IOKIYAR

Actor/Senator Fred Thompson can't believe America would elect a former celebrity to the Senate.

I find this historical amnesia to be all too prevalent.

I'm With Fred

John McCain's POW service isn't a prerequisite for the Presidency.



More from VetVoice.

Dubya, Grandpa Freddie, Droopy Joe

The President had a 8-minute cameo tonight, but it'll play nicely as 16 30-second ads. He told us all about how John McCain will stand up to the angry left, because, you know, it's 1971 and the hippies are holding a sit-in on the South Lawn and over at the Lincoln Memorial. And he said we need a President who will "remember the lessons of 9/11," probably because they bumped Rudy Giuliani tonight.

After Bush's understated appearance (of course, more overstated than the McCain campaign wanted), Fred Thompson ambled onstage and told a very unknown story: apparently, John McCain was a POW in Vietnam and he was held hostage for 5 1/2 years. I know, I didn't have a clue either. Glad for Thompson to tell me the whole story in excruciating detail, because McCain is so reluctant. I don't even understand where Thompson managed to get that series of pictures from McCain's POW days that were displayed on the 40-foot screen behind him. Maybe he found them in a Google image search. Thompson said that "being a POW isn't a qualification for President, but it reveals character," so I guess everyone can go ahead and agree with Wes Clark now.

(Also, we're back to McCain telling his captors the Green Bay Packers defensive line instead of the Pittsburgh Steelers; they're in Minnesota so I'm surprised he didn't claim it was the Vikings.)

When Thompson wasn't clearing his throat - really, that was half the speech - he was giving that down-home folksy wisdom we all loved during his 10 minutes running for President. He pushed the abortion and tax issues hard, as expected. And in a telling moment, he tried to rehabilitate Sarah Palin, which is great. They have to rally around her now and it is clear that they will. She's not going anywhere; no Eagleton scenario here. And the culture war issues rejected by the majority of the country, are back.

Joe Lieberman then got cheers in the audience for telling the assembled that McCain is nothing like that bastard George W. Bush, and that Clinton worked with Democrats better than Obama would. OK, the cheers were kind of wanting. You could have written his hard wank of a speech about a month ago all by yourself - about how good people of both parties should come together in the spirit of bipartisanship and put country first and fall behind a good soldier who represents the best of America. It's impossible to even rebut it because it's so deeply silly, the whole "my party left me" nonsense, the whole "we can all agree to do whatever John McCain says" stuff.

Now I'm watching the St. Paul police firing tear gas and concussion grenades at protesters.

Chris Matthews called it "a very effective night."

UPDATE: Here's the Obama campaign on Bush:

"Tonight, George Bush enthusiastically passed the torch to the man who's earned it by voting with him 90% of the time, and who will continue this President's legacy for the next four years – his disastrous economic policies, his foreign policy that hasn't made us safer, and his misguided war in Iraq that's costing us $10 billion a month. The man George Bush needs may be John McCain, but the change America needs is Barack Obama," said Obama campaign manager David Plouffe.

Radical Centrists

Uh-oh. Anyone who thinks that a positive agenda for the nation will simply be realized by the election of a Democratic President or even substantial gains to the majority in Congress needs to read this report by Ezra Klein from a health care conference today:

Mark Warner addressed the luncheon. Warner is a talented speaker, and fluent on health care [...] On the actual topic of reform, Warner promises, if he's elected, to find 9 or 10 other moderate Senators and form a "radical centrists" caucus. On the one hand, that sort of middle-of-the-road legislative work is important. On the other, you have to be clear about what you're trying to win. The deal needs to be in service of a policy. So hearing Warner start a compromise caucus before he's got something to fight for -- as compared to Ron Wyden, who's pulling in bipartisan sponsors around concrete legislation -- strikes me as a bit of a cart-before-the-horse problem.

As Klein notes, in this case, "centrism" is not being modeled around a particular policy or an issue but as a positive good in and of itself, making a virtue of being in the middle of whatever the two parties decide, and apparently not just on health care but on everything. This might cause David Broder to throw his Wheaties in the air in great joy, but it's just death for any kind of substantive progressive agenda. It's a roadblock. Our movement won't have to only fight off hundreds of millions of dollars in negative ads from a conservative movement that will not give up in subverting progress, but from these moderate Democrats that are supposed to represent the winning margin for that progress.

