The RNC unveiled a new web initiative today where Republican voters pose questions to Barack Obama.

Here’s the first video:

Make sure you head over to Can We Ask? for more.

I am sorry for the long hiatus, folks. End of the semester finals and papers have consumed my life for the past few weeks.

I am very intrigued by the recent discussion on this site pertaining to the influence social conservatives have upon the Republican Party and whether or not a split is inevitable. Forgive me as I stray from argument to argument. The thoughts below represent a loose outline of how McCain can position himself for the fall.

Though I do not believe the GOP circa 2008 is headed for a similar divide that saw the Democrat Party circa 1968 torn between hawks and doves, segregationists and desegregationists, it is obvious to all of us that John McCain will not win in November by following the road-map of Bush’s 2004 victory.

Suddenly, the GOP has a new face; a face rarely ever associated with party norms, a face wrinkled and old, one that has endured the bitterness of Washington politics and, before that, the horrors of war. Any Republican would begin the 2008 campaign facing daunting and nearly insurmountable challenges. The GOP goes in knowing that 1988 stands as the only time since World War II that a party was able to elect three consecutive presidents (Reagan in 1980 and 1984, George H.W. Bush in 1988). On top of the electoral history, the party is burdened with a very unpopular sitting president, a general public weary of two ongoing wars, and an economy buckling under the weight of rising energy prices and a faltering housing market.

Rolling out the conventional Republican talking points or relying on the ever-elusive “base” will not produce a win in November. Republicans must reinvigorate the party’s platform in 2008 and reach out to all Americans. Whether we like it or not, McCain must play to his strengths to hold off Barack Obama. Any attempts to recast him as a die-hard conservative to please the base are futile and counterproductive. By all means, let us emphasize his staunch pro-life record, but any hopes to defeat the Chosen One in a drawn out culture war would be ill-conceived. 

“As the Party of the open door, while steadfast to our commitment to our ideals, we respect and accept that members of our Party can have deeply held and sometimes differing views. This diversity is a source of strength, not a sign of weakness, and so we welcome into our ranks all who may hold differing positions.”

The above quote appears in the preamble of the Republican Party’s 2004 platform put forth at the national convention. It speaks to the necessity of expanding our party’s support in today’s acrimonious political environment. John McCain has already established his ability to draw a unique constituency, as Catholics, the elderly, Hispanics, Independents, and veterans delivered him key wins in the primary season. In fact, McCain is the ideal candidate to vie for the coveted “Reagan Democrats,” those predominantly working-class voters who reside in Northern states such as Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Non-ideological in nature, these voters will be drawn to McCain’s common sense approach to spending, immigration, and defense.

The Republican Party, once united behind the pure ideals of conservatism, now has lost its way by polluting its true intention and scope. Shaping a fresh narrative for the American people must be a priority for the McCain campaign. As the Democratic candidates exude their party’s diversity, charisma, and (inexperienced) youth, the GOP must highlight examples of successful conservative governance. McCain’s ability to present a dynamic, efficient, and reformist platform will be imperative to his chances in the fall. He should encourage Republican governors Charlie Crist of Florida, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Sarah Palin of Alaska, Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, and Mark Sanford of South Carolina to stump on his behalf. This group represents the next generation of party leaders. Their active campaigning could dispel any beliefs that the Grand Ole’ Party suffers from a lack of youthful and inspiring officials. In broader terms, McCain will be best suited by adopting a realist and sobering tone: acknowledge the problems our nation is facing, point out his past objections to failed policies, and push results-driven market solutions. 

Six and half years removed from the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks, the American public has lost faith in our international security policies. The semantics of a “War on Terror” has overshadowed American national interests and the overriding principles of our military action. John McCain must remind the public of the ever-evolving threat of militant Islam and other violent fundamentalists. He would be wise to showcase his quarter-century of foreign policy expertise and, before that, his time as a Navy pilot and POW in Vietnam.  

One of the more regretful weaknesses of the Bush foreign policy was the President’s disregard for public communication. Whether he has had a general aversion to voter interaction or simply found it meaningless once his approval ratings dropped into the freezing range, it is obvious that Bush has accomplished more to secure our nation than is actually perceived. John McCain could reverse this trend by giving a continual series of policy speeches on our purpose and goals on the world stage. An emphasis should be placed upon our success in preventing an attack on the homeland since September 11th and the inroads we have made in fracturing terror cells abroad. Most importantly, McCain would be better well positioned to win the Presidency if he can harness the public dialogue that has been previously filled by misconception and general disconnect.  

A McCain Administration must reconsider our aid to non-democracies such as Ethiopia, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. We cannot call for democratic reform in countries such as Egypt, Iran, and Syria while turning a blind eye to authoritarian and oppressive rule in nations that assist us in our struggle against radical expansionist forces. The push towards dramatic Middle Eastern democratization over the past five years is both admirable and long overdue. Yet the movement does not reflect the realities of Middle Eastern politics or the chance of achieving lasting liberalization.

The election of Hamas in Palestine is a prime example of what can go wrong if a long-suppressed and economically-distressed electorate is empowered too quickly. In the Middle East, The United States must carefully walk a tightrope between our duty to push for individual liberty versus the need for viable civic institutions and economic mobility. In countries such as Pakistan, where the military is the only true functioning body, we must not forget the fragile nature of governing coalitions and their unsteady grasp on violent groups waiting for chaos to erupt. 

Ugh. Good grief. Look:

Sen. John McCain really does want to tempt the Republican base. …

We’ve gotten our hands on an advanced transcript of this weekend’s “The Chris Matthews Show” on NBC and the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Katty Kay offered this nugget during the show’s “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know” segment:

“John McCain is going to be doing more of these themed tours of America, and one of them is going to be on energy and global climate change. It could get him into trouble with Republicans, of course, and with the base, who don’t think there is much climate change going on, but it is something that he’s very passionate about and he’s going to be talking about it.”

