No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for the '2012 Presidential Contest' Category

October 11, 2011

Another GOP Debate

Things are getting interesting:

Palin and Christie are definitely out.  The field is set.

Bachmann and Hunstman are no where to be seen on the polling but are still showing up to debates…for how long?

Johnson is invited.  Will he answer any question without starting with “I will pass a balanced budget!”

Ron Paul won a straw poll…or did he?  Does it mean anything anyway?

Reports are out suggesting that Romney’s team were advising Obama on how to do a healthcare mandate.

Perry seems to have lost all positive energy.

According to the MSM, Herman Cain is not really a black man.

All these things are likely to be discussed or commented on during the live blog tonight.  The debate starts at 7 PM central.  I’ll probably get started a bit before that.  Drunk or sober, you’re all invited!

September 22, 2011

Fox Presidential Debate Live/Drunk blog

by @ 12:10. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

Join us tonight for the Fox Presidential debate. You can join sober or drunk, your choice. My guess is that even if you join sober, you’re going to want to drink by the end of it. I’ll try to get this going about 15 minutes before the official go time.

September 5, 2011

APP Palmetto Freedom Forum liveblog

by @ 12:44. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

This effort from American Principles Project, starting at 2 pm Central, promises to be a rather unique experience. They invited all the GOP candidates, both actual and potential, who had at least a 5% average in a recent version of RealClearPolitics’ average of polls to appear one at a time before Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), Rep. Steve King (R-IA) and APP founder Robert George. Since the potential candidates who qualified, Sarah Palin and Rudy Giuliani, didn’t respond to the invite, and Texas governor Rick Perry had to go back to Texas last-minute to deal with the wildfires in his state, that means we’ll get Rep. Michelle Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Rep. Ron Paul, and Mitt Romney.

The forum will be on both CNN and Townhall with the latter also carrying a post-forum show.

Do try to be on your best behavior this time around; I’ll try not to swear even when dealing with Paul. Besides, we’ve got a full-throated drunkblog of MSNBC’s Wednesday debate ready to go. The “old” liveblog method of often-paraphrased questions in italics, in-line answers in plain text and in-line comments in parentheses will apply for as long as I can keep up. As always, CoverItLive will be handling the hosting, which means that you shouldn’t need to refresh to get the latest.

September 4, 2011

Live-blogging schedule – Monday and Wednesday Presidential debates

by @ 12:55. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

Due to scheduling conflicts, we won’t be bringing you Obama’s speech on Thursday. However, we do have two opportunities for you to jump on a live-blog this week:

  • Monday at 2 pm (Central), CNN and Townhall.com will have a rather unique debate/forum from South Carolina put on by the American Principles Project. Instead of reporters asking cattle-call questions, they’re going to have the APP founder, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) and Rep. Steve King (R-IA) grill those candidates who have gained some traction one at a time.
  • Wednesday at 7 pm, MSNBC will have what promises to be a train wreck, and an opportunity to drink heavily.

Stop on in for one or both. There may or may not be salty language on Monday, but I will guarantee salty language on Wednesday (known by TEMS chatizens as F-Bomb Wednesday).

August 29, 2011

Your NSFW video of the day (and an Obama disapproval update)

by @ 15:56. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

(H/T – Ace, who approved of the creative use of the f-bombs)

A fellow AoSHQ Moron™ by the nom de comment of Plonked! whipped up video of a certain dead Nazi’s reaction to Teh Won’s (aka Stuttering Clusterfuck Of A Miserable Failure) plummeting poll numbers…

Meanwhile, Obama has never been more underwater in the Gallup tracking poll, going to 38% approval-55% disapproval as of Sunday. Rasmussen is slightly kinder to him, with 45% approval-55% disapproval-Approval Index -19.

August 11, 2011

Pre-Ames Straw Poll GOP debate liveblog

by @ 18:43. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

I haven’t quite decided whether to turn off the (almost-)no-swearing lamp and let the alcohol flow, but we’re almost at the unofficial start of the Presidential campaign. Fox News is hosting tonight’s debate just before the Ames Straw Poll, and they lined up the 8 contenders who were officially in the race at the start of today:

– Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN)
– Former Godfather’s Pizza CEO/radio talk show host Herman Cain
– Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich
– Former Utah governor/ambassador to China Jon Huntsman
– Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX)
– Former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty
– Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney
– Former Senator Rick Santorum

That means no Texas governor Rick Perry, even though he let slip he’s entering the race this weekend.

