The New Supremes

Now that the Supreme Court has skewed to the right on a few decisions, E.J. Dionne (who once hit on Celine Dion) knows what to do: Panic! Eugene Robinson says the latest decisions means the court is now opposed to civil rights and integration.

As you might imagine, I think a lot of this is overreaction and misreading. More interesting is Cass Sunstein's read on the different types of conservative on the Supreme Court, which in this column are given the titles of "visionaries" and "minimalists." In the case of this latest decision, I have to admit it would make me a little uncomfortable to give school districts the right to discriminate based on race, even if the intention was to integrate. Laws often do not concern the intent of the parties involved, and while I might have carved out a place for that had I been on the bench, I can completely understand why reasonable people would be concerned about that precedent. In the New York Times, NPR's Juan Williams breaks down the decision with remarkable clarity and insight. The reality is, at least from my study of history, that good intentions rarely keep

Interestingly, the big winner seems to be the swing vote Anthony Kennedy, who wrote a very moderate middle-path decision decrying the majority's rationale, but still not upholding the programs because he thought the precedent would have been too dangerous. From the final graf of the Post's often-self-righteous editorial:

Justice Kennedy's concurring opinion correctly took the four-justice plurality to task for its glib assertion, in the opinion written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., that the "way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race." As Justice Kennedy noted, "Fifty years of experience since Brown. . . should teach us that the problem before us defies so easy a solution."

If you're really interested in this, a very readable discussion of the whole issue can be found here, by Salon's trio of analysts.

A new reason to love Rahm Emmanuel: His answer to Cheney's claim that the VP office is not part of the executive branch of government. If it's not, then why should Congress fund it as such? By the way, for those of you that haven't yet, check out the Post's special series on Cheney's redefinition of the Vice President's office.

The man who wrote Kennedy's nomination acceptance in 1960 drafts one 48 years later for the to-be-named Democratic nominee. Read the speech, and you may see some similarities to the rhetoric of a current candidate who, like JFK was, is a young, charismatic junior senator.

And now that President Bush has admitted defeat in his last real chance for a policy victory, the Dems have decided it's high time they try to stop the Iraq War... Again!

Who Does Mike Bloomberg Hurt?

Okay, if you're a Sopranos fan, or even just a TV/film fan, and you haven't read this post on the final episode of the Sopranos, you need to. Really. It will change the way you thought of the last few minutes.

Since I've been derailed the past couple days by a job interview and migraines, I'll make this one short. Here's a recap of the news if you've missed it:

The immigration bill fell apart again, which is only shocking if you don't know that Bush's approval rating is in the 20s. Speaking of Bush, he's invoking executive privilege on ALL of the documents dealing with the firing of US Attorneys. Tony Blair is the new man to find peace in the Middle East. Hillary picked a Celine Dion song as her theme (meaning I can now never vote for her) and raised $27 million in the second quarter, but Obama is expected to raise more, and his camp says he's on the verge of 250,000 donors. The Supreme Court is keeping up with its barrage of 5-4 conservative decisions, including the latest saying public schools can't discriminate to integrate. And Fred Thompson is now number one or two in most national primary polls.

I've been annoyed at the persistent inclusion of Gore in Dem polls, even though it really looks like he's not running. But then Charles Franklin turned me around. View the Gore numbers as the Dems unhappy with the top candidate(s), but not really following the race yet. Which, it turns out, could be quite a lot of people, at least in New Hampshire, where one poll has him winning with 32%.

I'll finish up with Mike Bloomberg, my favorite topic of the moment. There's a lot of debate over who he'd hurt if he ran. Conservatives are now calling this billionaire businessman (who, until a week ago, was a major donor and member of the Republican Party) "just another liberal Democrat" (that from a guest analyst on Tucker Carlson's show), and saying he'd kill a Hillary campaign. Preliminary polling suggests that, at least electorally, he'd do more damage to Rudy, in a Rudy-Hillary matchup.

