From the Notebook

-Twins Podcast is live tonight at 8pm CT. The Call-in number is 646-652-4947

-Did an interview with King Banaian and Michael Brodkorb on the NARN Final Word show. Big thanks to them for having me on the show. We discussed the Burger Tour and a little politics. Podcasts of the interview should be available on Townhall.com. I was on the second (4 o’clock) hour of the show at the bottom of the hour.

-Really enjoyed this modern take on Hamlet, despite the fact everyone was Irish, the production values were subpar and all of the great Hamlet soliloquies were in Gaelic.

-Saw the Angelina Jolie movie “Wanted” at a cheap theatre. Not bad. Not great, not good. Just not bad. The movie attempted a sort of Martin Scorsese-like sociopathology to it but failed. Worth three bucks though.

-For anyone who hasn’t heard yet, I was very excited to hear about Sarah Palin, as I wrote about her over a month ago and suggested she’d be nearly the ideal pick for McCain.

Update: Already Gabcasting–

Gabcast! On The Road Podcasts #15

Update

-Got to finally meet Mr.D. at the State Fair the other day. Good guy.

-The comment policy at my website has changed, possibly temporarily. Anything non-constructive (especially anonymous snark) will be deleted at my discretion. Normally this is an everything goes but slurs and slanders website, but some recent comments have gotten me to reconsider my open comment policy. Regular insulting commenters (like plebe) will still be tolerated.

-I’m just going to keep one notebook post open everyday during the convention for my short takes on the proceedings. Longer essays will become their own posts. I’ll try to make it so there’s only one or two posts per day.

Quick Notes

-Though I’ll be leaving for the Convention on Saturday (and I’ll be at the State Fair Saturday). The Twins Podcast will still go on as scheduled. 8pm, Sunday (CT) the call in number is 646-652-4947.

-Among the many opportunities to be sent my way, I’ll be at a preview of the new spoof movie An American Carol on Sunday. The movie comes out in theatres Oct 3rd.

-Read Marx y Engels “Communist Manifesto” this week as part of the GBWW 10 yr reading program. Well, let me say I’m sick of Karl Marx. Once I finish the required readings of Marx in the GBWW program, that’s it for me. Considering I learned Marxism from Prof. Marquit at the U of M (who was a member of the Communist Party in Poland when it was still behind the iron curtain, so I didn’t fool around) I’m very confident I don’t have that much more to learn about communism (at least from communists) anyway.

-Be sure to check my Gabcast podcast page frequently during the conventions as I expect to be doing several podcasts from the convention each day.

-Here’s the awesome True North press pass Derek created for me:

I’ll be sure to scan in my real credentials after the convention.

Simple Way to Contact Me:

Since so many people are disgruntled that I don’t publish my email anywhere or otherwise give any way to contact me, here is a contact form. There is also a contact form on my About page and a seperate contact form which I’ll make available on the sidebar.

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Conservative Canon: An Encyclopedia?

Recently I purchased a copy of ISI’s American Conservatism; An Encyclopedia. Considering the list price is over 55 bucks, I was happy to pay the seven dollars (though I wouldn’t have paid much more) to get the book. Skeptical as to the worth of this book, I have nonetheless taken the time to read some random articles and entries. Quickly, this reference book has gained my favor, to the point where I’d like to open debate about its inclusion on the canon (or whether it will be relagated to “further suggested works”).

The book would act as simply a reference, and wouldn’t become part of any specific reading program. Since anyone trying to read through the Canon will doubtless run into people or concepts with which they are not familiar and having this book on hand will be very useful. More useful than wikipedia. Also, the articles are very enjoyable themselves and I find myself reading three or four a day. Discuss.

The Evidence

It was my theory that the Biden pick was a misstep and was hishandled by the Obama campaign. It’s difficult to test the veracity of such claims, but this poll (via Gary Gross, who really needs to learn how to properly use the phrase “begs the question”) appears to show the electorate was unmoved by the selection of Senator Joe Biden:

This results in Biden potentially having a net positive impact on voter support for the Democratic ticket of +7 percentage points — small by comparison with other recent vice presidential selections.

• A net 17% of nationwide registered voters said they were more likely to vote for John Kerry in 2004 on the basis of his selection of John Edwards as his running mate (24% more likely and 7% less likely).

• A net 12% of voters reported being more likely to vote for Al Gore in 2000 on account of his choosing Joe Lieberman (16% more likely and 4% less likely).

