by John Q | And great was the Snoopy-dancing and blowing of raspberries among these guys based on the results of one lone Zogby poll giving McCain a 1% lead.
To which Gavin M. replies:
It must be difficult not being able to draw continuities between DARK TIME and LIGHT TIME, such that when the sun unexpectedly goes down in the evening it’s EATED BY THE SUN-EAT SERPENT, and when it startlingly comes up in the morning it’s MIRACLE HOORAY LIGHT. And then ONO! IT’S EATED BY THE EAT SERPENT, and then O HAI, IT’S MIRACLE HOORAY LIGHT, and on and on throughout your whole gaping lessoff existence — a ‘lessoff’ being like a moron except not even one.
We can be thankful that for most of us, here in the most advanced civilization the world has ever known, with unparalleled opportunities for self-refinement and the pursuit of practical reason, when something weird and unexpected arises — such as an election poll that gives a result unreflected by any other such poll — we go “Dude, that’s actually weird,” and are like, “You know, maybe there’s a reason.”
At this point a prediction is in order, and we feel that we can give it with some confidence. Barack Obama may win the presidential election, or else not win. We predict that this will depend on two things: cause and also effect — and that it will not be the result of building an airstrip out of palm fronds and sitting in a wicker control tower wearing a set of headphones made out of two halves of a coconut shell, willing the planes to come and deliver a bounty of cargo.
Of this we are greater than 97.2% sure.
In the meantime, the McCain camp has sent out a memo on the surge that is occurring during the final hours of the campaign. Ambinder's got the whole thing right here. Read it your self. Ambinder says:
The last thing the McCain campaign needs on election day is demoralized Republicans. Hence this memo, which recapitulates what Davis and co. said on a conference call with reporters this morning.
I will tell you something that I probably shouldn't. It irritates my co-bloggers.
I for one wouldn't care that much whether Obama wins or loses if the times were even slightly less desperate. He's got plenty of presidential bids left in him.
McCain and Palin and the GOP deserve to have to unscramble the mess that Bush has made. If I thought there was a chance either one of them could fix even one of the problems without making it even worse, I'd be all for it. The best we can hope for is a president who can steer a steady course through a typhoon of Bush-related consequences. Whatever he does, whichever ticket occupies the Oval Office and environs is going to be damned if they do and if they don't.
McCain's run a disgraceful, divisive, ugly campaign and there's a small part of me that wants him to have to face its consequences. But that lesson can't be brought home to him fully if Obama wins. It will only happen if he achieves the goal he's bought with his reputation. I admit I'm vindictive enough--almost--to wish this could happen.
I was a Hillary supporter because I think it's going to be a long, messy four years in which every choice is a bad one. Obama seems tough enough---I didn't think so then, though I do now I've seen him in action---to deal, but it kind of seems like a waste of him to me.
But during the primaries he won because he won and now he's either going to win again or come so close to it that the repercussions of his losing will include a profound distaste among his supporters for the prevailing McCain-Palin ticket, which is likely to end up as unpopular as Bush.
A McCain administration represents unparallelled opportunities for mockery and while I believe that there are hard times ahead, I---speaking only for myself and nobody else here---don't think they're going to be mitigated much by anything the president can do. The best we can happen is that the president won't make a bad situation worse. Sadly, McCain has repeatedly demonstrated throughout his campaign that he and Palin are experts in doing exactly that.
It's watching the entire right wing trying to cope with the fact that nobody except Americans who are as looney as they are is buying what they're selling anymore that keeps me going. I look forward to witnessing their slide into irrelevancy whatever happens.
BTW Nate Silver explains Zogby's lone result here.
Matt Drudge is touting the results of a one-day sample in a Zogby poll, which apparently showed John McCain ahead by 1 point.
There are a couple of significant problems with this.
...[T]he Zogby polls have been particularly volatile, because he uses nonsensical party ID weightings, which mean that his weighting process involves making numbers doing naughty things that they usually don't like to do.
....Zogby polls are generally a lagging rather than a leading indicator. This is because he splits his interviewing period over two days; most of the interviews that were conducted in this sample took place on Thursday night, with a few this afternoon. The reason this is significant is because lots of other pollsters were in the field on Thursday night, and most of them evidently showed good numbers for Obama, as he improved his standing in 6 of the 7 non-Zogby trackers.
Eh, whatever. I don't read polls anyway. We'll know the outcome when we know the outcome, end of story.
In the meantime: Rage, little wingnuts, rage against the dying of the light!
Life is a comedy for those who think, even when it's the worst of times. In other words, there's plenty to keep me entertained. And if perchance McCain pulls a win out of the country's ass and becomes president of the self-destructing economy, little wars everywhere, Obama and Clinton in the Senate, and a lot of very angry people from both parties who wanted Obama screaming, "YOU GOT WHAT YOU WANTED; NOW DO SOMETHING!" I'll still be entertained.
Because this is what we'll see:
WE WON! WE WON! GREAT GOD ALMIGHTY, WE'RE VINDICATED!!!!! SEE? SEE? WE WON! WE WERE RIGHT! WE WERE---
Uh, okay. Now what?
Memeorandum has blogger responses here.
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