Dan Drezner wrote Friday:

Here’s my position—I’m genuinely unsure of who I’m going to vote for. More and more, Bush reminds me of Nixon. He’s not afraid to make the bold move in foreign policy. On domestic policy, Bush seems like he’ll say or do anything, so long as it advances his short-term political advantage. If Karl Rove thought imposing wage and price controls would win Pennsylvania and Michigan for Bush, you’d see an Executive Order within 24 hours. Andrew Sullivan and others have delivered this harangue, so I won’t repeat it.

If—a big if—the Democrats put forward a credible alternative, then I could very well pull the donkey lever.

I’m close to being in the same boat as Dan (well, besides that whole “having a tenure-track job” thing), but I’m probably more likely than he is to pull the Libertarian lever than the “donkey” one.† After listening and watching the Dems, my rough assessment is that either Lieberman or Edwards would make a decent president, Kerry would be borderline, and the rest might as well be LaRouche. If one of those clowns got the nomination, I’d probably feel compelled to vote for George W. Bush, since I really don’t want to convert to Islam and/or learn Arabic. Nothing against Muslims, but my wishy-washy beliefs suit me just fine and I don’t particularly feel like converting.

However, Edwards, Kerry or Lieberman appear sufficiently competent and—more importantly—will be more constrained in their desired profligacy by a Republican Congress than Bush has been; plus, I suspect O’Connor’s mood-swings would be somewhat more conservative with a Democrat in the White House.* While I doubt I’d be sufficiently inclined to vote for any of them, their presence on the ticket would be more than sufficient to demotivate any support I might otherwise have for Bush.

Steven Taylor has your weekend edition of the Toast-O-Meter up and running, looking ahead to Tuesday’s seven-state primary.

I listened to most of tonight’s South Carolina Democratic primary debate in the car today driving up from Oxford to Memphis; what struck me most about the debate, besides Tom Brokaw’s inexplicable and repeated references to the Muslim world as “the Nation of Islam,” was the degree to which the amount of applause a particular statement received was inversely proportional with its plausibility as a policy.

Some of this, perhaps, can be attributed to Al Sharpton’s delivery, but it seemed as if even Dennis Kucinich got a better reaction from the assembled crowd than any of the more mainstream alternatives when speaking. Extremist candidates are often popular with the base of course—witness, for example, Alan Keyes’ appeal to debate attendees in his runs that never translated into primary votes. But if the crowd was at all reflective of the S.C. electorate,* Howard Dean may have put away the “red meat” too early…

In policy terms, all I can say is: thank God none of these guys will have a friendly Congress if they win the presidency. Just call me a cognitive Madisonian I guess…

Update: According to Dr. Scott Huffmon, a friend who attended the debate, there was "a tiny, but vocal, group of Kucinich supporters who were seated close to [the] stage," which would help explain much of the applause for Kucinich. Apparently the crowd was asked to refrain from applause and other noisemaking during the debate (except when entering and leaving commercial breaks), but the Kucinich and Sharpton supporters weren't particularly compliant with the request.

Martin Devon has some tough questions for the so-called “Deaniacs” in his weblog, while Steven Taylor notes that Dean is essentially conceding the February 3rd primaries to Edwards and Kerry. I’ve long suspected that Howard Dean and Wes Clark are both “empty vessels” that gained much of their support based on voters’ projection of the attitudes they’d like their ideal candidate to have, rather than gaining much support on the part of their own articulated beliefs. Indeed, in Dean’s more candid moments, he’s practically admitted that he’s tailored his campaign to appeal to the “angry Democrat” base, rather than being committed to those beliefs from the start—witness his flip-flop on the merits of Bush presidency from prior to 2002 and afterwards, for example.*

Projection effects aren’t unique to these two campaigns, or even politics in general; it’s part of human psychology to assume that the people we like agree with us on political issues, and for us to want our friends and neighbors to share our beliefs. But trying to build a political movement around a candidate who is simply a target for projection is largely doomed to failure—the only modern president to win an election on such an empty platform is Eisenhower, whose historical status as a war hero is much less doubtful than Wes Clark’s and whose political skills effectively reached across the partisan divide.

