Although it is a nice theory the fact is having conservatives not voting en masse for a candidate will essentially guarantee Obama the election because of our two party system.  In fact it would grant them a permanent majority for as long as it is practiced.  I believe that the real answer to dealing with RINOs is not as easy as not voting.  One of the things that must be done is that you must change and influence the culture so that conservatism is accepted while other ideologies are shunned.  The other is that we must put Conservatives in positions of power across the republican party.  Then the RINOs must be systematically rooted out and expelled from positions of power.  Also (and I don't know the specifics on this) our primary system should be changed.  Of course we get RINOs when democrats and independents are allowed to vote in some of our primaries.  In short it is not a kind of thing that you can sit at home one day and with one action rectify it.  It takes a continual effort of small and big moves to accomplish.  Even then it is never permanent.

I think that Israel try to use espionage to accomplish its goals.  It will only attack Iran directly and openly if it has no choice.  Iran through its oil reserves has bought some very powerful friends.  History also has shown that for the most part most nations(outside the US) seem to look Israel with almost contempt.  In fact sometimes I think that our protection of Israel might be one of the few things keeping it alive.

I think that it is slowing becoming more apparent that our up-incoming general election determines not only America's fate but those of other nations around the world.  The republican party should see if many prominent Israeli figures would offer political support during the general election, since the winner might determine the fate of Israel.  In fact maybe we would be able to take the Jewish vote away from the democrats if an appeal was made directly to them.

When I heard Mitt attack Newt being against Reagan during the Reagan presidency it didn't really even phase me.  I grew up with hearing stories of how Newt fought against the democrats during the Clinton years.  Newt has been a flag bearer of the republican party and the conservative movement like few other could even hope to claim.  There are a few big exceptions.  Times when for whatever reason he sided with the democrats(climate change is one that comes to mind). 

So I mostly just chalked it up to a failed tactic employed by Mitt.  You can't tell me Newt is establishment and he is so out there that people will think he's an extremist.  Pick one.  Even if he doesn't just a campaign tactic nothing more.  He's just trying to see if something sticks.  This one for me didn't even register.

Hmpf.  I'm a little disappointed that I got a 47.  The only thing that saved me from having a much lower score was military service.  I don't drink, smoke, fish, or do some of the activities that would've given me a higher score.

So are you saying that having a long hotly contested republican primary has hurt his electability?

Are you saying that now maybe he won't be able to beat Obama?

The general election will also go on for a while and I don't think it is good to have a candidate with a glass jaw.

I tire of the electability question as I believe that if any of the current candidates(even Ron Paul) win the republican primary they stand a good chance of beating Obama.  I care less about that because I want a candidate who will continue to almost viciously pursue Conservative values in the white house.  I don't want to elect someone just to stop the damage being done.  I want someone who will reverse it.  When(not if) the democrats win back the government after this election they will continue to push forward.  So any "progress" from just stopping the current damage that has already been done is only really a delay.  I say that if you're not going to do something worth doing why bother at all.

Maybe this is off on a tangent, but I guess it was on my mind.

Mitt need to run to the right in order to win the republican primary.  The only reason why he is running even further to the right than before is that Newt beat him in South Carolina.  He needs the conservatives to support him, they don't(by and large) which is why Newt won South Carolina.

Mitt may have run more conservative than he campaigned, but bear in mind that it is Massachusetts.  The bar is not exactly very high.  I wonder if pollsters had to get new question form(I know they probably don't use forms) to include conservative for Massachusetts.

How good of a president remains to be seen(remember he hasn't won the republican nomination).  Just because he transformed doesn't mean that he will govern to the right.  I still hold his conviction in question.  On economics I trust him when it comes to doing some of the easier cuts.  However I don't think he will take on medicare, medicaid, and Social security.  He could lose too much politically(like the ones before him probably thought).  I honestly don't see him doing it.

Although there is nothing wrong with calling global warming a hoax it is not necessarily the best way to go at it.  People have been brought up to think that science(or at least what we know that we call science.  Since from time to time what we know does a 180) cannot be influenced by the opinions of the observer.  The reason why we do double-blind studies because the person asking the questions can influence the result.  Also people don't know that in many fields of science approximations are needed.  This is because for some mathematical models there is no exact answer or it is too cumbersome to calculate.  Also I think that weather prediction models rely on partial order differential equations.  Which if you ask mathematicians can have huge error bounds.  In fact weather prediction models were the cause of the birth of chaos theory or the butterfly effect if you will.  So in my opinion weather prediction has always been more of an Art rather than a Science and any results need to be heavily scrutinized.

