South Carolina Primary Thread

 

We will have a thread on this subject in all its aspects beginning today.  pl

 

Comments

[Roy G.]

The Traveling Freak Show hits it's natural home at last.

The mask is now totally off, and the know nothings are ready to crown Gingrich as their champion, despite his astounding corruption, hypocrisy and lack of morality, while the business class is torn by Mitt's blowing the cover off the private equity shell game. Meanwhile, Santorum rallies the American Talibangelicals with his Puritan schtick, which attracts more money than voters. The last point is really what this motley collection of fools is after. This is what Democracy a la Citizens United looks like.

I don't want to impugn all the people in SC, but there seems to be a plurality of ignorant, ugly haters in that state - both the politicians and the hoi polloi.

Btw, Charles Pierce from Esquire is live logging the spectacle all weekend, and I highly recommend a read: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/

[Jake]

Let the games begin!

[William R. Cumming]

Looking somewhat long term, it may have been a fluke that President Obama, neither from the South or the West was elected. Normal black turnout in Presidential elections is 4-7% according to WAPO and in 2008 16% of eligible black voters turned out and voted for Obama.
The Presidency goes to the winner of 270 electoral votes and to get those after the 2010 census is all about the South and the West.
Also according to WAPO 57% of white eligible voters voted for McCain/Palin in 2008! Hard to know what a different VP choice by McCain would have meant as to the outcome but the consensus seems to be anyone but SARAH and he would have become President. Personally the big sag in McCain's campaign was begun the day after Lehman Bros. tanked. Now all the world's central bankers are printing money like mad to keep largely insolvent banks going through the elections this year in many important countries.

Thus, voter turnout and the actions of the Federal Reserve will determine the next President IMO. I still expect a very very close election perhaps being decided in the House of Representatives. There each state delegation gets one vote.

[Morocco Bama]

I think it's already ordained that Obama will get a second term. He's done everything requested of him thus far, so no need to rock the boat.

[Frabjous]

In last night’s debate, upon being asked by moderator John King about Noot's request to his second wife to be allowed an "open marriage" in order to continue his affair with now wife Callista (could there be a pattern here?), Noot responded that "I think the destructive, vicious, negative nature of much of the news media makes it harder to…attract decent people to run for public office". King should've responded "And so, we're left with indecent people like you running for office.”

Nootie's hubris knows no bounds!

Please don’t misundertake me, I think we are having the pleasure of observing some of the finest political theater of the modern era; I just can’t wait until the dems have to go through the presidentlal primary process - I predict an equally entertaining circular firing squad as the left tries to deal with iitsi extremists - the same ones who threw a monkey wrench in the Obamessiah’s works when the Dems had both the legislature and the executive.

Meanwhile, who’s playing the fiddle while Rome burns ‘cause we need some harmonization!

(Maybe Colbert or Trudeau?)

Mark

[Jose]

MSM is so happy that I will predict a Newtron bomb being dropped on Rombon...

The key is Florida...

[Charles I]

From up here its, er, grand. Newtie is as facile as Romney is a deer in the headlights, roadkill a specter to gruesome to ponder long. . .

[Charles I]

The buoyancy of the markets are a sight to behold, in marked contrast to this more apt market metaphor.

http://news.discovery.com/space/big-pic-costa-concordia-cruise-ship-satellite-120118.html

Mind the splash when they sink.

[Jake]

The evangelicals do not see Romney as a conservative and many will not vote for a Mormon....

[Farmer Don]

Maybe that's the case,
but if I were an American, I would be campaigning for Ron Paul hoping some fresh ideas get thrown into the Presidential debate.

[Bobo]

Well the "Washed Up Has Been" has resurrected himself with some blowhard bluster and the Palmetto Staters ate it up. Mitt is going to have to grow a backbone to put Newt away.

Talking with a friend in Charleston the other day to take the temperature he was raving about Newt but when I asked can he beat beat Obame he said not a chance but we love Newt.

[The Moar You Know]

Gingrich and Romney? This is the best the GOP can do?

Fix must be in for Obama. You don't run those two and seriously expect to win.

[steve]

@William Cumming

Are you saying that only 16% of eligible black voters voted for Obama?

I think that is incorrect.

ttp://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/us/politics/21vote.html

"In 2004, according to the census, barely 60 percent of eligible blacks voted. In 2008, nearly 65 percent did (as did 66 percent of white voting-age citizens).

But one of the biggest changes was the gap between black and white participation. In 2004, the rate of black voter registration was 10 percentage points below that of whites. Last year, it narrowed to four percentage points."

