Vox Popoli

Mickey Kaus unintentionally explains why Republicans shouldn’t have voted for Bush in 2004:

Tomorrow, if all goes as expected, Democrats should pause to be grateful that John Kerry didn’t get 70,000 more votes in Ohio in 2004. What would have happened if Kerry had won? 1) He would have presided over a slow motion loss, or continuing stalemate, in Iraq. No way Kerry would ever have approved the “surge.” 2) He would also have presided over the current housing and financial collapse that has both broken economic growth and, apparently, destroyed any chances of the incumbent party retaining the White House. Democrats don’t bear the main blame for this crisis, but is there any reason to think they would have prevented it? I can’t think of one. We’d be looking at a Republican wave instead of a Democratic sweep. …

Of course, Republicans shouldn’t have nominated Bush back in 2000 either.

A message from Marcher Lord:

I’m incredibly pleased. Your surgers did an amazing thing yesterday. As I’d hoped, there was a wonderful piggyback effect on the other two MLP books. “The Personifid Project” rose to #14,470, which was enough to rank it #4 in Religion & Spirituality > Fiction > Science Fiction & Fantasy. And “Hero, Second Class” rose to #4,796. Thank you to you and your readers for initiating and carrying out this surge. Their excitement about the surge and then their participation in it made this experiment exceed anything I had dreamed of for it.

For the record, here’s the statistics for Summa Elvetica on Amazon:

#141 in Books

#1 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Literature & Fiction > Fiction
#1 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Literature & Fiction > Science Fiction & Fantasy
#2 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Fiction
#12 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy

As a happy coincidence, yesterday morning I received my author’s copies and so got to see the actual book for the first time. It’s really quite a pretty book and on the basis of its looks alone, I don’t think those who participated in the SE surge will regret adding it to their library. It may please some of you to know that thanks primarily to the enthusiasm that’s been expressed, I found myself motivated to do a little scribbling of late; I’m not promising another novel per se, but at the very least there will be more stories involving Marcus Valerius and company.

Thanks very much to everyone who participated. I really appreciate it. And I hope you will let me know if you enjoy the novel.

I have to admit that I’m feeling quite cheerful this morning. John Derbyshire pretty much sums up my thoughts, except that I’m not in the least bit sour about the results of the election despite the failure of my McCain call; these events are precisely what I unsuccessfully attempted to warn conservatives and Republicans would be the logical outcome of their political pragmatism since 2003:

All right, I’m sour. The most liberal member of the U.S. Senate! And that shakedown-artist of a wife, with the permanent frown! And Joe Biden! …

I’m sour about the GOP too. What did it all get us, those 8 years of pandering and spending? If GWB had turned his face against new entitlements, closed the borders, deported the illegals, held the line on calls to loosen mortgage-lending standards, starved the Department of Education, and declined those invitations to mosque functions, would the GOP be in any worse shape now?…

Where was conservatism in this election? Where was restraint in government? Where was national sovereignty? Where was liberty? Where was self-support? And where are those things now? Where are they headed this next four years?

What Derb strongly implies, but does not explicitly point out, was that conservatism, government restraint, national sovereignty, liberty and self-support weren’t just lacking in this election, but more importantly, were completely absent from the Republican governance of the last eight years. All of these things were rejected at the advice of the more influential part of the conservative commentariat in the name of the Iraqi occupation and political pragmatism.

How practical is a “pragmatism” that manages to turn a Republican White House, House, and Senate into a Democratic White House, House, and Senate?

Leadership requires principle; pragmatism and pandering are simply followership. The “reformed conservatism” of a David Frum or a Russ Douthat that many Republicans will be tempted to embrace will be a fatal strategic mistake; the further that the newly empowered Democrats overreach to the left, the more important it will be for Republicans to offer a genuinely libertarian alternative.

There is no reason whatsoever to mourn a McCain loss. None. No one can reasonably argue that Mr. Bipartisan would ever imperil his amicable relations with his good friends on the other side of the aisle. Just as George Bush ensured the appearance of a Barack Obama, four years of John McCain presiding over the current economy would have not only moved the country in the same direction that Obama will take it, but ensured that his inevitable Democratic successor would be even worse than Obama.

