Florida handles its elections the way Seattle handles its snowstorms. They know that big ones happen every few years, but they never seem prepared for them. I’m still at the office, but will be leaving in the next hour for the Ale House where I plan to live blog with Darryl. I’ll also likely be getting updates from my old college roommate, Dan, a former Republican living in Miami who’s been complaining to me this week that he’s needed a Hazmat suit to open his mailbox.
This is an open thread…
[4:40] One other thing that Dan mentioned was that the Cuban community refers to Ron Paul as “El Loco”. El Loco seems to be getting about 7% of the votes counted so far.
[5:22] Finally at the Ale House only to find out that Darryl fucked up the Live blog plan. Jeez.
[5:26] No sound on the TV. It’s set to CNN, so it’s not necessary.
[5:31] Romney won this thing in a landslide, but Newt won among white evangelicals, once again demonstrating that morally repulsive infidelity can be forgiven by the religious right as long as you act like an entitled asshole whenever asked about it.
[5:34] Romney is speaking. I can’t hear it, but I’m guessing he’s firing people on his staff, just out of habit.
[5:37] In re: to Darryl. But I regret both votes equally! Consistency!
[5:52] Rick Santorum being interviewed in Las Vegas where he’s already preparing for his 4th place finish there.
[5:53] I swear to god, I’ve known Darryl for 8 years, but if he shaved his beard, I’d never recognize him.
[6:01] How Ron Paul could have a huge win in Virginia.
[6:07] Newt waddles to the podium. Every Democrat in the country quietly cheers him on.
[6:12] Yep
[6:18] For once, the most cartoonish thing happening in Orlando is not at Disney World.
[6:20] Newt just dominated the panhandle. If the rest of the south votes that way, there will be a lot of disappointed southerners when Mitt is nominated.
[6:22] Darryl is listening to NPR now on his giant headphones. I’m no longer in contention for the biggest geek in the bar. I concede.
[6:24] Carl just walked in. He’s rocking a good beard too, in about 10 years, it could look as good as Darryl’s.
[6:25] Carl: “Does this mean we’re not going to have a moon colony?”
[6:36] Ron Paul speaking in Nevada. That state could be interesting. Both Romney and Paul beat McCain there in 2008.
[6:46] Without sound, I have no idea what John King is doing. Is he predicting a Ron Paul win in Washington?
[6:49] Dan has surfaced in the comments. Hey man, this is for you.
[6:57] Dan explains why Mitt won and why one of the nation’s most notorious white collar criminals is now their governor.
[7:02] Romney did really well with Latino voters. Unfortunately for him, Florida is the only state where Latinos vote for Republicans.
[7:04] N in Seattle is here. All we need is Goldy for the full HA.
[7:05] Will Kelley-Kamp is now here too. Sweet. Live-blogging is likely to slow to a crawl here…
[7:11] Dammit Darryl!! Fix this!
[7:18] I want to send Will to Iran. He needs $3,000. Make your pledges now!
[7:31] Just chatting with Will about how insane it is that Ralph Reed still goes on TV as a representative of the religious right. If Jesus were alive today, I doubt he’d be able to turn the other cheek on that crook.
[7:47] That’s it for me. Will is doing stand-up on Monday nights at Seattle Comedy Underground. It’s $5 for two hours of comedy. Come check him out and say you’re there to see Will Kelley.
With 30% of the vote counted
I think the real story in this election in the implosion of the Christianist right.
In South Dakota, where elections are run by a Republican, the Sioux vote 10-to-1 for Democrats and non-Indian voters get 10 times as many voting days as Sioux voters. The Sioux are suing.
http://100r.org/2012/01/south-.....ly-voting/
Just commenting to bring the results (the important ones) to a tie. Take it to the floor of the HA convention!
@3
Thanks! Darryl, does this count?
No…unless you comment in my thread.
Oops!
In Florida, the only thing anyone wants to talk about is real estate prices…the other issues are too complicated. This week we have been promised that if environmental regulations can be removed, melting ice caps will help real estate values as more ocean front property is created. That is the market working!
Newt tells the big lie… He hates government, but he has made his entire career in government. I am not aware of his accomplishing anything or making any money that was outside of the government context.
Finally, the Republican phone calls have stopped in Florida. These calls were less truthful than a time share presentation.
I haven’t been paying attention tonight. The only way I can watch this stuff is if I’m drinking.
Not sure why all this polling was required…You had to expect the richest candidate would win Florida. Florida is like high school with money. Romney is like the guy in high school with the hottest car.
In other news, the kids at Harbor Ridge Middle School in Gig Harbor will be putting on a production of the musical High School Musical on 2.1, 2.2. & 2.3. Curtain’s at 6PM. Come on down and support the kids.
1 comment for Lee.
@10
That explains your governor.
