For the first time in my adult Iowa life...

The Iowa Circus Ringmaster bowed to winner Ron Paul and invited him to take a victory lap in center circle.

No. Wait.

The ringmasters bitched and whined that it ain't no fair. 

A sample from Polk County GOP co-chair Dave Funk:

“The nominee from Polk County is someone that not only myself but none of the members of my executive committee that I have asked can tell me who that person is,” Funk said, “and to nominate someone who has not been active in local county politics is inappropriate.”

The tortured syntax reflects the shock and awe old party stalwarts felt when a slate of delegates pledged to Dr. Paul carried the day against a "unity" assortment.*

I can't imagine why they were surprised. For a couple of election cycles now, libertarians and their fellow travellers have been rewiring the circuits in the state and county apparatus. Among other things, a Paul enthusiast has become state GOP chairman.

It's a sure bet that tomorrow's news commentary will concentrate on the Paulistas' sneaky lowdown dirty tricks. Like learning the party rules, showing up at meetings, organizing their supporters, working harder, and insisting on their right to frame the debate in their own terms.

If the grassroots Republicans who pay attention to the process disapproved of such tactics, all they had to do was keep endorsing the old GOPers, the small government conservatives who still love ag subsidies, ethanol mandates, American blood in Mideast sand, and even the suspension of whatever Constitutional language is necessary to make the Patriot Act seem a nice warm blanket.

At least Romney was smart enough not to call Paul insane too often. Now we'll see if he smart  enough to issue new marching orders to Reince Preibus: "It's going to be a long convention. Let the congressman have his say."

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*Danged if that doesn't remind me of Tammany Hall  and the Daly Machine. About every 20 years those thieves fubared things so badly that even the voters started getting the picture. So they trotted out a "unity" ticket (sometimes, especially in New York,  called  a "fusion" slate). That means they retired one old grafter among the dozens up for re-election and inked in one man who, for the moment, appeared to be honest.

Switzerland Listening to Ron Paul

Everyone knows an alternative currency based on a commodity won't work. Anyone who thinks it will is crazy and, worse, doesn't watch Rachel Maddow; in other words a deranged crank like Dr. Paul.

Or a citizen of Switzerland getting all worried about its own fiat currency and persuading his parliament to actually debate a circulating gold coin.

As I say, cranks.  As is well known, the Swiss know nothing about money.

Things Ron Paul wouldn't say or do, even in Minnesota

He wouldn't walk down the street eating lutefisk on a stick. He wouldn't say he loved lefska. He wouldn't promise to name an aircraft carrier the USS Uffdah.

Still, our libertarian Minnesota political whizzes love him, and they're about to prove it by sending a disporportionate number of Paul supporters to the national convention and by ensuring that his ideas carry weight at the state-party level.


On day two of the convention, Ron Paul supporters really get a chance to flex their muscle as the 2,000-plus delegates elect a slate to represent Minnesota at the national Republican convention in Tampa. Paul delegates have already claimed 20 of the 24 delegates elected from the state’s congressional districts. Three delegate slots automatically go to party officers. Another 13 national delegates are chosen on Saturday. With the force behind them, it’s possible -- maybe probable -- that 33 of the state’s 40 delegates will be pledged to nominate Ron Paul.



It parallels the libertarian/Paul movement in Iowa and several other states, and the immediate upshot is that his ideas will not be totally ignored in Tampa. The time beyond the convention is fuzzier, but  it can't hurt the liberty cause to have a young cadre of smart operatives pulling the strings in the middle levels of the GOP bureaucracy.

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I've attended political conventions for decades as a reporter, paid operative, and delegate. An outstanding feature is the blatent cluelessness of of many party officials and most delegates. They think the purpose is to bloviate on issues. The nearest comparison would be a mechanic who thinks his job is to expound this theories of automotive design while you're paying him to grind your valves.

