Defending the liberal tradition in history, science, and philosophy.
Fox News polls the question:
If there is an all-out war between the United States and various radical Muslim groups worldwide, who would you rather have in charge — Democrats or Republicans?
Guess who wins? Dems.
I say three comments before someone cries conspiracy theory. Oh, better yet, Ron Paul messed with the poll!
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However, regardless of party preference, most Americans vote the candidate, not the party, and if Republicans put up the right candidate and Democrats put up the wrong one, they won't win.
It's too bad so much of the Dem base dumps on guys like Lieberman or Hillery.
That means they're essentially tied. Yeah, let's whip out the champagne bottles for a tie!
Either they'll do better and we can rejoice, or they won't, and will gain a new appreciation for the challenge they've mocked Bush for not having solved yet.
Basically, people are stressed and believe the Dems will relieve their stress.
That belief will last about a month into President Hillary's administration, at which point, this very same question will yield an answer that will make the other side gloat.
For a little while.
More than half of Americans won't vote for Hillary Clinton, poll shows
My problem with too many of the Democrats now is that they think the war isn't real, that it's just something Bush and the neocons cooked up. By definition that wouldn't be an the case an all-out war. Otherwise it wouldn't be an all-out war.
Do you have a lot of experience as a slashdot troll? Your mad trolling skillz displayed here seem familiar.
The MSM don't just contribute money to Dems by 9:1.
And it's not a conspiracy. It's just people's prejudices coming out, like when Dan Rather's people just wanted to believe the Bush Guard memos were real.
Imagine for a moment how much different things would be if the press were 9:1 Republican.
And I'm not saying things would be better (in fact it would probably be worse), just very very different.
24. If there is an all-out war between the United States and various radical
Muslim groups worldwide, who would you rather have in charge — Democrats or
Republicans? (ROTATE)
Democrats Republicans (Both the same) (Don’t know)
26-27 Jun 07 41% 38 9 12
Democrats 75% 7 9 9
Republicans 5% 82 5 9
Independents 30% 31 19 20
Democrat column ends up totaling 110%, Republican ends up totaling 120% In the party and indep. breakdown the Dems winning only works if the poll over sampled democrats. The numbers don’t lie.
POLITICAL IDENTIFICATION: When you think about politics, do you think of
yourself as a Democrat or a Republican?
Democrat Republican (Independent) (Other) (Refused/Don’t know)
26-27 Jun 07 44% 35 16 2 4
Yep, heavy oversampling there.
If I read it right, then yes, the dems were over-sampled. From what I've seen, the overall average for the entire country these days approximates 33 Dem, 33 GOP, 34 Indep/swing.
Also, if I read what Gebera reported correctly, Donks prefer Donks, Derms prefer Derms, and Indies showing equal preference between parties (31/30) and/or same/undecided (19/20). Whoo, doggies, stop the presses! Partisans prefer themselves, while Indies split the difference. What's next, "chicks like to snuggle, guys like to fall asleep!?"
And -as Kevin D points out- the difference falls well within the margin for error. For the statistically literate, that means "dead even."
So, no, the Dems don't "win." Sorry, Ali. Try next week on the latest episode of "my political dick is bigger than yours!"
Ok. Now that we've had fun snarking at Ali for his latest snark (heh), let's look at the revealing truth, deep down.
Up until now, for several decades (say the mid-50s) the Derms have been percieved as being far stronger on national security than the Donks. True, JFK talked a big game, but he finked out during the Bay of Pigs, and punted Vietnam. Johnson's national-security performance in office reflected, alas, his vernacular synonym.
Don't even get me started on "Jimmeh..."
A lot of hawks like to dump on Clinton, but I'm hestant to make severe judgements right now. I'm too aware that was seems to obvious today might well become far less so in thirty, fifty, or more years later. Mr. Clinton did seem to hold onto an excessive concern for the civil rights of those attacking the United States, but consider the context of the times. The Cold War was over, the Soviet Union was on the ash-heap of history, and 9/11 was a paranoid and unrealistic nightmare. Back then the costs of legalistic nitpicking didn't seem so heavy.
Point being that for fifty years the Derms have been seen as the "national security" party, with "Scoop Jackson/Harry Truman" Dems as frequent allies.
If you followed the debates between 2004 & 2006, you saw how often conservative/Republicans would say something similar to "well, yes, Trent Lott and Denny Hastert are embarassing jackasses, but surely you don't trust the Dhimmicrats to defend this country, do you?
