Nightmare Ticket

I have a message for Barack Obama. As an independent, I am sure that I speak for many of my kind when I say this: If you pick Hillary Clinton to be your running mate, I'm voting for John McCain.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton don't "complement each other", as so many lunatics on the news have been claiming lately. The idea that their union would constitute a "dream ticket" is absolutely absurd. Lets face it - having Hillary on the ticket isn't really going to affect what her base does all that much. Most of them will fall in line behind whichever Democrat is nominated. It would be stupid for Obama to pick a VP with so many negatives.

I can guarantee that John McCain is rooting for Hillary. If Obama was so foolish, say goodbye to any Republicans that were thinking about supporting him. Say goodbye to a lot of Independents, too; they get along with McCain just fine. However, pick Hillary for VP, and say hello to a massive mobilization of life-long republicans. These are the people that are upset with Bush, don't particularly love McCain, and since Obama doesn't annoy them all that much, they might have stayed home on election day. Not anymore. The prospect of a Hillary Clinton vice presidency, or worse (remember, RFK was shot in June), will mobilize these people in vast numbers. They will vote not for John McCain, but against Hillary Clinton.

I've said it dozens of times. Anyone who thinks that the gay marriage issue can mobilize the conservative vote hasn't seen anything yet. With defeating Hillary Clinton as a rallying cry, McCain cannot lose. Don't do it Barack. You don't owe her anything. She'll probably poison your food or try to kill you in your sleep, anyway.

Leaving Iraq

It has been appropriate to withdraw for a long time now. Just in case there was any confusion left, however, a decisive event towards moving in that direction has occurred. One knows that it is time to go when the Shia leader al Sistani has declared that attacks on US Troops are acceptable.

Sistani is a moderate but extremely influential Iraqi Shia leader; easily the most powerful in Iraq. In the first few years of the invasion, he issued non-violence religious orders regarding US troops. He also kept Iraqi civil war at bay, by prohibiting his followers from retaliating against Sunni provocations. Finally, he urged his followers to vote in the US sponsored elections, which were thus a success only because of Sistani.

Hopefully the Shia government will ask US forces to leave soon. If they don't, we still should anyways. We have won the hearts and minds of nobody; the Iraqis don't want us there, and they don't appreciate the sacrifices our soldiers have made. Al Qaeda isn't going to take over the country; neither is Iran for that matter. Its long past time we let Iraqis sort things out for themselves.

Betting on the Clintons being evil

On Intrade, the contract "Dropout.June08.Clinton" is currently trading at about 81%. That's about 4:1 odds on a short-sell; it's essentially a bet to see whether or not Clinton drags this thing out to the convention. Doing so would be her best way to damage Obama in the long run. She needs Obama to lose if she is to make a run in 2012.

This might be the most overvalued Intrade stock I've ever seen.

The Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact

It has been terrifying to watch the formation of an unholy alliance between the Clinton campaign and Fox News. It reminds me of the Nazi-Soviet nonaggression pact in 1939 - and Barack Obama is Poland. Hillary Clinton and Fox News are mortal enemies, but the destruction of Barack Obama is a more pressing concern for both parties. Both have something to gain from Obama’s destruction: a Clinton run in 2012, and a McCain victory in 2008.

The Clinton camp will create the narrative, and Fox will continue to amplify it. Already we are seeing Clinton’s “feminist” surrogates lining up to accuse Obama of being a sexist; this to ensure that Obama never wins the female vote. Clinton will continue to pretend to be the friend of Michigan and Florida voters, to help McCain win those states in November. Meanwhile, Fox will continue to claim that Obama can’t win the white vote, and remind voters of Jeremiah Wright and “bittergate”. Obama does not have a white problem, he has a regional problem – he doesn’t do well in Appalachia. No surprise there – it’s poor, economically stagnant, uneducated, white, and racist; in other words, Hillary Clinton’s base.

The only people who could put a stop to this are the super delegates. A massive exodus from Clinton to Obama would be a firm rebuke to her divisive tactics and make a Democrat victory in November possible. However, I am not optimistic that the Democratic leadership will be either decisive or courageous. Over the last few years they have only shown themselves to be a bunch of indecisive, sniveling cowards; I don’t see why this time will be any different. How pathetic. This sad state of affairs reminds me why I am not a Democrat.

Sore loser, sore loser

Hillary Clinton recently blamed her imminent defeat on the media, claiming it has been sexist. Right. Hillary has been dead in the water since February. Had the roles been switched...had it been Hillary with an insurmountable delegate lead over Barack, what would the narrative have been? Hillary would have laughed at Obama for continuing to campaign. She would have declared victory months ago.

