WRONG SIDE

STEPHEN HADLEY


I watched Face the Nation this morning and let me start off by saying that it was great to have Bob Schieffer back in the chair as opposed to that sock puppet Russ Mitchell. Schieffer's guest in the first segment were Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Arlen Spector (R-Pa.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.). All of them support the premise that what Bush is trying to do as it pertains to pushing legislation that "clarifies" the Geneva Conventions and sets up kangaroo courts for detainees is wrong, but it was Graham (who was the only guest in studio) who really stole the show. If I didn't already know who he was, I would have thought that he was a Democrat. He clearly and concisely laid out why what Bush wants is completely wrong for the United States for the precise reason that if we go around changing the rules to suit our needs, then other nations with a less than stellar records on fairness and human rights would also feel they have the right to alter these protections. To paraphrase Graham, this is not the only war we will ever fight and we need to protect our own troops from potential abuses which will inevitably occur if we attempt to alter the Geneva Conventions as Bush wants to do. The very clear and concise explanations by Graham made for an excellent case against the Bush adminstration.

Providing balance during the second half was National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley. He's basically been put into a position to defend the indefensible, but that doesn't stop him from trying to convince the moderator (or moderators as he also appeared on This Week and Late Edition) that it's in our national interests to alter Article 3 of the Conventions. In particular, the adminstration wants clarification of subsection c, which prohibits "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment[.]" Personally, I sort of look at this and think about Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart back in 1964 when he tried to explain "hard-core" pornography, or what is obscene, by saying, "I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced . . . [b]ut I know it when I see it . . . ". Well said, Justice Stewart.

Schieffer closed the show by basically reciting the resumes of those who are the right side of this argument. McCain - a former POW, Graham - former JAG in the Air Force Reserve, John Warner - Senate Armed Services Committee and Colin Powell - former chairman of the Joint Chiefs and Secretary of State. These people's collective experiences on matters of national security should be unimpeachable and as such, Schieffer cannot understand how Bush ended up on the wrong side of this argument. I can think of a couple of reasons, but it's a Sunday morning so I'll try to be nice.

A WEINER BY ANY OTHER NAME

MICHAEL SAVAGE


Fun fact: did you know that Savage's real name is Michale Alan Weiner and he holds a Ph.D. from the UC Berkeley in epidemiology and nutrition and masters degrees in medical botany and medical anthropology. How an obviously intelligent individual like that can spew such hatred and vitriol on a daily basis boggles my mind. But I digress.
Today's episode of vitriol and hate comes to us via Media Matters, where, on his nationally syndicated radio show, he had this to say:

Weren't we told before Barbara Boxer became a U.S. senator, before Dianne Feinstein became a U.S. senator, before Hillary Clinton became a U.S. senator, that when women became senators, we'd have a kinder, gentler Senate, a more compassionate Senate? Well, I think the results are quite clear. The Senate is not kinder and gentler or more compassionate. In fact, it's more vicious and more histrionic than ever, specifically because women have been injected into the Senate.

I've been told that when Savage was a child his mother used to hold his head under the bath water for extended periods of time, but that's just what I've been told and it would certainly explain an awful lot of him.
Now, understanding that engaging a demagogue like Savage is about as useful (and painful) as a using a cheese grater to shave one's legs, I'll go ahead and take a swing at it anyway. I will not actually comment on the gist of his argument - that the Senate is meaner with women in it - because there would be no point. It's a dumb thing to say, period.
What I would like to engage is the final sentence where he states, "In fact, it's more vicious and more histrionic than ever, specifically because women have been injected into the Senate." The second I read this, my brain perked up as I recalled an incident involving an actual assault involving comments made about "the peculiar institution" and insulting a Senate colleague. In May 1856 Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was bludgeoned nearly to death by South Carolina congressman Preston Brooks. Wikipedia, as always, has the goods. Let's see, it's 1856. Women won't even be allowed to vote for another sixty years, much less run for Congress, but here we have the most heinous act of viciousness ever to take place in the hallowed halls of the institution. As if his argument even needed debunking, well here it is.
Oh, and if you want to fast forward to today's Congress, I can think of a particularly nasty incident off the top of my head - like when DICK Cheney told Patrick Leahy to"go fuck yourself" on the floor of the Senate back in June of 2004. Funny, I didn't see Boxer or Feinstein or Clinton around for that exchange.

REVOLUTION? OR NOT...