If, in fact, Hillary is the Dem nominee, and Mike B runs, I see him hurting the GOP a lot more than Hill. The fact is that, as Tucker pointed out to the guest I quoted above, the GOP still has a lot of Goldwater Republicans, quasi-Libertarians who believe in fiscal discipline, limited government, and competence over ideology. Like it or not, that's Mike Bloomberg. More importantly, though, people have largely made up their minds on Hillary. That's part of what makes her a poor nominee in my mind; there's no undecided. A third party candidate will take votes from people who are undecided on the main candidates, from voters who are unhappy with their other options. That has to hurt almost anyone more than it hurts Hillary, whose support base is devoted, if not as large as she might like.

A Closer Look at Iowa

Before I get to campaign stuff, please read this column on immigration. It's a little academic-sounding, but here's the main point:

But the central point overlooked by many critics is that an immigrant's effect on government treasuries doesn't adequately capture his contribution to the U.S. economy. The private sector, not the government fisc, is what powers our nation. To evaluate the real effect of immigrants, we must look at overall economic activity.

The column strives to look at the overall economic effect of immigrants, which is by and large quite positive, and to which this bill appears to add.

Okay, moving on...

Chris Cillizza has now, unbelievably, put Mitt Romney at No. 1 on "The Line," his rankings of the most likely to win his party's nomination. This because of his strong showing in Iowa and his big fundraising numbers. I had some snarky thing about how the Iowa caucus is a stupid way to predict who wins the nomination, but I did some research and it's not that cut and dry.



Iowa, of course, is a caucus system, as opposed to a primary system like the rest of the country. It's basically a very localized, Iowa-only version of the Electoral College. People meet at small gatherings and elect delegates to vote in the caucuses. It tends to attract the more devoted (read: radical) elements of each party, especially in the GOP.



Okay, so how important is it?



Well, despite the fact that it's a small electoral state with not a ton of national importance, and that its populace is hardly representative of the rest of the country, it appears to be pretty important (bold indicates eventual nominee):

2004: Kerry and George W. Bush
2000: Gore and Bush
1996: Clinton and Bob Dole
1992: Tom Harkin and George H.W. Bush
1988: Dick Gephardt and Dole
1984: Walter Mondale and Ronald Reagan
1980: Jimmy Carter and Bush Sr.
1976: Carter and Gerald Ford

Looks pretty good, right? Let's look a little closer. How about if we look at races that were actually competitive, as opposed to the incumbents, and how close the races were.

2004 - John Kerry (38%) defeated John Edwards (32%), Howard Dean (18%)

This is a good indicator, but hardly a resounding win for Kerry. It did, however, deal the first major blow to Dean's then-frontrunner status.

2000- George W. Bush (41%) defeated Steve Forbes (30%), Alan Keyes (14%)

Okay, but look at how well two completely laughable candidates did! Forbes? Keyes?? McCain got 5%, for the record.

1996- Bob Dole (26%) defeated Pat Buchanan (23%), Lamar Alexander (18%)

Well, who was going to beat Clinton, anyway? Of course, that's how the Dems felt in 1992, when they were running against an incumbent Bush Sr...

1992 - Tom Harkin (76%) defeated Paul Tsongas (4%), Bill Clinton (3%), Bob Kerrey (2%) and Jerry Brown (2%)

Wow.

1988 - Dick Gephardt (31%) defeated Paul Simon (27%), Michael Dukakis (22%)

So, presented with a non-Reagan opponent, the Iowa Dems were smarter than the rest of the country, and went for boring, conservative electability.

Bob Dole (37%) defeated Pat Robertson (25%), George H. W. Bush* (19%)

Dole aside, Pat Robertson beat the Reagan's VP and the eventual president. Huh?

1984 - Walter Mondale (49%) defeated Gary Hart (17%)

Really, who was going to beat Reagan?

1980- George H. W. Bush (32%) defeated Ronald Reagan* (30%), Howard Baker (15%)

A virtual tie. But Bush was better in Iowa before serving as Reagan's VP.

1976 - "Uncommitted" (37%) defeated Jimmy Carter* (28%)

Yes, Iowa is so important that about 4 in 10 voters there voted for NO ONE over Carter. Then again, maybe they were smart...

1972 - Edmund Muskie (36%) defeated George McGovern (23%)

Again, the more conservative (and probably electable) candidate.

