Noonan and Boehner

Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan interviews Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner. Be prepared for a number of long sighs on his part.

Surprisingly, he reports more problems with senior members than he has with Tea Party freshman members. And he clearly suggests the President backed down on a "go big" tax and debt reform negotiation.

If you follow the ins and outs of Washington lawmaking, you'll enjoy this look "under the hood."

Argentine Economics Report

Argentina is that country in Latin America which should be most prosperous, but is not. Read an overview of the Argentine economy's current problems, in PJ Media.

When we were last there our guide said he insisted on keeping his savings in U.S. dollars or euros, and not in Argentine banks, either. Pretty clearly savvy locals understand the dangers of hyperinflation and government currency manipulation.

Quote of the Day

Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer, quoting a White House official about the administration's policy towards Israel and Iran:

We’re trying to make the decision to attack as hard as possible for Israel.

Clearly the future of Israel is not of paramount importance to administration policy makers. Israel can be pardoned for having somewhat different priorities.

A Missing Factor

Mary Anastasia O'Grady writes a column on Latin America for The Wall Street Journal. Most recently she writes (subscription required for access) about the growing middle class in Mexico, summarizing the viewpoints of two Mexican co-authors Luis de la Calle and Luis Rubio who see Mexico as:

A nation where many politicians still think of the electorate as rural and poor but where consumption patterns reveal a trend toward urbanization and upward mobility. Judging by family incomes but also by things like housing rental and ownership, appliance purchases, Internet access and trips to the cinema they argue that today "the middle-class population is the majority in Mexico."

This has occurred "by combining the income of various family members [including remittances from abroad] rather than through the increased income of an individual or couple." In other words, Mexico has not achieved the wage gains generally associated with a rising middle class.

If the middle-class population is now the majority in Mexico it is true in substantial part because Mexico has exported millions of its poor to the United States. This factor O'Grady doesn't mention.

What Did It All Mean?

I've spent considerable time this afternoon reading various opinion piece responses to the Super Tuesday results. Some say Romney did well and should be considered the presumptive nominee. Others note that Romney's opponents got, collectively, a lot of votes although overall less than half.

What should we conclude? Namely, that all of the candidates on both parties are flawed individuals. Can you imagine that President Obama failed to win the Democrat primary in 15 Oklahoma counties? It's true, see the Yahoo News story from the Associated Press.

I believe Romney will be the eventual nominee but will be somewhat battered by the other three until he reaches the prize. What this means about his electability in November is anybody's guess.

Raison d'Etre

Friday's Wall Street Journal, honoring the late conservative blogger and new media whiz Andrew Breitbart, reprinted (link requires subscription) the following quote from his recent book Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World:

If the political left weren't so joyless, humorless, intrusive, taxing, overtaxing, anarchistic, controlling, rudderless, chaos-prone, pedantic, unrealistic, hypocritical, clueless, politically correct, angry, cruel, sanctimonious, retributive, redistributive, intolerant - and if the political left weren't hell-bent on expansion of said unpleasantness into all aspects of my family's life - the truth is, I would not be in your life.

If the Democratic Party were run by Joe Lieberman and Evan Bayh, if it had the slightest vestige of JFK and Henry "Scoop" Jackson, I wouldn't be on the political map.

If the American media were run by biased but not evil Tim Russerts and David Brinkleys, I wouldn't have joined the fight....

If America's pop-cultural ambassadors like Alec Baldwin and Janeane Garofalo didn't come back from their foreign trips to tell us how much they hate us, if my pay cable didn't highlight a comedy show every week that called me a racist for embracing constitutional principles and limited government, I wouldn't be at Tea Parties screaming my love for this great, charitable, and benevolent country.

I am a reluctant cultural warrior.

Andrew Breitbart speaks for a lot of us.

Super Tuesday Results

As this is written we know the results for all Super Tuesday states. Without belaboring the details, Romney won Vermont, Massachusetts, Virginia, Idaho, Alaska and (narrowly but importantly) Ohio.

Santorum won Oklahoma, North Dakota, and Tennessee. Gingrich won his home state of Georgia, and, once again, Paul won nothing. All of the above from various sites on Google which reference the Associated Press.

According to the RealClearPolitics chart Romney has 354 delegates, Santorum has 147, Gingrich has 87, and Paul has 54. To win the nomination requires 1144 delegates. In other words, Romney has substantially more delegates than the other three candidates combined.

Super Tuesday Is Here

The long-awaited Super Tuesday - when ten states select their delegates - is upon us. Some seventeen hours from now we should start getting results from the eastern states. By this time tomorrow we will know more about who will represent the GOP in November.

If this were a normal election year we'd expect some of the "final four" to drop out after tomorrow's contests. As anybody who's been following the process knows, 2012 is not a normal election year.

Romney, with the most delegates, cannot be expected to drop out. Paul's goal seems to be to give voice to the views of the libertarian subset of the GOP and he is certainly accomplishing that. Paul doesn't seem to care much about winning states, or even the nomination, so he won't drop out.

That leaves Gingrich and Santorum, struggling to become the one true voice of very conservative voters. It is clearly in Romney's interest for both of them to continue in the race, dividing the anti-Romney vote between them.

Ohio Likes Romney

After being behind, new polls show Romney catching up or ahead in Ohio. A The Week article at Yahoo News gives four reasons why. All are plausible, none is my first choice.