However, there's a very bleak bit of daylight here. In his speech, Warner talked about how every country in the world gets the benefit of drug company R&D, while we pay for it, because we keep any kind of competition and bargaining out of the purchase of prescription drugs. Similiarly, prospective recruit for the "radical centrist" caucus Ken Salazar said at the same conference that "health care is a fundamental right."

This fetishism for moderation is disturbing, but it seems that, much like Rick Perlstein noted that conservatism and liberalism are not random governing philosophies but actual expressions of human nature, "centrism" also springs from some deep-seated urge to split the difference and make oneself look or feel somehow superior or above political gamesmanship in the process. So the goal for the progressive movement must be to shift the political center and force those predisposed to the badges of centrism and bipartisanship to move to the left to save their political skins. And indeed, we're doing some good work, albeit limited, on that score.

Digby has mentioned Eric Boehlert's excellent piece about the blogswarm that caught Tweety Matthews napping and forced him to apologize for his rampant sexism. This is not something the progressive movement would have been in the position to demand just a few years ago. And I would argue that the influence is far more acute with respect to the Republican Presidential nomination. Progressives have done an excellent job of very sharply defining all of the major candidates in a very negative fashion, to the extent that traditional media is using the exact same frames. I saw a few minutes of CNN with some talking heads discussing Fred Thompson's withdrawal from the race (by the way, the guy's timing is so bad, he apparently won the Louisiana caucus after he dropped out). Every talking head was talking about Thompson's laziness, his lack of campaigning, his aw-shucks dimness, in increasingly vicious ways. Here's a transcript.

BLITZER: It wasn't exactly a shocker today, Jack, that Fred Thompson announced he's dropping out of this race. But let's take a look at the political fallout.

Among the Republicans, who gains, who loses?

CAFFERTY: Well, if he hadn't announced it, I'm not sure anybody would have noticed.

(LAUGHTER)

CAFFERTY: I mean I -- you know, it's like he hasn't -- he's only been here what -- you know, he wasn't that interested in campaigning. I think he would have liked it if somebody would have said you can be president. But he didn't want to work to get the job. And I'm not sure it means a heck of a lot for anybody. Somebody said that he might be trying to position himself to be vice president. He'll deny that.

BORGER: ...So watch for Mitt Romney, who is also running as a social conservative, to go after those six or seven Thompson voters that are out there.

(LAUGHTER)

BORGER: And he'll try -- he'll try and get them.

TOOBIN: You know, Wolf, you have to go all the way back to Rudolph Giuliani to find a campaign that has been singularly as unsuccessful as Fred Thompson's has been.

(LAUGHTER)

BORGER: That far back?

TOOBIN: You know, I just don't think it will have any impact at all, his departure...

BLITZER: Well, it could have a...

TOOBIN: ...just as his arrival didn't.

BORGER: You know...

BLITZER: It could have an impact in new episodes of "Law and Order," though.

BORGER: It could. It could. But, you know, this was such an interesting candidacy. It was created by the Republican establishment in Washington, who felt that they needed a new horse. They needed someone else. So they created this. They took a guy who was television. They said let's turn him into a presidential candidate. He will clearly appeal to the American public. And it totally flopped [...]

TOOBIN: That was the ultimate problem.

CAFFERTY: Take a look at all the other ideas the Republican establishment in Washington has had for the last seven years.

(LAUGHTER)

CAFFERTY: It's no surprise to me the Fred Thompson thing didn't go anywhere.

BLITZER: I can't tell you how many people in that Republican establishment -- especially here in Washington, the beltway, you know, the Republican lobbyists...

BORGER: Right.

BLITZER: ...the so-called elite, when they were even thinking of getting him in, they said this is the new Ronald Reagan. He's an actor.

CAFFERTY: Yes.

BLITZER: He's media-genic. He's powerful. And he's really going to turn things around.

(CROSSTALK) CAFFERTY: If you want to look at the definition of irrelevant, look up the Republican establishment in Washington, D.C.

BORGER: Right.

CAFFERTY: That's irrelevant.

(LAUGHTER)

TOOBIN: Fred Thompson definitely was the tallest candidate.

BORGER: Right.

(LAUGHTER)

BORGER: But, you know, it's so...

CAFFERTY: And the baldest.

BORGER: ...it's so arrogant, though, you know, to think that you can be anointed in Washington and you're pretty good on television and you look pretty good and you -- and you have great name recognition because you're in "Law and Order," and, gee, I can then become president.

