Pew Survey on Belief in Evolution of Humans

Four years ago, majorities of Republicans, Democrats and Independents all expressed a belief that humans evolved. Today, a large plurality of Republicans (48%) claim that humans have always existed in their present form.  Only 39% of Republicans believe that humans evolved from other forms of life. Did Fox News succeed in making their viewers dumber? Tempting as that is to say, I suspect that not many people stopped believing in evolution in the last four years. But I think that a lot of people who are smart enough to know that evolution happened, no longer identify as Republicans.

But let's focus on the positive.  Sixty percent of Americans overall now believe in evolution.  Just a third, (33%) believe that humans have always existed in their present form.  We have a long way to go, but what has Darwin taught us if not to believe in the power of very slow, extremely gradual change over long periods of time?

http://www.pewforum.org/2013/12/30/publics-views-on-human-evolution/

Walter White, sure, but the Osmonds?

Note: Blue states have marriage equality, green states have civil unions or domestic partnerships

Yesterday, the New Mexico Supreme Court unanimously ruled that its ban on gay marriages was unconstitutional.  The Land of Enchantment thus became the 17th state with full marriage equality. Barely 24 hours later, a federal district judge ruled that Utah's ban on same-sex marriages was unconstitutional.

As of this writing, marriage equality is the law of the land in the Beehive State.  Utah's attorney general has said the state will appeal and the district court's ruling could be stayed pending that appeal as early as Monday.  But the first gay couples were able to marry on Friday afternoon. The mayor of Salt Lake City even conducted a few wedding ceremonies, including one between a Utah state senator and his new husband.

Gay marriage in the home of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was once unthinkable.  And it might not still be the law in 72 hours.  But for now, the Honorable Robert J. Shelby, an Obama appointee, has wreaked a little welcome havoc on my marriage equality chart:  

Until this afternoon, the single best predictor of the legal status of gay relationships was the result of the last Presidential election. The whole country could be broken down into 3 tiers:

1. Full marriage equality in all 14 jurisdictions where the President got at least 55% of the vote.
2. A combination of equality or other recognition in eight of his next best 10 states.
3. A complete lockout in the remaining 27 states.

My thesis for all of these posts has been that the march towards marriage equality has mirrored the democratic process.  That's not strictly true anymore.  Last year, Barack Obama gained just 25 percent of the vote against the first ever Mormon presidential nominee.  (In 2008, Utah was his second worst state, with 34% of the vote against Episcopalian John McCain, slightly worse than the 32% he got in Wyoming.)  Utah is now a quintessential outlier.  

This aberration might go away on Monday.  And the appeal might ultimately succeed.  But this decision is consistent with a related long term political trend.  Judge Shelby has been on the bench for less than a year.  He was born in 1970.  That's quite young for a federal judge. He'll have this job for as long as he wants it.  And more than likely, at some point, five Supreme Court justices will make marriage equality the law of all 50 states.  It is a matter of when.  And by the time there's a Gen-X majority on that bench, this issue will be ancient history.

Update:  Huffington Post has the following nuggets or Judge Shelby:  "He was appointed by President Barack Obama after GOP Sen. Orrin Hatch recommended him in November 2011.

Shelby served in the Utah Army National Guard from 1988 to 1996 and was a combat engineer in Operation Desert Storm." 

Democrats 2016, The Morning Line

Assessing the Democrats will require a different metric than I used for the Republicans.  The Republican party is overwhelmingly white and majority male.  Fully half of them are white evangelical Christians.  So when I assessed the prospects of their possible candidates, I evaluated them in terms of their appeal to certain ideological blocks within the party.

The Democrats have fewer obvious ideological splits that Republicans, and a lot more demographic diversity.  Nearly 60% of voters in the 2008 Democratic primary were female.  And 31% were black or Hispanic. Candidates will also need to have access to money and to passionate volunteers.  Such resources can be found in labor unions and among the young, passionate voters who tend to be skeptical of government and anti-war.  So when evaluating the Democratic field, I will assign grades based on the ability of each candidate to appeal to women, minorities, labor unions and peaceniks.

For the Republicans I divided the field into three tiers: Contender, Pretenders and Niche Candidates. I will use slightly different labels for the Democrats.

I.  The 600 Pound Gorilla.

1.  Hillary Clinton (69).  It is rare for a non-incumbent to be such a heavy favorite to win their party's nomination.  The closest example in recent memory is Vice-President Al Gore, who eventually defeated a reasonably strong candidacy by Bill Bradley by winning every single primary and caucus in 2000.

Secretary Clinton is the obvious choice.  She has astronomical name recognition, a solid resume and the goodwill of the party faithful.  She also stands ready to make history as the first woman presidential nominee.  There's just one problem.  She's a lousy candidate.

I say that based mostly on her 2008 campaign.  She was the heavy favorite but she hired a bunch of warmed over hacks, most notably Mark Penn, who were influential in her husband's campaign. Senator Obama's campaign outworked her nearly everywhere and picked off delegates that she never should have lost.  The sheer incompetence of her campaign cost allowed the nomination to slip through her fingers.

A track record like that matters, and I can not consider her the inevitable nominee.  But the good news for her is that Barack Obama is not walking through that door this time.  As we'll see below, she is the most likely nominee.  But she can lose again, and her first job is to not forget that fact.

Report Card:  Women: A Minorities: B+ Labor Unions: B Peaceniks: C-

Hillary's biggest mistake in 2008 was under estimating Barack Obama's appeal to minority voters.  She relied on very early polling data that had her way ahead of him with black voters who thought highly of her.  Her primary campaign did real damage to the Clinton name among black Democrats.  But serving as his secretary of state probably healed those wounds sufficiently. 

Chance of Running:  99%  Chance of being the nominee: 70%

Veep Prospects:  None.  She doesn't want to spend her 70s waiting for some dude to die.  Except maybe her husband.  Zing!
Will She Get My Vote?  Probably not.  I think she is qualified and will probably make a decent President.  If she's the nominee, I'm sure I will support her strongly.  But I also expect a candidate to emerge that better matches my beliefs on certain key issues, most notably drug policy, defense spending and our relationship with Israel.

II.  The Obvious Alternative.

2.  Joe Biden (74).  Few men were born for their job more than Joe Biden was born to be Vice-President.  One reason that he was such a brilliant choice in 2008 is that Hillary Clinton could reasonably believe that he was not a threat to run in 2016 because of his age.  He will be older in 2016 than Bob Dole was in 1996 and John McCain was in 2008.  He will even be older than Ronald Reagan was when he ran for RE-election in 1984.

He also ran twice for President with spectacularly poor results.  He has no obvious base in the party, other than people who really love Barack Obama but who don't like Hillary Clinton. That's a small base.  But his name recognition and large rolodex of contacts will probably

Report Card:  Women: B+ Minorities: B+ Labor Unions: B- Peaceniks: C-

He most likely will run.  There are few things in life he loves more than the sound of his own voice. Glad handing might be one of them.  And he has tons of name recognition and supreme self-confidence. He should run and he should have a good time and he will lose, spectacularly.

There is one somewhat morbid factor to consider here.  If Barack Obama dies in the next two years, than Joe Biden will run as an incumbent.  It is a remote prospect, given the President's apparent health and relative youth. But it would improve his chance of being the 2016 nominee.

Chance of Running:  98%  Chance of being the nominee: 6%

Veep Prospects:  None.  No one takes this job twice.
Will He Get My Vote?  Probably not.  I would love to vote for a Blue Hen but I don't think he's a strong candidate and I don't think he's especially strong on the issues that I care about.

III.  The Plausibles.

3.  Brian Schwietzer (61).  He's an interesting guy and a successful two-term governor of a western state.  But it's a tiny state with just three electoral votes.  The Democrats last carried Montana in 1992, thanks largely to Ross Perot getting over a quarter of the votes there.  (Clinton won with less than 38% of the vote.)
Report Card:  Women: B+ Minorities: B Labor Unions: B+ Peaceniks: B+

I think he faces an uphill battle but his opening is from the Libertarian left.  He's an educated man who knows a lot about energy policy and who lived in the Middle East long enough to speak Arabic fluently.  He's also from a state with a health Libertarian streak and knows how to talk to people who are skeptical of government.  He made some news this morning by declaring an intention to visit every county in Iowa.  His challenge will be to combine the emotional appeal of the 2004 Dean campaign with the political efficiency of Obama's 2008 campaign.  He's a long shot but might be the most plausible one.

