It wasn’t even a learning experience for Bush.

Today, 44 days before the end of Bush's term and the start of Obama's, Obama demonstrated in this Meet the Press interview a clearer understanding of the challenges facing the Nation and the President, and what to do about them, than Bush did on his best day in office. Video and transcript here.

Joe the Plumber

He has a website!

If acres could vote

For other graphic representations of the recent Presidential election results, go here. Thanks to Matt Yglesias for the link.

Update on Wednesday, November 12, 2008 at 04:17PM by Skeptic

Tallied Statewide, majorities of whites voted for McCain only in the old Confederacy plus Oklahoma, Kentucky, and West Virginia, according to this Brad DeLong post. 

Update on Thursday, November 20, 2008 at 09:36AM by Skeptic

The counties in which John McCain garnered a larger percentage of votes than George W. Bush did in 2004 are also in the old South (11 Confederate States plus OK, KY, and WV) plus, of course, AK and AZ. Of the good set of graphics The New York Times has here, this is the one that best tells the tale, 

As the electorate seems to move left, both parties could move right.

Democrats are expected to increase their majorities in both the House and Senate in tomorrow's election because the ideological center of the electorate has moved left, at least temporarily. But the most vulnerable GOP seats are those held by moderate Republicans, and they are most likely to be replaced by moderate Democrats, not left-wingers. Thus, the Democratic caucus will have a greater proportion of centrists, and the Republican caucus will have fewer centrists, according to Ezra Klein who quotes Kevin Drum and discusses this and some implications here.

To the contrary, as to economics, I see the Congressional Democratic caucus moving left from where it has been—despite the bigger tent. The leaders of the Wall Street wing of the Party, exemplified by Robert Rubin, have been gobsmacked by the reality that their theories and policies have failed rather spectacularly when continued by Bush. (I posted about Rubinomics in Crisis here.) As a result, the Democratic Leadership Council and Hamilton Project folks seem to be moving toward the labor wing in their economic understanding and policies. Rubin's apparent shift can be seen in this joint op ed today with Jared Bernstein of the Economic Policy Institute, which is the number one think tank of the labor wing of the Party.

Perhaps the Congressional Republicans will also allow recent spectacular realities to moderate their economic ideology. If not, Democratic pundit Paul Krugman says "the G.O.P.'s long transformation into the party of the unreasonable right, a haven for racists and reactionaries, seems likely to accelerate as a result of the impending defeat." Many "Conservative" and Republican pundits like David Brooks and Ross Douthat, who would not use Krugman's hyperbole, are very concerned about such a transformation and are scrambling to give the GOP a new direction focusing on middle-class economic well-being. Of course, if the Democrats fail to deliver what the electorate wants, the GOP may be able to get back into power without revamping itself, and that creates an incentive for the GOP's Congressional rump to be maximally united and maximally obstructionist.

Update on Friday, November 7, 2008 at 09:05AM by Skeptic

Add Ramesh Ponnuru, senior editor of National Review, to the list of conservative intellectuals who say shifting to the right won't save the GOP because it needs a "coherent middle-class economic agenda" and doesn't have one.  It's interesting, and I think significant, that Ponnuru, Douthat and other conservatives speak of how to move the middle toward the conservative agenda, rather than moving the party to the middle.  They may have to do both, but I applaud their intellectual and rhetorical effort to change conventional wisdom.  Think tanks and journals on the left should do more of this. 

Update on Tuesday, November 11, 2008 at 08:00AM by Skeptic

David Brooks points out here that all of the Republican institutions for fundraising, for development and spreading of ideas, and for activism are controlled by the "Traditionalist" wing of the GOP.  Thus, the "Reformers" don't have the tools they need to move the Party toward different ideas and constituencies of the future.  Meanwhile, Traditionalist heavyweights meeting last week seemed pleased that several moderate Republican Members of Congress had lost their reelection bids, making the Republican caucus more purely Traditionalist.  It was not reported whether they are concerned that the GOP seems to have become primarily a regional party of the old Confederacy.  Brooks, a self-described moderate Reformer, calls it "Darkness at Dusk." 

Newspapers are obsolete—Part 1: Public Opinion Polling

Newspapers report lots of new data points, but too rarely provide useful patterns, trends and context, especially in their print editions. Take, for example, public opinion polls about the Presidential race. The lead story in the Los Angeles Times yesterday morning was this:

Barack Obama is leading Republican presidential rival John McCain in two battleground states, Florida and Ohio, where voters have more confidence in his ability to handle the troubled economy, a new Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.