So, to recap:

In contested races (which both sides are this time):

1. Iowa has correctly predicted the nominee about 50% of the time (if you count Carter's 1976 loss to no one as a "victory," it's 5 of 10) and

2. It has a running streak of correctly predicting the last three nominees.

3. Candidates who are well outside the mainstream can do quite well in the caucuses, especially when it's wide open.

When Iowa does not predict:

1. For Democrats, the voters err on the side of conservative and electable.
2. For Republicans, they vote for someone named Dole or Bush. Which, one assumes, implies they like old, familiar, and safe.


So...

Given the history, Edwards' lead in Iowa makes sense. Even though he's skewing liberal, he's familiar, electable, and would not be the first of his gender or race to be president. That said, a strong showing from Obama would be unsurprising, since the race is so open. Hillary shouldn't be huge, but she's conservative enough that she shouldn't be out of it, either. It would be surprising if anyone had a massive lead, or one of the top three was out of it entirely. If he lasts, I'd predict Edwards to finish in the low-30s, Obama and Hillary right behind in the 20s. None of the three has ever had a big lead in the state.

On the GOP side, the guy you'd think would be big here is McCain, but again he doesn't play in Iowa and never has. It isn't surprising that Romney's doing well, but it would be a little surprising if he won. I think Thompson, being old and safe and familiar (albeit from TNT reruns) is the guy here. Romney could easily pull a Forbes-esque 30% (to Thompson's, say, 40%), with Rudy in the teens.

Remember that Romney is spending tons of money in this state right now, so his lead is inflated. Similar with Edwards, who has been campaigning in that state for three years. Just like it was for Forbes, it'll be tough for them to sustain those numbers in a country where a quarter of the people won't vote for a Mormon and don't like populists who spend $400 on haircuts.

Michael Barone goes through the polls in an attempt to make sense of them.

For those of you who join me in thinking Supreme Court Justice is the best job in the world, here's the report on the Roberts Court, which has more 5-4 decisions so far this year than in all of last year. Hint: Kennedy is the new O'Connor.

It's not that I disagree with George Will (and other social "conservatives") when he finds these incidents of left-wing censorship. Of course, this is extreme and I think people should be allowed to have whatever conversations they want, no matter how reactionary and bigoted, and advertise those with whatever euphemisms they see fit. But it's not like George ever seeks out the thousands of infringement of free speech on the right wing and attacks those. We get it, George: You don't like the 1960s, football, or the Bay Area.

The Boston Globe is compiling a 7-part guide to everything ever about Mitt Romney.

The Post is compiling a 4-part examination of the Vice Presidency of Dick Cheney.

And one of the authors of that series, Jo Becker, also has a look at Murdoch lobbying for her new employer, The New York Times.

Mike Bloomberg: Independent

Sorry for the time off. I return on the anniversary of flag burning's protection as free speech. Three guesses which side William Rehnquist was on.

While I was out, apparently, Mike Bloomberg decided he's not a Republican anymore. He's not, by today's party's standards. But this whole talk that he's a Democrat is kind of stupid. He really is what most of the country is: socially on the left side of moderate, fiscally on the right side of moderate, driven by practicality more than ideology. He says he's not going to run, and keeps using his identity as a short, fat, billionaire Jew from New York as the reason he's unelectable. Okay, given all that information, is there any way to think of this move other than as another step to a Unity '08 bid? How about the fact that he's been researching the ins and outs of running as an independent for about two years? To be fair, the Poltico's Ben Smith was unimpressed by the report.

I've said before it's hard to think of a better situation for a third-party candidate than this one. He's rich, known, centrist, and savvy. Maybe Teddy Roosevelt was better, but his situation was still worse (running against the man his party endorsed). Remember, with three candidates, a plurality of the vote can be less than 40%. And Ross Perot, who was nuts and not a politician or a centrist, got 19%.

If only we had some polls on races with Bloomberg in them...

As you can see, he flips some swing states from GOP to Dem, and does better the worse the GOP nominee is. All very predictable. What is surprising is that he's getting around 10% in parrts of the country where they can't have much of an idea about who Bloomberg is. Kansas? Alabama? Imagine what happens when he starts spending money. Granted, SUSA kind of sucks, and so does Zogby, who lays out a nice case for Mike Bloomberg's chances, but the numbers are still impressive. Michael Grunwald has the argument for why he won't run.

Also while I was gone, www.pollster.com has started pages with summaries of primaries by state. Interesting if you're bored.

