Free-for-All 2008: Announcements, Announcements, Announcements

Announcements, announcements, announcements,
A terrible death to die, terrible death to die,
A terrible death to be talked to death,
A terrible death to die
Announcements, announcements, announcements,
Ohhh...

Is there any part of the American political process more inane than campaign announcements. The entire purpose of the exercise is to generate news ex nihilo and promote name recognition. In other words, they're all messing with my statistics!

Of course, the media isn't entirely credulous, and such "announced" candidates as Ron Paul and Duncan Hunter barely make a blip in the news. Of course, Paul, Hunter, and a bunch of other "who's?" are from the Republican side, which leads to the most interesting result of the chatter rankings this month. Ignore the status changes this month - those are deceiving - look instead at the absolute numbers. Last month, there were 13 GOP and 14 Dems over 600 chatter; this month there are 8 and 12, respectively. Likewise, 10 GOP and 11 Dems scored over 1,000 last month, this month there are 6 and 10. So Democrat numbers are down slightly, and GOP numbers are down sharply.

Why aren't the parties following the same trajectory? Is this an example of media bias? Plenty of Republicans have declared candidacy, or mulled it openly; there's no particular reason Democrat Tom Vilsack should have almost five times as many hits as Republicans Mike Huckabee or Duncan Hunter.

There is media bias at work here, but it's not - directly - bias against conservatives. Rather, it's the bias of covering and mentioning candidates with high name recognition. The Democrats do better in a period of "discretionary coverage" because they have better-established candidates. There's also feedback in this system: the media favors attractive left-of-center candidates, so they get better name recognition, so they're favored by the media, etc. This works as much (actually more) within the Republican camp as between the parties. After all, the papers have to think about both primaries, and they can't get Al Gore or Chris Dodd to run in the GOP. But they can lavish attention on McCain, Giuliani, Pataki and others who make for softer sound bites.

Obviously, there's a lot more going on in the rankings in general, and in any particular month, than a marginal phenomenon like media bias can account for, but clearly the choices of editors are writers are an influential part of what we observe as media chatter.

The monthly prediction...
Jan '07: Clinton & Obama over McCain & Giuliani
Dec '06: Clinton & Obama over McCain & Giuliani
Nov '06: McCain & Giuliani over Clinton & Warner
Oct '06: McCain & Giuliani over Clinton & Warner
Sep '06: McCain & Giuliani over Clinton & Warner
Aug '06: McCain & Giuliani over Clinton & Warner
Jul '06: Clinton & Warner over Allen & Romney
Jun '06: Clinton & Warner over Allen & Romney
May '06: Clinton & Warner over Allen & Romney
Apr '06: Clinton & Warner over Allen & Romney
Mar '06: Clinton & Warner over Allen & Rice
Feb '06: Clinton & Warner over Allen & Rice

Rank	Candidate	Chatter	Rank Change
R.1	Sen. John McCain	6,718	0
R.2	Gov. Mitt Romney	3,645	0
R.3	Secy. Condoleezza Rice	3,141	+3
R.4	Rudy Giuliani	2,975	-1
R.5	Sen. Chuck Hagel	1,394	+6
R.6	Sen. Sam Brownback	1,321	-1
R.7	Sen. George Allen	792	+5
R.8	Gov. George Pataki	756	+2
R.9	Newt Gingrich	523	0
R.10 (tie)	Gov. Mike Huckabee	406	-3
R.10 (tie)	Rep. Duncan Hunter	406	-2
R.12	Rep. Tom Tancredo	390	+3* (new)
R.13	Tommy Thompson	302	0
R.14	Sen. Bill Frist	290	-10
R.15	Gov. Jeb Bush	173	-1
...............	...............................................	.......................	...............
D.1	Sen. Hillary Clinton	6,047	0
D.2	Sen. Barack Obama	5,818	0
D.3	Sen. John Kerry	4,440	0
D.4	Sen. John Edwards	3,915	0
D.5	Sen. Joseph Biden	3,311	+2
D.6	Sen. Harry Reid	2,737	0
D.7	Sen. Christopher Dodd	2,171	+3
D.8	Gov. Tom Vilsack	1,970	-3
D.9	Gov. Bill Richardson	1,759	0
D.10	Al Gore	1,053	+1
D.11	Howard Dean	992	+1
D.12	Sen. Evan Bayh	731	-4
D.13	Wesley Clark	316	+2
D.14	Sen. Russ Feingold	312	-1
D.15	Gov. Mark Warner	310	-1

Notes: The Chatter Rankings are created by searching each candidate's name plus "2008" in the Google News database. This month tested but not qualifying are Ron Paul and Al Sharpton.

