OnTheIssues.com

There's a website called www.ontheissues.org I happened across that is pretty interesting - there's probably others of its kind out there too. It's a supposedly non-partisan run site that lets you look up a summary of politicians stances on key issues. You get a list of comments and votes the candidate has made on each issue, and someone in charge of the site turns it into a score for strongly/moderately for or against. Any favoritism for certain candidates could of course be based on leaving out specific comments or contexts, or overemphasizing others (i.e. giving strongly for or against ratings to fairly neutral comments). But one thing I do like is the brief backgrounds it gives for each issue if you click on it - as in what are some of the key arguements on either side.
And although I wouldn't base my vote on it, the "match a candidate" feature lets you answer 20 questions and then tells you how candidates would virtually respond (based on someone analyzing their comments on the issues as above). I got matched with Clinton, Obama, and Giuliani best - but still only 45% agreement with the best of them! So apparantly I like less than half of all politicians stances.

The rest of the campaign money story

Enough time has passed that I can shed some light on the remaining question marks in the money story from earlier. First, how Romney got all that money. Turns out 1 out of 6 dollars he raised in contributions of $1000 or more came from Utah, where 70% of all residents share Mitt Romney's Mormon faith. Contributions smaller than $1000 are tracked but the details are not released at this time. This is over 17 times what John McCain, who raised the next most money in Utah, got from the state - $74,000. I did the math and that comes out to $1.3 million of the $20 million+ Romney raised in 2006 and the first quarter of 2007. While there are lots of Mormons outside of Utah that contributed, clearly there's a lot more to Romney's fundraising than the Mormon connection. Business interests from Romney's east coast connections were equally important in the fundraising win for the former Massachussetts governor.

So what does this mean? Well, Romney outraised McCain nearly 2 to 1 ($23 million to $12 million), and Guilinani nearly 3 to 2 ($15 million). That means he'll have a big spending advantage in a primary race where deep pockets figure to be more important than ever. More notably, though, the extent to which he thrashed the competition in fundraising has given his campaign instant credibility. It's now a three man race for the Republican nomination. Most polls I've seen the last few weeks have had McCain and Guiliani neck and neck at around 25% each, with Romney getting at least 15% (and more the closer you get to Utah). No other Republican is coming up with more than 4% of the vote.

Contrast the derision with which Romney's fundraising was portrayed in the media with the Obamagasm that has continued uninterrupted since he declared for the candidacy. It turned out Barack Obama not only raised well over $20 million, he got it from 100,000 donors. That's important because it means he doesn't have to defer as much to the general election fund as Hillary does. In fact, Obama may have more money to spend in the primary season than Hillary. The former First Lady had to defer at least $10 million of her $36 million until after the primary season, because so many of her donations exceeded the limit for one election cycle. As a result, John Edwards is falling further back, but Obama is nearly becoming front runner. On average, one out of 20 polls is totally wrong. I may have seen a bad one, but Obama had a 14 percentage point lead on a second place Hillary in South Carolina. Just as surprising is that Edwards was a distant third - and Edwards is from North Carolina. I'm not sure I believe it, but, interesting if true.

Taxation without representation

I've been sitting on THIS http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/16755560.htm article for a while, and after Jason's post this seems like a good time to share it. It provides an excellent articulation of the dangers of overtaxing - especially at the local level, where residents and businesses can just as easily avoid the tax by moving out of town. That's all for now.

A Congressman was here?

So Rep. Loebsack was on campus last Thursday - his prescence was announced by a sign written in markers and taped to a fence (strategy also used for "free hot dogs and movie" announcements, although those get more attention). I was somewhat interested since the sign said it would be a global climate change discussion with professors and students, although I couldn't make it. But when I tried to find anything about how it went in the university paper, it seems that the topic didn't gain enough attention to actually happen - it seems that in its place, we just had a discussion on federal student financial aid. It boiled down to students saying they're too far in debt, and Loebsack saying well, Bush hasn't done anything about it. Members of the UI Antiwar committee suggested cutting into the defense spending to help provide more federal student aid. All in all, not terribly enlightening, at least as described in the two brief articles I read- http://www.press-citizen.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070406/NEWS01/704060309 and http://media.www.dailyiowan.com/media/storage/paper599/news/2007/04/06/Metro/Students.Air.Debt.Worries-2827071.shtml .
I agree that the defense budget should be the first to take cuts to pay for other worthwhile programs - but I don't think student aid should be the first to get it by a long shot.

