Blatant Reality

Today, Lieberman voiced his support for Bush’s statements about world leaders who want to talk to terrorists. Who would have thought that the former VP of the all-knowing Goracle would turn out to be a such decent fellow?

Well it seems that a recent Heritage Foundation study shows that a majority of the nation’s wealthiest congressional districts are represented by Democrats. Allahpundit from Hot Air makes an interesting point about what this may mean for the nation.

Exit question: On balance, is the Dems’ new bourgeois constituency good news or bad news? No one wants to lose supporters, especially ones with thick checkbooks, but this will make Her Majesty and the Democratic Congress think twice about the tax hikes needed to pay for those million good ideas we’ll be treated to shortly.

Oh how the tables have turned…

If you just go by the number of people that have joined Meetup groups, Ron Paul leading the pack of presidential hopefuls, both Republican and Democrat. Here are just some of the numbers to give you an idea.

Ron Paul 2008
29,810 Members in 740 Meetup Groups, 4,511 waiting for a Meetup Group

 

Barack Obama
4,039 Members in 70 Meetup Groups, 1,520 waiting for a Meetup Group

 

Dennis Kucinich
1,373 Members in 42 Meetup Groups, 2,459 waiting for a Meetup Group

 

Hillary Rodham Clinton
851 Members in 28 Meetup Groups, 1,074 waiting for a Meetup Group

Now only Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich have a “Meetup” logo prominently displayed on their pages so that could be the reason that Clinton and Obama don’t have as high of membership. However, even all the members combined is a pittance compared to Howard Dean’s Meetup support of over 140,000 in 2003.

By mid-November, the Howard Dean group on Meetup would have more than 140,000 members, though Meetup would matter less.

Tommy Thompson officially dropped out of the presidential race today.

(h/t Instapundit)

Former Gov. Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin, who said he would drop out of the Republican race for president if he didn’t come in first or second in Saturday’s Ames Straw Poll, finished sixth of 11 candidates.

For those who didn’t get a chance to see what he stood for, here are his takes on the issues:

Iraq – Governor Thompson believes Iraq is a vital front in the War on Terror and that the debate over short-term military solutions and defunding of the troops’ mission is shortsighted and counterproductive. Instead, Governor Thompson believes that America should work to build an Iraq with strong economic and political infrastructures. Details on his proposal can be found here.

 

Defense and Foreign Policy – Governor Thompson believes the nation must recommit itself to rebuilding the American military because our armed forces must have the capacity to dominate any war or any conflict we must enter – all while having the capability to fight a multi-front war. Our military is simply stretched too thin to protect American interests overseas and at home in these dangerous times. At the same time, our foreign policy cannot be based solely on military might. We must reach out to the rest of the world, and a good place to start is with medical diplomacy. Governor Thompson’s initiative would take America’s great doctors and health professionals, along with our medicines and technology, to some of the most distraught places in the world, helping to comfort and nurse the poor to better health. By doing so, we can begin to heal some of the wounds with our global neighbors.

 

Health Care – Governor Thompson believes America must strengthen its health care system if it is to remain the best in the world. He would accomplish this by 1. moving the focus to preventive from curative care; 2. accelerating the adoption of health information technology to save money and lives; 3. placing the uninsured in state-by-state insurable pools, allowing private insurers to bid on their coverage; 4. strengthening the nation’s long-term care system that robs too many Americans of their life savings; and 5. strengthening the Medicare and Medicaid programs to ensure the programs are there in the future for the millions of Americans who depend on them. Details on his proposal can be found here.

 

Immigration – Governor Thompson opposes amnesty and believes that America must enforce its immigration policies to the fullest extent of the law. People who are found to be in the country illegally should be returned to their home countries and should have to wait at the end of the line, behind people who are seeking to enter the country or become citizens legally.

 

Abortion – Governor Thompson is pro-life and signed one of the nation’s first partial-birth abortion bans. Under Thompson, the number of adoptions in Wisconsin increased by 22 percent, while the number of abortions decreased by 37 percent. Just as he did in Wisconsin, Thompson would appoint strict constructionist judges who do not legislate from the bench.

