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Contrary to Efty’s Florida projection, which is clearly clouded by his pro-Romney bias, I think that John McCain will come out on top of the results tonight in a close race despite Florida being a closed primary, Romney’s debate performance, and Romney surging for the past two weeks in Florida polling.

My prediction is based on two reasons essentially:

1. McCain is up by a small margin in the vast majority of recent FL polls

2. McCain still has unseen momentum from his endorsements from Governor Crist and Senator Martinez, both popular GOP Floridians.

Since McCain’s two recent endorsements he has received a bump in the last week which I believe would continue to have a positive effect even if the primary wasn’t held until next Tuesday.

There really is not any legitimate or scientific evidence to predict that Romey will win, the wishes of his supporters not withstanding.

The only other prediction I could make would be to not make one, and declare it a pure tossup considering how close the polls are. But what’s the fun in that?

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Our live coverage of President Bush’s 2008 State of the Union address is after the jump for those who would like to replay our live blogging. Thanks for joining us!

We’d like to recommend Slate’s interesting analysis of Bush’s language choice in the State of the Union.  It’s an interesting analysis of trends and the effect of current events on his wording. Lire le reste de cet article »

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I am making a bold prediction, but I believe that Romney will take Florida tomorrow.

I know Ryan already posted about McCain’s big endorsement from Governor Crist but the truth is the only real endorsement that matters in Florida is Jeb Bush’s and it is evident that he will not show his support for anyone prior to the state’s primary. While Crist may be able to help get slightly bigger crowds for McCain during stump speeches, he cannot overcome McCain’s two biggest challenges-he is too liberal and is doing nothing to address the housing crisis in his speeches while in Florida. On Meet the Press yesterday McCain said that the economic challenges the country faces are temporary and will be overcome; this may be true, but for the millions of voters whose houses have been foreclosed and whose stock portfolios are dwindling in value these words provide no consolation. Mitt Romney has the economy as his issue and as we can see from Michigan, McCain’s downplaying of the current state of the nations economic health does not benefit him.

Although the polls are not showing this, I believe that Joe Scarborough was right in his prediction today that Mitt Romney will win tomorrow. Many of the voters in central Florida who want to vote for Mike Huckabee have realized in the past two days that a vote for Huckabee is a vote for McCain and like Rudy, he simply does not represent their values. Additionally it appears that because of Romney’s economic experience many of the economic conservatives who had been supporting Rudy or Thompson are turning his way.

Despite McCain’s untrue attacks on Romney’s Iraq War record, he has been unable to change the topic of discussion. No matter how many times he mentions his support of the surge, it does not make the thousands of foreclosed houses in Florida go away. The issue on the forefront of everyones minds in Florida is the economy and nothing McCain can do will change that. Let us not forget where Rudy Giuliani currently sits in the polls, a distant third place. Rudy Giuliani has done nothing but espouse his national security experience for the past month in Florida and it has done nothing for him in the polls.

As long as the issue is the economy in the forefront of people’s minds Romney will out perform his competition.

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This evening is President Bush’s State of the Union address. New School Politics will be providing live coverage of the event via a new service, CoverItLive, which will be embedded on the site and will update automatically with our commentary. Eftychis, Ryan, and I [Zach] will be blogging the event with commentary, opinions, observations, our favorite links from elsewhere, and more. Readers can join in with the CoverItLive widget as well, which will appear on New School Politics at about 8PM Eastern Standard Time. You’ll be able to make comments, and more.

We look forward to joining you this evening for the State of the Union. For a reminder, just click on the widget below!

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From one of my favorite thinkers, Yaron Brook:

Today, what we have is not a system grounded in American individualism, but a collectivist system that aims to relieve the individual of the “burden” of paying for his own health care by coercively imposing its costs on his neighbors. For every dollar’s worth of hospital care a patient consumes, that patient pays only about 3 cents out-of-pocket; the rest is paid by third-party coverage. And for the health care system as a whole, patients pay only about 14%.

The result of shifting the responsibility for health care costs away from the individuals who accrue them was an explosion in spending.

I get the impression that American healthcare is generally seen as a market system by the electorate and the only alternative as more government control. Of course, factually this is untrue as the government is responsible from between 45 and 50% of healthcare spending in the US, making it the single largest ensurer of Americans. On top of this, an endless array of regulations make the American system not only tapped by government, but dominated by it.

Additionally, of the insurance that is (essentially) private, third parties (i.e. employers) pay for six times as much as individuals. And the obvious reason for that the way the tax structure is convoluted to subsidize employee based insurance by not taxing it as income. According to Paul Krugman and Robin Wells, “the value of the tax subsidy for employer-based insurance is estimated at around $150 billion a year.”

