Regarding Rep Steve King’s pointless comments that Obama would be a victory for terrorists. David Kurtz thinks that

It doesn’t matter whether you support Obama or Hillary, it’s got to give you pause that the leading Democrat in the race (at least in terms of delegates) can’t handle these predictable attacks more effectively.

I am not convinced that there is any good way to address this nonsense, because its so off the deep end. Its not the same as the swift boat attacks which made specific claims (John Kerry was not a war hero) that had to be addressed by the campaign. Rather, these types of comments are intended to create sort of feeling out there that Obama = terrorist coddler. This can only in my opinion be counter by ignoring the claim and staying on message about terrorism, defense etc. Create a positive message. If Obama goes on TV and specifically addresses this attack it will make it bigger, you don’t want to be caught on TV saying “my middle name, Hussein, will not cause terrorists to dance in the streets when I win”.

This is a classic tactic, make a spurious claim hoping to get the candidate on TV denying it: “I do not eat babies. I have never eaten babies”.

PS: Elliot, we hardly knew ye. Word to the wise: don’t sleep with prostitutes.

Until about yesterday I was thinking to myself that Mitt Romney would be a great opponent because he had almost no chance of winning. Mitt Romney is, in my opinion, a transparent panderer. Right now he is on the campaign trail trying to out-bigot and out-hawk all the wingnuts in the field. This is a guy who was pro-choice, signed a (flawed) universal health care bill in massachussets and was governer when same-sex marriage was made legal there. This was all in the last five years, not twenty years ago.

But then it occured to me…dishonesty can work. This is a guy who managed to get elected in Massachussets. If he gets the nomination he will run to the center as fast as he can. He will suddenly be the reasonable candidate. And with our useless political press he might even get away with it.

This article made me feel ill:

The big showdown between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama could come down to California’s “beer-drinking Democrats” versus its “wine and cheese” liberals - with the Bay Area playing a pivotal role in the outcome.

Can we stop talking about politics in the terms of beer, pizza, coffee or other class markers that may or may not exist? Gah.

So, Clinton wins (barely) in NH, splitting the early primaries. The good news is that super tuesday will be wide open and a lot of Americans will actually get some input on who will be the next president. California in particular will be a critical state to win on February 5th.

I like Obama a lot more than Clinton, she has too many of the Terry McAuliffe election losing triangulators around her. I am sick of that team that has been rushing the party towards the mythical center for years while the republicans tore the country apart. I would love to see their influence gone.

The other story is that Ron Paul is doing about as well as Rudy Guilliani. I personally think Ron Paul is a crackpot, but if he runs as an independent in the general election he will pull away enough republican votes to give us the really close swing states.

Obama and Huckabee take an early lead. I like Obama the most of any viable candidate and it is very good that all of the Democrats in the field roughly agree on a platform way to the left of the “centrist” platforms we had to deal with before. Not as left as I would like of course, but good.

The big nightmare for the republicans is that the rubes they were pandering to actually found a true believer in Huckabee. But at this point it looks like the only candidate that has any chance in the general election–Mccain–seems to be way behind. Also Ron Paul’s relatively strong showing makes me think he might make an independent run, if he can fund it. So at the risk of being horribly, horribly wrong I am going call this election for the democrat, who I suspect will be Barack Obama or John Edwards.

Yeah seriously, the fact that anyone thinks nuclear weapons are a good idea in any circumstance is disturbing.

I agree with more eloquent Sifu Tweety. Electability is a bullshit way to pick a candidate for president. Especially when we judge electability based on how half-assed a candidate is on the issues. If we are going to trust the system of primaries we must vote for the candidates we want to win, not the candidate we think middle america independents will want. Everyone looks to McGovern as evidence for what happens when you pick a candidate with your heart, not your head. But it is not 1972 anymore. Vote your conscience in the primaries and I suspect we will end up with a good candidate. A truly “too liberal” candidate just won’t win the primaries. I agree with Dennis Kucinich on the issues, but I guaruntee he won’t win the primary, even if every democrat votes for their favorite candidate, with no political calculus involved.

If Roger Simon thinks Mitt Romney is too good to be true, it is with complete disregard for who the guy is. Ok, this is a moderate, pro choice republican who decides to run for president and changes his mind on all these deeply held beliefs. In other words, he is a craven politician. Honestly I think he would be at least competent at the job of president, and of course as soon as he was in office he would focus on the standard big-business handouts that all republicans seem to be focused on. The fact is I find it very unlikely that he will get past the primary, but maybe republican primary voters will fall for this routine.