The death of Sen. Craig Thomas (R-WY) has basically ensured that the GOP will keep his Senate seat. If you want the full rundown, here it is, courtesy of Chris Cillizza.

More news on the Pennsylvania 10th, one of the 2006 Dem pickups that the GOP wants very much to take back.

Fred Thompson hired a fundraiser.

Some psychologists are upset with the APA's role in torture techniques, according to a recently declassified report.

Ralph Nader: Stop. Just stop.

And we now measure how well Hillary is doing by how few boos she gets when speaking to antiwar audiences. And by her support sorority, which struck me as just a little too much of a 1970s-first-wave feminism wet dream to be believed. Somehow, I think Barack is going to remain the darling of the left.

The GOP Gets Ready for Thompson Time

So the storm clouds are gathering for the Thompson campaign. Evemies are doing opposition research. Still, this list of liabilities looks pretty run-of-the-mill to me. Meanwhile, social "Conservatives" are so miffed at Rudy that they claim they'll leave if he's the nominee. No word yet on where, exactly, they'd go, or for whom they'd vote. Chris Cillizza breaks down the numbers of Thompson supporters, and finds that they confirm the CW: He's the electable one, strong across the board with no negatives. For now.

Barack Obama's a guest writer in the Post's OnFaith this week. This is for anyone who's interested in the way our candidates view religion. It's also especially useful to show anyone that still thinks he's a Muslim, or is still worried about that lying email circulated about him.

Looks like Cho's legacy, at least in part, may be the first federal gun legislation in 13 years.

Not sure how I feel about this Muslim writer's response to the Pew survey that found many Muslim Americans think of themselves as Muslim first and American second. I thought that question was pretty stupid, and I think his response is a little wrongheaded. The point is that America is a civic and political institution, and shouldn't be asked to compete in our heads with a religious, personal one. What I do like is his ending, where he points out that more than 40 percent of Christian Americans view themselves as Christian first, American second. This isn't as religiously skewed as xenophobes want it to be.

The Costs of Toughness

Before I start, read this TNR story on Richardson. It is a great outline of who this guy is, why he's so appealing, and why he's also not what most would call presidential. Here's a paragraph that addresses his habit of touching random people in a way that has made an aide or two uncomfortable:

The truth is that Richardson touches everyone this way. He routinely twists staffers into headlocks and pokes or bear-hugs people he's just met. At one event, I saw him grab a beefy union guy by the lapels and shout into his face, "Stay loose! No commitments yet!" His "political trait," he writes in his recent memoir, is to get "up close and personal." It's part of his charm and makes him a natural politician (he is, after all, the Guinness Book of World Records champion for a politician shaking the most hands in eight hours--13,392 at the New Mexico State Fair in 2002). It's also what enables him to negotiate with dictators--to treat them with the same level of cordiality as more upstanding members of the international community. But Richardson's informal style is not without its drawbacks. On the most basic level, giving an unsolicited scalp tickle to a stranger is peculiar behavior for a presidential candidate, and Richardson's touching has fueled a nasty whisper campaign that he's unelectable.

The article is incredibly engaging, as it shows a reporter's (TNR's Ryan Lizza) honest attempt to understand why this guy, who so many smart people like and is so successful at so many things, is just lacking in a way that eludes a lot of people.

But, for all his talk of experience, Richardson is not so much a foreign policy expert as he is a born negotiator. Richardson himself traces this style to a life spent navigating "between worlds," which is the title of his memoir. Even today, Richardson's ability to embrace duality is impressive.

Is it any wonder someone like me likes this guy? Still, the reporter does get to his view of the governor, which sounds pretty damning:

As I watched Richardson, I realized that there is no artifice to the man, which is an endearing quality for a presidential candidate. Lurking behind Richardson's grabby, clumsy style is a guy who will do anything to be loved. And that's how many Democrats view the United States right now--a nation that desperately needs the world to love us again. Richardson may be a good Cabinet member for the next president, but, despite his charm and likeability, the next president needs to be more than a frat-boy-in-chief who believes that personal connections can overcome all the world's ideological fissures. We've already been down that road.

