McCain getting hammered for habeus stance?

I know that comments after an article or blog post aren’t exactly the best place to find a balanced cross-section of views in our society, but usually you have at least some mixture of opinions, especially if the article is on a major news website.  However, finding any opinions that agree with John McCain are hard to find in the comments of this post at MSNBC (hell, there appear to be more Hillary flakes than people who agree with McCain).

However, I did see one which I thought I would comment on:

LEt’s see under the old policies of treating terrorists and enemy combatants as criminals the WTC was bombed, 9/11 was planned, two embassies were blow up, our barracks at Khobar Towers was destroyed, the Cole was bombed.

Since we started taking the fight to them in Iraq and Aghan there have been no attacks inside the US or at any of our installations abroad.  The GOP must be doing something right.

1) I guess the 4,000 troops in Iraq don’t count
2) Incidents of terrorism have increased. OK, they’re not bombing embassies any more, but that doesn’t mean they’re not bombing other things instead.

However, this may be the best one:

Timothy McVeigh had the benefit of habeas; last I heard, he’s still dead.

One Hundred Dollars

You know AP, we’re laughing at you, not with you.

Like bloggers are going to pay you $100 per article to quote you when we don’t even have to, while on top of that being told that we can’t even say how shitty your reporting might be.

Thought of the Day

Am I the only one who thinks that thia talk about McCain dropping out of the race is complete garbage?

I guess the thought is that they can then stick in some fresh face who hasn’t been pounded on for 3 months and thus have a chance to have an unvetted candidate elected President over Obama.

However, there are several problems with this:

1) If this was an anti-GOP year, why would they vote for one just because he’s a “fresh face” (assuming they actually choose a fresh face.  Some of the “possibilities” are hardly fresh)

2) Why would people choose to vote for an unvetted candidate, necessarily?  I’d think the argument of “there is no way to vet someone in two months, and you shouldn’t elect someone you don’t know” would be a powerful one.  And no, I don’t want to hear yapping about Obama not being vetted.  He’s been running for something like 18 months now.  That’s a far cry from only running for 2.

3) If McCain had picked a VP candidate – something that usually happens in July – wouldn’t that person be the natural person to nominate?

4) How in the world is it a good thing for the GOP to have absolute chaos at their convention?  People feared Clinton possibly “contesting” the election at the Democratic Convention, even though there would have only been one ballot since there would be only two people running.  Having a truly contested convention would be even worse, and while the press might love it, the GOP would be mighty embarassed by the time they were on the 5th ballot for President.  And we haven’t even addressed what might happen in the fight for the second spot.

In the end, the only way McCain is dropping out is because of health, and it would probably have to be something pretty bad that would either preventing him from campaigning or would cast enough doubt on his ability to live thorugh his first term that people would start looking for an alternative.  However, I highly doubt he’d be like “I’m just tired from being old, go find someone else.”

Obama gaining in North Carolina

I don’t usually write about specific polls, and especially a specific state poll, but I thought that this poll was significant for several reasons.

1. First off, it has Obama within 4 of McCain in North Carolina 45-41, with Barr getting 2%
2. This is a GOP polling firm, so if a GOP firm is saying that North Carolina is in play by being within 4%, then you definitely know it’s in play
3. Obama has consistently gained on McCain.  McCain lead by 10% in February, 9% in April, 5% in May, and now 4% in June.
4. This also marks the first time Obama is over 40% in the state in this poll.
5. Meanwhile, McCain has hung around 45% all spring – showing at 44% in February, 48% in April, 46% in May, and of course 45% this month.

Margin of error is +/- 4%, so each change from one poll to the next is all within the margin of error, but the trend seems to be unmistakeable.

