The New Republic

Seriously?  Everyone knows the Brownback endorsement is worth about 0.001% of the electorate.  Maybe there's evidence of a McCain comeback (the journos are salivating over the story to break up the monotony of the race so far), but this is not it.

- stgla

November 7, 2007 at 10:57am

Paging Dr. Tep....

- adaglas

November 7, 2007 at 11:00am

Chris, Brownback is a serious Catholic and is not an evangelical. There might be some aspects of Catholicism that might appear evangelical but serious Catholics don't go in for those things. When I say serious I am talking about Opus Dei serious, these people don't go much into the hallelejahs and praise Jesus.

- blackton

November 7, 2007 at 12:52pm

So Blackton, can we expect an endorsement from the Knights Templar Local #393?

- adaglas

November 7, 2007 at 1:10pm

Right here. Now, listen carefully, chilluns, to bold prediction #437 from Dr T. The Iraq War will NOT be the major issue in the general election next autumn. The major issue will be a reflection of, or maybe even explicitly, the economic insecurity suffered by WORKING FAMILIES across this country.

nb "working families" for these purposes = the core swing voter constituency of two-parent households of modest means with jobs in the volatile private sector and children of school age. These people live in the exurbs and the suburbs and are most concentrated (and volatile, politically speaking) in high-growth cities across the battleground states: Tampa and Orlando, Columbus OH, Denver/Colorado Springs, Phoenix, Vegas, etc.

These voters should be Dems, given their economic vulnerabilities, but they've been squarely in the gunsights of Rove for over a decade and were persuaded to vote (R) largely due to Rove/Mehlman/W's successful conflation of economic security and national security concerns. Now the national security terrain is up for grabs, and the economic insecurity that was always lurking beneath the surface of the security argument has moved front and center. The private sector is even more volatile than it was just a few years ago, and the great stimulant of our bread-and-circus, junk-credit consumer economy, the residential housing bubble, has collapsed. So we're back to It's the economy, stupid, only with a major twist: the threat is not unemployment but the collapse of effective government that can provide the minimal degree of provision and security needed by low- and moderate-income families: pension security, secure access to decent health insurance, and a generalized sense that our communities are secure from crime and Flint, MI-style economic decay.

These are the voters who will decide the election-- not people without jobs (we're basically at full employment and the underclass is either in jail or so alienated from the process that they won't vote in any case) and not people without children or with children but so wealthy that they can put those kids in private schools and not have to worry about health insurance access, poor public services. those who make enough money not of modest incomes  not the poor or unemployed, who don't vote anyway, and esp _FAMILIES_ ie the swing voters in the exurbs and the swing districts.

Someone will figure out that the importation of a semi-literate sh*t-wage underclass, which our commentariat and political class falsely label "immigration", neatly summarizes all the ways that our politics and our political economy are failing to address the security needs of working families.

Whoever figures that out and puts ending this underclass-importation scam at the top of his agenda will win the election.

copyright Dr T 11-01-07

- teplukhin2you

November 7, 2007 at 1:10pm

Fearless prediction #438: the GOP will figure this out before our side does, and in best Atwaterian/Rovian fashion will figure out how to demogogue the issue by spinning it in racial or cultural terms, and blindside the Dem candidate's clueless, sad-sack operatives to yet AGAIN snatch Repub victory from defeat.

Which means that we can expect a barrage of Willie Horton-style ads featuring nefarious illegal-immigrant gang members with hints of (real or imagined) ties to Al Qaeda, illegal immigrant drivers who used their drivers IDs to hack into NORAD and direct child-molestation networks from inside Fort Knox etc.

- teplukhin2you

November 7, 2007 at 1:32pm

blackton,

yes, Brownback is a serious Catholic, but he only converted in 2002. before then he was a serious Protestant evangelical, and his roots in evangelical circles are still deep (deeper in some ways, I suspect, than his Catholic roots).

and stgla, laugh at the significance of the endorsement if you must. but as Noam (and many others) have noted, this will both boost McCain in Iowa and help brand him as an acceptable choice for conservative religious voters.

- Chris Orr

November 7, 2007 at 1:54pm

I think the McCain comeback is for real, and if he links up with Huckabee it'll be an unbeatable ticket. He's already re-jiggered his immigration position, and surrounded by the other candidate looks like an adult among children. There's plenty of time for the Dems to flame out, and with Pelosi/Reid setting the tone it appears likely to be sooner rather than later.

- Robert Powell

November 7, 2007 at 3:56pm

Bob, you are right, McCain-Huckabee is well nigh unbeatable, just don't let the Republicans know that. Maybe Obama or Edwards can give him a run for his money, by making him look old, but at most I think they will only make it close. Hillary would get creamed.

- blackton

November 7, 2007 at 4:18pm

McCain-Huckabee is beatable if the Dems go populist on illegal immigration.

- teplukhin2you

November 7, 2007 at 4:50pm

tep, in my view it doesn't matter much what any of the Democrat(ic) candidates SAY about immigration unless their conferees in Congress actually DO something about it.  Of all the major issues confronting us, this one has the clearest track record of demonstrating that talk is cheap.

- Robert Powell

November 8, 2007 at 2:05am