Dismal Signs for the GOP — George Will

It’s looking bad for realistic Republicans out there. While hopeless optimists point to the evenness of the candidates on the Republican side, “realistic Republicans are looking for shelter.”

Nov. 4 could be their most disagreeable day since Nov. 3, 1964. Actually, this November could be even worse because in 1964 Barry Goldwater’s loss of 44 states served a purpose, the ideological reorientation and revitalization of the party. Which Republican candidate this year could produce a similarly constructive loss?

Today, all the usual indicators are dismal for Republicans. If that sweeping assertion seems counterintuitive, produce a counterexample. The adverse indicators include: shifts in voters’ identifications with the two parties (Democrats now 50 percent, Republicans 36 percent); the tendency of independents (they favored Democratic candidates by 18 points in 2006); the fact that Democrats hold a majority of congressional seats in states with 303 electoral votes; the Democrats’ strength and the Republicans’ relative weakness in fundraising; the percentage of Americans who think the country is on the “wrong track”; the Republicans’ enthusiasm deficit relative to Democrats’ embrace of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, one of whom will be nominated.

The articles is a good read to all who are interested. For myself, I think this is the first election where I really don’t feel compelled to vote for anyone. Giuliani, McCain, and Huckabee seem to only be Republicans in name; that is, it would seem to be a losing position to argue that any of them are actually conservative. Romney seems to be the closest candidate to the ideals of “conservatism,” but even he has a chequered past.

Republicans lost in 2006 because for the previous six years they stopped acting like conservatives. Spending like Democrats and engaging in non-conservative tactics (such as letting Kennedy write the education bill) didn’t do much good to conservatism, and they consequently lost badly. I suppose the party stands a real chance of continuing to fracture and hemorrhage as long as Republicans forget that.

Clinton Criticizes Obama in NH Mailer — AP

Sometimes I consider the thought that my political views are sometimes skewed based on various factors, but is it really impossible that we sometimes meet on common ground no matter the topic?

[Obama] voted against requiring medical care for aborted fetuses who survive, a vote that especially riled abortion opponents.

So an abortion doctor botches killing a baby and the baby lives. And, we actually have legislators who vote against keeping the baby alive because it is not, in fact, a “baby,” but a mere “aborted fetus?” Is that right? For the love of all that is holy, how can anyone, even an abortion proponent, be for that? The article above is actually stating how Clinton believes she is for more abortion rights than Obama, but it is hard to see how a person could grant more “rights” than leaving a baby to die on a cold table.

I hope that the doctors at least throw the babies in the trash so they don’t have to watch them suffer; maybe they can hide it by putting a half-eaten sandwich over top of it. Imagine how awful it would be to watch the final moments of an aborted mass of cells.

It says Clinton has a record of fighting “far-right Republicans” to defend abortion rights, while Obama has been “unwilling to take a stand on choice.”

?

Here is my schedule for the Spring semester (broken into days because no two days are the same):

Monday

10:00 a.m. - Business Organizations
11:00 a.m. - Christian Perspectives

Tuesday

10:00 a.m. - Criminal Procedure
11:00 a.m. - Income Tax

Wednesday

10:00 a.m. - Business Organizations
11:00 a.m. - Christian Perspectives
6:30 p.m. - Motor Vehicle Law

Thursday

10:00 a.m. - Criminal Procedure
11:00 a.m. - Income Tax
2:00 p.m. - Trial Advocacy

Friday

10:00 a.m. - Business Organizations
11:00 a.m. - Readings in Jurisprudence
1:00 p.m. - Trial Advocacy

4 years on Mars: Rovers Continue to Amaze — Space.com

The Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity were given 90 days to get their science done, but four years later, the rovers are still roving.

Since the rovers bounced onto Mars’ surface, they have collectively driven more than 11.8 miles (19.1 kilometers) and snapped more than 210,000 images. That’s roughly 55 standard DVD movies worth of uncompressed data.

Scientists have used this information through the years to crank out more than 100 studies about the planet’s geologic past “with many more in progress,” Lemmon said.

“It’s been a great year for the rovers and we’re getting deeper into Martian history than we’ve been done before,” Lemmon said. “These robots have entirely changed the way we view Mars.”

I have no idea how a hopeful 90-day mission turned into a still-going four-year mission; it seems like a pretty wide gap of prediction on the part of NASA. Regardless, it is always good to see space missions that go better than expected.