And I think they talked him into it. And I think they said to him, you know, you don't have to work that hard.

(LAUGHTER)

BORGER: You can actually just get this job, get in late, let the public take a look at you. You're different. You're going to win. It didn't work out that way.

CAFFERTY: He bought that part about not having to work very hard. He liked that part.

(LAUGHTER)

CAFFERTY: You can sit in the trailer until it's time for your close-up, Fred.

(LAUGHTER)

It has the usual Village cattiness, but these are themes that progressives pushed from the moment Thompson entered the race. He's lazy, he's an actor who wants to play the role of the President, he was pushed upon people by the establishment. And this is true across the line: Romney's an insincere flip-flopper, Rudy's a homicidal maniac, Huckabee's a Jesus freak, McCain wants to bomb the whole world (this narrative took hold until McCain dropped off the map and we stopped pressuring him), etc.

Now, we're aided by a really terrible slate of candidates. But it's clear that progressives have shot these narratives into the media bloodstream. Initially, Thompson was the guy you could smell the Aqua Velva on, and Romney was a guy who has shoulders on which you can land a 747. I really think the movement is maturing and deserves a lot of credit.

However, these are media narratives. We have not been able to make the same arguments in terms of policy. And that's the danger of this "radical centrist" coalition. The need is to force them into accepting ideas, in the case of health care, like the safe reimportation of drugs from Canada, guaranteed issue from the insurance companies, a public option competing with insurers, etc., as reasonable, moderate ideas, so that the debate shifts leftward. Otherwise, we're going to get a fake reform that rewards the insurance companies by giving them a forced market, without any of the regulation or cost controls that will actually help people get affordable coverage. And on and on down the line.

It's important to highlight what Mark Warner is telegraphing here. This is what we'll be up against in the future, and it's why the office of the President is arguably less important than the health and maturity of the progressive movement to leverage change.

Bye Fred

NBC News is reporting that Grandpa Fred is out of the race.

So ends the laziest candidacy in American history. They're showing b-roll of Fred "campaigning" on MSNBC and they literally can't find anything more interesting than him eating a bowl of soup.

Remember, this was the "conservative choice" beloved by the Internet right, the man who the Republicans saw as a savior when he first entered the campaign.

Hilarious.

An Embarrassing Human Being

Unca Fred Thompson not only has no interest in being President, he has no interest in politics or the economy.

Republican White House hopeful Fred Thompson made light of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's call for a quick economic stimulus Thursday and said it might be best to leave the economy alone for now.

Thompson was answering questions in a restaurant where Bernanke could be seen on a TV urging short-term relief to avert a recession. Thompson was asked what he would do.

"You could probably get a 'Law & Order' rerun on TNT there if you wanted to switch that around a little bit," quipped Thompson, who acted on the series. When the host reminded him Bernanke is a South Carolina native, Thompson joked: "That looks a little boring to me. I don't care."

That's your clear conservative choice in action.

By the way, Freddie's come out against the global AIDS initiative.

At a campaign stop attended by a CBS reporter in Lady's Island, S.C., Thompson was asked if he, "as a Christian, as a conservative," supported President Bush's global AIDS initiative. "Christ didn't tell us to go to the government and pass a bill to get some of these social problems dealt with. He told us to do it," Thompson responded. "The government has its role, but we need to keep firmly in mind the role of the government, and the role of us as individuals and as Christians on the other."

Thompson went on: "I'm not going to go around the state and the country with regards to a serious problem and say that I'm going to prioritize that. With people dying of cancer, and heart disease, and children dying of leukemia still, I got to tell you -- we've got a lot of problems here. . . . "

I think the only war Thompson's going to be fighting is the war on narcolepsy.

Debate Impressions

I did manage to watch both debates yesterday, and I think the contrast between the two parties couldn't be sharper. The Republicans had a nasty, mean, grumpy old man debate highlighted by John McCain's sniping and Fred Thompson occasionally weighing in from his rocking chair with a snide remark, not that he had a plan of his own. In a way Thompson is the quintessential conservative in this race; only caring about what we can't do, completely unconcerned about governance, just interested in showing his dominance by insulting his opponents. If he wasn't in a coma for six months I would say he epitomized the conservative id and would sail to victory. But Mitt Romney's got a better chance even though he was smacked around to an almost pity-inducing degree last night. And the Huckabump is going to be sufficient for him to claim that he defied expectations with a strong third-place finish. I still think he's the nominee, no matter how much the media wanks for St. McCain. Also, I forgot every word 9iu11iani said.

