tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3628992061398997355.post5673809029297391539..comments2019-12-18T13:54:57.355-08:00Comments on No Place Like Homes: Toward an early, hastily written, and poorly researched first draft of a history of the Obama presidencyUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3628992061398997355.post-79477809814210750532014-07-13T08:33:11.225-07:002014-07-13T08:33:11.225-07:00Thanks a lot Andrew (who, random reader, you shoul...Thanks a lot Andrew (who, random reader, you should know is from a tiny Midwestern farming town ...). I agree that Frank misses this obvious fact, but What's the Matter with Kansas is still a good book. (And also, the Baffler, the magazine he edits, has a lot of fun iconoclastic stuff). I tend to agree with you about 2016, but I am not quite as optimistic as you. This is totally unscientific (he tells the political scientist) but check out the list of states by 2012 margin here (the second graph): http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/the-2012-election-in-a-relative-sense/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0 The weakest margins of victory for Obama, starting from closest, were Florida, Ohio, Virginia, and Colorado. The weakest margins of victory for Romney were North Carolina, Georgia, and Missouri. Doesn't it just "feel" more plausible that the GOP can pick up Florida and Ohio and opposed to the Dems picking up North Carolina and Georgia? That said, Hillary crushes. Derek Hoffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13788619739997805477noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3628992061398997355.post-31515890536677306062014-07-12T11:43:18.638-07:002014-07-12T11:43:18.638-07:00You had a soft spot for Peggy Noonan? :)
Excellen...You had a soft spot for Peggy Noonan? :)<br /><br />Excellent stuff and of course I agree about the Tea Party and rural America. The scary thing is, our system favors rural America so that no matter how much urbanization occurs flyover country will still exert more influence on policy than it should.<br /><br />Add to that, Thomas Frank is full of sh*t. Google median incomes for farming households. Rural households are well-above the national median in income and are not voting against their own economic interests. Logic dictates that progressive policies are not going to emerge for a long time and probably not without a constitutional convention. The Repubs chances of ever winning another presidential race is the wildcard (hint: they won't anytime soon, I'm not even worried about the 2016 race and will take any odds on a Democrat right now).Andrewnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3628992061398997355.post-47092014874764325312014-07-06T13:28:41.008-07:002014-07-06T13:28:41.008-07:00(My comment disappeared when I clicked "Publi...(My comment disappeared when I clicked "Publish," so forgive me if two version of this end up appearing!).<br />Excellent post, Derek -- my favorite of all of your posts. And, yes, that is partly because I completely agree with you since we are cut from the same political cloth, but it's also because I am so disheartened by the decline of journalism. Journalistic standards should not be the same as soap box standard. Punditry is not journalism. I loved Nicholas Kristof as Beijing Bureau Chief for the New York Times and I think he richly deserved his Pulitzer. But once he became a columnist? Yuck...even though he and I seem to be very much on the same side politically. But how about some serious and balanced research for columns, just as much as articles? And stringent fact-checking. I find the current state of journalism so disheartening.Kristinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05956036471135150131noreply@blogger.com