If he starts trumpeting cap-and-trade as one of his major policy ideas, I swear to God…

Democrats are in a tizzy over Senator Clinton’s comments that she is better positioned to win in the Fall because she can win among white, working class Americans. Part of it is the concern that she equated hard working Americans with white Americans, suggesting that non-white Americans are not hard working. I have no opinion on what Hillary meant there, and will leave it to the Democrats to sort that out.

But the larger beef with the argument is that it takes other portions of the Democratic coalition for granted. Roland Martin sums this argument up nicely:

No Democrat can win the White House unless he or she is able to pull from all the various constituencies in the country, and it’s downright silly for the Clinton campaign to assert that idea that hard-working white votes are the only ones that matter.

. . .

But one major failure in Clinton’s argument is the assumption that all the traditional Democratic constituencies will offer her broad support if she’s the nominee. And considering her high negatives, she can’t afford any erosion.

Obama could make the case that she has failed miserably in the primaries in garnering young and African-American voters, and without them, she loses.

Let me tell you a little story. In 2006, after three decades of public service, Democratic Senator Paul Sarbanes of Maryland retired. Republicans nominated Michael Steele, a smart, dynamic African American candidate. Democrats nominated Ben Cardin, who was smart, but boring. Steele ran an unconventional campaign that stressed an empowerment agenda and his humble roots. After defeating an African American candidate in the primary (in part because of concerns that Mfume would scare the bejeezus out of white people (and yes, Obama is different than Mfume)), Cardin proceeded to, among other things, skip the NAACP debate, and had other problems being accused from both the right and left of taking the black vote for granted.

The moral of the story: Steele got 25% of the black vote. Now that may seem pretty good, but remember, this was an African American candidate, running in a state with a lot of upper middle class AAs, against a Democrat who defeated an AA candidate in a primary that divided along racial lines. It doesn’t get any better than that for Republicans. To put things in further perspective, George Allen got 15% of the vote after basically calling a kid a n*gg*r on videotape.

In other words, in the end, Clinton will get the black vote by a sizeable portion. Some AAs may stay home, but it is highly unlikely that there will be a stampede toward McCain. The same goes for young voters, who will likely hold their noses and vote for Hillary in the Fall.

Working class whites, on the other hand, are the Democratic swing vote. They are the Democrats’ equivalent of outer suburbanites for the Republican party (who were the reason so many Republicans were terrified of a Huckabee candidacy). A candidate who is being rejected in a primary 3-1 by a swing segment of the primary electorate may well have real problems in the general election holding on to them. It’s by no means a certainty, but it is a much greater risk than youth or AAs voting for McCain.

Martin is certainly right that Democrats need a broad coalition to win. But the answer to finding the broadest coalition is to find the candidate who appeals the most to the weakest members of the coalition. Hint: It ain’t Adlai Stevenson’s intellectual descendant . . .

One other thing, on an unrelated note. Martin writes:

Not only that, the Democratic Party has a chance to expand the map beyond the battleground states of Ohio and Pennsylvania. Democrats have a solid shot at winning Iowa, New Mexico, Missouri, Virginia, Colorado, Nevada and New Hampshire. Of those states, Obama won four of the seven, and he had narrow losses in New Mexico and New Hampshire.

Hating to be the bearer of bad news, but Democrats have won Iowa, New Mexico, and New Hampshire in three of the last four elections. Bill Clinton carried Missouri twice, Colorado and Nevada once (and narrowly lost them once), and came close in Virginia. All of those states were in play in 2004. As McCain would say, this isn’t expanding the map, my friends. Moreover, while Obama won four and lost two narrowly, Hillary won three and lost two narrowly (IA and MO). Pretty much comes out in the wash.

UPDATE: PabloZed writes in comments (and I’m not picking on him, but this is the most important counter out there to what I’ve written):

Yes, Clinton made a mistake by using the adjective “hardworking,” but her and Sean’s bigger mistake is making the illogical conclusion that the voters who chose Clinton necessarily reject Obama. These were democratic primaries after all and the idea that these voters would reject a candidate en mass based on race is absurd. A percentage will, but certainly not a significant percentage. Similarly, the voters who “rejected” McCain in Iowa, MI, and other states are not going to therefore flock to the democrats.

The problem is, again, that you are dealing with a Democratic swing constituency. When this group of voters votes Republican, Democrats lose. When blacks and liberals vote Republican . . . well, that doesn’t happen, so we don’t know what will happen to Democrats.

Will the white working class ultimately reject Obama in the election to the extent that they are rejecting him in the primaries? It is anyone’s guess. I think he has a problem because (a) I think part of the reason he’s losing 75-25 in this demographic is race, which isn’t going to change between now and the election, (b) I think if he has a problem with white working class Democrats, there is a reasonable chance this split is replicated with white working class independents who are even more likely to vote Republican and (c) he doesn’t have to lose all of them to lose the election, just a good chunk.

The reason the same rationale doesn’t apply to McCain is the same reason it doesn’t apply to Clinton: The people who rejected McCain in the primaries have nowhere else to go (save the Constitution party). Again, you have to look at this from the p.o.v. of a Republican receiving the nod in the face of strong opposition from a Republican swing constituency, eg Republican exurbanites. I would be sweating bullets if Republicans to McCain’s left had voted against him heavily in a primary, and Obama definitely needs to be concerned the Democrats to his right aren’t crazy about him.

There’s this popular, but largely mistaken, notion that the Republican Party could easily reclaim it’s image by jettisoning social conservatism. Millions of blue dog Democrats and open-minded independents would, so the theory goes, eagerly fill up any gap that the evangelical exit left. But, it usually takes decades to permanently shed party loyalty (usually through a transformative presidency), and even temporary shifts only occur when something has been DONE. Or rather, think about it this way. During the primaries, which race were you (the social moderates and liberals within the GOP) following more closely? The Democratic or the Republican race? In the general, which candidate will you pay the closest attention to? John McCain or Barack Obama? These answers should be obvious to anyone.