By contrast the Democrats had a pretty sober, substantive debate, outside of one defining moment when John Edwards tried to stick the knife in Hillary Clinton by parrying a Clinton attack with "any time the agents of change speak out, this is what the status quo does." That really pissed Clinton off, though she improved throughout the debate. I thought her faulting Edwards for not getting the patient's bill of rights through Tom DeLay's House when he worked his ass off to pass it in the Senate was a really weak return, however. Obama stayed relatively above the fray. Richardson was kind of just there.

But there were two defining moments. One was in the Democratic debate, when Charlie Gibson proved the cluelessness of the Beltway media with what is going on in the rest of the country.

Summary: During the ABC News-Facebook debate, moderator Charlie Gibson suggested that the Democratic presidential candidates' proposals to roll back or let some of President Bush's tax cuts expire would affect middle-class families, adding, "If you take a family of two professors here at St. Anselm, they're going to be in the $200,000 category that you're talking about lifting the taxes on." According to the U.S. Census, however, the median income for a U.S. household is $48,451, and the mean household income is $65,527; and only 3.4 percent of U.S. households have an income of $200,000 or more.

It was worse than that. The crowd openly laughed at Gibson for the stupidity of suggesting that two professors at St. Anselm make that kind of money (more like $75,000). And the larger point was that, because everybody in Gibson's world is rich, he naturally believes that the rest of the country is the same way.

The other key moment was when the Republicans were asked how they would contrast themselves with Barack Obama. They didn't find it very possible. It was easy for them to characterize Hillary as some sort of demon. But with Obama, Romney praised him, McCain praised him, Huckabee praised him and compared the two's success in Iowa, and Ron Paul praised him and compared the two's success with young voters. When McCain tried to draw contrast on experience, Romney stopped him and said "that's what Chris Dodd, Joe Biden, Bill Richardson, and Hillary Clinton said in Iowa, and they all got smoked." When the Republicans can't figure out a line of attack, you know they're worried. They'll fall back on the same liberal boogeyman stuff, but clearly Obama and his movement represent a real problem for Republicans.

That's all I got...

Welcome To Caucus Day!

It truly is exciting today, here in this small, mostly white state out in flyover country, where a small subset of Americans will cast their ballot and determine the fate of the GOP hopefuls. The media crush is simply amazing, everywhere you look there's another reporter. And the polling has been so non-stop that you expect another one after the caucusues are over! Yes, the eyes of the nation are truly upon Wyoming today!

Wait, you haven't heard about it?

Don't forget Wyoming. It's been overlooked in the hoopla surrounding Thursday's Iowa caucuses and next week's New Hampshire primary, but Wyoming Republicans will caucus Saturday and choose delegates to the national convention in September.

Candidates have paid little attention to the state, though.

Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Duncan Hunter and Ron Paul have passed through since September. Mike Huckabee, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain have not.

"Yes, there have been some appearances by the candidates in this state that otherwise wouldn't have occurred this early in the process," said Jim King, who teaches political science at the University of Wyoming. "But candidates are where the media are — in Iowa and New Hampshire."

This is an example of how truly arbitrary this whole selection process is. The media isn't covering Wyoming because they've decided New Hampshire is more important, and anyway who wants to go to Wyoming after spending all that time in Iowa? So they ignore it, which causes the candidates to ignore it, because the important thing about these early races is the bump and not the win. Not that Wyoming should be decisive, but there's no real reason it should be dramatically less decisive than Iow and New Hampshire; all they have going for them is history. This is exhibit A of why the whole system needs an overhaul.

UPDATE: The good news here for Fred Thompson is that it's another state he gets to skip, just like New Hampshire! And a roar went up in Thompson headquarters. Or a snore. Or something.

UPDATE II: Mitt-mentum!

CHEYENNE, Wyoming: U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney grabbed the early lead in Wyoming's Republican caucuses Saturday as the state had its brief moment in the political spotlight between the traditional attention-getting contests in Iowa and New Hampshire.

This is good news for John McCain.

UPDATE II: With 83% of precincts reporting Romney has 70% of the delegates, Freddie Thompson 20%, and Duncan Hunter 10%. Hugh Hewitt just had a heart palpitation.

.

