Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been thinking about this for a while now…

Dear Skippy.

We hope that you know that among all the bloggers of the world, you are among our most favored. Your political insights and commentary so often mirror what we are thinking that often we don’t see the point of writing on a subject after you have discoursed on it. This election year (in the US) has not been different than past election years in that respect. We, like you, have thought from early on that Romney will be the nominee. We have also believed, as you have that President Obama will win re-election. This is not due to his deserving to be re-elected; but due to Romney and the Republicans being so pathetic.

We have read and taken to heart your many exhortations (including the latest one) that we should vote for Libertarian Gary Johnson for President of the United States. After much consideration, we have decided that we could, in good conscience, cast our vote for Governor Johnson. He is a sensible Libertarian, and although we don’t agree with him on all the issues - as if we have ever agreed with every candidate on all the issues, he does have a reasonable plan for addressing the most pressing problems facing the United States today.

This is a big step for us. We normally don’t believe in voting for 3rd party candidates in national elections. We believe that voting for the 3rd party candidate is not a “protest” vote in a meaningful sense but more “throwing one’s vote away.” This year though, the two major party candidates just aren’t doing it for us. So we have thought long and hard about voting for Governor Johnson.

But then a crazy thing happened to our home state of Virginia four years ago. For the first time in our life, Virginia went for a Democrat in a Presidential election. Virginia awarded her electoral votes to Barack Obama in 2008. Now, in 2012 it looks like Virginia is a “swing state.”

We wouldn’t need to see a talking head on some cable news program to tell us we are living in a swing state. We’ve lived it for nearly a year now. You can’t turn on the TV or radio (or often the interwebs) without being bombarded with political ads.

You know, for years we’ve wanted to see all the attack ads and know what it is like to be a contested marketplace. Now we’re wishing we could go back to the days when the only time you saw a political ad was when it was highlighted on the news or when you went looking for it on the interwebs. It has been hell. The ads are maddening in their omnipresence. It is enough to drive a man to drink (much more than he normally does).

So, Virginia is a swing state. For the first time in our lifetime, our vote actually does mean something (Presidentially speaking). Now we find we are faced with a major problem. Do we cast our vote for a deserving man (Gary Johnson) who has no chance of winning or cast our vote for Romney or Obama in hopes that our vote does affect the outcome of the national election.

We know that the press are reporting that (alternately) Virginia is very close or the President is slightly ahead. According to information we’re getting from people who have access to internal polling from the various campaigns, everything is within the margin of error of any poll.

If we thought that Virginia was going solidly for either Romney or Obama, we’d vote for Gary Johnson. But this year it seems to be a more prudent course to use the lesser of the evils approach to casting our vote. Although we don’t think it will help him in the broader Electoral picture, we will likely vote for Romney. He is not our first (or second or probably third - okay he is our second choice actually) choice; but he is a better choice than voting to re-elect President Obama. And just so you know, even using the lesser of two evils approach the choice between Romney and Obama is an unpleasant one. Neither man has a serious plan for directly addressing the most serious problems facing the US. But one man has had nearly four years to work on those problems and has pretty much fucked it up at every opportunity. So, perhaps change is the best course.

We’re actually quite disappointed that it has come to this. But there it is. We’re pretty much screwed no matter how we vote; but it is wiser to do it this way than any other.

Cordially,

Your Maximum Leader

PS - if you are ever down our way, you have an open invitation at the Villainschloss.

So there you have it.

Sad.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is sure you didn’t need him to notify you of the assaults on the Embassies of the United States in Egypt and in Libya. During the rocket attack on the Embassy in Libya, our Ambassador, Christopher Stevens, was killed with other Americans.

Like any sensible and patriotic American, your Maximum Leader is angry with Libya and Egypt. He hopes, but holds out little hope, that those who stormed our Embassy in Egypt will be severely punished. He hopes, but again holds out little hope, that those who attacked our Embassy in Libya will be hunted down and killed themselves. He would prefer if this were done through a judicial process by the governments of Libya and Egypt… But he is not hopeful.

Your Maximum Leader is unreformed when it comes to ambassadors and embassies. They are sacrosanct and must be protected at all costs by the host nation. In this he is rather like the Romans and Mongols. Harm our ambassador and we will do severe harm to your nation. Your Maximum Leader seems to recall a story about Genghis Khan going to war with some central asian Kingdom because they killed his ambassador. Genghis actually wanted peace with the kingdom, but felt he had to go to war (and destroy their cities, rape their women, and kill their sons) because of the killing of his envoy.

Now your Maximum Leader is well aware that another war is not what the US needs, wants, can afford, or is inclined to do. (As satisfying as razing Benghazi might be…) But he wouldn’t object to some airstrikes on worthwhile targets. Neither would he oppose the clandestine hunting down and killing of those we can identify as being responsible.