As for my failed political predictions, do keep in mind that I batted .250 this round. Incorrect on Pataki, incorrect on Clinton, correct on Palin, incorrect on McCain. Not impressive, but not exactly bad when you consider that most of these predictions were made months in advance; everyone knows I’ve been expecting Bush’s successor to be some form of Democrat for literally years. More than one long-time regular correctly surmised via email that, in addition to my fear of a McCain presidency, there was a bit of the cruelty artist behind that most recent call. And as one sharp-eyed Obama supporter noted in the comments, the case for the McCain scenario foundered upon the fact that most of the polls in the battleground states tended to exceed the five-point fudge that was its justification. (In the spirit of the new U.S. president, I’m throwing the Baseball Savant under the bus.) Note that despite Obama’s win, the new model polls simply were not accurate, the final Gallup poll and final Zogby poll both had Obama +11 nationally, while CNN currently has the actual results at 52-47 with 96 percent reporting. That would indicate that the five-percent rule actually underestimated the major poll bias, not that it helped John McCain. UPDATE – Jonah Goldberg points out that the supposedly historic youth vote doesn’t appear to have been what it was projected to be either.

So, what now? I’m not concerned about whatever it is that the Democrats occupy themselves with doing over the next few months, since it’s not going to work and will only exacerbate the present problems. Yes, it will be outrageous, yes it will be stupid, and yes, it will all end in tears, but that’s obvious. I have little interest in attempting to guess precisely with what idiocies they will indulge themselves. The much more important thing is how the right reacts to all of this. Will it be the Euro-style Christian Democrat conservativism that the anti-Palin crowd are preaching in order to nibble away at the edges or will it be a principled Ron Paul opposition party?

Obviously, the latter is the correct strategy and one that will be positioned to take advantage of the problems caused by Democratic dalliance with overt socialism. But, I would not put it past the GOP elite to embrace what killed them while rejecting what would have permitted them to maintain their hold on the reins of power. However, keep in mind that all of this may well be irrelevant anyhow, as the untrammeled migration of the next four years may well lay the foundation for Karl Rove’s permanent majority party, albeit not the precise party he was contemplating.

As for the VP crew, here’s how we voted yesterday. I suspect that this may help explain how the election actually turned more on those who didn’t turn out for McCain rather than those who did turn out for Obama.

31% (N) None of the above (413)
30% (R) John McCain (402)
23% (C) Chuck Baldwin (303)
11% (L) Bob Barr (147)
05% (D) Barack Obama (60)

This should make clear what I have stated many times before: Vox Popoli is neither a Republican blog nor an echo chamber. I hope the Libertarians also learned that it’s a really bad idea to run a non-libertarian as their candidate. I think it’s clearly time for Libertarians and the Constitution Party to work out their differences and create a Freedom Alliance capable of succeeding the Republicans if they insist on going the way of the Whigs.

UPDATE – National Review finally bothers to notice something rather salient: “[A]ll the folks who told us McCain was the man, from Christopher Buckley to New Hampshire’s primary voters, had no difficulty abandoning him for Obama.” – Mark Steyn.

UPDATE II – “There was no spectacular youth vote or black vote. What there was was a spectacular seven-million strong abandonment of the Republican candidate, less than half of whom switched to the Dem.” Gee, I wonder why that happened?

2008 VP Election Results:

31% (N) None of the above (413)
30% (R) John McCain (402)
23% (C) Chuck Baldwin (303)
11% (L) Bob Barr (147)
05% (D) Barack Obama (60)

1,325 votes

I think it will be interesting to see how the results compare to the last time around, when 736 votes were cast as follows:

37% (R) George Bush (276)
34% (L) Michael Badnarik (254)
14% (C) Michael Peroutka (105)
10% (N) I didn’t vote (74)
04% (D) John Kerry (27)

This post will stay on top until the poll-blogging starts today, so scroll down for non-election related posts. And if there’s anything interesting going on at your local polling place, be sure to let us know.