The Minnesota Paulites illustrate the usefulness of highly skilled tinkering after learning the party rules and mores inside and out. When you've mastered the technical aspects,  then the time comes for using the machine to get to where you want to go, in this case from a higher level of statism to a a lower one. It's incremental and tedious, but it stands a better chance of reinstating our Constitution than loading up our M4geries.

Waiting on Ron Paul in WalMart Aisle 7

The good doctor says on Facebook he'll be guest host on CNBC's "Squawk Box" this morning starting about 6:30 EDT, e.g. now.

While I'm waiting, I'm watching  CNBC cover the scandal of WalMart bribing Mexican thugs, i.e. almost everyone high in that godforsaken government,  for the right to do business down there. 

A certain astonishment is evident in the teevee men and women doing the reporting, which suggests to me that they're more than a little parochial.  

The decision-making process for engaging in commerce -- large or small --  in Mexico is quite simple.

--Shall we do business South of the Border (yes or no)?

--If "yes" find out who there needs bribing, gather up the cash, and send it.

Super Tuesday

Romney won the cities, Santorum won the countryside, Gingrich won Georgia, and the Dutch make cheese.

Three scoundrels, alike in their lust to replace the sitting Scoundrel in Chief. Their differences reflect only marketing judgements as to which popular superstitions are most panderable in the amoral quest for fifty per cent plus one.

H.L. Mencken, from Dayton, Tennessee, on July 14, 1925:.


In his argument yesterday judge Neal had to admit pathetically that it was hopeless to fight for a repeal of the anti-evolution law. The Legislature of Tennessee, like the Legislature of every other American state, is made up of cheap job-seekers and ignoramuses. The Governor of the State is a politician ten times cheaper and trashier. It is vain to look for relief from such men. If the State is to be saved at all, it must be saved by the courts. For one, I have little hope of relief in that direction, despite Hays' logic and Darrow's eloquence. Constitutions, in America, no longer mean what they say. To mention the Bill of Rights is to be damned as a Red.

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If asked, Mencken would surely have agreed that secular superstitions exist. Free money. The nobility of pre-emptive war. Widely diffused responsibility for individual actions.

I don't know if he would praise Ron Paul, but I think that, at a minimum, he would concede that Paul's ideas are not those of an ignoramus, a word he would have found accurate in describing the Others.

Speaking of civil discourse...

Ron Paul finishes second in Washington and the local press reports;

 Attending his first caucus at the Labor Temple in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood, Dillon Smith, 31, vowed to write in Paul's name no matter who is on the ballot in November...


Good for you, Dillon. And it isn't a "wasted" vote. It is a statement of enlightened disgust, of which we have too few.


"I would rather die than vote for any of the other candidates," said Smith,...


That may be carrying things further than necessary. You could just move to another country, like maybe Malawi, where all of our over-the-hill celebrity sex sirens lived and adopted babies during the eight years of the Bush Administration.


... because the country needs someone who will "basically slit the throat of the federal government."


Attention all aromatherapy clinics in the Los Angeles-Frisco corridor!   Surely you understand that Dillon is speaking metaphorically and has not demanded ventilating any actual human jugulars.

Five neighbors who showed up from his precinct also supported Paul and voted 6-0 to elect Smith as a delegate to an upcoming legislative-district convention.


On the other hand, you never know. If I were a thug bent on violence, I think I'd avoid taking my jugular to Seattle's Belltown neighborhood.

Ron Paul Weds Mitt Romney, they say

(Caution: Long and political, a reply to my oldest friend, the Iowa kid  now  running the philosophy department of a university in one of the New England SSRs.  Our political discussions go back decades. He cited a Seattle Times article addressing the gossip about a Paul/Romney alliance. The elisions represent strictly personal stuff,  along with a thing or two about your humble scribe which hardly anyone would believe anyway. Using your delete key at his point in time would not offend me.)

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Hi ....,

Can of worms. 