Drop Dead Fred

Dissatisfied that he wasn't given the keys to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue immediately upon announcing, fed up with the grueling one-stop-every-other-day campaign schedule, convinced that there was practically nothing more he could do to ask people for their votes (except for actually showing up and asking), and just grumpy because he didn't get his green Jello today, Fred Thompson has reached the end of the line.

Several Republican officials close to Fred Thompson’s presidential campaign said they expect the candidate will drop out of the race within days if he finishes poorly in Thursday’s Iowa caucus.

Thompson’s campaign, which last spring and summer was generating fevered anticipation in the media and with some Republican activists, has never ignited nationally, and there are no signs of a late spark happening here in Iowa, where even a third-place finish is far from assured.

This reality—combined with a fundraising drought—left well-connected friends and advisers of Thompson Wednesday evening predicting that he will pull the plug on hype and hope before the Jan. 8 New Hampshire primary [...]

“Without a solid third-place finish, there’s no point in going on,” a Thompson adviser said Wednesday. “It was an honorable race, and he turned out to be a good candidate. The moment had just passed.”

No word on whether or not the advisor was referring to a Maalox moment.

By the way, it's expected that Thompson would throw his support to John McCain, inducing this cringe-worthy line:

In turn, Thompson might be named attorney general in a McCain administration.

For those of you who thought Alberto Gonzales was in over his head...

Also, looks like there could be an open podium for that Fox News debate this weekend! Ron Paul, anyone?

Brother, Can You Spare A Dime?

I guess the Law and Order money dried up.

When I got a generic fundraising e-mail "from" Fred Thompson campaign manager Bill Lacy last night offering "a quick update" on the effort to get "on the air statewide in Iowa," I didn't take it literally.

I should have.

Fred has gone dark in Iowa.

With not enough cash to buy ads, he's doing all the free media he can on his bus tour. But it's a remarkable indicator of just how topsy-turvy the GOP race has been that the man once viewed as the party's savior cannot even afford to buy TV time in the final days before Iowa.

It's probably for the best, since the TV spots were 20 seconds of Grandpa Freddie dozing in a chair, until a staff aide puts a mirror under his nose to ensure that he's still breathing.

It's not a scintillating message.

281 Strong For Fred!

This is hilarious:

According to the Department of Elections, Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee have been certified to be on the Delaware primary ballot on Feb.5th.

Unfortunately, Fred Thompson fell short of the 500 signature mark, and will not be on the ballot.

I know Delaware is a small state, but seriously? You couldn't find five HUNDRED people?

It gets better:

UPDATE: Jason Bonham at Race42008.com is reporting that the DOE said Thompson only had 281 out of 500 signatures, and that most of their signatures were rejected because they were not registered Republicans.

I think this is a terrible disenfranchisement of such noble Delawarians as Phil McCracken and Oliver Closeoff.

This news will go nicely with the new poll that shows Thompson behind the mentally ill Tom Tancredo in New Hampshire.

Do you get the feeling that Freddie might not be taking the whole Presidentin' thing seriously?

I Don’t Care What The Intelligence Says

Does any sentence sum up the modern conservative movement more?

They’re undoubtedly intent upon nuclear weapons. I don’t care what this latest NIE says. That’s foolishness that represents our own inability to get a handle on it more than anything else.

That was Fred Thompson, going with his gut over established reality and creating it himself.

In a similiar and far more dispiriting vein today was Thomas Friedman, who uses an idiotic analogy (par for the course for him, I know) to suggest we would be better off lying about the reality of Iran's nuclear program in order to make ourselves look tough to the Gulf states. I don't know when it was decided that we should base our foreign policy on how Bahrain would perceive us.

People know that Iran is still enriching uranium, and they know they have the right to do so under the NPT. People know that their enrichment program is actually overblown, and wouldn't produce enough weapons-grade product for a half-decade. People know that the ability to maneuver enriched uranium into a weapon is still a threat - Europe is pretty united on that one. And people know that a good ground for negotiations occurs when one side isn't threatening to blow up the other side every five seconds. Indeed, the toning down of the rhetoric, caused in part by the release of the NIE, is aiding efforts at additional sanctions at the UN.

Friedman doesn't understand this because the words "Suck. On. This." don't appear in such a policy.

I Mean, They Don't Even Have a Piggly Wiggy Up There!

Fred Thompson's done with New Hampshire.

Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson has no plans to return to first-primary state New Hampshire to campaign before the end of the year, a spokesman said yesterday.

