised fool who is spoiling for a fight (see the 9/11 and Clash of Civilisations crap, alongside his Iraq stance), seeking some sort of meaning (check his religious anti-religion arguments), and cannot admit how wrong he has been, on so many fronts for so long. But like I say, this is just my opinion.

  11. The thing about hitchens is that he’s just a controversy wh*re….He’ll just say what ever he can to make himself heard.

  12. Well we have Kirribilli , a political lightweight trying to camoflage imadequacy by nselectively & changing ‘cut ‘ & paste’ finance info pretending to be a financial guru

    Then precious j/v taking the ‘greig’ bait as was predictable.

    And Pancho not quite understanding 2025. But implying Obama is other than a political novice having exposed his signicant Pastorgate problems publicly at Philly but inadequately , & then contradicting some publicly a week later has not given McCain damaging political amunition is absurd

    Believing Pastorgate is not important to McCain is like saying Iraq is not important to Obama…the Obamabots blindness

  14. Pancho 414

    It’s actually 2023.5. This may seem weird but is in fact possible. Dems Abroad delegates count as 0.5 each. Don’t quite know how that works on the floor of the convention.

    Re Hitchens. Hate, like any emotion, is terrible for clarity of argument. Try feeling morally superior and contemptuous instead. It works for me! 😉

  16. Diogenes – I have seen 2023.5 on the demconwatch site, but I had assumed that this is a straight cut down the middle of 4047 – they were quoting 2024.5 previously. But I may be wrong.

  17. Pancho says 2024.5 …..would not be a good figure

    THEORETICALLY , 1012 for Hillary and 1012 for Obama

    and a 0.5 person deciding

  18. Ron,/ron/,R/ron-
    you are not STILL going on about it are you??
    Wherever you’ve been, surely you’ve had a chance to move on and get over it.
    If we are blind my friend, you are stuck in the mud up to your nostrils. Hillary is all washed up and McCain hasn’t even been started on yet.

  19. “Pancho says 2024.5 …..would not be a good figure

    THEORETICALLY , 1012 for Hillary and 1012 for Obama

    and a 0.5 person deciding

    No I didn’t Ron. My understanding is 4047 total delegates, requiring 2024 for a victory.

  21. Get used to it . Pastorgate will be news up to November & I will blog it.
    Because McCain will make it an issue

    Do you Obamabots want to stop the tedious Iraq comments against HRC and McCain or do you only want issues that suit the precious Obama

  22. Ron – I don’t think anyone thinks that Wright will not be an issue come November. But surely you don’t think that Iraq will not be? When the whole Wright issue is an historical blip, the Iraq War will remain the greatest strategic blunder in US history, impacting on politics and international relations for decades to come.

  23. KR @392, Bill Kristol is the only election-watcher I know who got the electoral college spot-on in 2004. He was also about 10,000 votes off a perfect prediction in the 2006 senate election (he only got the Allen-Webb race in Virginia wrong). A Malcolm Makerras he is not!

    The article I think you refer to (the one I read as a link on realclearpolitics.com) seemed fairly even handed to me, although I concede Kristol is about as partisan as they come (but no more partisan than the likes of Begala and Stephanopoly who are wheeled out by CNN and ABC as non-partisan election gurus). You can make a strong case that barring an act of lunacy or cancer, McCain is home. You can also make a strong case to the contrary. The fact that you don’t like to contemplate the outcome Kristol predicts does not provide a legitimate basis for rejecting outright what he says.

    Do you really believe Obama won’t cop a bucket-load between US Labour Day and election day? Of course the subtext to Kristol’s latter points are race and religion – it will make 1988 look like the most honourable election campaign of all time.

    Where exactly is Kristol so outrageously wrong? Same goes for Hitchens (his electoral prognostications that is, not all the other stuff)

  24. [Get used to it . Pastorgate will be news up to November & I will blog it.]