GEORGE W. BUSH


So Bush is desparate to get a bill passed that "refines the language" of the Geneva Conventions so that it'll be okay to keep torturing people. Never mind the fact that information ascertained through torture rarely pans out and never mind the fact that if the United States feels that it's within their rights to refine the language of the Conventions (that have worked fine and dandy over the last 60 years, might I add), that other countries with even more sinister aims may also feel obliged to do their own refining. Simply put, by angling for these ill-advised changes, Bush is putting American troops in harm's way.
Fortunately, there appear to be some Republicans who can understand these very basic arguments that I just laid out (focusing more on the latter than the former though) and they are now standing up and saying that the Bush is wrong on this. Unfortunately, the media and Bush are painting a bizarre picture of the goings-on, referring to the GOP members that spoke out as rebels and terming the event a Republican revolt. Here's my problem with this: Bush is not the Emporer of America! The few Republicans that are standing up aren't revolting against the Mighty Emporer, they're doing what the Dems have been meekly doing for six years now, which is their job. They're actually carrying out that whole "checks and balances" theory in the Constitution. Bush can propose whatever the hell law he wants, but it's the Congress' job to pass that law and it's about time that members of the GOP stood up and carried out their duties as members of the co-equal legislative branch. The elephants have been rubberstamping Bush for so long that people have apparently forgotten that when they actually do their job that it's not a revolt and the members are not leading a rebellion.
Finally, one blurb in the Post really caught my attention: "President Bush warned defiant Republican senators yesterday that he will close down a CIA interrogation program that he credited with thwarting terrorist attacks if they pass a proposal regulating detention of enemy combatants[.]" Perhaps it would bolster Bush's case just a tad if he were to ever share some information about the supposed thwarted terrorist attacks! Give me a list of three verifiable potential terrorist attacks (and please spare me the Brooklyn Bridge attack where the guy was going to destroy [probably more accurate to call it 'dismantle'] the bridge using a blow torch) that have been thwarted via your vaunted torture techniques and then we'll talk, because, sir, you've had precisely ZERO credibility with me from day one and have done nothing to earn any credibility in my eyes in the 2064 days that you have defiled and dishonored that hallowed office. Fortunately, after years of sleeping, the American public is finally waking up from their fear-induced comas and have realized the same thing. Just because you stand in front of a podium and purse your lips and squint your eyes and speak with mock authority on a subject, it does not automatically make what you say true, and more than likely the opposite is usually the case.

SATURDAY MORNING

GRACIE BLOGGING

Okay, so this is a little late from it's normal Friday evening slot. But I do have an excellent explanation. My sister-in-law came in from New Orleans to spend the weekend (and it better just be the weekend) so we actually had an honest to goodness babysitter. So the missus and I jumped at the opportunity to get out and go see a movie. I cannot remember the last time that we had actually seen a movie with just the two of us. We went and saw that movie Hollywoodland, about the mysterious death of George Reeves, the original TV Superman. Not bad, dragged a bit, could have used a bit more editing, but otherwise it was fine. Ben Affleck, who played Reeves, was very good. A couple of times I forgot that I was watching Affleck, so to me that's a good actor. For some unknown reason my wife finds Adrian Brody attractive so she liked staring at him for two hours.
Anyway, that's my Friday night and here's this week's shot of Gracie. Enjoy!

URBAN MYTHS

GEORGE W. BUSH


As if we needed anymore proof that this guy is certifiably the WORST president ever. From Bush during Friday press conference:

And, you know, there is a kind of an urban myth here in Washington about how this administration hasn't stayed focused on Osama bin Laden. Forget it. It's convenient throw-away lines, you know, when people say that. We have been on the hunt, and we'll stay on the hunt until we bring him to justice.

Pardon me for a moment sir, but aren't you the one who has flat out said that you are not that concerned about him just six months after the 9/11 attacks? Wasn't the CIA task force in charge of hunting down bin Laden shut down on your watch? Have you not just recently acknowledged that bin Laden is not a top priority?
Mr. Bush, the urban myth here is that you care about catching bin Laden. It's no great intellectual leap to see that he is much more valuable to you as a boogeyman to scare up the voters every two years than he is captured or dead. Everyday I become a little more disgusted in you.