Chance of Running:  98%  Chance of being the nominee: 5%

Veep Prospects:  Reasonable. He has executive experience and is a solid campaigner.
Will He Get My Vote?  Quite possibly.  He has my attention.

4.  Kristen Gillebrand (50).  She's good on TV and she represents a huge state.  Despite a fairly conservative voting record and image during her time in the house, she has made a name for herself in the Senate by championing issues that resonate with both the liberal base and with the party establishment.  That's an impressive feat for a young senator.   And she put up huge numbers in her second senate race.  She's a player, but she's probably crowded out by Hillary.

Report Card:  Women: A Minorities: A- Labor Unions: B+ Peaceniks: B-

If Hillary does not run, she might well be the front-runner.   But Hillary is extremely likely to run.  She is young, however and I expect her to run some day.

Chance of Running:  40%  Chance of being the nominee: 5%

Veep Prospects:  None, if Hillary is the nominee but excellent if it's someone other than Hillary.
Will she Get My Vote?  Perhaps.

5. Mark Warner (62).  He has an impeccable resume.  A very successful CEO, extremely popular Governor of a swing state, and now a Senator.  He has checked every box on the sheet.  And his electoral success in Virginia speaks for itself.  But I don't see a rationale to distinguish him from Hillary.  I'm not sure what story he tells that will resonate with the base.
Report Card:  Women: B+ Minorities: B+ Labor Unions: B Peaceniks: B-

If Hillary does not run, she might well be the front-runner.   But Hillary is extremely likely to run.  She is young, however and I expect her to run some day.

Chance of Running:  25%  Chance of being the nominee: 4%

Veep Prospects:  Outstanding.  His popularity in Virginia means that he will be on any nominee's short list.  If there can be said to be a front-runner for the #2 slot, then it is he.
Will he Get My Vote?  If he runs, it means he has come up with a message to run against Hillary on.     And that will get my attention.

6.    Martin O'Malley (53).  Governor O'Malley could carve out a place to Hillary's left on the issues while still projecting the kind of main stream posture that passes for gravitas in the current political climate.  And he has the ultimate "in" with liberal hipsters, he is the inspiration for a character on The Wire. (Mayor Carcetti).  He's also term limited, so he'll be out of office come January, 2015.  Just about the perfect time to launch a Presidential bid.

Report Card:  Women: A- Minorities: A- Labor Unions: B+ Peaceniks: B+

In short, a very plausible alternative to Hillary.

Chance of Running:  80%  Chance of being the nominee: 4%

Veep Prospects:  Decent, particularly if he does well in the primaries.
Will he Get My Vote?  Perhaps.  In the history of the republic, only one President has ever been mayor of a major city.  (Grover Cleveland, Buffalo).   One of my goals in life is to see another.  O'Malley qualifies.  (See above comment about The Wire.)

7.  Andrew Cuomo (59).  The rationale for his candidacy would be, more or less, I'm the governor of a really big state.  That might work some years, but it's not something the base can rally around.  His only liberal bona fides come from being Mario Cuomo's son and from being the first governor to get marriage equality through his legislature.  But he lacks the oratory skill and political shrewdness of his old man.  And his natural constituencies (bankers, limousine liberals) are perfectly fine with Hillary being the nominee.

Report Card:  Women: B+ Minorities: B Labor Unions: B- Peaceniks: B-

I'm not sure how he wins this thing but he might be tempted to run and hope for Mrs. Clinton to stumble.  If Clinton does win, he won't be the running mate (see the 12th amendment) and he would likely be 67 before there is another open nomination race. .

Chance of Running:  70%  Chance of being the nominee: 2%

Veep Prospects:  Not very good.  The nominee is likely to be a New Yorker, and that would put him out of the running.  And I can't think of a state or constituency that he shores up for the Democrats if the top of the ticket is someone else.
Will He Get My Vote?  That is unlikely.

IV.  The Long Shots.

8.  Elizabeth Warren (67).  In the interest of full disclosure, and not passing up on a humble brag, let me say that I know the Senator, a little.  She was briefly my boss, although I had virtually no direct interaction with her.  But I admire her very much, and some of that is based on the opinions of people who do happen to know her well.  I think she's brilliant.  And I will absolutely vote for her if she does. But I do not think she will run.  I think the Senate is exactly where she is meant to be, and I expect big, big things out of her on behalf of the middle class.
Chance of Running:  5%  Chance of being the nominee: 1%

She is in the long shot category mostly because I do not think she will run.  If she does run, she has real potential.
Veep Prospects:  None.  She's from a deep blue state and was an uneven candidate during her only previous campaign for office.  I also think she might be the rare politician that would turn the 2nd slot down.  She went to the Senate to get stuff done.
Will she Get My Vote?  Yes.

9. Howard Dean (68).  He is still very popular with the base.  2004 was a long time ago, but he can rebuild his network of supporters pretty fast.  And like Hillary, he also paid his dues by working hard for the party after a losing presidential bid.
Report Card:  Women: B+ Minorities: B+ Labor Unions: B+ Peaceniks: A

I'm sure he's thinking about a run.  But I don't think he wants to get beat again.  And I was never convinced that his wife was fully on board with the previous run.  Its hard to make this run without the support of a spouse.

Chance of Running:  35%  Chance of being the nominee: 1%

Veep Prospects:  Very weak.  His negatives are high and the Democrats have tended to pick a candidate closer to the center than the Presidential nominee.
Will he Get My Vote?  Unlikely.  I admire his success as the DNC chair, but I've never been sold on the Doctor as a future president.

10. Russ Feingold (63).  Impeccable bona fides with the base.  But he has maintained a relatively low profile since leaving the senate.
Report Card:  Women: B Minorities: B+ Labor Unions: B+ Peaceniks: A

His biggest practical problem may be that he is twice-divorced.  Spouses have become important campaign assets, and he doesn't have one.  That hurts.  He also hasn't shown any real interest in running. But he could probably compete in the Iowa caucuses, and whoever wins there has a shot.

Chance of Running:  15%  Chance of being the nominee: 1%

Veep Prospects:  Very weak.  Thinks about that big moment at the convention where Hillary accepts the nomination, then Bill joins her on stage, and then Russ....unaccompanied.  Its a bad visual.
Will he Get My Vote?  I think he is very principled, and we agree on most issues.  If the primary were held tomorrow, and I'm right about Warren not running, then I would vote for Feingold.

11.  Alan Grayson (58).  He was elected to the house in 2008, then lost in the 2010 midterms, before winning the seat back in 2012.  If he loses in the next midterms, I suspect he will at least ponder a run in the primaries.  He has the potential to become our equivalent of Ron Paul, by raising a lot of money and inspiring some very devoted followers.  But I don't think he will be seen as a real contender for the Presidency by the press unless he makes some huge noise in the early states.

Chance of Running:  20%  Chance of being the nominee: <1 p="">

Veep Prospects:  Very weak.  Sure he's from a swing-state, but I don't think he could win a statewide election in Florida, so he's not much help there.
Will he Get My Vote?  We agree on most issues and I really hope he stays in Congress.  And I'll keep an open mind if he does run for President, but his resume is a little light at this point.

IV.  The Field.
This list is far from complete.  Several candidates will emerge between now and then.  There will be someone on the far-left who runs on a campaign of reduced military spending, an end to NSA spying and creation of a single-payer healthcare.  There also seems to be a gaping hole in this field for a Latino or Latina to run in this field.  But I don't know who.  So for now, I'll stand with 11.

Rosa Parks, Game Show Contestant

That's a strange title.  And this is a strange piece of Americana/Pop Culture.  In 1980, Rosa Parks appeared as a contestant on the show To Tell The Truth.  The premise of that show was to have three people, one sworn to tell the truth, and two imposters.  So the Real Rosa appears with two other black women of a similar age and they are asked question by a panel of B-list celebrities.

