Follow the Money, not the Polls

The latest polls show McCain with a slight lead over Obama.  Yet intrade.com, which offers betting on the race, shows Obama well ahead. 

Especially because what people say to pollsters inaccurately reflects what they'll do in the voting booth, I believe it's smart to ignore the polls and follow the money.

Obama will win. I'm taking bets.

Perhaps the U.S. Isn't Doing as Badly as the Media Would Have Us Believe

New York Times syndicate columnist Jeff Jacoby wrote this today

The Smartest Vice-Presidential Picks?

If someone asked me (no one has,) these would be my recommendations to Obama and McCain for the strongest VP candidate:

Obama should choose Hillary:

• While she has strong negatives, she has many more passionate supporters, especially among women, including many who otherwise might not vote. The larger Obama's victory, the more he can claim a mandate for what will be a very liberal agenda, so having her on the ticket will greatly empower his presidency.
  
• I think the argument against her that America isn't ready for a Black president and a women vice-president is wrong. I think America really wants to show how not racist and sexist it is, so that ticket would yield, in my opinion, a win of unprecedented size.
  

• Most important, Hillary is smart, driven, ruthless, and an effective politician--that's an unbeatable combination in a politician.
  

I do think Obama will need to allow, indeed encourage her to be a new style of vice president: with a far more active role than traditional vice presidents. But both Clinton/Gore and Bush/Cheney have set precedent for that.

McCain should also choose Hillary:

• Right now, it appears he's dead in the water. He needs a bold VP pick, and for the reasons above, Hillary seems like the best shot.
  
• In addition, the country (thanks to the ever more baldly liberal-biased media and colleges,) is moving the country leftward, so McCain needs a leftist running mate if he's to have any chance of winning.
  
• Of course, McCain and Clinton would argue like hell in the Oval Office, but that's okay: Often the best ideas derive from a clash between two differing titans. (Alas, McCain is no titan now, if he ever was one.)

A Libertarian's Case for Obama

Regular readers of this blog know that I disagree with Obama's core value: that America needs yet more redistributive "justice." They know that I lean libertarian.

Yet as I see this campaign unfold, I'm beginning to wonder if Obama might be the right president at this point in American and world history.

Because of four decades now of liberal-slanted media and college education, most of our best and brightest are liberals, so an Obama presidency would be filled with more capable (and idealistic) people than under a McCain presidency. As every venture capitalist knows, it's as important to invest in the best people as it is to invest in the best ideas.

Have listened today to a McCain town hall meeting, it's clear to me that he shows early signs of cardiovascular dementia. He too often makes little slips, such as "Here in Vermont and the rest of this state, I mean country." In itself, of course, that means nothing. But when it happens again and again, not just in this town meeting but in, for example, when discussing Shia, Sunni, and Al Qaeda, which should be in the wheelhouse of his expertise, and the fact that his cognitive functioning will only decline during his term in office, I am convinced that McCain's cognitive functioning is too weak to be the president of the United States.

We've never had a radical president, either radical left or radical right. While one can theorize all one wants, and indeed my theories suggest America, en toto, will be much worse under a radical Left administration, there may be a need for a grand experiment with a superliberal/radical president supported by an overwhelmingly liberal congress, which is what is projected. Obama indeed will be the most liberal president in U.S. history:

• The non-partisan National Journal rated him America's most liberal senator, scoring him 100 out of 100 on liberality. And his liberality score has gone up every year he's been in office: #16 in 2005, #10 in 2006 and #1 in 2007. The trend suggests he'll grow ever more liberal.
  
• Despite band-aid statements to avoid losing votes, his statements and long-term associations make clear that his core values are radical Hard-Left, for example, Black Liberation Theology.
  
• His positions on health care, education, hatred of corporations, on illegal immigration (e.g., access to our most prestigious colleges even if it means legal residents are turned away,) are extraordinarily Leftist.
  