Barack Obama could start talking about fiscal responsibility, and about the need to encourage the creation of wealth, and you might miss it entirely, unless it became big news. This is doubly true of the average voter. They have a party preference, and from the beginning of the race until the end, the vast bulk of their attention is focused on what that party’s candidates say and do. To the extent that this is true, Barack Obama has nothing to gain, and quite alot to lose, by talking about fiscal responsibility and wealth creation. Because you’re not paying enough attention to Obama, to assimilate his unorthodox message; you aren’t yet considering whether or not a more fiscally conservative Democratic Party isn’t a better fit for you, given your social positions. Barack Obama starts to potentially gain some traction with you when his message becomes more then a message, and turns into a meme. Until then, he simply bleeds support (from the liberals who are paying attention to him, and who are alarmed by his message), and has no easy means of making it up.

This is, in my opinion, the reason why Rudy’s campaign strategy was doomed to fail. Because, from the get-go, the people most interested in Rudy, within the broader electorate, were more moderate then the average GOP’er. We can see this in early Rasmussen ideology polls. These folks were his potential base. But, when Rudy actually ran, because he didn’t want to alienate so-cons, he simply didn’t talk about social issues in any context. So he looked like a regular right-winger to the moderates (because he’s quite conservative fiscally and on defense issues), and the conservatives that he might of won over by not emphasizing his social liberalism weren’t, by and large, paying enough attention to him to be won over. This is what happens when you (either individually or as a party) change your ideology/emphasis without making sure that the folks you’re trying to rope in, are actually TUNED IN to what you’re saying. Newt Gingrich has moved a ton to the left on a number of issues in recent years. But, all he’s managed to do is alienate some conservatives; because moderates aren’t paying enough attention to mean ole’ Newt, to notice that he’s now a kinder, gentler, Newt.

Rudy had, really, only one viable option. 1. He had to actively repudiate extreme social conservatism, and hope that the less extreme social conservatives would hold their noses. Bill Clinton did things of this nature numerous times in 92′, having rationally calculated that after 12 years out of the White House, liberals would vote for him regardless. Sister Souljah is an obvious example. But, he also talked about, fairly prominently, a “Third Way”. And recall that famous quote of his? “The era of big government is over”? Bill Clinton didn’t just reject certain elements of Democratic orthodoxy, he actively repudiated them in such a way that he could ensure that those Republicans and independents who might be open to this message, were actually tuning in to what he was saying.

If you don’t do this, if you don’t manage to cast a narrative of repudiation, then all you’ll manage to do is quietly bleed support from your base, without gaining anything in the middle. But, this all goes to a broader point, which is this; strategies like this are most successful when A.) Your side is relatively committed to voting the party line, and B.) When the other side is relatively open to crossing over. That’s, generally speaking, true right after periods of long dominance by the opposing party or during periods where your own party is very well liked. The 2008 election is nothing like that for the GOP (though it is for the Democrats). The 2012 election is likely to be nothing like that for the GOP.

While it’s true that a number of Democrats will be open to voting GOP if Obama becomes the nominee, without the first condition (a base committed to voting the party line), we’re still in extremely dicey territory.  And the only situation where the base of the GOP will be committed to voting Republican, regardless of what McCain does, is a situation where we’re going to prevail without any ideological pivoting; i.e, where Obama has been turned into such a radical figure, that pretty much everyone to the right of Bernie Sanders will turn out to stop him from becoming president.  In other words, it’s not a good time to go about repudiating any major elements of the coalition, because they’ll take you at your word, and vamoose.  Ultimately, if the GOP tries to repudiate social conservatism, in the dire straits we now find ourselves in, it’ll find that the social conservatives leave easily enough, but nothing immediately rises up to take their place. To close, I’ll leave you with a thought.  Think of 1968, and all that’s happened since then.  Think of the segregation era Democratic party.  It’s taken, arguably, 4 decades for the Democratic party to recover from the post-Johnson diaspora of the segregationists. If you feel modern social conservatism is equivalent to segregation, then you might well be justified in promoting such a purge. If not, you probably ought to leave well enough alone.

There’s been a quiet shift in Evangelical politics for the last few years.

Richard Land, Dr. Dobson, George Barna, Gary Bauer, Rick Scarborough…

These are all names that are supposed to represent the religious right.

These are leaders who oppose an Evangelical Manifesto released a week ago.

Most of the manifesto deals with religious issues but the main controversy has been what it said about politics. The document calls for an end to politicizing religion.

It also criticizes Evangelicals allowing themselves to be closely linked to the Republican Party. I suppose Bush’s approval ratings are so low even Evangelicals want to distance themselves from him (I kid, I kid). Really I think this is a not so subtle distancing of Evangelicalism from the leaders of the religious right.

I think we saw how that worked out in the primary. Endorsements from religious right leaders did little to move Evangelical voters.

Clearly the old power brokers have lost their sway. Republicans will have to form a new model if they want to keep the 40% of the party that’s Evangelical Christian. You can’t depend on Televangelists or leaders of religious right non-profits to be your go between with those scary religious people.

A two-part question this week:

First: Who are some of your favorite present-day political commentators?

Mine: Thomas Sowell, Christopher Hitchens, Charles Krauthammer, Michael Barone, Jay Cost, George Will (sans his Obamaphilia phase in 2007), and I must admit that I hold a soft spot for Ann Coulter, for her biting wit.

Second: Who are some of your least favorite present-day non-liberal political commentators?

Mine: Pat Buchanan, Dick Morris, Bill O’Reilly (although I frequently watch his program, regardless), and Dennis Prager.