I surmise the basic fallacy behind this system is the desire for a free lunch–voters want heathcare, especially if they can get it at someone else’s expense.

But the wasteful incentives this way of thinking creates not only is inefficient, but eventually passes even higher costs on to consumers. Remember that when people bear less cost for a maneuver, they have no encouragement to try and control its costs. The consequence is that spending goes nuts.

For the sake of achieving greater frugality and more efficiently rewarding good and bad providers, it would be wise to give the individual a greater place in healthcare. This would not happen by government mandate or subsidy, but rather an equalizing of the playing field between individual and employer healthcare, as well as a downsizing of government’s roll in the industry.

For that reason, the medical reforms of Ron Paul, John McCain, and Rudy Giuliani tend to be superior to that of other candidates.

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On the same day as Caroline Kennedy released an editorial supporting Sen. Obama for President, her uncle, Senator Teddy Kennedy, also endorsed Obama.

From the Boston Globe:

WASHINGTON — Senator Edward M. Kennedy will endorse Barack Obama for president tomorrow, breaking his year-long neutrality to send a powerful signal of where the legendary Massachusetts Democrat sees the party going — and who he thinks is best to lead it.

Kennedy confidantes told the Globe today that the Bay State’s senior senator will appear with Obama and Kennedy’s niece, Caroline Kennedy, at a morning rally at American University in Washington tomorrow to announce his support.

That will be a potentially significant boost for Obama as he heads into a series of critical primaries on Super Tuesday, Feb. 5.

This is more good news for Obama, especially in a delegate-rich state like Mass. where he now has both Senators Kerry and Edwards supporting him.

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First, last night Governor Charlie Crist of Florida endorsed Sen. McCain for president (video here). This is very big for John McCain in Florida. Crist is a very popular governor with around 60% approval. This comes just days after FL Senator Mel Martinez also gave McCain an endorsement that could especially help him with Cuban-American Republicans this Tuesday.

At the time these two endorsements came in, polling indicated that the Florida GOP primary was neck  and neck between McCain and Mitt Romney, with Romney on the upswing from Thompson’s withdrawal and an excellent showing in Thursday’s debate.

On the Democratic side, the New York Times ran an editorial by Caroline Kennedy endorsing Barack Obama. The opinion was how one would expect yet profound in some ways. It made the case that Obama was the first candidate she knew of who could unite and inspire hope among Americans since her father. Here’s a taste:

I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them. But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president — not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans.

Its funny because the editorial cites almost nothing substantive, rather chosing to concentrate on just the tone and affect of the Senator’s campaign. At the same, the Kennedy name still means a lot to many–hence why both Obama and Clinton have been hoping for Ted Kennedy’s endorsement–and the endorsement certainly could compound the bounce he ought to receive from his SC victory.

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Obama was predicted to win South Carolina by about 12 points; He won by 28 points, more than doubling Hillary Clinton’s votes 55%-27%.

Many of the Obama romantics who would be quick to name this a “historic victory,” but not only doubt that there is anything exceptional about it, but I doubt that it will deter the Clinton machine from trucking on through Super Tuesday and to the nomination.

Long lauded as the campaign that transcends race, the Obama candidacy has difficulty claiming that title after SC. According to exit polls, the Senator won black voters, who are 55% of the electorate, 78%-19%. Among white voters however he did not fair well. At all. As a matter of fact he lost white vote to both Edwards and Clinton 40%-36%-24%, respectively. Voter turnout grew from about 300,000 in 2004 to 500,000 in ‘08, while black voter turnout more than doubled from 100,000 to over 200,00 in that time.

Of course, if that breakdown were to stand for the remainder of the primary, Obama would be crushed on Super Tuesday. And while there is no evidence that the same breakdown will be maintained across the country, it is still an indicative breakdown of race in the party.

The same pattern was not as apparent in Iowa and New Hampshire, those states may have been different. And South Carolina may have changed things. It was a very bitter race; it had certain racial undertones; and it featured a large black faction. All three of those “politics as usual” factors have their way of marginalizing lofty and idealistic fundament of Obama’s campaign. If Obama becomes the “black candidate” or this race becomes a dogfight, his transcendent status will become a transient victim of the Clinton dynasty. To some extent, this has already come true (as Dick Morris predicted).

Earlier today, the former President played off Obama’s win in South Carolina (video here) before it was even won, mentioning that “Jesse Jackson won SC in 1984 and ‘88…” the obvious implication being that Obama only made a showing in the state because he is black, further implying that his overall campaign is not very serious.