The key question is whether or not Dean can recover. The conventional wisdom says “no,” and I suspect that’s right—particularly as long as Clark is around to divide the “mainstream strident anti-war candidate” vote and (more fatally) John Kerry continues to rack up primary wins. Kerry could credibly sweep next Tuesday, especially with the Jim Clyburn endorsement in South Carolina. The endorsement of Kerry from South Carolina’s only black congressman may tip the balance against John Edwards in the one state he clearly must win Tuesday, although Edwards probably also needs to win Virginia and Tennessee on February 10th to remain viable.

And, speaking only for myself, the sooner both Clark and Dean are gone from this campaign the better.

No, this isn’t the post I promised yesterday. Hopefully I’ll have something either tonight or tomorrow. But, regardless, we be jammin’ as they say…

Dead Parrot Ryan has an apt analogy. And, you know, Joe Lieberman’s accent does sound vaguely Canadian...

I’ve been up in Memphis the past two days at the ass-end of a 56k dialup link, so I’ve been more of a punditry consumer than a punditry producer the past few days. Don’t expect that to change until late Wednesday… but, in the meantime, Steven Taylor has (virtually, at least) been all over New Hampshire, and ponders where things go from here.

My gut feeling is that John Kerry has a commanding but not insurmountable lead, while John Edwards is probably best positioned to catch him—if Howard Dean can’t win or even come close in his backyard, it’s hard to see him doing well elsewhere, whether we’re talking about the February 3rd primaries or the Michigan-Washington-Wisconsin trifecta that his campaign claims it’s positioning itself for. Wes Clark has largely failed to convert his military experience into a tangible asset on the trail—Kerry has the “people who respect heroes” vote cornered, and most military veterans have an innate distrust of generals, particularly ones who played politics in the service (a group Clark is apparently a member of, by most accounts); further, I don’t see Clark appealing to southerners so long as Edwards is still on the ticket. And I suspect Lieberman’s jet to Delaware tonight will divert to somewhere in Connecticut.

Of course, New Hampshire means nothing to either the Kucinich or Sharpton campaigns—two candidates who are in for the duration, and may be positioned to pick up some delegates down the stretch as voters in the late-voting states who want an alternative to the annointed winner (presumably Kerry) cast protest votes.

Also on the trail: James Joyner has a continuing roundup post. I’m flipping between MSNBC and Fox News here (with occasional forays to C-SPAN).

Steven Taylor has the “eye of the storm” edition of the Toast-O-Meter up at PoliBlog. Classic line, in reference to Joe Lieberman:

Losing is: The defining characteristic of his campaign.

Go forth and read the spin—before it’s been spun.

I didn’t watch much of the State of the Union Address (still working on syllabi, natch), but I did catch the tail end of it, and I sort of half-watched Chris Matthews anchoring MSNBC’s “postgame report”—the most interesting bit of which was the Frank Luntz focus group, I thought, mainly because I think those dial things they use are cool. Yes, I’m weird.

A few random thoughts:

• Do the dipshits who applauded when they heard the PATRIOT Act is expiring realize that they almost all voted for the bloody thing? That was probably the most lopsided vote since they passed the hideous, not to mention blatantly unconstitutional, Communications Decency Act in the mid-90s. (Incidentally, blatantly unconstitutional laws appear to have this interesting habit of getting lopsided votes in Congress; someone should research this scientifically.)
• I like the $300m for post-prison rehabilitation programs. Of course, I’d rather we decriminalize drugs and save ourselves the money, but that’s just me.
• I suspect the gay marriage thing was actually aimed at SCOTUS, or more specifically, Sandra Day O’Connor. Guess we’ll see if she was listening.
• At least Bush didn’t let out that Dean “crow sqwak” noise at the end of his speech.
• Speaking of Dean, I’m shocked he failed to include Mississippi in the list of states he promised to win (Olbermann had a map thingy of the list tonight, which was entertaining). Must not be any of them voters with Rebel flags on the back of their F-150s down here…

Anyway, cover letters to write then bedtime. Toodles!

By the way, James Joyner of OTB has all the reactions linked to one convenient post.

The news out of Iowa can’t be good for Howard Dean. The pressure’s now on for a convincing Dean resurgence in New Hampshire, which will be hard, given both Wesley Clark’s full-time campaigning in the state and John Kerry’s surge in Iowa.