Have at it!

I’m already on record saying I believe Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty will be John McCain’s choice to share the ticket — even if the notion doesn’t quicken the pulse of conservatives.  I base this on Senator McCain’s penchant to reward loyalty (T-Paw has been nothing if not loyal) and the fact that many beltway establishment Republican types like Vin Weber, pollster Tony Fabrizio and fmr. RNC chairman Ken Mehlman seem to be grooming the Governor for the national stage.

The problem is that the GOP has a a dearth of talent in both our gubernatorial and congressional ranks. I couldn’t help but read this Redstate roundtable on possible veep choices and feel discouraged — much like those who participated in the discussion.  The most likely choices all have significant electoral or ideological shortcomings.  Meanwhile, two of the more exciting prospects, Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin, are long on vision but short on experience.

My reptilian brain stem has been working on finding someone who meets the following seemingly impossible criteria: 1) palatable (if not exciting) to conservatives; 2) satisfactory name recognition; 3) geographic advantages; 4) able to reaffirm McCain’s maverick creds; 5) able to assume the presidency should tragedy strike; 6) not necessarily currently in politics.

Allow me to offer the name of MSNBC host and former Republican congressman Joe Scarborough.

Scarborough boasts a rock-solid lifetime ACU rating of 95.  Even so, he does not shrink from criticizing Republicans when events warrant so he would help brandish the McCain maverick brand.  He does not harken from, or have any association with, the unpopular Bush Administration or current congressional GOP leadership as he left the House to spend more time with his children in early 2001.  His name recognition is not off the charts but would still probably exceed that of many of the other contenders.  He is obviously telegenic and well-spoken.  His 3 terms in Congress and his daily appearance on MSNBC have made him well-versed in all the major issues of the day.  And he served Florida’s 1st congressional district, a McCain-leaning state but one we can not win without.

Have at it. 

So the question du jour is, “what went wrong” on Tuesday for the Clinton campaign? Why did she underperform?

North Carolina

You will recall that a couple of weeks ago, I sought to perform a regression analysis that would explain the North Carolina results. I came up with a good one. I found that by looking at all the counties in the South, an increase in African American (“AA”) population in a given county meant a .83 point increase in Obama’s performance. An increase of 1% in the college educated percentage meant that Obama’s performance would increase by .94% (plus a constant of 17.5).

Across the South, that explained 79% of the county-to-county variance in Obama’s performance.

It predicted that Obama’s map should look like this:

The bluest counties are the counties where Clinton was expected to get more than 65% of the vote. The greenest are the counties where Obama was expected to get more than 65% of the vote.

Here’s what it looked like in reality:

As you can see, the match is pretty good. Clinton overperformed in counties in Eastern North Carolina, especially toward the Outer Banks. Obama overperformed in Buncombe county, where the college education/AA screen wouldn’t necessarily pick up the high concentration of hippies in Asheville. He also overperformed in the counties in between Charlotte and Chapel Hill. I’m not sure about the demographics of these counties, but I thought it was interesting.

At any rate, North Carolina is more like the South than the rest of the South. The college-educated coefficient remained at .94, meaning that in North Carolina, a 1% increase in college-educated dwellers in a county meant that Obama would get an extra .94% of the vote. The AA coefficient was down, but only slightly — .74. This may represent an increased racial polarization in highly AA counties. The coefficient was about the same – 16.3%. But the r-square increased to .87, meaning that almost all of the county-to-county variance can be explained solely by race and college education. Which is stunning, when you think about it.

Indiana

For Indiana, things were more difficult. In Ohio and Pennsylvania, I had to add a variable for Bush performance to improve the r-square. It still barely explained 70% of the variance, and predicted a 14% win for Hillary.

But the constant wasn’t significant, meaning that while the model itself could be correct for how different variables affected Obama’s performance, we were unsure where the base Obama vote was.

Ultimately, that’s what happened here.

The internal regression for Indiana against Obama’s results ended up giving identical coefficients to the Ohio/PA coefficients. It was the base vote that was off. You can see this in the map above. The areas where Obama was expected to be mediocre ended up being strong for Obama. Some of the areas where he was expected to be weak, but not awful, ended up being mediocre Obama counties. He especially overperformed in the small and medium cities, such as Ft. Wayne, South Bend, and Evansville.

I tried a variety of variables to improve the performance, and just couldn’t. I tried rural%, unemployment, working class, some college education, tried putting in a dummy variable for appalachia into the PA/OH numbers, and various other theories, and came up with nothing.

Nor does proximity to Illinois explain it. Obama only did a few points better in Lake County than the model expected. He did substantially better in places like Allen County and Vandenburgh County, which are on the other side of the state from Chicago.

In the end, I think the difference is the difference between Southeast Ohio and Northwest Ohio. Both are demographically similar, with lots of working class whites, and few minorities. But Northwest Ohio was substantially more receptive to Obama. That seems to have occurred in Indiana as well.

Going Forward

So I think the answer to what went wrong lies in a rare miscalculation by the campaign. They began to believe their own press releases, and thought they had a shot in NC and would do well in Indiana. As such, they mismanaged expectations. The press began to turn the expectations into a narrow Clinton win in NC and a blowout in IN.

The Clinton campaign should have gone off of what I predicted a few months ago, here. Even with a 12-point loss in NC, and a narrow win in Indiana, she could still win the popular vote. That should have been the pitch. That a rough patch was coming, but that she could still prevail.

In reality, the results in IN and NC represent something of a comeback by Clinton. You will recall that it was not that long ago that she was trailing by 20 in NC polls and by 5 in Indiana. She should have stuck to that story, rather than allowing expectations to be played up. THAT is what doomed her, not the loss in NC and near-loss in IN.
So we’re left with this:

Her two best states are coming up in KY and WV. Had she played the expectations game better, she could be set up for a true comeback next week. But as it stands, it will be very, very difficult to dig out of this hole (but probably not impossible).