Status of the Electoral College: June 17

Here is the map for June 17th. Notes are below:

Numbers:

• My “official” count: Obama 219, McCain 201, Too Close to Call 118
• Strong states only: Obama 175, McCain 126
• Weak states only: McCain 75, Obama 44
• Count with “leaners”: Obama 272, McCain 266

All states with change of status

• Arkansas: Strong McCain to Weak McCain
• Iowa: Too Close to Call to Weak Obama
• Nevada: Weak McCain to Too Close to Call
• Wisconsin: Too Close to Call to Weak Obama

All states with some sort of change this week

• Arkansas (Strong McCain to Weak McCain) – new poll June 16
• Iowa (To Close To Call to Weak Obama) – new poll on June 12
• Georgia (no change) – new poll June 11
• Kansas (no change) – new polls on June 13 and June 16
• Massachusetts (no change) – new poll on June 12
• Michigan (no change) – new poll June 11
• Minnesota (no change) – new poll on June 13
• Nebraska (no change) – one poll fell off the one-month window and thus isn’t being used any more.
• Nevada (Weak McCain to To Close To Call) – new poll on June 16
• New Jersey (no change) – new poll on June 11
• New York (no change) – new polls on June 11 & June 16 (x2)
• North Carolina (no change) – new poll on June 12
• Oklahoma (no change) – new poll on June 13
• Oregon (no change) – new poll on June 13
• Virginia (no change) – new poll on June 17
• Washington (no change) – new poll June 11
• Wisconsin (To Close to Call to Weak Obama) – new poll on June 12

Also, see the spreadsheet.

If I include “leaners” – in other words if I include states where a candidate currently leads, but the margin is less than 5% (something which I’m keeping track of unofficially) – the Electoral Vote looks like Obama 272, McCain 266.

This is thanks to a razor-thin Obama lead in Ohio, and similarly razor-thin McCain leads in Michigan, Missouri, and Virginia.

Also, perhaps another metric to see the position of each candidate:

Total States where over 50%

Obama – 13 (for 171 Electoral Votes)
McCain – 14 (for 129 Electoral Votes)

So while McCain has more states where he’s over 50%, he has 42 fewer electoral votes where he crosses the 50% mark. In other words, Assuming where candidates are today is the floor of their support, Obama is already 63% towards getting a majority while McCain is only 48% of the way there.

Total States where leading, but under 50%

Obama – 9 (for 101 Electoral Votes)
McCain – 15 (for 137 Electoral Votes)

Total States where losing, but over 40% (number of those states where opponent is under 50%)

Obama – 13 states for 131 Electoral Votes (9 states for 98 Electoral Votes)
McCain – 7 state for 75 Electoral Votes (6 states for 72 Electoral Votes)

I’m including what are To Close To Call states on the map for the purposes of these numbers. As you can see, Obama is in a much better position when it comes to picking off states. Not only does he have fewer states (9 to 15) and electoral votes (101 to 137) than McCain which are in imminent danger of being picked off, but Obama has more states and Electoral Votes which he is in a position to pick off.

Also, McCain has very little growth potential once one looks past the high potential pick off targets for him, where Obama is looking at another 30 electoral votes which he could go after beyond those foremost in his sights.

Now, onto the status for each candidate:

Obama

Obama clearly wins this week as not only did he add two important states into his list – Iowa and Wisconsin – and put another state, Nevada, into the gray area, but nearly every single poll released this week improved his position. He improved in Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin and essentially stayed the same in Georgia, New Jersey and New York. He only really slid in Oregon, and that was just slightly; it’s still a “strong Obama” state.

60 of the McCain’s 65 “leaner” Electoral Votes are now within 3%, with a full 41 Electoral Votes within 1% (Michigan, Missouri, and Virginia). Only Ohio and it’s 20 Electoral Votes are within 1% for Obama, and only New Mexico and it’s 5 EVs and Connecticut and it’s 7 EVs are within 3% (and I seem to doubt that Connecticut will stay there after the next poll in that state). In short, McCain has more electoral votes within 1% of Obama than Obama has within 3% of McCain.

Obama now has multiple clear paths to victory. Giving Obama any state in which he leads by at least 2% puts him at 252 Electoral votes. Obama could win by either:

1. Winning Ohio
2. Winning Michigan or North Carolina and any other TCTC state
3. Winning Missouri and any McCain leaning TCTC state not named New Hampshire or Nevada
4. Winning Missouri, Hew Hampshire, and Nevada
5. Winning Virginia and any McCain leaning TCTC state not named New Hampshire

Yes, Obama still has a path to victory, even if he were to lose Ohio, Michigan, and New Hampshire (though it would be tough, he could do it with Missouri and North Carolina or with Virginia and Nevada).

