Bird Brains

A sixth reason the McCain "gas tax holiday" is a dumb idea

2008-04-30T09:18:00.000-07:00

It won't actually save anyone that much money.

Reader Sylvie wrote in to point this out to me, using the example of someone commuting in a 28 mpg car. I agreed but noted that the numbers would be different for someone with a less efficient vehicle. But then Dr. Housing Bubble, after noting that the plan would create an estimated $10 billion deficit in the Highway Trust Fund, ran the numbers for someone driving an 11 mpg Hummer H2, and also came up with a piddling savings:

More deficits! Are these people really serious? Okay, from Memorial Day until Labor Day, we have roughly 4 months of driving. Let us assume you are typical and drive around 15,000 miles per year, which works out to be 1,250 miles per month. So over a 4 month period we’ll be driving our H2 for 5,000 miles. At 11 mpg let us run the numbers to see how much we’ll save:

6,000 miles / 11 mpg = 545 gallons needed

545 x 18.4 cents = $100.28 grand total saved!

Bwahahaha! Holy crap we are so screwed. All this insanity over a freaking $100 bucks?

I realize $100 is starting to get into real money for some people, but spread over four months? It starts to look like pocket change. It's certainly not going to do much to stimulate the economy. At best it might stimulate a little more driving. And of course the above calculation assumes the pump price actually drops the full 18.4 cents, which is unlikely.

The Elitism of Thinking For Yourself

2008-04-29T10:07:00.000-07:00

So the Republicans and the media are going to portray the likely Democratic nominee as an out-of-touch elitist. Gee, who could have predicted? They never do that! Except every four years, no matter who the nominee is and no matter what he or she says or does.

But the concept of elitism as it exists in our politics is a peculiar one. Why was John Kerry an "elitist"? Because he windsurfed and lived in a big house and put Swiss cheese on his Philly cheesesteak. Why is Barack Obama an elitist? Because he buys arugula and orders orange juice rather than coffee. For this, Newsweek is alleging, on their cover, that he suffers from a "Bubba gap."

You might think that "elitism" in a politician would consist of, say, economic policies that favor wealthy elites at the expense of common people. But you would be wrong. Apparently, that has nothing to do with it, or it would be Republicans who got portrayed as "elitists," but Republicans get to be portrayed as "regular folk" while doing everything they can to screw regular folk. Meanwhile, the people whose policies actually help ordinary people out get accused of being "out of touch elitists."

One might fairly wonder what the hell it has to do with anything if the president eats and drinks the same things as Joe Sixpack.

As Chris Bowers at Open Left put it:

Comparisons of this nature always have a not so subtle message that purchasing consumer goods in a manner that is economically sustainable for your local region, environmentally sustainable in general, demonstrative of a curiosity toward and acceptance of other lifestyles and cultures, and, of course, personally healthy actually makes you an elitist. In other words, purchasing goods in a progressive manner is itself elitist, whereas purchasing goods in a less sustainable manner that suits enormous corporations makes you a populist.

It is the same sort of twisted logic that makes you an elitist by voting for candidates who want to broadly redistribute wealth or expand civil rights and liberties. Or, more crudely, the same sort of twisted logic that currently makes you an elitist because you voted for the black guy. I don't know exactly when underdogs, small business people, alternative lifestyles and cultural minorities became the elites, but it seems to be a permanent fixture of conservative ideology in the post-civil rights era. Comparisons like "arugula track vs. beer track" is one manifestation of that ideology.

Atrios, as usual, was more succinct:

The answer is that it's elitist to do anything but conform to the prevailing social norms. It's elitist to believe that you can do things differently.

Indeed. Although since the charges of "elitism" are leveled most often and most vociferously by, well, media elites, maybe the problem is that people like Chris Matthews think the unwashed middle-american masses define "elitism" this way. And, by setting the terms of the debate in this manner, it's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

There's something to it, though. I gave up eating meat in 1995, when I was 18. I always made a point of not rubbing this fact in anyone's face. It was my choice. I wasn't going to hassle anyone else about the choices they wanted to make.

For some people, though, that didn't matter. The moment they found out I was a vegetarian, it was as if I'd insulted them personally. "Why would you do that? Don't you know humans are omnivores? Haven't you heard of the food chain? What, you think you're better than me?"