To be honest, when I saw how certain lackwit Derm politicos wrapped themselves in the flag, I sometimes sympathized with Donks who rolled their eyes at expressions of patriotism. No, not at the men and women across this country who feel no embarassment at saluting the flag, honoring our soldiers, or getting all soft'n'squishy during a particularly beautiful rendition of our national anthem during a ballgame.
Nope, I'm talking about some log-rolling, glad-handing, worthless sack of crap hack inhabiting Washington, D.C., but acting as if he's John-fucking-Wayne combined with Bruce "Die Hard" Willis just because he votes for big DoD budgets.
These same people have been supported by a broad swath of the conservative/Republican movement. I honestly can't tell you how many times I've encountered the argument that even people like Lott, Hastert, and company are better than the Donks just because you can trust them on defense...
The dirty little secret is that the Derm leadership seemed to have decided, several years ago, that no matter how egregious their abuse of the public trust, public monies, and public welfare became, the Democrats were always worse. There was always that unspoken question: "would you trust anyone who takes Cindy Sheehan seriously?" My answer to that is still Hell, no!, but that doesn't mean I like what the Derms are pulling.
Again and again, the question was asked in blogs across this country: can you really trust the Hildebeast and John "French" Kerry to defend you?
The Republican leadership seems to have decided that this made them about as invulnerable as Superman. Alas for them, they forgot about Kryptonite. Or in this case, voters who decided they were mad as Hell, and't weren't going to take it any more. Even if it meant a less-than-optimum House of Representatives.
In other words, the Republicans will from now on have one helluva time beating up on the Democrats with the bloody shirt. They're not invulnerable! Too many independent/undecided voters have decided they're just too fed up with the Lott-ian crew in DC who seem to expect the proles to pay their taxes and quit complaining.
That's the significance of Ali's poll: The GOP doesn't have a "Get Out Of Jail, FREE!" card any more. Snark intended. :)
So now the Derms have to -God forbid- fight the Donks on the issues. And people on both ends of the spectrum are paying attention these days. I cite the late bastard abortion of an amnesty bill as evidence. That was definitely a bi-partisian killing, mi amigos.
Now, before any Donk faithful get too cocky (and, yes, Ali, I'm thinking of you {g}) let's all remember that the current Democratic Party leadership is remarkably similar to the Republican Party leadership in that they both generally demonsrate a remarkable lack of testicular fortitude, as well as an equivalent love for power and riches.
If Pelosi and company were worth a turtle's turd they would have had the funding for the Iraq war roped, tossed, tied, branded and squalling for mercy back in March.
If all the polls I've seen cited ("60% of all Americans oppose the war," blah blah) and all the common wisdom is that we've truly screwed the pooch, and that majority of American voters deeply and honestly believe we can't win in Iraq, then the Democratic leadership are a bunch of ineffective, gutless old women. Fit company for the prissy whiners at the helm of USS Elephant.
Vote for Fred! Hell, vote for Obama, or Richardson (or even Ron Paul) and really piss off the establishtment. Shake things up.
...Evil idea: let's all get together and write a really killer "Cross of Gold" speech for Barak Obama. Let's get the Derm leadership to truly wet their pants in panic...
plus minus 3 can also mean that there may be a 6 point difference between dems and repubs. its all a matter of what presumption one wants to give.
The poll oversampled Dems by 9%, three times the margin of error (ok, I know it doesn't work exacly like that, more like a 4.5% effect).
In any case the oversampling was greater than the margin for error and/or the split of 3%. It's quite possible to state: Correcting for the sample sizes the nation prefers the Republicans by a mere 1.5%.
Since that's far less than the margin of error, it's statistically insignificant.
However, it's still news. Dems usually get beat senseless in this category. Whatthefuxupwitdat?
...I was going to spend a few minutes explaining how statistics really work to Ali, but he's obviously going to shuck'n'jive around the whole issue. After all, the original post stated that the Dems "won" the poll. Now that statistically-literate have come out of the woodwork, he moves the goalposts.
The worst part is that both Gerbera and I both state quite explicitly that the traditional GOP advantage in national security has evaporated into a dead heat.
But instead of trying to follow up on that line of thought, such as "that's interesting; just what has happened that might explain a shift to 'dead even?'," Ali basically blows off the other disputants, classic modern-liberal style.
"If you can't baffle 'em with bullshit, just ignore 'em, and act like they aren't there."
Then Ali wonders why he gets rough receptions on this blog. Sheesh...
I'm really getting sick and tired of people who act as if no one's talking to them, when they encounter a disagreement they can't easily shoot down.
Of course we all lose our tempers now and then. Dean freely admits to being imperfect in this regard, which is why regulars to this establishment will generally be cut more slack than people who we don't know very well.
Still: behave like an adult, or go find somewhere else to play. Thanks.