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You know, I could have spent a lot of time typing up all the notes I took on what was said by the LP candidates at the debate…or I could just link you to this very awesome live-blogging coverage of it by Stephen Littau at The Liberty Papers. I’ve been reading their blog a bit, and I do think it’s going in my feed reader!

All in all, I was impressed by the debate. It was nothing like the ones you see on the mainstream media. Most of the questions were policy-based, and all the candidates got a chance to answer all the questions. None of this favoritism stuff you see with the MSM, where the frontrunners get to answer all the questions and the “second-tier” candidates only have a few minutes of speaking time. How a debate really should be: a place where everybody’s views can be heard. I haven’t made up my mind who I thought won the debate. The trouble is that they all mostly agreed with each other, with very few differences. Except for a few shots at their rivals, with former GOP Congressman Bob Barr taking most of the heat, they all pretty much sounded the same to me.

I must say, the Libertarian Party really caught my attention tonight. Coming from someone who’s fed up with the two-party duopoly in this country, that may not be so surprising to anyone who reads this blog. But to me, who thought they’d never consider joining a political party again, it really is something.

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As the Democratic primary season drags to the end of May and into June, other parties have already made decisions or are now making decisions as to who to run for their candidates.

I’m a bit late on this, but in March, the members of the New American Independent Party chose Frank McNulty as their nominee. Since I want to keep focusing on non-party candidates for the time being, I won’t do an analysis on him right now, but Mr. McNulty is just about on my list for when I do reach the third parties. Might be a little while, though. Needless to say, I have been doing some reading on his website from time to time, and I must say, I like what I’m seeing.

Meanwhile, the Libertarian Party is currently holding a convention to find their nominee. It started on Thursday and goes to Monday. A couple of high profile names are vying to be named their candidate, from former GOP Congressman Bob Barr to former 2008 Democratic Party candidate and Alaska Senator Mike Gravel. I just found out on the LP website that they’ll be holding a debate between seven of their candidates tonight at 7pm MDT (9pm EDT) on C-SPAN. I’m pretty interested in hearing what they have to say, so I’m going to watch it. Unfortunately, I no longer have the ability to “live-blog” a debate, as I don’t have cable in my room at home, but I’ll take some notes, and post an entry after it’s over. Stay tuned.

Finally, not part of a party himself, but perennial candidate for many parties, Ralph Nader, has recently chosen a VP running mate in lawyer Matt Gonzalez.

I’ll be back tonight after the Libertarian Party debate. I’m pretty sure there won’t be breaks, with C-SPAN not being a commercial network and all, but if there are, I’ll “live-delay blog” as much as I can.

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Now, I’m a second amendment supporter, as in, the personal freedom interpretation of the second amendment. I wouldn’t support any “militia-only” interpretation of it.

But some people ought to go out and buy some tin foil, so they can make themselves a hat.

Like the commenters here at Michelle Malkin’s place. Many of them are of the “OMG! If a Dem wins, they’re gonna take my gun away!” train of thought.

These are the same type of people who are clearly covering their houses with the metal, because they think we’re going to convert to the amero and give our sovereignty to Mexico.

Try again, kids.

With their guns and tin foil armor, they’ll be protected!

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Well now that I’ve officially become an alum of ECSU, I suppose it’s time to briefly describe my actual graduation.

I say briefly because, to be honest, it won’t be the most memorable day of my life.

First, I only got three hours of sleep, so the entire day is one big blur that I can’t remember well.

Then, the actual graduation was laden with audio issues! The initial speakers made the person’s voice sound like an alien, and the replacement ones brought up (my old department to the rescue!) were better, but kept getting this pulse sound through them for the rest of the event.

So, a graduation with long gaps in people talking, audio issues, and little sleep combined to be kind of sucky.

The speakers were good, though, and that beach ball was a laugh, if a little disrespectful at times. I thought it worked to break up the long wait on the speaker replacements, but not so much when the speakers were talking!

Oh well. There will be other events to remember.

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My thoughts go out to Senator Ted Kennedy and his family as he fights a malignant brain tumor.

No matter what you think of the man’s politics, a brain tumor is a horrible thing to have.  Yet, whenever this happens, the fringe wackos on the other side of the aisle wish the person death.

They should be fucking ashamed.

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I’ll post more about it later, but damn, it’s something to have gotten to this day. I’m so excited, I can’t get back to sleep!

Blast!

I’m trying for a few more minutes…

More later, and probably pictures, too.

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For the first time, cross-posted from my LiveJournal account, because the site was originally down for server transfer, and I really wanted to get this out.  WARNING: Spoilers for the last episode of Battlestar Galactica.  If you haven’t seen it and you plan to see it, you might not want to read this.

Continue reading →

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Dan Abrams is making the case for an Obama-Clinton ticket, noting the intense rivalry between the two candidates, but particularly their supporters.

In reference to Obama supporters disliking this ticket, he asks, “Shouldn’t they just swallow their pride?”

If it comes to it, I say yes.  Deal with it; if Obama thinks it’s good for him, they should accept it.  Not that I think she’s the inevitable running mate, as some media commenters are starting to suggest.  There are definitely other, probably more qualified options for him to choose.  But in the end, it’s up to him, and how he and his campaign see themselves winning the election.

Obama may have some differences with Clinton, but just listen to his speech this afternoon after the Edwards endorsement.  He speaks of working with her to win against McCain in the fall.  He certainly seems to have no issue working with her, so I’m a bit at a loss as to why some Obama supporters could be so against her as to outright reject such a pairing.

This is also how I feel with the vice-versa situation, an Obama nomination or Clinton-Obama pairing.

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As we wait for voters in West Virginia to vote, and for those polls to close, there’s something that is obvious about today, if you follow polls and the news, anyway:

Obama’s going to lose, and pretty badly.

Of course, you have to take everything with a grain of salt, but if what everybody says is true, this won’t be a good day for him?

Why?  Well, a number of factors, but I think it’s loss of appeal to blue-collar voters.  We’ve seen it time and again.  Even in states Obama wins, he has a tough time with white, blue-collar voters.  The cities are his domain, and in most places with a university, Obama rocks it out.

Unfortunately, that won’t win him the general election, especially when he has to start convincing conservatives to vote for him, as he’s going to need them against McCain.  Therefore, Obama needs to start moving to the center.

Just like how McCain was courting further right conservatives during the end of his primary run, I argued he also needed to start moving toward the center, or risk losing some of the Independents he’d picked up.  It is the same with Obama.

It is going to perhaps require considering other viewpoints that he may not have previously considered, but it is necessary, or he’ll have a tough time come November.  He needs to appeal to not only blue-collar Democrats, but he’ll also need Independent and even some conservatives to win the general.  So, he needs to begin speaking in a new way, especially when faced with some of the more conservative Democrats.

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Now, as I said a few minutes ago, I don’t usually buy into conspiracy theories, but when somebody can’t answer a simple question about why Lake County didn’t start reporting its results earlier, I grow suspicious.

A couple minutes ago, CNN’s John King asked Gary, Indiana mayor Rudy Clay three times why Lake County hasn’t been reporting its results incrementally throughout the night, and Clay would not give a straight answer. Not a reasoning, not a “I don’t know,” just a “We’re counting 11,000 early votes.”

Why can’t they release the machine votes as they get them? I don’t understand it. Come on, Clay. All you had to say is “I don’t know.” That. is. all!