"Obviously, Iowa comes first," campaign deputy communications director Karen Hanretty said. "Iowa is first in the nation, so we'll spend our time in Iowa and then be spending our time in the states that come after it." Iowa's caucuses are scheduled for Jan. 3; the New Hampshire primary is scheduled for Jan. 8 [...]

The New Hampshire Presidential Watch Web site reports that the Thompson has spent six days in New Hampshire with 12 public events, far fewer than the other major candidates. He does maintain a campaign office in Manchester, and state campaign coordinator Liz Christoffersen says it remains active.

If by "active" you mean that it has a working phone, and one guy there is really good with Microsoft Word. In other words, the office is as active as Thompson himself!

Do you really think that, after the Iowa caucuses on January 3, Thompson will figure out that it's time to LEAVE Iowa, then?

He Does Less Before 9AM Than Most People Do All Day

Unca Freddie Thompson's schedule, less than 30 days before the Iowa caucuses, submitted without comment:

This morning, according to the e-mailed schedule from Thompson's press office, Fred would begin his campaign day bright and early at 8:15 a.m. EST with a telephone interview with Andy Peterson on WMT in Cedar Falls, Iowa. He'd follow that 25 minutes later with an interview on AM Tampa Bay on WFLA and then at 10:40 he'd be interviewed on WHO in Des Moines.

By 11 a.m., he would be done with that.

And that's it for the campaign day.

A Little Knowledge Is A Dangerous Thing

There's an enormous danger in having a conservative movement so committed to their own failed beliefs that they are contempuous of information that conflicts with it, or the government professionals who practice their trade. This is exactly the kind of bullcrap we saw in the run-up to Iraq. Any contradictory information was dismissed because "Saddam's a liar, you can't trust anything that comes out of that country!" And now...

Last night on PBS’s Charlie Rose, former senator Fred Thompson added his own conspiracy theory to the mix, stating that Iran may have deliberately “leaked” the information on their lack of nuclear program to distract the U.S. “Nobody knows” if Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, he declared:

"We’re just going to have to wait and see, why they would start it up and move away without telling anybody. Unless of course they have leaked this themselves. So, just a bunch of unanswered questions. […]

This is perhaps a weak, faint attempt to cause us to divert our attention a little bit from what they’re doing."

These people don't understand intelligence and don't understand government. We got a retired Iranian general to flip and give us new intel, and it revealed that the nuclear weapons program was put on ice in 2003. Even Dick Cheney is accepting that.

“I don’t have any reason to question what the [intelligence] community has produced,” he said. “Now, there are things they don’t know. There’s always the possibility that circumstances will change. But I think they’ve done the best job they can with the intelligence that’s available.”

Now, Cheney also thinks Iraq will be self-governing by 2009 (they are NOW, you idjit), so he's got his own problems. And the entire Administration could be climbing down from the precipice of what would be a catastrophic war. But the point is this: people who are more wedded to their ideology than the truth need to be drummed out of public life.

UPDATE: I just saw Frank Gaffney on Hardball argue for a "Team B" intelligence assessment to challenge the NIE. Team B, of course, was even more wrong than the CIA about the Soviet Union's capabilities. Pat Buchanan asked Gaffney if he was calling for a Team B to the NIE on Iran in 2005, when the intelligence community thought there was a nuclear program. He said "No, because I agreed with it."

There you have it, folks. The conservative ideology explained: agree only with what validates your ideology, and question every other fact.

YouTube Debate Lowlights

Booman offers the best roundup of the Republican YouTube debate that I've seen. I have only seen parts of it. But as far as I can gather, it was a lightning round of immigrant-bashing, historical revisionism (public opinion lost the Vietnam War), Jesus praise (apparently, there is a religious test for office on the Republican side), and anti-tax rhetoric. It was a Wednesday, the day of Grover Norquist's weekly conservative meeting, and so I guess that's why he got to ask a question even though he has unfettered access to Republicans. I already mentioned Rudy Giuliani's stumble through questions about his taxpayer-financed booty calls. You had Mitt Romney refuse to call waterboarding torture until he consulted with an executive for Blackwater. Mike Huckabee came armed with an excellent amount of one-liners that allowed him to sidestep substantive questions. Fred Thompson made it through the whole debate without sleeping, though there was one touch and go moment where someone had to hold a piece of glass up to his nose to ensure he was still breathing. And CNN didn't exactly cover themselves in glory by failing to disclose that one of their questioners is on a steering committee for Hillary Clinton.

