Dixie Notes

There was only a 15% voter turnout yesterday, and Obama handily won, whereas Huckabee narrowly won. Not surprising to anyone, Obama won Orleans parish. He also won by smaller leads in Jefferson, Plaquemines, and St. John, with Mrs. Clinton winning St. Bernard and St. Tammany. St. Bernard is the only parish she won by a decent margin, and I’m not sure what to make of that. St. Bernard had the lowest percentage of McCain voters, as well as among the lowest percentage of Huckabee supporters, which doesn’t suggest a clear reason why St. Bernard went for Clinton.

The interesting thing is that McCain won all of the above parishes - Every single one - yet Huckabee won the statewide vote. This suggests that it’s the more rural people from north Louisiana who swayed the vote, in other words, the strongly evangelical voters.

Parker said a lot of the votes for Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, came from the more socially conservative areas of the state from Alexandria northward.

Almost half of the voters in the Louisiana GOP primary described themselves as born-again, evangelical Christians, according to the AP exit poll, and most of them voted for Huckabee. He also won two-thirds of those voters who said they were looking for a candidate who shares their values.

The motivating force that gets evangelicals up and out of the church pew is emotionally-charged issues. They could care less who the guy is. Get them riled up enough with abortion/stem cell research/evolution issues and they’ll go to vote for that, and drop a vote for the most atavistic Republican almost as an afterthought. The thing is, there’s lots of ‘em. As these results show, they easily overpower the more population-dense and sanity-dense areas.

Here’s my point: Democrats can’t be led like this. We won’t march to the polls behind the pied piper of the pulpit. The only chance we ever have of winning anything is just to avoid stirring these people up, and that’s why I’m placing myself in the Obama camp today. The speech he gave at Tulane certainly helped, but more than that, I think when you add up the votes Clinton will gain over Obama in the Northeast then subtract the protest votes she’ll provoke from evangelicals, you end up with a negative number. This resulted in McCain’s narrow loss in Louisiana, and this is not a trend we want to see in the National election.

_{p.s. Tom Schaller is a dumbass. I called it!}

It’s actually kinda funny to see how well the whole thing has been orchestrated. You see, there’s plenty of housing here, and no residents were even living in the projects that are being demolished. A month or so ago, all these homeless people started showing up out of nowhere from Texas and the Northeast and setting up camp in front of City Hall. New Orleans never has had a bad homeless problem like some other cities, because there’s a ton of social programs and shelters. Then, a month later, protesters started showing up protesting the demolition of the projects, saying it’s cruel to tear them down when we have all these homeless people. Most of them are people from outside the area that are just here to get their protestor bona fides.

I don’t know who’s behind all this, but they’re pretty well-organized and cynical, whoever they are. I figure there’s some political stuff going on behind the scenes, New Orleans is a pawn in some national organization’s efforts, and this is an attempt to force one side’s hand in whatever negotiation is happening. If I took the time to dig through the New Orleans blog network I could probably figure it out, but I’ll bet the people controlling it are based in DC. I wish someone in California would start chopping down some owl habitat or something so they’ll take their army with them to lay siege to some other poor town.

Look at this video. Sooner or later, one of the protestors will bait the police, who only have training handling drunk and happy crowds, into using excessive force, and we’ll have a full scale riot on our hands, just like LA.

Will we ever know the outcome of the negotiation or even the parties at the table?

Well, I can’t say I didn’t see that coming. Do we really need a hard-line Catholic who believes in demonic possession as our Governor? This is a man who has gone on record saying he is “100% opposed to abortion in all cases”, including rape, incest, or when the life of the mother may be in danger. Bet you a Dixie note the first thing on his agenda, after requesting the legislature draft a bill banning all forms of stem cell research and abortion, is “cleaning up” New Orleans.

Here’s a non-partisan list of Bobby Jindal’s positions.
Here’s blog coverage of Bobby Jindal’s belief in intelligent design, and Bobby Jindal’s use of racist rhetoric in Jena.

Bobby Jindal is bad has a thorough dissection of the TP’s endorsement.

This is a collection of quotes I collected while going through the 2007 GOP primary debate transcript. I tried to pick mostly quotes that had some meat to them, and not simply ones reflecting views shown on my scorecard.

Mitt Romney

we have a separation of church and state; it’s served us well in this country.

I think that Congress’s job is to make sure that laws are respecting the sanctity of life.

Like I said, he’s the guy the religious right is putting up against Giuliani.

Sam Brownback

We’ve had 40 or 50 years now of trying to run faith out of the public square.

And we’re a nation of faith, as my colleague Senator Lieberman, a Jew, says.

He’s so liberal that he would actually have a Jew as a colleague. What a big-hearted man.

America’s a faith-based experiment as a country.

And there are also Democrat members that there was cash found in refrigerators or deep-freezes.(sic)

“They did it too!” The “(sic)” is actually part of the transcript, I didn’t add it. Some things just write themselves.