• A net 18% of voters indicated they were more likely to vote for Bob Dole in 1996 on the basis of his choice of Jack Kemp to complete the ticket (26% more likely and 8% less likely).

• A net 25% of voters were more likely to vote for Bill Clinton in 1992 on account of Al Gore (33% more likely and 8% less likely).

The only recent vice presidential choices to spark less voter reaction than Biden were Dick Cheney in 2000 (net 4%, with 14% more likely and 10% less likely) and Dan Quayle in 1988 (net score of 0, with 10% more likely and 10% less likely).

The mechanism of the voter reaction can’t be known. I think the Obama campaign didn’t properly use the potential earned media from their VP pick announcement to maximum effect. It might simply be the fact nobody really knows who Biden is. It might even be demographics, Biden might not be helping Obama where he really needs it (shockingly enough, Obama probably has the east coast elite crowd locked up already).

This isn’t a huge blunder on Obama’s part, the Convention will give him a healthy bounce anyway. However, it might be indicative of the campaign to come.

Twins Podcast Now Available

-The Twins podcast is up, Seth Stohs, Dan Wade, Josh Taylor and Jeff Straub joined me for a very long discussion on the Twins and at the end we discussed the Olympics as well. The best part of the podcast was my attempt to give the “Baseball is the sport of the proletariat” speech. Otherwise, I would really like to up my performances in the podcasts but luckily all the other guys are pretty good. My goal for the podcast this year was simply to have fun and provide good content and I think this has been accomplished. Skill and production value will have to wait.

Since the goal is to have fun, anyone interested in getting on the podcast email list can just drop a comment or email me at marty dot andrade at gmail dotcom. Otherwise, just call in. The show is spread by word of mouth so anything anyone wants to do to spread the show, I’ll support, short of spamming.

From the Notebook

-The Twins podcast is up, Seth Stohs, Dan Wade, Josh Taylor and Jeff Straub joined me for a very long discussion on the Twins and at the end we discussed the Olympics as well. The best part of the podcast was my attempt to give the “Baseball is the sport of the proletariat” speech. Otherwise, I would really like to up my performances in the podcasts but luckily all the other guys are pretty good. My goal for the podcast this year was simply to have fun and provide good content and I think this has been accomplished. Skill and production value will have to wait.

-Tony Garcia has listed some of the reasons he thinks he lost his show in St. Cloud. No surprises, personality conflicts and the scourge of all budding talk show hosts: syndicated programming. Might I suggest podcasting?

-Finished Shakespeare’s Hamlet as part of the Great Books of the Western World Ten Year Reading Plan. Hamlet is called the greatest drama ever written and for good reason. However, I got a little annoyed at how flaky Hamlet got. I also watched a couple of versions of Hamlet online, including the MST3K version. Fun stuff.

-One of the funnier quirks arising from my GBWW reading program is the fact my own English is becoming archaic (check to see how often I use amongst rather than among) and reading old books is getting a lot easier. Hamlet might as well have been a contemporary novel to me (a huge shift over previous times I read Shakespeare). “thus”es and “thou”s and British grammar come quite naturally to me now.

-Instead of actually prepping for the Twins Podcast, I spent the few hours between when I got off work Sunday and when the Podcast started reading George Orwell’s Animal Farm. I prefer 1984 over Animal Farm, as I think most contemporary readers will not understand the allegory in Animal Farm. Yet, I couldn’t put it down. Conservative Canon worthy.

-Last week I read Darwin’s Black Box by Michael Behe. Behe is an Intelligent Design proponent and a biochemist. In the book he presents the idea of “irreducible complexity” as proof for design in certain molecular structures found in living cells. I found his descriptions of these molecular structures (including the existence of cellular rotary engines) to be fascinating but I can’t adopt wholesale his argument. I don’t feel it’s theologically necessary.

-The Right Wing Wacko gave me “Cheat to Win” written by former LifeUSA CEO Bob MacDonald and I read it last week during my involuntary vacation (note: “involuntary vacation” is not code for “fired” as I am back at work this week). Considering this book was written by an insurance salesman who became CEO of an insurance company, it was very entertaining. And funny. And irreverent. This book is great. Anyone who has found themselves amidst the corporate culture will want to read this book. Thanks to the Wacko for the book.

