Risk a shilling

Oh, to be done with the election and never have to hear about "optics" or "dog whistles" again.

While the race is pretty much a dead heat statistically, pundits are coming to the conclusion that things are getting pretty dicey for Mitt Romney and his chances of getting elected. There are three major battleground swing states in play, Ohio, Florida and Virginia. According to experts, all President Obama has to do is win one of these key states and it will be near statistically impossible for Mitt to win.

Obama currently holds a 5 point lead in, 7 point in Ohio and 5 point in Florida, according to the latest NBC, Marist and Wall Street Journal polls. He has a commanding lead with the london bookmakers as well.

From NBC:

"These states – all of which Obama carried in 2008 but which George W. Bush won in 2004 – represent three of the most crucial battlegrounds in the 2012 presidential election. And according to NBC’s electoral map, Romney likely needs to capture at least two of these states, if not all three, to secure the 270 electoral votes necessary to win the presidency.
By comparison, Obama can reach 270 by winning just one or two of these battlegrounds  – on top of the other states already considered to be in his column.
(Obama also has an additional path to victory without any of these three states if he wins the toss-up contests of Colorado, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin.)
What’s particularly striking about these polls, Miringoff observes, is how most voters in these battleground states have already made up their minds, with just 5 to 6 percent saying they’re undecided, and with more than 80 percent signaling that they strongly support their candidate.
“Those who are thinking of voting have pretty much picked sides,” he says."

So the likely voters have decided, there is little movement except for a slight post convention bounce for Barack and Mitt needs to slaughter the President in the debates if he is to have much of a chance at the big enchilada. Without any snarkiness, what do you think the chances are of that? A decent man, a successful man, one who has a lot of good qualities to admire. Not necessarily the most brilliant public speaker I have ever heard and a bit detached from the average american's lot. A little green, talks without thinking and seems to be run by a bunch of guys in a back room.

"President Obama promised to slow the rise of the oceans and to heal the planet. My promise is to help you and your family." Mitt Romney

On the backdrop of wife Ann saying that $150 million dollars doesn't qualify as wealthy to today's definition by Mitt that middle class means $200 to $250 thousand, or less, later qualifying that they mean aggregate household incomes, you get the feeling they might be a skoche detached.

 Every close election, and this one is going to be close, brings back arguments about the value and merit of the electoral college.

I say do away with it, every American's vote should count equally. What we have now is the tyranny of the rural population, a homogeneous demographic ideologically.

The electoral college unfairly conflates their power.

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Read the other day that Mitt was now concentrating on white males without a college degree. How exactly do you find and narrow down this demographic? Besides the obvious trolling at Nascar events, I mean. If you can read this paragraph without stumbling we aren't interested in talking to you...

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This should have been a gimmee for the Repubs, with the public's tepid response to the incumbent and the screwed up economy. What's the old expression, they could fuck up a wet dream?

I just don't think Americans are buying the message, the slate of candidates was a choice between Santorum psycho, Bachman wacko, Gingrich nutso and the only psychologically normal candidate, Mitt, who alienates many in his party because they think he belongs to a dangerous cult. I don't think he is a bad guy, probably way more pragmatic than he is given credit for, if you take his performance in Massachusetts into account, and probably willing to seek bipartisan compromise, something that has eluded the incumbent although probably through no fault of his own.

Mitt is about to be crucified by the conservative intelligentsia, eyed like the fat lady walking through the cannibal picnic. The truth is that it is not Mitt that scares most americans but the rest of his cronies, the tea party, the evangelical right, those that would privatize medicare and social security. The radicals of the day are all in the GOP and it scares people. Ryan today said that Obama can't say that we are all in this together because he isn't speaking to the unborn. God. What about ghosts, who is speaking to the ghosts?

It is the Gary Bauer's and Tony Perkins, Karl Rove's and Ann Coulter's that drive most of the sane people nuts. The Republican party, a once great party of W. Rudman, W. Cohen, Weicker and Rocky that has let itself become a freak show. He will be blamed but the reality is that our country is simply not buying the republican message. Obama didn't create the class war, but Goldman certainly brought it to the fore. On equal pay for women, reproductive rights, a host of issues, the environment, their social message seems like a walk back to the Victorian age.

Bauer said today that the reason Obama is winning is voter fraud and welfare money. Another commonly heard jeremiad is that the slanted mainstream media has it in for Romney and he is probably really actually winning.

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Ryan said yesterday that Obama treats their only true mid east ally with indifference. I agree with him. If not outright antipathy. Of course, Netanyahu is not an easy guy to work with and is trying to pin the President's ears back. But Obama has never been comfortable with Israel, never visited it although he found his way to Cairo, is too busy next month to meet with Netanyahu here.

They are just another country in the President's eyes, to the great pleasure of many americans, myself excluded. I listened to Hillary and Barack at the eulogy this morning and my respect for her is increasing and for him a trifle diminished. He is cold and aloof, a classic Chicago politician.

The State Department has always been dominated by arabists and I flinched today when they brought up the Palestinian Authority's sorrowful reaction to Ambassador Steven's killing. Yes, they have such a stellar reputation. How soon before the events pour into Gaza and the P.A.'s West Bank? Speaking of Israel can you imagine a scenario where an anti Moses movie is made and jews are killing and rioting in Haifa, Shaker Heights and Fairfax in protest? Of course not, we only expect that sort of behavior from you know who? We can't let a handful of radicals cast a pall over the islamic world as a whole, unless of course we are laboring under a grave misconception and the malady turns out to be actually systemic.

Iran's nuclear computer calculations have surfaced this week, the sort of modeling that is created prior to nuclear weapons being built. Probably the smoking gun that had alarmed the Israelis. A prudent country would take notice but it is probably not politically exigent right now, so there will be no red lines thank you.

Here's the real deal, the way the blast swami sees it; Iran gets one free punch, one nuke can land on Israel, but we americans will be in with both feet after that, that is if there is anything left. Count on us.

Don't do anything until you call us.

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An excellent discussion of the logistics of red lines at the Weekly Standard.

The whole enraged mideast makes me think of an old joke.

Did you hear, Salman Rushdie, author of the reviled Satanic Verses,  has a new book out? It's titled Buddha, you fat fuck.

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"I know that this awful loss, the terrible images of recent days, the pictures we're seeing again today, have caused some to question this work. And there is no doubt that these are difficult days. In moments such as this, so much anger and violence, even the most hopeful among us must wonder."

Barack Obama 9/14/12

I am past wondering, put me down in the "firmly convinced" category. Certain people have placed themselves outside of the human circle, and are if not beyond redemption, at least not worth a single drop of civilized blood.