After weeks of stakeouts, leaks, rumors and specualtion, we now have our Vice Presidential nominees for the two major Presidential candidates in the upcoming November elections. Senator Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. of Delaware and Governor Sarah Louise Heath Palin of Alaska are two nominees which present both distinct benefits and distinct problems for their respective running mates in matters of strategy, message and post-election utility. Ignore the bumps in the polls, the issues of timing and other short-term issues and look long term for a moment. Which candidate is really sitting pretty with their VP pick, and how will these picks resonate with American voters, if at all?

A caveat is in order. Vice presidential nominees, even in the 24 hour era of American news media, have rarely made a great impact on voter behavior. At the end of the day, the Veepstakes rarely end up being little more than something for the news networks to talk about to run out the clock between the primaries and the party conventions; thank the stupidity of frontloaded party primaries for that one. But in the afterglow of Biden and Palin’s nominations, it is worth questioning such conventional wisdom given the advanced age of John McCain (R-AZ), the unprecedented candidacy of Barack Obama (D-IL) and the possible impact of credible third party candidates such as Ralph Nader (I-CT), Bob Barr (L-GA), Chuck Baldwin (C-FL) and Cynthia McKinney (G-GA). Given the presence of these factors, Biden and Palin must be more than glorified cheerleaders for their running mates for the next 65 days. They must also demonstrate an ability to be a unifying force within their party, the capacity to serve as a guide to the new generation of leaders in both the Democratic and Republican Parties, and be able to stand up and take charge of the Presidency in the unthinkable but not entirely implausible event that the winner of this election passes away while in office.

It is an almost-impossible balancing act, but it is very possible that the more effective candidate in accomplishing such a task could play a pivotal role in deciding the election. So with this considered, let us look at the nominees and their impact on the race.

Joe Biden (D-DE)

Senator Biden is a Washington lifer in every sense of the word. A Senator since 1973, the man with the magic hairplugs has been paying his dues to the Democratic Party longer than many of his newest friends in Obamamania have been alive. In the 1988 Presidential election, he was a frontrunner to take on George H.W. Bush, but a rather overblown plagiarism scandal took him out of the running. Now he has been given about the best form of redemption that an overly-talkative fundraising wimp could ever hope to get with the Vice Presidential nod from Senator Obama. What does Senator Biden precisely offer to the Obama campaign?

Pros

• Feistiness and good humor - Biden’s keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention showed Biden’s ability to hit the applause lines, get good laughs, and fire off effective shots at John McCain. Obama is not well-served by being the put bull in this race while he lectures away about getting rid of “politics as usual”. He must remain above such a hypocritical posture and leave the attacking to surrogates who know what they’re doing. Biden is one of those guys.
• Policy heavyweight - From the Clarence Thomas hearings to the Violence Against Women Act to matters of foreign policy, Biden is considered one of the more experienced policy minds in Congress. This is a critical balance to the Obama’s campaign’s perceived or actual lack of substance on many critical domestic and international issues.
• Experience - 35+ years of Senate experience make him a very appealing choice for Obama, and might be a more comforting option than Palin when considering which might be more qualified to lead from Day One should Obama die in office or resign.

Cons

• Experience - There is a theme that is shared by these two nominees, despite their very clear differences at face value. Both Palin and Biden find themselves creating new spin opportunities for the opposition, often at the expense of some trump cards their subjective campaigns had used to their advantage up to this point. In Obama’s case, the presence of Biden on the Presidential ticket is hard to reconcile with his campaign’s motto of “change we can believe in”. It could be argued that the selection of Biden rather than a pragmatic red state Governor like Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, Phil Bredesen of Tennessee or Brian Schweitzer of Montana represents a dangerous departure from Obama’s change message. It is a charge that while not impossible to rebut, might be something that will bug Obama all the way to November 4.
• Loose lips… - Biden himself will be the first to admit that when it comes to talking, he likes to shoot his mouth off first and survey the carnage afterwards. His off-color comments about Indian-Americans, remarks about his high IQ and Obama being a “clean, nice-looking guy” might play well in the very white, well-educated state of Delaware, where he is a state institution to boot, but flyover country and the Deep South might not be so receptive to a man who is not good friends with open mics.
• Arrogance - For a guy who takes the Amtrak home every night and has very serious problems with his own property taxes and insurance rates, Biden can and does come off as a very cocky, arrogant fellow at times. Perhaps six terms in the ultimate gentleman’s club known as the United States Senate has given him an air of prissiness that doesn’t jive with the Obama camp’s image of him as the blue-collar Catholic kid from Scranton. Whatever the case, Biden would do well to make sure he avoids his tendency to talk down to people, especially when taking on the female Sarah Palin in the Vice Presidential debate. Condescension is a nasty color to wear around a woman.