THE FIVE WORST PEOPLE
IN THE WORLD

WEEK FOUR


Starting things off at number five is House Majority Leader John Boehner, who represents a party that's so bereft of ideas that he actually said, "I listen to my Democratic friends and I wonder if they're more interested in protecting the terrorists than protecting the American people." It's just such a bald-faced smear that has nothing to do with anything, that it makes my blood boil. It illustrates the GOP's continuing sad attempts to somehow figure out a way to hold onto power come November and I think this sort of rhetoric will ultimately backfire. With less than two months to go, Boehner is already saying inflammatory stuff like this. I imagine that by Halloween he'll be saying that he's got pictures of Nancy Pelosi giving bin Laden a footrub.

At number four is Joe Lieberman, who gave us a double wammy of lies and attacks against his opponent, Ned Lamont. A couple of weeks back, Joe said that those who support Ned's call for a timetable on withdrawals from Iraq are supporting the terrorists. This week, former president Jimmy Carter said that sort of crap is a terrible thing to say, then Joe (through a mouthpiece) says that he never said anything like that, which of course he did. Then, Joe's communications director decided to take on Ned Lamont for volunteering at an inner city school. Wha? Yeah, he thinks that Lamont has inferred that he's a teacher at this school when Ned has always been clear that he was volunteering to help out and assisted in a business class, and to good reviews, according to the actual teacher of the course. If this is all Joe's camp has, then they're in more trouble than I thought.

Michelle Malkin makes her first appearance in the Five Worst list this week as she attacked a local library system because they chose to commemorate the 9/11 attacks in a way that she found objectionable. Namely, they were using the day to recognize the diversity of their community. For this, Malkin called them moonbats and other such nonsense. I guess in Malkin's world, if you're not marching with signs saying "KILL THE RAGHEADS" and locking Muslims up in internment camps, then you're not "celebrating" 9/11 correctly.

Appearing at number two is our old friend, George Felix Allen Jr. Much like Joe above, Felix gave us a double dose of campaign stupidity, first by relentlessly attacking his opponent Jim Webb for daring to use a sixteen-second clip of Ronald Reagan saying nice things about him. Then, in an effort to downplay the whole "macaca" debacle, he's been doing everything but appearing on a reunion show of The Jeffersons. To read Felix's website, one would assume that "some of his best friends are black."

And coming in at number one is DICK Cheney. He's had a busy week, what with his continuing attempts at convincing the American public that Saddam and Osama were BFF and then telling the American public that in order to defeat the "enemy" we have to stand in lockstep with Bush and never ever never ever ever question anything that he does because that would be helping the terrorists if we did. So basically, by exercising our Constitutional right to speak freely of our elected officials, we are aiding and abetting the terrorists. I said it in the original post, so I'll just repeat it here: Shorter DICK: In order to keep America safe, we cannot actually be Americans.
And this man is a heartbeat away from the presidency. The Founding Fathers weep.

Finally, I know that I went a whole week without a Bush post and given the week he's had, it seems almost obligatory that he should have been on here, mostly given his brazen politicization of 9/11 over the past week. So even though I didn't actually give him a post and he didn't make the FIVE WORST list, let's go ahead and give him three bonus points as an honorable mention. Sound good?

Here's the latest tally after four weeks:
George W. Bush - 14 points
Joe Lieberman - 9 points
George Felix Allen Jr. - 8 points
Dick Cheney 6 points
ABC - Path to 9/11 - 5 points
Donald Rumsfeld - 5 points
Michelle Malkin - 3 points
Condoleeza Rice - 3 points
Ann Coulter - 3 points
Neil Cavuto - 2 points
John McCain - 2 points
John Boehner - 1 point
Frank Gaffney - 1 point
Hugh Hewitt - 1 point


(Points are awarded based on five points for a first place finish, four points for second and so on. Points will be carried over from week to week.)

