1. Not only does McCain support McCain-Feingold, it is one of his signature issues. This will infect many aspects of his presidency, including his appointment of judges. It will be devastating to have a President and a Congress who strongly support this issue at the same time.

George W. Bush signed McCain-Feingold despite believing it to be unconstitutional. I’ll take the guy who believes that the laws he proposes are constitutional over the guy who expediently decides to ignore what he believes the constitution says any day.

2. McCain opposed the Bush Tax Cuts, and what is worse, used class warfare rhetoric to criticize them.

Fair enough. I’d have preferred to see the Bush Spending Cuts than the Bush Tax Cuts, and generally think that we’ve ludicrously expanded the idea of a “middle class” income, but maybe I’m weird that way.

3. McCain has taken strong positions against doing anything about illegal immigration. I don’t believe his recent “conversion” on the issue. For the record, I favor a large amount of legal immigration, but I believe that illegal immigration needs to be addressed.

I think that’s a misstatement of McCain’s position, which after all was initially the same as the president’s.

4. McCain opposes strong interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, for top members of Al Qaeda like Khalid Sheik Mohammed.

Yeah, we really need to have another president who supports torture. That will surely help America’s standing in the world.

5. McCain wants to close down Guantanamo.

If you believe the Bush administration’s public statements (nobody does, but that’s beside the point), so do they.

6. McCain favors reimportation of drugs.

Yeah, free trade is a bitch. And Big Pharma is free to stop exporting drugs to countries that reexport the drugs if they aren’t paying a fair market price for them.

7. McCain takes a strong position on opposing global warming. For the record, I think that the evidence probably supports taking some actions now, such as establishing prizes for the development of technology reducing greenhouse gases, but not the kind of strong regulatory actions that McCain seems to support.

8. McCain opposes drilling in ANWR.

Those “strong regulatory actions” include, by the way, actions supported by Mitt Romney too (such as respecting the right of the states to regulate greenhouse gas emissions within their own borders). That federalism’s a bitch too.

9. McCain generally favors regulating American business, including pharmaceutical companies and transportation companies. This is his instinctual reaction to actions he does not like. He does not seem to understand economics. Recently, he spoke about the subprime problem in terms of “greedy people on Wall Street who need to go to jail."

Is there anyone in the race who doesn’t favor regulating American business? Well, except Ron Paul, but his priority is more on keeping brown people out of the country than deregulation.

10. McCain would not be good on judges. Despite his claims to the contrary, there is strong evidence that he would not have appointed Alito. And he is not likely to appoint people who think campaign finance is unconstitutional.

Would anyone other than George W. Bush have appointed Alito?

The Times-Picayune reminds us that voting in the primaries for Bobby Jindal’s replacement in Congress will take place on March 8, with the voter registration deadline being next Wednesday. The special elections in the 1st and 6th districts will be the first held in Louisiana since the legislature abolished the nonpartisan “jungle primary” system for elections to federal office introduced in the 1970s—given the Republican leanings of the 1st district, this is a race that is likely to be decided either in the March GOP primary or the potential April runoff (if no candidate receives a majority), both of which are only open to registered Republicans.

I look at Barack Obama’s voting record today at Outside The Beltway, on the heels of the declaration by National Journal that he was the most liberal senator in 2007.

My blog-colleague James Joyner on the results of the Florida primary:

Conservatives ranging from Michelle Malkin to Robert Stacy McCain can’t believe [John McCain] beat Romney. Republican primary voters, apparently, figure an 82% conservative who sometimes takes positions seemingly designed to anger the base is preferable to a guy who was a Massachusetts liberal a few months ago but now says exactly what conservatives want to hear. Go figure.

Heh.

I’m probably infringing on some other blogger’s schtick by posting this, but I thought it was worthwhile: 0.3% of Louisiana’s registered voters have voted early. You can totally sense the enthusiasm. In addition to making a stab at explaining how the votes correspond to delegates (to the extent delegates qua delegates matter in this process), there are also some handy statistics:

East Baton Rouge Parish, which has a controversial election to approve or reject a third riverboat casino, led the early voting with 1,880 votes cast, the only parish to register a four-digit total. St. Tammany was a distant second with 679 votes cast, and Natchitoches Parish was third with 614, four ahead of Orleans Parish. Jefferson Parish was fifth with 572 votes cast.

