Portrait Of A Loser

It didn't very long into the count of the votes from Florida to see that Rudolph Giuliani's campaign for president was over after his patheticly weak third place finish. Like all the other indignities that Rudolph Giuliani has only brought on himself over the years, his stupid strategy to ignore all the early GOP contests and instead concentrate on Florida only proved a major disaster and a huge tactical mistake. Likely few serious candidates for president will ever want to follow this absurd strategy example ever again, and will instead compete strongly in all the early contests and attempt to build early momentum.

But it was not only Giuliani's absurd late effort campaign strategy that can be faulted, but also the problems with his police commissioner which brought some scandal to Giuliani as well running in a right wing party with many voters distrustful of the seemingly "New York" values of Giuliani. Compared to many voters in his party, Giuliani seemed slightly "liberal" compared to their values, which was only another real problem for him once all the problems began to snowball together. Maybe the multiple marriages didn't help either as well as his more tolerant views on abortion than most in his party as well.

Not that long ago Giuliani was considered the Republican frontrunner. Tonight he's only a major Loser spelled with a capital "L" and expected to drop out and voice support for John McCain as early as Wednesday. How far he fell in a very short time.

Delegate Count Continues to Grow, Clinton And Romney Continue To Lead

Here's the latest estimate of the delegate count since the South Carolina primary:

Democrats: Clinton 230, Obama 152, Edwards 61, others 0 - 2,025 needed to nominate

Republicans: Romney 73, McCain 38, Huckabee 29, Paul 6, Giuliani 2, others 0 - 1,191 needed to nominate

It's Damage Control Time For The Clintons

Hillary Clinton may have done serious long term damage to her prospects to either winning the Democratic nomination or even winning the general election with the desperate campaign by the Clintons in South Carolina. The Clintons had strong support in the African-American community, however the racially devisive tone set by the failed South Carolina campaign may have hurt turnout prospects for Hillary Clinton among African-Americans for the general election should she be able to grab the nomination. Further, the huge loss, by a more than 2 to 1 margin to Barack Obama proved enough vulnerability in her campaign that more and more top Democrats such as the Kennedys will be coming out in support of Obama in fear that Clinton could lose the 2008 election and only drag the Democratic Party down in November.

Bill Clinton's attacks on behalf of his wife were not very helpful either, and probably backfired based on the extent of the massive loss in South Carolina. Rather than Hillary Clinton standing well on her own, her husband's continued involvement in her campaign only seem to make her appear weaker and less tough, and seem to inspire some quasipaternalistic-type problems for her campaign.

Conditions may seem to be right for a Democratic victory in 2008. But Clinton may be just the wrong candidate to head the national party ticket, and Obama may just be the stronger candidate to head the party into the election. Perhaps enough voters actually don't like Hillary Clinton that it could become a major problem for a general election battle with any Republican despite all that George Bush has done to give his party a bad name, including Iraq and a sagging economy.

Clinton still is the most likely to win the Democratic nomination. But with the landlide loss in South Carolina as well as new important endorsements, all of which may just prove to be enough to help lift Obama to some level of parity in the race, giving him an outside chance to possiby wrest the nomination from Clinton.

Obama Should Get Some Boost From South Carolina In Tightening Showdown With Clinton

Senator Barack Obama should get a big boost with a badly needed to win in South Carolina later today in his quest to upend Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. Edwards will likely come in third, but still will probably stay in the race despite this expected loss today in a state he won four years ago.

On Tuesday, Romney could win the Florida primary and further tighten his race with John McCain, which could also end the campaign of Rudolph Giuliani with a weak finish. Huckabee will show some strength in upcoming primaries in Southern states as well, but is highly unlikely to become the nominee as his national support continues to fade somewhat. Thompson voters need to decide where to go among the candidates still standing in the race, although they are unhappy about many positions of the remaining field.

If anything, the lack of a clear winner among either party at this point only points to factionalism and dissatisfaction with some candidates among the voters in both parties. This uncertainty makes this year's race for the White House more interesting than most years. It has been a long time since both races were so disputed and split like this.

John Edwards Moves Up A Little After Strong Debate Performance

New polling from South Carolina suggests that not only did John Edwards win the South Carolina debate, but is moving up enough that he could possiby take second place behind Barack Obama and be able to stay in the race until Super Tuesday.

It certainly looked like the Edwards campaign was in serious condition only days ago, but with his back up against the wall, his strong performance in the debate managed to maybe breathe a little new life back into the reeling Edwards effort.

Saturday voters go the polls in South Carolina and possiby give Obama an critically needed win and Edwards the opportunity to possiby grab a decent second place and remain a factor in the 2008 Democratic nomination race. It's make or break time for these guys while Hillary Clinton still looks to be the big winner on Super Tuesday unless her momentum can be slowed by someone.

