Musings of a Patriot

Month: January 2008

  • The Irony of Supressing Votes

    I find it rather funny that we have such a fuss being raised about laws requiring voters to show ID at the polls that a case has to be heard by the Supreme Court on the issue. What strikes me is that: if we had more voters voting, whatever fraud the voter ID laws are…

  • Uncommitted in Michigan

    In case this election cycle was not convoluted enough already we now get to approach the Michigan primary. The combination of having an open primary and having the DNC strip the delegates from Michigan for moving their primary into January meant that we faced the prospect of Democrats in Michigan voting in the Republican primary…

  • Bloggers – Turn Out Utah

    Earlier today, before significant numbers of ballots had been counted, the news coming out of New Hampshire was that turnout was way up and some precincts were requesting more ballots. In response to that, JM Bell and Misty Fowler each suggested that we’d love to have that problem in Utah. The more I think about…

  • The Pull of Youth

    I can’t really explain why the following passage stuck in my mind from Frank Richs’ column in the New York Times yesterday. Something about it just caught my attention and has been hanging on in the background ever since. Speaking of the winners of the Iowa caucuses: The two men are the youngest candidates in…

  • Pre-Fix Winners and Losers

    Over at the Washington Post political blog – The Fix – Chris Cillizza always does a Winners and Losers post after every debate. While he’s tied up with the Democratic debate I thought I’d beat him to the punch on the Republican side for tonight’s debate. WINNERS Mitt Romney: The fact that every other candidate…

  • Vote Totals in Iowa

    I had written before that the Iowa Democrats should publish their vote totals rather than just “delegate equivalents.” Today I discovered that USA Today is reporting the votes in the Iowa caucus results. Thanks to this more detailed information I finally see how Hillary Clinton managed to get one more delegate than John Edwards even…

  • Candidate Questions vs President Questions

    Thanks to Scott’s post on Presidential Qualifications I really got thinking about the difference between what we should look for in a president and what we often do look for in a candidate. Scott quoted three questions that Dr. Lawrence Lindsey suggested we should be asking to choose a good president: “Has the candidate faced…

  • Iowa Caucuses

    No, I’m not liveblogging nor am I going to analyze the results. I do wonder why I find it so fascinating to watch the results come in. That’s the same question I asked myself in November 2006 as I watched the results between Orrin Hatch and Pete Ashdown. The difference is in 2006 I was…

  • Magna Carta

    I don’t intend to review these historical documents each day, but I do want  to get started and I decided to go basically in historical order. Ever since I wrote yesterday I have been intrigued by the first of these documents – the Magna Carta or Great Charter. Prior to today I had never given…

  • A New Birth of Freedom

    How do we rekindle the flame of liberty in the heart of all American citizens? I have been thinking about that question. It continues to disturb me that high turnout in an election approaches 50% participation. That is evidence of the disengagement that indicates a passive (or absent) desire for freedom unlike the active desires…