The story usefully reports on which issues seem to be driving voters, but if you want to know—and you probably do—who's going to win the election, that's not in the fish wrap. You have to go to the online version of the Times where you will find an interactive graphic showing Obama projected to win 318 electoral votes, McCain 174, and 46 up for grabs. Even online it is not explained why the graphic says Florida (50% to 43% for Obama in the poll) "leans" toward Obama and Ohio (49% to 40% for Obama in the poll) is "up for grabs." Nor would you get any information about trends over time in Ohio, Florida, or nationwide to help you judge if the latest poll results confirm others or are perhaps outliers.

To get the most complete and current analyses, aggregating all the polls and showing trends over time, you have to go to the blogs. Fivethirtyeight.com is the one I have followed daily for a month or so. There you will see that Obama is projected to win nationwide by 6-7% of the popular vote and 159 electoral votes. Not only are the LATimes/Bloomberg results reported here but all other surveys for Ohio and Florida are also reported. Scroll down a little and you see that the national popular vote margin has been essentially unchanged for several weeks.

Dig deeper and you will find how much weight this blogger (Nate Silver) gives to each poll depending on his analysis of how each determines who are "likely voters," how it allocates "undecideds," any consistent biases toward one party/candidate or the other, accuracy in 2004, etc. You can scroll down and read each daily update analysis since October 9. You can click on Ohio (74 poll results) or Florida (70 poll results) and instantly pull up everything this blog has ever said about polling in those States, including chronological tables of all polls for each State.  (Corrected 11/3/08: Nate Silver says here that he allocates the undecideds himself.  Hmm.  That would introduce a consistent bias into all polls.)

Another blog that aggregates and analyzes all polls is Pollster.com. I haven't been following it (thanks for the tip, Ray), so I know less about the detail that is available or how to find it, but it seems to have very similar information and better, interactive, graphics. It shows Obama leading McCain by 169 electoral votes with 85 in the toss-up category. It projects that 272 EVs are "strong" for Obama and 39 "leaning." (Only 270 are needed to be elected.) By clicking around, I was able to see trend lines nationally and by State and learn that Pollster uses different weightings and projects slightly different margins than Fivethirtyeight.com.

Fivethirtyeight.com has an acknowledged Democratic sympathy, and Pollster.com is said to lean Republican. If I cock my head to one side and squint, I think I might see both as being influenced slightly by their sympathies. A third website that seems to have even richer data is RealClearPolitics.com. (Thanks to Ray for this one too.) I haven't dug into it much, but its analyses and projections seem very similar to the other 2 sites. Like Pollster.com, it shows Obama leading by 169 EVs, but it is more cautious about "calling" States for either candidate and classifies more as "leaning."

Finally, I love this graphic from Brad DeLong's blog because it scales the area of each State to the numbers of electoral votes.

Bottom line, in less time than it took to read the LATimes piece in print, I could have checked all 3 websites and had a very good idea where the race stands and which States are close and which are not. In fact, I did check Fivethirtyeight.com about 12 hours before the fish wrap hit my driveway and it had already incorporated the results of the LATimes/Bloomberg poll. To be fair to fish wraps, Fivethirtyeight.com and Pollster.com don't report the poll internals showing which issues are driving voters (but that information was in the free online version of the Times and probably elsewhere online as well).

Obama’s economic, energy, environmental, and national security policy

Obama "wants to launch an 'Apollo project' to build a new alternative-energy economy. His rationale for doing so includes some hard truths about the current economic mess," according to this Joe Klein interview reported in the current Time magazine.

The engine of economic growth for the past 20 years is not going to be there for the next 20. That was consumer spending. Basically, we turbocharged this economy based on cheap credit." But the days of easy credit are over, Obama said, "because there is too much deleveraging taking place, too much debt." A new economic turbocharger is going to have to be found, and "there is no better potential driver that pervades all aspects of our economy than a new energy economy ... That's going to be my No. 1 priority when I get into office.

