Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis has expressed some confusion over the Irish’s placement in recent polls. And since i have a little time to kill, and figure that most Irish fans on this site allready hate me anyway i figured i’d try and help him out by explaining it to him.

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The Bull Moose celebrates the rise of the “radical center” in 2006:

The political story of the week is that independent voters are heavily swinging to the Democrats this year. … Yesterday, E.J. Dionne noted the likely influence of these rad centrists on a Democratic Congress,

“The Democrats’ dependence on moderate voters and moderate candidates belies Republican claims that a Democratic victory would bring radically liberal politics to Washington. In fact, the first imperative of Democratic congressional leaders, if their party is successful, will be finding policies, ideas and rhetoric to allow the party’s progressives and moderates to get along and govern effectively together.” …

If Democrats gain control over the House and/or the Senate, they should not be deluded that they can’t go into the minority in [2008]. The independent voters who will give them the majority will be watching carefully to see if the Democrats govern from the center or engage in the old polarizing politics that the voters rejected.

The independent center is not tied to either party. The indies are firing the Republicans. Can the Democrats win the allegiance of the radical center with a governing agenda that claims the middle of American politics?

If Democrats and Republicans merely bicker like Sunnis and Shiites over the next two years, independents could look outside the two party system for an answer. There is a severe lack of confidence in our entire leadership class, and donkeys and elephants will be making a major error if they ignore that fact.

I hope the Moose is right.

Looks like Rick Santorum is trying the old LBJ/Goldwater “flower girl” trick.

Apparently, Bob Casey wants Iran and North Korea to nuke us, China to dominate us, and terrorists to kill us all. Vote for Santorum!

In other Santorum-related news, here’s a video of Stephen Colbert explaining the Pennsylvania senator’s Mount Doom analogy. Heh.

P.S. About that ad… I have to say, the “amnesty for illegals” part is actually quite offensive. I say that as someone who opposes full-fledged amnesty, and who believes national security is a legitimate, indeed a crucial, argument for tightening our border security. But the debate over how to secure our porous borders is one thing, and the debate over whether to give amnesty (or something similar) to the illegal immigrants who are already here is another thing entirely. The first issue has important national-security implications; the second issue doesn’t, so far as I can tell. The argument against amnesty is that it rewards illegal behavior, and perhaps encourages further illegal immigration by implying the prospect of future amnesties — not that it will let terrorists into this country.

The people who would be applying for amnesty are already here, and if anything, amnesty would bring them “out of the shadows,” thus perhaps increasing our security by giving us a better idea of who’s a threat and who’s among the vast majority of illegal immigrants who just came here for a better life. And while I understand the argument that the mere prospect of amnesty (or of future amnesties) might bring more illegal immigrants in, I don’t see how it would bring more terrorists in. Terrorists don’t want amnesty; they want to kill us. Thus, it seems to me, the only immigration-related issue that’s relevant to the war on terror is the physical security of the border itself, not amnesty vs. non-amnesty.

It’s perfectly fine for Santorum to argue that Casey is wrong to support amnesty (assuming that Casey does, in fact, support amnesty, and I have no idea whether that’s true), but it’s not fine for him to claim that because Casey supports amnesty, he therefore supports a policy that would allow more terrorists into the country. If I’m wrong on this, someone please tell me how, but logically, I just don’t think Santorum’s argument is supportable.

In a long-overdue move, I’ve created a blog category specifically for posts about Joe Lieberman and the U.S. Senate race in Connecticut.

Actually, it’s not limited to the Senate race; it contains 177 posts (on 12 pages) going all the way back to August 2003, and including my endorsement of Joe for president, my first-ever reference to “Joe-mentum,” and lots more from the 2004 presidential race… plus everything from these eventful past few months.

The Lieberman category is a subcategory of “Connecticut & Newington,” rather than of “Elections & Politics (U.S.)” or “Election 2006” (you can see the full category structure here), so all posts about the current Senate race will actually appear in at least two different categories: the “Election 2006” category and the “Joe Lieberman” category.

Now maybe I can actually get Blog of Joe to blogroll me. :)

In what could be the best news for Republican electoral hopes brought about by an adversary since Osama bin Laden’s videotape in October 2004, the New Jersey Supreme Court is set to rule on gay marriage today. If they legalize it, Mickey Kaus speculates that it could help the Republicans nationwide in the midterm elections — which are a perhaps very unlucky 13 days away:

Influence Peddler speculates that a pro-gay-marriage ruling in New Jersey…might “energize Republicans to come to the polls to register their displeasure by voting against [Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Robert] Menendez.” But why do we think a New Jersey pro-gay-marriage ruling will only have an impact in New Jersey? It might signal to voters nationwide that a judge-made gay marriage trend threatens to sweep large chunks of the nation–it won’t just be bottled up in Massachusetts anymore. If you oppose gay marriage that might bother you, and motivate you to vote, even if you live in Missouri. Or, say, Tennessee. Or even Virginia.