9:18 PM – Ohio called for Obama. That should suffice to shoot down my prediction of an upset, although it’s certainly not conclusive at this point. I still expect that the pre-election polls will be shown to be inaccurate, but apparently not as inaccurate as I’d thought. I’m going to call it a night now, so if someone could do the hourly updates on the surge for me, I’d appreciate it.

9:11 PM – Republican suicide by Karl Rove. Hispanics make up 40 percent of the New Mexico electorate and go heavily for Obama. Serves John McAmnesty right. Seriously, who pays these jokers to be political strategists? They’re blatantly incompetent. The average turn-based strategy gamer would do better. Hell, the RTS guys would too. FPS triggermen, probably not.

9:01 PM – Fox mistakenly puts a checkmark calling Ohio for Obama. But it, Virginia, and Indiana are still counting votes and too close to call. Kind of running out of steam here, though, so it would be nice to see how Virginia shakes out sooner rather than later.

8:46 PM – Holy cats, #161! I never thought we’d come within 500 spots of TIA, let alone 100. Unbelievable. Barone reports that the exit polls in Virginia are overestimating Obama’s votes by more than 10 percent.

8:39 PM – Georgia called for McCain, so the Obama landslide idea is probably a non-starter.

8:15 PM – The first sign my prediction is wrong. New Hampshire called for Obama; National Review has given Pennsylvania to Obama as well. Twenty minutes later, so has Fox. At this point, I’m pretty much waiting for Virginia to reach a conclusion since New Hampshire indicates that a major McCain overperformance is unlikely.

7:30 PM – Still too close to call in Indiana, Ohio, and Virginia. GA still too close to call, which would seem to be problematic for McCain. McCain did hold West Virginia, though, where the Senate and governorship both went Democratic, as well as South Carolina.

7:27 PM – I find Derb’s lack of faith disturbing.

7:06 PM – Some incongruities. A 15-percent lead in the Indiana exit polling for Obmama, but Fox has already called the state for the Republican governor and it’s still considered too close to call, as is Virginia.

6:16 PM – Pennsylvania exit polls report +15 Obama. Which would appear conclusive, had anyone white, male and over the age of 20 been asked how they voted.

5:41 PM – Oh noes! The eleven new voters in Indiana went for Obama! And newsflash! White men in Virginia tend to prefer McCain. In other news, water is still wet. There’s clearly a book in this for the Littlest Chickenhawk. 439, by the way… no, make that 299 and #1 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Literature & Fiction > Fiction.

4:42 PM – 539!! And we should be getting the first projections in another 90 minutes.

3:48 PM – 995! The surge has cracked 1,000! And in what may or may not be an election report: “I’m not sure this is election news, but when I went to Fleet Farm last night to buy some last-minute deer hunting supplies, I saw they were completely sold out of shotgun buckshot loads, in all gauges and shot sizes. Which is really odd, because it’s not legal to hunt *anything* with buckshot in Minnesota.”

3:23 PM – “Somewhere in Hell, Capone, Thompson, and Daley are laughing…” – the OC.

3:10 PM – She is subtle, like a Ridgeback….

2:56 PM – All right. The prosecco is now in full E-F-F-E-C-T. Blue bottle, baby!

2:49 PM – 1,784 and #1 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Literature & Fiction > Science Fiction & Fantasy. That will make Marcher Lord very happy indeed.

2:36 PM – That Black Panther is huge! A little disappointed with his interview, though. I was so hoping that he’d announce that he was with the S1W, boyeee.

1:52 PM – A thought. If something like 30 percent of black voters and new voters have voted already, as has been claimed in some reports, then a huge Election Day turnout would tend to suggest that either McCain is drawing a bigger turnout than expected or some people are voting more than once.

1:45 PM – Marcher Lord emails to let us know that at 5,484, Summa Elvetica has become the #1 book in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Fiction > Science Fiction & Fantasy, surpassing CS Lewis’s Perelandra.

12:15 PM – The Summa Elvetica surge commences! We’re starting at a lofty rank of 389,710 with an ultimate objective of cracking the top 999. (Small press, reasonable goals, you know?) Place your orders here!

12:08 PM – PANTHER POWER! Fox has the first sighting of Obama’s Schwarztruppen trying to run a little intimidation operation at a polling place. This is going to be more amusing than I’d thought!