Why did Dean sputter in Iowa? The easiest conclusion to draw is that Dean’s attempt to tap a well of anger among Democrats has failed, at least in Iowa, because Democrats as a whole aren’t quite that angry. According to the New York Times‘ account, Dean was unable to capitalize on anti-war sentiment:

A survey of voters entering the caucus sites Monday suggested that what had been Dr. Dean’s central appeal — his opposition to the war in Iraq — did him little good on Monday night. Just 14 percent said the war in Iraq had shaped their final decision, even though 75 percent said they opposed the war.

Dr. Dean’s showing also raised questions about what had been one of the most intriguing elements of the Dean candidacy: that he had recruited thousands of first-time voters who could transform the nature of American presidential politics. Although half the voters on Monday were attending their first Iowa caucuses, 36 percent voted for Mr. Kerry, compared with 22 percent for Dr. Dean and 24 percent for Mr. Edwards.

The question is now: what about New Hampshire? Clearly, Clark, Dean and Kerry are poised for a fight, with John Edwards in much the position he was in Iowa—any finish above fourth place can be spun as a win, as the key state for his fortunes is South Carolina—a state in which Dean has no traction and where, as Columbia’s The State reports, Kerry now has to scramble to rebuild an organization he dismantled to focus on Iowa and New Hampshire.

Of course, every reporter and political wonk’s fantasy is a brokered convention—something that isn’t in the cards quite yet, given that not a single delegate has been allocated so far. But, nonetheless, Vincent Kennedy McDean might be well-advised to tone it down a notch or two—while politics, like pro wrestling, is a rough-and-tumble sport, in only the latter do the “heels” often win.

Radley Balko shows the faces of the people who will, in all likelihood, decide the Democratic nomination. Here’s a hint: they look like Howard Dean’s cabinet in Vermont did…

Kevin Drum reckons the soft underbelly of the Bush presidency is Dick Cheney:

I’m going to stick with my suggestion that the Democrats could gain some traction by making Cheney a bigger issue in the campaign than vice presidents usually are. It would require a subtle touch, of course, but let’s face it: nobody likes an evil genius operating out of a hole. There ought to be something there we can take advantage of.

On the other hand, Unlearned Hand isn’t buying quite yet:

First of all, I think most Americans just won’t believe any claims that the Vice-President is exerting so much control. It goes against all conventional wisdom on vice-presidencies, and that’s a lot of inertia to overcome.

I’m not so sure about that; vice presidents have become more salient figures over the past 10–15 years than they used to be (see, e.g., Al Gore), although I’ll agree that the size of Cheney’s role is unprecedented. I’m rather inclined to think that vice presidents ought to have larger roles anyway, within the limitation that their primary job is to not die before the president does.

Cheney’s large role, in a lot of ways, is probably due to the relative inexperience of Bush in national politics. Interestingly, though, the “Ex-Governor – D.C. Insider” pattern has applied to every presidential ticket since Ford’s.

Second, it can easily be spun (perhaps correctly) into proof that Democrats know they can’t win by going after the President himself. Karl Rove could have a field day running ads that say “They are picking on the President’s staff because they don’t want to go head-to-head with George W. Bush.”

Well, it’s one thing to go after Andy Card and another to go after Cheney—the latter’s name, at least, is on the ballot. And I think there are legitimate issues that can be aired about Cheney’s role vis à vis Halliburton. I don’t know that I buy them necessarily (Cheney is hardly the first beltway insider to “descend from heaven” into a cushy job in the private sector, to borrow the Japanese coinage), but it’s a legitimate topic for discussion.

Third, I think Cheney’s presence is actually reassuring to a lot of people. To the extent that people do buy into the “Bush is dumb” rhetoric, many of them think having Cheney around makes for a perfect complement: Bush gives them the leadership and machismo that reassures a frightened nation, Cheney provides the organization and runs a lot of the policy analysis.

Perhaps that’s the case. On the other hand, I think the public perception of Cheney is that he’s on the verge of death—hardly a reassuring image. On balance, I tend to agree with Kevin and think Cheney’s a liability, at least on the image side.