It was the media that allowed Hillary to keep in this race. The Clinton campaign has used the media to dictate the narrative for months. First it was pledged delegates. Then it was "big states". Then it was the popular vote. Now its working class white people. According to the Clintons, the criteria we should use to pick the nominee is changing every other week, and the media laps it up. Hillary shouldn't be criticizing the media, she should be thanking it graciously for allowing her to continue her campaign for far longer than she should have been able to.


Just in case anyone is wondering why Clinton keeps winning "the white vote", it has far less to do with race than region. Obama can win the white vote; states don't get any more rural and white than Iowa. What he cannot win is the Appalachian vote. The Appalachian region extends through Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, and Kentucky...all big Clinton wins. Economically stagnant, uneducated, and white, Appalachia is Clinton's base. I'm not impressed.

Its over!!!

Granted, people who have been paying attention know that Obama won the nomination a long time ago. This has only gone on so long because the media wouldn't accept that Obama won until he delivered a "knockout blow" to Hillary. Last night, Obama delivered. North Carolina was a humiliation for HRC, who believed that she was going to keep it close. Indiana, with its abundant blue collar, working class, non-college educated white folk, aka "Hillary's base", should have went strongly for Hillary. Polls showed her winning by 6+ percent.

In reality, she couldn't even give her victory speech with confidence, because Indiana was still up in the air at that point. Bill was standing next to her, and he was absolutely furious. His face was as red as a monkey's ass. The Clintons knew last night that this race was over. I am so proud of Indiana, for being the state that finally destroyed the Clinton machine. Its been an exciting election thus far, but I'm glad its over. It has been a huge distraction, and I have work to do.

...and it most certainly is over. John McCain doesn't stand even a remote chance of beating Obama in November.

George Bush's third term?

Someone asked Hillary if she knew of a single economist who thought her summer gas tax holiday was a good idea.

"Well, I'll tell you what, I'm not going to put my lot in with economists."

Classic. Its incredible how broad the census against this idea really is. It spans from the far left all the way to the far right. And yet, in the face of overwhelming agreement that this idea sucks, Hillary didn't backtrack. Instead, she became more adamant and more insistent that her idea was the correct one. She is now challenging Congress to pass legislation, to force everyone to choose to side "with the oil companies or with the American people" (barf).

This its just the latest illustration of a picture that has developed in many people's minds about what Hillary really represents. Her campaign reeks of nepotism; she is surrounded by yes-men and incompetent cronies. Her political tactics are vile and of the lowest order (she had to go negative early because she has no real vision of her own). She says offensive and dangerous things about other nations; most recently, claiming that we would "obliterate" all of Iran. She is a proven, pathological liar; indeed she does it so commonly that now it isn't even considered a big deal when she does. Notice how quickly the "sniper fire" controversy died down. Even many of her policies are outlandish and ridiculous - and yet, she egotistically clings to them in defiance. This isn't about whats best for the country, its about proving that she is right.

Hillary Clinton sure has a lot in common with George W. Bush. It is she, not John McCain, who most accurately would represent Bush's "third term" in office. Even now, her poll numbers are strengthening. She is poised to win Indiana and could even upset Obama in North Carolina. Polls now show Hillary beating McCain handily in a general election, while Obama-McCain is quite close. I've spent months trying to convince conservatives to support Barack Obama during this election cycle, citing his many strengths as a unifier and a stimulus for change. Now I'm going to urge conservatives, especially ones in Indiana, to rally around Obama for a different reason:

Do it, or be prepared to watch Hillary Clinton give an inaugural address in January.

One way to not get the Iranians to stop pursuing nuclear weapons:

Threaten to "obliterate" their nation. There seems to be a constant stream of American politicians who are willing to talk about nuking Iran. Most of the GOP candidates in one debate refused to rule out the use of preemptive nuclear weapons; only McCain and Ron Paul dissented. And now Hillary Clinton is talking of annihilating Iran? If I was an Iranian, I'd be pushing even harder for a strong nuclear program to deter a US attack.

I don't need to write a post talking about how stupid Hillary Clinton is, of course. There is not a single person who would ever read my blog that would be a Hillary supporter. My (small) reader base consists of only two types of people: bored, young, internet-saavy liberals who are well educated, and thus hate Hillary. Or family and friends who are educated and conservative, and thus hate Hillary. But I did want to put this out there because this is really the kind of thing that McCain or Obama fans should be jumping on to illustrate just how unpalatable a Hillary presidency would be. She isn't even the Democrat nominee yet and she is already pissing off other countries.

I can't believe I'm blogging at 1:45 am, the morning of my pharmacology final exam.