All in all, I'm pleased with my decision to be somewhere else last night. Anyone else have any thoughts?

The Best Health Care System Money Can't Buy

According to Rudy 9iu11iani and the rest of the Right's Field, the American health insurance marketplace is clearly superior than a system of "socialized medicine". Gubmint-run health care will force Americans into long lines, rationed care, and stunted innovation. Interesting how they haven't learned from their own experiences with the US health care system. This of course is because most of them are rich enough to get the best care possible. They're simply unconcerned with the plight of the unwashed masses.

When Rudolph W. Giuliani was diagnosed with prostate cancer in the spring of 2000, one thing he did not have to worry about was a lack of medical insurance.

Today, the former New York mayor joins two other cancer survivors in seeking the Republican presidential nomination: Arizona Sen. John McCain has been treated for melanoma, the most serious type of skin malignancy, and former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson had lymphoma, a cancer of the immune system.

All three have offered proposals with the stated aim of helping the 47 million people in the U.S. who have no health insurance, including those with preexisting medical conditions.

But under the plans all three have put forward, cancer survivors such as themselves could not be sure of getting coverage -- especially if they were not already covered by a government or job-related plan and had to seek insurance as individuals.

McCain and 9iu11liani had government-run health care at the time of their illnesses. Fred Thompson is covered through the Screen Actors Guild. They simply aren't in touch with what most Americans who actually have to navigate the insurance system have to face. They want to depend on the ravages of the private market when they don't even depend on it themselves. The truth is that nobody with a pre-existing condition is going to come close to their wonderful market-driven health insurance. You'll either be denied off the bat or you won't be able to afford it.

The candidates "can't sit there and say they understand what people are going through, because they've got healthcare," (cancer patient Susan) Brown said. "We went through the same illness, however [they] don't understand what it's like not to have health insurance."

This would require the foreign concept of empathy.

Write A New Story

I'm not always comfortable with publishing polls because they're a snapshot. But we're only a month-plus out of New Hampshire, and the trends of this CNN poll show that the media simply needs to start running a new story about the Republican race. Because Mitt Romney is solidly in the lead right now.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson has skidded into sixth place in a new CNN/WMUR poll of likely Republican voters in New Hampshire, edged out by ex-Libertarian and anti-war congressman Ron Paul and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney topped the poll, widening a lead he has held for months in neighboring New Hampshire, while Arizona Sen. John McCain and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani were running close in the second and third spots.

Thompson ... has trailed the GOP front-runners in early voting states since entering the race in August, and his support in New Hampshire dropped from 13 percent in a September poll to 4 percent in November's survey.

By contrast, Romney's support grew from 25 percent to 33 percent over the same period; McCain held steady at 18 percent; and Giuliani dipped from 24 to 16 percent.

Meanwhile, the percentage of support for Paul grew from 4 percent to 8 percent, putting him fourth among the GOP contenders in the Granite State [...]

Among other contenders, Huckabee — seen gaining ground ahead of the Iowa caucuses — claimed 5 percent support in the new poll. Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo, who has made opposition to illegal immigration the centerpiece of his campaign, drew 1 percent; and California Rep. Duncan Hunter, the former chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, had the support of fewer than half of 1 percent.

Romney is now well beyond the margin of error in New Hampshire, and 9iu11iani, who's trying to make a strong showing UP TO THIRD in Iowa, is looking at the same placement in New Hampshire. Meanwhile, Ron Paul is surging and will probably spend as much money in that state as anyone else. And Fred Thompson no longer exists.

All I'm saying is that it might be time to rewrite those stories (And do it yourself, because the CBS newswriters are going on strike). If all you're going to do is focus on the horse race, the least you can do is get it right.

More Iowa Stories

It looks like the Right's Field is trying to manage expectations in preparation for the January 3 caucuses. Mike Huckabee could end Mitt Romney's Presidential ambitions right there if he should manage a victory. He's now on the radar screen and his opponents are hitting him over the familiar issue of immigration.

On Fox News on Wednesday, he was asked about a bill he supported as governor that would have granted tuition breaks to the children of illegal immigrants. He suggested that he had only wanted to give such children access to scholarships. In fact, the initial bill he supported did have a scholarship provision. But that provision was later stripped out and was not included in the legislation that Huckabee continued to push.