As always, I’ll be using CoverItLive to handle the live-blogging traffic, so you won’t need to hit refresh to keep up. I’ll start things about 7:45 pm. If you don’t see the CiL window below, click here to catch it in a new window.

Revisions/extensions (9:16 pm 8/11/2011) – Since CiL crashed, not just for me but for everybody, I’m concentrating on Twitter. Sorry about that.

June 14, 2011

The obligatory post-debate analysis

by @ 8:49. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

In general, the Gang of 7 survived the CNN sandbagging in good order. Do note that the use of “sandbag” is more of a reflection of a wet, limp bag of sand than a flying bag of sand, but not for the lack of trying on moderator John King’s part.

Of course, some did so better than others, so let’s do a hung-over review in alphabetical order:

  • Michele Bachmann – The consensus winner, not in small part by being the only newsmaker of the bunch and announcing her candidacy at the beginning of the debate. She delivered, and not the Biden gaffetastic crazy some of my friends in the center-right coalition believe she is limited to.
  • Herman Cain – If I were grading, it would be an Incomplete, though not for a lack of substance. King seemed to treat him as a “token” after he was introduced first. He was markedly improved from the first debate, but he still has a way to go to be a top-tier debater. Bonus points for not whining about the silent treatment from King early.
  • Debate format – This was a mixed bag. I liked that the jumping-off questions from the public were, for the most part, appropriate for a GOP debate, even ones from those who from the intro would seem to be prejudiced against the GOP. Then, the “pros” took over, and the debate at times took on a feel of a DNC inquisition.
  • Newt Gingrich – The good – he seemed prepared despite losing his entire campaign staff last week. The bad – he seems to think that if the thundering herd wants to stampede right off the cliff, the herd shouldn’t be discouraged from doing so.
  • John King – He proved that CNN should never get another GOP debate again.
  • Ron Paul – It took a bit longer for the batshit crazy to kick in than usual on any given question, and indeed on a couple answers, it didn’t kick in at all. Unfortunately, it’s never far from the surface and too often erupting like Mt. Vesuvius.
  • Tim Pawlenty – I believe 4 letters describe his demurring from the Sunday charge of ObamneyCare – W-I-M-P. Memo to the Anybody-But-Romney crowd; if you’re going to get the first GOP candidate since Dwight Eisenhower that wasn’t Next-In-Line™, you’re going to have to start tearing Romney down when he’s present.
  • Mitt Romney – If you doubted that he was Next-In-Line™, doubt no more. He’s running as though he already secured the nomination (and so far, there’s nothing that would disabuse him of that assumption), and didn’t make any major missteps.
  • Rick Santorum – The only wave of the night he created was when he unabashedly backed Paul Ryan’s budget. Other than that, I don’t know how he got promoted to the A-list.

June 13, 2011

CNN New Hampshire GOP Presidential debate drunkblog

by @ 17:06. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

In a bit under 2 hours, CNN will have the second GOP Presidential debate. Partly because the 2008 cycle’s debates is how I managed to snag Shoebox as a co-blogger, and partly because I need the practice for tomorrow’s Drinking Right (as always, at Papa’s Social Club, 7718 W Burleigh in Milwaukee, starting at 7 pm) and RightOnline later in the week, I’ll fire up a drunkblog. As always, I’ll be using CoverItLive to handle the liveblogging duties, which means you won’t need to refresh this page to keep up. The standard drunkblog rules apply, which means I paraphrase a lot and salty language may will be used.

April 28, 2011

The 3 G’s

If you started grade school around or before, the time that I did, or, if you are a student of history, you are familiar with the 3 R’s.  Readin’, Ritin’ and Rithmetic.  The 3 R’s were the core, the foundation of a public education.  Nearly everything we were taught in grade school was, or was tied to the 3 R’s. 