And with that, I think maybe I’ll go roll myself a dwarven fighter/mage. If I roll double-zeroes twice, maybe I’ll get psionic abilities!!!!

Cross-posted at The HinzSight Report

I was inspired to write this blog by Doc Holliday’s comment in EPU’s excellent What Fredheads want - offering the Olive Branch (I would say that one olive I wish were on the branch were the olive of McCain not pandering to Latino hate groups, but I digress) on Redstate, where Doc says:

I do not think conservatism at its nature starts with “social conservatism”, I think it starts with economic conservatism. If you boiled this group down to the one issue they can all agree on, it is “get the gov out of economics”.

I agree that the kind of conservatism most conservatives mean when they refer to same is a variation of this basic concept, also frequently reduced to small government guaranteeing private property rights.

But in pondering Doc’s comment and E Pluibus Unum’s more extensive definitions incorporating the three-legged stool that William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan made famous, I conclude that one must begin any talk of economic conservatism with an environment in which it can function and flourish.

The many became one as social conservatives!

That environment would be what we call civilization itself.

I realize now since I began blogging and debating over three years ago, when pressed to self identify most strongly with either the fiscal-cons, security-cons or social-cons, I always land with the social-cons.

Before I go further, let me stress that I have always been a war hawk. I was a Democrat from birth to 2000, and I was a JFK democrat. I loathed the limp-wristed weakness the new castrati democrats exuded and still exude to our enemies abroad. But I was a social liberal for most of those years for the same reason everyone is, but won’t admit: I wanted to eat my cake and yet, still get to keep it, i.e. responsibility free, consequenceless sex.

I lived through the late 70’s failed liberal policies as a teen, majored in economics in college, and saw Reagan’s Milton Friedman-Arthur Laffer conservative economic policies work in spades. We are still in the Reagan recovery.

But I think the reason, when forced, despite my strong war hawkishness and economic background, that I self identify as a social conservative is that without it, none of the others are possible for very long.

I am happy to see that John McCain understands this better than many of his apologists at Redstate and elsewhere that think the answer to GOP woes is to reach out to moderates.

A moderate has one basic meaning: social liberalism, i.e. pro choice on abortion, pro-special rights based on one’s declared preferred sexual activities and banning any meaningful mention of God from the public square, especially including from the public schools, unless it is a secular, supposed values-free God that teaches of Susie having two mommies.

The GOP doesn’t win trying to be Democrats.

And America loses.

Can we name a civilization that thrives and prospers by killing off its young or reducing marriage to sex instead of the basic unit that makes civilization of the young possible? No.

Civilization appeared precisely when one woman seduced one man to be hers exclusively.

The capitols of abortion in Russia and China face dire straits, as do the mini-capitols in Western Europe. Yes, even China. China has a great shortage of females due to selective abortion of females. Throughout history, nations with such shortages turned to war. If they turn to war with us, we will destroy them. But more acutely, China is about to face a grave obstacle to continued economic growth. They have an aging population, especially in the educated, inductrial areas.

And Europe and Russia? They are dying off.

The United States still produces enough babies to replace itself, but barely.

Let’s get back to Doc’s economic argument. Freedom is the secret to our success. The founders defined freedom as keeping the fruits of one’s labor, i.e. private property.

But they also saw that our freedom would only work for a moral and religious people, i.e. this people and their reverence for judeo-christian values as seen by the Frenchman Alexis de Toucheville.

Benjamin Franklin and many of the Founders loved to quote William Penn: “[men] must be governed by God, or they will be ruled by tyrants.”

Appeals to moderates are appeals to future rule by tyrants. The process has begun of course (see Big Government).

Yet, the dominant voice here at Redstate, despite McCain’s appeal on the most basic of areas to social conservatives, i.e. originalist judges that would restore the free religious speech rights and local self government that caused social conservatives to get into politics on defense to begin with, seems to be that the GOP can only win by appealing to moderates.

Let’s look back and see what we find among prior Presidents as the United States became the most powerful and blessed nation on earth.

Among them we find differing views on economics, oddly enough, but who among George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, William McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, FDR, HST, Ike, or JFK were social liberals?

None. They were all social conservatives.

We lost our way in the 60’s and 70’s and who was it that led the comeback of America and the GOP?

Social conservatives named Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich.

Civilization itself begins and ends with moral values. Only via the self restraint of same can freedom produce the bounty that defines America. A bounty that makes us rich enough to be stronger than those that would take what we have.

John McCain is appealing to social conservatives, not moderates. Good.

Now, will Redstate’s powers that be join him, or will they work at cross-purposes with watered down moderate appeals, which reminds me of my God, who said in Revelation 3:16

So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.

I will not be spued out of God’s mouth.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer columns
The HinzSight Report
The Minority Report
Race 4 2008
“One man with courage makes a majority.” - Andrew Jackson

As a strong social conservative Republican, I wanted to respond to Clarence Claus’s post below with two points.

1) Yes, it is true that some Republicans who claim to be pro-life simply do it for the votes. I am very suspicious of these Republicans. Many of you know I was adamantly against Mitt Romney for this very reason. Genuine pro-lifers take the issue so seriously because it is an issue close to their hearts, and something they passionately believe in. Its hard for a pro-lifer to comprehend somebody thinking that abortion is an OK practice, especially in America with all its economic prosperity. Its even harder for pro-lifers to then see politicians flip on their stance simply for political gain. It is extremely hard to swallow. But, at the same time, many converts also become champions on the issue. For instance, it isn’t widely known, but Senator Rick Santorum was no social conservative before he ran for office. Former colleagues of his before he ran for office will tell you he was by no means a conservative. But he ended up becoming a champion of the issue.