I don't have the numbers but would imagine that Obama received over 90% of that black vote which would translate to Obama getting c. 58% of the eligible black vote, not 16%.

As for the white vote, I had read awhile back that no democratic nominee since LBJ in 1964 has received a majority of the white vote.

I looked into that since many claims were being made after the 2008 election that whites refused to vote for a black president. No, whites just don't vote for democrats, black or white. In that vein as well, and further kicking the racist myth, Obama did receive a higher percentage of the white vote than any democrat since Carter in 1976.

[William R. Cumming]

Now its a several month delegate race with no clear winner until the very end for the Republicans.

[Martin Oline]

I found this site to have very interesting maps of the voter turnout from the 2008 election. They are graphically scaled by various criteria.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/

[Fred]

I think the only one who really needs to be worry if Newt is going to commit adultery again is Calista. The important point left out is the corruption of money that led to the 84 ethics charges against Gingrich when he was speaker. Now the lobbyist money is replaced with Super-pacs, courtesy of the Conservatives on the Supreme Court.

[r whitman]

The biggest thing to come out is Mitts' Cayman Islands tax dodge accounts. This is going to be class warfare at its best. Perhaps Noot has some secret money squirreled away too. One can only hope.

[Morocco Bama]

Go Newt, Go!! South Carolinians have spoken. They want Open Marriage...so long as it's between a man and a woman, but no abortions. Plus, who can forget his bi-polar, chain-smoking "I cannot tell a lie" stepmother who called Hillary a "Bitch." What's not to like?

Newt, of all the candidates, so quintessentially captures the heart and character of most "Americans", there really is no other viable choice. I don't vote, but if I were to vote, it would have to be Newt because he is by and far the most appropriate representation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vecw539MjWM

FYI - I believe Newt's pip of a stepmother was accurate in her description of Hillary. Also, you'd think someone who has such influence, as Hillary does, could score a consolation supply of Lipozene.

[turcopolier]

R. Whitman

Yes. I think the offshore investments are symptomatic of some hidden aspect of Romney's life that will be revealed and that will finish him off. Also, the LDS thing was the dog that bit with evangelical protestants in SC. pl

[r whitman]

Im not much on the religion thing but am I the only one that sees the irony of a Catholic with three wives versus a Mormon with one wife.

[Frabjous]

I think when push comes to shove in the large states, Romney’s ground game and established organization will mean more than Noot’s histrionics, although the mediasaurus may bleat so loudly that “Noot must not be ignored!” that that won’t matter. What may happen is that Romney, Noot, and Paul will all arrive at the convention with enough delegates to affect - but not effect - the outcome; then the short knives will come out and the blood will flow. So pop up the popcorn, sit back and enjoy the show!

[johnf]

As a mere foreigner I'm still struggling to understand why vulture capitalist Sheldon Adelson provided Gingrich with millions of dollars to do attack ads on vulture capitalism.

The other thing foreigners can't understand is why American elections last so long. This once seems to have been going on for ever and we're still nearly a year away from the actual election.

How long did election campaigns last in the good old days of the founding fathers?

[Charles I]

100 word answer to "When are your taxes coming out" painful to watch. Newt's Occasional, Presidential Dudgeon, Ethically-challenged Horndog Hypocrisy personified - indecorously cheered at the august assembly given Newt's gravitas and all - mind boggling, befuddling to this unshriven naif.

Newt gets it, what with Egypt and all, you'll be two for two

[Morocco Bama]

Newton Leroy Gingrich has more lives than Dick Nixon. He reminds me of Nixon, for some reason. Maybe it's his love of the bottle. Anyhow, here's a slideshow of the many wives of Leroy (that middle name should help him garner a percentage of the black vote). The current wife, his third but who are we to judge, is a hottie. Her maiden name is Bisek....which rhymes with another hottie's name.....Bisset (God, how I loved her in The Deep).

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/slideshow/gingrich-women-newts-wives-15404552

I think Willard's Mitt (sequel to Charlotte's Web) should be required to show his underwear....not just his tax return. We have a right to know if it's really true what they say about the underwear.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kFS8D2PQL7M/TwZ6SDAzikI/AAAAAAAAARE/GxXsisE-hNo/s1600/mitt-romney-skinny-jeans-mormon-underwear.jpg

[fanto]

all the debates are painful to watch. But the standing ovation of South Carolinians to the hypocritical theatrical answer Newt gave King was frightening.