Atrios is onto something; I got the distinct impression people were responding to my having chosen to do things differently as some sort of active insult to the status quo they were following, and thus as an insult to them personally. I suppose that's the nerve the media is touching when they try and get people worked up about how Barack Obama shops at Whole Foods.

Let's show those faux-populist media snobs that "reg'lar Americans" are smarter than they give us credit for. Don't believe the hype.

Five reasons the McCain "gas tax holiday" is a dumb idea

2008-04-28T14:17:00.001-07:00

John McCain has proposed eliminating the federal gas tax (18.4¢ on gasoline, 24.4¢ on diesel) between Labor Day and Memorial Day, as a way to ease gas prices and stimulate the economy. He's been hammering Obama for opposing this idea, and Hillary has jumped on the bandwagon. But it's a dumb idea, and here's why:

The Highway Trust Fund, which funds highway infrastructure, would lose revenue. Americans apparently have short memories; the I-35W bridge collapse was less than a year ago, but the concern for the state of our bridges and highways that it created seems to have been short-lived.
The proposal is unlikely to pass Congress. The states would stand to lose Highway Trust Fund revenue. Representatives from large states with lots of highway miles will oppose it.
There's no guarantee the pump price will go down. Oil companies might just end up absorbing the extra profit. We don't have much excess refining capacity in the U.S. The lower price would create additional demand, as people drove more; this would likely cause prices to go up again as more demand chased the same supply of fuel.
It will worsen global warming. Lower prices, if they do appear, will discourage conservation and raise carbon emissions.
It will discourage the development of alternative fuels. Part of the reason investment in alternative fuels has been slow to appear is because many investors lost their shirts in the 1990s, when oil prices suddenly tanked. High gasoline prices mean these alternatives can compete. If there's uncertainty that prices will stay high, investors will be scared off.

A ray of sunshine

2008-04-23T14:37:00.001-07:00

With the increasingly bitter Democratic primary grinding on, it's easy to get discouraged. It's important not to lose sight of the fact that we have a lot of momentum on our side this time. There are lot of disaffected Republicans right now; there's a nearly 20-point gap between those who identify as Republican and those who identify as Democrats, while they were evenly split in 2002.

A recent example of this phenomenon was the special election in Mississippi to fill Roger Wicker's old seat. It's not over yet (there's going to be a runoff) but it looks like a Democrat may take what was supposed to be a safe Republican seat. This story has been almost lost in the coverage of the Pennsylvania primary. The Votemaster over at Electoral Vote describes it well:

MS-01 is an R+10 district the Republicans have held for a decade, so it should have been a cakewalk. Only it wasn't. Despite the NRCC pouring $300,000 into the race, Democrat Travis Childers got 49.6% of the vote to Republican Greg Davis' 46.3%. Travis fell 410 votes under 50% so there will be a runoff May 13. Nobody thought the NRCC was going to pour money into such a strong Republican district and then lose. Undoubtedly both the DCCC and NRCC are going to be spending like drunken sailors for the next three weeks.

I really hate these people

2008-04-14T12:34:00.000-07:00

So, the president of the United states has nonchalantly (and a little petulantly, as is his wont) admitted that, yeah, he and pretty much everyone else in his administration were meeting daily and discussing what torture techniques to use on what detainees. This, for those who don't know, is both grossly immoral and flagrantly illegal, to the point where I would be very surprised if any of them feel free to travel internationally after leaving office. Like Henry Kissinger before them, they're going to have to consider which countries might turn them over to international authorities for war crimes.

You would think the media would be buzzing about this, the way they do when, you know, a Democratic president gets a blow job.

But no, they're too busy talking about the fact that Barack Obama asked for orange juice instead of coffee, and what an awful elitist bastard this makes him.

Seriously.

Pardon me, I have to go scream and beat my head against a wall.

Clinton or Obama, they'll get my vote

2008-04-13T22:54:00.000-07:00

I've gotten some interesting mail since my last post, mostly from Hillary Clinton supporters. It's appreciated. (Really, I'm serious.) I feel I should clarify why I was singling out Clinton supporters specifically. It's not because I'm an Obama supporter, although I am. (I feel Clinton's strong negatives would make it much harder for her to win the general election.) It's simply because, short of some serious arm-twisting in smoke-filled rooms, Clinton doesn't have a clear path to the nomination. Unless Obama implodes dramatically, he's going to be the nominee. That makes it important that current Clinton supporters be willing to get behind him in November. Were the situation reversed, I'd have been writing the same post about Obama-ites instead of Clintonistas.