What’s a gay-marriage-supporting, judicial-activism-opposing, Democratic-Congress-endorsing, backlash-fearing independent to do? Root for a “yes” ruling? Root for a “no” ruling? Root for the entire court to fall asleep for, say, two weeks or so, and then tell us their ruling?

Stay tuned!

Am I the only one who, upon reading the United Press International account of a new Kinsey Institute study supposedly showing that “54 percent of men and 19 percent of women admit they think about sex every day — or several times a day,” had the following reactions:

1) The percentages seem absurdly low;
2) The reported frequency of thoughts about sex also seems absurdly low;
3) The reported statistics most certainly do not match UPI’s headline, “Report finds sex always on men’s minds,” nor the conclusion in the article’s lede that “most men are always thinking of sex.”

Note to UPI: once a day ≠ “always”! And although 54 percent technically qualifies as “most,” it’s an awfully slim majority. What was Kinsey’s margin of error, I wonder?

If we take the study at face value and assume that its results are true (which I don’t, but just for the sake of argument here), my lead sentence would be: “A shocking new study from the Kinsey Institute claims that barely half of men, and less than one-fifth of women, think about sex daily.” Or perhaps: “A shocking new study from the Kinsey Institute claims that 46 percent of men and 81 percent of women do not think about sex at least once a day.” I mean, really. Was this survey conducted in a convent or something?

A group of free speech-hating, LaRouche-supporting thugs tried to drown out Senator Joe Lieberman in Monday’s final U.S. Senate debate in New London, CT, apparently desiring that the voters of Connecticut not have the opportunity to hear the candidates speak. They had been rowdy and rude at times throughout the debate, but it was during Lieberman’s closing statement that it got really bad, as they started… singing. Moderator George Stephanopoulos seemed powerless to stop the hecklers, as did Lamont (who may have feared that these idiots were some of his less savory supporters), Lieberman himself, and the rest of the audience. It was left to the excitable Republican candidate, Alan Schlesinger, to put the morons in their place. Video here. (Hat tip: Derek Muller.)

My dad watched the debate live, and here’s how he characterized it in comments:

Joe’s [debate] win was greatly Enhanced by the antidemocratic antics of neo-stalinists in the audience who tried, repeatedly and at length, to drown him out while moderator George Stephanopoulos dithered & Ned Lamont sat stunned with his trademark deer-in-the-headlights Look. :> Finally it took a menacing Advance & a mighty Roar by the large & stentorian Republican candidate Alan Schlesinger, God bless him :) ~ “LEAVE THIS HALL! SHOW SOME RESPECT FOR SENATOR LIEBERMAN!” ~ to shut the littlebaby fascists up. Apparently they were then, belatedly, escorted from the theatre, presumably shuddering in Shock & Awe. :)

Based on the video, the exact quote was “Show some respect to Senator Lieberman! Leave this audience now!” But, close enough. :) Schlesinger stood up as he said it, and immediately as he finished, Lieberman walked over and shook his hand. The audience cheered. Lamont, still seated, belatedly nodded — several seconds after Schlesinger had finished and the audience had begun cheering (”deer in the headlights,” indeed) — and clapped politely.

Conservative blogger Allahpundit, at the above video link, says of Hollerin’ Alan: “A good man. Not a man we can afford to vote for, but a good man.”

P.S. It’s not in the video, but according to the New Haven Register, when order was restored Lieberman said: “Thank you, Alan. I’m real glad you came out from under that bus you said you were under [a reference to something Schlesinger said in the first debate -ed.]. You have made a real contribution to this campaign in the last few debates, and I thank you for the constructive ideas you have offered.”

Anyway… more on the hecklers here:

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The new trailer for Eragon is pretty freakin’ awesome. (Hat tip: Andrew Hiller.)

I had to laugh, though, at the derivativeness of this shot, showing the evil wizard shade, Durza, standing high above a huge army of Uruks Urgals, holding out his right hand as he urges his legions to go out there and find the hobbit boy who has the all-important Ring dragon:

“There will be no dawn… for men.”

Just because the whole thing is a blatant ripoff of the entire fantasy genre, most especially Lord of the Rings, and just because it inevitably won’t be nearly as good as LOTR, doesn’t mean I won’t go see it, and love it. :)

ESPN’s The Dash predicts the result of the big November 25 showdown at the Coliseum:

Still simmering from last year, Notre Dame turns USC game into a crusade and wins on a last-second Brady Quinn sneak, with a push from Darius Walker. Irish go 11-1 and throw the BCS Standings into complete chaos.

