Dan Cleary

WSJ: Tennessee Resists Obama Wave

How refreshing - an election post-mortem on the Volunteer State that doesn't chalk it all up to racism.

Zogby Defends Ziegler Poll of Obama Voters

As you might expect, there has been some blowback from the left directed at pollster John Zogby for conducting a poll commissioned by John Ziegler to gauge how well-informed Barack Obama voters are. (See video and story here ; see reaction from the left here, here, here, here, and here).

Zogby's defense:

"We stand by the results our survey work on behalf of John Ziegler, as we stand by all of our work. We reject the notion that this was a push poll because it very simply wasn't. It was a legitimate effort to test the knowledge of voters who cast ballots for Barack Obama in the Nov. 4 election. Push polls are a malicious effort to sway public opinion one way or the other, while message and knowledge testing is quite another effort of public opinion research that is legitimate inquiry and has value in the public square. In this case, the respondents were given a full range of responses and were not pressured or influenced to respond in one way or another. This poll was not designed to hurt anyone, which is obvious as it was conducted after the election. The client is free to draw his own conclusions about the research, as are bloggers and other members of society. But Zogby International is a neutral party in this matter. We were hired to test public opinion on a particular subject and with no ax to grind, that's exactly what we did. We don't have to agree or disagree with the questions, we simply ask them and provide the client with a fair and accurate set of data reflecting public opinion." - John Zogby

Sounds to me like Zogby would gladly conduct a similar poll among John McCain supporters.

I suspect they'd outperform the Obama voters on these questions though.

How Obama Got Elected

Over the weekend, Zogby conducted a national poll of 512 Barack Obama voters.

The results are... not surprising, honestly:

57.4% could NOT correctly say which party controls congress (50/50 shot just by guessing)

81.8% could NOT correctly say Joe Biden quit a previous campaign because of plagiarism (25% chance by guessing)

82.6% could NOT correctly say that Barack Obama won his first election by getting opponents kicked off the ballot (25% chance by guessing)

88.4% could NOT correctly say that Obama said his policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket (25% chance by guessing)

56.1% could NOT correctly say Obama started his political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground (25% chance by guessing).

Oh, there's more.

For more on this video (which was produced by John Ziegler, who then commissioned Zogby to conduct the full-blown telephone poll), click here.

Via Flopping Aces.

Ace: Was McCain Really the Most Electable Republican?

We will never know for sure, but Republicans wouldn't mind a do-over right about now.

Ace muses:

I cannot imagine any candidate except McCain being unwilling to pin blame for Fannie/Freddie/CRA on the Democrats.

That was all him. A weird and ultimately fatal mix of a strange sense of "honor" that prevented him from attacking Democrats, a determination to remain "bipartisan" and thus never take Republicans' side against Democrats, residual guilt over voting against the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday which caused him again and again to play the race card on himself, and a general lack of fluency in economic issues making him reluctant to play on this turf at all.

No one else had that kind of perfect storm of suicidal stupidity working against him.

Read the rest here.

Republican Lack of Enthusiasm Key Factor in Obama Victory

Via Instapundit:

VOTER TURNOUT NO RECORD: "Turnout in last week's election increased from four years ago but fell far short of some forecasts largely because many Republican voters either stayed home or left blank the presidential section of their ballots."

Yes, McCain didn't exactly fire up the base.

So much for the notion that Republicans had to nominate a moderate like John McCain to even have a chance in this year's election. In hindsight, maybe Fred Thompson or Duncan Hunter would have fared better than McCain against Obama.

Could it be that traditional conservative candidates are more viable than the party is willing to recognize?

Mark Ritchie: Coleman "Wants to Win At Any Price"

Oh, the irony!

Mark Ritchie is Minnesota's Democratic Secretary of State, and heads up the board that oversees the recount in the Al Franken/Norm Coleman Senate race.

And - surprise, surprise - Ritchie also has ties to ACORN and George Soros.

Via John Lott.

Sarah Palin Talks with Greta Van Susteren (Parts 2 and 3)

Not much political talk here - the conversation mainly consisted of hunting, fishing, and Alaska's great outdoors.

John Hinderaker to Appear on H&C to Discuss Franken/Coleman Recount

I normally don't go out of my way to watch Hannity and Colmes, but I'll be sure to check it out tonight since Powerline's John Hinderaker is scheduled to appear. He'll be discussing the latest developments in the contested Senate race between Republican incumbent Norm Coleman and Democratic challenger Al Franken. Fox contributor Lanny Davis will also be on opposite Hinderaker to offer the Democratic perspective on this sordid affair.

Powerline has a done a great series of detailed posts on this race that are worth checking out, entitled "What's Happening in Minnesota?" (Parts 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5).

If you would like to contribute to Norm Coleman's campaign, go here (see button on the right side of the page). It would be bad enough if Al Franken, a world-class jerk and all-around buffoon, gained this Senate seat fair and square. It would be nothing less than an outrage for Franken and the Democrats to simply steal the seat from Coleman, which is exactly what it looks like they are trying to do.

Not that the Democrats are strangers to that sort of thing.

UPDATE: Here's the clip:

Also, Parts 6 and 7 of "What's Happening in Minnesota?"

And finally, here's the Wall Street Journal's take on the mischief in Minnesota.

Sarah Palin Talks with Greta Van Susteren (Part 1)

Dowd: Bush Incompetency Led to First Black President

Everyone knows that George Bush's unpopularity helped Barack Obama immensely, just as it would have for Hillary Clinton, or any other Democrat who might have run for president in 2008.

But I've never heard anyone put it quite like Maureen Dowd:

Now we have the delicious irony that a white president from a patrician family, whose administration was so negligent about America’s poor and black citizens, was so incompetent that he helped elect the first black president.

Let's attempt to unpack that one, shall we?

On second thought, forget it.

Via Tim Blair.