I'd be surprised to learn  Paul and Romney shook hands in a green room somewhere. (EDIT: meaning shook hands to seal a deal.)  However, I revert (counting coup) to a position I took back around Iowa Caucus time  when  Michele and the others floated the notion that Paul would become a third-party candidate and thus guarantee a second Obama term.  I wrote that it would not happen for a number of reasons, including his desire to keep Rand positioned for greater things in the GOP.  I'm sure  his personal agenda still includes a mighty desire to make his son White-House viable in '16 or beyond.

Paul's alleged kid-gloves treatment of Romney could rest on this premise: "Santorum will NOT become president. Romney MIGHT, though the odds are long. Therefore a non-aggression pact -- however tacit and muted -- with Romney is more likely to keep the Paul family name burnished in Republican circles."

One of the flaws in my reasoning is its assumption that a Romney who loses to Obama would continue to wield useful power in the party.  He might or might not. It depends on how well he can hang on to his support from Wall Street -- the debt industry, the Republican "Establishment"  -- after failing to oust Obama.

More immediately, the Romney perspective  by now must include the possibility of a brokered convention where even a handful of Paul delegates could be decisive. There's no reason for Mitt to further anger anti-statist thinkers and activists prior to the convention,  however much he might fear and detest them. Strange bedfellows, etc.

Even more immediately, analysis of this race won't be any easier after Michigan and Arizona. Absent a large surprise, we won't know a Hell of a lot more about the relative Romney/Santorum prospects than we do now. 

Aside: Rand's comment that he'd be honored to be asked to serve as No. 2 to Romney was stupid.

Elsewhere in the septic tank, Obama probably will win, but he's on thin ice. He might, therefore,  determine it politically unwise to bomb Iran and Syria -- and shit, for all I know,  another sandy draft choice or two to be named later -- before the second week of November.  (What, a closet Muslim bombing professing Muslims!  Why not? Muslims have been killing one another centuries. :) ) 

So have Christians, come to think of it. Maybe others, too, but I'm not too hip on the history of the Buddhist wars.

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I almost certainly won't go to Tampa. ... but my contacts in the RNC and among the campaigns are by now non-existent, so I couldn't get close enough to the real decision making processes to even hear them clearly.  Why spend three or four thousand or more to mingle with varnished hair and Florsheim wingtips? The better part of wisdom is knowing when one has transitioned from barely-was to complete has-been. Too, my resolve to avoid crowds larger than  50,000 people remains intact.

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Winter is making a last gasp in your old home land. We're facing a few days of general sky dumps -- snow, sleet, rain, but the long-range forecasters are beginning to remark on the growing power of the sun to usher in our annual hemi-global warming.  Bring it on. I'm tired of wearing socks. I want to go out in the fields and shoot dirt clods.  I want to launch the canoe and sneak up on yellow fluffy goslings  for photographic  purposes. I want to sit on my dock and catch  three perch for lunch. When all this occurs I'm afraid you'll have to stand in for me  as chief watch dog of the peoples' liberties.

...  has just become a National Merit  Scholar, a finalist. He's applying to the ... where he hopes to learn enough physics to explain the cosmos to Stephen Hawking. :)

...

Best,

Jim 

(This might be stripped of some of the personal content  and blogged; don't feel ambitious enough to try to dream up original content)

The Frontrunner Ron Paul (Caution: Adult Content)

Now will you forgive us for imposing Rick Santorum on you? Even though his primary campaign theme is a strict "One Climax, One Kid" rule?

The competent Ann Selzer has just published a poll of Iowa voters, and our "unelectable" Ron Paul whips every other GOPer in a face-to-face against His Ineptness Barack Obama.

I wouldn't break out the champagne just yet. The results seem to reflect more revulsion with President Obama and the other Republicans than any great enchantment with our offbeat ol' Grandpa Paul.  But a guy can be heartened to see hints of a friendlier attitude toward Constitutional government.