On the whole, Biden does a great deal of good for Obama, and in a perfect world, more good than bad. He is a known figure whose personal problems have been dragged through the mud many a time already. Any personal attacks would thus lose a lot of impact on people. But the McCain camp jumped hard on his selections by Obama with two hard-hitting, if not very disingenuous ads attacking the VP vetting process. This neutralized Biden’s impact on the race, which after the weeks of hype leading up to his nomination, had to deliver a major blow to internal morale in the Obama campaign and the DNC writ large. Ready to lead? Probably. Ready to help bring victory for the Democrats in November? Hard to say for sure.

Overall - B minus.

Sarah Palin (R-AK)

Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-MN) would have made for a great show at St. Paul. Fmr. Governor Mitt Romney (R-MA) would have been the ultimate insurance policy for McCain in must-win states like Colorado, Montana, Nevada and New Mexico. Not to mention both of them have spent the past five months criss-crossing the country practically begging for the nod. So you can imagine the media’s surprise, if not outright shock, when a little-known former Mayor of a town of less than 5,000 people and Governor of a state with a smaller population than many United States Congressional districts was chosen to be McCain’s running mate. The Politico was uncharacteristically blunt in their assessment, saying the selection of Sarah Palin was proof that the McCain campaign was “desperate”. Paul Begala asked “what were they thinking?” upon hearing the news. Well, what might have actually crossed the McCain campaign’s mind when they went with Palin?

Pros

• Broader demographic appeal - Pawlenty would have kept Minnesota close, and Romney would have helped a lot out west. But Palin’s statistical value to McCain cannot be seen if considered directly in terms of electoral votes. She gives McCain a yet to be seen bump with women voters who identify with her status as a working mom. She helps him with young Republican voters who see her as a fresh new face in the party (and the sexy librarian look does not hurt either, this writer must confess). And most importantly, she has excited disaffected conservatives who were quite rightly suspicious of McCain’s loyalty to conservative values. This is a constituency that McCain has made a career out of alienating to suit his own political needs. With Palin’s pick along with his performance at the Saddleback Forum, he has exploited the value of treating this large constituency as something other than yesterday’s garbage, as he has for the past twenty-five years.
• The chick factor - Ask any political consultant worth paying for and he will tell you that being a woman is a huge asset in a campaign, as a general rule. Unless you are already a highly polarizing candidate, like a  Hillary Rodham Clinton or Katherine Harris, the gender advantages that God has afforded women like Sarah Palin are considerable. Personal attacks [putting aside the spurious 4chan/DailyKos prank about her youngest son] are all but off limits, as voters are almost universally turned off by the appearance of a woman being ganged up on by men. Her maternal instincts and sensibilities can resonate with female voters, and even to younger male voters who can identify with their own moms when they see her in action.
• Looking long-term - The selection of Palin is an affirmation of the reality that John McCain is not going to be the standard bearer of the Republican Party for very long, even if he elected President. He and his generation have perhaps unwittingly conceded that their ideals and brand of politics are not long for this world, and that the inter-generational battle between the youth and the establishment of the GOP will enter into a new phase of entrenchment and advancement for the party’s rising stars. The splintering of the various factions of the GOP made plain by the Presidential primary will get worse before they get better, but with figures like Palin taking center stage, the possibility of a smoother transition now exists.