A few months ago I think we all thought this would be an easy election for Democrats. Since then, the Republicans have, in spite of internal misgivings, managed to nominate their strongest candidate. Meanwhile, our candidates — either of which would be an excellent choice as President — have been tearing each other down and effectively writing McCain's attack ads for him. Slowly but surely, our lead has been erased. We now face a tough slog in the general election.

The Democratic party simply can't afford to fall apart into internal bickering. If a sixth of our voters decide to stay home because they're bitter about the primary, we will lose. That means not just losing the White House for the next four years; it means losing the Supreme Court for a generation.

So, yes, I support Obama. But if Clinton is the nominee, I'll gladly go and vote for her. I fervently hope other Democratic voters will be able to look past this hard-fought primary and see that either candidate is preferable to four more years with a Republican in the White House.

Hillary Clinton — The Next Nader?

2008-04-08T15:50:00.000-07:00

While it seems unlikely now that Clinton will be the nominee, the outcome of the election in November may still depend on her actions.

Robert Jamieson has a column today where he talks to a Clinton supporter who says she'll vote for McCain if Clinton is not the nominee. If there were only a handful of people who felt that way, this wouldn't be a big deal; but polls show 28% of Clinton supporters say they'll refuse to vote for Obama. That works out to a big number — roughly 11-12% of Democrats. To put this in perspective, Nader only siphoned off 2% of the Democratic vote in 2000. The "Clinton or else" crowd could easily throw the election to McCain if they follow through on their threats.

One hopes that the Clinton faithful will think about what a McCain presidency would really mean before using their votes to demonstrate their bitterness over Clinton's loss. Does getting back at the party really mean more to them than abortion rights, de-escalating the war in Iraq, and staying out of war with Iran? Does it mean more to them than ensuring the Supreme Court will not tip farther to the right? Does it mean more to them than health care reform? Are they really that short-sighted?

While, unlike Nader, Clinton is not threatening to run as a third-party candidate, the actions of her die-hard supporters could have much the same effect in November. If Obama is the nominee — and that now looks all but certain — she needs to endorse him and throw her weight behind his candidacy, in order to reconcile the party. Otherwise we'll be looking at President McCain for the next four years.

What conservatives think war is good for

2008-04-07T14:05:00.000-07:00

I noticed, recently, that John McCain is running ads touting what a responsible fiscal conservative he is. I'm too lazy to go and find the ad now, but it announced several budget items McCain had voted to cut--all domestic budget items, all in the millions of dollars.

For anyone who's forgotten, the U.S. is currently spending nearly $5000 a second in a war whose ultimate costs will be in the trillions. John McCain fervently believes that we should stay in that war indefinitely.

So how on earth can he run as a "fiscal conservative" as that term is generally understood? He wants to spend more money, to get less, than anyone else in the race.

And yet, he, and other Republicans with similar views, are allowed to go around making the same contradictory claims about themselves and their policies. The press never asks what a supposed "budget hawk" is doing advocating pouring trillions into the military and racking up record debt.

Why doesn't military spending count as spending?

As far as the media is concerned, I have no theories, except to note that the media has a decades-long history of letting Republicans set the framework of assumptions for virtually every issue. But I do think Republicans are consciously taking advantage of this loophole.

The following are more or less core beliefs of the modern conservative movement:

1. Increasing military spending is always a good idea.
2. Military engagement is often in and of itself a good thing.
3. Domestic spending is often in and of itself a bad thing.
4. Slashing domestic spending is always a good idea.

So it's perfect, isn't it? If war is good, or at least not-bad, and domestic spending IS bad, what's the best thing you could possibly do? Start as many expensive, prolonged wars as you can. Then, all the money will have to be poured into the war hole, and nobody will be able to propose any meaningful domestic spending ever.

That's my conspiracy theory for today.

The Eventual Nominee

2008-03-27T20:33:00.000-07:00

The dark side of faith

2008-03-24T23:31:00.000-07:00

"Faith" is a word with almost exclusively positive connotations, at least in the U.S. In some ways it's almost synonymous with morality; polls consistently show that we like our leaders to have strong religious beliefs, and large percentages of people say that religious faith is necessary to be a good person.