This succinct statement of where we are, how we got here, and why we need to do something different in the future, and the focus on a new alternative-energy economy as our next growth engine is all good. It could mean big domestic investment and spending, creating millions of hot jobs with low unemployment, rising middle class incomes and spending, downward pressure on oil prices, shipping less of our wealth to petro-states, getting our balance of payments in order, and stopping global climate change.

Update on Thursday, October 30, 2008 at 11:34AM by Skeptic

And Obama put this same message into his 30-minute infomercial aired last night. A transcript is here on Joe Romm's blog. 

Plus pay for plus performance

Palin's traveling stylist is paid almost twice as much as McCain's chief foreign policy advisor, according to this report today. Well that's fair. Palin looks pretty good. McCain's foreign policy looks terrible.

Do we really want a socialist for President?

Sarah Palin says Obama's proposed tax cuts for 95 percent of Americans sounds like socialism to her. She should know. She's governor of a State in which 99 percent of the land is owned by governments, and the Alaska State Permanent Fund sends exactly the same size welfare payment to every Alaskan every year ($3,269 in 2008) whether they are productive or idle. Or is that communism?

There is no Bradley Effect, but there was a Field Effect when Bradley lost to Deukmejian.

The Bradley Effect is the name given to the idea that a significant number of racist voters will vote against a black candidate but be unwilling to admit that to pollsters. A narrower version of the conjecture is that they will tell a pollster they are "undecided" even though have fully decided to vote against the black guy. The eponymous effect is attributed to the fact that Tom Bradley lost the California governor's race to George Deukmejian in 1982 even though some late polls projected Bradley the winner, and the prestigious Field Poll projected a 7-point margin for Bradley.

V. Lance Tarrance, Jr., who was Deukmejian's pollster, debunks the conjecture here. (Thanks to John for the link.) Except for the Field Poll, the polls showed that the 1982 race was tight—within the margin of error. Tarrance's polling showed the Bradley margin steadily declining in the last five weeks, with Bradley ahead by a statistically insignificant 45-44 in the last pre-election poll. Other experts looking at exit polls and results in select precincts projected that Deukmejian had won. Mervin Field said after the 1982 election that "race was a factor in the Bradley loss." Thus, "Field Effect" could be an eponymous term for a humiliated researcher blaming his data.

Polling analyst, Nate Silver, points out here and here that it is impossible to measure a lying-to-the-pollster effect, but points out that there have been recent races involving an African-American candidate in which there was no significant discrepancy between late polls and outcomes.

Update on Monday, October 20, 2008 at 03:44PM by Skeptic

Bradley's campaign manager in 1982, Nelson Rising, says here that their internal polling showed Bradley's lead shrinking as election day approached, and he denies there was any "Bradley Effect."  Another Bradley campaign insider writes here that there was no "Bradley Effect."  Thanks to John for these links too. 

How inexperienced voters choose a candidate

Would people who use foolish criteria to pick a Presidential candidate pick in the same way a surgeon to cut open their chests, a pilot to fly them through a storm, or a lawyer to keep them out of jail? I had assumed the answer to that is no, but Mort convinced me the answer is probably yes. They are being consistent, not perverse.

Many of us are frustrated that so much of many political campaigns comes down to factors that have no apparent connection to executive competence, substantive expertise, policy proposals, integrity, record of success/failure, and other evidence generally deemed indicative of future performance. Instead, factors such as likeability, shared beliefs, demographic identity, and the general feeling that the candidate is "like me" or "understands me" seem to sway the decisions of vast numbers of voters.

Perhaps that is because these people make few if any "personnel" decisions. Many people don't "select" doctors or other professionals but accept whomever is assigned to them or take the first referral. Many people never have a supervisory position in which they are called upon to choose a candidate or give a performance evaluation. If they have no experience managing people and no sense of how to go about it, picking a Presidential candidate may be more like picking a spouse than any other decision they've ever made.

Obama rounds up the usual suspects

Obama met yesterday morning with his "banking brain trust" to come up with a response to the ongoing financial meltdown. Politico has their names here. In the room were the most senior members of the Clinton Administration economic team, plus Paul Volker. A few others participated by telephone. On the list, I see exactly one person, Joseph Stiglitz, who might be expected to question the conventional economic wisdom that has guided both parties for 2 decades.

Nobody from left-leaning think tanks like Center for Economic and Policy Research, Economic Policy Institute, or Demos. No Robert Reich (even though he has been speaking as Obama's surrogate on economics), who has a different plan, or other labor-oriented economist. No George Soros (who probably knows more about the financial markets than all of those who did participate). In fact, nobody who would be uncomfortable at the University of Chicago.

