The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

Episode 4 of my podcast ( I Feel Snitty ), entitled, "Jake Tapper: The Least Trusted Name in Debates," received the following comments: - "This is great!" - "This one is my favorite so far! Great job!" Check it out at this link: https://ifeelsnitty.podbean.com/e/jake-tapper-the-least-trusted-name-in-debates/

I released my pre-debate rankings a couple of days ago ( https://thekind-heartedsmartaleck.blogspot.com/2019/06/democratic-candidate-rankings-pre.html) . As I vowed, here now are my post-debate rankings, with the change in their rankings noted in parentheses: 24) John Delaney (-7) 23) Mike Gravel (+/-0) 22) Wayne Messam (+/-0) 21) John Hickenlooper (+/-0) 20) Marianne Williamson (+4) 19) Jay Inslee (+/-0) 18) Eric Swalwell (+/-0) 17) Michael Bennet (+3) 16) Andrew Yang (-5) 15) Beto O'Rourke (-8) 14) Steve Bullock (-1) 13) Tim Ryan (+3) 12) Seth Moulton (+3) 11) Bill de Blasio (+3) 10) Amy Klobuchar (-1) 9) Tulsi Gabbard (+1) 8) Joe Biden (+/-0) 7) Bernie Sanders (-2) 6) Kirsten Gillibrand (+/-0) 5) Julian Castro (+7) 4) Cory Booker (+/-0) 3) Pete Buttigieg (+/-0) 2) Elizabeth Warren (+/-0) 1) Kamala Harris (+/-0) Who should stay in? 1) Kamala Harris 2) Elizabeth Warren 3) Pete Buttigieg 4) Cory Booker 5) Julian Castro ...

Almost exactly 2 months ago I released my initial rankings of the 24 (yes, 24) Democratic candidates running for president in the 2020 election. With the first two Democratic debates taking place Wednesday and Thursday of this week, I thought I'd update my rankings, and then do so again following the debates. Here are my updated rankings (my initial rankings can be viewed at this link -  https://thekind-heartedsmartaleck.blogspot.com/2019/04/the-democratic-candidate-countdown.html ), with the change in their rankings noted in parentheses: 24) Marianne Williamson (-1): Her recent comments regarding vaccinations will need some clarification and alteration if she wants to climb out of the cellar. Even then, she'll likely only peak around 22 or 23, so... :: gives her two thumbs up and a sarcastic facial expression :: 23) Mike Gravel (+/-0): Didn't even know this guy was running for president? You're not alone. The guy is pushing 90 and is more likely to be seen at a n...

While Fox News hosted the first Republican debate this primary season, CNN has hosted the past two debates, one for both the Republican and Democratic parties. Their Republican debate was mostly moderated by Jake Tapper and the Democratic debate was moderated by Anderson Cooper. Jake Tapper seemed to treat the former of the two debates like a hybrid of a reality television show and a TMZ special. The vaguer and more intense the responses from Republican candidates Tapper got, the more likely he was to get excited and return the favor by asking another series of general yet insensitive questions, hoping to spark a fist-fight. Anderson Cooper, meanwhile, treated the latter of the two debates like a hybrid of an actual debate and a conspiracy forum. At times he'd ask ridiculous questions which seemed to derive from a right-wing conspiracy-oriented website, yet he'd consistently ask each candidate for specifics, and when he wasn't satisfied with a response, he wasn't coy to...

While it can certainly be difficult engaging in a civilized and productive debate with an individual who has a differing viewpoint from your own, I find that to especially be the case when their argument comes from nothing but a moral perspective. There's absolutely nothing wrong with an individual defending their beliefs of what is right and wrong; however, this is typically accompanied by a black-and-white manner of thinking, which makes it next to impossible to reason with them beyond their limited moral scope. I find that allowing our preconceived notions of morality to determine our opinions limits our willingness to expand our knowledge with regard to such issues, which could result in the evolution of those very opinions. A strong emotional attachment also seems to often times be present to one's moral views, devoid of evidence to support such beliefs. Even if evidence debunks such an individual's opinion, emotion tends to trump facts. This is why I rarely pu...

