Monday, November 03, 2008

According to some of the latest polling data, roughly 9% of the electorate is still undecided. I have long held that based on voting patterns from previous elections, McCain stands a decent chance of pulling this out. However, unlike past years, the Democrats have a candidate that they have really embraced. What this could mean is that more Democrats will go to the polls than ever before.

In 2004, Republicans outvoted Democrats 71% to 64%, giving George Bush a comfortable victory. If the Democrats increase their totals significantly (while Republicans remain stagnant), they can tip the scales. It seems obvious to me that this is why so many liberal media outlets have been touting the New York Times polling numbers showing the race all but won for Obama. By advertising that the race is already won, they hope to convince McCain supporters to stay home and not bother to cast votes for their guy. However, it works both ways, as previous polls have suggested.

All of this means is that while the media has tried to convince the electorate that Obama is certain to win, the race is way too close to call. 9% of the electorate is a huge number to fill - especially when most elections are decided by much less.

If that 9% number is true, than in my opinion, this bodes very well for McCain. Racism aside (while I agree there is a segment of the population that will not vote for Obama because of his color, there is another segment that will vote for him because of it), I happen to believe that when alone in the voting booth, those who are truly undecided will vote with the one who is proven and experienced. While Obama may be the "sexy" choice, there is nothing about him that makes him the "safe" choice.

With the election just one day away, I again turn to the remarkable Thomas Sowell to put things in the proper perspective:
Ego and Mouth

After the big gamble on subprime mortgages that led to the current financial crisis, is there going to be an even bigger gamble, by putting the fate of a nation in the hands of a man whose only qualifications are ego and mouth?

Barack Obama has the kind of cocksure confidence that can only be achieved by not achieving anything else.

Anyone who has actually had to take responsibility for consequences by running any kind of enterprise-- whether economic or academic, or even just managing a sports team-- is likely at some point to be chastened by either the setbacks brought on by his own mistakes or by seeing his successes followed by negative consequences that he never anticipated.

The kind of self-righteous self-confidence that has become Obama's trademark is usually found in sophomores in Ivy League colleges-- very bright and articulate students, utterly untempered by experience in real world.

The signs of Barack Obama's self-centered immaturity are painfully obvious, though ignored by true believers who have poured their hopes into him, and by the media who just want the symbolism and the ideology that Obama represents.

The triumphal tour of world capitals and photo-op meetings with world leaders by someone who, after all, was still merely a candidate, is just one sign of this self-centered immaturity.

"This is our time!" he proclaimed. And "I will change the world." But ultimately this election is not about him, but about the fate of this nation, at a time of both domestic and international peril, with a major financial crisis still unresolved and a nuclear Iran looming on the horizon.

For someone who has actually accomplished nothing to blithely talk about taking away what has been earned by those who have accomplished something, and give it to whomever he chooses in the name of "spreading the wealth," is the kind of casual arrogance that has led to many economic catastrophes in many countries.

The equally casual ease with which Barack Obama has talked about appointing judges on the basis of their empathies with various segments of the population makes a mockery of the very concept of law.

After this man has wrecked the economy and destroyed constitutional law with his judicial appointments, what can he do for an encore? He can cripple the military and gamble America's future on his ability to sit down with enemy nations and talk them out of causing trouble.

Senator Obama's running mate, Senator Joe Biden, has for years shown the same easy-way-out mindset. Senator Biden has for decades opposed strengthening our military forces. In 1991, Biden urged relying on sanctions to get Saddam Hussein's troops out of Kuwait, instead of military force, despite the demonstrated futility of sanctions as a means of undoing an invasion.

People who think Governor Sarah Palin didn't handle some "gotcha" questions well in a couple of interviews show no interest in how she compares to the Democrats' Vice Presidential candidate, Senator Biden.

Joe Biden is much more of the kind of politician the mainstream media like. Not only is he a liberal's liberal, he answers questions far more glibly than Governor Palin-- grossly inaccurately in many cases, but glibly.

Moreover, this is a long-standing pattern with Biden. When he was running for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination back in 1987, someone in the audience asked him what law school he attended and how well he did.

Flashing his special phony smile, Biden said, "I think I have a much higher IQ than you do." He added, "I went to law school on a full academic scholarship" and "ended up in the top half" of the class.

But Biden did not have a full academic scholarship. Newsweek reported: "He went on a half scholarship based on need. He didn't finish in the 'top half' of his class. He was 76th out of 85."

Add to Obama and Biden House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and you have all the ingredients for a historic meltdown. Let us not forget that the Roman Empire did decline and fall, blighting the lives of millions for centuries.

1 comment:

said...

I won't comment on the Sowell piece, except to say that upon a 2nd reading it leaves me with the same impression I got the first time I read it last Friday on townhall.com...in it, Sowell sounds an awful lot like a snot-nosed high school dweeb railing on a good-looking, popular classmate simply because that person is more sociable and has an easier time talking to the girls. Now you have ot understand that.even when I find myself disagreeing with the content I typically like Sowell's writing very much...the guy really can wield a pen. In this piece, though, he lets his personal guard down a little bit too much, and the result is a faint sniveling odor.

OK. So having said that, the far more important point I have to offer here is that there is no "safe" choice in the Presidential Election 2008. Given the consequences, though, there can be no doubt that with Palin on the Republican ticket Obama is by far the "safer" choice (albeit the less "sexy").

Unless you have already voted early, Shayne, there is still time for you to wake up from W neocon nightmare and make your vote count in tomorrow's election. Take the phone off the hook, turn off the TV and the radio and your computer, turn down the lights, and make yourself a nice cup of hot cocoa and give it all some serious, pure unadulterated thought...you can get there, I just know it.