Your Maximum Leader would like more than a little outrage from his President and Secretary of State. But he honestly isn’t sure what they can/will do beyond their statements.

And just so you don’t think that your Maximum Leader is totally irrational in this… He is aware that there are very limited response options given that our long-term interest in these nations is to promote a stable (reasonably) pro-western government…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is going to forget how to blog if he keeps going on his intermittent rate of updating. Here are some thoughts and tidbits for your reading pleasure.

First off, in keeping with your Maximum Leader’s advocacy of King Richard III of England (per post below); you might be interested in knowing that archeologists believe that they have found the church in which Richard’s remains were buried after the King’s defeat and death at the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485. Here is the article: Lost medieval church found beneath parking lot. Here is the first bit of the piece:

The hunt for King Richard III’s grave is heating up, with archaeologists announcing Sept. 5 that they have located the church where the king was buried in 1485.
“The discoveries so far leave us in no doubt that we are on the site of Leicester’s Franciscan Friary, meaning we have crossed the first significant hurdle of the investigation,” Richard Buckley, the lead archaeologist on the dig, said in a statement.
Buckley and his colleagues have been excavating a parking lot in Leicester, England, since Aug. 25. They are searching for Greyfriars church, said to be the final resting place of Richard III, who died in battle during the War of the Roses, an English civil war. A century later, Shakespeare would immortalize Richard III in a play of the same name.
After his death in the Battle of Bosworth Field, Richard III was brought to Leicester and buried at Greyfriars. The location of the grave, and the church itself, was eventually lost to history, though University of Leicester archaeologists traced the likely location to beneath the parking lot for the Leicester City Council offices.

The article continues to say that if the archeologists find Richard’s grave, he will be reinterred in Leicester Cathedral.

Of course, your Maximum Leader’s readings have all pointed towards Richard’s body (bones mostly) being removed from his grave and thrown into the nearby River Soar during the Tudor dissolution of the monasteries. So it could be that Richard will not be found at all. Your Maximum Leader, for one, really hopes that they find Richard’s grave and are able to give him a proper royal burial.

Your Maximum Leader apparently bought too soon when he purchased Kindle Fires for himself (in June) and Mrs Villain (in August). Now Amazon has revamped and expanded the line of offerings in the Kindle Fire department. Your Maximum Leader is a little intrigued by the prospect of an HD Fire. The other interesting bit is the kid-proofing settings that are coming with the Kindle Fire OS upgrade. Villainette #1 and the Wee Villain frequently “borrow” one of the Kindles in the house. (The former to read books and the latter to watch videos.) It would be nice to put a filter on the items (mostly video content) that we could keep the kids from watching. Anyhooo… Your Maximum Leader should have waited and gotten the second Kindle later in the year when the new HD models were available.

Some commenters on the tablet computer market are writing that Amazon’s new Kindle Fires are game changers in the segment. Your Maximum Leader disagrees with this. He sees the Kindle Fire as an entertainment platform; whereas other tablets are computer surrogates with increased functionality. Perhaps most tablets are entertainment platforms and not computer surrogates to their owners… In which case, the new Fires might actually be game changers…

You might be curious to know your Maximum Leader’s thoughts on the recently completed national party conventions. He doesn’t have many thoughts on them. He didn’t watch anything beyond the recaps on morning newsfotainment programs (mostly ABC’s GMA to be honest). Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure how watching would benefit him at all. The candidates and their supporters are not adding anything of substance to national debate (such as it is). They are repeating tropes they’ve been trotting out for the past 18 months at least. Conventions are nothing more than pep rallies for the hardcore supporters. Your Maximum Leader can do without such pep rallies. He’s looking forward, without good reason by the way, to the Obama/Romney and Biden/Ryan debates. He is looking forward to them because there might be some real substance discussed at those events. He must emphasize the “might” in that last sentence. Debates are tightly scripted and rule-bound. That noted, they are live and extemporaneous to a limited extent. It is possible that one or both of the debaters might go off-script and something worthwhile come up. It hasn’t happened too often, but it does happen. So there is that.

So, you might be thinking, if your Maximum Leader wasn’t watching the political conventions; what was he watching. Why he was watching his beloved Washington Nationals baseball club. The Nationals continue to lead the National League East; and are battling it out for the best record in baseball (with the Cincinnati Reds). Your Maximum Leader loves baseball. He has always enjoyed watching the Nationals (in person and on TV). This season has been different. Your Maximum Leader tunes in (or arrives at the park) fully expecting to see the Nationals win a game. This has not been the case in past seasons. It is thrilling spectacle.