When I went to school, if you wanted to know if a teacher was a good or poor teacher it was simple process.  If a parent looked at their child and their child knew the 3 R’s, the teacher was good.  If the parent’s child didn’t know the 3 R’s, the teacher wasn’t good.  It wasn’t a very complicated process of evaluation, nuance didn’t play a role.  Parents knew who was responsible for the 3 R’s and they knew if their child was accomplished in them.

GallupObama approval hits 5 month low
New Hampshire Obama approval rating below “break even” point
PennsylvaniaObama approval rating at all time low

Renewed combativeness (some would say snippiness), a new spokesperson and even dropping drone bombs in Libya have not helped President Obama’s approval ratings.  In fact, regardless of what he attempts to use to distract his audience, nothing seems to change the trend of his approval polls.

President Obama talks and behaves as if all those who disagree with him and his policies were included in what he calls “the far right fringe.”  In his mind, “the fringe,” is made up of all the people who doubted that he satisfied the Constitutional requirement for being a natural born citizen.  In other words, President Obama believes, or at least communicates, that all those who disagree with him are “birthers.”  I have no doubt that at whatever fundraiser he is attending this evening, he is perplexed by the fact that his approval rating continues to drop even though he has released his birth certificate.

As it was with the link of the 3 R’s with the approval of teachers throughout my education, there is an alphabetical link to explain the falling approval rating for President Obama; the 3 G’s.

Gas, Groceries and GDP are the only items you need to watch to determine whether President Obama’s approval ratings are moving up or down.

Gas and Groceries are fairly obvious.  The average price of gas is now $1.02 more than it was a year ago.  More importantly, those who follow the prices are suggesting that the price may well go over $4.50 before peaking.  At the current price, a family with two cars averaging 15,000 miles a year each, is paying over $125/month more for gas than a year ago.  If it peaks at $4.50/gallon, the average increase will be over $200 per month.

Grocery costs are getting nasty.  Just this week the USDA announced that US food inflation will run 4 to 5.5 times the rate it did just last year. With those averages, and some items like Beef (up 12.2% in a year), Pork (up 11.2% in a year) and Citrus fruits (up 8.5% in a year) running far higher than the average, it’s not hard to see how a family of four will face food cost increases of over $100 per month.

If you don’t think everyday food and gas costs are catching up with the average consumer, guess again. Today, Walmart, the largest food retailer in the US, said that they are seeing spending patterns that suggest that many of their customers are expending their budgets before getting to the end of the month.

Wal-Mart’s core shoppers are running out of money much faster than a year ago due to rising gasoline prices, and the retail giant is worried, CEO Mike Duke said Wednesday.

“We’re seeing core consumers under a lot of pressure,” Duke said at an event in New York. “There’s no doubt that rising fuel prices are having an impact.” Wal-Mart shoppers, many of whom live paycheck to paycheck, typically shop in bulk at the beginning of the month when their paychecks come in.

Lately, they’re “running out of money” at a faster clip, he said.

“Purchases are really dropping off by the end of the month even more than last year,” Duke said. “This end-of-month [purchases] cycle is growing to be a concern.

So, core costs are increasing but how does GDP impact Obama’s approval ratings?

There is a strong correlation between GDP and real wage growth. GDP has slowed to an annual rate of 1.8%. At the same time, inflation is running at 3.8%. This means that the real incomes are likely not keeping up with the rate of inflation.

Everyday costs are going up but incomes aren’t. That’s a recipe for a very unhappy employee base let alone electorate.

Keep an eye on the 3 G’s. As the 3 G’s get worse, so will Obama’s approval ratings. If they improve, so will the ratings. I believe the relationship between the 3 G’s and Obama’s approval is so strong that I would wager the following: If the 3 G’s do not improve from where they are today, and I don’t think they will, Obama will lose his reelection bid.

As a country, we’re failing the 3 G’s.  I don’t think it’s difficult for most people to figure out who’s in charge of the class.

April 11, 2011

Distilling the Republican “Big Three”

by @ 12:59. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

One of Jim Geraghty’s readers beat me to this observation – “Tim Pawlenty is the Huck/Mitt love child — a telegenic blue state governor with a populist tone.”