The essence of religious faith is believing that things are true in spite of a lack of evidence for them; the Bible even says we shouldn't trust our own understanding. But is this really a virtue? Is it really laudable to switch off the logical parts of our minds?

I was thinking about these questions today after I learned about Ava Worthington. Ava, a 16-month-old infant, contracted bacterial bronchial pneumonia, a condition that can be cured with antibiotics. Ava's parents belong to a Christian sect that believes in faith healing exclusively; they treated her with prayer instead of seeking medical attention. Ava, ultimately, was killed by her parents' faith that only God could heal her.

Holy Joe to the rescue

2008-03-21T19:07:00.000-07:00

First Joe Lieberman helps John McCain sort out this Iran/Al-Qaeda link that the prospective president keeps misidentifying. Now he helps John with his Jewish Holidays:

In Israel yesterday, NBC’s Lauren Appelbaum reports, Lieberman once again intervened when McCain made an incorrect reference about the Jewish holiday Purim -- by calling the holiday "their version of Halloween here."

This is giving me hope, considering how incredibly well Joe served the Gore campaign in 2000.

EDIT: I'm actually reading in places that some Jews do consider Purim to be like Halloween. If this is the case, I wonder why Joe had to correct him. After all, he'd seem to be an authority on the matter.

Media framing

2008-03-19T13:31:00.000-07:00

A quick look at CNN's political ticker shows something interesting.

"Dems seize on McCain's Iran gaffe" is a headline. "Obama needles McCain on Iran gaffe" is another. Under that, it reads (emphasis mine):

Barack Obama on Wednesday took aim at potential rival John McCain over the Arizona senator's apparent misstep at a recent press conference in Jordan, the latest sign Democrats are looking to capitalize on the moment.

Judging by how the media handled the Wright "scandal," I have a feeling that if Obama had made a similar error, we wouldn't be hearing about "Republicans trying to capitalize on Obama's supposed mistake" or what have you. No, this would be treated as an overall failing on Obama's part, something that should shock the nation. But since McCain made the error, those nasty old donkeys are just being opportunistic about a silly ol' mistake anyone coulda made, goshdurnit.

Thus, it begins.

The next bubble?

2008-03-18T13:53:00.000-07:00

Edit: Swapped the housing price graph for another one, after noticing the first one I included was a graph of the percent change in prices, not of prices themselves.

What's the next investment bubble going to be? I'm not an economist, so I don't know. (If I were an economist, I really wouldn't know.) But I have my suspicions. Let's look at a couple previous bubbles. Here's a chart of the NASDAQ, centered on when the tech bubble popped:

And here's one of U.S. median housing prices — over a much longer period, but then, real estate markets move more slowly:

What's the most striking feature of these graphs? That sudden, almost exponential rise at the end of the boom, with the trend line becoming almost vertical. In both cases this happened about the time a lot of people seemed convinced that prices would only go up, forever. Those people got a nasty shock.

Now let's look at the price of gold over the last ten years:

Hmmm. Kinda makes you think, doesn't it? I'm hearing a lot of advertisements lately that bill gold as a safe investment that can only increase in value. Think there might be another nasty shock coming?

Probably not what he wants people to hear

2008-03-18T09:52:00.000-07:00

McCain's visit to Iraq prompted this choice quote:

"This visit confirms that the Republicans believe that the Iraqi war is very important in the fight against terrorism in the Middle East," said Wael Abdul Latif, an independent Shiite member of the Iraqi Parliament. "It's a message to Iran that the United States will never leave, even after Bush is gone."

Iraqis have figured this out, but the American public really needs to be made aware of it. In spite of his (mostly undeserved) reputation as a maverick and a moderate, McCain is by far the most hawkish candidate, and electing him means an open-ended commitment to keeping our troops in Iraq.

McCain's latest flip-flop

2008-03-14T13:11:00.000-07:00

Sen. McCain voted for the Bush tax cuts after he voted against them:

Republican nominee-to-be John McCain of Arizona voted to extend the full roster of Bush's tax cuts, which he opposed seven years ago as being skewed toward the wealthy.