Heh. That would be awesome… well, except for the whole USC losing thing. But it would be awesome because of the bald-faced hypocrisy that it would bring to the surface. Of course, Irish fans would say that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, and thus claim they’re not being hypocritical. But still. “A rule is a rule,” right? Heh. It would be kinda like if an SEC team (ideally LSU) someday wins the AP championship but not the BCS…

“I hate cruelty; I love Pottery Barn.” –Prof. Kaveny

Female undergrad to male undergrad, describing some sort of petty drama among her group of friends:

“She got really pissed off, so she un-friended him on Facebook.”

Oh, the humanity!!

When President Bush needs to find something on “the Internets,” he uses “the Google.”

Specifically: “One of the things I’ve used on the Google is to pull up maps.” He added, “I forgot the name of the program.” Umm, that would be Google Maps. Very hard to remember, I know.

(Hat tip: ironlionOROKU.)

Bill Quick — the guy whose blog, Daily Pundit, permanently features a front-page image of the World Trade Center exploding — didn’t vote Republican in 2006. He explains why by linking to a list of issues that he says will inspire “large chunks of [the Republican] base and other normally dependable voters…to stay home in disgust.”

Hat tip: InstaPundit, who himself did vote Republican, albeit reluctantly — saying, “the Republicans don’t really deserve my vote…but nonetheless the Democrats have blown it again” — much to the chagrin of Andrew Sullivan (though said chagrin is apparently rather poorly informed).

Me? I’ll be voting for the Democrat for my local, hotly contested House race. (Heaven help the Democrats if Pelosi breaks her anti-impeachment pledge, because I’m depending on that, and they’ll lose my vote for a long, long time if they’re lying to me.) As for the Senate, there is no Democratic nominee running against Dick Lugar (R), so I have to decide whether to vote for Lugar, vote for Libertarian candidate Steve Osborn, or cast a write-in vote for Joe Lieberman — a protest vote, of sorts, against both major parties. At the moment, I’m leaning toward the latter option. After all, I did introduce myself to the senator last week as “the inaugural member of the ‘Indiana for Lieberman’ party.” :)

UPDATE: Instalanche! Welcome, new readers!

Glenn Reynolds characterizes my view as “Brendan Loy doesn’t care” about “what happens if Democrats win.” That’s not really correct. Don’t forget that I was a Democrat for most of my life, only very recently declaring my independence, so it’s not like I disagree with everything the party stands for. On the contrary, I am likely to agree with the sort of moves a Democratic Congress would likely make vis a vis social issues such as gay rights, stem-cell research, abstinence-only education, etc.

As for the hot-button economic issues…

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With Ohio State’s pre-Nov. 18 schedule consisting of Minnesota, Illinois and Northwestern, and Michigan’s of Northwestern, Ball State and Indiana, we can already pencil in (or maybe even “pen” in) the winner of the Michigan-OSU showdown as one of the two BCS title-game contenders, writes the L.A. Times’s Chris Dufresne. He adds:

The question now is whether the loser of the Ohio State-Michigan game could still finish second in the BCS and make it to the title game.

What if Michigan, which moved ahead of USC to No. 2 in the latest BCS standings, beats Ohio State on a last-second field goal? How far would the Buckeyes fall in the standings?

In 2003, No. 1 Oklahoma was thrashed in the Big 12 title game by Kansas State but fell to only No. 2 in the BCS, which allowed the Sooners to play Louisiana State in the BCS title game.

Of course, for the 2003 scenario to play out, there would need to be no undefeated teams (well, no undefeated teams not named Boise State… or perhaps Rutgers) left standing at the end of the season, outside of the OSU-Michigan winner, of course. Also, let’s not forget that Oklahoma only fell to #3 in the polls because there were only three one-loss teams; everyone else had at least two losses! Otherwise the Sooners would have tumbled further in the polls, perhaps far enough to offset their strength in the computers. Last but not least, the computers are worth less in the BCS formula, relative to the polls, than they used to be. So the pollsters, for good or ill, have more power to “punish” teams in the BCS for late losses.

Still, if USC loses (presumably to Cal or Notre Dame, the former being considerably more likely than the latter, IMHO) and the right combination of things happens in the Big East, Dufresne’s scenario could very well happen — especially given that the OSU-Michgan game occurs on the third-to-last week of the season, and both teams are idle after that, so the memories of the loss will have faded considerably in the pollsters’ minds by the time the final polls come out. In fact, for that very reason, the loss doesn’t even necessarily have to be squeaky-close, and Ohio State doesn’t necessarily have to be the loser! For example, consider this scenario.

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When the Levees Broke, Brendan’s debut in a documentary, will be available on DVD December 19. Makes a great stocking stuffer. :-)