Cons

• The next Dan Quayle - Like Quayle, Palin is another nationally unknown figure picked to assuage concerns about the GOP’s nominee and his conservative credentials. Quayle did accomplish this to some extent, but his lack of name recognition allowed his detractors to aggressively define the Indiana University Law School grad as an ignorant boob, and possibly prevent an even greater landslide for George H.W. Bush in 1988. I am rather convinced that Palin can spell “potato” correctly, but her performance at the Vice Presidential debate will be a key factor in how voters perceive her.
• Experience - A major ace in the McCain campaign’s deck was their attacks on Obama’s lack of experience and perceived lack of preparedness to be President. The selection of Palin, not unlike Obama’s selection of Biden, at least temporarily throws a wrench into that narrative that the opposition can exploit. The Obama campaign, on balance, appears to have a more compelling case now on the “can she step in if McCain dies” question than the McCain camp has for Obama. However, with 65 days and a lot of other questions on the table, it remains to be seen if that question will mobilize voters in any direction and in any reasonable quanity.

The Palin pick certainly accomplished what the McCain campaign hoped for and more. She has stopped at least a bit of the momentum Obama could have gained from his convention speech, and has rejuvenated the Republican base in a way that McCain has not since the campaign began, with the possible exception of the grating “drill here, drill now” phenomenon (and credit for that goes to Newt Gingrich, anyway). Over the next week or so, she will get to experience the joy of the media smear machine just as Biden did in 1988. How she endures that will make a major impact on how her pick helps or hinders the McCain candidacy.

Overall - B plus.

It’s going to be a very exciting last couple of months, to be sure. Just make sure not to forget about your local elections as well. In the grand scheme of things, whoever wins the Presidency isn’t going to have much of an impact on your life compared to your Mayors and Sheriffs and County Commissioners and other local office holders. Florida primary turnout was absolutely abysmal last week; come November 4, we need to be on the ball and voting. That’s all.

EDIT: Oh, and an informative (if slanted) Palin site, courtesy of a friend.

http://palin4america.wordpress.com/

Barack Obama needs to go back to school.  Here’s the brief on a recent proposal of his:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday pushed for a windfall profits tax to fund $1,000 emergency rebate checks for consumers besieged by high energy costs, a counter to Republican rival John McCain’s call for more offshore drilling in coastal states like Florida. (AP)

Let’s look at this carefully.  There is a perceived problem: Americans are spending a larger fraction of their income on energy costs, most directly gasoline, but also the rising crude oil costs cascade price escalations throughout the economy, since basically everything involves energy-using transportation.  (I say perceived, because in the short run everything seems like a crisis.)

Perhaps there should be a government solution to this perceived problem.  I won’t argue that particular point, not today.  So let’s assume that yes, there should be some government action.  Obama’s proposed plan is to tax oil companies’ so-called “windfall profits” and use the increased revenue to issue a rebate check to consumers.

Taxing oil companies will increase the cost of providing gasoline to consumers.  Gasoline supply will decrease.

Issuing a rebate check to consumers will provide them with additional wealth to spend on things like gasoline.  Gasoline demand will increase.

When supply decreases, prices go up.  When demand increases, prices go up.  When supply decreases and demand increases… prices go up.

Obama’s plan is so far off-base, it’s borderline idiotic.  But of course, there is a reason.  This is a classic example of election-time politics.  A politician promises immediate satisfaction in the short run (in this case, a rather substantial rebate check).  Though this instant gratification feels good right now, it will hurt much worse later.  But by that time, elections are over and the politician is in office.  When the
costs of the instant gratification finally become apparent, the previous office-holder gets blamed, and the newly elected official (who knew exactly what he was doing) lets things return to equilibrium and takes credit for fixing the problem.

There are, of course, variations on this theme.  That’s politics, and it’s been going on for a long time.  But Barack Obama, who claims to be subscriber to “New Politics”, shows his hand with this particular play.

That is all. Enjoy your summer.

The University released their budget cuts for FY2009 today. These take effect 1 July 2009. Check them out. No one is sparred. Any ideas to improve the situation? Encourage people to play the lottery more? Cut Bright Futures? Raise tutition? Kick out the liberals?

How racism in America survived the Civil War Amendments, the civil rights revolution, the advents of cable television, talk radio and citizen journalism and other various equalizing forces in American society to its present form.