McCain

Perhaps the main good thing for McCain this week is that there is no change in the Electoral College map if one includes leaners – McCain is still 4 Electoral Votes from a win, which he could get by picking off New Mexico or by pulling a shocker in Connecticut (or the easy way by winning Ohio).

McCain’s main hope right now is hoping that Obama’s nomination bounce is just a bounce and isn’t something lasting. However, he is very close to having Pennsylvania go into the “weak Obama” category (Connecticut probably should be there in the first place, but we’ll have to wait for a new poll for that) and having Missouri, Michigan, and Virginia go into the Obama with leaners total.

McCain also has more “weak” electoral votes than Obama does – 75 to 44 to be precise – though for better or for worse, most of them have been historically reliable red states except Florida and West Virginia.

McCain’s strategy at this point is to keep it close and hope people swing to him in the end for national security reasons or that something happens to Obama along the way. However, what he can’t have is the trend towards Obama that we say this week last for very much longer

Other stats

States which haven’t had a new poll in over a month:

Alaska, DC, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Montana, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont, Wyoming

Sister states
These are states for each candidate where the margin in those states are within 1% of each other and within 3 total electoral votes or 25% of electoral votes of the smaller state.

• Ohio (Obama, 20 EVs, +0.2%) and Michigan (McCain, 17 EVs, +0.5%)
• New Mexico (Obama, 5 EVs, +2.8%) and New Hampshire (McCain, 4 EVs, +1.8%)
• Iowa (Obama, 7 EVs, +5%) and Nevada (McCain, 5 EVs, +4.4%)
• Delaware (Obama, 3 EVs, +9%) and Alaska (McCain, 3 EVs, +8%)
• Oregon (Obama, 7 EVs, +10.7%) and Mississippi (McCain, 6 EVs, +10.5%) or Kansas (McCain, 6 EVs, +10.6%)
• Maine (Obama, 4 EVs, +13%) and Idaho (McCain, 4 EVs, +13%) or Wyoming (McCain, 3 EVs, +13%)
• Maryland (Obama, 10 EVs, +14%) and Oklahoma (McCain, 7 EVs, +14%)
• Vermont (Obama, 3 EVs, + 34%) and Utah (McCain, 5 EVs, +35%)

To see the current status, go to the Status of the Electoral College page.

Blowing Roe Off

This “talking point” should be a serious red flag for anyone even thinking of considering the Hillary hold-outs as a serious group and legitimate part of the Democratic Party:

DAILY TALKING POINT 6/17/08: ROE V WADE IS SETTLED LAW. IT HAS SURVIVED 34 YEARS, 24 OF WHICH WERE UNDER REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTS. RIGHT-WING LUNATICS MAY NOT HAVE GOTTEN THE MEMO YET, BUT HERE’S THE FACTS: THE ERA OF FORCED PREGNANCY IS ALREADY LONG GONE. OBAMA MOVEMENT, YOUR SCARE TACTICS WONT WORK.

Really? You’re going to say that mere days after 4 of 9 Supreme Court justices tried to rule that the United States had the right to hold non-citizens/non-naturalized aliens without any recourse, period? Really?

I’m sure many people would have thought that the absolute right of habeus corpus for anyone under the jurisdiction of the United States (and we’re obviously saying that detainees are under our jurisdiction or else we wouldn’t be able to prosecute them) was settled law, but 4 of 9 Supreme Court justices disagreed.  With a John McCain Supreme Court justice on the court, they would have almost certainly won.

Shrugging off any challenge to Roe because it’s “settled” is an extremely dangerous and extremely naive position to take.  Surely the effect of two Bush nominees on the court should have shown them that much already.

Oh, and P.S.: Hillary herself disagrees with you.

