My first election projection.

Here is my first projection as to how I think the presidential race will turn out. Obviously there is a lot of time left and anything can happen. But, if things remain pretty much as they are, I am estimating that John McCain will handily beat Barack Obama.

The red states are those that I believe will favor McCain and the blue are those that will favor Obama. I do not believe that Florida will be a close state this time. And I doubt that Ohio will be tight either.

If we compare this year’s projection to the 2004 results here are the major changes I am seeing. The Democrats will pick up Iowa and New Mexico, with 7 and 5 electoral votes respectively. But this gain of 12 electoral votes will more than be offset by their loss of Michigan with 17 electoral votes. In the electoral college the Republicans will do better in 2008 than they did in 2004.

The bad news in this election is that either McCain or Obama will win. However, given that I don’t see the Democrats losing control of the House or the Senate. Since that is the case the least bad situation overall is a Republican president. Gridlock is the best government we can expect, keep the bastards at each other’s throat and they don’t have time to grab our throats.

In regards to the (formerly) Libertarian Party my projections are dismal. Bob Barr won’t do particularly well. His actual vote totals will be well below what his campaign had been projecting. The LP sold their soul to win votes and I doubt they’ll actually succeed in doing that. I suspect that the upside for Barr would 1.5%. I think it more likely he’ll score under 1%.

His problem is manifold. Ron Paul won’t endorse him and Barr has pretty much insulted Paul and alienated him through his antics and those of his underhanded staff members. Barr has alienated large numbers of LP activists and members with his unlibertarian positions and compromises. And his ability to raise funds has been very poor.

Just because he and Richard Viguerie could manage to squeeze a majority out of the Denver LP convention doesn’t mean he can get the LP faithful to rally to his cause. If anything his shying away from the Libertarian label in his own campaign has pretty much pushed Libertarians away. If you go to Barr’s campaign web site the main page doesn’t have the word libertarian anywhere on it.

Personally I think that is good. Barr is no libertarian so he shouldn’t call himself one. But some of the really nasty types in the LP, who yearned for power and Starrdom, tried to push the bullshit that Barr would increase name recognition for the LP. He could have -- of course the problem was that the LP brand would be associated with the petty conservatism of Bob Barr and not with libertarianism. Barr partially solved that problem by abandoning the libertarian label in his own campaign. But then most of Barr’s main campaign staff are not even remotely libertarian themselves.

In the end the Libertarian Party managed to create huge divisions by promoting a smarmy little career politician, abandoned core principles, and alienated its core supporters. All the party got in return was a smirking little candidate. Barr has all the appeal of a pit viper and is as cuddly as a cactus. What he has managed to do is get a lot of Libertarians talking about whether they will vote for McCain or Obama on purely strategic grounds.

I doubt that any of the Third Party candidates will do particularly well. I especially hope that the theocratic thugs in the Constitution Party do as badly as possible. I emphasize that anyone who says they have much in common with the Constitution Party or their leader Rev. Chuck Baldwin, is not even remotely close to being a libertarian. And I don’t care if they do come from Lake Jackson either.

PS: If you want to enlarge the electoral map above just click on it.

McCain's age is a point in favor of Palin.

Whatever you think of Sarah Palin, John McCain certainly took a lot of attention away from Obama. If Obama was thinking he’d bask in the “glory” of his nomination, with a media already prone to proclaim him the new messiah, he is surely fuming with disappointment.

And some of the really slimy Democrats are slithering out from under their rocks to hiss and strike. One of the most disgusting of the Congressvermin is Robert Wexler of Florida and he is trying to raise the cry that Palin hates Jews. He is claiming that Palin was a supporter of paleoconservative Pat Buchanan. And Wexler claims that Buchanan is a sympathizer with the Nazis. Wexler does get rather rabid when he’s off his medication. Unfortunately he never takes his meds.

While I happen to think Buchanan is a very odious fellow, and probably a closet anti-Semite, I think calling him a sympathizer for the Nazis indicates that Wexler is just as venial as Buchanan, just in different ways. Apparently when Palin was a mayor of a small town in Alaska, Buchanan came through on a campaign visit. She attended a fundraiser for another local Republican where Buchanan spoke and was seen wearing a Buchanan button.