    Glad to hear it Ron. Don’t let those dirty Obamabots get away with thinking that the crazy old rants of an aged war veteran are any less important than the deaths of thousands…..

  25. The SF Chronicle calls for the Olympic torch relay to be cancelled. Makes good sense to me. It’s only a PR campaign and it is clearly not helping the Olympics PR campaign. Hillary is the candidate who is the most anti-China and has asked for Bush to boycott, which might be taking things a bit far but shows a degree of decency that pleases me.

    Clinton urges Bush to boycott Beijing Olympics
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080408/ts_nm/usa_politics_clinton_dc

    Extinguish torch before someone gets burned
    http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/07/BAGJ101E0E.DTL

  26. [Clinton urges Bush to boycott Beijing Olympics]

    To those who know better….

    Is this a ‘vote-winner’ so to speak? I’d assume that the democrat base would be fairly supportive of such a stance….right?

  27. Chris – where have Kristol and Hitchens been wrong? Surely you jest? Although I have not seen too many Hitchens electoral prognostications, I have not seen Trots in government, and his team seems to be badly losing at the moment. As for Kristol picking 2004 – come on. Even Shanahan was right for about 11 years. Picking the winner when you are incredibly partisan and your guy wins isn’t a great feat.

    Where has Kristol been wrong? Well of late he has had to retract two NYT columns because of bad sourcing: http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/03/kristol_bungles_key_fact_in_an.php, on top of being wrong about every step of the Iraq War, from WMD to the surge.

  28. # 424 Chris from Edgecliff

    valid points you make

    Also iraq can end up being a 2 edged sword for both.

    Further Obama has been quoted that after withdrawal , if al queda becomes a problem again , he’ll just go right in.. wow

  29. Whatever, Hillary’s comments have upped the ante on the issue and there is currently a significant difference between her and Obama.

    How it will play out in the polls? Could be the spark her campaign needs.

    No doubt it would rile a few here if Hillary became the “candidate of principle” and voters flocked to her because of her strong character and moral fibre.

  33. 3423 Pancho , I agree with you that both Pastorgate & Iraq will be issues right up to november . BUT other Obama supporters do not agree with you.

    Also , Iraq as said is going to be politically difficult for both Obama & McCain

  34. Ron – Iraq is much easier politically for Obama. We are not talking about the ins and outs of intricate policy, or moral takes, but politics. Poll after poll has shown that the people of the US hate the war now. They have had enough. They have been constantly lied to about it and they want out. Obama is on a winner here.

  35. GG @ 430.

    I haven’t seen Obama’s opinion on China/Tibet. I’m guessing they are soft and fluffy though. I agree Hillary’s motivation is irrelevant to whether it’s a good policy or not. I think it’s great she is taking the moral high ground and hope she drags McCain, Bush and Obama there. It could be a great wedge! Good luck to her. The more things she does like this, and attacking McCain on the economy as she has recently done, the better her argument for staying in the race is IMHO.

  36. Diogenes –
    I want to see Obama be as tough on China as Hillary is, and if her positon forces his hand then all the better. Still think she’s done tjough – all they have to do is replay the Bosnia/ lying footage during the election. She’s unelectable.

  37. GG @ 430 [No doubt it would rile a few here if Hillary became the “candidate of principle” and voters flocked to her because of her strong character and moral fibre.]
    Precisely. Precisely. Spot-on. Nailed it. If only Hillary was a completely different person, and also could erase everything in her campaign so far, then we might have two candidates of ‘strong character and moral fibre’. Of course, here on planet earth, it is Obama with the voters flocking to him for those reasons.

    Perhaps Hillary could start wearing a mask – a wonderful magic mask projecting strong character and moral fibre, and honesty. That might work.

  38. Diogenes ,

    You should read your own links.

    “Clinton’s Democratic presidential rival, Barack Obama, said he too was disturbed by events in Tibet and had communicated his concerns to Bush. But the Illinois senator stopped short of calling for the president to skip the opening ceremonies in Beijing.”

