As the Republican presidential candidates’ debate in Michigan yesterday illustrated, GOPers (with the partial exception of a confused-sounding Mike Huckabee) dutifully lined up in support of Bush’s veto of S-CHIP expansion legislation, defying both public opinion and the sensibilities of Sen. Charles Grassley, who happens to be from the first state in the nominating contest.
At the Washington Post, Ruth Marcus has a good write-up of where the candidates are, why they are there, and the price they may ultimately pay for treating a successful and highly popular health care program as “socialized medicine.”

Just an observation, following-up on our staff post below on the Des Moines Register poll. Check out Patrick Healy’s article “New Program for Saving Is Proposed by Clinton” in today’s New York Times. An interesting coincidence that candidate Clinton, whose campaign is increasingly being described as a “juggernaut,” (see here, for example) comes out with an innovative federal “401K-style” program on the heels of of the Register poll showing 51 percent of the likely caucus-goers are over age 55. The hunch here is that Clinton’s exceptionally-alert strategists figured this out a long time ago, in addition to the fact that seniors always rule when it comes to turn-out percentage. Heck, the picture with Healy’s article alone almost tells the story. Don’t be surprised by a rash of “me too” proposals suddenly emerging from the rest of the Dem field.

In his Pollster.com post, Mark Blumenthal analyses and distills the latest data of the well-regarded Des Moines Register poll. Blumenthal’s post doesn’t provide much in the way of horse-race statistics, but he picks demographic nuggets that provide an informative profile of Iowa Caucus voters.

Much of the content, on economic policies at least, of the Republican candidates’ debate in Dearborn (not Detroit, as I misrepresented it earlier today) this afternoon would have sounded perfectly normal twenty years ago. Lowering taxes, reducing regulations, and cutting public spending (in the abstract) are the eternal, divinely-established rules for growing the economy. Entitlement programs are out of control. Relentless optimism is America’s greatest economic asset. If you substitute “China” for “Japan,” even the hand-wringing of Hunter and Tancredo about trade sounded perfectly familiar. And Ron Paul’s lectures about monetary policy sounded a lot like those of Jack Kemp back in the day.
The one candidate who might have taken the debate in a different direction was Mike Huckabee, who likes to talk about economic inequality (not that he proposes to do anything about it other than a highly regressive national sales tax). But he was virtually ignored by the questioners for much of the debate, and then he strangely delivered his rap on pay disparities in the form of a warning to Republicans that people might resort to joining unions! (He also flubbed a chance to distinguish himself from the field on S-CHIP by refusing to say whether he would have vetoed the bill in Congress).
But beyond economic policy, the most alarming segment of the debate was the candidates’ answers to the question about whether a president should seek congressional authorization for military action against Iraq. With the obvious exception of Ron Paul, and the partial exception of Fred Thompson (who at least, by mentioning the War Powers Act, seemed to recognize there are some legal restrictions of executive military powers), the candidates all treated congressional authorization of military action as purely a matter of political expediency. Mitt Romney appeared to dismiss the constitutional issues by saying he’d “refer it to the lawyers.”
They are giving us all fair warning, folks.

The Republican candidates for president are gathering this afternoon in Detroit for a debate on economic issues sponsored by The Wall Street Journal and MSNBC (telecast live at 4:00 EDT on CNBC, and rebroadcast at 9:00 EDT on MSNBC). It ought to be an edifying show, in the sense of displaying that the conservative conquest of the Republican Party extends beyond national security adventurism and social-issues extremism.
Jonathan Chait has an op-ed in today’s New York Times reminding us that Republican fealty to the completely discredited supply-side theory of economics is at an all-time high. He singles out John McCain’s surrender to the supply-siders as exemplifying their iron control of the GOP:

Last year, Senator John McCain earned widespread ridicule for publicly embracing Jerry Falwell, whom he had once described as “evil.” But an equally breathtaking turnabout occurred earlier in the year, when Mr. McCain embraced the Bush tax cuts he had once denounced as an unaffordable giveaway to the rich. In an interview with National Review, Mr. McCain justified his reversal by saying, “Tax cuts, starting with Kennedy, as we all know, increase revenues.” It was the political equivalent of Galileo conceding that the Sun does indeed revolve around the Earth

The debate may showcase some ideas a lot nuttier than eternal life for Bush’s tax cuts. A Wall Street Journal article by Amy Schatz yesterday focused on Fred Thompson (who will be making his first candidate forum appearance in Detroit) and his views on tax policy. Maybe I’m reading it wrong, but Schatz appeared to suggest that Fred’s main economic goal is to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits in order to pay for a cut in corporate tax rates. Now that’s a vote-winner! (Fred also seems inclined to launch a trade war with the European Union–not usually thought of as the source of America’s biggest trade problems–by exempting exports from federal taxation).
So if you work at home or work for someone who doesn’t object to blowing two hours watching a bunch of old white men in suits speaking in the economic equivalent of The Unknown Tongue, you should check out today’s debate. It will provide a timely reminder that these guys live in a very different America than most of the rest of us.

For all of the media coverage and water-coooler buzz about global warming as an issue of concern, it checks in fairly low in priority rankings, when it is listed at all. Most recently, it ranked 7th in a New York Times/CBS News poll conducted 7/9-17.
But such rankings of the importance of issues may understate the depth of concern many people have about global warming. A national survey conducted by Yale University, Gallup and the ClearVision Institute 7-23-26 and released last week indicates that 40% of respondents now say that presidential candidates’ positions on the issue will “strongly influence” their vote in both the presidential primaries and general election.
The survey also found that 85 percent favored requiring automakers to increase the fuel efficiency of cars, trucks and SUVs to 35 mpg, “even if it meant a new car would cost up to $500 more.” In addition, 82 percent of respondents want to require that at least 20 percent of electricity comes from renewable sources, even if it costs an extra $100 annually. However, two-thirds of respondents opposed raising gasoline taxes and 71 percent were against raising electricity taxes to curb carbon emissions.
Democrats have a significant edge in addressing global warming. An NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll conducted 7/27-30 found that 48 percent of adults said the Democratic Party would do a “better job” of addressing the issue, while only 9 percent favored the Republicans.
Democrats are expected to provide the needed leadership on the issue, a challenge that is proving increasingly difficult for a party well-short of a veto-proof majority. As Daniel W. Reilly explains in his post on the topic at The Politico, “Democrats have held more than 120 hearings on global warming and have delivered countless speeches in this Congress. Yet a climate change bill is still in the drafting stages in the Senate.”
With a president hostile to environmental reform in the white house, enactment of global warming reforms could be more than a year away. But clearly, the low regard the public has for the GOP’s commitment to curb global warming gives Dems an advantage. In light of the alarming greenhouse gas threshold announcement in today’s WaPo, highlighting the difference between the parties on the issue could make a pivotal difference in the ’08 presidential and congressional elections.

Lots of progressive activists are agonizing about John Edwards’ campaign fundraising woes. But the more dramatic money saga is on the Right, where third quarter fundraising numbers appear to confirm that Mike Huckabee, for all of his yeasty ideological and personal qualities, just can’t raise the dough.
After all, Huckabee is almost perfectly positioned to finish second or third in Iowa. Were he to beat Fred Thompson there, he’d not only become the Hot Item in the Republican race, but would probably become the overwhelming favorite of the Christian Right. Moreover, he’d roll into New Hampshire touting a national sales tax plan that makes both corporate and “populist” conservatives drool. He’s got the rock band; he’s got the humor; he’s got the weight loss; he’s got the Kevin Spacey looks. He’s got every political insider in the hep world expecting him to make a move and keep the contest interesting.
As the old saying goes: If he had some ham, he’d make a ham sandwich, if he had some bread (pun intended).
With every imaginable realistic-longshot advantage, Huckabee raised about a million in the third quarter. By contrast, Ron Paul, whose only real function in the campaign is to ensure that candidate debates don’t sound like a jingoistic echo chamber on Iraq, raised five times that much. Ol’ Fred raised nine times that much. And though we haven’t seen Sam Brownback’s numbers yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if the doomed Kansan outraised Huckabee.
Unless something changes real fast, Huckabee’s campaign will become a talking point in every professional fundraiser’s pitch to future political campaigns.