See new graphs of the Chatter Rankings plus Chatter Rankings from December 2006, November, October, September, August, July, June, May, April, March, February, December 2005, August, July, June, and May.

Today's Ice Storm

Rochester's weather this weekend was indeed a "wintry mix". This morning, freezing rain became a small ice storm, coating trees, cars, and buildings in a quarter-inch of ice. The pedestrian bridge to campus had a solid inch frozen onto it. Fortunately, I didn't have much more to do this weekend than read and root for the PATRIOTS! My reading over the last week includes 1776, City of God, Ender's Game, and Ender's Shadow. I have one more day of relative freedom before classes start!

Ice storms are beautiful; these photos don't really capture the amazing whiteness of it, but here you go.

Stalkerbook Item of the Day

Weston Ruter posted a video. Spiders on Drugs. An experiment from the '60s to see how spiders react to different drugs.

Thousands of Kelos

An Opinion Journal guest article highlights a new crop of stomach-turning abuses of power by revenue-hungry local governments. Using coercion,

Rather than condemn the property for a private developer and risk a lawsuit, Burien came up with a plan--it would put a road through the property, and the city manager told his staff to "make damn sure" it did. When a subsequent survey revealed that the road would not affect the building itself, but only sideswipe a small corner of the property, the staff developed yet another site plan that put the road directly through the building.

redefinition,

Auburn recently declared much of its beautiful downtown "blighted," and adopted a Community Renewal Plan. One city manager explained that blight "means anything that impairs or arrests sound growth"

and outright corruption,

A developer in the Port Chester, N.Y., demanded that Bart Didden give him either $800,000 or a 50% share in Mr. Didden's property, which was slated to be a CVS pharmacy--or the developer would have the village condemn it. Mr. Didden refused; the next day, the village condemned his property to hand it over to the developer to construct a Walgreens. Tomorrow, the U.S. Supreme Court will consider whether to take the case.

in the onward march from the outdated notion of "government by consent of the governed" to the new old-fashioned way: for-profit government.

As America becomes more populous, more sophisticated, and more governed, we need to bolster the Constitution with a more robust definition of "consent of the governed." Government by voting majorities - which in small communities may represent 10 or 15% of all citizens - is not the same as government by consent of the governed. The U.S. Constitution was not written to give power to the government, but rather to limit the powers of government. It's high time to enforce the spirit of the document by clarifying and bolstering the fences that America's kind guardians have been quietly dismantling for the past two centuries.

What Did We Do To Deserve This?

David Beckham is coming to play in America. Dear Lord. Talk about world-wide branding!

This move is the mirror image of the Dice-K signing by the Red Sox, but is born of the same motivation. The Red Sox signed Japan's "National Treasure" - aged 26 - to rope a nation of eager and well-off fans into a rivalry ten timezones away. Beckham's move is even more grandiose: it is intended to jump-start an entire league, both domestically and internationally. With success, Beckham's stint in Los Angeles will make the Galaxy the team Americans either love or hate (in which case, they'll go online and find out just which MLS team they live nearest) and will notify the rest of the world that Americans do in fact have football teams.

U.S. Enters Somali Civil War

According to CBS News, the U.S. has joined Ethiopia, the Somali TNG, and Kenya in the annihilation of the remaining Somali Islamists, who are concentrated in forests near the Kenyan border. U.S. involvement is limited to coastal patrols and - now - airstrikes. Since the U.S. government refuses to confirm the attacks yet, we don't have a good idea of the scope or targets, but this may represent an important turning point in the East African conflict.

Update: Shabelle Media Network reports from Mogadishu, posted in AllAfrica, that the TNG confirms and supports the U.S. air strikes, mentioning the 'Q-word':

Somalia's President Abdulahi Yusuf Ahmed, who has held a press conference at the presidential palace, Villa Somalia, in the capital Mogadishu, said he firmly supports the American air bombardment on suspected al-Qaeda hideouts in southern Somalia last night.

I am incredulous of the target really being al-Qaeda, but it's certainly a helpful excuse for both the U.S. and the TNG.

Non a 2007

I have to doff my beret to the gaggle of Nantesians who parodied their nation's propensity to protest. The Beeb reports:

Demonstrators in the western city of Nantes waved banners reading: "No to 2007" and "Now is better!" The marchers called on governments and the UN to stop time's "mad race" and declare a moratorium on the future.

However, I disagree. I'm glad to see 2006 over, and I hope to fare 2007 well on better terms fifty-two weeks hence.