I Drew This

2008-03-12T19:03:00.001-07:00

A thought on Spitzer

2008-03-12T15:48:00.000-07:00

Liberal Eagle's post on Eliot Spitzer vs. George W. Bush makes a good point, but doesn't point out why the treatment of these two politicians is so different. I think it's really quite simple. George W. Bush has always looked after the interests of CEOs and others with power in the corporate world. Eliot Spitzer, on the other hand, took them on. There was cheering on the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange when Spitzer's problems hit the news — that's how much the people with real money, the people who pull the strings, hate the guy.

If Spitzer Should Resign...

2008-03-12T12:47:00.000-07:00

...then George W. Bush should be prosecuted.

I mean, let's be fair. Eliot Spitzer is undeniably a hypocrite, having busted up prostitution rings while secretly patronizing one such service. But the actual crime Spitzer is being hounded from office, and potentially prosecuted, for is victimless. Who actually gets hurt if two adults have sex and one of them gets paid for it? How does that affect me, or anyone other than Mrs. Spitzer?

But while Eliot Spitzer's crimes are victimless, George W. Bush's crimes have millions of victims. According to the U.K. Independent, 1.2 million Iraqis fled to Syria after our illegal invasion of their country, which posed no threat to us. As many as 50,000 women, and girls as young as 13, have been forced into prostitution there to survive.

What does it say about us as a society that a governor who has consensual sex is hounded from office in disgrace, but a president whose illegal actions kill hundreds of thousands and inflict profound suffering on millions more is allowed to serve out his term in relative peace?

Real morality is a question of preventing human suffering. George W. Bush is a far, far less moral person than Eliot Spitzer.

Eagle's Election Expectations

2008-03-10T14:35:00.000-07:00

1. The Democrats are going to end up nominating Obama, one way or another. His running mate will be someone other than Hillary Clinton.

2. His press coverage will continue to get more negative, while McCain's will remain glowingly positive.

3. The press narratives will be familiar: the Republican nominee will be presented as a tough, straight-talking "regular guy," while the Democratic nominee will be presented as effeminate, effete and vaguely foreign--"not really one of us."

4. There will be articles that contrast the candidates' houses. As in "Barack Obama lives in a mansion in a rich district of Chicago. By contrast, John McCain likes to have barbecues on his ranch in Arizona."

5. Obama will win anyway.

Steve Drew This

2008-03-08T14:56:00.000-08:00

A million apologies to Steve Puckett, who actually sent me this comic about three weeks ago, and I meant to run it right away and then forgot to! So, here it is now.

I dig Steve's comic, Mandy.

Abuse me, please

2008-03-07T12:19:00.000-08:00

John McCain's famous temper flashes at a reporter when asked about a conversation with John Kerry.

The text itself is pretty wild, with McCain incredibly incoherent in his rebuttals, to the point where I'm not sure what it is that he's denying. But I think in his mind he wants people to be assured that he'd never cozied up to Kerry at all during the 2004 election.

What's most telling to me, however, is this:

Bumiller: “Okay. Can I ask you about your (pause) Why you’re so angry?”

McCain: “Pardon me?”

Bumiller: “Nevermind, nevermind.”

There are some not-unfounded fears that the media will lionize McCain throughout the campaign as a straight-mavericking talker or a talking maverick-straighter, but frankly, this sort of behavior from the GOP's Great White Hope doesn't lead me to believe that such reverence will continue. McCain, throughout the Republican debates, has come off as a cranky, tired old man who believes he deserves the Presidency and doesn't want anyone to throw him off his goal of getting it. Since right now he's out to woo conservatives, whippersnapper reporters who challenge his School of Reagan cred are probably to be treated like ornery mosquitos to be swatted.

It's early in the campaign, for crying out loud. If he snaps at more reporters, I feel that the media machine will gradually laud McCain with less and less enthusiasm, to the point where outside the Fox News circuit, McCain's "strengths" will be delivered with all the conviction of a suburban junior high school principal. The media may have a certain amount of masochism for their great Tax Relief Overlords, but it can only go so far.

Qwest for fire

2008-03-06T11:46:00.000-08:00

Via Daily Kos, an interesting press release from the Republican National Convention:

To help meet its goal of holding the most tech-savvy convention in history, the Committee on Arrangements (COA) for the 2008 Republican National Convention today announced that Qwest Communications International Inc. (NYSE: Q) will serve as the Official Communications Provider for the Sept. 1-4 event.

Why is that significant? Because Qwest is the only telecommunication company not to be willing to hand over its records to the Bush Administration. In other words, if your communications services are being served by Qwest, it's very likely you're not being spied upon.