If Obama becomes President, he'll be facing the most challenging economy in nearly 80 years, and it looks like he'll be relying on the most in-a-rut, helped-to-get-us-here group of advisors it is possible to imagine. Experience means you know how to do what you've done, but if what needs doing next is different, experience is likely disabling.

Update on Sunday, July 19, 2009 at 09:14AM by Skeptic

Paul Krugman seems to agree here.

Update on Friday, December 11, 2009 at 10:43AM by Skeptic

One year on, Matt Taibbi writes a lengthy, scathing, and fair indictment of Obama for selling out to Wall Street and excluding economic advisors who dissent from basic Rubinomics. 

The significance of all of these appointments isn't that the Wall Street types are now in a position to provide direct favors to their former employers. It's that, with one or two exceptions, they collectively offer a microcosm of what the Democratic Party has come to stand for in the 21st century. Virtually all of the Rubinites brought in to manage the economy under Obama share the same fundamental political philosophy carefully articulated for years by the Hamilton Project: Expand the safety net to protect the poor, but let Wall Street do whatever it wants. "Bob Rubin, these guys, they're classic limousine liberals," says David Sirota, a former Democratic strategist. "These are basically people who have made shitloads of money in the speculative economy, but they want to call themselves good Democrats because they're willing to give a little more to the poor. That's the model for this Democratic Party: Let the rich do their thing, but give a fraction more to everyone else."

See Rubinomics in Crisis for an explanation of the Democratic Party's internal wrangle about economic philosophy.  It seems the Rubinistas may never have doubted their doctrine; they were just concerned they might not get back into power to keep implementing it.  Now that they're back in power in the Obama White House, the crisis is over and the doctrine is unchanged.

Thanks to Christine for the link.

Carly Fiorina says Sarah Palin unqualified to run a major organization.

Well somebody, had the wit to ask if Sarah Palin is qualified to be president of HP. Answer from the discharged president of HP, "No." I had hoped Ezra Klein, who was covering the Republican convention when I sent this email on September 3 would get a chance to ask this question.

Ezra,

The GOP elites are all enthusiastically assuring us that Palin is qualified to be President. I wonder what, in their minds, the minimum qualifications are. For example, is she qualified to be Secretary of State? Or Sec'y of Treasury or Defense? Is she qualified to be CEO of Ebay or HP. What about CEO of Wal-Mart or Bank of America? Maybe you'll get a chance to ask.

Roger

It is reported that when Carly Fiorina clarified her assessment by saying that John McCain also was not qualified to run HP she was angrily relieved of duties of speaking for the McCain campaign.

Say No to Palin and McCain (Guest Blogger)

Sarah Palin's cynical audacity challenges our nation to stand against her.

– Her sequestration from the press for coaching belies her readiness and makes a mockery of our political process.

– Her scorn for the works of others (e.g., "community organizer") reveals her ignorance – or her cynicism.

– Her apparent unwillingness (and McCain's) to deal accurately with the "Bridge" and earmarks belies her honesty and rant that she will be a reformer.

– Her unwillingness to grant girls or women who have been raped the right to choose abortion belies her religious tenets, i.e., "Do unto others...."

These are dangerous times, times that require more than a moose-hunting, tooth-grinding, unblinking hockey mom. It's not the fact that she is a woman that matters. It's the fact that she is the wrong candidate – for women, for men, for our children, for our future.

Nancy F. (age 68)

How you campaign is how you govern.

Underlying most reporting and discussion of the current and past Presidential campaigns seems to be an assumption that campaigning is different from governing. During the campaign—the horse race—you gotta be tough and remember that politics ain't beanbag and that character assassination works. While campaigning, repetitive and bald-faced lies, ad hominem attacks, dirty money, secret commitments to special interests, expedient flip-flops, evasion of responsibility for what you and your staff have done, dirty tricks, etc. seem to be regarded as situation-appropriate ethics.