By the close of business Tuesday, 6,808 white voters had cast ballots, 2,299 African-Americans voted and 199 from other ethnic groups voted. A total of 5,388 of the early voters were Democrats, 3,497 were Republicans and 421 were independents or nonaffiliated voters who cast ballots for the local races.

I’ll be packing some additional reading material to bring with me to the polls on the 9th; War and Peace alone may not suffice.

As noted by me at OTB, one question going forward for Democrats is whether or not Barack Obama’s voter breakdown by race carries into the next primary states. Here’s some quick-and-dirty math for Florida’s zero-delegates-except-if-Hillary-says-so primary on Tuesday.

Assuming Obama gets 80% of the black vote and 25% of the non-black vote, and 24% of Florida Democratic primary voters are black (assuming no differential turnout, based on Florida’s registration statistics from December 31st), Obama should get around 38% of the Florida vote. That’s well ahead of how Obama has been polling in Florida, so I’m not at all convinced that the extrapolation works well even though Obama’s average has been tracking upwards slightly in the state and one would expect that Florida whites would be less racially conservative than South Carolina whites. I think the safe money is that Clinton will still win the state and its 0 delegates comfortably, but I wouldn’t be overly surprised with a result like 40–35 or so (with both candidates receiving about equal numbers of those 0 delegates at stake, given the Democrats’ high threshold-PR rules).

So, it’s not OK for Democrats to boycott debates held on Fox News, but it’s just dandy for all the Republican candidates except John McCain to refuse to meet with the New York Times editorial board. Apparently petulance is only petty when one is a Democrat.

Today I ponder Giuliani’s freefall in the Florida polls and mock the Ronulans for losing to Fred Thompson in the completely meaningless Louisiana GOP caucuses.

… are posted over at Outside the Beltway. They’ve been there for a day or so, I just didn’t get around to letting y’all know about them until now.

Now back to laundry.

For someone who fundamentally believes that political campaigns are by-and-large sideshows that have little real effect on voter preferences, I am surprisingly transfixed by the last week of the campaign. Then again, that may be due to my week of broadband withdrawal at Dad’s, where I replaced my normal web surfing habits with channel-flipping between MSNBC, Fox News, and CNN. Maybe a return to broadband will restore my corrosive cynicism about the democratic process.

Related: the latest Toast-O-Meter™ update from Steven Taylor.

Vacation (of a sort) continues. I flipped between the NFL playoffs, some Ashley Judd movie that was on CBS, and the ABC/Facebook debates some last night, and probably paid more attention to the Republicans than the Democrats—I wish I could say it was because I changed my registration to Republican before I left, although that is true, but really it had more to do with my exceedingly low tolerance for listening to Hillary Clinton (there’s your likability problem) and my much higher tolerance for Ashley Judd and John Madden. The competitiveness of the Jaguars-Steelers game probably was a factor as well.

Much is being said about the Obama boomlet and the gushing reaction he has received from across the political spectrum; the most notable to me was that originating from Joe Scarborough, a guy from a different ideological planet than Obama. Does Obama pull away Republicans from Huckabee in a general election matchup? Like James Joyner, I’m skeptical—after all, I’ve read The American Voter and 47 subsequent years’ worth of political science research that says that partisanship is fairly sticky and it’s the primary determinant of vote choice—but elections are won at the margins, not based on the behavior of the bulk of voters. Obama would also be more likely to arouse opposition from Republicans in Congress when he tacks too far to the left; the behavior of the GOP with a Republican in the White House who’s significantly more fiscally conservative than Mike Huckabee suggests that Reagan’s 11th Commandment is more valued by the bulk of the congressional GOP than fiscal sanity. (I’d probably vote for Obama over Huckabee… but then again I voted for John Kerry in 2004, so I’m probably not representative of the typical Republican.)

Interestingly enough, both Alex Tabarrok and Greg Mankiw appear to give the “most economically literate” endorsement from the Democratic debate to Obama. Then again, on any stage containing John Edwards, the threshold for economic literacy is pretty damn low.

Steven Taylor has brought back the always-popular Toast-O-Meter for the 2008 campaign. The semi-official motto: “If Sabato can use a crystal ball, why can’t I use a toaster?”

Hey, it beats Hillary Clinton’s latest focus-group-approved tag line, “Ready for Change”—a description that certainly applies to all 71% of the Iowa caucus-goers who didn’t vote for her.

I consider the Ron Paul is Revolutionary Buzz over at OTB today.

