An older post suddenly turned very current, by Jason Thibeault, on Santroum’s wife’s abortion, a laser-like analysis of last night’s numbers by Pharyngula’s PZ Myers, a commentary on Bachman thinking (or not) on her feet, or not, by Ed Brayton, Zingularity on The Iowa Afterbirth, Greta Christina summarizes the Twiterverse’s Titilating Tweeting about Santorum surging from behind, and my own insightful analysis in which I liken Iowa and New Hampshire to a long married couple deciding where to have dinner.
Monthly Archives: January 2012
From Iowa to New Hampshire. What to look for and what it means. (Updated)
We’ll get to the big picture in just a moment, but first a fair well to our home-girl, Michele. Today’s headline could have been Bachmann Moves Ahead “Full Steam” after Iowa Victory … … by the other guy” but in the end, she appears to have dropped out.
It is … difficult to see such a path for Bachmann, given her last-place finish and the fact that her campaign strategy had been premised on a strong launch in Iowa, the state where she was born and where she won the GOP straw poll in Ames in August.
At first her campaign manager, Keith Nahigian, said Bachmann is going ahead “full steam.”*
But hours later she dropped out of the race. And speaking of the race, let’s have a quick look at the final tallies:
Mitt Romney 30,015 (25%)
Rick Santorum 30,007 (25%)
Ron Paul 26,219 (21%)
Newt Gingrich 16,251 (13%)
Rick Perry 12,604 (10%)
Michele Bachmann 6,073 (5%)
John Huntsman also relieved a few votes, so technically, he came in last behind Michele. (See this insightful analysis of the numbers by Pharngula’s PZ Myers.)
And now, the meaning of it all… Continue reading From Iowa to New Hampshire. What to look for and what it means. (Updated)
Early Iowa Results: Santorum Romney Wins by 18 8 (updated)
Gingrich and Perry both have two digits but are being doubled by the front runers. Michele Bachmann is hanging on to second to last place with 6%.
Apropos my earlier post on this, here’s what this means: Predicting the outcome of the Republican Primary process from this race, we can say with reasonable confidence that the GOP will be fielding a white male or may or may not be a Mormon, a Libertarian or a Dark Horse Conservative.
The polls going into this stage of the primary race showed Romney a tiny bit ahead of Paul with Santorum, Gingrich and Perry (in that order) trailing in late December, with very little change in that configuration just two days ago. Assuming the pattern being reported by major news networks (Romney, Paul and Santorum in a close race at the top) this means that Santorum has moved significantly forward, or was somehow being underrepresented in earlier polling. It is probably safest to assume the former.
UPDATE: At just after midnight Iowa time, with 99% of the results in, Rick Santorum has 25% of the votes is the winner of the Iowa Caucuses by 18 votes over second place Mitt Romnmey. Ron Paul is a close third with 21% of the votes. Gingrich has 13%, Rick Perry 10%, Michele Bachmann 5% and John Huntsman a trace.
It is starting to look like Perry will be withdrawing, and I assume that a fair percentage of his votes will go to Bachmann, so she may rise, in effect, from mid single digits to upper-mid single digits before the week is out, but of course, that only refers to Iowans, and hardly any of them live in New Hampshire, the next stop on this train’s journey. Long journey. Like Michele Bachmann says:
Funniest facebook entry: 2011
Here is my entry for the Funniest Facebook Entry 2011 award:
and here’s the runner-up
These are from here. There’s a lot more where they came from. Do not be drinking a hot beverage while browsing through the provided five pages of facebook updates and comments. Seriously.
I have been awarded a Great Honor
Along with some other deserving people including …
Greta Christina, Ophelia Benson, Jen McCreight, Amanda Marcotte, Stephanie Zvan, Greg Laden, and PZ Myers
It’s hardly a secret that last year was a challenging one for me in terms of a large number of people in our community shitting on me on a daily basis. Amanda, Stephanie, Greg, and PZ were with me at SkepchickCon last year when Richard Dawkins told me that sexism in this community didn’t matter because FGM. I’ll be honest: that was kind of a low point for me, and a big part of me just wanted to pack up and never interact with the atheist community again.
But seeing the reaction of Amanda, PZ, Greg, and Stephanie helped me put it into perspective and realize that I wasn’t alone in this fight, and that meant the world to me. In the weeks that followed, Greta, Ophelia, and Jen joined in to publicly denounce both Dawkins and others who were trying to bully me into silence.