This is a point well-taken. But I think, in his rush to understand Richardson, Lizza has let himself be sucked into ignoring the complexity that he sees in Richardson for the rest of the article. The point is that Richardson may be Bush-like in tactic, but unlike Bush, he has actually been successful. Bush is entirely defined by his ideology, and believes personal connections can overcome the fact that his ideology is basically to crap on the rest of the world. Richardson may well be guilty of not having enough of an overarching ideology, but that's what makes his negotiating work. He's willing to actually listen to what people want, try to understand it, and make them feel satisfied, instead of just having a beer and being buddies. Maybe that's not what you want, but it's not the same thing as Bush's deeply held beliefs that nothing anyone else wants matters at all.

For those of you who had something to do besides watch CNN yesterday, there was a final decision in the Genarlow Wilson case.

Recap: Wilson, a 17-year-old top athletic prospect in Georgia, was at a party where he was videotaped engaging in some naughty behavior with a girl, who turned out to later be 15 years old. Now, for most people, a 17-year-old and a 15-year-old to mess around is not the biggest deal in the world, but it triggered a law in Georgia where any sex act involving someone under 16 is a felony. So Genarlow Wilson went to jail for a 10-year sentence. 10 years. Just for the record, if he had had intercourse with the girl on the tape, it would have been less of a crime. His case was so stupid, the legislature changed the law and made it a misdemeanor, instead of a felony.

Anyway, yesterday, Genarlow Wilson was released with 12 months time served (he's actually been in jail for 2 years).

Why am I rambling about this unfortunate kid who made a mistake and then lost what could have been a very, very good life?

The law that sent Genarlow Wilson to jail for more time than the average muderer (who gets seven years in jail) was passed in the early 1990s, where there was a craze to be "tough on crime." This led to things like "zero tolerance" policies, and crackdowns on all manner of things.

I bring this up because, in the coming elections, all sorts of candidates will claim that other candidates are "soft," or that they are "tough," on criminals. Please, please, please beware. No politician believes crime is good. But Draconian punishments are not the same thing as being tough on crime and policies that do not allow thought are often the same as policies that do not allow justice.

Of course, we don't need criminals anymore; we have terrorists to instill fear in voters. But appealing to our sense of security by being tough on someone else is a barbaric way of showing qualifications for the job of President, which I think probably requires some sense of mercy and complexity, not just a heavy hand on "security." History has shown that an "security" without intelligence and moderation is more likely to give us Guantanamo, or throw a kid in jail for no reason, than it is to actually make us safer.

Okay, on to news.

If you didn't see the highly bizarre last stop in Bush's European tour, it was in Albania, where he is among the most beloved men in the world. They wanted to end on a high note, and the only place where he can do that, I guess, is Albania. It reminded the Post's Gene Robinson of all the things that will characterize this administration. Let's also note that the admin's first order of business on returning is to revive the immigration bill and try to get that through, hoping that a victory will re-establish their leverage. Good luck with that.

Fred Thompson's biggest accomplishment in the Senate was his help in brokering the McCain-Feingold compromise. Since that's a big part of why Republicans claim to hate McCain, we'll see if that translates to Fred when he gets in the race. He's currently in second in almost all of the polls I've seen, including this Bloomberg one. Meanwhile, the Romney Campaign (New slogan: "10 Mittens For 10 Kittens") is concerning the Mormons. Thanks to Erica for the link and the slogan.

Congress' approval rating is tiny, just as it was under the GOP, and that's because the Dems haven't done anything. Now, can they spin it as the GOP stopping them? Maybe, but the LA Times reports that most of the country sees this group as "business as usual." Here's the Economist's take.

I'm about to post the results of a Gallup survey on evolution, so if you're a harsh secularist, it might be better to avert your eyes:

41% believe "creationism, that is, the idea that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years" is true and "evolution, that is, the idea that human beings developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life" is false, 28% believe evolution is true and creationism is false, and 24% believe both creationism and evolution are "probably" or "definitely" true.

57% of Democrats, 30% of Republicans, and 61% of independents believe in evolution; 40% of Democrats, 37% of independents and 68% of Republicans do not.

