144 Or Less / 12-17-11

If you mean to sign a pledge defending marriage, but instead you end up offending it, you might be Newt Gingrich.

First of all, I'm sorry -- really sorry. Secondly, you should rethink your decision to sign this.

This is, in short, the latest Republican-sponsored quixotic battle against same-sex marriage.

Given that you cheated on your first two wives, once while you were impeaching Clinton for lying about sexual indiscretions, then also while another was fighting off cancer (successfully!), you're better off signing an overt declaration of war on marriage rather than a laughable oath to "protect" it from committed people who would like their children to grow up in a stable home where two loving parents don't have to explain to their children why the government disallows their union.

Long sentence there. Shorter ones now.

Now go win the nomination, you double-talking sleazebag. Please.

(Word count: 144)

And Now It's Ron Paul's Turn / 12-17-11

Not his turn to win, mind you. Don't get your man-panties in a bunch. Or even your lady panties. Which is somewhat redundant, come to think of it, and why wouldn't you think of it?

(I'm glad I don't have to be as serious for this one as for the Romney one.)

My last two full posts have laid out why Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich won't win the 2012 Republican nomination. Since those guys account for about two-thirds of Republican voters, that means Ron Paul, who generally places third in national and state-by-state polls, is the new favorite to oppose Obama next year... right?

Yeah no. Not happening. Whatever the opposite of "right" is. Is there even a word for that?

It's not going to be Paul either. (Waiting for your objection. Noted. Waiting for your next question.) Then who? (There we go. Thanks for participating.)

To be totally honest, I haven't figured that one out yet. Possible future post, yay! No, for now, I'm just excluding people one at a time. In much the same way that I've been methodically honing my impressions of God by excluding traits -- God is not male, is not the world's manager, is not Santa Claus, is not summoned by our prayers to magically heal and protect us, is not fighting a proxy war through us against some red dude with horns and a pitchfork -- I also have been trimming the Republican field of candidates.

Which doesn't necessarily mean I'll finish this journey with a good answer. Why should it?

Redirecting. Ron Paul will not be the nominee for a variety of reasons, none of which is convincing enough on its own, but when combined with its buddies, gains extra power. Yes, just like the Constructicons. I was thinking that too.

1. Paul is 76 years old. I'm not being ageist. I'm being realistic. Everyone else is being ageist. The oldest presidential candidate to ever win a first term was Ronald Reagan, who was 69 years old in 1980. (Modern technology has permitted Reagan to age only six years since then!) Paul is in good health. He's a doctor. He's a spry 76. But he'd be 77 and five months on Inauguration Day, and people don't put people in office when 80 is right around their corner. Not in this country, anyway.

2. Paul isn't a Republican. (This is probably a good 1. reason, but I wrote 1. first, so this is 2.) He wears the R label, but only because he's not a Democrat either. He's a Libertarian Lite. A Conservative Constitutionalist. (A con-con, if you will. I will. I already did.) Here is his list of positions. You put him in a box, if you can find one the right shape. He voted against the 2011 Republican budget as drafted by Paul Ryan. Good for him. But you could say that loyalty to the party brand is not his forte.

You know, that's practically a disqualifying offense on its own. Practically.

3. Paul is ignored/laughed at/derided/choose your term/mocked by the mainstream media. Hoping for this to change is pointless. Should Paul win three early states (Iowa, NH and Nevada are certainly fertile ground for him, and the February calendar is caucus-heavy, which bodes well for him too), Paul's most unpopular traits will certainly get highlighted. Mind you, this will not deter his most hard-core supporters, but it will help empty the bandwagon pretty quickly.

4. He doesn't look the part. Voters like their candidates to look presidential, and Paul's rumpled suits, 5'10''-or-so height, and semi-grouchy mannerisms are a turn-off for too many people. It's shallow. It's also hard to deny. Although if denial is one of your specialties, go right ahead.

5. He's a sure loser in the general election. Paul's right on the national pulse when it comes to certain things (lower taxes, against wars of choice, pro-civil-liberties, slashing foreign aid) but is so very extreme in his proposed budget cuts, his contempt of labor unions, and his plans to scrap the Federal Reserve would make for so very many effective negative ads it's not even funny. (If the inevitable ads were funny, like Jack-in-the-Box-meets-Old-Spice funny, then it's all worth it, he should totally score the nomination.)

The above reasons don't preclude a major role for Paul in the process. I can see a scenario where he finishes with the second-most delegates, and another where he is offered the vice-presidential slot on the ticket. But in only the most far-fetched parallel universe is he the Republican nominee.

In conclusion? Sorry Noah S., Matt L. and Mike G.

But if not Ron Paul, who?

The Gingrich Who Stole Christmas / 12-14-11

My last post ended with "If not Romney, who?"

Glad you asked. Turns out Newt Gingrich enjoys a double-digit lead in national polling for the 2012 Republican nomination. He leads in Iowa, where they'll be voting in three weeks. He leads nationally. He leads in Florida and South Carolina, states which hold the other January primaries, by an average of 19 points. Real Clear Politics does a poll of polls every day, and here's their latest one, showing Gingrich with a 12-point cushion. The predictive model at Fivethirtyeight.com, which rose to prominence in 2008 with its statistically rigorous look at the election, predicts he'll win the first caucus.

Newt Gingrich has stolen Christmas from Mitt Romney and is now the undisputed front-runner.

Yes, that Newt Gingrich. Yes, him. It's almost too easy to write the post about how the man will not be the Republican nominee.