By the Managing Editor

Perhaps it’s the fact that the GOP no longer has a primary race to run, or maybe it’s because I had no intention of voting for Hillary Rodham Clinton or Barack Obama in the first place. Whatever the reason, I find myself otherwise quite bored with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright scandal. Perhaps my colleagues might disagree, but I can’t find much fault in Wright for his belief that America’s track record toward blacks might actually be less than spotless, even to this day. As if the eighty years and change of bondage weren’t bad enough, the Radical Republicans of the North imposed draconian Reconstruction policies upon the South, institutionalizing poverty and antiquity in the former Confederate states that has only been mitigated by military investment and the invention of air conditioning in the past sixty years. And as if that weren’t bad enough, Democrats in the South imposed America’s first gun control laws in the 19th century to make sure those colored folk wouldn’t stand a fighting chance when the Klan knocked on their door with white sheets and stiff ropes.

The 20th century did not bode much better for blacks, and the 21st century appears to offer more of the same racist traditions with merely different tactics. The naively-named “separate but equal” doctrine further aggravated the atrocious teaching conditions Southern schools faced from the outset of the 1900s, and in Tuskegee, black men were used as human guinea pigs for syphilis treatments as recently as the 1970s, nearly thirty years after Dachau was shut down. Today, a black American can sit at the front of the bus and share a classroom with white children and presumably be allowed to attend a college in Florida besides FAMU, but neither the conservative’s American Dream of equality of opportunity nor the liberal’s of equality of outcome could be said to be achieved by any objective standard.

Imagine being a black child about to be brought into this world. You have about a seventy percent chance of not having a dad waiting on the receiving end of your mother’s birth canal. You are twelve times more likely to go to prison than even attend college, let alone get a degree. Your mother likely had to drive (if she did not have to take the bus for lack of a car) past several Planned Parenthood clinics on the way to an emergency room, unless she was lucky enough to have health insurance. You are drastically more likely than the white kid being born in the delivery room next to you to live in real poverty, develop diabetes, drop out of high school, learn what it’s like to choose between food and driving to your second job, and never enjoying retirement.

Numbers are not everything by any means, but this is essentially reality in 2008 for a black child in America. Sure, it’s better than being flogged and sexually assaulted by overseers or having to walk in gutters when a white man passes by on the street, but this is nothing to pat our backs over. It is folly to look to our past and say that our present is somehow progress, and it is equally foolish to look at the ways of the past and not say that racism is not only alive and well in America, but remains a source of power and influence to those who practice it. The War on Drugs has given America a cocaine enforcement policy that says white people get less time for snorting blow in their country club homes while cops swarm the streets of Detroit busting people for holding anything that could be used as a crack pipe, let alone actually carrying crack cocaine. Inner cities are home to some of the most restrictive firearms codes in the country, allowing criminals with less than admirable tolerance for conventional morality to shoot up neighborhoods and murder innocents in the streets with impunity. The resulting crime problems that engulf the inner cities tank property values, send qualified and needed public servants to the more peaceful suburbs and exurbs, and extinguish any chance for meaningful economic development by the private sector. With no hope for a better life coming to them, blacks often feel they have no choice but to come to government, the same entity which in these cases created the problems which lead to their desperate situations, for answers.

We thus begin to see a vicious circle of paternalism and dependency, where people in government provide handouts instead of answers, and scramble for votes instead of actually making a difference. It turns out that the Democratic Party has been a good deal more effective at this than the Republican Party, as blacks vote Democrat to Republican at a 9 to 1 clip consistently. But while Republicans tend to ignore the opportunity to help blacks, Democrats not only ignore the opportunity but seem perfectly content to reap the benefits of a reliable constituency at the polling station. A statistician with my level of tact might call this sort of thing “demographic enslavement”.

If we want to have Barack Obama’s gooey, smooshy visions of “hope” and “change” come to fruition, we should start by viewing all Americans, not just black Americans, as more than just welfare mercenaries looking for the next bribe. If our states spent the money they spend administering entitlements for the federal government on cutting crime, enforcing environmental standards and reforming school curricula, economic opportunity in urban areas would significantly increase. If the 2nd Amendment were legalized in Urban America, criminals would be less inclined to terrorize our streets and we could put to rest the shameful legacy of gun control, one of the last great failures of Reconstruction. Finally, once we make these things happen, localities must lower property taxes and the federal government must cut taxes on investment to make sure jobs can grown and replenish our cities with wealth and income for poor families like never before.