Also, am I the only one who finds it ironic that a group which is supposedly all about people who are claiming that they are “thinking for themselves” (because, of course, it’s impossible to think for yourself and support Obama at the same time) is also handing out talking points and telling people to freep this comment thread or another?  So much for thinking for yourself.

Also, perhaps they can answer my challenge on actually showing how their claim that Obama was “selected” is true.

P.P.S. Update: Do you serioiusly expect me to believe that, had Clinton won the nomination, that you wouldn’t be using the possibility of Roe being overturned by McCain supreme court justices as an argument why women should vote for Clinton?  This is nothing more than taking a position, then choosing arguments to fit your position, even if they completely contradict all the positions you held previously.

Jumping the Shark, and a Challenge

So yeah, can we say that a certain blog-that-shall-not-be-named has jumped the shark when they start listening to Tom Delay to boost their talking points and throw Al Gore under the bus for not endorsing Clinton?  Of course, they jumped the shark a long time ago, and I figure it’s only a matter of time before they throw Clinton herself under the bus when she starts actively campaigning for Obama.

And oh yeah, I’ve seen a lot of claims on that site by people that Obama “stole” the nomination from Clinton.  OK, Obama has a 128 pledged delegate lead over Clinton.  Please show me a way that Obama “stole” enough delegates from Clinton to give him a delegate lead over her.  Oh yeah, and please be consistent in your arguments.

Oh yeah, and here is a second challenge: Why are you demanding Obama release his actual birth certificate when he’s already released a Certificate of Birth which would be valid in a court of law?  If you think it’s fraudulent, then prove it.  Otherwise, shut up.  And, oh yeah, do we have any assurances that you wouldn’t claim that any birth certificate that Obama may release is also fake anyway?  If you’re willing to say that a Certificate of Birth which is recognized as a legal proof of citizenship if fake, what’s to stop you from saying the same thing about the birth certificate itself?

Renewable Oil

Possibly.  There has been research into genetically engineering bacteria so that they can eat agricultural waste and excrete, of all things, crude oil.

And it’s not only crude oil, but it may be somewhat decent for the environment:

The company claims that this “Oil 2.0” will not only be renewable but also carbon negative – meaning that the carbon it emits will be less than that sucked from the atmosphere by the raw materials from which it is made.

How can they do it?  This is how:

Because crude oil (which can be refined into other products, such as petroleum or jet fuel) is only a few molecular stages removed from the fatty acids normally excreted by yeast or E. coli during fermentation, it does not take much fiddling to get the desired result.

The bacteria apparently are engineered to eat any sort of feedstock or biological material that can be broken down into sugar – and the material used can be adapted for wherever the bacterial plants may be built, such as using wheat straw from California or wood chips from the south.

So how viable is this stuff?  It may be a while yet before you pump your gas at your local Bacteria Brand gas station, but it does look promising:

The closest that LS9 has come to mass production is a 1,000-litre fermenting machine, which looks like a large stainless-steel jar, next to a wardrobe-sized computer connected by a tangle of cables and tubes. It has not yet been plugged in. The machine produces the equivalent of one barrel a week and takes up 40 sq ft of floor space.

Obviously one barrel a week is hardly going to help us at this point, and while 40 square feet for 1 barrel may not sound too horrible, when one takes into account how much oil we actually use, it gets pretty significant:

However, to substitute America’s weekly oil consumption of 143 million barrels, you would need a facility that covered about 205 square miles, an area roughly the size of Chicago.

And that’s the catch right now. This all sounds great in a lab (much like corn ethanol did), but we have to see whether it can actually be turned into a viable sustainable form of energy as well (which corn ethanol is increasingly showing that it isn’t).

However, this research is definitely worth it. It’s noted that if the bacteria were to use Brazilian sugar cane as feed, the oil that is produced could cost as low as $50 a barrel.

Of course, some people may get all horrified and have visions of the blob or whatever when we’re talking about genetically modified bacteria, but research into the genetics of bacteria have been going on for years. I assume that they have ways of getting around the genetic volatility of bacteria, and it sounds like they routinely destroy batches of bacteria and create new ones, which is probably largely because of that.

In any case, this is a very interesting research, and I really hope that this ends up going somewhere.