On the Bloomberg front, the latest CW is that his willingness to drop $500 million on the election would be different enough from anything we've seen that it might just work. Maybe. Many think he is self-centered enough to run, but that it may well come down to who the major parties nominate:

Bloomberg (who speaks fondly of John McCain) might be goaded into the race if the Republicans pick a social conservative, say, Fred Thompson or Mitt Romney, who runs as the Great Right Hope. Among the Democrats, John Edwards, a former trial lawyer (an occupational pedigree not beloved by financial leaders like Bloomberg) running on the liberal end of his party, might arouse Bloomberg's ire. In contrast, the billionaire mayor presumably would not oppose Barack Obama, since Bloomberg would not want to be remembered for standing in the doorway after the first African-American in history won a major-party presidential nomination.

More concisely, earlier in the same Salon.com article:

"Mike Bloomberg should run for president for one reason -- America and the rest of the world is ready for change," said Mitchell Moss, a professor of city planning at New York University and an informal advisor to Bloomberg. "We've had eight years of ideology. It would be worthwhile to have someone who just cares about getting things done."

How Sick Is Fred Thompson?

Today's topic, and information, courtesy of reader Dr. Michael Heller, M.D.

Fred Thompson, as many of you know, has cancer. Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma (NHL), to be exact. He revealed, in preparation for running, that he has not had symptoms in 2 years or so. That sounds good to most of us, and medical care is at such a point where most of us think of cancer, like many other diseases, as a chronic condition, the type of thing you can grow old with, like Magic Johnson and AIDS, or Lance Armstrong and his cancer, or Mario Lemieux and his cancer.

I mean, the man's on Law and Order and running for president. How sick can he be?

The answer, sadly, is worse than I thought. From the doc:

He was diagnosed 3 years ago wth localized non-hodgkins lymphoma. No systemic symptoms, which is good. He then had radiation therapy but then it relapsed, which is bad. He then had rituximab therapy which put it in remission, which is how good, exactly?

As you may know, drugs have to be studied before they are used. Like most cancer drugs, this one is "experimental" and we don't know a ton about it. But it has been studied somewhat.

In the major study of this drug for this disease, "only" 4 of 47 patients died within 4 years (remember, that by the end of his first term, FDT would be 8 years from diagnosis.

Those are good numbers for a drug, especially given the severity of FDT's cancer. Consider that the median survival rate for indolent NHL is 8-1o years. 5, 10, and 15 year survival rates of NHL on the whole are: 53% / 43% / 37% (c0urtesy www.lymphomation.org).

So, only 10 percent died with the drug in the study, as opposed to about half of all NHL cases. Now, in such things, specific types of NHL, the treatment, age, genetics, etc. all play a HUGE role, so take the statistics as very broad information. And we're dealing with a small sample size. But, even given that FDT's cancer is worse than normal, we would agree the drug appears to help patients live longer. Back to the doc:

In that same study, only 15% of the treated patients (a total of 7 patients) were in remission 4 years later; it's anybody's guess how many would be in remission after 7 or 8 years but you can bet it's a single digit percent.

To recap: In the only major study applicable to Fred Thompson...
1. Less than 1 in 10 patients were dead within four years, but
2. Only 1 in 7 patients were not sick four years later, and
3. By the end of his first term, FDT would be doubling that timeline

So, from what we know about this cancer and treatment:

1. Statistically, FDT has an unbelievably small chance of not being very sick (or worse) by the end of one term, and two terms would be a statistical miracle.

2. His chances of a relapse even between now and Election Day are small at best.

Now, one could, of course, argue that his already-statistically-improbable health is a sign that he's the medical miracle. There's something in him that beats cancer, in other words. My late grandmother had such a thing, and beat cancer three times before finally succumbing at a ripe old age. On the other hand, if Fred Thompson has such a miracle gene, it has a funny way of showing it, since the cancer has already relapsed after radiation treatment.

While of course nothing is certain, the bottom line is this:

Fred Thompson is, statistically, very likely to be sick or dead within the next six to ten years.


Wait a second and read that sentence again.


He is not Magic Johnson or Lance Armstrong or Mario Lemieux (all, by the way, young athletes in their 30s, in addition to having different diseases). Even if he beats the odds and suffers no relapses between now and November of next year, it's pretty hard to imagine none of his opponents bringing this up. Especially if he starts to poll well.

Hello Fred, goodbye Scooter, thank you George Marshall

Happy trails, Scooter Libby! We'll have a cell mate for you, soon!