If we are going to have a real discussion about race in America, let’s drop the talk about pastors and middle names and start talking about what really keeps our cities in ruins and why our politicians do everything in their power to keep them that way. It is only once we recognize and come to grips with our new vehicles of racism when we can really put an end to it and ensure that the American Dream of equality of opportunity and an equal shot at prosperity can be realized. Liberty and prosperity go hand in hand in this country; for black Americans, it’s been a long time coming to ensure they finally can have both.

The Florida Frontier is clearly doing something wrong. All the newspapers and cable news networks that I’ve seen in the past few days keep telling me that the United States is in a recession and this has caused a lot of people to get really pissed and/or worried. The evidence, however, shows that we aren’t in a recession. The Economist declared “The Great American Slowdown.” I think this might be more in line with reality than those in the media looking to get a profit on fear mongering. The Bureau of Economic Analysis released their findings here. Turns out our 4^th quarter 2007 growth was 0.6%. The same is expected for the first quarter (now) of 2008. This isn’t good by any stretch of the imagination but it’s nowhere near as catastrophic as I’ve seen it painted by some. It’s not too far off from what many European countries have come to expect in GDP growth.  Germany is looking at a 1.8% increase and France a 2.1% increase. Again, we should be growing at a much higher rate, above 3.5% or so, but there’s no need to make a run on the banks.

GDP is the output of a nation’s goods and services, so industry plays a large part in that. Take a look at this graph:

It shows that we are actually increasing our production. While these numbers aren’t fantastic, we haven’t hit a recession yet.

I wonder, do those who keep lamenting that our economy is in ruins not know any better? Or is it election year politicking? Any thoughts on that?

Lastly, I think there is real concern over the increasing cost of gas and food. Most have come to realize that the “green” fad and subsequent subsidies have lead to farmers not producing other food staples. As for gas, that takes someone far more intelligent that I to figure out. Maybe friend of the Frontier Ben Stein has some ideas.  

The difference between Micheal Moore and Ben Stein is plain and apparent: the purpose of Moore’s movies, every one of them, was to “close debate” as to what is truth: health care, gun laws, and that President Bush is evil. To do this, since all of these are clearly far from the truth, Moore had to riddle his movies with propaganda.

Stein, on the other hand, had the opposite purpose, to open debate. His movie was a push to get intellegent design back into the scientific realm and, and with reasons why to boot. His movie was just biting and ‘Hollywood’ enough to cut down the arrogant, egotistical atheist-evolutionist scientists who claim to know what cannot be known. This objective, in and of itself, makes the argument that Stein’s movie is ‘propaganda’ obsolete.
And why is it so hard to let both fields of study into the scientific realm? Evolutionary theory has NO - let me repeat - NO answers for how life came to be from simple chemicals. Intelligent Design has one, though. And Intelligent Design answers are supported by documents thousands and thousands of years old - some the earliest documents in existence. What is history but a collection of documents?
I don’t understand why it is so hard for atheists to accept that a higher power could have made the first complex chemicals, when they themselves admit they have no answers to the spark of life question. If evolution was such a ‘perfect’ and ‘complete’ theory, then why would this debate continue? Like the professor in the movie said, “those theories which never have perfect answers always see the most questions arise”. And, it’s true, evolutionary theory is full of holes. Perhaps, however, some cannot believe in an intangible answer to problems. Some cannot accept into reality what they cannot sense, and it will take that higher form of cognitive processing to open the debate back up to Intelligent Design.

In the March 2008 printed edition of this publication, the staff offered its endorsement in the Presidential race to Arizona Senator John S. McCain III. The Managing Editor notes that this endorsement was not unanimous, and while he does not disagree with the decision, he hereby exercises his right of reply with the following comments.

Unconvinced: A Commentary on John McCain.

One of the unfortunate consequences of being human is that despite all of our best efforts, and despite our attempts to construct institutions that attempt to produce the best possible solutions and policies to represent our interests, it is all too possible and all too common that we make mistakes. The sanctimonious defenders of democracy tell us that in party primaries, the “people make the right choices”, and that “the people must stand by the people their party nominates”. Perhaps I am too much of a capitalist, but the fallibility which makes us human combined with the need for a truly open marketplace of ideas in politics suggest that neither platitude has any basis in reality. Just as doctors with years of experience in medicine school can foul up basic medical procedures, so can members of political parties fail to nominate adequate candidates to represent them. When such mistakes occur, members of parties should not feel compelled to support these inadequate candidates out of a contrived sense of duty or loyalty. That duty and loyalty to party is far better invested in working internally of the party to make sure such mistakes are not repeated.