A friend of mine recently said that while some people have seen the Republican debates as jokes to this point in the primary season, they're anything but, and should be taken quite seriously. While I agree that, in the grand scheme of things, these debates should be taken seriously (after all, they could hold a significant impact on who the nominees are in next year's election), the debates to this point have been sorry excuses for jokes. I've watched all four Republican debates to this point, both the junior varsity and varsity debates, and as sad as it is to say, the two junior varsity debates were of higher quality than the two varsity debates. The two junior varsity debates included six and four candidates, respectively. With between four and six candidates sharing the stage, this allowed each significant air-time to provide a clearer picture of who they were and what they stood for to the viewing audience. Not only that, but with just four to six candidates on stage,...

Approximately 48 hours after the first pair of Republican presidential primary debates, fact-checkers nationwide decided to call it quits on fact-checking the three hours worth of debates from Thursday night. Many called fact-checking the three hours worth of debates between the 17 candidates "the hardest, most migraine-inducing work we'd ever done." The fact-checkers guess at least 35% of them contemplated suicide and another 45% suffered alcohol poisoning before being rushed to the hospital over the past couple days. One fact-checker, who shall remain unnamed, allegedly reached a point where he started ripping off his clothes, running in circles, and repeatedly yelling, "Idiocracy!" When interviewing several of these very fact-checkers, here's what else they had to say about their experience: - "I only got through half of the first debate, because after almost every candidate's response, I had to ask myself, 'Wait, did they really just say w...

So, I heard the GOP held a couple of debates last night. Okay, I admit I watched them. It was the most I had watched Fox News in, well, forever - and yes, I mean that literally, for as long as I've been living anyway. Here's what I learned from the two debates. In the first debate, the seven second-tier candidates discussed matters for an hour, and while most people believe Carly Fiorina was the standout from the debate, my feeling of it was, "None of them have a serious chance of becoming the party's nominee." The questions felt lazy, as did many of the responses, and it had the feel of a bunch of 5-6 teams (in college football) attempting to win #6 just to qualify for a bowl game. Fiorina may have outshined the other six candidates, but in all reality, the only thing it did for her was to perhaps make the eventual nominee think about her as his running mate. Rick Perry showcased he's backtracked on his being able to count to two, as when asked to describe ...

What do Ohio Governor John Kasich, State Treasurer Josh Mandel, Attorney General Mike DeWine, and Secretary of State Jon Husted all have in common, besides being Republican? They've been ducking debates leading up to election day. In Governor Kasich's case, his campaign feels that, with such a large lead over Democratic challenger Ed Fitzgerald, it could only potentially do the governor harm to participate in debates. Given many Republicans' issues in such settings leading up to the 2012 elections, perhaps many have opted to go the silent route, thinking it's less potentially damaging than actually attempting to answer moderators' questions by opening their mouths. Regardless of the reason or excuse, however, I think this strategy is very disrespectful to voters. What are independents, moderates, and undecideds supposed to weigh their decisions on? Misleading ads and fliers? Newspaper endorsements? Biased radio shows and cable news networks? Good luck with that....

I don't typically like to brag, but I have to say that with regard to my predictions during this election season, I've been closer to perfect than Halle Berry with a British accent. As I mentioned in an earlier post today, I called 50 of the 51 states (including D.C.) correctly in the election last night and guessed 46 of the 51 accurately when it came to specific margin of victory. Florida was my only hiccup, as I gave Romney an ever so slight edge and it appears as if Obama is going to carry the state. I predicted the winner of all four debates accurately and guessed the margin of victory correctly on three of the four. In the fourth and final debate, I gave the president a slight edge, but thought that the CBS snap poll would only show him winning by a score which was in the margin of error and that wasn't the case, as according to that poll, it was his most dominating performance of the three presidential debates. I also correctly called out the Gallup tracking po...