I completely forgot to do it last time, but this time I will be sure to actually get everyone’s blogs onto the blogroll. I’ve had a few requests lately, so if you’d like to have your blog added to the Voxologisti, please let me know in the comments to this post. The only requirement is to put VP in your blogroll and to give me both your blogname as well as the blog URL.

Just a reminder for those interested: the Summa Elvetica surge will take place tomorrow between 12 noon and 12 midnight Eastern, so if you’re planning to participate, make sure you get your orders in between those times. Amazon says out of stock, but ignore that since it’s a print-to-order system anyhow.

I don’t know exactly what time I’ll start pollblogging tomorrow, but Spacebunny and I will be sitting down with a bottle of prosecco or two in front of the television starting sometime around 3 PM EST. In order to maximize our viewing pleasure, we’ll switch between CNN and MSNBC if Obama looks to be losing, or Fox if things aren’t going McCain’s way. Feel free to swing by, hang out, and bask in the schadenfreude however it turns out.

The best part of being a libertarian is never having to worry about how the election turns out.

Over the last week, numerous people have emailed me and asked for my prediction regarding the election. My predictions are of limited value, of course, given my notorious inability to correctly predict either 2008 nomination in 2003, but since I dislike cowardly commentators who refuse to go out on a limb for fear of damaging their precious reputations, I consider myself bound to honor these requests and make a prediction about who will win the presidency tomorrow.

The media experts are pretty much all predicting an Obama win of varying degrees. FiveThirtyEight rates it at a 96.3 percent probability. Ever since the September economic meltdown occurred and McCain blew his handling of the bail-out so badly, I also assumed that Obama would win going away, but as the election has drawn closer and I’ve paid more attention to the details, I’ve noticed a few significant cracks in their basic assumptions. I’m not just being contrary here, I’m basing my prediction on three pre-established factors that don’t involve my instinctive distrust of expert consensus.

The first is my five-point rule. In general, if a Democrat leads by less than five points in the polls, he loses. I was planning to run the numbers today, but the Baseball Savant already did so I don’t have to. He points out:

Look at the states that would flip to McCain if the 5% adjustment holds true:

Colorado: Obama +4.3
North Carolina: Obama +0.5
Nevada: Obama +2.6
Ohio: Obama +2.1
Virginia: Obama +4.4

I haven’t checked the Savant’s math, but he’s a competent guy and assuming that he added the states up correctly, it looks as if McCain will not only win, but will win by a larger margin in the electoral college than George W. Bush did. Also note that during the primary voting, Obama’s exit polling was overestimated by SEVEN percent on average.

Second, I’ve been very skeptical of the polls this time around because they’re based on new and improved models that have not been hitherto used and did not work well in the primaries. Thanks to Alan Greenspan and the Black Swan Boyz, we’ve all had it driven very well home that untested new models seldom work anywhere nearly as well as advertised. These new polling models are predicated on the idea that due to the sheer wonderfulness of Barack Obama, the turnout patterns will be very different than they’ve historically been. The problem is that turnout among new voters, young voters, and Hispanic voters has actually been lagging among those voting early. It’s certainly true that voter registrations have been extraordinarily high, but it must be kept in mind that the ease with which registration can now be accomplished logically suggests that the percentage of registered voters who fail to vote will also be at an all-time high.

Third, the anxious actions of the Obama campaign belie the seemingly serene confidence of the Obama candidate. Obama’s success in building a political career has largely been based on illusion, and I think the air of calm assurance that he’s been projecting is a false one. By all rights, he should be absolutely slaughtering McCain; Hillary would probably be 20 points ahead at this point. But he isn’t, and since he hasn’t sealed the deal by now with such powerful Democratic winds at his back, it suggests that the deal is not sealable by him.

I’m not voting for either man. My considered opinion is that America would be worse off in the short term and better off in the long term with an Obama victory. But based on my observations, I am forced to conclude that despite the way things superficially appear, John McCain will win the election. The two key states to watch are New Hampshire and Virginia, with a particular emphasis on Virginia. If either of them go for McCain, you can safely conclude that it’s over in the GOP’s favor.