Donald Trump Blames The Recession On The Oil Companies

Donald Trump considers the latest recession for the American economy on the oil companies and blames the White House for failure to address greed in the oil industry. However with the Bush Administration largely comprised of oil industry interests, any action their part to deal with this is highly unlikely. Since oil is a comodity some investors are making huge profits by pushing the price of oil up on the world commodity markets.

Trump is also critical of the Bush tax rebates to spur the economy. He believes many Americans will simply buy some consumer product manufactured in China and only send more U.S. dollars overseas rather than really invest in America.

Bush Administration Made Over 900 Known False Statements To Help Promote The Iraq War

According to NBC News, an independent analysis of the statements from the Bush Administration leading to the 2003 Iraq War involved making over 900 false statements intended to build public support for the run-up to the war. These including false statement such as suggesting a nuclear "mushroom" cloud and other serious injury to the U.S. would result unless the U.S. acts against Iraq. In other examples, nonmilitary sites were misidentified as dangerous military research sites or weapons production sites.

The Bush Administration deliberately misused national security concerns of the American public to start an elective war with Iraq which was weakened by 12 years of UN sanctions against weapons of mass destruction and tight regulations regarding the sale of oil to be used for food relief only. Although certainly a terrible dictator, Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein was hardly in any real position to pose either a regional or global threat since his power and military were so depleted since his loss in the 1991 Gulf War.

Clinton And Romney Lead In Delegate Counts

So far Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney are leading in their respective delegate counts for their party conventions. Here's the latest estimated delegate count breakdown:

Democrats: 2,025 needed to nominate. Clinton 190, Obama 103, Edwards 51 and Kucinich 1

Republicans: 1,191 needed to nominate. Romney 52, Huckabee 22, McCain 15, Thompson 6, Paul 2, Giuliani 1, Hunter 1

Only time will tell who will each of their party nominations at this point. Things could not be muddled at this point, especially for the Republicans. Hillary Clinton may have some organizational advantages in the big states voting on Super Tuesday.

Do Republican Presidential Candidates Have Anything To Offer Michigan Workers?

On Tuesday, Republican candidates Mitt Romney and John McCain will vie to win their party primary in Michigan, but the real question is do they have really have anything to offer Michigan working families?

The reality is many Republican lawmakers have a weak record on labor issues, and many are openly antiunion in their sentiments. Many support free trade policies that have helped to take American jobs and export them to labor cheap nations. And some like John McCain simply talk about job training so that Michigan workers can take on a job at a fraction of the wages of their lost union autoworker job. Is any of this really any solution at all?

While it is certainly true that Republican voters differ in their values than Democrats, still most people rely on a job to put food on the table or to provide shelter. And regardless of what party you belong to, why vote for candidates who are against good wages, health care benefits, a union job or favor exporting your job to some labor cheap nation? That makes no sense at all.

My QWEST Service Nightmare

After days and days of lost phone and internet service, thanks to serious storm damage to the house and a terrible clerical error at QWEST, I'm back. My lost internet connection took place a few weeks ago when a heavy rain storm did an estimated $40,000 of damage to my home causing telephone line problems. And then QWEST greatly complicated the problem by disconnecting my phone service due to some clerical error even though all my bills have been paid in full to them after the recent death of both parents.

In Seattle's business office for QWEST, most of the staff were particularly unhelpful and even refused me access to my own phone account or to authorize reconnection or repair services. My lawyer had to send the same legal documents to QWEST twice since January 3, which they only managed to lose twice during that time. And I had to arrange extra law office visits and actions by my attorney to get my phone service reconnected. Normally a person should not have to spend an entire week working with lawyers and spending for the same Circuit Court documents to be sent over and over again just to get their phone reconnected when it never should have been disconnected in the first place. But QWEST is a nightmare of bureaucratic ineptness, and I certainly cannot recommend them to anyone after this experience. It is a rare business that disregards official Circuit Court documents and orders. Most businesses would not want to risk contempt of court risks for such actions.

Why someone at QWEST decided to disconnect my phone service in the first place is a good question. All my bills were fully paid. And instead of being helpful, most QWEST reprentatives either attempted to use my request for help as an excuse to attempt to try to sell me more QWEST services when I didn't even have my phone service restored. On staffer even attempted to lecture me about religion, which I didn't realize was an officially sanctioned QWEST function.

I'll give credit to the line repairmen from QWEST who successfully reconnected the brand new phone line that I ran into the house. They were professional and helpful compared to the QWEST office staffers who give the THREE STOOGES a serious run for their money. But then again, how many persons have to climb a high ladder and connect their own new incoming house phone line themselves?

I'll give my lawyers great credit for getting my phone and internet service back yesterday after days and days of legal problems with QWEST. And I'll credit the lineworkers at QWEST as being some of the only people in their entire organization to know what they're really doing. Thank God for lawyers. They really do the Lord's work when you're in real legal mess. Lawyers deserve all the same level of respect that doctors or other professionals are given.