And a more melancholy happy trails to Sen. Craig Thomas (R-WY), who died yesterday at the age of 74. A public land conservationist, he was a staunch conservative in line with his Western State's population, and not that far from a Libertarian on many issues. In line with the Wyoming state law, his state party will submit a list of Republican replacements, and the Democratic governor will have five days to choose one. Wyoming is an interesting state politically, staunchly conservative Republican with a penchant for electing Democratic governors who are beloved and re-elected for years.


Fred Thompson is now second in most of the polls I'm seeing, pulling in about 17% to Rudy's about 30%. To be fair, FDT is basically tied with McCain and Romney, so we have no idea how much Rudy is up by. Similarly, a lot of polls (including USAToday/Gallup, which is usually pretty good) have Obama and Hillary very close, but with Gore behind in the high teens. The CW is that those Gore supporters are likely to go with Hillary, because they're loyal, establishment Democrats. One could, of course, argue that such establishment Dems, if they're not supporting Hill-dog now, are looking for anyone else who can win.


Here's what Richard Cohen says about the idea that Thompson is the new Reagan:

Here is where he is so different from Reagan and why the comparison is wrong. Reagan was an ideologue. He had converted from New Deal liberalism to Barry Goldwater and Bill Buckley conservatism. It animated his life or, if not that, then at least his political career. He had a deadly serious reason for going into politics, and it was not, as it seemed to some at the time, a continuation of showbiz by other means. This is why he sought and won the California governorship, and after two terms, he ran for the presidency -- losing the first time out. By then he was no more an actor than Arnold Schwarzenegger is a competitive bodybuilder. Reagan had transformed himself. He was the dominant politician of the conservative moment. He was no pretty face.

Well put. But the right surrogates helped a lazy, substanceless Bushie on the campaign trail, and they can help Thompson, if they believe he's the right man for the job. What's that you say? Bushie's nephew, George P. Bush, has encouraged his uncle's supporters to jump to Fred? Huh. And the third-ranking Republican in the House, who's a power player in the most important swing state, will run Fred Thompson's Florida show.

In other news, people are getting more disapproving of Dems in Congress, which maybe was to be expected. The bottom line is that not much has changed under their watch, for all the "There's a new Congress in town" lines that Pelosi et al. doled out. Some of it is the GOP's fault, but some of it is not. Maybe this will help. Maybe not.

Tom DeLay on why Hillary needs Bill.

Pat Buchanan on how the West lost Russia.

Anne Appelbaum on how the U.S. lost the West.

And it was 60 years ago today that George C. Marshall, one of the greatest men of the 20th Century, gave this speech introducing the plan that would bear his name.

Why Learn Which Programs Work When You Can Just Guess?

In a move sure to revolutionize government spending, the Bush Administration has figured out a way to eliminate all of the debates over which programs we should fund.

Don't ask.

The Office of Management and Budget has not requested funding necessary to conduct the Survey on Income and Program Participation, or SIPP. What is this silly-acronymed questionnaire, you ask, and why do we need it to be delivered thrice yearly to an already test-sick population?

Because it's the most important thing our Census Bureau does every year, and it measures how well we spend our money, and who we spend it on.

But Greg is a nutcase, center-wing moderate, you say. He's out there. We can't trust him. How would the most maniacally neutral press outlet in the country introduce an article about this move?

It is one of the most important surveys the government conducts -- the only large-scale measurement of the impact of Medicaid, food stamps, school lunches, unemployment and other safety-net programs for the poor.

That was the lede from Page A13 of a little rag known as The Washington Post.

This could not happen, you say. Spending money wisely is a definition of a fiscally conservative standpoint. And Bush says he is one. I mean, even the ultraconservative Heritage Foundation says SIPP is important. So the Bush Administration can not have completely eliminated the best way we have measuring effective spending. Right?

Well, they kept three states. Surely, a few people in New York, Texas and California are an accurate representation of how well we spend your tax dollars.

My guess is this is a posturing move developed by the GOP, like their little yearly threat to get rid of the NEA. At least, I hope so. But if, at some point, the White House wants to go 20 minutes without managing to disappoint me, I'm ready for a change.

