Steve, Americans have been drooling over “war heroes” since George Washington, so you certainly have a point there.

However, it’s such a terrible year to be a Republican that the Dems will maybe, just maybe, be able to barely eek out a win. Maybe. We’ll see. We can be sure that, ceteris paribus, the Dems will absolutely destroy the Republicans in Congress. I’ll be surprised if they don’t.

Keep in mind though that the Republicans have won the presidency exactly once since 1988. That was 2004. By any measure of the remotest common sense, the election of 2000 was a tie. I’m not saying Gore won, but Bush certainly didn’t win either. Had we still lived in a free country at the time, Congress or some other democratic body would have worked out an agreement as in the case of previous de facto ties such as in 1876 or 1800. So in that case (2000), a perceived effeminate leftist at least got a tie. And it wasn’t a very good year to be a Democrat.

People who run around predicitng elections are generally full of it, so I don’t put much stock in any single pundit’s predictions. Success with predictions based on “gut feelings” or other such prognostications are a matter of luck. No one can say for sure what will happen between now and November.

That’s not to say that certain analyses are not worth reading. I thought Alan Abramowitz’ analysis to be unusually enlightening. His conclusion – with a lousy economy, and the 8th year of a hated incumbent of his own Party, McCain has a serious problem.

But never underestimate the American voter’s love of militarism.

The Best of Ryan McMaken

Re Steve’s blog to the effect that both Hillary and Obama are unelectable, I have wondered, for some time now, whether the political establishment – via its dutiful MSM – is also aware of this and has promoted these two as the Democratic candidates from which Boobus is to make a selection. If there is enough voter opposition to either of these two, it might be enough to swing the November election to McCain, the man most likely to continue Bush’s imperialistic, war-making policies. This would help to explain the establishment’s need to keep Ron Paul out of the picture, as his views would detract from McCain’s chances for a narrow margin of victory.

The Best of Butler Shaffer