FRIDAY SURVIVOR BLOGGING

WEEK ONE


Alright, it's almost all politics all the time around here so I thought that I'd mix it up a little bit on Fridays by doing some Survivor blogging. I blogged about this a couple of weeks ago, so I thought that I might follow up (perhaps weekly) on the infamous program.
As some of you may already be aware, this season's Survivor features four teams of five people each segregated along racial an ethnic lines. Five whites, five blacks, five Asians and five Latinos. All contestants are Americans, so I will not be noting each group by their "blank"-American designation - I'd like to finish this post before lunch. Also note, there may be a couple of SPOILERS so if you wish to watch the show but haven't yet, I suggest that you stop reading and come back later.
Of course, there were the early jokes by certain right wingers about how blacks can't swim and the Latinos should do well because they're willing to do jobs that others won't do. That were lame putdowns and I'm happy to report that no black person drowned during the first episode.
As for the tribes themselves, when I first saw the pictures of them, I immediately noticed that all tribes are definitely not created equal. There were two groups with three men and two women (Asians and Latinos) and two groups with two men and three women (whites and blacks). Please don't think me sexist, but I could tell that these two teams would be at something of a disadvantage. And the results of the physical challenge seemed to bear that out. The top two teams were the Asians and the Latinos, followed by the whites and the blacks. So the blacks finished last, huh? Yep, and it had nothing to do with swimming or anything other than the fact that, from a physical perspective, they aren't that strong. One of the men (a jazz musician) on the team is quite overweight and at least one of the women looks a little older and out of shape herself. So, to me, being black has nothing to do with their performance; it's the fact that it's just not a strong tribe physically. Also, one of the members made a valid point when they said that probably their biggest drawback as a group is that they're a bunch of city slickers with very little "roughing it" experience. I would concur with that assessment.
My early favorite going in was the Asian tribe, and after watching them win the first challenge, I'm sticking with that selection. Everyone looks really fit and they seem to have decent group chemistry. One member made a comment that, given the individual ethnic backgrounds of the group (Two Koreans, one Filipino, one Vietnamese and one Filipino-Hawaiian) the fact that they're all in an Asian group means little since their tribal lineage cuts such a large swath. Still, like I said, the group looks really strong and have only one "black sheep" (a older Vietnamese man named Cao Boi - "Cowboy") whom I could see getting voted out fairly soon if they happen to lose an immunity challenge.
Overall, not a bad first episode. It appears that the show will run with the segregation concept for the forseeable future, which I don't think is necessarily a bad thing. Ultimately, the setup will have little to with deciding who wins the million dollars. As a member of the white tribe, Jonathan said, "I don't believe that just because these groups have cultural similarities that that will make them more specifically cohesive. This is Survivor, someone's going to win a million dollars and they're going to have to cut the throat of some guy next to him at some point." Well said.

DOUBLE HEADER

GEORGE FELIX ALLEN JR.

I've got a rare two-fer from Felix as he's been kind of busy the past few days making nice with "non-white" people and then attacking his opponent on what can only be called a trifling issue. The latter's up first:

George Felix Allen Jr., still pissed off that anyone other than he would dare to lay claim to the imagined legacy of Ronald Reagan continued his attack on his opponent, Democratic Senate nominee and former Reagan appointee Jim Webb. Felix is choosing to attack Webb by implying that Webb served in the Reagan administration for less than a year and that Webb certainly has no right to bring up the fact that Reagan actually said complementary things about Webb back in the '80s.
Just to remind everyone, this is the offensive statement by Reagan that Webb dares to use in a campaign ad: "One man who sat where you do now is another member of our administration, Assistant Secretary of Defense James Webb, the most decorated member of his class. James' gallantry as a Marine officer in Vietnam won him the Navy Cross and other decorations."
Webb refused to pull that ad when Felix and Nancy Reagan (no doubt at Felix's urging) demanded he do so and now Allen is claiming that Webb is disrespecting Mrs. Reagan and all but urinating on Reagan's very grave. The new ad out of Felix's camp is terribly misleading and is designed to imply that Webb barely had a cup of coffee while serving in the administration and thus has no right to herald anything positive that Reagan might have said about him.
It's amazing how this one issue is dominating Felix's campaign. If this is all that he has (and that would appear to be the case given a look at the front page of his website), then I think that it speaks volumes about the sorry state of his candidacy.
(Quick note: Webb served two positions in the Reagan administration, first serving as Assistant Secretary of Defense from 1984 to 1987 and then 10 months as Secretary of the Navy.)

