Ron Paul makes it official

No one is surprised. The good doctor is to announce something in Des Moines this afternoon, and if it isn't formation of a White House exploratory committee I'll kiss your arse on the steps of the Cato Institute and give you time to get Chris Mathews and his camera crew  to the ceremony.

Ron Paul's 2008 caucus vote  was  9+ per cent. Without Gary Johnson and a couple of even more minor candidates making libertarian noises, Paul would do better this time for three reasons:  (1) He's learned from his 2008 organizational mistakes, mainly frittering away money. (2) He is actively courting the evangelical right with a harder pro-life position. (3)  Libertarian thinking has become less outre after two Obama years which gave even the unwashed a glimpse of what a statist future really holds.

If Johnson perseveres, he'll get a good  measure of the Paul vote. Cain and Trump will also get pieces of it. If we use the caucus vote to measure the advance of  liberty thinking, adding the Paul and Moore tallies will probably be the best we can do.

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I'll jump the gun a little and make the day's second edit of your vital list of  Air Force 1 aspirants.   (Link fixed.)

Rand is out.  He  was never much more than a velleity among the small set which prefers younger libertarian heads,  balmed with Brylcreem.



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UPDATE:  Ron Paul did the expected.

Iowa Caucuses 2002; Culling the herd

Haley Barbour of Mississippi is out despite a solid tie for third in the latest GOP coolest-hair polls. (He and Michele trailed only Don and Sarah.)

Now, dropping out is often a tactic for dropping back in (beg me, please beg me)  but Haley probably means it.  He claims no fire in his belly, code for "I haven't got a prayer."

The remaining supplicants here in Grant Wood Bucolia now total 19, including the firebellied certains, the probables, the possibles, and a few who have, at most, a little smoldering navel lint.

Your indispensable master list of  mental giants seeking to lead the Free World has been updated.
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Birther - ing us all

Joel has a ready answer for the striped-pants set:.

I emerged squalling from the nether regions of a human female. She seemed upset at the time.

The increasingly whacky Department of State wants that kind of information before it will issue you a passport. The  form, here, assumes that within 45 minutes* you can, among other things,  jot down the times  and places of your mother's doctor appointments in conjunction with your debut, along with any welcoming religious ceremonies. (I urge you to stifle disrespectful thoughts about  inquiring among Obama's  mom's physicians.)

I'm exempt because I had the foresight to be born in a hospital run by good Lutheran patriots who promptly reported me to the authorities in order that I might be entered on the tax rolls.


Besides, I already have a passport, but, dammit, I think it would be fun to re-apply, just so I could tell Foggy Bottom: "Upon the13th day of my existence, local Celtic mystics  were joined by coreligionists from miles around.  Garbed in ceremonial nudity accented with woad,  they conducted  the traditional rites of precautionary exorcism."


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And lest we think that this uberbureacracy is strictly federal,or that you can get away from it by dying, don't forget the snoopers' compulsions to continue it beyond your grave.  

*Paperwork Reduction Notice. Snort.

H'T also to Tam again.

Giving perverts a bad name -- and official cover

A TSAer who gets to grope for a living just can't get enough of the little tykes at work.  His off-duty hobby seems to be gaping, along with aiding and abetting similar scum.

An on-line site has it, but so far the big timers haven't found it newsworthy. And maybe our official leaders are fudging a little point  here, too.

"Although the case was unsealed Thursday, neither the indictment nor the news release mentioned Gordon's job searching airline passengers for TSA."


H/T -- Tam