James Gilmore

We can’t allow a situation where everyone … believes that the United States does not have their best interests at heart.

You’re a little late on that one, buddy. Does any leader have another nation’s interests at heart? See below.

I don’t tend to want to amend this Constitution in a variety of different ways

my record as governor of Virginia, I think, has been one that the pro-life community, of which I am a part, would be very proud

Cookie?

Mike Huckabee

I tell people up front my faith does affect my decision process. It explains me.

Duncan Hunter

I think we should bring together all of our colleges, our universities, the private sector, government laboratories and … remove energy dependence on the Middle East and … help the climate. … We need to make sure that all the licensing from our laboratories goes to the private sector, goes to the American manufacturing sector for these energy systems.

I don’t quite understand what he’s getting at here, but if he’s encouraging private industry to license and market the things coming out of labs, I’m all for it.

Tommy Thompson

There are 18 territories in Iraq, just like we have 50 states in America. I would require those territories to elect governments, just like we do in our states.

I would split the oil reserves — one-third to the federal government, one-third to the state government, and one-third to every man, woman and child.

I’m sure the Kurds are totally excited about that.

John McCain

The greatest challenge of our time is the specter and threat of radical Islamic extremism.

We did lose our way; We began to value principle over power.

Brave of him to take such a bold and honest position at a Republican debate.

Ron Paul

don’t pretend the Iraqis were a national threat

I am a strong supporter of the original intent

I would work very hard to protect the privacy of American citizens, being very, very cautious about warrantless searches, and I would guarantee that I would never abuse habeas corpus.

Go on, you’ve got my attention now.

I trust the freedom of expression, and that’s why we should never interfere with the Internet, that’s why I’ve never voted to regulate the Internet, even when there’s the temptation to put bad things on the Internet. Regulation of bad and good on the Internet should be done differently.

I’m all ears.

Well, in my first week, I already got rid of the income tax. In my second week — (laughter) — I would get rid of the inflation tax, the tax that nobody talks about.

OK, now you’re scaring me. I really like your ideas, and would like to subscribe to your newsletter, but I’m worried that I’ll start getting free copies of Guns and Ammo and Soldier of Fortune showing up in my mailbox.

Rudy Giuliani

I think it really is important that we, you know, define the Republican party to fit today.

Well, it’s not like any right-wingers were gonna vote for him anyways.

There is plenty of opportunity to then use federal funds [for stem cell research, with restrictions, like Senator Coleman's bill].

The Sunnis believe that the caliphate should be selected, and the Shi’ites believe that it should be by descent.

I wish they could have gone down the line, and asked Giuliani last.

Every single person in this country who comes in from a foreign country should be identified, should be in a database.

I know you mean well, but it’s just a short step from immigrants to everyone.

[Immigrants] who want to pay taxes — God bless them, let them pay taxes.

Sounds reasonable to me. Let’s see what Contestant #10 has to say about that.

Tom Tancredo

No more obfuscating with using words like, “Well, I am not for amnesty but I’m for letting them stay.” That kind of stuff has got to be taken away from the political debate.

Yes, we should just stop talking about the immigrant issue right now. Wait, would that suck for you, since that’s your wedge issue?

I would say pardon [Rove], but right after or before you pardon Ramos and Compean, two people who are presently serving in — prison time for actually doing their job on the border.

Doing their job here means shooting some people who were trying to cross.

If there is a threat to the existence of Israel, then you have to come to the aid of Israel.

A threat to the existence of Israel is a potential threat to the existence of the United States.

How are we supposed to have the Second Coming of Christ with all these Muslims in God’s city?

I don’t believe that the government of the United States should be putting forth a plan [to solve the shortage of donated organs].

The government shouldn’t intervene, except in the case of embryos.

I say that that would be the greatest day in this country’s history when [Roe v. Wade] is in fact overturned.

[Ethics problems] are not unique to the Republican Party. These are failures by individuals.

Except that the Republican scandals all seem to have been agreed upon at high levels of government. There was no email trail discussing which freezer Jefferson should hide the cash in.

Let me also, please — because I haven’t had enough opportunity … to address … whether or not it has be a centrist who wins the presidency. I believe it’s not necessarily whether you’re a centrist or not. I believe it’s whether or not you believe in your heart in the things that you say, and I do.

I’m a nice right-winger.

There’s been some talk recently about attempts to legislate diversity. Whatever side of the fence you are on with respect to this issue, This is something you must read:

“Whereas the Victorian ladies were concerned about evolution’s challenge to conventional religion, their equivalents today are worried about its impact on the egalitarian premise on which democracy is based. Perhaps, Hamilton suggests, Darwin’s lesson, put simply, is that all men are not born equal. He considers the current academic enthusiasm for political correctness - an ‘escape route for less able minds’ - an institutionalised form of denial.”