The Twins Podcast

I’ll be hosting another Twins Podcast this Sunday night at 8pm CT.

The Call-in number is: 646-652-4947

The webpage is http://blogtalkradio.com/andrade and there’s a chat room feature everyone can use prior to and during the show.

Live Twins Podcast

I’ll be hosting another Twins Podcast this Sunday night at 8pm CT.

The Call-in number is: 646-652-4947

The webpage is http://blogtalkradio.com/andrade and there’s a chat room feature everyone can use prior to and during the show.

The Collapse of Campaign Security

Last week Wednesday it was pretty clear Biden was going to be Obama’s pick. By Thursday night I told my liberal co-worker friend Biden was going to be the pick. Friday is when the media began hounding the Obama Campaign about the VP pick and Friday night they were camped out anywhere Biden might be, to the point where I even heard about media people tracking airplane flights via radar.

Drudge reported Secret Service agents had taken over Biden’s security late Friday night and by about 1am NBC (might have been 1:30, I’m a little hazy in my memory) reported Biden was the pick on their live Olympics coverage. It wasn’t until 3am that people got their text messages from Obama on their phones.

The debacle is a classic example of when the operational security of a campaign collapses. Political campaigns are about carefully managing the message and trying to control the conversation on your terms. The media can explode on a story to either disastrous or positive effect. Controlling when information leaks out and how it leaks out allows the savvy campaign manager to predict not only the media reaction but also the reaction of the opposition party.

In a presidential campaign there are predictable events which will cause explosions of media. Concessions, VP announcements, debates, new polling data, conventions. These happen every presidential campaign and any political hack worth their salt will have plans dealing with these events. The VP announcement is perhaps the one event a campaign has the most control over.

As long as they can keep the secret long enough to take advantage of the media cycle.

Ideally, the candidate makes his decision (along with a few select advisers) and within 24 hours they have all their press kits ready to go and go public in the middle of the week where they’ll dominate the 24 hour news networks and prevent the opposition campaign from having prepared material to dampen the positive media exposure.

By being unable to keep the secret and releasing the VP pick in the middle of the night Saturday morning the Obama campaign has allowed the Republicans to rain on what should have been very positive media coverage parade.

Firstly, for the next 24 hours there is no major media cycle to speak of. The next “big important” political media coverage cycle are the Sunday talk shows. The McCain campaign thus has a full day to make plans for 1) TV ads 2) web viral videos 3) opposition research on Biden 4) the next media cycle. If Obama properly times his announcement for midweek, McCain spokespeople and supporters will be brought on the 24 hour news networks without a lot of prep time. They will be forced to speak on Biden without a “campaign message” about Biden and the various reactions could put the McCain campaign at a disadvantage. Now, however, the McCain campaign can pick and choose what their overall media theme will be in response to Biden. (BTW, that theme appears to be “Biden is the mentor” and I’m not sure how good that will be)

Secondly, McCain could decide to announce his VP pick on a Sunday talk show and take away all the potential media coverage Obama was expecting. No matter what, the Sunday talk shows will be giving equal time to the McCain campaign’s planned response and the Biden announcement will be old news by Monday, when the real media cycle begins.

All of this is important because the Obama campaign has thrown away millions of dollars in free media exposure. Not only have they given away tons of free media, they have actually given a great deal of free media to the GOP.

Thirdly, this makes the Obama campaign look immature and ineffective. The messed up their own VP media blitz. They couldn’t handle the pressure. They weren’t ready with a national message to go along with the Biden pick. This will create an opening for opposition criticism. How competent can we expect Obama’s administration to be when his campaign couldn’t even send those text messages in a timely manner?

In the next week the Dems will get a lot of positive media attention thanks to their National Convention. But they have allowed that positive attention to be isolated. This Sunday, the Biden announcement will face heavy criticism amongst the media in the talk show circuit. The next Sunday could be spent talking about the Convention, however, I think McCain could soften up that media coverage by announcing his VP pick on the Sunday talk shows and destroy the momentum Obama should be enjoying after the convention. Then, the RNC will bring more media attention to their ticket and dominate the media cycle for a solid 11 days. I don’t know if McCain will do it this way, but if he did I think it could give him a better convention bounce.

But let the lesson be clear, maintaining campaign informational intelligence (or security, depends on what Karl Rove training camp you’ve been through) is paramount to controlling the kind of earned media a campaign recieves.