My home House district goes blue

Funny thing. In 1988, Ronald Reagan's last year as president, the unemployment rate was 5.4 percent.

Today the unemployment rate is 5.0 percent.

The average unemployment rate during the Bush admininstration is just a microscopic amount lower than the average unemployment rate during the Clinton administration.

The media has convinced most people, especially those without much understanding of economics, that the economy is in the middle of a horrible depression. But the latest GDP figures show that the economy still have not declined; the economy is still growing, even if it is growing slower than it was a year ago.

As a non-crunchy conservative (a conservative who actually supports the free enterprise system, doesn't think that purchasing food grown 100 miles away should be punishable by public hanging, supports tax cuts on capital formation, opposes more government regulation of corporations), I think the nation would be better off in the medium term electing a Democrat president this November.

The Democrats already control Congress and are likely to retain control this fall. Electing a Republican from the Arlen Specter wing of the GOP to the White House along with a Democrat Congress is not going to result in public policies conservative enough to improve the country. But the media will call a federal government led by Pelosi, Reid and McCain "Republican rule" because the presidency is a more visible office than Congress, even though Congress arguably has as much power over the economy as the President.

So, while a Obama or Clinton presidency teamed with a Democrat Congress will have a negative impact on the nation, at least no one will be confused as to which party or ideology is at fault. The fault will land squarely on the Left. This will give the Right a chance to rebound in the 2010 elections and the 2012 elections. If McCain wins, the Democrats will win in 2010 and 2012 and the nation won't be able to recover until 2014 and 2016. By that time, so much socialism (with crunchy-cons cheering the corporate bashing as "socially conservative") will have been enacted, it will be hard to undo the damage.

Let's hope Obama can recover from the Wright fiasco and win in November.

But boy, would I love to see him [Jindal] on that Republican ticket, if only so I could vote for him for president in 2012.

I think this type of thinking is based on a misunderstanding of the US political structure.

No matter how smart, talented and correct on policy issues a president of the US is, the nation will continue to drift or decline if Congress is stocked with people who have socialist tendencies.

In the US, the president can not change the tax code or change an entitlement program without first Congress acting. So, a bad Congress can make a good president look like a failure.

Think about it. The average American will say things like, "If I were president I would do something about dependence and foreign oil." But if Congress refuses to allow any oil drilling in the US, gasoline prices will not decline and the US will have to continue to import a higher and higher percentage of its oil from abroad.

The average American doesn't have a clear idea as to which constitutional powers are vested in Congress and which are vested in the Executive. So, if Pelosi and Reid and the rank and file Democrat members of Congress are misguided in their thinking, the blame for their bad decisions is placed on the president.

This goes a long way towards explaining Bush's low approval ratings. Although, I do think that most Americans would like to pretend that Islamo-fascism doesn't really exist and, thus, have turned against Bush because Bush is serious about confronting Islamo-fascism, even if it hurts his approval ratings.

The bottom line is that in a democracy, if people are misguided in their beliefs about economics and national security, a correctly guided president will have a low approval rating. That seems to be the case today. But when a new president takes office and things get worse, people might eventually realize, at least temporarily, that free enterprise at home and an assertive security policy abroad is the right way to go.

I worry about his rising too high, too fast. He's only been governor for a few months, and I hear from a source in Baton Rouge sympathetic to Jindal that the Jindalistas are way, way overconfident. Cocky, even. But boy, would I love to see him on that Republican ticket, if only so I could vote for him for president in 2012.

Oh my goodness! I look forward to watching Bobby Jindal grow and mature. Maybe he'll even be President some day. But Obama is a seasoned veteran compared to Jindal right now, and Obama's inexperience is high on my list of reasons why I'm rooting for a Clinton-McCain contest in November.

Put not your trust in Princes, Rod.

The surprising thing on the Democratic side is that Cazayoux's victory has been treated casually, as only a mild anomaly in the present environment. Bill Foster's win in Hastert's Illinois district was considered more impressive.

A fact easily overlooked about Bobby Jindal is that he's a Brown University alum. His actual views read more conservative-appearing than conservative at core. He's fooled a lot of rubes and knows it, of course. Let me suggest that he will showed marked ability to tack leftward as the political winds continue to blow that way.

And blow that way for a while longer they will, TC. I've been writing a longer analysis piece for a Democratic forum on 'the issues' for a while. Basically, the story is that policies in all half dozen major areas are defined by simple doctrines that Bush and his Congress were able to impose in 2001-03. But that comes with a price. One political bloc after another, in sequence from left to right, eventually rejects the doctrines as they fail to achieve the ends claimed. It's a dynamic of burnout of Republican-championed doctrines. Most of them have burned out for ~65% of voters; it'll probably be more than 70% by year's end.

No matter who gets elected President, that person and his/her Administration is stuck with affairs in those particular ruts, and will have to ride them out to their conclusions. McCain will presumably prolong the agony and waste of lives and treasure and national misère most. Clinton is in my opinion the more efficient of the two Democrats at getting to the end and making the necessary turnarounds.

Do you think having Jindal on the ticket would have any impact on the volume of "Obama is really a Muslim" emails in my inbox?

Republicans could have won this seat, but instead they ended up with a wing-nut pro-life zealot. The Dem will easily be the most socially conservative member of the House, but the only vote that really matters is who he chooses for Speaker.

I actually find all the Jindal talk surprising because he makes Obama look like an elder statesman in comparison. No real track record of results, but lots of raw ambition. He's barely moved into the Governor's office.

What's Dan Quayle doing these days?

"The media has convinced most people, especially those without much understanding of economics, that the economy is in the middle of a horrible depression."

It worked in 1992, when they beat a Bush whose approval ratings were so high in 1991 that all the leading Democrats decided to pass. Why not try it again?

"The Democrats would have a much larger House majority if they allowed more of that type under their umbrella."

If the Democratic party ever compromises on abortion and removes the gun control plank from its platform, the GOP might as well close up shop.

RE: "Woody Jenkins is one of the most unattractive Republican politicians he's ever met, and it shouldn't have been that hard to beat someone that unlikable."

The amazing thing to me is that Jenkins received the votes that he did. I'm certainly not sorry Cazayoux won - even if he raises taxes on us.

"BEATING A DEMON
Physical Dimensions of Spiritual Warfare

December 1994 By Bobby Jindal"

Interesting reading...well worth the $1.50 charged for a access.

Most of the people leaving the House this year are moderates who have been pushed aside by the party.

Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that they're moderates who realize that their districts are about to tip Democratic, and they don't want to face certain defeat?

Jeff Sullivan,

TC makes some very good points here, although I'm pretty sure the point about crunch-cons favouring public hanging for those buying non-locally-produced food was meant as a friendly dig. Er, right?

Or an unfriendly dig. I do think that the problem with the Republican party today is that is contains too few rank and file voters committed to the free enterprise system. As Mark Steyn often writes, we have one and one-half socialist parties in the US. All of the Democrat party and about half of the Republian party is committed to creeping socialism or unwilling to seriously oppose it.

Rod, Being from Louisiana and from that area you know you are not exactly telling the whole story here :)

Woody Jenkins as you know is a person that many people just don't like. Including many conservatives. I fond him a tad of a mean spirited guy. He has a ton of people who don't wish to see him back on the political scene. When he ran against Mary Landrieu I really had to force myself to vote for him. I am not sure that National politics played much a fact in peoples minds in this. I think many could not just stomach Woody being their Congressman. As soon as he won the primary I knew we we were in trouble