Is that proof? Well, unfortunately for the smearbund, Palin was actually on record as endorsing Steve Forbes in that election. Apparently she attended the local rally in her official capacity and wore the button as a courtesy. I also understand that when a local newspaper wrote that button incident might mean she was endorsing Buchanan she actually wrote a letter to the paper making it clear that she was NOT a Buchanan supporter.

However, don’t expect that smear to disappear. The more radical elements in the Democratic Party will go full hog to try to paint Palin with the worst sort of viewpoints. No surprises there, they have all the honesty and fanaticism of the Religious Right. Personally, when I see creeps of the Wexler variety going after real creeps in the Religious Right, I enjoy the fight no matter who wins. It’s like watching Stalin and Hitler going to war -- you hope they destroy each other.

As I see it, the Far Left and the Religious Right are both immoral, vile, hypocrites and a danger to the country. But the hypocrisy of the Left in regards to Palin is staggering. She sat in on one local fundraiser where Buchanan spoke while the Mayor of her town. Suddenly Wexler is invoking the Holocaust and trying to paint images of Palin pushing Jews into gas chambers.

Meanwhile, when Obama’s long time association with the radical Rev. Jeremiah Wright was revealed we were told it meant nothing. Attending what amounted to be a big political event as Mayor is endowed with great meaning while a long term personal relationship is supposed to mean nothing.

We are also hearing that Palin has no experience. Up until last week, that was one of Obama’s selling points. He was the “outsider” who wasn’t part of the Beltway crowd. So he was going to be a fresh breeze in politics. Damn, trumped again, since Alaska is even more outside the Beltway. And you can’t exactly say that a couple of years in the Senate gives one executive abilities. If anything, a governor is more used to the executive office than a legislator. If anything former Senators have a tendency to think it is the president’s job to pass legislation instead of veto it.

What about foreign policy? Obama’s entire experience on foreign policy is running off to Berlin to give a speech to local adoring socialists. Giving a speech to Berliners is not exactly foreign policy experience. It’s barely more than a tourist trip.

I happen to think that the Republican Party is pretty much a cesspool. So what does concern me about Palin is that McCain found one of the least noxious politicians in his party. That bothers me because she will only make him look better by her presence.

I’m not anxious to put Palin in the White House, with or without McCain. But I know I don’t want Obama there either -- especially with Joe Biden.

But there might be a reason to wish that a McCain/Palin ticket wins. One reason, of course, is that a Democratic legislature will be a war with the president and that means gridlock. The country is safer with gridlock. The less they do, the less they damage. But that isn’t the most appealing feature of having Palin on the ticket. It’s McCain’s age that is most appealing.

Let’s face it: the dude is old. And he could keel over any day. Out of the power-hungry jackals that infest politics, from what I can see, Palin is one of the least offensive. She has stood up to corruption local pork-barrel politics in Alaska and might be willing to resist it in Washington. She is not nearly as extreme in her social conservative views as most Republicans. She is not our savior by any means, probably barely tolerable. But in the political swamp, barely tolerable is often a big improvement.

She is tolerable enough that she could never actually win the presidency on her own. And about the only way to get someone, who isn’t entirely noxious, into the presidency these days is get them in as vice president and then have the president die. Certainly Bush knew that and hence one reason he had Cheney as vice president -- assassination insurance.

If a McCain/Palin ticket carries the day in November, and I suspect it will, then I would encourage decent Americans to shower McCain with gifts -- rich foods, with lots of salt, grease and fat. Every campaign stop ought to have an obligatory photo op of him chowing down on some artery clogging morsel.

I know that scoundrels, creeps and closet authoritarians tend to win the White House these days. And whoever wins the White House in November will be no cause to celebrate. But McCain’s age is certainly one reason to hope he wins. At worst he’d be a typical politician and at best he might not make it through the first term. Obama will be a disaster no matter how long he stays and, if he goes home to Jesus a tad bit early, he’ll leave us with Biden.

If the vice president is basically someone who waits around to take over when the president dies, then I think I’d rather have Palin than Biden. On the other hand, I don’t find her so appealing as to actually bother voting.