But this pre-season seems to go on for ever. Just yesterday, in the middle of the night, Mitch Daniels, one of the Mainstream Media's favorites, announced by e-mail that he will not run for the nomination. He joins Chris Christie, Haley Barbour, Mike Huckabee, and Donald Trump in taking a pass, and what with the disasters attendant on Newt Gingrich's roll-out, we may anticipate a withdrawal there as well. Pollsters are reduced to recalibrating their findings and hypothetically allocating the supporters of each non-candidate to the rest of the hypothetical field.
When I first fired up this hot stove and declared the league open, I laid it down as an irrefutable postulate that someone would get the Republican nomination. I mean, members of the House of Representation from solid districts often face no opposition at all, and there may even have been a senator who ran unopposed, though I cannot think of one off hand. But no one since Washington has received 100% of the electoral votes, in effect running unopposed.
You can't have a game if only one team shows up. Play ball!, anyone?
Come on Ron Paul...
ReplyDelete"Belcher appeared confident of success [in a boxing match], and threw his hat into the ring, as an act of defiance to his antagonist"
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Professor Wolff --
ReplyDeleteI would not be so smug regarding Obama’s opposition. Note that it did not take too much of an effort for the likes of Scott Brown to obtain Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat (Martha Coakley, believing she was the designated shoo-in for the seat, barely campaigned). Obama will have to campaign as though his life depends on it (his career certainly does). He has lost much of the left/progressive base that formed a key part of his grassroots support (see for example, Cornel West’s sour grapes abandonment of Obama). This means that Obama will have to convince mainstream independents to vote for him over the republican nominee. A done deal? I’m not so sure. Allow me this anecdotal aside: Not too long ago I was browsing through a Barnes & Noble bookstore in a suburb of southern New Jersey. I overheard what turned out to be a father snatching a book from his young son’s hands and admonishing him: “I don’t want you looking at that!” When the child asked why, the father testily replied, “because Obama is a communist!” Afterwards, I walked over to examine the book in question. It was a children’s book depicting, in chronological order, all the presidents of the United States. As the most recent president, Obama’s photo was on the cover of the book. As I pondered this event, I realized exactly what, in part, Obama is up against.
I really don't see the man energizing that unprecedented youth vote he received in 08. The kids, they just aren't buying his trite and obviously mendacious "audacity" and "change"
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