  39. GG

    Guilty as charged. These patients keep taking up my time. But my “soft and fluffy” prediction proved to be right!

  40. Pancho @ 431

    Kristol’s blatherings in the link you provided really outline the insanity of the whole Neocon world.

    Their doctrine and belief is that “they can create their own reality”.

  41. GG@430
    it would not ‘Rile’ me if Hillary turned out to be a woman of principle and strong character. It would completely floor me.
    Because she isn’t.

  42. And the Straight Talk Express is about to go around a bend, press-wise. Good to see him copping some scrutiny:

    ‘For an advocate of straight talk and government transparency, John McCain has been less than clear with a voter-education nonprofit, on whose board he serves, about why he hasn’t responded to its survey of issue positions. Now, after nine months, 17 phone calls, and 8 emails asking McCain to state exactly where he stands on key issues, Montana-based Project Vote Smart is poised to kick McCain off its board.’
    http://www.motherjones.com/washington_dispatch/2008/04/mccain-project-vote-smart.html

  47. Edgey Chris

    Kristol would be rooting for McCain even if Bomb Bomb was clinically dead! It’s neocon pathology at it’s most flagrant; whoever keeps the fantasy alive gets their vote.

    Sorry, but Iraq is not going to win them votes in November, for all the reasons that have become obvious over the last five years.

    If you can see the US economy in recession and the falling housing market inspiring the punters to vote for more leftover Bush policies you’ve got a remarkably inventive imagination.

    It isn’t looking pretty, and the voters are going to be a lot angrier about being conned into war, and a 2nd term of Bush’s incompetance, than you can imagine.

    McCain can do the mock patriotism all he likes, but when they’re taking out US corpses from the friggin’ “Green Zone” it’s bloody hard to keep saying you’re winning.

  48. GG @ 444 [“Never let facts get in the way of your prejudices.”]
    You are confused as to the meaning of ‘prejudice’. A prejudiced decision to support a candidate would be making the decision without considering the relevant elements.

    It is not prejudice to enter a political situation with your mind open, and proceed to evaluate the options, considering all the pros and cons, and then express a preference for, say, a party or a candidate, based on rational thought. Neither is it then prejudice to continue to support that choice as long as they remain the preferred one in your mind, based on continuing rational analysis of the facts.
    You should try it sometime. It’s safe to try it at home without risk of too much injury.

  49. JV,

    You understand the concepts of open mindedness and rational analysis but it is you that needs the practice.

    Hillary’s position on China is new information that challenges your view of her, so you ignore it and talk about face masks. Hmm.

    You and others pillory Hillary for alleged lying, but ignore Obama’s slipperiness. Hmm.

    Have not seen any retractions today re the hospital “lies” which are apparently true. Of course you can rationalise your behaviour because she allegedly lied about other matters. Hmm.

    There appears to be an invisible shield protecting that very “open mind” of yours.

    But don’t worry, everyone is the same. I can deal with the hypocrsiy, it is the pseudo intellectual sanctimony that peeves me.

    Cheers

  50. GG – I know little about US China relations, so I can’t make informed comment about the various positions on China.

    With regards to the hospital story and the lies there, here is what the story you are quoting says:

    ‘But a closer examination of the story Clinton was originally told indicates that while Clinton erred slightly in relaying the tragic tale, that doesn’t mean it’s not fundamentally true. On that, the jury is still out.

    …I’m trying to find out more about this story — it’s not always easy when health records are involved, not to mention a grieving family who may already have some issues with the media.

    But I will try, and report back to you what I find out.”

    The story does not prove she is not lying. She has still offered misrepresentations. She may just have made mistakes in her portrayal in order to aid her argument. But on the form we have seen, Hillary doesn’t make those sort of mistakes. Again she has streched the truth for her gain.

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