The SoapBoxers

Presidential race

Empire State Building turns blue. Obama wins. (Photo credit: Lisa Bettany {Mostly Lisa})

Barack Obama rolled to a fairly comfortable win on Tuesday night, winning in excess of 300 electoral votes.  Florida is still undecided, but leaning slightly to Obama.  If he wins that state, he’ll end up with 332 electoral votes.  Obama dominated the battleground states, with his win in Ohio punctuating the victory.

The base of the Democratic party, the states which Democratic candidates have won in each of the last six elections, now accounts for 242 electoral votes.  In essence, this means that the 2016 Democratic candidate starts with 242 electoral votes in his/her pocket and need to only capture 28 more from Colorado, Florida, Iowa, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, North Carolina, and Virginia.

Currently, the Republicans win amongst white males and get beaten by Democrats in most other demographic groups.  If the Republican platform remain the same, this could create a problem, as the racial/ethnic makeup of the country is changing, with Caucasians becoming a smaller percentage of the population every year.  The Republicans must make more of an effort to the issues that are important to women and racial and ethnic minorities.

Congress

The new Senate will consist of 54 Democrats (this includes Bernie Sanders), 45 Republicans, and one Independent.  Former Maine governor Angus “Burger” King won the Senate race.  While he has not disclosed which party he will caucus with, most insiders feel he will side with Democrats.  The Democratic party actually gave no support to the actual Democrat in the race, fearing a splintered vote would allow the Republican to win.  Two of the higher profile losses were Akin and Mourdock gaffe-ing their way to defeat in races where they had a good chance to win.

The Republicans will maintain their majority in the House, with numbers approaching their current strength of 240 members.

Speaker of the House John Boehner was quick to say “The American people also made clear there’s no mandate for raising tax rates.”  That’s true, speaker Boehner, but tax rates WILL increase at the end of the year unless congress and the president agree on a solution.  The Bush-era tax cuts and the FICA reduction will be expiring. 

While there have been rhetoric about bi-partisanship this morning, there will surely be a tense battle as we approach the fiscal cliff at the end of the year.  Buckle your seat belts.

Meanwhile, in Iowa

Iowa’s representation in the House dropped from five to four.  This meant that Republican incumbent Tom Latham and Democratic incumbent Leonard Boswell went head-to-head in a new district.  Latham won, and overall the voters elected two Democrats and two Republicans.  Iowa’s Senators – who were not up for re-election and long-term members Chuck Grassley (Republican) and Tom Harkin (Democrat).  The governor is Republican, the state legislature has one house controlled by each party, and Obama won the presidential vote.  Iowa is purple.

In 2009, Iowa’s Supreme Court struck down a ban on gay marriage, declaring it unconstitutional.  All seven members of the court joined the unanimous decision.

Iowa’s Supreme Court justices are appointed by the governor (from a pool nominated by commission).  They are on the ballot for retention after one year on the job, and then again every eight years.  In 2010, it happened that three of those justices were up for retention.  A well-funded effort to have them removed from office narrowly won.

The same group tried again this year, running ads against Supreme Court Justice David Wiggins.  This time around, voters chose to retain Wiggins.  I think 2010 was a serious wake-up call to a lot of voters, making them aware of the dangers of politicizing the judicial process.  If a political group could make judges fear for their jobs – and kicking 43% of the court out in one election could definitely instill such fear – then might the judges be fearful of making unpopular decisions, even if they were the legally correct decisions?  Let our judges be just, even when their decisions are not popular.

For the moment, the attempt to replace the justices and replace them with ones who might over the decision seems dead.

There’s a second way to negate the decision, and that would be to amend the state constitution.  However, that’s a pretty cumbersome process.  It involves passage of both houses of the legislature in two consecutive sessions.  A session is two years.  With the Democrats appearing to be in control of the state senate, the issue seems to be off the table until at least the 2015-2016 session.  This means that the very earliest it could reach the voters is 2017.  Barring a change in the makeup of the legislature (members leaving to to death, illness, scandal, etc) or a reversal by the supreme court, it seems that gay marriage will be legal in Iowa for a number of years.

Election day has finally arrived.  For those of us in the battleground states, it will signal the end of political ads and the returns of ads for Ruffles, Charmin, and Tide.  Hooray for Charmin!

