Presidential Politics

I have been watching the campaigns for president with growing amusement and amazement. On the Democratic side it is looking like a total melee. If this was a third world country you could pretty much count on open bloodshed being spilled at the convention. Thus far at least we have managed to avoid that for the most part here in the US but you can never tell. Black talking heads are already making threatening noises about Clinton “stealing” the nomination from Obama. The press is making much about Clinton pressuring “super delegates” to vote for her while for the most part ignoring the fact that Obama is doing the same thing. Some Democratic activists are threatening to abandon the party if the super delegates change the outcome from what the elected delegates choose. The real donnybrook will come when neither of the candidates ends up with a majority of the elected delegates and the Supers have to vote. This raises the big question of Michigan and Florida. Is there anyone but me who is amused that despite the Democrats constant bitching about Republican supposedly disenfranchising voters no one complains when the Democratic Nation Party disenfranchises two entire states? If it comes down to it Clinton will try to seat the delegates. Obama of course will object greatly because he didn’t campaign in Florida at all and wasn’t on the ballot in Michigan. Expect chaos. I rather expect the Democratic campaign to get pretty ugly pretty fast.

On the Republican side, I personally am hoping that Anne Coulter sticks to her guns and abandons the party. I really dislike having lunatics on my side of an argument. The rest of the talking heads are still griping about McCain but it seems to be scaling back as more people come out in support of McCain. Boortz is still pretty adamant in favor of Huckabee but that is because he supports the Fairtax. Boortz also says quite clearly that failing to vote of McCain in the general election would be an exceptionally stupid thing for Republicans to do. He is a pragmatist if nothing else.
The question still arises in my mind of who McCain will choose as VP. Romney is a bet after his endorsement but I don’t think so. McCain needs to choose someone that the religious extremist in the Republican Party will support. And frankly, deep down inside they really don’t think Romney is one of them. The anti-Mormon bigotry is still there. Newt Gingrich would be an interesting choice. His “Conservative” credentials are all there but he may drive away the independents and moderates due to his reputation.

At any rate, it will be interesting to watch.