The clip really speaks for itself and you should watch the whole thing.  But it's just a little mind blowing to realize that 25 years after bravely defying the forces of segregation, she wasn't too recognizable for this program.

Today is the 58th anniversary of Mrs. Parks refusing to stand up on that bus.  This should be a day that is remembered nationally.  I think every bus and every train in the country should have one seat left open in the first row, with a little black sash placed on it.  Because we can not take for granted what she did for all of us. Nipsey says it best at the end of his comments.  Mrs. Parks is ten feet tall and a hero for American democracy.

Thank you, Rosa.  And thank you too, Nipsey.

GOP 2016, First Report Card

A follow to last week's post about the potential 2016 Republican Presidential Candidates.  I will post this chart from time to time, as candidates move up or down the rankings, or in and out of the announced field.

I haven't made any adjustments since the first post, but there are two developments worth mentioning.

1.  Paul Ryan has made some comments about how the GOP should reach out to minorities.  He seems destined to be the Jack Kemp of his generation: a Rust Belt House Member, with a reputation for being a fiscal policy wonk, and a one-time Vice-Presidential Candidate.  The other thing he is likely to have in common with Kemp is that he will never be President.  But a few years as HUD secretary might be in the cards one day.  (And I doubt he'll ever be a pro Quarterback either.)

2. The tentative deal with Iran will create the first possible rift among the field.  As I wrote in the previous post, this could be the first time in a generation that there are genuine foreign policy difference among the Republican presidential candidates.  Rand Paul, at least, might try to run as a libertarian alternative to the Neo-Con orthodoxy of the Republican party since 9/11.  The exact tenor of his response might reveal which camp he is more concerned with courting.  I suspect he will try to be both critical of the President while playing lip service to the value of diplomacy, blah blah bullshit.

The letter grades shown in the right-hand columns reflect my perception of how each candidate appeals to what I consider the major parts of the Republican primary voters: Bankers, (Religious) Zealots, (War) Hawks and Isolationists.

GOP 2016, The Morning Line

I'm going to dip my toes into speculating about how the next Presidential race will go.  I start with the Republicans because, frankly, they are the most entertaining show in politics.  I will break the candidates into three tiers, which can be thought of as Contenders, Also-Rans and Niche Candidates.

 The Ideological Geography and Demography of the Voters.

The nominating process is about appealing to very specific slivers of the electorate.  For the last several decades, the Republican primaries usually come down to  which candidate can appeal sufficiently to the Pro-Business/Wall Street wing, and without completely alienating the more religious elements of the Christian right.  The 2016 race may be a little more complicated, because I think there are two spectrum along which the candidates will compete, one related to domestic issues and the other to foreign policy and military issues.

A. The Domestic Divide: Bankers and Zealots.
B.  Foreign Policy Divide: Hawks and Isolationists.

The domestic divide is nothing new but this might be the first Republican campaign in my lifetime to feature real, fervent debates about foreign policy issues.   For the past few cycles, the Isolationist wing of the Party has been a sideshow with a small but vocal base of voters who rally to Ron Paul.  But one effect of the Republican base loathing President Obama has been to stoke some skepticism about the wisdom of an imperial presidency and foreign policy.  It's probably a fad, and I don't think the party will stick to this idea if and when they have the keys to the Oval Office, but it could influence the race and so I will give a grade to each candidate for how they might appeal to each half of these two spectra.  Each candidate will be given a grade for his ability to appeal to Bankers, Zealots, Hawks and Isolationists.

I.  The Contenders

The contenders are ranked by their strength as a general election candidate.  The number by their name is the age they will be on Election Day, 2016.

1.  Jeb Bush (63).  Its easy to dismiss him because of the baggage his name carries but the Bush name is not going to hurt him in the Republican primaries.  Believe it or not, that third of the country thinks his brother did a bang-up job, more or less.  Besides, Jeb is the smart one.  It was a fluke that his idiot brother  became President and I thinkg that must chap his ass.  I like to picture George 41 begging Jeb to step up and fix the family legacy.  (I'm not saying that W is their Fredo.  That could be Neil but W. is more like a lightweight version of Santino who sent other people's kids to dive over to Connie and Carlo's house.)

        Jeb will have instant appeal to establishment Republicans because of his name.  And he will also seem like a smart investment because he is very popular in Florida and the GOP probably can't win a Presidential election without winning Florida.  So he will have money, and name recognition and won't come off like a clown.  This should be enough to make him the front-runner by the time we get to Iowa.  

Report Card:  Bankers: A- Zealots: A- Hawks: A- Isolationists: C+

So I think he has pretty broad appeal, and I think that the Isolationists are the smallest segment in this party.  In fact, I think their numbers are temporarily inflated by the widespread distrust of the currrent President.  Deep down a lot of those folks would be happy to have another President they can trust enough to start a war or two in the Middle East.  But to the extent the Paulites have any legitimate claims of influencing Republican foreign policy, Jeb will suffer for the many sins of his brother.  

Chance of Running:  85%  Chance of being the nominee: 28%

Veep Prospects:  Slim.  The Bush name will be a net minus in the general, so unless the nominee really thinks a Veep can sew up Florida, they won't be picking old Jeb.

2.  Chris Christie (54).  Governor Christie is basking in the glow of an easy win in a deep blue state.  I'm not sure that has a lot of significance two years from now, but it does allow him to frame a specific narrative: I'm the guy who can win in places that we can't win.  It's not the worst start point for a candidate in this field.  And I rank him second because I do think he will expand the electoral map, not just to New Jersey but I think he would run relatively strong in New Hampshire, Ohio and Pennsylvania.  

There are also reasons to be bearish about him.  Firstly, he's an obnoxious jerk. And while that seems to fit the nation's personality more often than we like to admit, it is off-putting.  It's also hard to gauge how people will react to him as he slims down over the next three years due to his gastric bypass surgery.  It's a weird thing to say but he will look very different two years from now, and that will affect how people react to him. Maybe they will admire him for being proactive about his weight. Maybe others will resent him for it.  It might cost him some of his every-man shtick if he's 185 pounds at the time of the Iowa caucuses.  The rumors about how what the Romney campaign learned in vetting him also raise some unsavory prospects.

My biggest reservation though is that the Right Wing noise machine really hates him.  Last night I endured Sean Hannity and Anne Coulter going through a laundry list of things he did to infuriate that crowd.  (Embracing President Obama after Sandy, appointing some people they didn't like, presumably including this guy, scheduling a special election for the Senate that Corey Booker won, etc.)

Report Card:  Bankers: A- Zealots: B+ Hawks: B+ Isolationists: B-

Solid across the board, but like most Governors he is a bit of cipher on international issues.  He seems likely to be more of a Remember 9/11! candidate than an aspiring Isolationist.

Chance of Running:  99%  Chance of being the nominee: 26%

Veep Prospects:  Reasonable.  If a hard right nominee emerges, Christie may be seen as bringing balance to the ticket, along with a chance to expand the map to some states that the Democrats would otherwise take for granted.  

3.  Rick Santorum  (58).  The Republican presidential nominating process is more like a Royal Succession than an open primary.  In 1976 Gerald Ford narrowly beat Ronald Reagan.  Four years later, Reagan staved off George H.W. Bush, who 8 years later defeated Bob Dole to become the nominee.  Four years after that Bob Dole won the nomination rather easily, which left a void in the successor position.  In 2000 Bush beat McCain, who won the nomination the next time around, by beating Mitt Romney, who, you guessed it, was nominated the time after that.  If this pattern holds, Rick Santorum will be the nominee of the Republican party.  But almost no one is talking about him as
a serious contender.

Report Card:  Bankers: B+ Zealots: A Hawks: A- Isolationists: B-
His appeal is definitely broad enough to win.  I don't think he will automatically alienate any of the major constituencies in the Republican party.  True Libertarians won't vote for him, but I don't think they make up a big share of the early states.  The GOP has also floated the idea of scheduling a Super Tuesday after the traditional early states, in the upper Midwest.  I think Santorum would benefit from that schedule, if only because it would diminish the importance of the Southern States, and most of the other contenders are southerners. 