The mainstream media likes to talk about the national polls, but as I have said in the past, these polls are completely worthless.  There’s no prize for the candidate who wins the national popular vote.

Most of the polls have had President Obama maintaining a lead in the electoral college (based on his performance in various state polls) for several months now.  While it’s true that Obama’s leads are within the margin of error in many states, he will most likely win most of those states.  As long as the polling errors are not matter of systemic bias (unintentional or intentional) and are simply independent errors, these polls should be erring on the side of Obama roughly half the time and on the side of Romney half the time.  The fact that the margin is within the poll’s margin of error does not necessarily mean that the trailing candidate is the one getting the short end of the stick – the poll could also be understating the lead of a candidate.

There has been much talk about Ohio.  Without it, Romney has a nearly impossible task in front of him.  I see Obama winning Ohio, due in part to election day weather.  There is very little chance of rain on Tuesday in Cleveland and Cincinnati, and this helps Obama.  Every inch of rain on election days boosts Republicans by 2.5%?  Why?  This is simply a bus vs. car issue.  Taking a bus somewhere in the rain is a worse experience that driving a car, because of how wet you get walking to and from bus stops.  Two demographics that use public transit more than others are the poor and inner city dwellers (poor and non-poor alike).  Both of these groups skew to the left.

Election Fraud

There has been much talk about voter fraud and the possibility of requiring IDs to vote.  I really think people are missing the forest for the trees.  Studies have shown that in-person voter fraud is very rare.  Absentee fraud is far more common.

The real danger, though, is people who are being disenfranchised.  There are shenanigans every year.  Among the tricks this year and notifying voters of alternative voting methods (phone and email) that are not actually legitimate, throwing away voter registration forms for a particular party, and sending in a fraudulent absentee ballot for a vote, so that when the voter appears at the poll in person, they will not be allowed to vote.

At this point, I would suggest that you never trust anyone to help with your registration – handle it yourself.  Even taking the precaution of waiting for the registration card in the mail isn’t good enough, as it would be very easy for the perpetrators to send out counterfeit cards (which, of course, would be worthless when trying to prove you are registered).

Some international observers recently have been critical about the US election process.  With some of the tricks that get pulled by partisans, and the outright lies in many campaign commercials, I do think our election process falls well short of the standards we should strive for.  Today’s voters may have more information than at any time in the past, but in many cases, they aren’t more informed – they are misinformed.  Take a few minutes to find the context for quotes and “facts” and you’ll be a more educated voter.  We should strive for a future when voters are correctly informed and when every eligible voter is allowed to cast a vote – even when their party differs from yours.

Kosmo and I are both are deep into the NaNoWriMo effort. I have not seen Kosmo’s update, but so far I am on track with this year’s event with 7828 words so far. This is just barely above the 1667 words per day. It has been fun. My one piece of advice is based on my lessons learned. For the actual NaNoWriMo effort, do not spend time reviewing what you have already written. I have spent many hours in the past reading and editing my work with very little progress to the 50,000 word goal. That is only advice for the month of writing. When you are trying to create a novel, most of your time is reading and rereading your own effort to knock the edges off of the sharp corners and make sure the work in internally consistent.

This year I started with a four element outline, just four major events that I am trying to weave together with a good connecting steam of actions and descriptions. I am almost a fifth of the way into the work with the joining of the first two events underway and background for the next event already sort of in place.

To keep up the pace of writing, I have been trying to get two uninterrupted hours each night. The weekend days provided several writing opportunities, but many more interruptions than the week nights. I have even snuck in a couple of minutes typing before heading to work. I hope all of you are getting similar opportunities.

On Football, the traditional power houses are slowly floating to the top, both in college and in professional ranks. In College, Alabama, Kansas State, Notre Dame and Oregon are the major undefeated with Louisville being the ugly duckling undefeated. In the pros, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Chicago, the New York Giants, San Francisco and New England are back in the top. Denver, Atlanta and Houston are new comers, but not very surprising.

I have noticed plenty of chants for the replacement referees. A little sooner than I expected, but it just depends on if you think your team is being short changed. We are in the final stretch for the college teams and the half way point for the pros. Now we should start seeing the games in the mud and snow, which to me is real football weather. I personally cannot wait for Johnny’s college update.