 

Marriage – Governor Thompson believes marriage is between a man and a woman. He supports states’ rights in determining the definition of marriage and believes it should be done legislatively or by referendum.

 

Education – Governor Thompson, who started the nation’s first school choice program in Milwaukee, believes America must hold our schools to high standards from kindergarten through college while making sure all of our children have access to a world-class education, regardless of what neighborhood they live in or how much money their parents make. Governor Thompson believes Congress can make No Child Left Behind stronger, and do so without wavering on its core principles.

 

Second Amendment – Governor Thompson is a gun owner who signed legislation that banned Wisconsin communities from passing anti-gun ordinances that are stricter than state law.

 

Taxes and Spending – Governor Thompson cut taxes by $16.4 billion in Wisconsin and believes President Bush’s tax cuts must be permanent to allow taxpayers to keep more of their hard-earned money and to continue to build the economy. Governor Thompson also vetoed more than 1,900 items in 14 years in office, saving taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.

 

Energy and the Environment – Governor Thompson believes America must become more independent in its energy needs and break reliance on foreign oil. We must begin with greater investments in renewable energy, like ethanol, so we can bring these technologies to market faster and more efficiently. And we must come together and deal with our changing climate.

Those were taken from his website located here. However, I doubt the website will be up for too much longer.

A more detailed CNN article is located here.

It seems that many Democrats fear that if Senator Clinton is the presidential nominee, she will scare many to vote Republican come election day.

The chairman of a Midwest state party called Clinton a nightmare for congressional and state legislative candidates.

 

A Democratic congressman from the West, locked in a close re-election fight, said Clinton is the Democratic candidate most likely to cost him his seat.

 

A strategist with close ties to leaders in Congress said Democratic Senate candidates in competitive races would be strongly urged to distance themselves from Clinton.

 

“The argument with Hillary right now in some of these red states is she’s so damn unpopular,” said Andy Arnold, chairman of the Greenville, S.C., Democratic Party. “I think Hillary is someone who could drive folks on the other side out to vote who otherwise wouldn’t.”

 

“Republicans are upset with their candidates,” Arnold added, “but she will make up for that by essentially scaring folks to the polls.”

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled yesterday that vote swapping (or vote pairing) is protected by the first amendment.

Writing for the panel, Judge Raymond Fisher said, among other things, that “any agreements that paired users may have reached about swapping votes were also constitutionally protected. Such agreements — like the e-mails that preceded them — involved people’s opinions on “campaigns for political office,” which are precisely where the First Amendment ‘has its fullest and most urgent application.’ … whatever the wisdom of using vote-swapping agreements to communicate these positions, such agreements plainly differ from conventional (and illegal) vote buying, which conveys no message other than the parties; willingness to exchange votes for money (or some other form of private profit.)”

The article has many links on the background of the case and vote swapping in itself.

The Rasmussen Report found that even though Hillary may be leading the Democrats in their primary, she is still tied with the GOP frontrunners.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone shows former Big Apple Mayor Rudy Giuliani with a statistically insignificant one-point lead over the former First Lady, 46% to 45%. Former U.S. Senator Fred Thompson posts exactly the same numbers when matched against Clinton. It’s Thompson 46% Clinton 45%.

However, when Obama or Edwards is paired up with Thompson or Giuliani, the Democrats have a major lead. What does this mean for Republicans? Pray that Hillary gets nominated for the Democratic presidential candidate.

Yep, in their most recent poll, the New York Times finds that 48% of those polled consider themselves as conservatives. That is the highest percentage this poll has gotten in the past 15 years it has been conducted! This record high has only been tied twice, in polls conducted in the months of June and November in 1996.

Also, those who consider themselves to be liberals is at its lowest point in the past 15 years at 15%! This record low has only being tied once, in December of 1995.

Now remember that these polls can be misleading. For example, even though the conservative/liberal percentages stood at 45% to 20% respectively at the time of the 2006 election, conservatives still got annihilated at the polls. Therefore, take these poll results with a grain of salt.

Complete poll results located here.

(Conservative/Liberal results located on page 14)