Insert your own inappropriate punchline here…

February 18, 2011

Right Wing News Blogger Poll – GOP 2012 Presidential Field, Feb 2011 edition

by @ 21:55. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

Once again, John Hawkins took the temperature of a gaggle of right-of-center bloggers, and once again, I was one of the 63 who submitted their thoughts. This time, we had several questions on who we preferred in the GOP Presidential field.

The most-interesting answer was the combined first-choice/second-choice results. The supposed rock-stars of CPAC, Ron Paul and Donald Trump, netted a total of one (second-place) vote. Surprisingly, Chris Christie ran away with 30 votes (23 first-place votes to run away with that category, 7 second-place votes). My choices (Herman Cain as 1st, Sarah Palin as 2nd) finished, respectively fourth (tied for third in 1st-place votes, tied for fifth in 2nd-place votes) and second (a distant second in 1st-place votes, barely first in 2nd-place votes).

We’re still almost a full year from the primary season, so things can and will change.

December 16, 2010

DOWN GOES PALIN!

by @ 7:36. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

Over the course of the past week, Erick Erickson has been running a tournament-style poll for who the RedState faithful want to see as the 2012 GOP Presidential nominee. Yesterday saw the final round end, and, believe it or not, Sarah Palin did not finish first. Allow me to recap the brackets before I tell you who knocked off Palin (which is why I bit.ly’ed the link; it would otherwise have told you who won the poll):

Round 1
– Herman Cain beat Donald Trump in The Businessmen matchup
– David Petraeus beat Jeb Bush in The Wild Cards matchup
– John Bolton beat John Thune in The Johns matchup
– Mike Pence beat Mike Huckabee in The Mikes matchup
– Tim Pawlenty beat Mitt Romney in The Northern Governors matchup
– Haley Barbour beat Rick Perry in The Southern Governors matchup
– Sarah Palin beat Mitch Daniels in The Other Governors matchup
– Rick Santorum beat Newt Gingrich in The Former Politicos matchup

Round 2
– Herman Cain beat David Petraeus in the Business v. Wild Card matchup
– Mike Pence beat John Bolton in the John v. Mike matchup
– Haley Barbour beat Tim Pawlenty in the North v. South matchup
– Sarah Palin beat Rick Santorum in the Other v. Former matchup

Semi-finals
– Herman Cain beat Mike Pence
– Sarah Palin beat Haley Barbour

And now, the final – Herman Cain knocked off Sarah Palin, 8,900-8,100. I am surprised, even though I have met Cain and was flat-out impressed by him, much like the rest of blog row at the 2010 Defending the American Dream Summit. There are that Cain’s entry into the race will happen on Friday; he already snagged Mark Block away from Americans for Prosperity’s Wisconsin chapter after Block turned it from a 300-member group in 2007 into a 90,000+-member group now.

January 25, 2010

Right Wing News’ 2012 GOP straw poll

by @ 15:50. Filed under 2012 Presidential Contest.

John Hawkins conducted a straw poll of 68 of the most-influential right-of-center bloggers plus me, asking who we would vote for if the 2012 GOP Presidential primary was held today. I was tempted to take the Shoebox approach and ask for a “none of the above”, but since that wasn’t on the menu, I decided to make a selection. Let’s review what we as a group chose:

12) Mike Huckabee: 0% (0 votes)

I would have thought that the guy who finished third in the 2008 primaries, who has almost all of the social conservative values one could want, and who was the biggest advocate for the “Fair”Tax would have picked up at least a couple votes. However, the message from him that government needs to be bigger and from us that government is just too damn big is an overriding one.

11) Ron Paul: 1% (1 votes)

The fifteen minutes of fame is over.

T-9) Newt Gingrich: 3% (2 votes)

Gingrich is the poster child of a double-talking politician (see his endorsements of Gorebal “Warming” with SanFranNan and of Dede Scozzafava)

T-9) Haley Barbour: 3% (2 votes)

Barbour is proof that a blind elephant finding a nut (his response to Katrina) is not enough to overcome a love of big government.