One of the things that makes your Maximum Leader so excited to watch the Nationals is the sheer potential of it. By potential he means that he honestly feels this team has no limitations on their ability to advance. Neither are they weighed down by history. Some of you out there might wonder what your Maximum Leader means by being weighed down by history. This is a hotly debated item. To explain further… Your Maximum Leader’s second favorite sport, ice hockey, serves as his example. His beloved Washington Capitals have been a great team for the past 5 years. But, they can’t get to the championship game in the playoffs (Division championship or Stanley Cup). The Caps are great to watch and exciting during the season. They make it to the post-season. Then your Maximum Leader expects them to make it to the second round and be eliminated. It has happened so many time in the team’s history it almost seems like a forgone conclusion. Your Maximum Leader is weighed down by negative expectations. It can be debated that the players (who come and go for the most part) feel this history as well. Players say that they don’t feel the weight of history on them as they are playing. But your Maximum Leader doubts that. The Caps potential seems limited - and will until they make it to a championship game. The Nationals aren’t like that. Baseball’s long history in Washington is punctuated by stretches of baseball’s absence from our city. While it is true that the Washington baseball club hasn’t make the playoffs since 1969 (the year your Maximum Leader was born) and hasn’t won in the playoffs since 1933 (before your Maximum Leader’s parents were born); it must be noted that there was no baseball in Washington from 1971 until 2005. So there really isn’t a history that weighs on the city or the players. This franchise can write its own history. Your Maximum Leader hopes it is great history at that.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader, whilst speaking with friends about this blog recently, was asked why he isn’t writing long political screeds this election year. Well… That is pretty easy. This election is not getting your Maximum Leader’s juices flowing. Allow him to briefly enumerate the reasons.

First, your Maximum Leader doesn’t particularly like either candidate. President Obama has been, in your Maximum Leader’s eyes, the European-style, left-of-center, mildly-socialist leader that he anticipated. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t want to say that he is an out and out socialist (as many on the right would). But he does have that left-wing collectivist bend that so many Democrats do. The President’s health care laws is the greatest example of this. Your Maximum Leader also feels that President Obama and his team are not particularly adept at what they do. Indeed, they don’t seem to have any plans with which to match up to their rhetoric. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t think that the President knows exactly what to do now, except get re-elected.

Secondly, Governor Romney is not your Maximum Leader’s favorite either. Your Maximum Leader feels that Romney would be the mirror of Obama. You would get a European-style, right-of-center, mildly-pro-business leader. Of course that would be an improvement; but it isn’t really thrilling either.

Third, your Maximum Leader has long believed that President Obama will win re-election in a squeaker. The bad economy and all of the other signs that point towards the President not winning re-election are not enough to overcome the advantages of incumbency, the polarization of the electorate (which will break slightly for Obama) and the weakness of Romney.

Fourth, neither candidate, party, or commentator is regularly talking about a serious plan to fix what ails our nation. We need to control spending and reduce the debt. In order to do this we need drastic spending cuts, and we need to grow government revenue. That means taxes of one sort or another. We are in a sticky wicket here as your Maximum Leader does feel that making the dramatic changes needed in the midst of an anemic economy will only worsen that economy. But the long-term problem looks to be more severe if you don’t act quickly and immediately. So, your Maximum Leader doesn’t have a plan to address the problems of the nation. He has a host of ideas that would move towards that end. All of the ideas are unpopular and would make your Maximum Leader completely un-electable to any position in the Federal government. Some of the ideas are: letting the “Bush” tax cuts expire; raising the retirement age for Social Security and means-testsing Social Security benefits; repealing Obamacare; drastically changing how Medicare and Medicaid work; drastically changing laws concerning how private health insurers can operate across state lines; and evaluating how we spend our defense dollars. We have to make changes and no one is talking about the areas of the federal budget that really cost money (Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid) and no one (except the President and he is only talking in half-measures) is talking about revenue/taxes. Basically, anyone with an iota of sense can see the problem; but no one in a position to do anything about the problems has the balls to take the first step.

Finally, there is no civility in talking politics. And where there is no civility in talking politics there is no joy in talking politics. Your Maximum Leader probably will make some pronouncements here between now and the election; but what he’ll say likely will not please anyone. The up-side of this is that his readership is so small now that the few of you who remain will likely not be too offended or too prone to be uncivil in your comments…

By the way… Your Maximum Leader means for you all to read the title of this post and think of Mel Brooks in “History of the World, Part 1.” (And your Maximum Leader still awaits History of the World, Part 2.)

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been remarkably tedious in his constant commenting that he has things to blog about, but very little time to do so. Well… One of the items that your Maximum Leader has meant to blog about for a while now has wound up in the Washington Post.