Speaking of Iowa, there’s new data on the current preferences of those almighty likely Caucus-goers. It’s the latest installment (and the first since May) of the Des Moines Register’s Iowa Poll, which has a large impact because the results are so often referred to in the Register‘s much-followed campaign coverage.
Among Democrats, the major news was another confirmation that Hillary Clinton’s in the lead (contradicting the recent Newsweek poll of Iowa showing Obama in the lead). More important than the numbers (Clinton 29, Edwards 23, Obama 22, Richardson 8, Biden 5) is the finding that HRC is supported by nearly half of those (one-third of the total) who say they’ve definitely made up their minds. The poll could also pour a bit of cold water on the Richardson campaign; the Guv was at 10 percent in the Iowa Poll back in May.
On the Republican side, the poll shows the two candidates who dissed Iowa by skipping the August State Republican Straw Poll slipping into fourth and fifth place, with Rudy Guiliani falling from 17 percent to 11 percent since May, and John McCain diving from 18 percent to 7 percent. The major beneficiaries of that lost support appear to be Mike Huckabee, now in third place with 12 percent, and Fred Thompson (not a candidate back in May), who’s now at 18 percent, trailing front-runner Mitt Romney (29 percent, down 1 from May). Fred’s robust support levels are somewhat surprising; he’s only been in the state once since his touring-the-State-Fair-in-a-golf-cart fiasco in August. But that doesn’t mean he’s necessarily got the kind of organization that could convert that support into Caucus results. Once again, Iowa Exceptionalism is on display in this poll, which provides no evidence of the Rudy boom or the McCain revival that national polls have shown.

Eriposte at The Left Coaster takes a stab at answering an interesting question, “Is Hillary Clinton a ‘Corporate Democrat’“? Eriposte concludes that front-runner Clinton is less “corporate” than many Dems might believe, according to her track record. However, Eriposte flags Ari Berman’s Nation article “Hillary Inc.” making the opposite argument persuasively enough. It would be helpful if a smiliar analyis was applied to all of the candidates. For a good gateway link to the AFL-CIO voting ratings of candidates who are senators or congress members according to their votes on labor issues, click here.

From his perch at the Top of the Ticket blog at the L.A. Times, Andrew Malcom flags a fun feature at Beliefnet.com about the presidential candidates’ religious talk:

It’s called the God-o-Meter and it’s billed as “a scientific measure of God-talk in elections.” It’s a joint operation between Beliefnet and Time magazine and it rates candidates on the basis of what they’re saying about religion and the religious communities’ reactions to them.

As you might imagine it’s quite a horse-race in the GOP field, with Huckabee, McCain and Romney leading the pack with a three-way tie at 8 points. Readers may be surprised, however, to learn which Democratic presidential candidates also score an 8 on the God-o-Meter: Barack Obama and Bill Richardson, indicating perhaps that position on the left-right political continuum has little to do with the propensity for God talk. Dodd and Giuliani have the lowest scores, Dodd being the only candidate to refuse to talk about his religious beliefs in detail on principle and Giuliani because, well, “he doesn’t like to either,” according to Malcom.
(For readers seeking clues about their own spiritual direction, Beliefnet also has a 20-question quiz, “Belief-O-Matic,” which ranks the religious faiths and denominations most closely alligned with the test-taker’s beliefs. Despite the flip test name, the questions are thoughtfuil and provocative.)