On the few occasions when I can't resist launching a rant, when I dumbly give in to the temptation to speak with less than fully formed arguments arranged in essay form, I will risk embarrassing myself in this space.

Not everything below will be worthless thinking out loud. Some of it may even be intelligent observation.

But no matter how awful these words come to haunt me on reflection--days, months, weeks, or years later--I will do my best to resist erasing this crap, to remind myself how dumb I can sometimes be.

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by Terry Michael,
12:40 a.m. Thursday, February 7, 2008

About to lose my pundit's license?

My 6:30 p.m. Monday, February 4 post doesn't look so good right now. Keep in mind, when I go to Las Vegas (I have to, my family lives there) I always play the longshot slots, because the rewards for being foolishly bold could yield big returns.

Could. But almost never do. And didn't in this case (Terry said, wiping the egg off his soul patch.)

I would still like to know, if the exit pollsters can tell me: did Obama and Romney win among those who actually voted on election day, rather than those who may have cast their votes weeks ago using California's early voting option (an abomination of the electoral process, I would argue, as someone who believes the electorate should be making decisions on the same set of facts.)

But Obama is still well on his way to the nomination, leading a movement, while the senator from New York is still heading a corporation of operatives. (Did you watch her READ that cut-and-paste-job of a "victory" speech Tuesday night...a paragraph here, a paragraph there, attempting to coopt Barack's themes, even to the point she's now doing his trademark applauding of the audience.)

However, my boy Mitt (not my candidate Mitt, just my prediction Mitt) seems to be a victim of theGOP's suicidal tendencies. Romney's still their best general election candidate, who would have a chance to beat Clinton (not Obama); but the GOP K Street division is insisting on going down to defeat with the geezer from Arizona.

David Broder, in a column today ("The Formidable McCain") reflects the conventional, but really wrong Beltway "wisdom" that McCain would be strong because he appeals to independents with his can't we all just get along, or I'll break your knee caps schtick. But if you read all the way through David's mis-analysis, he completely contradicts himself at the end of the column, pointing out McCain's fatal weaknesses, his age and his Iraq warrior-ism.

Anyway....

Damn, I hate saying I'm wrong, but:

I was wrong.

Last time that happens! LOLOLOLOL

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byTerry Michael,
6:30 p.m. Monday, February 4, 2008

Surfs up for Obama in California, and a
California Quake for Romney
May Shake McCain Inevitability

Two big stories are shaping up for Super Duper Tuesday, one almost on the radar screen of pundits, but the other may send shock waves under the inevitability turf McCain has been staking out with help from the Republican establishment and an adoring media.

Like the tidal wave that came in from the Atlantic in South Carolina, the California surf is going to be up for the Illinois Senator and will begin his sweep to victory. If the Democratic nomination is not close to being clinched for Obama by the end of the day Tuesday, it will be well on its way.

Even more seismic, to mix metaphors, may be a California victory for Mitt Romney, which will break the Republican race wide open.

Perhaps I am just too wed to my unyielding and consistent predictions over the past year that it will be an Obama-Romney race in 2008. But we have a candidate in each party representing hope, the future, and a clean break with old politics. The more Obama defines the race in those terms, the less likely Republicans will find the past and the status quo attractive options for their standard bearer.

Admittedly, it's a long shot for Romney, but we've seen the unexpected repeatedly happen in this most interesting presidential campaign of the past half century.

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Obama, Oprah. Oprah, Obama.
(And thoughts about liberal racism.)
by Terry Michael, February 16, 2007
One of the possibly few good things about electing Obama/Oprah/Oprah/Obama, in addition to his almost-straight-forward opposition to our criminal enterprise in Iraq, would be giving lie to the liberal racist insistence on seeing a bigot behind every bush. It would also be a big blow to the Diversity Industrial Complex, which feeds off liberal race consciousness. For more on liberal racism, see Dave Weigel at Hit 'n Run, "Say It Loud! I Vote for Blacks and I'm Proud!"

[Click here for Permalink to this piece on this site]

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The Neo-Con warriors' religion,
impervious to fact and argument.
No 'White Flag' for these unrequited lovers.
by Terry Michael, February 2, 2007
Listening to an NPR sound bite recently from a neo-conservative foreign policy wonk, I wondered to myself: “Is arguing the war with a Neo-Con like trying to talk sense to an unrequited lover, or debating evolution with a fundamentalist Christian?

How can you have a rational discussion with someone whose "views" have devolved to the received wisdom of religious faith? Or the in-denial mind set of a friend who has lost at love?

You can recite a fact base.......
....[Click here for Permalink to full text of this piece on this site]

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Kramer, race and demagoguery....

by Terry Michael, December 3, 2006

Michael "Kramer" Richards' use of the "N" word unleashed a torrent of really stupid media babble.

"Thoughtful" liberal columnists told us it was proof racism is alive and well in America. Hustling demagogues like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton got the TV time-crack to which their giant egos are addicted. And black "comedians" and hip hop "artists" reassessed their own use of the racial expletive.

Truth is, the glass is more than half full.....
..... [Click here for Permalink to full text of this piece on this site]

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Sen. Webb: a little smarter
spontaneity, please....

by Terry Michael, December 3, 2006

Authenticity and spontaneity are qualities many of us are desperately seeking in politicians. Jim Webb was certainly both, in his "That's between me and my boy" exchange with President Bush at a White House reception.

But a smart retort would have been infinitely more useful....
....[Click here for Permalink to full text of this piece on this site]

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