by WonkoKevin

Some of you out in the Wonksophere may have noticed that while Obama’s mud level (how much negative language he uses when talking about McCain) has been consistently lower than McCain’s mud level, the actual volume of statements from one about the other has been drastically different.  McCain’s press releases and published speeches average about 10 Obama mentions a day, while Obama’s mentions of McCain’s average maybe 1 per day.  The difference is caused by their definition of ”press release”.  In Obama’s case, only statements by Obama himself are being pushed as press releases, and he almost never mentions McCain in these statements.  McCain’s campaign repackages or redistributes news stories or editorials by other media and counts it as a press release, and those tend to be heavy negative on Obama.  As a quasi-journalist, I don’t think it’s correct for McCain to be calling these redistributions “press releases”.  On the other hand, the public and media don’t care what they’re called, and it represents an advantage to McCain.

by WonkoKevin

Two new polls from American Research Group are dominating people’s attention as we are now less than a week away from the Iowa caucuses.  According to the ARG poll, Hillary Clinton has a commanding lead over John Edwards 34 to 20 percent, with Barack Obama in third at 19% and Joe Biden at 8%.  In the Republican race, Mike Huckabee maintained a slim but diminishing lead over Mitt Romney 23 to 21 percent, with a surging John McCain at 17%, Rudy Giuliani at a surprising 14%, and Ron Paul at 10%, ahead of Fred Thompson. (more…)

by WonkoSteve

Today the Wonkosphere is still atwitter about Thursday’s CNN demo debate. Two ridiculous themes IMHO are the softball question that one student asked Hillary, and why there were so many Clinton supporters in the crowd.

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by WonkoSteve

So who lost the Demo debate last night? Some say it was CNN. The Wonkosphere thinks they morphed it into a football game, and snuck extra players onto the field.

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by WonkoKevin

Over the last two weeks, John McCain has been working the trail harder than any other Republican candidate, spending 12 of 14 days out in the field. McCain’s Most Excellent Tour included 4 days in Iowa (a total of 11 different stops), 3 days in New Hampshire (8 stops), 4 days in South Carolina (12 stops), and 1 day in Michigan (1 stop). Conversely, Ron Paul’s schedule can only suggest he is being severely mishandled, or he is not a serious candidate. Getting nominated only comes from winning delegates, which only comes from being active on the trail. Paul’s schedule has only officially had 5 of the last 14 days booked, with 3 days (total of 6 stops) in South Carolina, and one day each in Pennsylvania and Illinois (huh?). Now I know that a candidate may be doing very important stuff on the days they’re not schedule for an official stop–private stops, fundraising, mainstream media–but there’s only 2 months left… Paul’s best chance at a high-place finish early on is in New Hampshire, yet he has not been there since September 29! (Data comes from Slate’s “Map the Candidates“.)

Rudy Giuliani–while being very busy with only 3 unscheduled days–gets the award for most travel miles, and perhaps the award for the most unfocused schedule: 2 days in Iowa and New Hampshire, and 1 day each in South Carolina, DC, California, Missouri, New Jersey, Colorado, and Nevada. Mitt Romney had 10 of 14 days scheduled, with 3 days each in Iowa and New Hampshire, 2 days in South Carolina, and 1 day in Florida and Michigan. Fred Thompson and Mike Huckabee both had 7 of the 14 days scheduled. Huckabee had 2 days in IA and HN, 1 in SC, and 2 in Texas, while Thompson had 2 days in IA and SC, 1 in NH, 1 in DC, and 1 in Nevada.

So kudos to McCain for working it. Romney, who has been probably working it hardest over the entire campaign, had a busy and balanced 2 weeks. Thompson and Huckabee, right idea but you may want to step up the activity level. Giuliani–what’s your strategy? It’s not clear to me what they think they need to do in IA, NH, and SC. Ron Paul–why wouldn’t you want to spend every waking moment of every day in New Hampshire?

by WonkoKevin

I love the passion of Chris Matthews.  Agree with him or not, he is a Wonkogod.  Matthews was on Bill Maher this week… While most of the media covered Maher going out into the crowd to throw out a heckler, the most interesting part of the show was Maher’s interview of Russian-former-chess-champion-now-politico Gary Kasparov.  Matthew’s enthusiasm is as good as Kasparov’s Straight Talk Express.

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