Chance of Running:  85%  Chance of being the nominee: 23%

Veep Prospects:  Modest.  But if he runs strong but loses to someone other than Christie, the nominee might feel like he's the best chance at picking off Pennsylvania. 

4.  Ted Cruz (46).  Just as Christie has already planted his flag in the center of this field, Senator Cruz has planted his in the hearts and minds of the parties right wing.  When the history of the 2013 Shutdown of the Federal Government is written, it may well be decided that the whole thing happened because this guy was looking to collect Email addresses of potential donors.  He also has the one thing that every Presidential candidate needs: a ridiculously out-sized belief in his own ability and intelligence.  So he's running.  And he will have an army of volunteers out there in Iowa.  But I think his recent game of chicken with the global economy may have hurt him a little too much with the establishment.  And the thing about appealing to crazy people is you have to keep being crazy. It never, ever stops.  So he can lose their support over almost any damned fool thing in the next 26 months.  But for now, the polls show he has a plurality of support among Republican primary voters.  So he belongs up here with the big boys.

Report Card:  Bankers: C Zealots: A Hawks: B+ Isolationists: B+

He has already painted himself into a corner with the money types.  They won't forget that he took the prospect of default right to the wire.  But I think he's stronger on foreign policy than most people appreciate, because I think he is best able to balance public lip service about the fear of  a certain President while also subtly conveying the very real fear of certain other threats to national security.  

Chance of Running:  99.9999999999999%  

Chance of being the nominee: 13%

Veep Prospects:  The only way he gets on the ticket is if he is an extremely close runner-up in the primaries and the establishment nominee feels they need to pick him or else risk losing the enthusiasm of the base.  This is doubly unlikely though, as the GOP base always rallies to oppose the Democratic nominee, and that will be even easier if that nominee is named Hillary Clinton.  

5.  Rand Paul (53).  Rand has two things going for him: a built-in fund raising base among people who supported his father so fervently in the last two cycles, and a deep personal commitment to an ideology that justifies any amount of dishonesty, greed and shamelessness in the pursuit of personal glory and political power.

So you guessed it...I don't like this guy.  Every once in a while he seems to take a principled stand on something, but deep down he's only really committed to his own cause.  When President Obama was threatening to go to war in Syria, Senator Paul could have opposed it on the lofty principal that America shouldn't take sides in another countries civil war.  But that might send the wrong message to the very people who will vote to determine the 2016 GOP nomination.  So he took it as step further and said that President Obama was wrong to pursue this war because the bloody, dictatorial Assad regime was good, because it was a friend to Christians, and that the rebels were dirty Muslim terrorists.

That's about as cynical as it can get.  But it bought him cover.  Instead of taking a principled stand against foreign interventions, he was standing up to this President on behalf of Christians.  Oi vey. 

Report Card:  Bankers: A- Zealots: B Hawks: D Isolationists: A
I think his cynicism will only get him so far.  I don't think he can win the principled foreign policy argument this time around and I know the other candidates will paint him as soft on Muslims.  He probably also hurt his standing with some of the big money types by supporting the government shutdown, although he was tactful enough to not be the public face of it.  His recent plaigarism scandal also revealed that he might be too thin-skinned for this contest.  But he will run, and he will have money and he will be shameless. So he has a punchers chance.
Chance of Running:  99%  Chance of being the nominee: 5%

Veep Prospects:  Unlikely.  He doesn't strengthen the party in any battle grounds and I think the establishment types will consider him too unorthodox to put on the ticket.

I just added up the Chance of Being the Nominee for each candidate and came to 95%.  That makes the rest of the filed a 20 to one shot.  That's probably a little high, given that so much can change in the next two years.  But as you'll see below, everyone else has some serious problems to over come.  

II. The Not Ready for Prime Time Candidates (Also-Rans).

6.  Marco Rubio (45).  Senator Rubio is more likely to one day become President than any other person mentioned in this essay.  But that day will not be 2016.  He is too young, to unseasoned and he's already committed a huge tactical error that will cost him if he does run this time.

By supporting comprehensive immigration reform, he alienated too many voters.  His painfully nervous response to the Presidents State of the Union address also gave the impression that he's just not ready for the heavy stuff yet.  But time is on his side.  He's a young man and if the Republicans lose in 2016, they will have to realize that the road back to the White House requires diversifying.  He's smart and he's handsome and if he's smart, he'll sit this one out.

Report Card:  Bankers: A- Zealots: B Hawks: B+ Isolationists: B

Chance of Running:  50%   Chance of being the nominee: Less than 1%

Veep Prospects:  High.  The Republican nominee will see him as a tremendous asset in Florida and as a bridge to non-white voters.  The base will live with him on the ticket as long as the top half is solidly against comprehensive immigration reform.  And the only potential nominee that that would not be true of is Jeb Bush, and because of the 12th Amendment, no nominee will ever pick a running mate from the same state. 

7.  Paul Ryan (46).   Losing Vice-Presidential candidates almost always run for President but the last time won actually became his party's nominee was Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  As Lloy Bentsen would say, Paul Ryan is no Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

He was at best a mediocre candidate for the Romney campaign and he doesn't seem to inspire much of a reaction in anyone, really.  If he runs, it might be because he realizes that he will have a tough time ever winning a state-wide race in Wisconsin.  And that tells you all you need to know about his Presidential prospects.

Report Card:  Bankers: B+ Zealots: B Hawks: B Isolationists: C

Chance of Running:  50%   Chance of being the nominee: Less than 1%

Veep Prospects:  Zero.  He had his chance.

8.  Bobby Jindal (45).   The party isn't ready to nominate someone as....exotic as Governor Jindal.  He seems like a nice enough guy and he's probably more competent than most of the people on this list.  But this dog just doesn't hunt.

Report Card:  Bankers: A- Zealots: B- Hawks: B Isolationists: D

Chance of Running:  35%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  He'll be on everyone's short list, if only because he meets the minimum resume standards and seems to be a likable guy that might poll well with independents.  But he also doesn't help in any battle grounds and there's no compelling reason to put him on the ticket, unless the nominee wants to dip the party's toes into the diversity pool.  Unlikely but possible.

9.  Scott Walker (49).   He's a mediocrity, but an ambitious mediocrity.  And he has some national pull among the Tea Party because of an unsuccessful attempt to recall him from the Governor's mansion in Madison.  He also has already begun trying out his shtick that Congress is so unpopular that the GOP nominee must be a Governor.  So he's working it.

Report Card:  Bankers: B Zealots: B+ Hawks: B Isolationists: B-

Chance of Running:  70%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  Eh.  Why not?.

10. Rick Perry (66).   Well, he looks good for his age, doesn't he?  And that's about the only really strong point in his favor.  I think he might run because he wants to erase the memory of his horrific, car crash 2012 campaign.  But he was such a lousy candidate last time that I think he will have a really hard time raising money this time around.  No one wants to invest in someone so unlikely to win..

Report Card:  Bankers: A- Zealots: A- Hawks: A- Isolationists: C
Well, that's another point in his favor-none of the big constituencies hate him.  But he's just not a good candidate and I think he made the irreversible impression of being a moron to too many people. In theory, that's a disqualifier.

Chance of Running:  30%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  He kind of fits the Biden model of being older, gaffe-prone and being well known nationally.  But I can't imagine what demographic or experiential advantage he would bring to the eventual ticket.

The Niche Candidates (The Really Fun Stuff.).
I have a pretty intense interest in hopeless Presidential candidacies. I remember once reading an article about George McGovern contemplating a third run for the Presidency in 1992.  The gist of the article was that he had recently sold a bed and breakfast that he was running with his wife and was trying to decide between buying a smaller bed and breakfast somewhere else or running for President.  What a great choice-downscale a small business or run to be the most important person in the world.  It is a credit to Senator McGovern that he chose the former.