I predict the nominees at Outside the Beltway today, part of a series from all of the OTB faithful.

Not one, not two, but possibly three separate special elections will be held to replace Bobby Jindal in Congress. That’s in addition to the presidential primary already scheduled for February, and up to four potential election dates in the second half of the year. I suppose we can live without representation in Congress for up to four months…

James Joyner at my occasional alternative haunt, OTB, discusses Mike Huckabee’s failure to gain much traction on the campaign trail with the Christian right’s leaders—who have seemed to prefer candidates like Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani—despite his impeccable Christian credentials, a topic we ended up discussing in part during Friday’s southern politics class (as sort of an offshoot of our discussion about what the off-year elections mean for the GOP in the south).

I think much of Huckabee’s problem dates back to a conscious decision by the evangelical movement around 30 years ago. In 1976, evangelical Christians came out for “one of their own”—Jimmy Carter—but four years of Carter’s rule convinced evangelicals that having a fellow devout Christian in the White House was much less important than the policies the president would pursue, and thus they defected to Ronald Reagan, a divorced man whose level of religious commitment was barely discernible. Evangelicals have since voted for George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, and George W. Bush, all three of whom cannot really be described as evangelicals themselves, even as Democrats have presented Southern Baptist candidates like Al Gore and Bill Clinton. In short, evangelicals learned from the Carter experience that voting instrumentally on the basis of policy was more important than voting for “the man” on the basis of his religious convictions. And, as the evangelical movement has aged and fragmented (and some leaders, such as Jerry Falwell have died off), there’s no single power broker who can sway enough votes to a candidate like Huckabee to matter much.

Perhaps if Huckabee can exceed expectations in Iowa he might have a shot at picking up more endorsements from the Christian right, but as long as he is mired in the lower tier of the GOP field and evangelicals remain satisfied with the policy commitments—to the extent they’ve even made policy commitments—of the more viable (and certainly less evangelical) candidates like Giuliani, Thompson, McCain, and Romney, I don’t see much movement happening for Huckabee.

Well, if you thought Ron Paul truly believed in ending the “illegal war in Iraq” and going after the “war criminals” at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue… you thought wrong, since he’s one of the 167 House members who voted to drop fellow moonbat-courting presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich’s impeachment resolution against Dick Cheney into the memory hole. Maybe you can get your campaign contribution from Monday back, but somehow I doubt it.

More thoughts on the Cheney impeachment vote from Viking Pundit, who—like many others—focuses on the hypocrisy on the other side of the aisle. To quote the late, great Phil Hartman on NewsRadio: “A debate? How totally whack that would be, yo!”

Update: More on this theme from Prof. Karlson and Rick Moran.

Marc Ambinder hypothesizes that the GOP presidential contenders might be duking it out until March. I suppose that’s a little more plausible than the media fantasies that there will be a brokered convention or even that either major party’s delegate counts actually matter—estimates thereof are duly reported after each primary and caucus, despite all modern races being settled in practice weeks before any candidate had a first-ballot majority—but not much.

Jim Babka, who if I recall correctly was once upon a time one of those Libertarian Party activists who turned my campaign contributions into about bupkiss, takes to the pages of Positive Liberty to advance the thesis that Ron Paul is the only Republican candidate who can win in November of next year. Commenter AMW presents the more compelling argument:

Alternative Hypothesis: Every politician represents a basket of goods to the voters, and while most voters can find at least one good in Dr. Paul’s basket that they approve strongly of, few can find enough to justify voting for him. The left may be anti-war, but I’m guessing they’ll prefer the candidate who advocates univeral [sic] healthcare, more spending on schools and a tough stance on the drug war, even if she’ll only make marginal changes to the Iraq strategy. And the knuckle-dragging mouth-breathers at Red State et al. would sooner trade in their AM talk-shows for NPR than give a “surrender monkey” like Paul the satisfaction of their vote, minimal government advocate or no.

I think the other thing that supporters of Paul are missing here is that not only are presidential candidates “baskets of goods,” they’re also strategic actors. The amount of daylight between the loophole-ridden Democratic withdrawal promises (arguably, every single American solider in Iraq is already engaged in one of counterterrorism actions, support of Iraqi forces, humanitarian projects, or stabilization operations—things that the leading Democrats all promise will continue) and the positions of the leading GOP contenders is already small, and given the progress—or lack thereof—in Iraq, any GOP—or Democratic—contender who secures the nomination can either take the tack of “the Iraqis are in control, so it’s time to bring troops home” or “the Iraqis have spent the last 9–12 months squabbling while the surge was giving them time to figure stuff out, and there’s no progress, so it’s time to bring troops home.”