For a few years now, Martin Kelly has been participating in NaNoWriMo.  This year, I’m also taking the plunge.

What are the odds of me hitting the 50,000 word goal by the end of the month?  Not good.  Not good at all.  However, I’m hoping that the exercise will allow me to find small pockets of writing time and take advantage of them, so that I can continue the good habits after November is over.  I have several book ideas at the moment, but have struggled to find time to write.

If you want to buddy me on the site, go ahead.  Here’s my profile.

My book is tentatively titled “Shuffle”.  My main idea behind the book is that the main character’s life has been shuffled like a deck of cards and he’s going to live the time out of sequence.  This is likely triggered by an event in his 20s, to avoid having his youth messed up to much.  In a nutshell, one day he’ll be 42.  The next day he’ll be 25.  A few weeks later, he’ll be 70.  The idea came from the combination of several things – Quantum Leap, Memento, 11/22/63, and more importantly, the “random” button on XKCD.

The one thing missing at the moment is a plot.  I came up with this idea on the spur of the moment a few days ago.  Is the main character the protagonist or the antagonist?  If the story is going to be interesting, there really should be some sort of conflict.  But what sort of conflict?  Romantic troubles, or someone trying to kill the character.  (On second thought, those two ideas really aren’t mutually exclusive).  Heck, I’m not even settled on the gender of the character, much less the name (although I could always just go with Pat).

OK, need to finish this up and get back to my writing.  My word count at 11:30 on the first day of NaNoWriMo?  7.

Mitt Romney can’t lose.  President Obama won’t let him.

A person once asked on Facebook “Does the presidential debate make a difference?” At first I thought about Regan’s debates. He didn’t just impress the People, he connected with them. His ideas resonated with the audience. His humor even garnered laughs from his opponent. President Reagan was likable, presidential, and his ideas became our ideas. I think the vast majority agreed the government wasn’t the solution it was the problem. His one and only debate in 1980 possibly won the election for him. What got him reelected was his ideas worked. When Reagan ran for reelection the economy was turning around. People saw their lives improve, the Iranian hostages released, and no more gasoline rationing.

Mitt Romney has ideas not tag lines. The first debate Mitt Romney devastated his opponent. Mitt didn’t do this with general terms like hope or change. Change can mean anything and different people have different hopes. Romney did a wonderful job explaining why cutting taxes works. Romney did an excellent job explaining what reduces violence including gun violence. Romney connected with the People with ideas.

Mitt Romney was very specific. He was specific on the effect of taxes and economic behavior. He was specific on national defense. Romney was very specific on what policies and promises President Obama failed in. Romney’s ideas are measurable. Reducing permanently unemployed and unemployed is measureable. Not cutting spending on national defense is measureable. Reducing taxes and limiting deductions is measureable. All these ideas are attainable and relevant.

People notice the greatest economies are in states with oil and oil exploration like North Dakota and Texas. Romney’s ideas for energy independence are attainable and relevant. Green technology is not there yet. Romney’s ideas are time-bound. Green technology isn’t there yet, clean coal and clean oil production is.

S Specific

M Measurable

A Attainable

R Relevant

T Time-bound

Romney is SMART and smart. President Obama’s hope and change could mean anything to anyone. While this may have helped him get into office it hindered his ability to get reelected. People have wonderful imaginations which lead to great disappointment when their ideas of change are not achieved. Hope is quickly erased with every policy that don’t match their idea of change. Failing to be specific is a failure of leadership.

President Obama did do measurements correctly but when it’s not coupled to specifics it is useless. He promised that if we pass TARP we won’t see 9% unemployment. He wasn’t specific on how this was to be achieved. We know throwing money at a problem doesn’t fix it and it didn’t fix employment it made it worse. He promised green jobs and energy independence. He failed and added billions to the debt in the process. He promised to cut taxes but only provided 18 tax incentives and extensions. Every April I pay more taxes and the President’s so-called “tax-cuts” are not relevant to the working middle class.

The last debate on foreign policy should have been a slam dunk for Romney. The Libyan embassy attack was and continues to blow up in Obama’s face beyond any Lewinski scandal or Watergate cover-up. Romney could have gone on the attack with near impunity but he chose not to and played it safe. With what I consider only a fair performance Romney still gained in the polls.