Running for President is now it's own reward.  Mike Huckabee turned his 2008 campaign into a comfortable life as a media personality.  Dennis Kucinich is employed by Fox News solely because he got flogged in a few Democratic presidential attempts.  And appearing on stage with actual contenders is good for your lecture fees and gives your grandchildren something to put on their college applications.  "Assistant Regional Coordinator for Young Voter Outreach" sounds pretty nifty, doesn't it?

And the best, most entertaining niche candidates usually come from the Republican party.  Bob Dornan, Al Haig, Michelle Bachmann, Herman Cain, all provided me and my fellow political nerds with countless memories and Daily Show set pieces. 2016 may be especially prime for this sort of fodder, as the Republican party has a few side show debates to settle and lots of ways to express their contempt for Barack Hussein Obama.  Think of each of these sub-categories as an ecological niche that will generate enough passion among enough people that several dopes will probably be able to raise sufficient funds to make the Iowa and New Hampshire ballots and one of the 10 or 11 podiums in those early going debates.

a.  The Black Guy.
I've often been asked to quantify the extent to which conservative enmity towards Barack Obama is racially motivated.  I usually surprise people by saying not very much.  This is something of a quibble, because I do think that feelings about race shape the reaction of many older, conservative Americans to the President.  But they also hated Clinton, whom they usually referred to as a Bubba, or a hill billy.  And Carter was a bumpkin Peanut farmer.  Kennedy was a Harvard elitists.  Roosevelt was a traitor to his class.  My point is that every President is spoken of by his opponents in superficially nasty ways.  With this President, race, and a vague sense of foreignness, are the handiest proxies.

But it really pisses off people to be called racist.  And there is a segment of the population that would just love to prove how non-racist they are by publicly supporting a black candidate the next time around.  And the GOP/Fox Noise Machine has a few models who ready to assume the Allen Keyes/Herman Cain mantle and run with it.

1.  Allen West  (55).  This guy loves to tell you how patriotic he is but he might have an even greater love for assuring white conservatives that they are right to question the President's patriotism and civility.  (Never mind how unpatriotic and incivil that very notion is.)  This guy is also a retired Lieutenant Colonel, so he pulls at all the right superficial strings of the Republican party base.  And those folks will be more than happy to forget all their complaints about Barack Obama only being in Congress for 4 years.  Allen West only has half that amount, but logical consistency is not exactly a big hang up for this demographic.
If he wins back his congressional seat in 2014, he'll probably skip the Presidential race.  But he might have already figured out that Running for President is a lot easier, much more fun and a lot more profitable than being in Congress.
Report Card:  Bankers: B Zealots: A  Hawks: A- Isolationists: C-

Chance of Running:  50%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  None.

2.  Ben Carson (65).  This guy became famous by lecturing the President at a Prayer Breakfast.  The perfect blend of piety and presumption.  He touches a lot of the same bases as Col. West, but has never run for anything, and there is, believe it or not, an art and skill to this process.  He will probably put out the feelers and rattle the cup but he might decide not to run, unless he is simply addicted to the attention that Sean Hannity currently gives him.
Report Card:  Bankers: C Zealots: A  Hawks: B Isolationists: D

Chance of Running:  25%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  None.

b.   The War Hawks.
1.  John Bolton (68).  This guy just can't wait to get on stage and tell us all how smart he is and how scary Iran is and how reckless Barack Obama is and how wonderful Israel is and all sorts of things that no one is especially clamoring to hear.  But I think he's serious, because he recently invested in a toupee that matches his moustache.  I desperately want this man to run for President, because he will put the rest of the field in the position of forcing them to agree with really stupid, reckless, arrogant things.
Report Card:  Bankers: B+ Zealots: B+  Hawks: A+  Isolationists: F

Chance of Running:  55%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  None.

2.  Peter King (72). This guy has actually already publicly state that he is running for President.  He's running to grind two axes, one against Al Qaeda for being the bad kind of terrorists. (Only Irish Catholics are the good kind.)  And the other is against the Tea Party for not understanding that government spending is sometimes good and for being insufficiently vigilant against the bad (non-Irish Catholic) kinds of terrorists.
Report Card:  Bankers: B+ Zealots: A-  Hawks: A  Isolationists: F

Chance of Running:  75%   Chance of being the nominee: 0%

Veep Prospects:  None.

c.  The Woman.
In thinking of this field as an ecological niche, there is a glaring lack of likely female candidates.  The likely Democratic nominee is a woman and the Republican establishment is painfully aware that they need to do better among women next time around.  So there is room for someone to make some hay in this slot.  But who?

Sarah Palin is too lazy to run.  Condi Rice is too liberal to be a plausible candidate, not withstanding her appeal to some of the above-mentioned crowds.  There are two female candidates who are worth considering, although they probably each have a better chance of being the vice-presidential pick than the presidential nominee.

1.  Kelly Ayotte (48).  The hardcore base hates her, because she occasionally makes deals with the Democrats, usually in company with McCain and Graham.  It's hard to imagine her winning the nomination, but she has at times played the game with the right buzz words (Read: Benghazi) to keep her street cred among the crazy crowd.  She probably can get enough support to be a plausible candidate and the fact that she is from New Hampshire could muck up the race by making Iowa and South Carolina much more important. 

Report Card:  Bankers: B+ Zealots: B  Hawks: B+  Isolationists: C+

Chance of Running:  25%   Chance of being the nominee: 1%

Veep Prospects:  Very strong.  She comes from a swing state (albeit a small one) and if the Republicans are facing Hillary in the general election, than she might provide the right boost and/or cover against perceptions of gender bias.

2.  Susana Martinez (57).  I haven't followed her closely but I know she gave a very well-received speech at the 2012 Republican convention.  She's a bit of a cipher but there's no reason I know of to keep her from running. 

Report Card:  Bankers: B Zealots: B  Hawks: B  Isolationists: B

Chance of Running:  20%   Chance of being the nominee: 1%

Veep Prospects.  Also strong.  Barack Obama won New Mexico by wide margins twice.  But it was a very close state in both of Bush's elections. (He won it in 2004; lost it to Gore by 300 votes in 2000.) Her ethnic and gender appeal also makes her attractive.

IV.  The Field.
We are still more than two years away from the first votes being cast.  I'm sure that at least one actual candidate has not been mentioned yet.  There's never been a senator or governor who didn't see a President looking back at him in the mirror.  And there could be a General or Admiral or talk show host who decides to go for it too.  But this list is everyone that's on my radar so far.  I'm sure I'll do updates from time to time.  I once thought Mike Huckabee would be a good candidate for the Republicans but he seems way more happy being a talking head than having to Govern.

But someone not listed on this page will at least make onto the stage for the early debates.  And I'm sure he'll be good for a few laughs.

Aloha, Marriage Equality.

Hawaii today embraced marriage equality.  This is especially fitting for a number of reasons: one the Aloha state was the first to embrace a tentative step towards this goal, which caused the Right-wing to go nuts and Bill Clinton to foolishly go along with the Defense of Marriage Act.  But 20 years later, all is well.

It's also appropriate because Hawaii is the birth place of our President, and not coincidentally, the state that gave him the highest percentage of its vote in both of his campaigns.  This removes the one anomaly from the table I posted last time, and have updated below.

The Dark Blue states have marriage equality.  The 14 places that gave the highest percentage of their vote to the President, all have marriage equality.  Three of his next eight best states also have it. The remaining 29 states do not.

In Praise of Activist Judges, or The Land of Lincoln Gets with the Times

Note: Green States have taken some concrete step(s) towards passing marriage equality.


Today the Illinois legislature finally passed Marriage Equality.  Governor Pat Quinn will sign it soon, and Illinois will then become the 15th state in the Union with gay marriage.  The map tells the tale pretty well. Marriage equality dominates the North East, and the West Coast, and has a solid foothold in the progressive upper Midwest.

How we got here.

In 2004 the Massachussetts Supreme Court held that denying marriage rights to gay couples violated the state's constitution.  To give you an idea how radical this seemed, even I was less than happy about it because I thought the issue might hurt the Presidential campaign of its Junior Senator, John Kerry.  That proved correct in the short term, but the longer term effects have been much happier.