2008 will be fought on energy policy, health care, trade, border security and immigration, and the foreign policy crisis of the week—which, dollars to donuts, won’t be Iraq by the time Labor Day 2008 rolls around. I have no doubt that whoever the eventual Republican nominee is will be far better positioned to capture the median voter on those issues than Paul is—America isn’t buying the Great Libertarian Offer, even when served with a side dose of Buchananite populism.

David Weigel at Hit and Run isn’t quite sure why Ron Paul attracts a lot of young supporters. Perhaps there’s a giant red flag here:

Jacob Bofferding, a student at Iowa State University, said he decided to work for Paul after seeing him on a televised debate.

“For Ron Paul to stand up there and say, ‘people hate us because we intervene in their lives’ and for (Rudy) Giuliani to say ‘that’s ridiculous,’ that blew my mind,” said Bofferding.

“Our imperialistic foreign policy is the biggest threat to this country, not groups of terrorists that have no state sponsor,” Bofferding said. “The first thing you have to do is stop subsidizing oppressive regimes in the Middle East.”

This is Noam Chomsky 101, and Chomsky has rock-star status among the perpetually-aggrieved college student community, despite being one of those people over 30 they’re not supposed to trust. That Paul (or Kucinich or Gravel on the left) would have a similar appeal saying the exact same things shouldn’t be much of a surprise.

Odd that Google has switched from showing John McCain ads to now showing Barack Obama ads, while continuing to intersperse ads for Newt Gingrich’s weekly email or whatever. Perhaps the core demographic of my blog is “fans of members of Congress who will never be president.”

When six key staffers resign from your campaign in one day, you might be in trouble.

If you believe Billy Hollis, not much, although his practical positions on trade and immigration policy might appeal to some trade unionist elements of the Democratic coalition.

Part II in the Ron Paul series.

Hit and Run links a New Republic profile of Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, popular with the right’s equivalent of the Netroots but apparently not attracting as many fans from libertarian ranks. Michael Crowley explains why:

But libertarians are a fractious bunch, and some hardcore activists have mixed feelings about the man now carrying their banner. For instance, libertarian purists generally support a laissez-faire government attitude toward abortion and gay marriage, as well as “open border” immigration policies and unfettered free trade. Yet Paul opposes gay marriage, believes states should outlaw abortion, decries high immigration rates, and has called himself “sort of” a protectionist. (These divergences may be explained by Paul’s socially conservative East Texas district, which lies adjacent to Tom DeLay’s former district and which President Bush last carried with 67 percent of the vote. Being pro-choice simply doesn’t fly there.)

As a result, Paul’s candidacy leaves some of his erstwhile libertarian fans cold—particularly the intellectuals who congregate in Washington outfits like the CATO Institute or Reason magazine. “He comes from a more right-wing populist approach,” explains Brian Doherty, a California-based Reason editor and author of Radicals for Capitalism, a history of the libertarian movement. “Culturally, he strikes a lot of the more cosmopolitan libertarians as a yokel.” (Doherty himself is a Paul admirer.)

And, while some libertarians criticize Paul from the left on social issues, others are swiping at him from the right over the war. “Will Libertarianism Survive Ron Paul?” asked one article on the America’s Future Foundation website, before continuing, “Paul’s prominence threatens to make his blame-America instincts the defining characteristic of libertarianism in the public imagination. If libertarianism becomes inextricably associated with radical pacifism, will young people with classically liberal instincts be discouraged from serious political engagement?”

The question facing this libertarian-minded voter who’s likely to vote in the GOP presidential primary: if I wasn’t inclined to vote for Pat Buchanan, why would I vote for Ron Paul, given that on almost all the issues that matter their positions are virtually indistinguishable?

Apparently there was a debate among the Republican contenders for the presidential nomination tonight.

If more states keep following Florida’s lead, we may soon thankfully reach a point at which a state sets its primary date to be before the present time, the nomination will be decided (since the primary will have already taken place), and this whole process will be mercifully over. Or maybe I just watch too much science fiction where this sort of causality is commonplace (like this episode of Futurama).