Michael @ 8
” The only way I can watch this stuff is if I’m drinking.”
Yeah…well, I mean, that’s really the point!
Looks like voter turnout in FL’ s GOP primary is yet another in 2012 which less than 2008.
4th yr of Trillion dollar deficits…This Idiot has got to go
Bashing The Media
I’m watching an MSNBC video of Newt’s Florida speech. Predictably, he starts by bashing “the elite media,” then talks about “people power” and running a campaign of “ideas.”
If you want to throw red meat to the GOP base, just attack the media — they love that stuff. Now I want to throw in my two cents.
The late Pop Rabbit (RIP, sniffle) was a journalist, and a damn good one. I have a journalism education and was a news reporter before I became a lawyer.
A free press is the bedrock of democracy. Without it, you have no government accountability, and no check on government power. You can’t have “people power” without a free press.
I believe in a free and democratic America. And here is my promise to you: I will NEVER vote for any politician who panders for votes by attacking the press.
That means you don’t get my vote, Newt. Even if you’re the last candidate on earth.
@16 Given a choice between big idiots and little idiots, I’ll take little idiots. You can bleat all you want about the very difficult decisions Obama has had to make — e.g., choosing between depression or deficits, and yes, that’s the position his predecessor put him in.
What you didn’t see on Obama’s watch was government employees using grain shovels to stuff taxpayers’ money into contractors’ duffle bags ey into duffle bags held open by contractors at the tailgates of pickup trucks in Iraq.
Anytime you wanna lecture us about fiscal responsibility, asshole, I’m gonna shove THAT right back in your stupid wingnut face.
The women over at the spovangelist can tell it way better than I can.
@16
Austerity measures are really good at doing one thing: creating austere living conditions for the people living under them. Take a good look at Ireland right now. Do you want to live like that?
What happens when federal money for highway repairs don’t come through and bridges start falling into rivers? You think we’re fucked now, but we’d really be fucked if trucks couldn’t roll on I-90.
And last but not least, everyone in congress even the Tea Baggers are licking that money up. So, it’s not like if Obama wasn’t the president that spending wouldn’t be going on. If Palin was Veep right now she’d probably have 5 bridges to nowhere being built back in Alaska.
The debit is a problem, but it’s not that big of a problem and it’s not just Obama’s fault and it would be there regardless of who was president.
@19 Yeah, I saw that news story. Komen’s excuse was that PP is “under investigation” — yeah right, by a rightwing GOP congressman. Komen caved in to pressure from fanatics, it’s that simple. Shameful. This funding doesn’t even have anything to do with abortions; it paid for mammograms to protect women from cancer. Chalk up another anti-life victory for human-life-hating Republican extremists.
@20 “Austerity measures are really good at doing one thing: creating austere living conditions for the people living under them.”
I respectfully disagree. What austerity measures are really good at is turning recessions into depressions.
Which brings me to Europe. What’s going on in Europe is that the richer northern European countries, especially Germany, are trying to impose austerity policies on poorer southern European countries that are already mired in unemployment and recession.
Of course, Greece would be in better shape if people in that country — particularly the affluent — paid any taxes. In Greece, tax evasion is a national sport. Now you know — in case you were wondering — why the Greek government has no money. That’s a different issue.
But one thing should be crystal clear: Europe isn’t going to solve its problems, and cash-strapped European governments aren’t going to be able to pay their debts — by killing economic growth and making the residents of the Continent’s poorest countries live on concentration camp rations.
This isn’t my opinion, I got this from the published statements of Bill Gross, billionaire founder of Pacific Investments Management Company (PIMCO) and the most widely listened-to bond trading expert on the planet.
Keet kickin the can, its 120 Trillion dollars deep right now considering unfunded liabilities.
Want to talk about Greece and Ireland, I’d be glad to. Especially to any of you who just got a 70% haircut on Greece debt.
Got any US savings bonds, muni’s, treasury bills etc you still have faith in?
@24 Everybody holding Greek bonds, raise your hands.
@24 “Got any US savings bonds, muni’s, treasury bills etc you still have faith in?”
The whole world is flocking into Treasuries, and Wall Street still likes munis, so what do you know that they don’t?
On the other hand, this is what the austerity policies advocated by conservatives gets you:
“Data from the European Union’s statistics office … showed … that unemployment in the euro zone rose to 10.4 in December, … the highest since June 1998, before the introduction of the euro in 1999. ‘We expect the unemployment rate in the euro area to continue increasing – possibly at a faster pace …,’ Francois Cabau, an economist at Barclays Capital, wrote in a market note.”
http://www.cnbc.com/id/46206294
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Strangely, throwing millions of people out of work tends to increase unemployment. At least, conservativdes find that strange. I don’t.