Ex-Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, still leading in Iowa, has decided that it's time to take the gloves off with regard to Huckabee. Campaigning in Iowa this week, the Associated Press reported, Romney told reporters: "Giving a better deal to the children of illegal aliens than we give to U.S. citizens from surrounding states is simply not fair and not right."

On Fox News, Huckabee responded with a dig at prior reports that Romney had employed groundskeepers who were illegal: "I guess Mitt Romney would rather keep people out of college so they can keep working on his lawn, since he had illegals there."

Not a bad comeback. I thought Huckabee's Chuck Norris facts ad was funny but it's going to confuse the hell out of 70 year-olds in Iowa who aren't familiar with hipster jokes on the Internet. His problem is that, if the immigration issue is as strong in the Republican Party as polls suggest, he's going to have trouble with this stand.

Meanwhile, Rudy donned his farm clothes and visited Iowa once again, and apparently he's blanketing the state with mailers and phone calls and radio ads, trying to maybe move up to third and declare victory. Of course, when one of the most powerful GOP electeds in the state says that your nomination would undermine the Party... that's not a good sign.

Rep. Steve King of Iowa warned today that the conservative underpinnings of the Republican party platform would be "sacrificed" if Rudy Giuliani is the Republican presidential nominee.

King, a leading conservative from western Iowa's heavily Republican 5th District, said that in addition he fears the nomination of Giuliani would spur a third-party candidate on the right who would "sink" GOP chances of winning the White House.

"I don't know anybody else who has spoken publicly about that concern," King said in an interview in his office at the U.S. Capitol. "What's it take to be a spoiler? Not much."

As for Grandpa Freddie, he's attacked Huckabee by calling him "John Edwards in a Republican suit" (what's the cut of a Republican suit? Is it made out of poor people?), but privately, his Congressional supporters are trying to find a way to sneak out the side door.

Several House Republicans who endorsed Fred Thompson for president now say that they are frustrated with what they view as an apathetic campaign, and at least one regrets having committed to the former Tennessee senator.

“I think he’s kind of done a belly flop,” said an estranged Thompson backer who indicated he will not pull his public support before the “Super Tuesday” primaries. “We’ll just wait till after Feb. 5 because I think he’s going to get beat.”

The disaffected members of team Thompson say he has failed to put to rest whispers that he is unwilling to campaign hard enough to win the presidency.

“He seems to be perpetuating it instead of defeating it,” another dissatisfied Thompson backer said. “I can’t see me bailing on him, but there’s some frustration.”

Now that's a proud group of endorsers right there.

Huckabee Double Down

Mike Huckabee is going all in in the Hawkeye State.

Ex-AR Gov. Mike Huckabee will spend most of the next 65 days in Iowa and has moved the majority of his staff to the state in an effort to capitalize on a sense that he's gaining ground here.

“Well, I certainly think even the Iowa poll numbers are reflecting that we’re in play in a very strong way and continue to move up and other candidates have stalled and are beginning to decline. I think we’re in great position there [...]

“We’re hoping to do what we essentially did with the straw poll, just doing it on steroids. We know we’ve got to get physical bodies that so committed to us no matter how cold the temperature is… no matter how good the Orange Bowl is…. Among those caucus goers who have already made up their mind, we’re in first place.. what we’re doing now is to go down to the precinct level, recruiting chairman in the precincts, getting precincts townships, counties.. We’re developing our efforts where the concentration of voters is likely o be highest…

The Republican race is shaping up very interestingly in the early states. Where Huckabee is focusing on Iowa, the newly flush with cash Ron Paul is focusing on New Hampshire. You can also argue that, since Freddie has fallen back nationally, he's the "spoiler" in South Carolina. And they're all doing quite well at this stage of the game in their regional bailiwicks. For the "national" candidates, their problem could be that they never get to fully capture the narrative or any media attention. Chris Bowers says that this favors Romney, because a weakening top tier and all these wild-cards make his early-state position even stronger.

But if you look historically, a Presidential race with all these regional candidates typically ends up in a brokered convention and a compromise candidate. Obviously, the state of things in 21st-century politics would appear to preclude that, but this is a crazy year for The Right's Field.

UPDATE: Just to tweak my California friends, Huckabee is at least the third candidate I know who is openly parking in one of the early states and ignoring... California, which was supposed to be so "relevant" with its February 5 primary. Heck, Chris Dodd MOVED to Iowa and enrolled his kids in grade school there. The primary shift was NEVER about relevance, it was about getting a term limits change on the ballot in time for incumbents to stay in power.