2) My second point is a bit more optimistic. Our Republican Party has genuine pro-lifers for which it is an issue that is deep in their hearts. For instance, Congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey. Before he became a Congressman at the age of 27, yes, 27, he was the executive director of New Jersey Right to Life. He is an amazing speaker on the pro-life issue on the House floor, and I introduced him as he gave a passionate speech at this year’s Students for Life of America conference. He is in politics because of the issue. And in no way does it serve him politically. He represents central New Jersey, which is overwhelmingly pro-abortion. He does it because he believes in it, not because it wins him votes. Next, lets look at Senator Sam Brownback. I can tell you from working for him and spending countless hours that this is an issue that is close to his heart and is passionate about. He has lived it too, having adopted two children which he absolutely adores. I’ve seen it first-hand. I’ve also gotten to know Congressman Jeff Fortenberry from Nebraska, former Congresswoman Melissa Hart, Congresswoman Jean Schmidt, and Congressman Trent Franks. They are passionate in the issue and you can see they really do believe it and want to end abortion, not use it as a means to continue getting elected.

My point is, it is true our party has candidates that pander to social conservatives for votes. But I can tell you first-hand that our party also has candidates that truly believe in our cause. Instead of leaving the Republican Party, fight for those that fight for our cause. Contribute to candidates like Chris Smith and Melissa Hart. If you are in college or in a position to work for these candidates, go work for them. I’m headed out to New Jersey this summer to work for Smith. Don’t get disheartened by the candidates that are wishy-washy, but instead motivate yourself by the real deal, the real believers.

And finally, just look at the other side. They are absolutely horrific on this issue. For instance, take a look at this quote and guess who said it:

“The first thing I’d do as president,” he told a cheering audience, “is sign the Freedom of Choice Act. That’s the first thing that I’d do.”

Obama. The same guy who blasted out a direct-mail fundraising piece when the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban passed. The same guy who believes its OK to kill a baby should it be born alive in a botched abortion.

Point is, the other side is atrocious on this issue. They are the party of death. And while we might have the panderers … we also have heroes. The other side simply is led by people who are plain evil.

A frequent commenter on this site, MetroRepublican, made a comment today that addresses a fear that many socially conservative Republicans have. Socially conservative Republicans have long wondered whether recent Republican nominees and many Republican activists really care about the issues we care about such as banning abortion or if they just use those issues to get blue collar voters to vote against their economic interests. That is what Barack Obama has claimed. He thinks that white, working-class voters who would benefit more from liberal economic policies vote Republican because of social issues.

Well, MetroRepublican confirmed a fear that a lot of these voters have. He said the following:

And social conservative issues are fantasyland that serious people don’t take seriously. They’re just scare tactics used every 4 years.

Many other Republicans who claim to support our issues promote socially moderate candidates for Vice-President and endorse socially moderate candidates in primaries under the guise of pragmatism. Furthermore, even though Reagan and the Bushes have been President for 20 of the last 28 years and have appointed 7 Supreme Court justices, Roe v. Wade hasn’t been overturned.

MetroRepublican raises an interesting point. Do our politicians just use issues we care about as a “scare tactic” in order to win? If that is the case, we should perhaps consider an alternative strategy. I am not withdrawing my support of Senator McCain at the moment. I will give him the benefit of the doubt, but I am wondering if any so-cons out there believe what MetroRepublican is saying that the Republicans only use social issues as scare tactics. If so, does anybody have any suggestions for an alternative strategy we could employ? I am glad to know MetroRepublican is just as elitist as Barack Obama is. He just went on to say that pundits rarely talk about social conservatism either because they don’t take it seriously, so that makes me wonder even more if we should pursue a different strategy than blindly supporting the Republican party.

You don’t have to be an American male who grew up in the 80’s to soil yourself in maniacal laughter upon watching this video; but it helps.

My stupid real job is getting in the way of explaining what I think happened Tuesday night. Here’s the basic takeaways, which I’ll expand upon tonight or tomorrow:

(1) North Carolina behaved exactly like other Southern states behaved. Our model predicted that he would get 55.4% of the vote. He got a little upwards of 56%. Using the actual results for NC, race and college education in a county explain over 80% of the variance.

(2) Indiana behaved differently than Ohio and Pennsylvania. But it did so consistently. The predicted map looked like the actual map. It is just consistently bluer than the actual map. Moreover, the coefficients for the variables are the same in IN as in OH and PA. Some other variable moved the state as a whole about 6 points his direction. Looking at the composite map at the bottom, it looks like Indiana behaved like Western Ohio. I thought that I had captured that variance by controlling for the increased Republican nature of Western Ohio, but apparently there is something else. Population density? It looks like Obama overperformed especially in small and medium cities like Ft. Wayne, Evanston, and college towns like South Bend and Bloomington. It’s more than just the college nature of the towns, as we have a variable to control for college education. I welcome thoughts.

(3) Appalachia didn’t budge. She is going to absolutely blow him out of the water in West VA and KY. Whether that is enough to get her back in the race is another matter altogether.

Predicted North Carolina

Actual North Carolina

Predicted Indiana

Actual Indiana

Composite Map To Date

CQ politics has a wonderful bracket style poll running with 32 potential VP’s. The first round has already passed, but make sure to vote in future rounds. Here’s the link.

Update:

Here are the standings from our Veep polls about a month ago, for comparison sake.  I’ve bolded the folks that are also on CQ’s list. 

1. Mark Sanford: 6.53

2. Tim Pawlenty: 5.88

3. Mitt Romney: 5.64

4.  Sarah Palin: 5.56

5. Rudy Giuliani: 5.48

6. Chris Cox: 5.10

7. Donald Carcieri: 5.05

8. Tom Coburn: 4.94

9. Condoleeza Rice: 4.91

10. Bill Owens: 4.87

11. Jon Huntsman Jr.: 4.79

12. Colin Powell: 4.52

13. Frank Keating: 4.44

14. Tom Ridge: 4.16

15.  Mike Huckabee: 3.25

16. Joe Lieberman: 2.69

The Ron Paul Cult never really dies. It just sleeps…and waits. And will purchase anything bearing its leader’s name.