The reason for this change is simple gay marriage was no longer an abstraction.  It was an experiment.  And in a very short time, the opponents of gay marriage faced their worst nightmare: evidence.  Before too long people realized that no one was hurt by their gay neighbors having the right to marry.  Massachusetts still had the lowest divorce divorce rate in the nation.  The vast majority of marriages remained of the one man, one woman variety.  So voters came around to say, well, if there's no harm in it, then there's no reason to ban it.  So the idea spread.  Mostly in the Northeast, but the Iowa Supreme Court planted the Rainbow flag deep in the heart land, and still, no one suffered.  At all.

In 2010 New York made history by becoming the first state to approve gay marriage through the legislative process.  In 2012, Washington and Maryland became the first states to do so by direct popular vote.

And last month New Jersey courts joined the hit parade.  Today, Illinois' elected representatives did the same.  And as the map show, we have a handful of states that have taken at least some affirmative steps to repeal their laws against gay marriage.  Hawaii seems likely to be the next state to go Blue on my map, but the New Mexico may beat them to the punch.  When those two states fall in line, Marriage Equality will be the law of the land in 200 Electoral College votes.

Democracy in Action.
But what's really great about this process is that those activist judges in Boston didn't upend the democratic process so much as prod it along.  Consider this chart.  The left/blue column are the states that Barack Obama carried in 2012.  The Dark Blue states are the ones that have marriage equality.  The right column are the states that voted for Mitt Romney. There is no need for two shades of Red,because none of those states have marriage equality.  (Or even civil unions, for that matter.)

Thirteen of President Obama's best 14 jurisdictions have marriage equality.  And the state of his birth will soon make it 14 of 14.  His 29 weakest states do not have marriage equality at present and it's also not on the immediate horizon in any of those places*.  So the law reflects the political leanings of the people, and that trend will continue for the next few years.  Most likely this will eventually be federalized by the Supreme Court.  But in the meantime, the law increasingly reflects the political affiliations of the voters.  But without those "activist judges" in Massachusetts, the cause of equality would probably be in much worse shape.

*One last encouraging fact on the Red States.  A recent Poll of South Carolina found that only 52% of voters in that state oppose gay marriage.  Just six years ago, SC passed a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage by referendum that got 78% of the vote.  So if the Land of Lincoln can get there in 2013, maybe the Birthplace of Succession can get there sooner than we think.

It Was The Right Call, Rick

Walking Dead Season 4, Episode Four, "Indifference" Summary: Rife with Spoilers.

After last week, I was had serious doubts about this season of the Walking Dead.  I was worried that it would be like a Bizzarro World version of Season two, where all anyone did was kill zombies. But tonight's episode restored balance by shifting the focus back to where it should be-the balance between Survival and Civilization.

I still think the story line about Carol is flawed by plot holes.  After all, she exposed herself to the disease by going down to kill two people who were quarantined, then dragging their infected bodies out to the court yard.  It would have been just as easy to let nature take its course, and then kill them as walkers.

But it set up a good story line tonight.  Rick has been wary of leadership, because of the effect it had on him as a parent.  In the interval between seasons, Rick became determined to restore civilization.  He started with himself by putting down the gun and picking up the tools of farming.  (Swords into plow shares, and all that.)

And the Group took its own steps back to civilization.  They put everyone to work, marshaled their resources and governed by a Council.  They even developed an Immigration policy, of sorts.  Obviously that doesn't make for great television, so the season was bound to be about fighting.  (See again, Season Two.)

But what Rick has learned is that surviving isn't worth much if it just means living like a savage.  Carol, by going rogue, undermined that.  No one gets to make those calls by their self.  That's the whole point of having a Group, a home, etc.

So Rick sent Carol packing.  As a practical matter, this probably averted a war.  Tyrese would have killed Carol.  Darryl would have killed Tyrese.  Maybe Sasha would have killed Darryl.  Or maybe just the Group would have split into two factions.

The trap that this show constantly faces is falling into a never-ending series of Zombie fights and harrowing escapes.  That's not very interesting.  Their real mission is to restore the world.  Rick did his job.  He is a farmer, but not just a farmer.  He's a law man.  And he kept the peace tonight.

A few stray thoughts:
* I loved that the sign on the Gas Station had a price of 7 odd dollars a gallon.  That indicates that as the shit hit the fan, some price gouging went on.
* I suspect Herschel will live long enough to give Bob some A.A. talk.
* Only four characters from Season One are still part of the Group-Rick, Darryl, Glen and Carl.  But I do suspect that Carol will be back. My hunch is that she will run into the Governor before the Group does.
*  If this Season does not continue the level of tonight's rebound, then the show itself will be on the anti-Star Trek path, where the Odd numbered seasons are good, and the even numbered stink.

Rick's To-Do List (And Season 4 Death Predictions)

When Season Three of the The Walking Dead ended, I planned to write a Blog Post about all of the things Rick Grimes should do to make the prison more safe.  My hope was that season four of the Walking Dead would center on the attempts to rebuild a civilization.  It seemed to have a lot of interesting possibilities.  About a month later I read the novel World War Z, by Max Brooks.  This book (but not the Brad Pitt film of the same name) dealt with the issues that interest me in a much more intelligent way than I could have hoped from TWD. So my curiosity was sated.

And eventually we saw the Comic-Con preview of Season Four.  I was surprised by how much the preview showed in terms of story points.  The preview showed that the Survivors have taken steps to resume some agriculture and are educating the kids that came over from Mayberry.  It's also evident that things will go very badly and the Prison will have to be abandoned.  Probably the right thing for the story.  I'm sure the season will be very entertaining.  But here are a few stray thoughts on what I want to see from Rick in tonight's debut.

1.  Marshall the resources (especially weapons) of Woodbury.  This is job one. Get the gungs, get the food, get the solar panels, vehicles, etc.

2.  Integrate the Woodbury survivors.  The season finale implied that the Woodbury survivors were all children or elderly people.  But there are at least two characters that could be of great import.  One is the doctor.  I think they should at least explain what happened to her, because she (and her equipment) would be so valuable to the survivors.  The other is the visibly pregnant woman that we saw in the first Woodbury episode.  I don't know how much infant formula they have been able to scavenge but it a possible wet nurse for Little Ass Kicker would be invaluable.

3.  Repair and improve the prison.  Clear more cell blocks.  Fix the breach that Tyrese's group came in through last season.  Try to rebuild the guard tower.

4.  Walker Defenses.  Learn from the governor and build some Zombie pits.  Make it a daily routine to clear them.

5.   Nature.  My biggest nitpik with TWD so far is the near-absence of conflict between wildlife and humans.  We are now two years removed from the zombie apocalypse.  Bears, wild cats, wolves would be reasserting their natural dominance of the ecosystem.  The preview hints at some scenes involving animals being fed to Walker to get them near the prison.  That's a promising starting point but I want to see the survivors being threatened by some of the non-human predatory species.

6.  The Big Picture.  What I most loved about World War Z is that it was written as an oral history, looking back at the war from a secure and peaceful future.  This removed suspense and let in a real breadth of subject matters-politics, military strategy, religion, cultural differences and prejudices, etc.  TWD will never be that, because it's a TV show that runs on the tension of the struggle to survive.  Last season I hoped that Milton would have something interesting to say about what the long-term issues facing Rick and the group would be.  But that doesn't really make television.  Nevertheless, the scale of the problem is pretty amazing.  There are 900 million people that live in the new world.  That means about 899 million zombies to take care of, more or less.  So the only plausible way this crisis ends is if the zombies ever start to "die".  Maybe that will come in a later season but I get the impression that AMC knows it needs to milk this series for as long as possible.  So I don't expect a zombie cure.  That means lots of zombie kills for years to come.

Death Predictions.

Season 3 of the The Walking Dead was made great by the gutsy decision to kill two original characters early on. Such deaths are the emotional currency of the series.  We know from the preview that at least 12 people die in the prison.  Most of them are probably red shirts from Woodbury.  But there will be important death as the season goes along.  Here are some thoughts.