But enough of the abstraction and on to the central thesis of these comments. I’ve called myself a Republican for longer than some would care to know. I still consider myself a loyal member of the GOP despite eight rather disappointing years under the leadership of a President who would fit in frighteningly well with the Christian Democrat parties of Latin America. But when it comes to the 2008 Republican Presidential race, there is no sense crying over spilled milk when it comes to who my party’s nominee will be [In the interest of full disclosure, I remain a Ron Paul supporter]. After years of enjoying a self-styled perception of the “Republican maverick in the Senate”, John Sidney McCain III is the Republican nominee for President this year. The stats do not lie when considering the question of who gave McCain the nomination. In a field crowded with candidates vying for the title of “the true conservative” (whatever that means in a post G.W. Bush era), McCain earned the grudging trust of self-declared conservative Republicans, in addition to more moderate voters who vote in open primary states. The nomination is his, and it is now time for Republicans to determine if he is deserving of the Oval Office.

The fact that his Democratic opponent in November will be far less palatable to rank-and-file Republicans than McCain should not hide the fact that we Republicans royally screwed up this primary. The fact that Hillary or Obama could be our only alternative to McCain in the general election should not blind Republicans to the reality that we simply picked the wrong nominee for our party. At one point in this race, eleven men were running for our nomination. Of those running, McCain might have been more qualified to be our nominee than four of them…at most [Brownback, Gilmore, Hunter, Tancredo]. McCain’s almost-nauseating resilience compounded by the media’s veritable love affair with him, allowed him to overcome staffing snafus, money woes and being demonstrably misinformed on a variety of critical issues to take our party’s nomination. Now that we are stuck with McCain for the forseeable future (and if his mother is any indication, possibly the next eight years), it is time to not only weigh our priorities in 2008, but also to do what is necessary to reform the Republican nominating schema to reduce our chances of screwing up in the future.

Make no mistake about this, folks. For all of McCain’s many faults, and for all of his irksome positions on the environment, taxes and internationalism, and despite his growing senility, is far more palatable a choice for conservatives than anybody the Democrats nominate this election. Furthermore, any Democratic nominee will present a serious contrast to McCain on major issues that will define the future or our country. The Constitution may nominate Alan Keyes, and the Libertarian Party may nominate former Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia, but other than fine oratory and a hypnotic porn star mustache respectively, neither offer much in the way of reasonable alternatives to a Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton Administration other than a smug sense of ideological purity for those conservatives who might support them. While I certainly can empathize with the desire and to be forthright am considering supporting Barr in November still, all do so at their own peril, considering the risks of a Clinton or Obama Presidency becoming a reality.

However, on the matter of this publication’s endorsement of Senator McCain, I cannot join with my colleagues or my Editor in Chief. This should not be construed to imply that I would not or will not vote for Senator McCain come Election Day. But would I in fact cast my ballot for him, it would not be an endorsement of his candidacy, but rather a statement of opposition to that of the Democratic nominee. But on account of the failure of the nomination regime of my party to ensure the best candidate earned the nomination of actual party membership, combined with McCain’s casual understanding of party loyalty, I cannot and will not endorse him for President.

After 2008, the Republican National Committee must resolve several critical flaws in their rules for delegate nominations by the state Republican parties. First and foremost, they ought to amend their nomination rules to only accept delegates chosen from completely closed primaries. Caucuses have proven to be detrimental to ensuring party members their right to participate in their own party’s work, and open primaries have for far too long been notorious for independent voters pooling together to “game the system” and undermine political parties (see the 1950 Wisconsin Senate Republican Primary and the 1988 Michigan Democratic Presidential Primary as prime examples). Second, the GOP must impose strict proportional representation requirements for these primaries. In Florida, John McCain won all 57 of the states GOP convention delegates while winning just 36% of the vote. Putting an end to winner take all primaries will allow for a more deliberative nomination process without opening the door for the slugfest we see in the DNC over superdelegates and other such nonsense.