Here you have it:

Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul’s newest book, “The Revolution: A Manifesto,” is number one on the New York Times Best Sellers list for May 18th, 2008. The ranking is yet another of the many successes Dr. Paul has had during his presidential candidacy spreading his message of personal freedom and constitutional government.Upon its official release on April 30th, “The Revolution: A Manifesto” was the number one bestseller on Amazon.com and remains the number one bestseller in political books.

Well, then! Congratulations, Congressman Paul.

Recently, I spoke with two Kerry voters from the Midwest who supported Hillary Clinton in the primary season this year. Both say they cannot support Barack Obama for president. Both agree that Obama is far too much of a leftist to be entrusted with the presidency. Both hate Bush for all the reasons that most Americans do, but both fear what Obama’s policies would do to our economy and our nation. Both agree that an Obama presidency would mean higher taxes, the end of quality health care in America, and fewer — that’s right, fewer — jobs.

But neither can commit to supporting McCain at this time either. The reason is surprising. McCain is viewed by these Hillary voters as about right on domestic issues. He’s broken from his party enough on laissez faire philosophy to the extent that Hillary voters trust that McCain wouldn’t take away their government programs. And his rocky relationship with the Religious Right leads Hillary voters to suspect that, while McCain is personally a cultural conservative who served his country and who has led a fairly normal life as a family man, the senator from Arizona won’t be attempting to use the state to legislate the values of a certain strain of Christianity on everyone else. The result is that Hillary voters seem to prefer McCain to Obama on domestic issues, an advantage which McCain can’t afford to lose with a foolish veep selection of a generic Republican who will be a drag on the ticket.

So why aren’t my Hillary-voting Democrat friends jumping on the McCain bandwagon? The reason starts and ends with one word: Iraq. Blue collar Democrats tend to have foreign policy views similar to Patrick J. Buchanan. They want a foreign policy that serves America’s interests. Full stop. Paragraph. To them, the Iraq project was never in America’s interest, and current polling demonstrates that most Americans still favor ending the occupation as soon as possible. Iraq is seen to these voters as a waste and a distraction. They want to end the war now.

A part of me wonders what would happen if McCain would do a full one-eighty on the war. He could hold a press conference and with righteous indignation attack the incompetence of the Bush Administration concerning the war and the refusal of a free Iraq to put aside ancient squabbles to come together in peace. He could also attack Iran and the other nations of the region for rooting for the failure of the Iraq project, leading to a myriad of deaths both American and Iraqi. Finally, he could call on the rest of the world to band together to help prevent a humanitarian crisis as the U.S. exits Mesopotamia over the course of his first year in office. In place of the current government of inept and corrupt leaders, McCain could propose the installation of a governing Iraqi council comprised of equal numbers of Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds. McCain could propose an alternative foreign policy of utilizing the resources freed from Iraq in an effort to eliminate the Islamist terrorist cells that exist throughout the world.

It’s just a thought. But perhaps it’s one worth thinking about. McCain definitely needs to continue to reinforce his image as a pragmatist on domestic issues who is something other than a generic Republican. But in order to actually convert Hillary voters, and not just get them to stay home in a race against Obama, McCain may have to remove his full Wilsonian jacket.

Rasmussen Wisconsin Presidential Election

• John McCain 47%
• Barack Obama 43%

• John McCain 47%
• Hillary Clinton 43%

Favorable / Unfavorable (Net)

• John McCain 58% / 40% (+18%)
• Barack Obama 51% / 48% (+3%)
• Hillary Clinton 46% / 52% (-6%)

This telephone survey of 500 Likely Voters was conducted by Rasmussen Reports on May 5, 2008. The margin of sampling error for the survey is +/- 4 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. John Kerry won the state for the Democrats in 2004 by 10,000 votes out of three million cast. Four years earlier, Al Gore won the state by only 5,000 votes.

A huge concern among consumers today is the price of gas. With the rapid increase in gas prices in recent months, McCain and Clinton openly favor a gas tax holiday during the summer, while Obama is opposed. Nearly half (47%) of Wisconsin voters favor a gas tax holiday, while 38% are opposed to the idea. These figures are similar to the national average.

The survey also found that more voters are worried about the next president raising taxes, rather than cutting them. Sixty-one percent (61%) of Wisconsin voters are at least somewhat worried that the next president will raise taxes too much and harm the economy. Meanwhile, just 35% are concerned that the next president will cut taxes too much and harm important government programs.

Thirty-nine percent (39%) of Wisconsin voters believe the government needs more tax revenue to fund important national programs. Forty-three percent (43%) disagree.

Both democratic candidates have stated that they would consider raising the capital gains tax. Obama has voiced that he would consider raising the tax from 15% to 28%. In Wisconsin, 59% of voters oppose a raise in the capital gains tax. Nearly half (49%) of voters believe a raise in the tax would hurt the economy. Nationally, 65% of voters are opposed to a raise in the capital gains tax.

In the past, people have speculated, here at Race42008, that someone on the right would end up running for the nomination as an independent.

Well, Bob Barr is apparently running for the the Libertarian Party nomination.

1. Since the Democratic race is essentially over, what does Hillary do now? Try to get put on the ticket as VP, try to become Senate Majority Leader during next term, beg Obama to put her on the Supreme Court if he’s elected, or what?

2. Given the gaping holes that have been revealed in the Democratic Party, does Obama have a good chance of unifying the party by November or will the Reagan Democrats defect to McCain in mass?