President Obama is not time-bound and is asking for four more years to somehow find success with the same failed policies. President Obama’s attempts to impress have failed to connect with the People. President Obama has failed in every debate to sound presidential, SMART, and smart. Debates matter and President Obama did everything right to ensure a Romney win on November 6.

It is that time of year again. National Novel Writing Month is almost upon us. It is time to sharpen you pencil or warm up you keyboard. The goal is 50,000 words captured during the month of November. The rewards are tremendous; bragging rights, nifty icons, and your novel captured.

I have participated in NaNoWriMo each of the last three years. The first two saw success. My first effort was finally complete and available for the public early this year. It is a romance, and nothing like what I had originally planned. I am planning a freebee week during November, and will advertise it on The Soap Boxers. My second effort was also a success in that I reached 50,000 words. It is still incomplete, a science fiction effort that I have really enjoyed writing. My third effort fell well short of the 50,000 words and will likely never be finished. It is a teenage adventure fantasy involving fire breathing ninja squirrels from outer space. I thought it would be the easiest of my attempts, but I was wrong.

This year I am planning a fantasy word epic that I think can actually spread across several books. Of course you have to finish one before you can have a second.

Some of you may not have heard of NaNoWriMo before. It is an event sponsored by the office of letters and lights at NaNoWriMo.org. The site provides plenty of encouragement, examples of success, and the opportunity to support writing at all levels, from kids to professionals. There are writing communities that can be joined either electronically or locally. They schedule write ins and web casts. The official word counter is provided so that you can gauge your progress and claim your prizes.

I hope that each and every one of you participates. It is not really about winning the day, it is about writing. It is about capturing your ideas in written words, and if you choose, to share them with others. It is not a contest to see who is the best, strongest, or most long winded. It is not an election or a game. This is an opportunity to have fun, write, and be with others trying to do the same thing. It all begins on November 1. If you want to participate in the actual event, log on to NaNoWriMo.org and set up your profile.

Let the writing begin!!!!!

My My….crow is tasty and best served when cold….

In lasts week’s article I went on the record about Notre Dame with the following statement:

I am going on record that Boomer Sooner will roll one up on this over-rated team. Of course I could be completely wrong as frankly Oklahoma can be pretty average as well (see loss to Kansas State). Coach Stoops has a way of losing the big one, but I predict this will look more like the game against Texas than the turnover plagued loss to the Wildcats.

I even went as far to proclaim in the office that you can’t spell “BLOWOUT” without “OU”

After a Sunday to prepare for the onslaught of grief in the office on Monday, I supplied some cookies from a local establishment – Eileen’s.  While I am not a paid endorser, I am giving Eileen’s some free publicity today as their cookies are the GREATS!. Of course everyone in the office already likes them and how can you not like chocolate cookies with green mint frosting to celebrate a Fighting Irish victory over Oklahoma.

Of course my cookie offerings could not stop the onslaught of emails of Manti Te’o’ and various signs popping up on my cubicle throughout the day when I would be away at lunch or at the printer.

Gotta love those Irish fans.

The Big 10?

Could Nate Sudfeld lead the Hoosiers to the Big 10 title game?

Another crazy week in the conference. Denard Robinson gets injured and Nebraska wins rather easily against Michigan. Neither team looked very good on the field, matter of fact you could argue the play of both offenses rivaled the condition on Sunday morning of most of the people that were at our football tailgate party all day on Saturday at Memorial Stadium…..sluggish….

The Huskers have the lead in their division but head into what is sure to be a dog-fight this weekend in East Lansing. This side of the equation for the Conference Title game in Indianapolis is still wide open in what has been a very average year in comparison to the national stage.

On the other side of the league, Wisconsin loses to Michigan State last week at home (the first home loss in 21 games for Bielema’s boys was the 2nd longest streak in the nation) but since both Penn State and Ohio State are ineligible for the Title game, they are still clearly in command to make that game. Unfortunately they have lost their starting QB Joel Stave to a broken collarbone so they will have to go to the back-up plan and basically just hold off pesky Indiana to play for (gulp) the automatic BCS berth. But as Kosmo alluded to in his article yesterday, the Big 10 is still full of scenarios that could have them sending no one to BCS Bowl this year.