We must learn from our mistakes in the future, but until we can put those lessons to use, we have to live with our mistakes. John McCain is today’s mistake for the Republican Party and its members. The question now is whether the bigger mistake was for us to nominate Senator McCain or to allow a far less desirable person to become President out of bitterness. No party member should feel compelled to support Senator McCain, but every party member should be able to figure out which is the more grievous error.

I dissent.

Due to the limitations of the print form of the Frontier Jeff and I were forced to cut the list of possible candidates down significantly. While many people are being thrown around as possibilities, including Tommy Franks among others.

Our short list included the 5 men and women discussed in the article, Jindal, Pawlenty, Sanford, Pence, and Hutchison. Also the following were, in our eyes, possible choices:Mitt Romney (R), Charlie Crist (R-FL), Rob Portman (R-OH), Haley Barbour (R-MS), Condoleezza Rice (R), Joe Lieberman (I-CN), Jim DeMint (R-SC), Fred Thompson (R), and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)

Recently a list of 5 front runners was named by the campaign. Lieberman, Crist, Blackburn, Barbor and Pawlenty are there. Our list seems to be dead on here, we not only have all 5 the campaign has listed but we included the hot names like Condi that seem to pop up weekly reguardless of how much she denies.

Of course no one will admit they want it. Some dance gracefully around the question, like either Ms. Rice or Mrs. Hutchison, saying they do not want the position when asked. Others laugh off the question, as Mr. Jindal did, saying “He’s not going to ask me.” while modest it isn’t a no.

It will continue to all be speculation and guessing until the man himself decides.

Some of the Frontier staff, along with some College Republicans, went to see Ben Stein’s new big screen documentary “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed”.  In case you haven’t heard, the film is about intelligent design and whether or not it is a valid scientific theory.  Honestly, I went into the theater hoping for myths about evolution to be debunked, for scientific hypotheses generated by intelligent design, for significant holes in the evolutionary theory.  I was sorely disappointed (but rather entertained, I should add) by a parade of fluffy interviews, Ben Stein wandering around various cities, and scathingly atheistic evolution advocates, all juxtaposed with footage from Nazi and communist Germany.

To be fair, Ben Stein had a point.  His claim that anybody who even mentions intelligent design in the scientific community is instantly ridiculed and ostracized is probably true.  Science should be about challenging authority, breaking theories down to make them better.  Most of the people he interviewed said that intelligent designers had some very valid issues with evolutionary theory.

Unfortunately, I never saw nor heard from these “valid issues”, only some very weak, non-arguments that have already been raised, debated on, and settled. Anybody who has read a little bit of literature on evolution will find the arguments presented to be ridiculous.  Ben Stein’s incredulity at “DNA riding on the backs of crystals” was laughable, the intelligent design scientists’ claim that evolution could not construct new species was simply ignorant.

The rest of the movie was riddled with propaganda.  A large chunk of time was devoted to Ben Stein visiting a holocaust memorial.  Wait, what?  What does that have to do with evolution?  His point was that Hitler was a firm believer in Darwinism, and therefore Darwinists are Nazis.  Clips of interviews with evolutionary scientists were interspliced with clips of Nazis murdering Jews.  Planned Parenthood was portrayed as a neo-Nazi eugenics movement.  Does all this remind you of something?  Or perhaps, someone?

Yes, Michael Moore, the liberals’ own “documentary” maker, notorious for his non-arguments and skewing of facts.  Moore has been criticized for bad facts, poor taste, and downright misconstruing of quotations.  Stein is now just as guilty.  In “Expelled”, he quotes from Darwin’s “Descent of Man”, using the quotation to imply that Darwin was suggesting Hitler-like breeding of the human race.  Stein stops right there, but Darwin goes on to say that mankind’s sympathy is “the noblest part of our nature”, and if we were ever to participate in the kind of breeding he just described, it would be an act of “overwhelming … evil”.

“Expelled” is an entertaining watch, I’ll admit that.  I had a good time chuckling at the absurdities of the movie, and at the very least it made me think about the issues again.  My opinion of Mr. Stein has been lowered some, but hey, the Republican’s can have their own Moore if they want.