Part two of Felix's double header is his attempts to dig himself out of his Macaca hole he put himself in a few weeks ago. To recap, he called a dark-skinned worker of his opponent "macaca" which is apparently something of an offensive racial slur in some parts of the world. Instead of manning up and apologizing, we were treated to two weeks of denial, half-hearted explanations and obfuscation before offering a qualified apology to the offended party. The gaffe cost Felix much support and turned a double-digit lead into a competitive race in which Webb has actually led in some polls. Anyway, in an effort to improve his image among colored folk, Felix held an 'ethnic rally' where he invited potential non-white supporters for a quick meet-and-greet. As Josh Marshall notes over at TPM, "I guess 'ethnic rally was better than 'brown people outreach' and that probably would have been better than 'macaca day'." According to reports, the event was sparsely attended and perhaps a dozen African Americans bothered to show up.
Then on Wednesday, in a move highlighted on his campaign website that just completely smacks of "some of my best friends are black", Felix trumpets that a BLACK Democratic state lawmaker will be supporting him in the upcoming election. See, that's important because he's a Democrat and has nothing to do with the fact that he's BLACK. It's totally coincidental that Felix put a picture of the face of the BLACK Democratic lawmaker on his website, and the link to an article from Felix's website is to a Washington Post article, who's headline reads "Black Democrat Says He Will Back Allen, Not Webb". Some of my best friends, indeed.

To sum up, Felix's campaign currently consists of attacking Webb for using Reagan in a political ad and then cozying up to blacks as he yells from the hills, "See, I'm not racist!! Look at all of my colored friends!!!" With a political operation like this, could someone please explain to me how he got elected in the first place?

KEYSTONE CAMPAIGNING

JOE LIEBERMAN


Joe Lieberman has had something of a busy week, or rather his surrogates have been out digging holes for the erstwhile Connecticut for Lieberman candidate for the Senate.
Earlier this week, former president Jimmy Carter called out Lieberman for implying that those who are against Bush's policies in Iraq were supporting the terrorists. Carter: "He’s joined in with the Republican spokespersons by saying that Democrats who disagree are really supporting terrorism. So for all these reasons I’ve lost my confidence in Joe Lieberman and don’t wish to see him re-elected."
Naturally, the Lieberman camp attempts to deny it, in the form of spokesperson Tammy Sun, who said, "[I]t is entirely false to suggest that Joe Lieberman in any way equated dissent about the war with supporting terrorists."
But of course, anyone with half a brain and a google search engine can easily find at least one instance where Lieberman has said just that: "If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, get out by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes in this plot hatched in England. It will strengthen them and they will strike again."

Not wanting to be outdone, the total trainwreck and Lieberman communications director known as Dan Gerstein, who has set out to attack Ned Lamont because ... he volunteers to teach part time at inner city schools? From Gerstein: "The reality is Ned Lamont has trouble with the truth. Ned Lamont has loudly and widely trumpeted his credentials as an educator and in doing so has unequivocally given people the impression that he is currently a teacher in the Bridgeport public schools. Since Mr. Lamont is touting this credential, there are legitimate questions," Gerstein said.
Actually, from the very beginning, Lamont has been completely upfront on this. He has never once claimed to being a teacher in the Bridgeport public schools. This just a pointless attack that, like Sun's stupidity, is easily verifiable and shot down. Lamont has always contended that he volunteered part time to help with a business class. Honestly, and this is just my opinion, volunteering sounds better to me anyway. Why would the Leiberman camp make an issue of this? All it really stands to do is highlight that Lamont volunteered at an inner city school. He volunteered, as in he didn't have to do it. But he chose to help his community by volunteering his time for a good cause. When's the last time Lieberman volunteered for anything? From what I understand, many people in Connecticut feel that Lieberman has barely spent any amount of time in the state the past six or so years, which is probably why he's in this electoral pickle he finds himself in anyway.
I sort of wonder if there's ever been a major campaign run by such absolute imbeciles. I can see what they're trying to do here to Lamont - they're attempting to define him as someone who is untruthful and associates with others who are untruthful. It's just that these guys are so inept at developing a narrative on Lamont that they seem to be tripping over themselves to say the next dumb thing that hurts their candidate. Not that Lieberman needs any help when it comes to saying dumb things, or course.

I'm sure that if some reporter actually calls the Joe Camp on these outright lies and misrepresentations, he'll spin it that the evil bloggers are being mean to him, just like they were when they shut down his website and cost him a primary victory. Remember, in the event of being called on one lie, say an even bigger lie. It distracts the sheeple.