Oh, I'm going to write the post anyway. Not doing so would be a wasted opportunity. It would be borderline irresponsible. Besides, I have to write this tonight, so I can give the same treatment to Ron Paul tomorrow. After that, eh, who knows. Because if it's not going to be one of the three front-runners... wow. If it's not one of those three guys, and I really don't think it'll be, then we're in for a doozy of a primary season, and a Republican convention actually worth paying attention to.

Seriously, my political lobe is all tingly. *shivers*

So. Newt will not win the nomination for a variety of reasons. Let's give these reasons some sequential numbers.

1. He says stuff. So much stuff. Even for a Republican, it's seriously crazy stuff. For example, last week, he warmed up by stating in a debate that our child labor laws are "truly stupid," then stood by his remarks. Just read the first few quotes here, remembering that this is Newt defending his stance that children should in part replace adult janitors who, according to him, make too much money. Oh, and calling Palestinians an "invented" people is just the sort of thing a president ought to do, too. (And that was just last week! Both statemenst! Days apart!)

2. He has more enemies than friends in the GOP power corridors. More on why this matters this two reasons later.

3. He's not going to win Iowa or New Hampshire, and that will take the sails out of his campaign. According to multiple reports, he's massively disorganized compared to Paul, Perry and Bachmann -- even compared to Romney. One of those four is winning the Hawkeye State. (My money's on Paul.) Meanwhile, Romney will at least eke out a win in New Hampshire. Fundraising will dry up and supporters will voice their doubts more openly after the perceived front-runner fails to take either of the first two contests.

4. His personal life is too much of a liability. And because of 2., 4. is amplified. Any campaign manager who wants to destroy Newt can make it happen. It's not hard. You just remind people that the guy led the drive to impeach Clinton... while he was having an affair of his own. You remind them that at the height of the mortgage crisis, he took $1.6 million in pay from Freddie Mac... then claimed, straight-faced, he was being paid for his services as a historian. You remind them he cheated on his first wife, then divorced his second one while she was dying of cancer so he could marry his current spouse... before Wife Number Two had the decency to die. Those are the broad strokes, but after that who cares about the details: There's three women, lots of cheating, and massive douchebaggery, all rolled into one guy.

And I haven't even yet mentioned the time Newt admitted that he shut down the government in part so he could exact revenge on the President for making him sit in the back of Air Force One.

I'm all for politicians making mistakes and learning from them, you know, like regular people, but the baggage above is too much for Newt to overcome. And we're just talking, so far, about the luggage he checked at the counter. There's plenty more: carry-ons, backpacks, rolling suitcases, laptops, and fanny packs full of additional icky Newtrivia, just waiting to be unpacked on the national scene.

5. My favorite. He made a well-intentioned video to help raise awareness of climate change. In the video, he sits on the couch with fellow former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, or as she's known to Republican voters, Harpy McLucifer (D-San Frangaysco). Newt might as well have shot a commercial for an abortion clinic and solicited funds for Planned Parenthood, standing in front of a juicy Robert Mapplethorpe painting. That would have gone over way better.

Newt will win some delegates along the way. Just not the nomination.

But if not Newt, who?

[Respoiler: Ron Paul's up next. Guess how the post ends!]

Mitt Romney, The LDS Question, and Flipfloppery / 12-13-11

Going to tread lightly here, because this is a sensitive topic. Don't expect a lot of biting wit.

Mitt Romney has two problems.

First, he's a Mormon.

Important clarification: He doesn't have a problem with me. I would vote for a Democrat who's a Mormon. If Harry Reid (you know, the Senate Majority Leader) were running for office in my state, I would choose him over the right-wing alternative. His policy squares with mine. He could be an atheist, a Baptist, a Buddhist, whatever, I really couldn't possibly care less. I want left-wingers in office enacting left-wing policies, thwarting right-wing initiatives.

Yeah, well, as luck would have it, Mitt Romney isn't running for my vote, for the Senate in a reliably blue state, or for governor again, as a moderate Republican.

He's running for the chance to represent the Republicans in an election for President of the United States. And to get there, he needs to win over the people who vote in primaries.

And yeah. Between 40 and 60 percent of the R primary electorate, depending on the state, is made up of evangelical Christians. About half of those of those believe Mormonism is a cult. Trust my numbers, or just do the math: roughly, a quarter of R primary voters gladly place Romney in the Cult Box.

Important fact: Christians classify their Mormon brethren in that uncomplimentary way for multiple reasons. But chief among those is that in LDS circles, the Book of Mormon is viewed as equal to the Bible.

Understatement: fair or unfair, when the LDS church went that route, it was practically asking for the "cult" label. Denying the divinity of Christ is the biggest massive breach of orthodoxy I can imagine, and right behind that, in second place, lies messing with the ultimate authority of the Word of God.

Like I said, that's neither here nor there for me. I have my own tenuous relationship with so-called orthodox dogma. (Really? A virgin birth? Are you serious?)

But again, I'm not voting in the Republican primaries. It's most definitely here and there for a large swath of the people Romney needs to reach.

When combined with his propensity to, um, how to say this -- his propensity to let his views on certain issues "evolve," and his extremely moderate past during his governorship of Massachusetts, Romney has a big problem. He's not appealing to the people who decide if he's appealing.

So he keeps polling between 20 and 30 percent, time and again, week after week, state after state. Forgive me, but duh.

I'll be shocked if Romney garners more than a third of the Republican vote in any primary outside of New England and the Mountain West. And that's no path to the nomination.

But if not Mitt, who?

Tomorrow, I'll give newt Gingrich the same treatment. (Spoiler: The post ends with "But if not Newt, who?")