For me, watching Bush debate is a lot like watching my son play baseball. While I may root for him to do well, I feel helpless in being able to make him do well. Like when my son is batting, I try to will it that he'll hit the ball. Similarly, while observing Bush, I try to will it that he'll nail a point. So when Kerry says lamely, "I consider nuclear proliferation to greatest threat to our nation." I'm using all my mental energy to try to get Bush to say something like "Well Senator, I ...

Why do these shows interview so many spin doctors? Like we care what Hilary Clinton thinks on the debate or what Karen Hughs think. We know what they're going to say and it's meaningless. It's just talking points. Does anyone actually take the spinners seriously? I'd rather have the talking heads on there.

Bush is doing better this time but he's still totally outclassed by Kerry. The momentum is shifting to Kerry. President Kerry? Republicans may need to get used to that.

As I've said elsewhere, I think Kerry edged out Bush in this debate.  But from reading views around the net and watching the pundits, it seems I am in the minority. But here's a difference: I was driving home from a friend's for most of the debate so I heard the debate on the radio and that was where I felt Kerry was beating Bush. I only saw the last part at home on TV and that I will say that Bush seemed to be doing a bit better. So I wonder if body language and other elements that...

I judge Kerry as the winner again in this debate.  If I were to numerically score this based on my "gut" I'd give it like this: Debate #1: Kerry 5 Bush 2 Debate #2: Cheney 2 Edwards 1 Debate #3: Kerry 5 Bush 4 Total so far: Kerry/Edwards: 11  Bush/Cheney: 8 What do you think?

So far both Kerry and Bush look pretty good. What do you think?

Stephen Green is pretty ticked off with how Democrats are trying to undermine the US election with their shenegans. Read it for yourself. And here's a running tally of voter fraud. Slate has some interesting views on the whole Cheney's Daughter is gay thing . My own point is fairly succinct: If Cheney's daughter were suffering from Parkison's disease, would it have been acceptable for Kerry to bring her up as a reason to fund fetal stem cell research? Perhaps you would think that's oka...

Kerry seemed a bit off his game today and Bush seemed very much on his game. This time I give Bush the edge.  He seemed relaxed, strong on the issues, and got all his points out.  Kerry wasn't that bad but he was a lot more defensive than I would have thought. I don't think it will make much difference though. Bush blew the first debate so badly when the audience was so big. The audience here was much smaller than it was in the first debate. Kerry also played a bit of dirty pool wit...

I wish I were more excited about this election.  It's a sad commentary of our political process and its overall nastiness that the best we can do it a John Kerry or George W. Bush.  Two guys who wouldn't have made it through a first round of interviews at most companies. And so that's what we end up with - guys who can't get real jobs end up becoming politicians. Ever heard the saying "Those who can't, teach"?  They should add a corollary to that: Those who can't, teach. And th...

Kerry's decision to use Cheney's daughter as a political prop in the last debate may come back to haunt him. Non-parents don't seem to get the big deal but most parents I know (left or right) are pretty outraged by it. It may turn out to be the blunder that costs Kerry in Ohio which is the key state in this election. One good article on the issue can be found here: http://thoughtsonline.blogspot.com/2004/10/james-taranto-and-others-may-be-right.html Imagine if Bush had talked about how t...

Polls are interesting things but statistical analysis is my thing.  And based on our models in The Political Machine, Kerry is going to squeak out a victory in November barring a sudden change in events. The Florida of 2004 may be where you least expect it - Iowa. Ohio and Iowa are going to be the key states this time. But it is Iowa that people should be keeping an eye on even more so than Ohio or Florida. It has a relatively low population which creates all kinds of opportunity for mes...

Imagine if we hadn't invaded Iraq. How would the election be different? Well, first we now know that the oil for food program was a total scam. We also know Saddam was in the process of bribing France, Russia, and China in the hopes of ending sanctions. We still wouldn't have gotten Osama Bin Laden in all likelyhood so there would be this terrorist dictator in Saddam who was openly opposing us who, by all accounts in 2003, was in possession of WMDs with every intent to aid terrorists. T...

With the first debate over, I think it was pretty clear that Kerry gained more than Bush.  Neither scored any knock out blows on the other and the # of memorable sound bites is going to be minimal. But overall, Kerry did what he needed to do. Expect to see the polls narrow considerably.

The strange thing is that the press seems to treat illegitimate votes as a kind of noise, a kind of tolerable if unfortunate democratic static, while intimidated no-shows are a travesty against all that is holy. Yet, and this should be obvious, in terms of the aggregative democratic procedure, an unnoticed illegal vote for one guy (in a two horse race) is EXACTLY EQUIVALENT to scaring off a voter for the other guy. If somebody's dog manages to vote for John Kerry, then, in effect, Velma T...

The CO2 level in the atmosphere is now 372 parts per million.  Before the industrial revolution, which began the widespread use of fossil fuels (coal and oil mainly), that number was only 227 parts per million. That's a 30% increase. CO2 is a green house gas.  It is not a pollutant. When you burn something, anything, your best case scenario for non-pollution end result is water and carbon dioxide.  There's no magic bullet to solving that as long as are relying on energy so...