The gap between rich and poor has gotten too wide and perhaps a hard Leftist is needed to close the gap, and make the public feel that the cards aren't too stacked against them. (I know that statement is contradictory to my antipathy to redistributive "justice, " but, from where I sit, there is a need for modestly more progressivity of the tax code, but less redistributive "justice" in education, health care, and regarding illegal immigrants. I believe the net costs to America of the latter three are huge, and resulting in an overall worse America.)

Obama is a truly gifted orator, and whenever one deals with the masses, the ability to give a rousing speech is more important than real-world competence. Speechmaking inspires, and that is one of a president's main roles, especially in an era in which China, India, and other countries are in ascendancy while the U.S. is likely in unavoidable decline.

I have not decided whom I'm going to vote for, but consistent with my core belief that the major media has largely abdicated its responsibility to fairly present issues on all sides, having, on previous posts, presented the case against Obama, here I present the case for him.

Why the Political Campaign is So Repulsive...And a Better Approach YOU can take

You've probably never heard of George Lakoff's Rockridge Institute nor political consultant, Drew Westin nor pollster Frank Luntz.

They are the Josef Goebbels of American politics--teaching candidates manipulative propaganda techniques to obfuscate the issues. They replace facts with focus-group and even MRI-tested manipulative phrases. It disgusts me.

We can't ban them but, please, avoid listening to the candidates--they are robots merely mouthing the focus-group tested phrases. Read commentaries from all quarters.

I cited my favorite sites in an earlier post, but here are some recent worthy articles:

FROM A LIBERAL PUBLICATION
The New York Times' comparison of candidates on the issues

Salon's recent take on the Obama and Clinton campaigns.

FROM A CENTRIST PUBLICATION
The Economist's endorsement of Obama for the nomination but not necessarily the presidency.

FROM A CONSERVATIVE PUBLICATION
Charles Krauthammer's support of Clinton for the nomination (in the National Review.)

FROM A LIBERTARIAN PERSPECTIVE
A call for a Libertarian-oriented president by the editor of the libertarian Reason magazine. (This was published in the L.A. Times.)

How to Pick Who to Vote For

I believe it was Churchill who said, "Judge a man not by what he says, but by what he does."

There's no better way to choose which politician to vote for. After all, our system virtually forces a candidate who really want to win to parse, massage, mislead, and even outright lie.

If we replace the blather with relevant deeds, the following facts about Obama come into evidence:

The nonpartisan National Journal rates Congress members' voting records on a scale from 0 (most conservative) to 100 (most liberal.) Obama's voting record scored 100. Is this a man likely to be a uniter not a divider? And if you consider yourself a moderate, can you be comfortable with a man whose voting record is maximally liberal?

Obama and his family, including his children, for 20 years attended the church of Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Obama calls him "His spiritual advisor." He donated thousands of dollars to Wright's church. He named him to one of his presidential campaign committees. All these suggest he condones if not embraces the key themes in Wright's sermons. An ABC News review of dozens of Wright's sermons found "repeated denunciations of the U.S.," most memorably saying "God bless America? No. God DAMN America!" Wright also insisted that the U.S. created the AIDS virus to kill Blacks, that the U.S. brought 9/11 on itself, and that anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan is a great man.

Candidly, I do not follow politics closely enough to responsibly and representatively describe the full range of Obama's, Clinton's, McCain's, or Ron Paul's (Yes, he still is running--Here's his Apr. 28 CNN interview) relevant actions. I offer the above two merely because they're the two most glaring examples I've heard of. I don't mean to imply that there might not be equally important facts about the others.)

I invite you to search out the candidates' relevant behaviors, notably their voting records and examples of effective leadership. To those ends, a good place to start is VoteSmart. (When you get there, scroll down.) I'd also just Google the candidates and avoid sites created by the candidates, the parties, or advocacy groups. Instead, read liberal, conservative, and libertarian sites' reporting, not of what the candidates said, but of what they've done.