3. Should it worry McCain and his campaign that even though he’s been the nominee of the Republican Party for two months, he only managed to win 73% in Pennsylvania, 77% in Indiana and 74% in North Carolina?

4. In the event that Barack Obama loses to McCain in November, who do the Democrats nominate in 2012? Do they nominate a centrist like Mark Warner or Ed Rendell or do the double down on a more liberal candidate and say that Obama lost because of Hillary’s tactics during the primary?

5. In the event that John McCain loses to Obama in November (God help us if that happens), who do the Republicans run in 2012? I figure both Huckabee and Romney will give it another go and Gov. Pawlenty will run as well.

Hillary Clinton made this declaration in a press conference in Shepherdstown, WV earlier today.

What is her case for remaining in the race? She has the stronger coalition to beat John McCain consisting of the key swing groups of working class whites, women, and Hispanics.

In an email, Clinton reassures her supporters that, “As we enter the final 28 days of voting, I know you’ll give it everything you’ve got. And you know I will do the same.”

So the race continues…

Make sure that you check out Patrick Hynes’ new project  Now! Hampshire, which launched today.

Now! Hampshire starts off with a bang, featuring interviews with John Sununu and Jeanne Shaheen.

And thus, McGovern becomes the first strong ally of the Clintons to ask her to concede. I suspect there are more in the works. Obama’s campaign is probably lining up a mass of 20 or more superdelegates in order to really solidify the “It’s Over” narrative.

Honestly, I’m pretty bummed right now. For all intents and purposes, it is over for Hillary. It’s a shame because she had just come into her own and I was looking forward to seeing her blow him out in Kentucky and West Virginia. Given reports that Hillary donated $6.4 million to her campaign, she clearly has no money left to run the campaign. She may try to just coast along until WV and KY, win them big and then drop out.

Some of the strangest general election polls so far have been ones showing Obama within striking distance in states like Alaska, Montana, North Dakota, and Texas — all supposedly reliably dark red states — as well as McCain within striking distance in Massachusetts.

As part of one of SUSA’s poll dumps back in February, they sprung a McCain +1 in Texas against Obama poll on everyone that folks rejected out of hand as an outlier. In a state that has voted Republican the last 28 years (and which Bush won by 23 points), this couldn’t be the case, right?

Well, a new Rasmussen poll confirms that McCain is struggling in the Lone Star State:

• McCain - 48%
• Obama - 43%

And it’s not just Obama that is making Texas close - Hillary is within 6 there as well. The last time Texas was this close was in 1992 - when there was a major third party challenger - and we know how that one turned out. The additional negative of this poll is that it comes during what was supposed to be Obama’s roughest patch in the election season thus far. The positive thing about this poll is there’s still five months until the general election, and McCain still is in the lead.

Thus, far Hillary’s tried to make the argument that Barack is fatally weak with significant constituencies within the Democratic Party, and that he’s doomed to electoral disaster because of this. She’s only had limited success in selling this argument, in large part because it’s rather difficult to “prove” that working class whites really won’t vote for Obama in November. After all, maybe Obama is doing poorly with this group because they REALLY love Hillary. Last night’s tremendous failure further complicates the argument, to the point where she almost has no means to convince the superdelegates. Almost no means.

Let’s suppose, instead of trudging on and wracking up large victories in West Virginia and Kentucky, she instead decides to “suspend” her campaign within the next 4 or 5 days. She doesn’t endorse Obama, and she doesn’t officially withdraw, but for all and intents and purposes she’s conceded. Now, let’s suppose next Tuesday something odd happens; Hillary Clinton still wins West Virginia, and by a fairly sizable margin. Suddenly, Obama’s weakness with working class whites doesn’t just look like a problem, but an insurmountable problem. He can’t even win the demographic when his opponent has conceded; they’d rather cast a protest vote then vote for him.

Afterwards, Hillary declares that, in light of the West Virginia results, she has no choice but to resume her campaign. The public wants her, and Obama simply cannot win the demographics needed to become president. The timing for “suspending” her campaign is key here. She wants to suspend it early enough that the media absorbs her withdrawal, but not so early that the public does. Sunday night sounds promising to me. This scenario is not at all far fetched. Hillary is looking down the barrel of a 30-40 point victory in West Virginia if she remains in the race. No state in the country is more favorable to her, or more unfavorable to Obama. She could potentially win the state through her early votes alone. And recall that Ron Paul is still getting 17% of the vote in primaries.

It’s not at all unprecedented to put up amazing showings despite not officially being in the race. What’s more, in terms of actual delegates, there’s really no meaningful benefit to winning the state by 30-40 points instead of 5-15. Hillary can’t win on delegates; she must win on narrative, and no conceivable narrative gives her the momentum or leverage to convince the superdelegates if she remains in the race. If she wants to win, if she hopes to prove that Obama really can’t, in any circumstances, win working class whites, she must drop out. So that she can attempt to rise from the ashes after West Virginia. It’s still a huge long-shot, but it’s frankly the only hint of a hope she has left.

The story itself is titled, ” The Nominee” and features a picture of Barack and Michelle Obama.

I’m pretty much done with the liveblog — NC should get closer, and she’ll probably hang on in IN, since he just complemented her on winning IN.  My NC prediction of 55-45 is looking pretty good, but the IN prediction is all shot to heck.

The million dollar question though is: Does the Superdelegate dam break tomorrow?  Obama has a week to rack up some delegates before a pair of 30+ point losses in KY and WV.  She should be glad there isn’t another two- or six- week gap between primaries.

Make no mistake about it, despite Wright and Ayers, there are still millions of utterly deluded Obama-lovers, who continue to believe in the hope of a post-racial, post-partisan, new politics filled, uniter-in-chief. All Wright and Ayers have done is assured that a certain segment of the population that would ordinarily be open to voting Democratic in 2008, now find Obama somewhere between worrying and repel