Paul beats the president by 7 points. Santorum beats him by 4 and Romney wins by 2. Poor Newt loses; Mr. Obama sends him home to Callista by 14 points.

From Hawkeye lips to God's ears, eh?

(There is rain on our parade. Paul's unfavorables total 41 points against Santorum's 33.  The others' hate numbers are worse, 51 for Mitt and 65 for Newt.  



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For a couple of reasons you probably want to read the whole thing, including links to the polling geekery. My brief report here is undoubtedly colored by a bias against hinging a presidential race on regulating the reproductive habits of every Joe and Sally Sixpack in the land. Likewise by disgust with the intense debate about how manly -- or bogus -- Mitt looks in his new starched and ironed jeans.  Too, my mind may still be fogged by the pleasant little fantasy  about going  rock climbing with Rachel.

Sunday Morning Catch-All; Gun Show Loophole Editon

What a fine little show over in Estherville. Discerning buyers from miles around swamped my table and left happy with pounds and pounds of shooty (and otherwise outdoor-jockish) stuff which a partner and I were just plain tired of looking at. Why, I had to get up early this morning  to count the money Federal Reserve Cartoons.

If today goes as well I'll treat myself to something lethal enough to send the Bloomberg Bleating Society scurrying to the sanctuary of the nearest fern bar.

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Speaking of the Super Bowl, have you seen that Mayor Bloomberg is sponsoring a SB commercial demanding more common-sense gun control? I presume it includes a bleat for ending the mysterious gun show loophole. He probably heard that I reverse loopholed a Bubba-ed, trashed-out Winchester 37 and knows that it can be modified and sniper-scoped to bring down a Cessna 150 at nearly 50 yards. Too bad I'll miss the ad. My Super Bowl plan is to check the internet tomorrow morning to see who played, and, if my interest doesn't wane, who won. Just in case the subject happens to come up in conversation. Wouldn't want to sound ignorant.

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Politics: The anti-authoritarian idea is doing reasonably well in Nevada, considering Ron Paul is running against the Mormon Church, or, rather, the Mormon Church is running against him.

I wonder if he's trotted out that bit of recent history showing that the Government of the United States is the only outfit in the history of the world to lose money on a place peddling whiskey and whores?

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Thank you for your kind attention. See you after the loophole closes this evening.

The adulation of Ron Paul

...and while I'm on the subject, let me tip my hat to our grumpy hermit out in the western desert.

"Surely there must be some golden mean, in which a person can be credulous enough to still have faith in the political process, without going completely moonbat in the veneration of an individual."

That's Joel's reaction -- spot on, if you ask me -- to some nincompoop's screed linking Ron Paul to the Second Coming.
.

The Space-Out Coast

Down in Florida last night the best line of the cage fight was nonchalantly delivered by Ron Paul. "...that debate doesn't interest me very much."

He was addressing the unzipped front-runners, two-handedly swinging their members at one another about whose investments were least horrible.

Paul's contribution was his usual, that is, consistent view that (a) presidential debates ought to be about policy and (b)  no policy will work well until Washington learns arithmetic and  weans itself from ever-flowing tit of fiat money. That actually got a passing reaction from  Mitt and Newt, essentially, "Good point in a way, (pause) but my balls really are brazenbigger than Mitt's (or Newt's.)"

Welcome to the great national dialog as it is understood by most of the GOP and all -- every one -- of the famous heads who agree that the morning-after headline must proclaim that Mitt added three inches.

But the things you will learn from the Yellow an' Brown, they'll help you a lot with the white

Some folks in Bombay and Tehran are listening to Ron Paul. Those sneaky, oil-starved Indians of the sub-continent dislike our "sanctions" on Iran, so they've plotted with the ayatollahs. The sub-conts will get Iranian oil. The Iranians get gold. 

It would be fun to turn this into a 21st Century  Kipling tale. Gold-laden cargo elephants by the score lumber across the Khyber Pass to a rendezvous with Shiite camel trains at a fortified wadi in the high desert plateau of Taliban land. All is guarded with Khyber Pass Rifles, and security is further secured with golden-coin baksheesh to the Afghan war lords.