Here comes the money

Most of the leaders in the Presidential race have released their first quarter fundraising totals, and there are some surprises. Remember, these amounts do not account for campaign expenditures. First, the Democrats.
Sen. Clinton (NY) - $36 million (see notes in post above)
Sen. Obama (IL) - $20 million
Frmr. Sen. Edwards (NC) - $12 million
Gov. Richardson (NM) - $6 million
Sen. Dodd (CT) - $4 million
Sen. Biden (DE) - $3 million

Despite Hillary's huge money edge (the exact size of which is undetermined), she is slipping significantly in many polls and no longer holds 1/3 of the vote. In short, Democrats are beginning to realize that there are viable alternatives and the Clinton campaign no longer has an air of inevitability. I would prefer Richardson especially, but either of the other 2 Democratic front runners to Clinton. Former VP Al Gore is still holding over 10% in Democratic polls even though he has neither expressed or shown interest in running. None of the other Dems seems to have a significant following (after the Big 3 and Gore, Richardson is usually next with under 5%).

Now, the Republicans.
Frmr. Gov. Romney (MA) - $20.6 million (!)
Frmr. NYC Mayor Giuliani - $15 million
Sen. John McCain - $12.5 million
Sen. Brownback (KS) - $1.3 million
Rep. Tancredo (CO) - $1.3 million
Frmr. Gov. Huckabee (AR) - $500,000
Tommy Thompson, Jim GIlmore, Duncan Hunter, and Ron Paul did not release figures, but all are expected to be closer to Huckabee than Romney.

The fundraising success of Mitt Romney was a huge surprise to many people, given how far he trails Giuliani and McCain in the polls (Romney's best polling usually has him a distant third and more often 4th or 5th). Equally surprising is just how badly McCain was trailing Romney in fundraising. It is very early yet, but the early fundraising returns are often given tremendous weight in determining the viability of candidates. Clearly, wealthy elites within the Republican party are not especially enamored with John McCain. Equally clearly, there is a much higher percentage of people in the GOP that are supporting the two moderates, McCain and Giuliani, than are giving to campaigns. Now, $12 million is not chump change, but in this race it's only good enough for third place. The social conservatives still have yet to settle on a candidate - none meet their standards - but thepossibility of a rally by one of the current bottom feeders is there should one of them become a golden boy.

None of this changes my support of McCain and Giuliani on the Republican side, or Richardson (if I had to pick) on the Democratic side. It shouldn't change what you think either - just a bit of the horse race. More to come later, but I'll try to make my next post not P2008-related.

Pres. 2008 Update

It was last January when I wrote about the Presidential candidates for each party. Time to revisit that list.

On the Republican side, Rudy Guiliani has become the clear #1 candidate and John McCain Is definately #2 by far over the competition. Rudy is the choice of the moderate wing of the party. McCain is the choice of the classic conservatives. The social conservatives (aka the Neocons) don't really have a candidate that's electable. The libertarians don't really have a candidate at all, though some support McCain because Guiliani is pro-gun control and they can't stand any of the dozen or so minor socially conservative candidates.

If the neocons at some point coalesce around a single candidate in time for that person to get fundraising in place, that person may sneak by and secure the nomination. The reason I had not heard of Frmr. Sen. Fred Thompson prior to the Lincoln Day Dinner was because he had only been in the race a very short while. He was becoming something of a "great white hope" (to borrow a boxing term) to social conservatives unsatisfied with the postions of the two leaders and the electability of the rest of the candidates. By attempting to come in as a "true" social conservative, Thompson stole the thunder from a potential Newt Gingrich candidacy announcement, and instantly passed Mitt Romney (Fmr. Gov. of MA) who was seen as more electable but something of a flip-flopper on social issues. I would not want to be Mitt Romney at this time. Sen. Sam Brownback (KS) is probably the most visible of the pure, unabashed conservatives, but he has all the charisma of my computer desk and would be a dead duck against almost any Democrat in the general election. Other conservatives like Tommy Thompson and Mike Huckabee have only regional support and can't get off the ground without the field thinning significantly. In short, at this point it's a two man race until someone drops out.

There are lots of Democrats in the race as well, but very few of them actually matter right now. Hillary Clinton is still the definitive number one, but she's no longer anywhere near 50% of her own party. Barack Obama and John Edwards are neck and neck, duking it out for #2. The rest of the pack is WAY behind. If Al Gore enters the race (and the only people expecting that are his grass-roots supporters), multiple polls have shown he would immediately have support equal to Obama and Edwards at least. However, Gore has shown zero interest in the race and has not taken any action consistent with starting up a presidential campaign.

NM Governor Bill Richardson is my personal favorite among the Democratic candidates. He's interesting for several reasons. While the big 3 Democrats are all liberals trying to look like moderates, Bill Richardson actually IS a moderate. At least fiscally. Like the main 3 candidates, Richardson knows he can't get the Democratic nomination without being solidly anti-war. But while the others have a voting history of being tax-and-spend liberals, Richardson balanced the budget of New Mexico without raising taxes by cutting $230 million in waste. He also cut taxes by about $1 billion. Experience also matters. Hillary is just entering her second term in the Senate as of 2006. Edwards is a former Senator, but he had served just under 1 term before resigning to become John Kerry's running mate in 2004. Obama was just elected to the Senate for the first time in 2004 - making him a Senator for all of 2 years and three months so far. He does, though, have experience in the Illinois state legislature. Richardson, on the other hand, is a former 15 year Congressman, a former Energy Secretary under President Clinton, and a former Ambassador to the U.N. (also under Clinton). This makes him the only candidate that has conducted face-to-face negotiations with other world leaders in either party. He also is the only governor in the race for the Dems, and of a normally Republican leaning state no less. Lastly, Richardson would be the first Latino nominated for US president by a major party. That would influence a voter bloc at least equal in size to the African-Americans, possibly for the long term. Courting the Latinos may be something the Democrats would want to do. Unfortunately, Richardson is not getting any exposure in the media.