After all the bloviation about how patriotic the telecommunications companies are for "cooperating" with Bush on its illegal spying and wiretap program (for a price, of course), why would the Republican party want to associate itself with the one holdout? Hint: it's all bullshit.

Notes on the Lone Star State

2008-03-05T09:23:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd post some observations on the Texas primary, this morning. There's no particular moral here, I just thought this stuff was interesting.

Some of you may be aware that Rush Limbaugh was calling for Republicans to vote for Clinton in the Democratic primary. (Texas has an open primary, so this is legal.) The idea was that keeping her in the race longer would hurt Obama, should he become the nominee, by prolonging the negative campaigning against him. Many Republicans also seem to feel that Clinton, with her strong negatives, would be easy to beat in November. As it turns out, there was unusually heavy crossover voting — about 10%. However, exit polls suggest it split, with a slight advantage to Obama. I guess in the end Texas Republicans couldn't bring themselves to check a box marked "Clinton."

Clinton's attempts to portray Obama as inexperienced paid off big, with people who cited experience as the most important voting issue breaking 10 to 1 for her.

Voters divided evenly between the two on the economy, which I think is likely to be one of the biggest issues in the general campaign. While unemployment is still low in much of the country, middle class incomes have been largely flat during the Bush Administration, and the housing slump is creating a "reverse wealth effect" that makes people feel even poorer. This is the first national decline in real estate prices since the Great Depression, and recovery is unlikely any time soon &mdash adjustable-rate mortage "resets" don't start to tail off until 2011. In short, a recovery that felt lackluster for most people is now showing signs of slumping off into another recession.

Clinton broached the idea of a Clinton-Obama ticket should she win the nomination. Now that it's a given that Clinton is still in the running, I hope this possibility stays open, because I think a Clinton-Obama ticket could actually be quite powerful. Obama's charm would help a lot in smoothing over Clinton's rough edges.

In Virginia, a miscarriage could be a felony

2008-02-27T10:33:00.000-08:00

Wow. We're at new levels of loathesome.

The Virginia House of Representatives has just passed a horrendous bill, HB1126, which states:

Except as provided in other sections of this article, any person, including the pregnant female, who administers, or cause causes to be taken by a woman pregnant female, any drug or other thing, or uses means, with intent to destroy her unborn child, or to produce abortion or miscarriage, and thereby destroys such child, or produces such abortion or miscarriage, he is guilty of a Class 4 felony.

It's bad enough that abortion is being considered a crime punishable by prison. But "causing a miscarriage"? The language is incredibly vague and should be patently unconstitutional, let alone totalitarian. How does one judge intent in this matter? What's to stop someone from claiming his wife "caused" a miscarriage, getting her in prison, and getting a divorce out of it? That's just one ugly scenario that plays out here.

This goes beyond "overturning Roe v. Wade" into flat-out dehumanization. If a woman lies on the operating table and it's a choice between saving her life or hoping the baby will come to term, well, hope you like a life in the clink, lady. If the Virginia Supreme Court doesn't rule this thing unconstitutional, we have truly entered a dark age for human rights.

Count me for Obama

2008-02-13T14:38:00.000-08:00

I've sat on the fence for most of this primary season, for one big reason — I like both candidates. I think either Hillary or Obama would make an excellent president, and I agree with both of them on most policy issues. Lately, though, I've been leaning more and more towards Obama, and it's because of that E-word many of you are probably sick of hearing:

Electability.

Yes, I know — some of you will argue that Hillary is the more experienced choice, more of a known quantity. And you're right. But the press hates her, and as the 2000 election showed, that makes it very hard to win¹. Media preferences are going to be critical in this election because the press loves McCain. Even people who don't like him refer to him as a "media darling." Obama, though, is something else entirely. He has an amazing ability to make pundits all misty-eyed with his JFK-esque charm.

Public opinion about these candidates' personalities is inevitably going to mirror what the media tells people to think. It's not surprising, then, that in head-to-head matchup polls, Obama almost always beats McCain while Hillary almost always loses. It's possible Hillary could turn this around with a good campaign, but she'd be swimming against the current.

---

[1] I know, it's entirely possible Gore technically won that election. Realistically, though, it was a tie. We don't want another one of those. If it's close enough to go to the Supreme Court again, we'll lose.