Likely to Die:

1. The Governor.  Probably in episode 8, to make the half-season meaningful.  Chances of dying this season: 99%.

2.  Maggie and/or Glenn.  Their engagement was one of the few sweet moments of a grim season three.  I think they will pay a price for it.  My hunch is that Maggie is more likely to die than Glenn, but I wouldn't rule out both of them dying, perhaps together.  Maybe one will turn and then bite the other.  Chances of dying this season: Maggie 70%, Glenn 60%.

3.  Carl.  Well the season has to end on a big note.  And Carl is Rick's last tie to the world before the apocalypse.  His death is the ace in the hole of the series creators.  They may not want to play it yet, but I wouldn't be shocked.  (51%)

4.  Sasha' character could also be on a dangerous arc.  I think Tyrese will be around for the long haul so they might write a story about the death of his sister to give his character some depth.  60%

5.  DeAngelo Barskdale's new character has Red Shirt written all over him.  70%.

Reasonable Death Candidates.
Someone of noticeable value will have to die early.  Hershel or Carol would seem to be good candidates but I think they both have some potential left as characters.  I mean Carol has to sleep with Darry at some point, right?  Hershel: 40%, Carol 35%.

Unlikely to Die.  Judith, Beth,

Bullet Proof.
Rick, because he's the protagonist.  Darryl, because he draws so many female fans to the show and Michonne because she is the ultimate fantasy of the 14 year old boys that this show is intended to entertain.

I am nearly 40.  But it entertains me too.

My Favorite Mariano Rivera Memory

On June 6, 2003 the New York Yankees played at Wrigley Field since the 1938 World Series.  I attended that game and had seats about ten rows behind the Yankees bullpen.  I was seated behind a boy who was about seven years old.  During the early innings, the boy walked down to the Yankees bullpen with a disposable camera.  Mariano River noticed him and stopped to smile for him and said hello.

When he got back to his seat, the boy's father handed him a ball and told him to go ask Mariano for an autograph.  When he got up there, Mo politely declined.  "I can't during the game.  It's not allowed.  But I'll sign it after the game."  The boy was disappointed but his dad did a good job of explaining it all to him.

As the game progressed, the Yankees took the lead and Mariano wound up having to pitch the top of the ninth inning.  Mariano got the Cubs out for the save.  As the game ended, the Yankees bench emptied and everyone lined up for high-fives.  Then all the Yankees started to head back into the dugout.  At this point, the dad tried to explain to his son that Mr. Rivera didn't know he would be pitching when the game ended. So he probably won't be coming back out to sign the ball.

But I soon noticed that Mariano was not walking in the same direction as the other Yankees.  He turned out towards right field, back toward the bullpen.  His lanky frame walked all the way back out to the bullpen at a calm, casual pace.

When he got out there, he pointed to the point and gestured for him to come down.  He signed his ball, smiled and turned away back towards the dugout.  A few other people started shoving things in his face to sign, but he demurred.  A few cursed him for not signing their stuff.  But Mo didn't seem to mind.  He just kept walking at that same deliberate speed.

A grown up can never appreciate an athlete in quite the same way a child does.  So no one will ever replace Don Mattingly as my favorite Yankee.  But this story is why Mariano Rivera is my favorite Yankee of this generation.

Breaking Bad, What Do We Know

This was written about an hour and half before the premier of the penultimate Breaking Bad episode.  If you're not caught up, then this contains spoilers.  And you have bad taste.


There are only two episodes left of Breaking Bad.  For the past several months I have been under the assumption that the last episode will begin, more or less, where the cold opening of the season premiere opened, at a Denny's on Walt's 52nd birthday.

So with only one episode to get us to that point.  Let's consider what we know, and what has to happen to get us there.

What We Know From the First Cold Open.

1. About 3 more months have to pass.  In the first episode of season one, Skyler is about 7 months pregnant.  Last week, the Amber Alert described Holly White as 18 months old.  That means about 21 months have passed since Walt's 50th birthday, which was the day the show started.  

2.   Walt is still sick but he is not on chemo.  His hair has grown back and he has a pretty full beard.  He coughs and pops some pills in the Dennny's bathroom.

3.  He still has some significant money.  He pays what must be 10 to 20K for the machine gun in his trunk.  He also leaves $100 for Lucy as a tip on his free breakfast.  The tip is fairly ostentatious.

4. Walt doesn't seem to plan on being around very long.  He tells the gun dealer that the gun will never "leave town".  He is not worried, particularly, about getting caught.  He has a fake ID and has changed his appearance but leaving the $100 tip is the kind of thing that could get him remembered.  

5.  He has a very big machine gun.

What We Know From the Second Cold Open.

1.  The home is abandoned and has been vandalized.  Kids ride skate boards in the pool and there is some kind of police warning up on the house.  The home has been stripped bare.  No furniture and not much trash.  There is a visible gash in the kitchen floor, like someone was trying to dig for money (or meth).  The name Heisenburg is written in large letters on the living room floor.

2.  He goes back for the ricin.  So he must be expecting a need to poison someone.  Either he thinks the gun will not be sufficient for all of his murdering needs or he thinks ricin will make a good suicide alternative, should he find himself pinned down.  

3.  Some specific memory makes him wince in the bed room mirror.  I'm not sure what that might be, but it's very noticeable and dramatic.  Before re-watching it I thought maybe he was thinking of last week's knife fight with Schyler.  But he's in a different room.  Not sure what this one means but Gilligan is pretty famous for not putting anything on the screen that doesn't have some plot purpose.

4.  There is no sign of Walt's family.  Sure they would have likely been relocated by the DEA after the craziness, but it certainly seems ominous.  

So What Has to Happen Tonight.

So we know that Walt makes it successfully away to his new life as Mr. Lambert, in New Hampshire. Tonight's episode is called The Granite State, which suggests that we'll be seeing Walt's new life in upper New England.  But I suspect that tonight's episode will have more to do with Jesse, Lydia, the Nazis and Schyler.  Something has to happen to give Walt an incentive to throw away his live up North and to come back for revenge.  Some thoughts.

1.  He's dying, so he might not have much to leave behind.

2.  He's spending a little freely, so that might suggest that he's given up the hope of getting the money to Schyler and the kids.  Maybe they are just under police protection, but it certainly seems possible that they are dead.

3.  He has to have a reason to want revenge.  I know he's been through a lot but he can't really feel too burned by the Nazis.  Sure they killed Hank but Walt is smart enough to realize that they were left with little choice once Walt called them to that spot.  

So who is the source of Walt's need for revenge?  When last we saw Walt, he was assenting to Jesse being tortured and even twisted the knife personally by telling him the truth about Jane.  So it seems unlikely that he's coming back to avenge the torture (or death) of Jesse Pinkman.  It's also a little hard to imagine why the Nazis would kill Schyler or the kids at this point.  They are no threat to them, and they have $70 million dollars and a blossoming fortune maker as Meth Dealers to the Czech Republic.  

Here's my best theory.  Jesse acts up or escapes.  So the Nazis kill Brock and/or his mother.  This news gets back to Walt, and he realizes that he is responsible for that kid being killed.  That's the one thing he can't forgive himself for.  So he loads up the Volvo and drives out west stopping only for gas.  Thirty hours later, he's breaking his bacon into the number 52.

The best thing about this prediction is that I am almost certainly wrong.  Breaking Bad is not as important as the Wire or as emotionally engaging as the Sopranos'.  But it is superb story telling, that may push the bounds with some implausible developments but never plays cheap with the emotions of the audience.  I can't wait to see how it all ends.

Happy to Update This Map.

Two months ago I posted a similar map showing the status of Marriage Equality.  But that map was inaccurate in one important respect.  Until about 12 hours ago, zero state had true marriage equality.  A same-sex couple married in New York or Iowa were not entitled to federal benefits, such as the right to collect spousal social security benefits.  And military couples could only get additional Basic Allowance for Housing money if their spouse was of the opposite gender.