Personally, though, I think Democrats could make much more hay with the Creepy Combo of John Ashcroft and Tom Ridge—at least with libertarian-minded voters like me who are deeply skeptical about Homeland Security’s smoke-and-mirrors operation and Ashcroft’s ties to the fundies and the CCC types. With a reasonably credible candidate at the front of the ticket (at this point, it’d have to be Edwards or possibly Kerry), that sort of message might sway my vote.

This is today’s OTB Traffic Jam entry.

Among Democratic contenders for the nomination, Wes Clark has so far had the Memphis airwaves to himself—apparently in an effort to build momentum going into the February 10th open primary in Tennessee, which is only 3 weeks away from Tuesday. Is Clark planning a “Southern strategy” of his own? Or is this a misallocation of resources? Only time will tell, but if he does well in both New Hampshire and on February 3rd, he should be well-positioned for a win in Tennessee in the race against presumed front-runner Howard Dean.

Steven Taylor observes that the latest poll numbers, which show both Kerry and Edwards with statistically-insignificant leads over Dean, are essentially meaningless; he’s still predicting a Dean victory.

Steven Taylor has posted the pre-Iowa edition of the Toast-O-Meter™. Also of interest: Jeff Quinton is keeping his eye on all things South Carolina.

Stephen Green ponders whether Howard Dean’s candidacy is stagnating in the face of surges from Wesley Clark (in New Hampshire, as he’s had the whole state to himself while the rest of the Dems pander to Iowans prior to next Tuesday’s essentially meaningless precinct caucuses) and John Edwards (who’s picking up endorsements and favorable media coverage in Iowa).

At this point, the narrative for Iowa is pretty much written:* Edwards surges to a surprisingly strong third-place finish, and Dick Gephardt fails to live up to expectations in his own back yard against Dean, effectively starting the “death bells” for Gephardt’s campaign—with the nails to the coffin coming when he finishes spectacularly poorly in New Hampshire.

So, what’s the New Hampshire narrative? Today’s polls still show Dean with a statistically-significant, but rapidly eroding, lead over Clark. If Dean and Clark finish within single digits of each other, Dean fails to live up to expectations—and has to hope that Clark, Edwards, and Gephardt divide the South Carolina electorate enough for Dean to finish #2 behind Edwards. If, on the other hand, Dean gets a double-digit win over Clark in New Hampshire, that’s probably enough to make him the designated frontrunner and tip the balance in the non-S.C. February 3rd primaries through favorable media.

Stay tuned, things are about to get interesting…

* Update: Ok, maybe not… where the heck did Kerry come from?

VodkaPundit Stephen Green plays with Excel’s mapping feature to draw some electoral college maps on the (not unreasonable) presumption that the relative strength of the Republicans and Democrats in each state is unchanged since 2000. Fun stuff.

Marybeth links a Joel Klein piece on the fun and excitement that is the Iowa caucuses. Classic quotes:

To explain how it all works, Iowa Secretary of State Chet Culver is going around the state holding practice caucuses. At his workshop last Tuesday at the library in Clive, a suburb seven miles west of Des Moines, about 50 people showed up, several of them young enough to be my parents. Most of these folks already knew how caucuses work and just wanted a refresher course. Clive needs to get itself a bowling alley.

As Culver, 37, a former history teacher, began with an hour-long PowerPoint presentation on the history of the caucus going back to 1846, a sign-language interpreter flashed signs — even though not a single person in the room was deaf. It hit me about 15 minutes into the speech that the sign-language guy must have realized no one there was deaf, but by that time it was too embarrassing to just stop. So he kept going, his bravery a further testimony to the lengths Iowans go through just to get David Broder to visit.

At least Bob Putnam would approve!

For the second hour, Culver had the audience stage a fake caucus. It turns out the Republican caucus is really simple. They pass around ballots, count them and go home to watch Everybody Loves Raymond while the Democrats are still reading their rules. I predict the state will eventually be 100% Republican.

Once all the candidates have at least 15%, a formula Culver describes as “needing a Ph.D. in math to understand” is used to determine how many delegates each candidate gets. The percentage of delegates each candidate gets is the number reported in the media. Then the media, for reasons that are unclear, pretend that has something to do with whom the country wants to be President.

Yes, this is exactly the sort of shit Ackerman and Fishkin want to foist on America. Thanks—but no thanks.

