Currently, the Grand Ole' Party of Reagan and Bush are in quite a leadership crisis and there seems to be no apparent direction in which the majority of the party wishes to go. There are those who would like to keep drifting farther and farther right both politically and socially. There are also those who would prefer to move more toward the "center" which, following the 2008 election is still to the right of where the country would prefer to be, but that's what political parties do right. Anyway, in between these two poles we find a varied number of positions and outlooks on the significant, and not so significant, issues of the day. This is all normal within a political party, and is to be expected, the problem with the Republican party comes in the infighting we see on a daily basis among different players within the party.
We have seen this search for a leader and direction in significant ways over the past several weeks. The first major difficulty came in the aftermath following the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. While most Republican members in Congress decided to oppose the package (all in the House, all but 3 in the Senate), there were Republican governors who believed the package would be useful for their constituents and their states. This has created much turmoil within the Republican party. What the governors, such as Gov. Schwarzenegger (R-CA), Gov. Crist (R-FL), and Gov. Huntsman (R-UT) understand is that without this money, people will literally suffer. The Congressmen and women who chose to be overly, prinicpled ideologues instead of pragmatic legislators, are doing so to simply please the Conservative zealots, and seem to care little about the actual living conditions of the citizens of this country. This final point also applies to those governors of several southern states (Jindal (LA), Barbour (MS), Perry (TX), Sanford (SC), Perdue (GA)) and Alaska (Sarah Palin!!!), who have decided to put national ambition ahead of their constituents and have decided to reject some of the funds for those who need them the most, the unemployed. The Republicans will have to decide what is more important, their tired ideals or their constituents real life needs. Their decision, as of right now seems to be the former, and if it holds to be true, they will be in serious trouble politically, because with the election of Obama, we saw that the polity wass much more interested in real solutions as opposed to hyperpartisan ideals that alienate rather than bring people together.
This brings me to Rush Limbaugh, the darling of the Conservative wing of the Republican party. He is without a doubt the loudest voice on the right, the problem for the party comes when they must decide whether they listen to him, and he becomes the leader of the crowd, or if he is just another voice. It seems they are choosing the former. Time after time the Republicans are allowing Rush to set the agenda. We see this when they give him the keynote at CPAC, or when the newly elected RNC Chairman has to apologize for benignly suggesting he may be the leader of the party that just elected him as their leader. Rush is the driving force behind modern Conservatism and it seems that the old fashion moderate, intellectual conservative is a dying breed and will continue to be so as long as the Republicans keep pushing themselves farther and farther to the right. By examining any of the speeches at the CPAC (check out CSPAN.org, or watch this Daily Show clip), this shift is evident.
By moving even farther to the right the Republican party will become increasingly marginal and serve only to act as an obstructionist party. Instead of viewing the landscape of the world in which we live and creating policy positions accordingly, given their world view, the Republican party is holding fast to the principals of the 1980s and early 2000s which have lead to the economic crisis we are in now and disregard the dire situation in which individuals and groups find themselves. When a political party begins to disregard entire groups of persons, it will become marginal, and will have a very tough time winning in multiple, non traditionally Republican parts of the country. Furthermore, it will allow the Democratic Party to spread into some traditionally Republican regions such as the mid and upper mid-west (MO, ND, MT), southwest (AZ), and the Atlantic south (SC, GA). We shall see where the Republicans decide to go in the future, however it seems that they are increasingly moving to the right and favor the incendiary language of Rush to the more moderate and pragmatic tones that may actually win an election.
Monday, March 2, 2009
New look following election
While this blog while continue to be used for my electoral predictions in 2009 for the NJ and VA gubernatorial races and the 2010 midterm elections, I will primarily be posting my outlook on news stories of the day, including personal analysis along with possible political implications which may emerge due to the day's events. Also, just to clear everything up, I was not able to complete my electoral predictions for the 2008 election, due to a major screw up on my part in not backing up my file with the bulk of information on it. However in days to come I will post my altered electoral predictions just for pure interest driven purposes. More to come tomorrow (or later if I'm in the mood).
Thursday, June 26, 2008
What My Electoral Predictions Are About
Hello all,
My name is Chris Comninel and I am extremely interested in this year's presidential election, as I believe many other American citizens are. Last cycle (2004), I was only 17 and was not able to vote; however, I was very in tune with the political process and the particulars of the outcome of the electoral college.