For my money, what's working for Romney is George H. W. Bush's old favorite, "the big mo" aka momentum. Romney won Arizona and Michigan, and then Washington.

These states have had more impact than the three previous that Santorum won. Perhaps it is because Santorum has alienated modern women. The other DrC said she couldn't vote for him - not a good sign.

This GOP primary season has certainly demonstrated unpredictability. That said, anything other than an eventual Romney nomination will be a surprise to me.

Weird Science 3.0

Cure schizophrenia with an antibiotic as though it was an infection? How weird is that? There is some evidence it might work, too.

A British paper, The Independent, has a story about just that, a test using an antibiotic on schizophrenia being sponsored by their National Institute of Health Research. Really, you couldn't make this story up.

More About James Q. Wilson

The New York Times' Ross Douthat quotes Daniel Patrick Moynihan as telling President Richard Nixon:

Mr. President, James Q. Wilson is the smartest man in the United States.

Who knows? That may have been true at the time. Moynihan might have been a close runner-up.

Having It Both Ways

A Frenchman is suing Google for posting online a picture of him peeing in his yard. It is part of Google's Street View section. See the Reuters article.

What I don't understand is how a Frenchman can be embarrassed about being photographed urinating. In the years we drove back and forth along I-95 on the East Coast, we learned that whenever we saw a car stopped along the highway the car had Quebec plates and one of the male passengers was standing alongside having a pee.

We concluded public urination by males was part of the French culture, or lack thereof. Does the French fellow on Google get to have it both ways? Does he get to pee in his yard but sue anyone who takes his picture from the public street?

Low Voltage

Last Sunday we wrote about the White House's inability to make policy choices people like. Their emphasis on various failing "green" industries is emblematic of this disjuncture.

A recent New York Post editorial about Government Motors shutting down the Chevy Volt assembly line for five weeks underscores how out of step with America this administration continues to be. The marketplace - you and me as consumers - shows little interest in purchasing the poorly performing but high priced "green" goods beloved by POTUS.

Romney Wins Washington State

Mitt Romney has handily won in Washington state. The results with 95% of the caucuses reporting are as follows, according to Google which sources Associated Press:

37.6% Romney

24.6% Paul

23.9% Santorum

10.4% Gingrich

Apparently 3.5% of caucus attendees spoke up for other candidates. Google also has an Associated Press map of Washington showing which counties favored which candidate.

This win gives Romney a nice boost going into Super Tuesday three days hence. He now has won roughly 16% of the 1144 delegates necessary to have a majority, according to The New York Times. Santorum, the second highest, has won exactly half as many.

Breitbart Autopsy Continues

Thursday we wrote that Andrew Breitbart should be autopsied as his unexpected death at 43 was obviously suspicious. A Reuters article says the physical autopsy has been done; very thorough toxicology and microscopic tissue studies are underway and will take 4-6 weeks.

The article's strong implication is that the physical autopsy found nothing obvious like trauma, a ruptured aneurism, massive heart attack, or stroke. I believe any such would have been announced as presumptive cause of death. The mystery deepens.

Quote of the Day

Joseph Stalin, sharing his deadly problem-solving motto:

Death solves all problems. No man, no problem.

What a sweetheart Uncle Joe was, he may have killed more people than Hitler. His mantra comes from a lamentation upon the coarse standard of public discourse by Carl M. Cannon, found in RealClearPolitics.

Cillizza: How to Read Super Tuesday

Super Tuesday, when ten states hold primaries or caucuses, is less than a week away. The Washington Post's Chris Cillizza has done a decent analysis of the importance of the various states to the various candidates, who needs to do what where.

Ohio is the place where everybody who matters (e.g., everybody but Paul) needs to do well. Gingrich needs to do well in Georgia, Santorum needs to do well in North Dakota and Oklahoma. If Romney doesn't do well in the Northeast he will look weak. See the article.

Loss of a Giant

Political scientist James Q. Wilson died this morning at age 80, see the Boston Globe obituary. For the past couple of decades he has been that political scientist who has had the most impact on public policy.

We quoted him most recently on January 30 of this year. Wilson wrote things that made practical sense, his policy prescriptions were based on a realistic grasp of human nature. He will be missed.

See The Wall Street Journal's obituary for this wise man, as well as their collection of his quotes.

The Cloud's Silver Lining

There are still good reasons to believe Obama may be a one term president, and this article by The Week's editorial staff on Yahoo News lists six of them. Two of these strike me as particularly meaningful:

• The economy is even worse for Obama's base.
• Another Mideast war could doom Obama.

The Great Recession has been particularly tough on young people and African-Americans. The unemployment rates of both groups have been especially high.

An Israeli attack on Iran forces the President to choose between another two key Obama constituencies: pro-Israel American Jews and peaceniks. Whatever he decides to do alienates one of these groups.

In neither of these situations are angered Democrats likely to vote Republican, but they may very well decide no one running in either party represents them and stay home.

The other four reasons Obama could lose aren't bad either.

Liberal Hate

Conservative web entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart died this morning, of alleged "natural causes." I hope an autopsy is done as lefty haters may have been responsible.

See this article in The Washington Examiner for revolting examples of the glee his death has evoked. It is ugly stuff.