As I’ve noted before, there’s a Democratic delegate selection rule that requires 15% support in a congressional district for a candidate to receive delegates. However, as the Commissar notes, the caucus procedure isn’t exactly a single-ballot electoral situation, according to Carl Hulse of The New York Times:

The chairman of the caucus determines the “viability” threshold for groups backing each presidential candidates, which in most cases will be 15 percent of the number of people attending. Caucusgoers then have 30 minutes to divide into preference groups for the candidates. If some groups supporting candidates do not reach the 15 percent level, those people then have up to half an hour to realign with other campaigns.

At this stage, the pressure will be on the newly liberated caucusgoers to enlist with another candidate. In a deeper layer of strategy, some participants might even align with a candidate they are not that wild about to cut into the count of those who most threaten their first choice.

At the end of 30 minutes, the preference groups are counted again and the delegates are apportioned by multiplying the number in the preference group by the number of delegates up for grabs in a precinct, then dividing by the total attending the caucus. In cases of ties, delegates can be awarded by flipping a coin or drawing straws.

The Commissar expects this will lead to some strategic behavior, as groups of voters who might prefer other candidates may coalesce around a single “ABD” candidate to counter the Dean groundswell. Yet there are a couple of obstacles to such a process:

1. This process only happens at caucus sites, rather than at a higher level of aggregation. Gephardt may get the nod at one location, Edwards at another, and Lieberman at a third.
2. The caucuses only elect delegates to county conventions; as The Green Papers notes, the process for choosing congressional district and statewide delegates happens in late April, by which time the nomination will essentially be decided—and thus almost all of Iowa’s national convention delegates are likely to opt for the presumed nominee at that point, rather than following the caucus-goers’ preferences.

So, in the grand scheme of things: Iowa decides virtually nothing, and essentially is as important as today’s eminently forgettable D.C. non-binding primary, yet it’s been the center of media attention for two months. Great.

Notice to any prospective employer who got here by Googling my name:

Jeff Jarvis semi-fisks a Pew study that (a) shows Americans don’t know much about politics and (b) assumes this actually matters. Money quote from Jeff:

The net result, Pew complains, is that the electorate is poorly informed. I’d say that at this stage in the election, the electorate doesn’t want to be informed. Unless you live in Iowa or New Hampshire, there’s no point in paying attention to half the candidates running now, right?

On the night of February 3rd, the primary process, for all intents and purposes, will be over, without 90% of the population of America being consulted. The Democratic candidates aren’t really “waltzing before a blind audience,” to steal a phrase; instead, they’re waltzing before a few audiences who get to decide which one gets to go to the national finals in November—with the rest of us stuck watching in the meantime, because nothing could possibly be more important than seeing a bunch of Democrats suck up to Iowans for weeks on end. I think voters are being much smarter than Pew thinks they are.

Christie Todd Whitman argues on the New York Times op-ed page that the GOP needs to spend more time reaching out to moderate voters. (Hat tip: Martin Devon of Patio Pundit.)

Update: James Joyner isn’t buying.

Some say George W. Bush looks like a chimpanzee. Now, Jeff Jarvis speculates that Howard Dean looks like a thumb. Sounds like a warped version of rock-paper-scissors to me…

Pieter Dorsman of Peaktalk wonders if the United States might be following the path of Canada and the Netherlands, with both the left and the right in those countries becoming disaffected with the centrists who held sway in the 1990s. Definitely a good read. (Digression follows…)

Steven Taylor has the latest Toast-O-Meter update, live from N‘Orleans (I have to say that Steven’s far more dedicated to his craft than I would be in his stead). And who says political science is irrelevant?

At the Southern Political Science Association meeting this week, Merle Black, professor at Emory University, and expert on Southern Politics, stated that Dean had no chance of winning any of the South in the general election, indeed, assuming no radical events, that none of the Nine would be able to win the South, although Clark might could win Arkansas. The entire panel, all experts on Southern Politics, concurred.

According to the SPSA program, the panel included both Black brothers, Harold Stanley, Hastings Wyber, and Ron Weber, and was moderated by Robert Steed… for those of you keeping score at home.

Note to potential presidential candidates: don’t go on obscure Canadian political panel shows—your comments may return from the past to bite you in the ass.

Link via Matt Stinson.