8) Rick Perry: 4% (3 votes)

That had to be the Lonestar Sympathy Vote.

T-6) John Thune: 7% (5 votes)

The last good thing I remember out of Thune was his removal of Tom Daschle from the Senate Majority Leader’s office.

T-6) Jeb Bush: 7% (5 votes)

If there’s one thing more damaged than the GOP brand, it’s the Bush brand. It is, in this case, very unfortunate.

5) Tim Pawlenty: 9% (6 votes)

The middle of the road is a great place to get high-lowed.

4) Mitch Daniels: 10% (7 votes)

It truly is a shame that Daniels is not more well-known outside Indiana. Of note, he is the highest current executive office-holder (of course, there’s only 3 on the list).

3) Mitt Romney: 12% (8 votes)

Next In Line™ lives.

2) Mike Pence: 14% (10 votes)

Pence is proof that making the right call on TARP is a winning play (full disclosure – I voted for Pence)

1) Sarah Palin: 29% (20 votes)

I have to wonder how much was knocked off by the fact that Palin will be stumping for her former running mate in his Arizona Senate primary.

November 30, 2009

Say What?

Newsmax is reporting the Mike Huckabee is leaning against being involved with the 2012 Presidential contest:

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee says he’s leaning slightly against running for president in 2012 but says it’s far too early to say what he will do.

I think this is nothing but publicity for Huckabee.  But, if true, I welcome the announcement. 

Huckabee is the kind of “conservative” who would give President George W. Bush a bad name.  The only things that I’m convinced that Huckabee is conservative on are abortion and gay marriage.  Everything else seems to be up for pragmatic adjustments.  However, what flavor of conservative Huckabee is or isn’t, is not why I write.

Huckabee has provided several reasons or markers, for why he won’t run, or might yet run, for President:

  • It depends upon on the 2010 elections turn out
  • Whether the party will unite behind him
  • The status of his weekly TV program.

He’s kidding, right?

Running for President, or any political office for that matter, is not something you do on a lark.  These are grueling, all encompassing endeavors, not only for the candidate but also for their family and friends.  Having seen first hand, the sacrifice required to participate in a simple intraparty election, I would never counsel anyone to run for an office that they weren’t personally convicted and committed that their ideas and leadership were best for their constituents and the office.  But, that doesn’t seem to even enter Huckabee’s mind.

Depending upon the 2010 election– If you think you’ve got the best ideas for the country, what difference could this make?  Is Huckabee saying that if the Republicans make gains in 2010 that his ideas become irrelevant?  If so, his ideas are already irrelevant.  Or, is he saying that if the Republicans don’t do well in 2010 that he “won’t play” because it’s too big a challenge? 

There is only one valid take Huckabee might have, that I could agree with his reasoning.   If Republicans make big gains in 2010, and the force behind that change is the tea party activists, Huckabee would not be the likely nominee as he wouldn’t get the support of most tea party activists.

Whether the party will unite behind him– ummmmm, isn’t this what the nomination process is all about?  Did John McCain really think the party was united behind him in 2008?  I suppose that it’s possible that his political ego convinced him that they were.  If so, it’s just one more reason why McCain never got united support. 

A leader will create unity where none exists.  They do this by casting a vision and helping others understand and see how that vision is the best for accomplishing the goal or task that confronts them.  If Huckabee is unable to create unity, not only will he not be the nominee, he shouldn’t be.  Again, looking back at 2008, McCain was beat as much by a competent opponent as by his own incompetency in regularly sticking his finger in the eye of core conservatives and keeping them from unifying with the party even if they wanted to.

Dependent upon his TV show – This is hilarious!  Is he suggesting that if his show is doing well he isn’t interested in being President?  Or, is he saying that if he bombs on TV, being President sounds like a good interim job while he finds another media gig?

Personally, I’ve never understood the appeal of Mike Huckabee.  I’ve always thought him to be a populist who didn’t have any real core convictions.  There have been many who’ve tried to convince me that Huckabee was a serious candidate.  The next time someone tries to do that, I’ll point them to this article and respond, “Say What?”

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