I don't understand why anybody would believe that once the campaign is over the winner will stop all that nasty stuff and play by Marquis of Queensbury rules while governing. First, campaigns are never over; it's now accepted that there are "permanent campaigns" while in office. Second, Richard Nixon and George W. Bush were the two nastiest campaigners since WWII, and neither of them reformed a bit in office. Indeed, they were our lyingest, cheatingest, concealingest, law-defyingest, and most partisan Presidents of the era. Third, because candidates are subject to much more media scrutiny and accountability than are Presidents, a President can much more easily get away with the nasty stuff than can a candidate. If his conscience lets a candidate do something in the campaign, there is no restraint on going at least that deeply into the dark side when in power.

How he campaigns is the "character issue" I would like to see discussed more in the mainstream media, but I guess that's just me.

Update on Saturday, September 13, 2008 at 06:32PM by Skeptic

Former McCain supporter, Andrew Sullivan, now declares him unfit to be President because of the way he is campaigning.  Thanks to Christa for the link. 

Update on Saturday, September 13, 2008 at 09:44PM by Skeptic

The Obama campaign and NBC News are both using the L word in connection with McCain campaign statements.  Other MSM reports aggregated here prefer euphemisms, such as the Washington Post's award of "4 Pinnochios" to McCain for statements he made on The View.  Now let's take the next step and talk about whether it's a good idea or a bad idea to put our lives and fortunes in the hands of somebody who will look us in the eye and lie to us. 

Update on Monday, September 15, 2008 at 09:47AM by Skeptic

Biden's back (where's he been?) and he's saying on the stump this morning, "The campaign a person runs says everything about the way they'll govern." 

Update on Monday, September 15, 2008 at 01:01PM by Skeptic

ABC News weighs in, not using the L word but posting a copy of the letter from Gov. Palin to Sen. Stevens in which she makes her earmark requests.  Correspondent Jake Tapper says in his open letter to John McCain, "Will you please stop telling the American people that she never asked for or received any pork barrel projects?" 

Update on Monday, September 15, 2008 at 10:05PM by Skeptic

Claire McCaskill frames the right message, and Joe Romm writes it up here. 

The Republican Party needs an overwhelming rejection November 4 in order to modernize itself. We can help.

"The main impediment to Republican modernization" is that Republican doctrine is hobbled by the belief that we all are, and all need to be, "rugged individualists fighting the collectivist foe," according to conservative columnist David Brooks today. Brooks argues that "this individualist description of human nature seems to be wrong," and concludes that "if Republicans are going to fully modernize, they're probably going to have to . . . project a conservatism that emphasizes society as well as individuals, security as well as freedom, a social revival and not just an economic one and the community as opposed to the state." Based on his other writings, it seems Brooks doesn't expect any such fundamental change unless/until devastating electoral losses cause big changes in the Republican Party leadership and thinkers.

What Republicans would sound like if they talked about the economy?

Hannity suffers a TKO, on his own show, when he tries to talk over economist Bob Kuttner in this video.  The video clip is from News Hounds (We watch FOX so you don't have to)--what a great service!

Georgia is a “little loudmouth dude.”

Adam Serwer explicitly opposes bringing Georgia into NATO on very practical grounds.

I don't think people should go hyperventilating about ABC News reporting that Sarah Palin said "war may be necessary" if Russia invades another country. For one thing, Obama's own (irresponsible, in my view) position that Georgia should be let into NATO implies a military obligation to preserve Georgia's security. Personally, I don't think NATO should be in the habit of letting in little countries that have a habit of starting wars with bigger countries that they can't finish without assistance, but that's just my childhood in D.C. talking. In my experience, the last person you want to be friends with is the little loudmouth dude who likes to start fights.

Adam's street-smart analysis is as sophisticated (and correct) as mine, but I have video here.

Not enough Republican experts?

David Brooks worries that there are not enough Republican experts to staff a McCain/Palin administration. I don't understand why he thinks there is such a talent shortage. Aren't there at least 100,000 Republicans as expert as Sarah Palin?

McCain’s veep choice narrows celebrity gap.

Not only are we all Georgians but we’re all middle class.

When asked by Rick Warren to define "rich," John McCain said an American family needs an income of $5 million to be "rich." Get a grip, John! Any family that brings in at least $1.6 million is richer than 99.9% of American families. Even Obama's answer stretches the word "middle" beyond recognition. He said a family earning less than $150,000 per year is "middle class" or poor.  Does he know that about 94% of American families earn less than $150,000? Indeed, 80% earn less than $88,000. Ezra Klein has a good post and a nice chart here.