Alas, isn't that romantic, and personally I blame Obama, for whom Ben Bernanke works. His Ineptness's sanctions defy mortal understanding, but, highly simplified, they rap the knuckles of any bank looking to make a buck on Iranian oil deals.  The trouble is, the sanctions work only with banks addicted to the funny money of Fed Boss Bernanke and his counterparts in the Eurosoc zone. (And of course EastAsia with whom we have always been at war.)

The maharajahs just happen to own  their own bank which does quite nicely with a stiff middle finger presented to all the world's fiat money thugs of the "central banks" -- save their own, of course. It will handle the bullion transfers, and if it chooses to involve a SMLE or fake Remington rolling block, that will be just a nostalgic tip of the turban to its national history.

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As the cited article notes, this gold/oil deal will chip another smidgen of value from what ever assets we peons have foolishly invested in the funny money of the West. Dollars, Euros, Pounds, etc. 

Could be that Dr. Paul can digest this in time for the next debate.  For years and years he has been expounding the logic of sound money -- at the very least as an alternative to to Federal Reserve Cartoons posing as actual wealth. It might occur to him to bring up the Indian-Iran transaction to illustrate that when the shit hits the fan, gold works wonders. And people smarter than our own political masters already know it.

But serously, folks...

If all of Paul's speeches had been delivered with the good-natured fire of his address last night -- as he acknowledged his close third-place finish -- he would have won more caucus votes.

As it happened, his 21per cent is impressive enough, earned in a region in love with massive farm subsidies and disproportionately full of retirees attached to their Social Security checks and subsidized health care.* A place of fervor in its belief that tossing money at schools advances education.  A place that argues the morality and effectiveness of laws requiring Americans to burn food in their in their vehicles.

And, yes, it does represent a step forward in the great argument that liberty is preferable in every way to legislative and bureaucratic compulsion. Well done, Dr. Paul, and an appreciative nod to your people who helped make it happen.


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*Guilty, Your Honor, but begging the Court's leave to offer a brief explanation.

FLASH ... Romney Captures SoL, Newt nabs second, Paul pales

Freedom did not shake her lovely tresses in my village of Smugleye-on-Lake. Our good Dr. Paul captured 11 votes of the 77 cast for 14.28 per cent.

The SoL tab:

Romney 22
Gingrich 20
Santorum 17
Paul 11
Perry 4
Bachmann 1

Further reports as they become available should your reporter remain awake. Being with that many people (about a thousand; it was a county-wide doin's) makes his butt tired, and the sensation often rapidly disseminates itself thoughout the other bodily parts.

Iowa Poll Results

Our libertarian is No. 2, two points behind Mitt's hair. It's the famous statistical tie.

Santorum is 3rd at 15. Newt is No. 4 with 13.7. Another stat tie.

In Order:

Romney 24

Paul 22

Santorum 15

Gingrich 13.7

Perry 11

Bachmann 7

Hunstman NR

Bated Breath (2), Iowa Caucuses 2012

In an hour we'll get the important pollster's final guess on how well the libertarian idea is selling in Iowa. Ann Selzer runs the Iowa Poll, and her operation was the  best predictor four years ago. It's paid for by the predictably statist Des Moines Register, but the little green editors there seem to leave Ann alone. They follow the Mark Twain dicta of journalism: "Get your facts first, then you can twist them as much as you want."

Ron Paul has been holding his own despite being outed as an insane anti-semitic racist who wants to spread the American legs wide for penetration by all those nasty foreigners  -- Arabs,  Commies,  Zoroastrians and so forth. His plan to use the 82nd Airborne as school-crossing guards has hurt him  especially badly. But he perseveres as No.1 or 2 --  more or less tied with Mitt Romney in the other polls.