This sincere interest in the process, and a particular candidate, I decided to be as informed as possible about the election, and state polling, for it would be state polling that would most accurately gage the possible outcomes of the election. I searched for some type of averaging formula, but at the time could not think of a good empirical formula. Of course I did give more weight to more recent polls, and gave more weight to polls which had a larger sample size. Given the lack of such a particular formula, I was pretty accurate in noting that Ohio would be within about a point (I have an excel spreadsheet to prove it).
So this election cycle, I thought I would get specific and try to figure out a proper method of averaging the state polls, which are coming out in great numbers due to increased interest. So I followed my weighting stated above, with regard to recentness, but it still had much to be desired so, I did some research and found a remarkable idea, which is currently used at 538.com, a half-life formula of 30 days. Also, I am using a weighting number, given to each poll, based on primary accuracy, with the most accurate organization receiving a number of 3, and decreasing at a rate according to pollster ratings on 538.com.
So here is my methodology, and I am crediting 538.com, for a lot of help in this process. First, my base poll, is a SurveyUSA poll conducted from 2/26-2/28 in all 50 states. Then, there is a jump for most states to mid May, when it was pretty clear who each party's nominee would be, to the most recent poll I could find in a given state. For each poll, I multiply the 1) recentness number, 2) poll accuracy number, 3) the sample size number, and 4) the candidate's percentage received. This gives each candidate a "Multiplication Number." For each candidate, the "Mult Nums." are summed up and divided by a number created by multiplying the 1) recentness number, 2) poll accuracy number, and 3) the sample size number. This gives each candidate an average percentage. The numbers change each time a new poll is introduced.
This is different from 538's predictions because I do not factor in regression data, because although we can understand something from prior elections, I believe each election is unique and has factors which make it such. For example, in '96 and '04, we were dealing with incumbents and any election is going to favor an incumbent because of his great amount of resources. Also, my predictions change daily and are solely based on my averages, and not trend lines. This may change in the future, but because it it so early trends may be exaggerated in a particular direction.
I am doing this solely for my own interests and I am posting it just so its out there. If you find it interesting, thats great, if not, I still do. In coming days, I will post current averages in varying states, and have a little bit of commentary on each average.
Thanks for reading.
My name is Chris Comninel and I am extremely interested in this year's presidential election, as I believe many other American citizens are. Last cycle (2004), I was only 17 and was not able to vote; however, I was very in tune with the political process and the particulars of the outcome of the electoral college.
This sincere interest in the process, and a particular candidate, I decided to be as informed as possible about the election, and state polling, for it would be state polling that would most accurately gage the possible outcomes of the election. I searched for some type of averaging formula, but at the time could not think of a good empirical formula. Of course I did give more weight to more recent polls, and gave more weight to polls which had a larger sample size. Given the lack of such a particular formula, I was pretty accurate in noting that Ohio would be within about a point (I have an excel spreadsheet to prove it).
So this election cycle, I thought I would get specific and try to figure out a proper method of averaging the state polls, which are coming out in great numbers due to increased interest. So I followed my weighting stated above, with regard to recentness, but it still had much to be desired so, I did some research and found a remarkable idea, which is currently used at 538.com, a half-life formula of 30 days. Also, I am using a weighting number, given to each poll, based on primary accuracy, with the most accurate organization receiving a number of 3, and decreasing at a rate according to pollster ratings on 538.com.
So here is my methodology, and I am crediting 538.com, for a lot of help in this process. First, my base poll, is a SurveyUSA poll conducted from 2/26-2/28 in all 50 states. Then, there is a jump for most states to mid May, when it was pretty clear who each party's nominee would be, to the most recent poll I could find in a given state. For each poll, I multiply the 1) recentness number, 2) poll accuracy number, 3) the sample size number, and 4) the candidate's percentage received. This gives each candidate a "Multiplication Number." For each candidate, the "Mult Nums." are summed up and divided by a number created by multiplying the 1) recentness number, 2) poll accuracy number, and 3) the sample size number. This gives each candidate an average percentage. The numbers change each time a new poll is introduced.
This is different from 538's predictions because I do not factor in regression data, because although we can understand something from prior elections, I believe each election is unique and has factors which make it such. For example, in '96 and '04, we were dealing with incumbents and any election is going to favor an incumbent because of his great amount of resources. Also, my predictions change daily and are solely based on my averages, and not trend lines. This may change in the future, but because it it so early trends may be exaggerated in a particular direction.
I am doing this solely for my own interests and I am posting it just so its out there. If you find it interesting, thats great, if not, I still do. In coming days, I will post current averages in varying states, and have a little bit of commentary on each average.
Thanks for reading.
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