The many possibilities as they say are very …well….possible. I am guessing conference athletic directors might be secretly rooting for Nebraska to run the table just so everyone can get a slice of the BCS payday pie.

Optimus Klein

Collin Klein has pretty much distanced himself from the rest of the pack and barring a major crash and burn by his team or injury he looks to be the guy to hoist the trophy at the Downtown Athletic Club. On the year he has 1630 passing yards 634 yards rushing and a combined 28 Td’s. The Mildcats have Oklahoma State, TCU, Baylor and Texas on the schedule…What that spells to me is more huge stats by the lead Cat.

Fighting Frankies!

Once a Husker always a Husker, and I was disappointed to see that former Husker Coach Frank Solich and the Ohio Bobcats lost their first game of the year this past week to Miami of Ohio. The MAC is tough and this drops them from the rankings and even outside mention at a possible BCS bid if they ran the table, to now being in third place in their own conference.

Know a Good Real Estate Agent?

Really? This was 2011? Seems a lot longer.

I have a hard time believing that Auburn will keep Gene Chizik after the abysmal year of the Tigers. They got wood-shedded again this past week losing by 42 points. The good news for Auburn is they have New Mexico State this week and still have to play powerhouse Alabama A&M in another examples of two cases of an SEC school playing weird home games late in the year against poor opponents or downright patsies.

The bad news is that they also have to face Georgia (who I still think really isn’t that good) and Alabama (which I think IS really that good)

I am sure for War Eagle fans it seems so very long ago that they had paid Cam Newton and won their BCS Title. Wonder where Gene will end up?

Until next time, stay classy Tarpon Springs, Florida

Hurricane Sandy

Many in the northeast don’t have to go to work or school today.  But that’s not a good thing.  it’s because Hurricane Sandy is about to come ashore and could hammer the region for several days.  Early estimates of damage are in the neighborhood of $50 billion – and those estimates may end up being conservative, based on the path of the storm.  Sandy is a slow-moving storm, which is a horrible thing for a hurricane, and it means that the storm will dump rain on the region for a long period of time.

New Jersey governor Chris Christie put it best when he gave this succinct advice:

Don’t be stupid. Get out!

The Election

The timing of the storm also comes just a week before election day.  President Obama’s performance in some battleground states – notably Virginia and North Carolina – could depend on how he handles reaction to the storm.  There’s really not much Romney can do in this case, other than volunteer to fill sandbags somewhere.  At this stage, he’s a private citizen and has no authority over emergency response.

For reasons that elude me, people continue to report on the national polling numbers.  Maybe there’s more national interest in these numbers, but they are completely irrelevant.  Large majorities in some states will make a candidate look good in the national polls, but doesn’t help them in the electoral college.  The game is all about winning the battleground states.  What the candidates do in Texas and California does absolutely nothing to move the needle. 

World Series

Late Sunday night, the Giants finished off the Tigers in extra innings.  This capped an incredible post-season run by the Giants.  They are a hated rival of mine, but I applaud their ability to overcome a myriad of obstacles and win their second World Series in three years.  Marco Scutaro drove in an ecstatically sliding Ryan Theriot with the winning run.

College Football

A notable story in college football this year is the poor performance by the Big 10 conference.  In the latest BCS rankings, just a single Big 10 team made the rankings.  (To avoid kicking my Big 10 friends while they are down, I won’t point out how many Big 12 teams are in the rankings.  But it’s easy to find out.)

One wrinkle in the BCS is that a team from a non-automatic qualifier conference earns an automatic berth is they finish in the top 16 and also finish above the champion of any of the automatic qualifier conferences.  (I think only one team can take advantage of this per year).  Here are where some teams currently fit in the BCS standings:

• 19) Boise State
• 20) Nebraska (highest ranked Big 10 team)
• 25) Louisiana Tech

I like Boise State well enough, but I’m pulling for Louisiana Tech to crash the BCS party this year.

I’m also hoping for Notre Dame and Alabama to lose in the coming weeks.  Maybe have a nice batch of losses for the SEC and end up with an LSU-Louisiana Tech BCS game …

The big injury news on Saturday was standout South Carolina running back Marcus Lattimore, who dislocated his knee and suffered ligament damage in the game against Tennessee.  On the positive side, Lattimore did not break any bones.  He could possibly sit out 2013 as a redshirt year and then return to the field for the Gamecocks in 2014.