SCRAPPING THE BOTTOM OF THE BARREL

JOHN BOEHNER


Democrats rightfully questioned why Mr. Bush chose to inject politics into his address to the nation in what should have been a non-political speech commemorating the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Most agree that the speech was a big whiff for the president, who failed to use the opportunity to reach out and invoke the unity the nation shared back in 2001 and instead utilized the national address as yet another platform to sell his failing Iraq war policy. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said, "Sadly, it was a missed opportunity for President Bush, who apparently was more consumed by staying the course in Iraq and playing election year politics." House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said, "The American people deserved an opportunity to grieve and come together as a nation last night. Instead President Bush gave them partisan and inaccurate rhetoric."
Of course, questioning anything Bush ever said or does is cause to be branded a traitor and hater by the Republican attack dogs, and this time was no exception. From House Majority Leader John Boehner: "I listen to my Democratic friends and I wonder if they're more interested in protecting the terrorists than protecting the American people."
Disregarding for a moment that his statement has no actual relevance to the substance of Pelosi's and Reid's remarks, the statement is a massively transparent illustration of just how totally lost the entire Republican Party is. This is all they've got left. They're not even attempting to engage the Democrats on the issues. I completely expect that in the leadup to the November midterms the Democrats will continue to engage Bush's wrongheaded approach to foreign policy while the GOP will continue to engage in ad hominem attacks. They know that they've lost the debate. Iraq is a disaster, the "war on terror" is going nowhere, Afghanistan will most likely be under Taliban control again by 2008, Osama bin Laden is still alive and kicking five years after killing 3000 people, and let's not even start on the non-existent domestic agenda. The Republicans have nothing left. They've lost the debate so they cranked up the attack machine.

Oh, a quick note as I had forgotten about this originally but noticed it after doing a little Wikipedia search. In June 1995, Boehner provoked contentions of unethical conduct when he distributed campaign contributions from tobacco industry lobbyists on the House floor as House members were weighing how to vote on tobacco subsidies. And this guy is the #2 Republican in the House of Representatives. Actually, to me it seems kind of appropriate given the state of the GOP. Nothing to stand on, nothing to run on, nothing but lies and smears.

TIME FOR MORE GOP STRAW POLLS!

For those of you new to the site, I'm a junkie for straw polls. Love 'em. Especially GOP polls; call it opposition research. Conventional wisdom suggests that John McCain is the early favorite as he's got lots of cash, an strong infrastructure and his "maverick" moniker that lets him appeal to moderate voters (I'll leave it for another time to again complain about McCain's alleged moderate streak; suffice it to say, I think it's baloney). But these straw polls, conducted online every once in a while over in the right blogosphere, paint a much different picture.

First, I'll do a quick recap of how the poll is constructed. There is a list of 11 candidates and there are three choices for each candidate; first choice, acceptable and unacceptable. Voters could only vote for one "first choice" but multiple "acceptable" or "unacceptable" results. Based on the ratings that those who took the polls gave themselves, there's a fairly strong representation of the very conservative section of the GOP in the poll.
The potential candidates in the survey, listed in alphabetical order, are Allen, Brownback, Frist, Gingrich, Giuliani, Hagel, Huckabee, McCain, Pataki, Romney and Tancredo. At the time of my viewing, there had been 4945 ballots cast. Poll results can be found here.

Since last time I examined one of these straw polls was back on August 27th, some of the numbers have definitely shifted. Starting off, Giuliani is no longer tops as the "first choice" candidate as he has now swapped placed with the former second place, Newt Gingrich. August numbers had Rudy at 25% compared to 21.5% for Newt and Mitt Romney well behind with 12.9% Presumptive nominee McCain garnered on 6.2% of the "first choice" selections. Now, Gingrich is up with 24.2% of the "first choices" and Rudy follows closely with 22.7% Romney is still third, though he's moved up some percentage points and is now at 15.4%. McCain support dwindled to 4.1% of "first choice" selections.
Moving onto the "acceptable" choices, again we see a switch that Newt has moved up to first place, though it's probably more accurate to say that he's polling the same and Rudy has fallen. Newt's still at 66% (the same as the August number) but Rudy has seen his stock drop as far as being an acceptable candidate falling to 60.7% compared to 66.7% back in August. The current number is barely good enough for third place as George Felix Allen Jr. is right behind him at 60.6%. Moving up to second place is Romney, who grabs 63%. McCain finds himself in eighth place, garnering a paltry 21% acceptability number. I'm no expert, but that number sort of sucks.
And finally, in the "unacceptable" category, heading up the list is Chuck Hagel, which isn't surprising, at 69% which is a tick up from August. McCain finds himself the second most unacceptable candidate on the list (moving up two places from August) with 68.3%, which is a big six point shift from his August number of 62%. The least "unacceptable" candidate is Gingrich at 21%, a positive gain of three points from his August numbers. Giuliani drops here as well, falling to fourth from first with 26.9%. Romney comes in behind Newt with 22.7% unacceptibility rating and George Felix Allen Jr. is third with 24.1% unacceptibility.

