Presidential Election Political Smackdown FFA

[Robroy]

[Charles Dean]

Interesting thing this weekend. Hung out with my brother who about 5-6 weeks ago was voting McCain and was pretty interested in Palin. He's always voted republican, but he's not a Christian.

Yesterday found out that he voted for Obama. The reason? Sarah Palin. He said after finding out more about her that she's one of the most terrifying candidates ever and that the prospect of her likely becoming president given McCain's age and cancer issues he could not vote for McCain. Even though he really doesn't like him.

Given the conservative pundits who are non-fundamentalist who have jumped ship recently I wonder if this is a pretty widespread sentiment with non-evangelical conservatives.

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,214 ... 20,00.html

[Charles Dean]

Oh and speaking of Palin, another ethics probe for her!!! http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/10/ ... 4071.shtml

Guess Maverick means taking taxpayer dollars for your own benefit, eh?

[rose-colored-coolaid]

[rose-colored-coolaid]

[WestSideBilly]

I early voted on Friday, since my election place and work are a long ways apart (and I didn't figure the GOP was going to find anything of substance to change the game). Lot of people waiting 80-90 minutes to vote, I heard Saturday the line was 3-4 times longer.

About the only thing amusing about it was a woman in line ahead of me with a "MIss Alaska" sash on. Wasn't sure if she was wearing her vote or making fun of Palin.

I watched TV most of the day, from about 8:30 am until after the Seachickens finished up their suckfest. So many political spots. I'm really looking forward to Wednesday. Especially the riots.

[Charles Dean]

How Palin was handled in this election was an ENORMOUS mistake for the Republican party. Frankly, the GOP should've let McCain pick Lieberman like he wanted and just let him lose.

Then, they should've taken Palin and groomed her for 2012. If she'd actually been vetted and they really realized how completely out of her league the national race is, she could've made an amazing run in 2012.

Imagine if they'd spent 2-3 years teaching her foreign policy, making trips to russia, Europe, Mideast, etc. teaching her about things outside of Alaska basically. She's an incredibly intelligent woman, with an incredibly small worldview.

But now, her national political career is over.

Early voting has been amazing. They're expecting something like 85% turnout in Washington state. That's unheard of.

Even with all of the early voting the waits have been insane. Tuesday is going to be nutso.

And yes, no matter who wins there will be riots.

[rose-colored-coolaid]

[rose-colored-coolaid]

I was just thinking about the interplay between the presidential election and the state gubernatorial race. In the gubernatorial race, Gregoire is favored by maybe a point or two (well within the polls margin for error), but in the presidential race Obama is leading by double digits in most polls.

I thought this would be a hard year for Rossi due to Obama attracting so many line democratic voters, but the numbers aren't bearing this out. This suggests that Obama is not really drawing a larger number of truly democratic voters (at least in our state), which leaves me with three guesses.

1) Obama is drawing out a record number of independents, who will vote for him but not for democrats across the board.

2) He's taking a lot of republican votes (at least in WA) but not shifting people from their bases otherwise. Could these be the moderate republicans who don't care much either way about gay marriage or abortion and dislike the direction the party is heading?

3) It's the economy. McCain is admittedly ignore about financial matters, and Palin is assumed ignorant due to general myopia, so for the president people are voting Obama while Rossi has proven his business acumen due to being a self-made man.

[WestSideBilly]

Add in:

4) Many Democrats have little faith in Gregoire.


This was the hardest choice on the ballot for me, and I'm not particularly keen with the choice I made. I would have preferred "throwing away" my vote on someone else (mostly so I could bitch about it no matter who wins ).

[Charles Dean]

That's the thing. Last election, Democrats weren't really very happy with Gregoire as a candidate. After all, Washington was strong for Kerry and she barely won/didn't win depending on your view.

I mean, as universally loved as Gary Locke was, he was a pretty hard act for anyone to follow I think. She's a career politician, which I think many people have disdain for.

I don't think that she's done a terrible job, but she certainly doesn't inspire by any means.

I voted for her more as an anti-Rossi. Can't ever trust someone who works in real estate.

[Robroy]

Personally, I think that in four years Palin will be a shoo in for re-election as president. Although McCain's mom is still alive, so he could pull off the first four years.

[rose-colored-coolaid]

[WestSideBilly]

[Charles Dean]