NBA

Reigning sixth man of year James Harden was traded from the Thunder to the Rockets.  Several picks and a few players were involved, but I’m not enough of an NBA fan to break down all the details.  However, I find it interesting that Harden left Oklahoma City because of money.  He’ll get a “max deal” of $60 million over four years from the Rockets.  Harden was offered $55.5 million over 4 years from the Thunder?

Wouldn’t you take a few less dollar for the opportunity to chase some titles with Kevin Durant.  (I guess I shouldn’t tell them that I like Durant – Durant!”)

This story originally ran on October 29, 2010.  This story is part of a trio of holiday stories  – you may also like Friends for Thanksgiving and Mrs. Claus and the Christmas Mistress.  All of them are “a bit” disturbing.

I threw another log into the bonfire and watched as the flames engulfed it.  The fire was off to a roaring start – just where it needed to be at this time of night.  The trick-or-treating was winding down, and the neighborhood kids would soon be gathering in my yard for the annual Halloween party.

The party was a neighborhood tradition, dating back nearly twenty years.  I was widowed at a young age, and from that point forward, made my work the focal point of my life.  I was a sixth grade teacher, and had won many awards for my work with the kids.  The Halloween party was a fun extension of my job.

I looked around the back yard to make sure everything was set up.  The lighting was at just the right level – sufficient to allow some visibility, but low enough to add spookiness to the occasion.

Pitchers of hot chocolate sat on the wooden picnic tables, as well as the main attraction for the evening – my world-famous chili.  My chili had a very distinctive taste that always made people clamor for more.

A few minutes later, Jeremy Dempsey led the first group of kids into the backyard.

“Hey, Mr. Raven.  Is the chili ready?”

“Yep, Jeremy, grab a bowl.”

“What’s in it, anyway?  My dad says it’s deer meat.”

I laughed.  “Oh, I couldn’t possible tell you my secret.  Isn’t it good enough to know that it’s delicious?”

The boy thought about pursuing the topic further, but then raced off to join his friends.

As the crowd was eating their chili, we began the tradition of telling scary tales.  I had the younger kids start out with the predictably tame stories and gradually built up to the older kids – some of whom did a pretty good job of scaring some of the youngsters.

When Steven Harper finished, it was my turn.

“Tonight I shall tell you a scary story … but a story that is very true.  Just two houses down,” I pointed toward the allegedly haunted house for effect “is the house where Old Man Harris once lived.”

“Harris was a grumpy old man of the worst kind.  If your baseball went into his yard, you wouldn’t get it back – and the cranky old man would pop out of the house and scream at you.”  Some of the older kids nodded their heads in agreement – they had experienced this firsthand.

“During the past decade, eight children have disappeared from this neighborhood – all on Halloween.  The cops always suspected Old Man Harris, but they could never find any evidence, so the elderly killing machine walked free.”  At this, the kids began to murmur amongst themselves – they knew of the abductions and knew that Harris was the Maple Street Marauder.

“Last year, twelve year old Sarah Miller disappeared on Halloween and hasn’t been heard from since.  Her friends told the police that Sarah was going to walk by the haunted Harris house on her way home – in spite of their protests.  Once again, the police could find no evidence that Harris committed any crime, and he walked free.  But this time, he would not escape justice.  Sarah’s father demanded revenge and shot Harris in the head as he walked to his mailbox.”

The kids all knew this story, so it didn’t scare them – although it made them a bit uncomfortable – setting them up for the finish.

“What you don’t know, though, is that Harris isn’t finished.  He made a deal with the devil to deliver a dozen souls.  Even though Harris is dead, the deal is not done.  His ghost must still kill four children as sacrifices to Satan.  This is the first Halloween since his death … and the next installment is due tonight.  I urge you to take every precaution and avoid the Harris house on this haunted night.”

I knew that my warning would only serve to embolden some of the older kids, who were now sure to pass by the Harris house after they left the party.  Unlike past years, I wouldn’t be able to stalk and kill them.  With Harris rotting under ground, I no longer had my scapegoat.

Perhaps the worst crime of all was that my famous chili would surely lose its special kick next year.  Tonight’s batch contained the last few morsels of Sarah Miller.

