Two Days Before Super Tuesday 2016

It's a three-way race for the GOP nomination as we head into Super Tuesday.  According to the latest polls, Donald Trump is way out in front and favored to win the most delegates on Tuesday.  When it's all over, he could have a total of 277 delegates, if my math is correct, more than Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio combined (275 total).  After March 1, delegates will be awarded on a Winner-Take-All basis.  Since Trump is leading polls in upcoming states, including mega states like Florida (99 delegates), New York (95 delegates) and California (172 delegates), Trump should win the GOP nomination with the minimum 1237 delegates that are required.

Unless Rubio and Cruz team up after Super Tuesday.  If that happens, either through one of the two of them dropping out of the race after Super Tuesday, which is unlikely, or by their cutting a deal at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, July 18-21, which is very likely, then Trump will be the GOP candidate for president.

And here's the interesting part: If Hillory Clinton is the Democratic nominee, as many predict -- according to the polls -- only Rubio would beat her.  Trump versus Clinton and Cruz versus Clinton contests are, at this point anyway, too close to call.

Sources:
Polls
Super Tuesday explained
Delegates leading up to Super Tuesday
How GOP primaries work in 2016

How Judge Scalia's Death May Spell Death of Gun Rights in America

On Saturday the United States buried one of its most outspoken Supreme Court judges in decades, Justice Antonin Scalia.  May he rest in peace.

Justice Scalia was the deciding ballot in a 2008 5-4 Supreme Court vote against gun control.  In Scalia's opinion, the Framers of the U.S. Constitution had intended for individual citizens to be able to keep loaded firearms in their homes for protection.  Four other judges evidently agreed.  Justice Stevens, arguing for the opposing judges, felt that the Framers had intended only for the people's militia to bear arms, not for the people, themselves.  And that the Framers would have been horrified if automatic weapons (machine guns) had existed and had been included as legitimate arms for self defense.

So, people, we have Justice Scalia to thank for a gun-crazed America in recent years.

Which brings me to my next point.  That's why it's incredibly important that President Obama gets to nominate a liberal judge to the bench and why the United States Senate needs to confirm that nominee.  Then, when a gun control case is next brought to the Court will it result in what the majority of Americans want: gun control.  Something legislators, especially Republicans, who are beholden to their benefactors, are loath to implement.

Then, maybe, will we stop hearing about people harming other innocent people, like this deranged man did on Saturday in Michigan.  The day Justice Scalia was being laid to rest.

May God have mercy on his soul.

Trump Wins SC - Polls Were Right

Well, unlike Iowa, where the polls were off, they came through for Donald Trump Saturday night and this blogger has to admit he was wrong. Ted Cruz did not win as I had predicted.  The question now is whether Trump is going to be the GOP nominee for president.  Super Tuesday will likely answer that question.

If Trump does become president, how effective would he be?  I mean, if his own party despises him, and if he can't work with the Democrats, what policies could he possibly advance?  If you thought Obama had it tough bridging the divide between the Democrats and the Republicans, imagine how difficult it would be for an outsider like Trump to force Washington to do his bidding.

Can Americans and the Free World stand another four years of dysfunction?  Has the United States become ungovernable?  How did it come to this?

Ted Cruz to Win South Carolina

According to this week's polls and experts, Donald Trump will win in South Carolina tomorrow.  Depending on whom you ask, he is ahead of the next closest candidate, Ted Cruz, by 5 to 18 percentage points.

I'm not so sure.

For one thing, the polls that have been taken are based on small sample sizes -- typically around 500 supposedly registered Republican voters in a state where around 650,000 of them voted in the last primary, in 2012.  That means their margin of error is huge, around 5 to 7%, statistically, all other things being equal, which means, in turn, that the lead could flip in the final contest tomorrow.