Their support has extended far beyond the Dawkins disaster. When I recently…
Go read all about it here and leave a nice supporting and encouraging comment, or I’ll kick your ass!!!
"Hey Lerb, why big cat have long teeth?"
The history of human thought is an epic adventure of exploration and discovery. Since the beginning of time, humans have been curious about order and chaos in nature and our place in the world. By understanding the natural world around us, we understand ourselves better. But how we attempt to answer these fundamental questions has evolved over time. This evolving history, looks something like this:
The Meaning and Significance of Tonight’s Iowa Caucuses.
Did you know that a “Caucus” is a Native American Thing? It is. And the Iowa Caucuses start tonight in about an hour as I write this. It might look a little different than the original Native American thing.
No candidate that has finished in fourth place or lower in the Iowa Caucuses has ever become president, however, by my count, one of those individuals (a fourth placer) won the Republican nomination. Obama, Kerry, Gore, Clinton, Carter and Mondale were first placers; Dukakis came in third as did Clinton in one of his years, Carter came in second after “nobody” one year, and McGovern came in third after “Uncommitted” and Musky in the year that Nixon’s plumbers fixed the election. So, for the Democrats, coming in first or even second matters as you either win the presidency, win but have the election stolen, or come very close. For the Republicans, going back to 76, Ford came in first and lost, Reagan came in second and won (then came in first as unopposed sitting president). George Bush Senior was unopposed the first time he won, but then became a one termer, so the 92 caucus is meaningless for the Republicans. Dole came in first in 96 and sucked as a candidate, and then George W. Bush did a first place as a new candidate and a first place unopposed. Last election, for the first time in Repulbican history and the only time in the history of the caucuses, a forth placer won the nomination (John McCain) and he was trounced by Obama.
So if there is a pattern, it is this: Continue reading The Meaning and Significance of Tonight’s Iowa Caucuses.
The Impending Ice Age
Obamacare is working
ObamaCare Is Winning the Fight on Fraud and Abuse
Thanks to provisions in the Affordable Care Act (ACA/ObamaCare) and to an unprecedented effort by the Obama Administration, more progress has been made in the past three years to combat health care fraud and abuse than ever before. There was a 68.9 percent increase in criminal health care fraud prosecutions from 2010 to 2011, and 2010 was already the highest ever. See the chart below, released last month by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University.
Cain Reaffirms His Interest in … jeesh…
The man did not know about Libya and US policy there, yet other than the long ongoing wars, that was the single biggest deal that the US Secretary of Defense had to deal with all year.
I had assumed the Vatican was good for Italy
… in terms of tourism dollars, payouts, subcontracting, etc. etc. Indeed, most of the people I know in Italy who are not archaeologists are somehow involved in restoring old stuff, and I think a good amount of Vatican money goes into that. But it appears that my assumption was wrong.
Six billion euros. That’s how much the Catholic Church costs Italy every year, according to the first detailed investigation of the impact of state support and tax privileges received by the Church. The findings by Italy’s Union of Rationalist Atheists and Agnostics (UAAR), a member organization of the International Humanist and Ethical Union, were published the day after Italy’s new government announced a budget filled with new taxes and drastic spending cuts.
“Six billion euros per year are a lot,” said Raffaele Carcano, secretary of UAAR.
I’ll say! Check out the whole story here. Tax The Churches!
All Candidates Should Acknowledge Climate Change
Obviously! But they mostly don’t. Check this out:
New Hampshire scientists call on “all candidates” to “acknowledge” cliamte change
In 2008, one of the little acknowledged political subtexts was how significantly global warming played in the Republican primary process. Both independently and as part of organizational efforts, individuals asked questions at events (and on street corners) and many events has signs about voters’ concerns over the need for climate change action. John McCain stood alone in discussing climate change forthrightly. In terms of impact, John McCain might just have won in New Hampshire (setting him on the path for the nomination) due to statements like these:
Michele Bachmann Makes Surprise Speech
Hat Tip Aseem.
Today is the Iowa Caucus. We are rooting for Michele Bachmann!
How dare this reporter be so mean to Michele:
Why ask a question about issues on the day of the election, dammit!?!?!?
I can only hope that Michele does well enough to say in the race. Please, Iowa, don’t let me down!
2011 Ass Kicking Skeptics
Rebecca Watson has written a year end summary of “Skeptics who Kicked Ass” which you must go read. Hey, guess what? I’m one of them! So look out, I might kick your ass. Be good.