It seems that Republicans can’t keep putting their foot in their mouth about rape and abortion these days. The latest on their greatest hits album when it comes to this topic is from Indiana Senate candidate Richard Mourdock. Yesterday during a debate with his Democratic opponent Rep. Joe Donnelly when the topic of abortion in the case of rape or incest Mourdock had this to say. “I struggled with it myself for a long time, but I came to realize that life is a gift from God. And I think, even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, that it is something that God intended to happen.”

Now, unlike Akin, who said his now infamous discussion on legitimate rape and magical lady parts on a local TV show, Mourdock said these comments during a senate race debate. Candidates actually prepare for debates, you knew this topic was bound to come up. So the excuse of not being prepared for the topic to come up and misspeaking is clearly not valid here. So what is the next line of action? Oh but of course, the my comments were taken out of context. No sir, your comments are being quoted fully and accurately and their meaning is quite clear. You said that you have struggled with this for a long time, you said that rape is horrible, but you said that the baby created out of that is God’s intent. So if you want to take what you said about this that even though it was horrible the rape itself must have been God’s intent. That’s just wrong – a fine argument for you to make is that every life is God’s gift, but that is not what you said. You said that your view was it was God’s intent. Just like Akin you got caught speaking your actual beliefs in public. Just fess up to it, you are entitled to your opinion, no matter how moronically wrong it may be, but at least stand by what you really meant to say after you said it.

Now after the Akin comments were made you had conservative politicians trying to force him out of the race and the party even withdrew its financial backing. However conservative voters stuck with him after that, and that is why I feel that the Republican politicians are going to tread lightly on this, this is especially true for Romney. He is not going to want to outrage the hard conservative base that actually believes this crap on the eve of the election. In such a close race you need your base to turn out in mass effect, and as such it would be devastating if some of them decided to say cast their vote the way of say a Gary Johnson instead. Although I feel their hatred of President Obama would trump just about anything, but that is besides the point.

As I was saying, Romney is not going to want to upset the base at this late stage in the game, but it is a fine line to walk. He also needs to make sure he does not upset independent voters. So here we have Mittens walking on eggs. His campaign has released a statement saying the candidate does not share the views of Mourdock on this issue. Then again how are we to really know what Mitt Romney believes in, it changes so much, it is kind of like Kansas weather, but once again I am getting off topic. On the other hand though you have the campaign standing by the lone campaign ad for a Senate candidate featuring Mitt Romney himself in it that was debuted the day before the comments. Saying that Mourdock and his principles are still the best for the job. So as with everything else in this campaign, Romney is all over the place on what he actually stands for and believes in. Then again all he really cares about is being President and in the end that means that Obama will not have the job anymore and for them that is all that matters, even if their candidate actually believes in what they do after getting the job or not.

Well that is all from me this month. Not much need to do a Bad Nut of the Month as Mourdock clearly takes the prize, but if there was a second place it would be for Ann Coulter and her multiple tweets referring to the President as a retard and her mocking and ridicule of the deaths of Arlen Specter and George McGovern. We now stand just a mere dozen days until election day, so how do you think it is going to go? It is time to play some Fantasy Politics predictions. Now I think Obama will win the popular vote by a slim margin and will win the Electoral College 288-252. I also think that the Democrats will continue to control the Senate.

In some of the high profile races McCaskill will hold on to defeat Akin in Missouri, Mourdock who was in a tight race to begin with is going to lose to Donnelly in Indiana, Murphy will beat McMahon in Connecticut, Nelson is going to defeat Mack in Florida and I also think that Elizabeth Warren will take out Scott Brown in Massachusetts. On the house side things will be likely to look much the same I hate to say, as I see the Democrats getting probably just a net gain of a seat or two, three tops. One race involving one of my favorite people to rant about is going to be mighty close. In Minnesota’s 6th district former Presidential Candidate and three term Congresswoman Michele Bachman is in her tightest race yet and in a district that was fine tuned to her chances this time around to boot. Now while I am not going to come out and say that Bachman is going to lose to Jim Graves there, I am willing to bet that the margin of victory for either candidate will be from one to two percent. Well there you have some of my predictions laid out before you and you can play along to. I don’t have much to give out in the way of prizes, but feel free to post in the comments and we can have a little fantasy political prediction game going into election day