If you happen to have a swing voter in your House district, go on, send them an email. Tell them to cut something else. This is a pathetic excuse for governance.

The Impending FDT Campaign

Back from the dark ages, where routers fail every five minutes and we can't check email. If you missed the New Hampshire Dem debate last night, here's the local recap. Sounds like Hillary teed off on Wolf Blitzer, which makes me like her a lot more.

So Fred Dalton Thompson's getting his non-campaign campaign on less and less, as he nears the more standard kind of campaign. The Wall Street Journal's John Fund takes a solid look at the potential FDT campaign's effect on politics in the future, if it works.

Another solid look comes from an e-mail commenting on the Sunday morning intellectual ghetto of punditry, which was of course ga-ga over a potential FDT run. The e-mail noted that there was lots of fawning, with little discussion of the fact that (and I quote):

1) he's old
2) he's famously lazy
3) he is or was famously hypersexed
4) he was a lobbyist for the very worst
5) he has (present tense) cancer

To play the Devil's advocate, I'll note that he's 64, which is not that old for a Republican candidate (Rudy just turned 64, Reagan was in his 70s, McCain would be 72) and his lymphoma is in remission, he says, and has been for a couple years. The sex and the lobbying, as we have seen, is hardly a fatal detriment. In fact, the sex (and young hawttie wife) makes him seem virile, and the lobbying contacts will help with money. Please note from the article linked below:

"I was single for a long time, and, yep, I chased a lot of women," Thompson replied, chuckling, according to an attendee who took notes. "And a lot of women chased me. And those that chased me tended to catch me."

The remark drew laughter from men and grins from women, according to witnesses.

The laziness has, actually, been discussed by pundits and will continue to be. It's the knock on him right now, and it's something he'll prove wrong by actually doing it. One might point out, though, that our current president is not the hardest of workers. One could argue that it's possible to be lazy and win in this day and age.

For an extensive breakdown of those points and more attacks on Thompson, I refer you to this Salon article and updates by Glenn Greenwald. He also goes out against Howard Fineman, whom I just saw speak last week. He was surprisingly good, actually, a man who's trying to be a true neutral moderate. I think the shots aimed at him in this piece are a touch cheap. Pointing out someone's strong points is the job of a good, objective analyst, and does not mean that said analyst endorses or prefers the candidate in question.

One of the weird things about winning is that it inspires people to help you more. Longtime Republican backers Sallie Mae, who have made the most money from Bush's slashing of federal aid for college students, are now hedging their bets a little bit.

If you care, Bush's turning the student aid program into a private enterprise is among the things I find the most deplorable about this administration. Many of the current White House's views on issues I don't agree with, but many of them are at least ideologically consistent. The government's role in abortion, immigration, even the Iraq War, can all make sense from a certain perspective. But it is one of the government's main responsibilities to educate its populace, and slashing the money to send kids to college is a mortgaging of a society's future for a stupidly small amount of money.

My thoughts on the immigration bill were always that those who said it was so fragile and it would never pass were deliberately making the compromise seem weaker than it was. Remember, anyone that votes no on the bill has to face the criticism that they didn't do anything to fix the situation, which everyone seems to think is such a huge disaster that we have to do something. Everyone except me, of course. The reality is that even the public doesn't think one thing, if they've decided at all. In the meantime, "Amnesty" is the new word people can't support, even though it, like "terrorism" and "abortion" and all the other things people can't support, doesn't have a clear meaning.

For those of you who live in the Keystone State with me, I'd like to point out that Al Gore, currently not running, is second here to Hillary in the Quinnippiac poll. Welcome to PA, where we support anyone except those who might win. Fineman, incidentally, thinks Al will run. I still think he won't. He is ticking up in the pollster.com averages, which also have FDT coming back to earth. He's tied with Mitt Romney, who Fineman humorously noted is the only Republican candidate with one wife. Romney also has never run a business, despite what his whole "I'm the guy who can handle the world's largest enterprise" gig. Prediction: After this article (thanks to Erica for the heads up), Mitt will come out and say he's owned a piggy bank or two, but he's always been a big supporter of money and people who have it.

Footnotes:

Larry Flynt's at it again.

Thanks to the Independent blogger Hankster, who noted our recent Bloomberg discussion on her blog.