The Clintons know what they are doing. Better than anyone else. They are running a hard campaign against Obama; their basic goal is to frame his candidacy as impractical and not serious. Hence they are inclined to play petty political hardball, because hardball is a game the Clintons always win. And while they played it in South Carolina and lost, it was a small price to pay for the results it will return on February 5th.

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We encountered some problems after upgrading our Wordpress installation to 2.3.2 on Thursday night. Thanks for bearing with us while we figured everything out. While updating, we added some other plugins we think our readers will find interesting. Additionally, you may notice a completely revamped sidebar. We’ll go over the changes after the jump.

Lire le reste de cet article »

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The Florida debate was very different than any of the GOP debates we have seen so far. The format of the debate itself is not that different, but rather the circumstances surrounding it make it one of the most important discussions amongst the candidates thus far. This is the first debate to occur in either party after one of the major candidates dropped out; Fred Thompson was the only candidate perceived as having a chance to obtain his parties nomination who has so far dropped out. Unlike the past several debates in South Carolina, Iowa, and New Hampshire this event was more of an introduction for the candidates than a closing argument. Due to the tight primary schedule, none of the candidates with the exception of Giuliani have invested great amounts of time in the state thus far and it was their first opportunity to reach Floridian GOP primary voters on their local broadcast stations. Finally, the primary this debate is intended for has the potential to kill off another presidential bid; of course that is if Rudy Giuliani does not win in the sunshine state. With the high stakes surround tonight’s MSNBC debate it is also curious that it was such a passive event, indeed the whole affair was quite civil compared to Monday’s CNN run Democratic blood bath. The question worth asking is, with all of the pressure and importance of this debate, who came out on top? It was without a question Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney.

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney

It should be first noted that Governor Romney has done something significant over the past three-weeks he has changed his image. In what has to be one of the more impressive political come backs in modern history, the Governor has recovered from two embarrassing defeats in Iowa and New Hampshire and has done so with a whole new approach. As one of his supporters from the beginning, I saw his comprehension of the economy along with his private sector experience and logical consultant based thinking to be his greatest strengths. For far too long his campaign marketed him as something he was not, the GOP candidate least offensive to the many different colored elephants underneath the GOP tent. He won Michigan and Nevada because he spoke to the voters in those states about the economy with a resonance, passion, and understanding that none of the other candidates can. Just as John McCain can discuss the war in Iraq with more authority than his rivals, Romney can do the same on the economy. Luckily for Romney, the focus of the election has shifted in the past two months from the war to the looming economic crisis. This truth along with his new found confidence in himself enabled him to steal the debate from McCain and Giuliani.

The first half an hour of the debate focused on the economy and Romney dominated those first thirty minutes. It became quickly evident that he has made a commitment to tell Floridians that he will turn-around their hurting economy and he was very effective in conveying that message. The fact that Romney has been able to remove some of the shine from his almost too polished demeanor has made him more appealing to voters, but what really helped him tonight was that none of his opponents questioned him on his record. In fact, they did something even stranger than not attack him-they engaged him in ways that provided him with openings to explain even more of his policies and to have even more air time. No one did poorly in tonight’s debate, but Romney just did better than his opponents. At one point I recall Governor Romney received two questions from the moderators and then two from the other candidates; because of this attempted gang up he was given an almost five minute monologue with the voters.

Participants in the GOP Debate on Thursday (L to R): Romney, McCain, Giuliani, Paul, and Huckabee

Romney walked away with the debate because he was able to differentiate himself from the other candidates through his discussion of the economy, his witty attacks on the Clinton’s, and his well-versed rebuttals to Tim Russet’s criticisms of his personal wealth. McCain and Rudy did not win because neither of them were able to grab an issue, the war is McCain’s strong suit but with the shifting focus towards the economy it is clear that he needs to branch out onto other issues. Giuliani’s problem is that he did nothing to convince Florida voters to support him over Mitt Romney for economic reasons; in fact Giuliani talked less about his economic achievements in New York than he has in past debates. Mike Huckabee went into this debate knowing that he will not do well in Florida and I believe he made a wise choice to stick to his social conservative stances and not try and promote himself as an economic or national security candidate. As usual, the other candidate who did very well was Ron Paul; like in most of the debates he partakes however he received very few questions. Another fault of McCain and Giuliani was that neither of them made an attempt to convince former Fred Thompson supporters not to drift towards Romney and polls indicate that the 9% of support Thompson had may be enough to put the Massachusetts Governor into first place. There are still several days until the Florida primary, but if I was a Floridian GOP voter with many foreclosed homes in my neighborhood and tonight was my first introduction to any of the candidates I believe I would have only seen one viable candidate on the stage.

Editor’s Note: Images were added to this post at 4PM on Friday, January 25th.

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