First off I think that Santorum, Romney, and Gingrich had a good showing at the debate.  Santorum surprised me in that he seemed to improved the most attacking Romney on Romney Care might've been one of the highlights of the debate(Or at least Romney's response was).  The better performance of Santorum and Romney is one reason that Gingrich didn't look as good on the debate stage.  Another is that it seemed that the debate was slanted toward being anti-gingrich.  He is the front-runner so that is to be expected, but come on the space program and fannie and freddy were supposed to be slightly negative toward Gingrich(although they are actually legitimate this time). 

Also I did notice that Wolf would cut off the debate between the candidates on an issue prematurely going to a question by an online poster.  I haven't gone issue by issue but it is something that I noticed.  I feel like the candidate who won the most might be Wolf's.  I know that might be something of a big accusation, but something about the debate struck me as not right.  I can't place it though.

It sucks to be a republican and a minority and a politician.  2 out of 3 is fine.  However you get all of them and they(the mainstream media) come getcha'.  I think they do it out of fear of losing their monopoly over minority votes, and how it is almost completely centered around identity politics.

Personally I always like the idea of NASA.  Sure it is a bloated bureaucracy now, but just what it was able to accomplish is amazing.  It is one of the few government agencies that I do not hate.  That is until Obama shifted it from Space Exploration to Muslim outreach.  Sure it sounds a little grandiose, but I don't know I've always had a soft spot for NASA so I can't get that mad about this issue.

It also highlights one of the reasons why I like Newt.  Out of all the candidates he seems more able to take risks.  To strike out to get that home run, but I don't know maybe the situation calls for a bunter(like Romney).

I think that what Mitt said about liberty is just something that he said in haste not a Freudian slip.  I'll give him that much.  However I do find his comfort with health care to be uncomfortable.

What I don't understand is why he didn't say something along the lines of: "Massachusetts is a state and it is okay for states to try and pass and fail based on what they pass so long as it does not violate federal law.  What president Obama passed is a federal mandate that will take away from the citizens of the entire nation the freedom to choose their healthcare.  So if it fails the entire country fails.  What I did is in lines with the idea of federalism.  What Obama did is not."

Something like that.  He will probably make it more eloquent though.  There still is an avenue of attack that Romney could use against Obama Care.

It depends exactly where you stand on particular issues in my opinion.  Also you need to determine the fervor at which they will pursue their particular goals(Ron Paul and Santorum seem to possess the most fervor).  Then you need to think of ability and the likelihood that they can achieve their goals if they are elected(Gingrich and Romney seem to possess the most ability).  Electability is also an issue(personally though I think they all have a good chance of beating Obama).  I think most of the issues of deciding a candidate seem to come from this.  Fervor is important because if they have it they won't sway from what they said in the campaign(i.e. Santorum will probably never vote for an abortion bill even with a political gun to his head).  Candidates can have different levels of fervor about different issues though.  Ability is important because you want them to actually be able to accomplish what they said.  Electability is important because well you want them to win to get into office.  That probably doesn't help though so yeah your welcome.

OR the voters really choose.  Some of us still have resentment built up over the bush years and how he was treated in the media and how he reacted to the media.  Just because people buy ink by the barrel doesn't mean that they decide how people think.  What happened in South Carolina was the people choosing Newt in spite of the media.

Hmm okay I was just curious, but how would you solve a situation where a faction uses force on you within your system?  You must have something to act as a disincentive(if that IS a real word).  How would one stand against many and how would tyranny be avoided?(if you don't want a tiny political discussion then nm).  Or are you refering to peaceful means to achieve anarchy?  I haven't read Rothbard.

I am actually a little curious, in what way are you the "good" kind?  Are you referring to limited to a level that libertarians like Ron Paul suggest, or do you support the total destruction of order?  Just curious.

I heard this opinion before various times.  People assume that because Newt has huge negatives those will cause him to lose rather than his huge positives causing him to win.  Romney might be a candidate with almost no weaknesses to offer an opening, but Newt is a man who can create a opening to strike his opponent.  I sensed that Newt could pull off a win in South Carolina back when did the crazy move to attack Romney from the left(Probably because it was crazy).  The media seems to almost want Romney to get the nomination, by the way they keep telling republicans he is the only one who can win.  Personally I think it is because they fear his unpredictable nature(and that time to time he will make them look like fools).