Will be gone during Super Duper Tuesday to this magical place. I cannot believe how quickly I received my absentee ballot. When I did one for the 2004 election, it took two months plus for it to arrive. This one took maybe five days (including a weekend!) Maybe a good reason for living in the outer boroughs? Quick turnaround.

So now all I have to decide is who to vote for.  I am a registered democrat, so I’m relegated to choosing between Clinton, Obama, Edwards and a few others I don’t know much about.  Both Dodd and Richardson have subsequently dropped out. The latest developments have me curious as to who will ultimately win and how much my vote actually matters. The last primary I voted quickly for Kucinich because I wasn’t happy with the front runners then.  But now its four years later and its coming across that there is not such a  clear front runner.  I know Nevada will make a difference but I need to get in my ballot before then because I’m like that. I hope to have it out by Monday to give me the weekend to think it over.

I’m not into the whole binary Obama vs. Hillary way of thinking and still do consider Edwards to be a viable candidate. And I will always be a Kucinich girl but alas I need to make a decision.  I’ll be visiting the candidate’s web pages over the next few days to finalize my decision.

Side note: I totally should write up my opinions on this whole Clinton crying mess but honestly it seems so “over done” at this point. Maybe I will.  We’ll see.

88% Dennis Kucinich
87% John Edwards
86% Mike Gravel
82% Barack Obama
81% Hillary Clinton
79% Chris Dodd
77% Bill Richardson
75% Joe Biden
35% Rudy Giuliani
28% John McCain
21% Mike Huckabee
19% Mitt Romney
19% Tom Tancredo
14% Ron Paul
11% Fred Thompson

2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz

Side note: poor Iowans and New Hampshire people (I don’t know what to call them as a population), I’m sure their sick of reporters and all of the political people taking over their states.

Wow, the news (CNN in this house) is pretty crazy tonight! John McCain takes it and makes it looks like the repubs may have a viable candidate. Nothing against Huckabee.

And the the whole Obama vs. Clinton contest…its so close. Looks like Clinton is pulling it in but anything could happen…we shall see!

EDIT: They keep talking about how “women” “women” “women” are effecting the Obama/Clinton vote. But some dude is saying the word “women” like its a food he hasn’t ever really tried before  like the word “sushi” or “tapas.” He also says it like he can’t quite believe the word exists. HA.

This article from yesterday’s NYTimes magazine is a pretty good assessment of Americans’ attitudes toward Mormonism via Mitt Romney.

Yet the Mormons’ political loyalty is not fully reciprocated by their fellow Republicans. Twenty-nine percent of Republicans told the Harris Poll last year that they probably or definitely would not vote for a Mormon for president. Among evangelicals, some of the discomfort is narrowly religious: Mormon theology is sometimes understood as non-Christian and heretical. Elsewhere, the reasons for the aversion to Mormons are harder to pin down — bigotry can be funny that way — but they are certainly not theological. A majority of Americans have no idea what Mormons believe. Via

And of course, I am more than curious to find out what happens tomorrow in New Hampshire…We’ll see.

I am also weirded out by Romney’s new term for Obama as the “senator killer”…hmm yeahh. That’s not a calculated term at all.

Personally, I’m not sure if I’m 100 percent for Obama but I am excited that the majority of democrats in Iowa supported him. I think America is ready for a change and hopefully next week’s primary in NH will support that as well. Perhaps, this will inspire others who support Obama but didn’t think he was an electable candidate to make the leap and vote for him. I was also moved by Edwards’ speech last night. I liked how he immediately discussed health care as that is an issue that is close to me for personal and professional reasons.

And  Huckabee. The fact that he was elected really scares me a lot. Its refreshing to see two very different candidates win yesterday. New Hampshire will tell a lot with the republicans maybe even more so than the democrats. The evangelical vote isn’t so big in the Northeast as it is in the Midwest, but there are plenty of fiscal conservatives. And with that there is a perhaps more electable republican candidate for the rest of the country.

So onto Super Duper Tuesday as Wolf Blitzer calls it!

Woah! What an interesting turn of events…

Barack Obama will win the Iowa Democratic caucus and Mike Huckabee will be the Republican winner, CNN projects.

With 88 percent of precincts reporting, Obama had the support of 37 percent of voters, compared to 30 percent for Edwards and 30 percent for Clinton.

“The numbers tell us this was a debate between change and experience, and change won,” said CNN political analyst Bill Schneider.

With 66 percent of Republican precincts reporting, Huckabee had the support of 34 percent of voters, compared to 25 percent for Mitt Romney. Fred Thompson had 14 percent, John McCain had 13 percent and Ron Paul had 10 percent. via CNN

I am very much eager to watch coverage of the Iowa Caucus.  And I am also eager to see who will come out the winner on either side so we will see how this election will start shaping up.

I am openly liberal but am not sure who I will be supporting and am looking to Iowa voters for some guidance.

I spent the night near Iowa City once. In my drive across the country, it was the last place going West to California that offered espresso right off the freeway.

- Ms. Rose

Supposedly back in the 1990s, Huckabee wanted to isolate AIDS patients…wonder how he feels about it now…

“If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague,” Huckabee wrote. via

What a nice medieval approach!

But this Bridge Club is super gutsy…

In a fight reminiscent of the brouhaha over an anti-Bush statement by Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks in 2003, a team of women who represented the United States at the world bridge championships in Shanghai last month is facing sanctions, including a yearlong ban from competition, for a spur-of-the-moment protest.

At issue is a crudely lettered sign, scribbled on the back of a menu, that was held up at an awards dinner and read, “We did not vote for Bush.”

Wow, that is pretty cool in my book, the women explained themselves via a comment from their team captain:

“What we were trying to say, not to Americans but to our friends from other countries, was that we understand that they are questioning and critical of what our country is doing these days, and we want you to know that we, too, are critical,” Ms. Greenberg said, stressing that she was speaking for herself and not her six teammates.

It is definitely reminiscent of the whole unfortunate, blown out of proportion Dixie Chicks scenario. Some popular culture pundits claim it is trendy to speak out against the war and Pres. Bush and that it is more acceptable to do so (See massive articles about the latest slew of “anti-war” movies). I always doubted this and this whole incident shows that it is not A-OK to use our free speech rights. Anyone who says this is NOT about free speech, is badly misinformed.

I hope these Bridge players go unpunished and our further lauded for their courageous behavior and encouraged to continue to speak/act out against actions and figures they believe are UnAmerican.

I also love how this references voting, showing that these women participated in their duties as American citizens.

Go to Hillary’s page and watch the video

Don’t Stop Believin’ (found here)
- Journey

Just a small town girl
Living in a lonely world
She took the midnight train going anywhere
Just a city boy
Born and raised in South Detroit
He took the midnight train going anywhere

A singer in a smoky room
A smell of wine and cheap perfume
For a smile they can share the night
It goes on and on and on and on

{Refrain}
Strangers, waiting, up and down the boulevard
Their shadows searching in the night
Streetlight people, living just to find emotion
Hiding somewhere in the night

Working hard to get my fill
Everybody wants a thrill
Paying anything to roll the dice
Just one more time
Some will win, some will lose
Some were born to sing the blues
Oh the movie never ends
It goes on and on and on and on

{Refrain}

Don’t stop believing
Hold on to that feeling
Streetlight people