The money tells a different story. On Sunday the major Democratic hopefuls revealed their first quarter fundraising totals as per the federal election guidelines. As expected, Hillary blew away the previous all-time record with $36 million dollars. Although about $11 million was rollover from her non-event 2006 Senate re-election race, that still means she came up with $26 million in hard money donations in just 3 months. However, Hillary is collecting for both the primary season and the general election (campaign finance law keeps the two accounts separate and the same person can contribute the maximum for both) so no one really knows how much cash she actually has on-hand. John Edwards raised $11 million, Bill Richardson $6 million, Chris Dodd $4 million, and Joe Biden $3 million. Obama did not release a specific figure, but is expected to at least match Edwards's $11 million, with some analysts guessing $20 million or more. No one posted how much they have already spent - and some campaigns are already on TV in New Hampshire. I have not seen what the Republicans did, but I'll post when I do.

Summit County Lincoln Day Dinner 2007

Last night I attended my very first political dinner. I'm going to have a problem with these things if I have to go to too many because the only thing they ever serve is chicken. But that is really the only thing I can complain about. The dinner itself was huge, with over 1000 tickets sold and probably 900 or so actually there. It was also affordable, at $40 a head ($10 for college students). A lot of these are $2000 jobs, but Summit County Republicans (SCRP) likes to keep it an option for as many people as possible. They have a $2000 chicken dinner later in the summer instead that's much more exclusive.

I don't think I made any contacts that will get me a job in the short term, but I did have the chance to meet former U.S. Senator Mike DeWine. We chatted 1-on-1 for about 2 minutes about my background and our mutual respect and admiration for John McCain. He was wearing a sticker for McCain and I think he was officially representing the McCain campaign at the dinner. The two were colleagues for years in the Senate and both are relatively moderate Republicans - which is basically the circle I'm about to be running in. I don't know if he'll remember me, but if so Mike DeWine is a good friend to have. We did not exchange contact information.

U.S. Representative LaTourette was scheduled to speak last night, but for some reason couldn't make it at the last minute. So, county party chair Alex Arshinkoff took over as the master of ceremonies. Mr. Arshinkoff is a party organization man, but is still an energetic and engaging speaker. He introduced State Auditor Mary Taylor (a Summit County native), who was the only Republican to win statewide office in last year's Democratic landslide. She did not speak long. Minority Leader John Boehner (pronounced "BAY-ner") was the keynote speaker. He spoke about looking forward to the future after a tough election loss in 2006, and the importance of Iraq in the greater war on terror.

I dare say the war is the one issue Republicans still all agree on. Radical terrorism, Islamic or otherwise, is not going to go away on its own. Iraq has a duly elected government that has stated over and over again they want us to stay. With the new reinforcements about 60% in place, we are once again starting to gain ground on the 70 or so seperate militias, gangs, and other organizations we are fighting on the ground in Iraq. THIS http://www.michaeltotten.com/archives/001407.html is a vision of hope for all Iraq if we are successful. It's a real story of success you probably haven't heard elsewhere.

There was also a straw poll regarding the 2008 Presidential race taken at the dinner. Straw polls are unscientific votes taken among people at a specific event. Often, candidates try to stack the event with their own supporters if they hear of a straw poll taking place. I voted for John McCain because he supports the war, opposes wasteful government spending, is a reformer of government and is socially moderate. I only have my notes from the hastily-read results to go by, but here are the highlights.

Undeclared candidate George Pitaki was on the ballot but got only 3 votes. Condoleeza Rice got 3 write-in votes. Lots of people apparantly wrote in themselves or other audience members. Duncan Hunter got 11 votes, and Mike Huckabee got 14. Out of the nearly 2 dozen names, 6 got most of the votes.
Ultra-conservative Sam Brownback got 44 votes.
Undeclared candidate Newt Gingrich got 62 votes (8.2%).
Mitt Romney got 65 votes (8.5%).
Former TN Senator Frank Thompson, who I didn't even have on the radar, somehow got 91 votes (around 12%).
Sen. John McCain finished second with 194 votes (about 26%).
Rudy Giuliani won with 293 votes (38.9%).

These results are typical of many other straw polls I've seen. I like that moderates McCain and Giuliani together had over 60% of the vote at a GOP party function. That bodes well for us Republicans giving the nomination to someone that won't make the rest of the country lose their lunch.