But you have to admit, American media people support the Democratic Party over the Republican Party by a vast majority. The exception in cable TV is Fox News, which tends to support the Republicans. ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, HLN, MSNBC, etc. – they’re not bastions of support for the Republicans or Libertarians: they’re for the Democrats.
I think this all started back in the Nixon years. It didn’t take Tricky Dick very long to get the media to hate his guts and to develop a bias against him and the Republican Party. That media bias now is just a holdover from those years.
Ireland? Ireland is in trouble?
But didn’t I just read (a few years back) about the “miraculous” transformation of the economics of Ireland by the reductions in wages, breaking the power of unions, cutting taxes and luring companies to Ireland with generous subsidies. Reaganomics had “solved” the poverty of Ireland!
(snicker)
It looks like Gingrich carried the panhandle and central Florida, all of which are more like southern Alabama than they are the rest of the state. Romney did surprisingly well with seniors throughout the state, and carried the Latino community in south Florida (mostly anti-Castro expats).
The good news for Democrats is that in a general election, this may well be the ceiling that either candidate can reach in Florida. Anyone who didn’t already vote in the Republican primary may be lost to the Republicans completely this year. The vitriol of the primary races is turning off independents and moderates to both Romney and Gingrich. And it’s unclear how many Republicans will be willing to forgive the other side in the primary race, swallow hard, and go to the polls to vote for whomever the Republicans nominate.
This puts Florida well in play for the Democrates in the general election. I’d also love to see West lose his Congressional seat this year – he’s just another Newt Gingrich without the history degree.
@28: That may be true of on-the-air personalities, but is absolutely NOT true of the news directors/executives. You know, the people who actually determine what stories get covered and how.
The biggest myth of the 20th and 21st centuries is the myth of the “liberal” media.
A short glimpse of the future:
Over the next four weeks, we have four widely-spaced caucuses (Nevada, Maine, Colorado, Minnesota), and one primary (Mississipi). Romney will be looking for the knock-out punch so he can get to work focusing on Obama, but I don’t think he’s going to get it in February. Only Mississipi seems like fertile ground for a Gingrich victory in February, but I think Gingrich will stay in contention with a series of second-place finishes. The caucuses give Gingrich an opportunity to stack the deck in his favor by pushing a high turn-out among his followers.
Santorum might drop out of the race, but now that Gingrich has a multi-billionaire backer willing to write big checks, I think Gingrich can survive until Super Tuesday on March 6th.
The big races at the end of February are the Arizona and Michigan caucuses on Feb. 28th. Romney will take Michigan, but Gingrich has a chance to take Arizona.
Some pundits think that this finally gives Washington some importance in the nomination process, with it’s March 3rd caucuses. But I don’t think so. Both campaigns will probably emerge exhausted from the Feb. 28th contests in Arizona and Michigan, and stumble straight to the Super Tuesday contests a week later. Washington’s results will be relevant only if Newt continues to do poorly and the Washington delegate count tips him over the edge. But I just don’t see it – Newt is the kind of guy who will hold out for a miracle on Super Tuesday before giving that hated concession speech.
# 31: It’s also not true of the ownership of the media: by a HUGE majority, most are conservative republicans. And with corporate control of the media becoming the rule, rather than the exception, that has consequences, too: a number of Clear Channel radio folks have complained that on-air personalities who joke about Romney often find themselves without a gig anymore. They forget that Clear Channel is owned by Baine Capital, in which Romney still has a substantial interest.
Besides, all this complaining about the media having a “liberal bias” confuses cause and effect. The reporters/journalists who do the D.C. political beat are around politicians and their staffs all day long, every day. They generally know who’s a liar and a hypocrite who sounds off “talking points” the moment the camera is on them, but acts differently the rest of the time. They know who’s intellegent, and who is dumber than a doornail. They know who’s taking money from whom, and how that effects their vote. If they tend to lean more to Democrats than Republicans, after all this is taken into account, then so be it.
Newt has been getting away with attacks on the media for years. The mere fact that the media reports them tends to disprove their bias. But the fact is, Newt, and a lot of his fellow Republicans, want to stack the deck where the media is only gets to tell the story THEY want it to tell, and tell it THEIR WAY. Anytime the media shows a bit of backbone or independence, they scream bloody murder about media bias.
Correction to # 32: Missouri is the primary state between now and Super Tuesday, not Mississippi.
@28 Republicans think anyone who doesn’t repeat their lies is “biased.” That b.s. doesn’t sell to anyone with more than one brain cell. The difference between Fox and “ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, HLN, MSNBC, etc.” is the latter are objective. Fox is propaganda.
@21
Kormen took on a rabid, anti-choice, woman as a vice president and cooked up a new policy of not funding groups that were under investigation by congress just before a rabid, anti-choice, congressman launched his investigation into Planned Parenthood.
@22
I’d call going from a recession to a depression austere.