Presidential Updates

Wow, wedding season, busy work and gardening and summer illnesses are kicking my @ss. I think about stuff all the time to write about, the summer doldrums are upon me and I just don't write that well right now, but things are heating up and thinning out. I continue with my Romney and Giuliani obsession, wondering how the hell the Republican party ended up with these two insignificant, self-absorbed political bottom dwellers as front runners and waiting for the Democratic field to implode under its own weight.

Romney Picks Up Some Straws
In the cavalcade of events that leads up to the Iowa caucus, the Republican Ames straw poll is the kickoff. It is not without irony that the pretty boy of the field wins this beauty contest. John McCain and Rudy sat this dance out. The straw poll is mostly a fundraiser for the Iowa Republican party but for some it can be a graceful exit or a way to make a little noise in the campaign if your organization can stand the cost and the wear and tear of your candidate constantly eating fair food and trying to find clever aprons.

As the frontrunner, ole flip flop Mitt begins to open himself up to the sniping of the media and our old friend, history and the truth. Mitt is a helluva manager, looks at data, talks to experts makes a decision but as a leader is an empty shirt. Mitt had the occasion to misspeak this week when asking about his 5 sons and their (lack of) military service, Mitt said that different people serve in different ways, and that his sons were serving the country by supporting him as a Presidential candidate. Thus indirectly and likely unintentionally comparing his son driving a Winnebago from county to county in Iowa to a soldier or marine serving in Afghanistan or Iraq. As if there were IED's and snipers on the way from Sioux Falls to Ames. This disconnect that the candidate has from reality is likely to be his downfall. His fake folksiness and concern for the common man is trumped by his arrogance and pursuit for power.

I'll give Romney this, he is a much more trustworthy and honest man than the one licking at his heels, Rudy Giuliani. Romney would do well and place himself in the general election to be true to himself and true to his beliefs rather than flowing with the prevailing wind. It is sad to say that we may look for a Presidential candidate as the one who would do the least harm.

A Pandering We Will Go

The early campaign season is a time to pander to special interests. Candidates uncomfortably go on hunting and fishing trips, find jeans to wear uncomfortably to county fairs, and the diners in Iowa and New Hampshire apparently filled with people who have the time to spend their days not at work and drinking coffee are haunted by both major and minor applicants for the most important job in the world. Both sides generally will say whatever the group they are talking to wants to hear. No matter the cost to the federal taxpayer, or the the cost to America at large. Republicans generally will be seen with farmers and "regular people", gunowners, the evangelicals and big pumpkin growers.

Democrats run to the unions. The biggest target of the Democratic candidates attention is the NEA, the umbrella union that represents teachers and other educators. Some polls say that over 85% of teachers will vote Democratic, so this becomes a valuable ground for donations, field workers, and of course the votes needed to get the nomination.

So what you do is attack standardized tests, accountability, and NCLB in general while clamoring for higher teacher pay and more federal money for education without any kind of accountability for the money spent. Little of the argument is spent in reality, talking about student learning is done only in the abstract, reduce class size which of course means increasing the number of teachers in the union and educate the whole child, generally a codeword for no high stakes testing. Good teachers are among the hardest working people in the world, but changes such as merit pay, more pay for mathematics, science and special education teachers, and greater accountability and standards for high school graduation are essential for success and to suggest that no change is necessary is insanity. There is little research that will tell you that across the board higher pay for teachers leads to student achievement.

Obama seemed to deviate a bit from the formula, suggesting merit pay as a potential solution to the dismay of the crowd. I generally choose not to write about education but to see any candidate without the courage to deviate from the party line is terrifying. Certainly there are issues with NCLB and Ed Reform has seemed to falter and stall in many ways. But these are the days of big promises and asking for little in return but their votes. And this is not only for the educators but the corn farmers, the gun toters, and others who think that their issue is bigger and more important than anyone elses. Again where is the courage, where is the courage to look at the disastrous educational experience that many students face. This is not to place the blame at the feet of America's educators, but to say that American education needs more than platitudes for teachers and placing the blame on a standardized testing system.

Tommy Gun Calls it a Campaign
Struck by his failure to gain any traction in the Ames straw poll and flattened by his own irrelevance Tommy Thompson dropped out of the 2008 presidential race. I'm unsure why Tommy decided to run in the first place. Not enough white guys?, a lack of ex-governors? Free haircuts? Likes Iowa barbecue?

So now builds "Huckmentum". Mike Huckabee called out the Republican party, defying it not to become the "party of plutocrats." Thus starting the class war from the right hand side. The Republican party has done well for itself, working on the politics of fear, both internal and external, the myth of the destruction of the family and the fear that the Democrats want to take all your money. Thus the Halliburtons, Enrons and Big Oil and Pharma of the world have managed to get aligned with the blue collar worker who often begins to vote against his own financial interest. Huckabee has made an interesting comment and a very strong tactical move, he knows he has little to lose by going the populist route.

The early races in Nevada, South Carolina, Iowa and New Hampshire are filled with those Republicans who feel they've been screwed, screwed by immigration, by free traders, by big corporate America. So skinny Mike moves up slightly in this oddsmakers book. Rolling the dice on working Republicans who fear the half million dollar speech giving of a Rudy Giuliani or the slice and dice capitalism of Bain Capital's Mitt Romney and sketching the "Two America's" is fair play for the John Edwards of the right.