Rick Santorum has emerged as the sort-of concensus candidate for those who think we'll get to heaven by peeping in one another's windows and reporting abominations to the proper authorities.

I'll pass on the poll results here, even though they'll be all over the media within minutes.

N.B. -- Even though Ann is considered damn good at her job, polling a universe as tiny and flighty as 90,000 - 120,000 expected caucusoids  is a major challenge.

Forced to bet right now, my limited-confidence guess of the poll results is:

1. Romney

2. Paul (or in a statistical dead heat with Mitt)

3.Santorum

4. Gingrich

...followed by those who no longer matter.

Let's be careful out there; an informant has reported the Hubris Gang is on the streets

Another morning note to my buddy, dealing with a more practical aspect of the final two weeks in the corn fields and hog lots:

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Hi Dick,

At this moment Paul may be the clear favorite here. This exposes him to dat ol'debbil game of expectations.

1. In the two weeks remaining he will suffer unremitting negative attacks. They will center on general goofiness and advanced age with a strong undertone of alleged racism and anti-semitism.

2. These will have some effect, perhaps enough to deny him victory or even a strong second-place finish.

3. If that happens he will enter New Hampshire weaker, and his small but increasing support in South Carolina and Florida will deteriorate. Super Tuesday will be a Newt Romney walkaway.

The other danger here is really energized preachers pounding their KJVs. There's still time for them to coalesce around one of their own.  Bachmann, in particular, is running a near-perfect end-game race.

Jim

The Great Debate -- Iowa Caucuses 20112

My pal Dick is my old high school debate partner, and I immodestly report we tucked a bronze or two in the trophy case. This post is a little obscure for anyone not familiar with formal debate, but, what the Hell. Some readers are. Others are free to move on until I get back to my favorite hobby, posting retro cheesecake and gun porn. :)

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Dick emailed me a positive Christian Science Monitor  piece on Ron Paul. The reply:

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Scene: The National Forensic League national final in traditional debate. PBS teevee cameras are rolling:

Paul is the first-negative speaker who spends his first three minutes admitting "need" but criticizing the  affirmative's analysis of the nature of the need. In his seven remaining minutes he presents an alternative solution, a counter-plan. Even if somewhat faulty, it boasts internal consistency, unheard of in either academic or political disputation.

Discombobulated, the second affirmative stumbles through disjointed short takes about the unfairness of trick cases. Second negative reestablishes the logic and real-world pertinence of its program. First affirmative has had time to recover a semblance of coherence as that term is understood by, say, Kingman Brewster and Teddy Kennedy. 

This is enough for the judges who, by training and experience,  have never in their  lives faced a problem to which the solution was not government-inspired. The  remaining rebuttals are largely  ignored. Decision for the affirmative. 

But the nature of debate is forever changed.  

:)  

Yep, Romney

That didn't take long. Romney is The One.  Smart, experienced, moderate, and all that.

The Register (correctly, I think)  dismisses Gingrich as a flake. It rejects Ron Paul because:

"Ron Paul’s libertarian ideology would lead to economic chaos and isolationism, neither of which this nation can afford."


That would be as opposed to the current economic chaos accompanied by shooting all the Arabaic speakers who piss us off?  Bearing in mind, of course, that this  sometimes motivates the Arabs shoot back. 

Bated breath - Iowa Caucuses 2012

The Des Moines Register is about to announce its endorsement of a GOP caucus candidate.  It will be good for one news cycle of excess verbiage among the political classes, then fade iinto the murk.

The Register has a history of endorsing the left-most candidate who has never been convicted of a serious felony. This year that would seem to be Romney, but everything else is so screwy any guess is dangerous.

The paper is trying to create suspense -- and traffic -- with a poll asking whom you think it will endorse. Ron Paul is the runaway winner. Good enough, although it is apparently a result of Paulistas' intensity rather than an answer to the actual question. The paper didn't ask, and doesn't care,  whom it should endorse.