For another thing, Trump supporters are more likely to brag about their support for him, wearing their support of a non-politician, an outsider, as a badge of honor.  Since polls rely on a telephone respondent's willingness to "take a short poll", I believe that Trump supporters are more likely to wish to share their support of this straight-shootin' non-politically-correct disruptor of establishment politics.

Finally, in case anyone missed social studies class, South Carolina is a southern state. Ted Cruz is a good ol' southern boy (regardless of where he was born).  He's one of theirs.  Donald Trump is a bombastic New Yawka; a Yankee.  He might as well be a foreigner to some South Carolinians. Whom do you think voters are more apt to trust?

I predict Ted Cruz will win South Carolina tomorrow.

p.s. I am a Democratic supporter.

Why Republicans Will Lose in 2016

Regardless of who wins the presidential primaries for the Republicans, he or she will not get elected president of the United States.

Virtually all of the Republican front-runners decried President Obama's unilateral action to curb gun violence in America, yesterday.  But, as this editorial states, among others, they and the NRA are crazy.  Americans are overwhelmingly in favor of curbing guns and gun violence.  "Do something!", they are practically pleading.

This time, Republicans (and some Democrats) who are willing to continue to take tainted money from the gun lobby will have the wrath of the voters to contend with.  They will not get elected.  And that includes the Republican candidate for president.

You heard it here first.

The Republican Presidential Nominee Front Runners

If you want to know who the front runners are for the GOP ticket, just pay attention to the names that are getting the most mentions after last night's final Republican candidates' debate.  Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio.  Everyone else is an also-ran.

Realistically, Trump doesn't stand a chance.  His simplistic view of things open him up to future attacks by Cruz when the gloves come off during primary season, striking fear and doubt in the hearts of all those Apprentice show fans.

That leaves Cruz and Rubio for Prez and Veep, respectively; a nice fit, really, since Cruz appeals to the Bible belt and to the far-right, and since Rubio appeals to the college educated 'Establishment', as well as the Latinos and immigrants.

Cruz-Rubio for 2016.   You heard it here, first.

No Democracy in America Without Senate Reform

The U.S. Senate commands tremendous power.  Without it, laws cannot pass.  Including gun laws.  Yet the constitution of the Senate, which states that there will be two senators from each state, regardless of population, means that a citizen of Wyoming has 66 times the voting power of a citizen of California.  How is that democratic?

During the 1787 Constitutional Convention, the Country's forefathers arrived at what is called "the Great Compromise" or "Connecticut Compromise", which allowed for small states to have the same number of senators as large states.   Why?  Some say it was to protect the autonomy of the states, regardless of whether they were large or small.  Others claim it was a pure power grab by the small states.  The compromise was probably struck because, back then, it wasn't as big a deal.  After all, the country had 4 million residents, compared to 315 million today, and the largest state, New York, was only 11 times bigger than the smallest one, Delaware.  Today, California is 66 times bigger than Wyoming and the gap is growing as more people flock to California and the coasts than to the middle.  So unequal representation is getting worse.

The problem is exacerbated by the fact that smaller states are also predominantly white, red-neck, gun-toting, conservative, Republican, so-called "Red" states.  In effect, that means that Red state voters command more voting power than Blue state voters (see Table).

How is this manifested today?  Even when a majority of Americans are for stricter gun laws, like they are today, according to the polls, and even when the President, himself, is scheduled to go on national television tonight to address the Nation on the topic of guns, terrorism and security, both the majority and the President are prevented from passing sensible laws by the minority, the small state citizens, like the ones in Wyoming, who command 66 times the voting power of the citizens of California.

So how do Americans reform the Senate?   The U.S. Constitution requires a two thirds majority to amend the Constitution but, in the case of the Senate, there is a special, additional rule that requires the consent of each and every state.  That makes it nearly impossible to change U.S. governance.

So, the nearly 40 million residents of California continue to pay their taxes and yet, do not get to advance their wishes or needs because of their extremely minuscule vote.  It seems to me the last time that happened, the year was 1776.  And the citizens revolted.