What it all means:
I'm sort of suprised that Rudy's acceptibility numbers have dropped by almost seven points in just about three weeks, especially considering that we just finished the various 9/11 commemorations and, of course, that's where Rudy made his scratch back in '01. I do not believe that Rudy would even be included in this poll if not for the events of 9/11. All that being said, it looks like more and more conservatives are actually starting to look at Giuliani's record and have decided that he's not an acceptable candidate. I would expect his numbers to continue to fall in the coming weeks and months.
Also, as I mentioned at the beginning, the polls results (at least the straw polls I've viewed) are flying in the face of conventional wisdom as McCain is not getting the love from conservatives. Perhaps the "maverick" thing backfires with conservatives. Maybe they seem him as too moderate. Wouldn't that be ironical.
Newt Gingrich definitely benefitted from Rudy's plunge, though whether that will actually result in primary support for him remains to be seen. Mitt Romney is also someone who deserves a strong look given his numbers, though I'd be hardpressed to figure out how being a governor from a liberal New England state like Massachusetts would be helpful in getting him votes in the South.
Something else to note is that six of the candidates are from the Senate and I do not believe that that is a viable path to the White House even if your name is McCain. The last time a senator won the presidency was almost fifty years ago when Kennedy barely won in '60. So that leaves three governors (and two of them are from the Northeast, never a good sign) while two are private citizens, Newt and Rudy.
I personally think that Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee bears watching. Though his numbers are anemic (1.2% first choice, 37.6% acceptable, 38.1% unacceptable), he is a governor from a southern state (and three of the last five presidents were elected having held the same position - Carter, Clinton and Bush II) and I believe that as time rolls on and people become more familiar with him, his numbers will rise.
But that's just my take and honestly, I am no authority on how the right wing mind works, so who knows?

RANDOM THOUGHTS

LINCOLN CHAFEE


Last night, Steve Laffey lost to incumbent Rhode Island Republican Senator Lincoln Chafee. Laffey is, to put it politely, a true-blue (or is it red) right winger. Chafee is a moderate, a Republican in name only, or a RINO. Hard right Republicans cannot stand Chafee, and I can certainly understand why - the guy actually did not vote for Bush in 2004 (he wrote in George H.W. Bush), he did not vote to support Bush in Iraq and he did not vote for Bush's various ill-advised tax cuts. But here's the rub: In Rhode Island, Steve Laffey is unelectable in the general election against Democrat Sheldon Whitehorse. Lincoln Chafee is. Polling shows that in a Chaffee/Whitehorse matchup, the candidates are in a statistical dead heat, but in a Laffey/Whitehorse pairing, Whitehorse is a winner by a large margin. So while the GOP is loathe to lose a Senate seat, which would have been a foregone conclusion if Laffey would have prevailed, they equally loathed seeing a traitor (Redstate.com's word, not mine) to the party get reelected.
Now we have a situation here that is eerily reminiscent of the Connecticut Democratic Primary back in August. Yesterday in Rhode Island a Republican incumbent was almost unseated by a candidate universally considered to be on the fringe of his party's far right wing. One month ago, we saw a situation where a Democratic incumbent was unseated by a candidate some considered to be on the fringe of his party's left wing. In the latter case, it was a constant drum beat leading up to the primary by the media as a sign of the imminent surrender of the Democratic Party to it's pinko-commie-peacenik-moveon.org fringe. In the former case... nary a peep. When Ned Lamont defeated Joe Lieberman back in early August, the media and right wingers were up in arms about how the Dems are just lost and there purging their party of any moderates now that Lieberman, a huge supporter of Bush's Iraq war policy, was defeated. Yet here is a clear and identifiable instance of a party almost purging its own moderate elements and moving to its far right edges, but there's been no commentary and mainstream coverage chronicling how this would have been the end of the Republican Party as it ran further and further to the right. Hey, all I'm asking for is a little balance from the doom and gloom political pundits.
So anyway, by continuing to support Chafee, the citizens of Rhode Island pushed back against the more fringe elements of the GOP and have given themselves a fighting chance of holding the seat come November. And I'm sure this will cause no end of consternation among the righties because, after reading some of the things I've read over in Rightblogistan, it seems that they would rather lose a seat in the Senate than see Lincoln Chafee reelected.