So, now when I say equal....I mean equal.  And that's a great thing.  Marriage equality now exists in 13 states, plus the District of Columbia.  That adds up to 161 electoral votes and 30% of the American people. The seven states that have some legal recognition of gay relationships cover an additional 70 Electoral Votes.   More than forty percent of Americans now live in states that have at least some form of legal recognition of gay relationships.

The larger point of my previous post was just how closely the Marriage Equality map tracks the Electoral College map.  Writing today, that's even more clear.  With California and Minnesota brought into the fold, we now have 13 States plus the District of Columbia (Blue in the above map) with true Marriage Equality.  Seven other states provide for either Civil Unions or Domestic Partnerships (Green) that provide at least some, but not all of the benefits of marriage.  Today's opinion stopped short of doing, as some hoped it would, of elevating these relationships to full marital status.  And then 30 states offer no legal recognition of same-sex relationships (Red).

All 21 jurisdictions that recognize gay relationships voted for Barack Obama in 2012.  All twenty four states that voted for Mitt Romney do not recognize gay relationships.  The President's best results in a non-recognition states were Michigan (54%) and New Mexico (53%). The other states that the President carried but do not have legal recognition of gay marriage (PA, VA, OH and FL),  gave him less than 52% .Every state where he got under 50% do not recognize gay marriage.

This correlation is even more pronounced when you sort the states by the margin of difference for the Presidential election.  Barack carried all 21 Recognition states by more than five percent of the vote.  Barack Obama's 15 best states all recognize gay relationships and 11 of them have Marriage Equality.  Every state where President Obama's got more than 54.2% of the vote, recognize gay relationships.

This correlation seems to indicate that Marriage Equality's best changes for growth are in the states that have recognition but not equality.  Hawaii, Illinois, Nevada and Oregon seem the most likely places to achieve marriage equality next.  But beyond those few states, the road ahead may be tough.  New Jersey, and to a lesser degree Wisconsin,  should be prime candidates but they both currently have Republican governors with national political ambitions.

Among the non-recognition states, Pennsylvania and New Mexico may get there, but I don't think it will be in the next year or two.  Beyond that, we may see a slow gradual process whereby Red or at least Purple states embrace marriage equality over a generation, if not longer.  Or maybe, sometime sooner than that, the issue will be before a Supreme Court with a different ideological bent than currently constituted, and the right to be married will be federally recognized.

For now, we have marriage equality in one state for every stripe on the flag. Now, onto the stars.

Look Familiar? The Politics of Marriage Equality

Yesterday the school of my college years became the 11th state to extend marriage rights to gay couples.  Delaware follows Rhode Island who became the 10th state just a week before.  Both Minnesota and Illinois are half-way there, having marriage equality bills that were passed by one chamber and await certain signature by the respective governors if the other chamber passes it.

So we could soon have marriage equality in as many states as there are stripes on our flag.  But the road to one for every star will probably take a while.

California will probably have marriage equality after the Supreme Court rules on Proposition 8 next month.  Nevada has also taken steps towards legalizing gay marriage, but the prospects there are (forgive me) dicier, because the issue wold have to be put to voters, and that can't happen until 2016.  (Oregon will vote on the issue next year.

So I started thinking about where we stand on this issue.  And it occurred to me that with the District of Columbia, we may soon have 16 jurisdictions that allow gay couples to marry.  All of them voted for President Obama's re-election.  So did all the other states that allow gay civil unions but haven't been mentioned yet. (CO, HI, NJ, WI)

So I made this map to show the breakdown of the states by political leanings.  We now have 21 states (including DC) that have completed or taken significant steps toward legalizing gay marriage.  They are all blue.  There are 7 blue states that have not.  It seems to me that the 6 blue states are going to be the next places for equality proponents to advance the cause.  (New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Virginia and Florida, in rough likelihood of them coming around on the issue).

All 24 Romney states limit marriage to heterosexual couples.  Will any of them budge before these last few blue hold outs?  My guess is now.  And in about 4 years, we might have a map that exactly matches the electoral college division.

Deep Blue-Marriage Equality States

Pale Blue-States with Civil Unions or Where Marriage Equality Legislation Has Passed One Chamber

Yellow-Obama states that have not moved toward equality

Red-Romney States

Thoughts on Oscar

Best Picture.  I saw six of the nine nominees.  I doubt that Amour, Les Miserables or Life of Pi is going to win, so I won't trouble myself over missing these three.  Of the remaining six, I liked them in this order.

1. Lincoln.  I was so ambivalent about this movie.  I adore Abraham Lincoln but I have grown very tired of Spielberg's aesthetic and need to be nice.  But he took some chances with this movie, and I liked it very much.  I also am going to go against the consensus and predict that it will win this category because....

2. Zero Dark 30.  I was mildly disappointed by this movie for the opposite reason that Argo irked me.  I think that Catherine Bigelow felt overly constrained by the need to get the details right, and that made for less than cinematic movie making.  But she's a great talent and this is still a very strong film.

The most interesting thing about this movie is the reaction of various political camps.  Last fall it was assumed that this movie would be a thinly veiled campaign flick for the President.  They wisely delayed the release to avoid that controversy.  But the President is barely mentioned in this movie; the most political thing about the movie is the honest depiction of the torture that our interrogators put subjected suspected terrorists too in the early part of this decade.  The reaction of the right-wingers is particularly interesting.  They like to point out that these "enhanced interrogation" techniques preceded the capture of Bin Laden but they haven't quite embraced this movie as a sop to their sensibilities precisely because it shows that (back to English) torture in an accurate and honest way.  And no one, not even Dick Cheney, can bring himself to run around saying that we should be proud of having treated people like that.  (And of course it must be emphasized that torture led to many dead ends and distractions that might have delayed the eventual killing of bin-Laden by a number of years.)


3. Argo.  I perfectly fine, adequate, entertaining movie that will probably be most remembered for the liberties that it took with history.  I think the only reason this movie is considered the favorite is that it's written around the idea that people from Hollywood once behaved bravely and produced a minor miracle.  Maybe that's enough to get it over the top but the fact that Ben Afleck was not nominated for Best Director makes me suspect that support for the movie is weaker than believed.

4. Djano Unchained.  Difficult to watch. I swayed back and forth during the movie between admiring Tarrantino for not pulling any punches in depicting how brutal the institution of slavery was and feeling queasy that he was using this violence in an exploitative way. And the 3rd act is way too long.

5. Silver Linings Playbook.  Cute and mildly ambitious for the genre but doesn't quite deliver.

6. Beasts of the Southern Wild.  Heavy handed and kind of dull.

Best Actor.  Daniel Day-Lewis will win and he deserves too.  Denzel was terrific in a pretty mediocre film.  Bradley Cooper stepped up his game.  Did not see Hugh Jackman sing or Jaquin Phoenix in the Master but if there's going to be an upset here, I think it would be Phoenix.

Best Actress:  Jessica Chastain was very good in Zero Dark 30 so I'm rooting for her but I think it might go to  Emmanual Riva for Amour, a film that I have not seen.

Best Supporting Actor:  Quite a field. All 5 nominees have won before, in either the lead or supporting category.  I think Alan Arkin deserves it among the nominees I saw but I'm once again thinking that there could be an upset from the Master.  I also wouldn't rule out Robert Deniro because it's been a long time since he's won and Silver Linings seems to have been very popular with the Academy.  Tommy Lee Jones is the betting favorite and I enjoyed his performance but it wasn't much of a stretch for him to play a curmudgeon.  Christopher Waltz was fine but he wasn't even the best supporting actor in his movie.  That would be Samuel L. Jackson, who was robbed of a nomination this year and probably should have won the whole thing.

Best Supporting Actress:  I didn't see Les Mis but I know Oscar bait when I see it and Anne Hathaway has all the makings of a trooper.  She will win.  Helen Hunt gave the best performance that I saw in this category.  (I have no literally no memory of Bradley Cooper's mom in Silver Linings but I guess she impressed someone.)  The lifetime achievement Oscar should go to Amy Adam's agent.  Year in and year out she plays mediocre parts in movies way better than her performance and yet she's been nominated for 4 Oscars in 8 years.  Remarkable.

Best Director: Spielberg