John Scalzi has his own take on things electoral, upon which I’ve commented in some detail in case you’re interested.

UPDATE – Bob Krumm puts significantly more work into his analysis and reaches very similar conclusions. All hail Logic: the lazy intellectual’s shortcut. It’s entirely possible that we could both be wrong, of course, but look at it this way. If your life was on the line, would you bet on the precision of the media’s new polling models?

He regards fairness about as favorably as I regard equality:

With two days to go before the election, I felt it was time to bubble this one back to the top. I do so now because one party in this election has made it a stated goal, if it wins the Presidency and gains fillibuster-proof control of the Senate, to reinstate the Orwellianly misnamed “Fairness Doctrine.”

As someone who once held an FCC broadcaster’s license and was required to learn the Fairness Doctrine as catechism, this disturbs me deeply. The Fairness Doctrine sounds innocuous enough. “Oh, it’s just about making them give equal time to both sides.”

Wrong! The Fairness Doctrine was always, from its inception, about suppressing domestic political dissent, and for 50 years it did so very effectively.

Allow me to backtrack a moment. I held an FCC broadcaster’s license. What this means is that while the station’s engineers held a different class of license, and the station owner held yet another kind of license (and I believe those requirements remain), I — and all other on-air personalities at the time — was required to have a license from the government simply in order to be allowed to speak live and on the air.

Of course, being a government license, it could be suspended or revoked at any time on the whim of a single government bureaucrat, and if it was suspended or revoked, I was off the air. After all, the engineer and the station owner didn’t want to risk having their licenses suspended or revoked for allowing me to speak.

So imagine that. Having to get a license from the government in order to exercise your First Amendment rights, and having to live in constant fear of having it revoked every time you opened your mouth in front of a live microphone. That is what the so-called Fairness Doctrine is all about.

Actually, I suspect the Fairness Doctrine will be among the least of our concerns now that Obama has announced his plans for a New Obamanation Army. And, to be honest, I find it more than a little ludicrous to look to John McCain, the author of McCain-Feingold, as the great guardian of free political speech. The amusing thing would be if McCain somehow won, but then signed the Fairness Doctrine into law anyhow.

Speaking of the presidency, I’ll post the oft-requested prediction later this morning.

That brave, bold atheist, who nevertheless fears to debate Christians on secular radio stations, actually dares to label others as cowards:

Hey, Christian cowards — if you’re going to try again to get this person kicked off youtube, at least be brave enough to ‘fess up here first…and let’s hear you explain why your faith is so weak that it cannot hold up against free speech.

Keep in mind, this is the very same individual who is afraid to go on Northern Alliance Radio because he fears it might be as unsympathetic to atheists as Pharyngula is to Christians. So, fess up PZ, let’s hear you explain why your reason is so weak that it cannot hold up against free speech.

76 Alamo City Spartans (7-1-0)
52 Judean Peoples Front (3-5-0)

63 Mounds View Meerkats (5-3-0)
58 Silver Spooners (3-3-2)

89 Burns Redbeards (6-2-0)
44 Winston Reverends (2-6-0)

74 Greenfield Grizzlies (3-4-1)
60 Valders Valkyries (4-4-0)

76 Masonville Marauders (3-4-1)
37 Black Mouth Curs (2-6-0)

This is your weekly NFL discussion thread. Tennessee is really looking very good now that Fisher has had the sense to give up on the Vince Young Project. Kerry Collins was always a decent quarterback, and Rich Gannon has already showed how a long-time mediocre quarterback can take full advantage of his years of experience towards the end of his career should he find himself with the right team at the right time. They certainly look like the team to beat at the moment. But, as last year’s Super Bowl showed, it must always be kept in mind that the NFL is very seldom a done deal.

VP-AFL

136 Masonville Marauders (7-1-0)
114 The Thunder (4-4-0)

107 Az Hammeroids (6-1-1)
78 Cranberry Bogs (4-4-0)

103 Carpe Oro (3-5-0)
74 Bukkakelypse Boyz (3-5-0)

97 Alamo City Spartans (4-4-0)
66 Supernaut’s Jihad (4-4-0)

92 COS McRays (2-6-0)
28 Village Valkyries (2-5-1)