I honestly don't mean for the title of this blog to come across as arrogant or like I have all the answers. I don't. However, political debates are becoming a bigger joke than the NFL replacement refs. The thing about it is, I don't even need to make my opinions known in most of these debates. I don't feel prompted to get involved in a debate unless I read or hear something which I know to be false. Unfortunately (for them and for me in a way), this happens quite regularly. I read, research and fact-check with more regularity than meteorologists give an inaccurate forecast. I've found that most people don't do this. They resort to partisan opinion-oriented shows in order to provide them with "knowledge" and seem to then often times mistake opinion as fact and vice versa. So these debates often times go something like this: Them: "Barack Obama is a Muslim, socialist born in Kenya and his wife thinks he deserves the presidency because he's...

I have finally discovered Mitt Romney's secret talent - he can see the future! Think about it - in the past few days, before President Obama even released a statement regarding the attacks in Egypt and Libya, Romney stated that the president sympathized with the attacks and apologized for America. Now, two and a half weeks before the debate, the Republican nominee for president had this to say in an interview with George Stephanopoulous: "I think the challenge that I'll have in the debate is that the president tends to, how shall I say it, to say things that aren't true. I've looked at prior debates. And in that kind of case, it's difficult to say, 'Well, am I going to spend my time correcting things that aren't quite accurate? Or am I going to spend my time talking about the things I want to talk about?" This makes sense. Perhaps Romney is behaving in the manner he is because he can see into the future, where on November 6th, he's going to...

This is getting to be ridiculous. I really can't wait for when we draw closer to the election and the Obama team decides to expose Mitt Romney's outrageous flip-flops. He's at it again, with regard to healthcare reform (again). Let's think about this for a moment... Mitt Romney passed what has been termed Romneycare when he was Governor of Massachusetts. Obamacare, as it's been called, is pretty much identical to the before-mentioned Romneycare, yet the Republican presidential candidate said his first order of business, should he be elected, would be to repeal Obamacare. On NBC yesterday, Romney said that "there are a number of things that I like" about Obamacare - you know, that bill he said he'd repeal right when he stepped into office as the new president should he win the election. He claimed to liking the fact that, under Obamacare, people with pre-existing conditions won't be rejected for healthcare coverage and also a portion of it which...

On August 23rd of 2012, it can be confirmed that the November presidential election is over and we will have ourselves a new man in the Oval Office - Mitt Romney. Yes, that's right - prior to either party's convention, a debate - two and a half months before the election, the race has been decided. The Republican nominee - Mitt Romney - has come away with 320 electoral votes and President (for the time) Barack Obama finished with just 218. Romney won the states of: Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Colorado, Wisconsin, Minnesota and New Hampshire. Okay, so it's not November; it's not even September, but that doesn't seem to matter to political science professors Ken Bickers of Colorado-Boulder or Michael Berry of Colorado-Denver. They've devised a forecasting model which made the before-mentioned prediction and which they claim has never been wrong before. I find this to be ridiculous. We haven't heard the two candidates debate yet. ...

One has to love how many polls are coming out with regard to the 2012 Presidential Election. Within a 3-day span last week, we were showcased two polls which revealed just how pointless they are at this stage in the election season. Conservative-leaning Rasmussen released polls which showed Obama at -10 in approval rating (44% approve, 54% disapprove) and had him trailing Mitt Romney by 5 points. Just a couple days later, Bloomberg released a poll which showed Obama at +9 (53% approve, 44% disapprove) with Obama ahead of Romney by 13 points (53-40). So, what can we make of that? In my opinion, absolutely nothing. The two candidates haven't even debated yet. Let's calm down with laying claim that there is any significance in these polls until the two actually duke it out once or twice via debates. While the Republican Primary seemed never-ending on certain levels, we still have over 4 months to go until election day and what a fun 4 months that will be on cable "news"....