Your Maximum Leader is a careful donor of what money he sets aside for charity. One of the entities to which your Maximum Leader tries to give some money every year is the Institute for Justice. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t know if you have ever seen, or clicked through, the link on the right side navigation for the Institute for Justice, but it is there. IJ is a small law firm that fights for economic freedom in America. They got the most press when the, very sadly, lost the infamous Kelo vs. New Haven, CT case concerning eminent domain. Your Maximum Leader believes that IJ was right in its position in Kelo, and the US Supreme Court was very very wrong…

Anyhoo…

The Institute for Justice continues to fight for economic freedom and private property. Now their the face of their most recent fight are Benedictine monks in Louisiana who are trying to sell coffins. The story has made the front page of the Washington Post Online: Louisiana monks go to court to sell caskets.

The basic facts are these. The Benedictines want to sell caskets in their home state; but they were given cease and desist orders before selling their first casket. In Louisiana, only licensed funeral parlors (with funeral directors) can sell caskets. Louisiana law does, however, allow people to buy caskets on-line and use them. The IJ is fighting for the monks on the grounds that Louisiana’s regulations are irrational and unconstitutional (on due process and equal protection grounds).

Your Maximum Leader wishes that there was a particular passage he could cite here to give you the heart of the story, but there really isn’t. You should just go and read the Washington Post piece (clicky here). Or, if you want you can go over to the Institute for Justices’ web site and read their page on this case which has lots of good links and information.

Your Maximum Leader would also commend the Institute for Justice to you if you consider giving to advocacy organizations. This is a good one. You can donate to IJ by clicking here.

Read it all.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader got tired of looking at the last post at the top of his blog. Sadly, he doesn’t have a good idea for a single cogent post. He’s sure he’s had some ideas over the past few days; but his brain is blank now.

In politics there isn’t much out there for real commentary. Obama blah blah blah blah. Romney bleh bleh bleh bleh. The real race will not heat up for a while yet. Provided that there is much of a race. Your Maximum Leader still thinks that Obama will win re-election. Not because he deserves it mind you. Rather because Republicans are hell-bent-for-leather to be idiots. Romney is, of the crop who chose to run, the most electable. But just being the non-Obama is not going to win in November. Neither man is talking about the real issues facing our nation. Neither man seems serious about governing in a way that reverse the problems of spending, taxation and debt that imperil our nation’s future.

(NB to readers: Amazingly, no one seems to think that seriously discussing austerity and changes to federal spending and taxation is path to the presidency of these United States…)

If it is of any consolation, for those of you out there thinking that China is all the shit (Paul Krugman, your Maximum Leader is glaring at you)… The Economist just ran a podcast discussing Chinese demography and how the 1 child policy can likely cause massive economic distress in the 2030 and on timeframe. Apparently in rural China the birth rate is 1.7; in most urban areas it is closer to 1; but in the most cosmopolitan cities (Shanghai for example) the birth rate is .7. That will cause massive strain on China’s ability to maintain growth (and care for an aging population).

Of course, once China goes to hell there is no telling who will want to purchase US Treasury bills and finance our spending… India? We’re looking at you…

In other political news… Your Maximum Leader sees that sleezebag Tareq Salahi has filed papers to run for governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia. After nearly spitting out a mouthful of Makers Mark while reading that news, your Maximum Leader regained his composure and became more amused. This is a guy most famous for crashing a state dinner at the White House. He also has a habit of getting sued for not living up to his commitments and being a general asshole. One imagines that somehow this will somehow transform the “Real Housewives of DC” into a new reality show entitled “Governor’s Mansion Here I come!” Sweet jeebus… Just when you think politics couldn’t get any lower…

In sporting news…

Your Maximum Leader has long been disgusted with the complete disregard people in the Washington DC area have for all teams that are not the Washington Redskins. The Washington Capitals have been competing in (and yesterday won) a hard playoff series with the Boston Bruins. The Washington Nationals are the best team in the NL (and the second best in MLB). But what is everyone in Washington focused on? The NFL draft.

Your Maximum Leader believes that Robert Griffin III is likely a good guy and excellent football player. He may actually have what it takes to help the Redskins improve. But really now, at this point your Maximum Leader couldn’t give a damn about football and is now getting actively annoyed at continued football talk.

Your Maximum Leader caught his first Nationals game of the year last Friday. He watched his beloved Nationals win (a nail biter) over the (Florida) Miami Marlins. (NB to readers. The Marlins new stadium looks interesting, but their new uniforms look like crap.) It was a great experience. He is sure he’ll take in a number of games this season. He hopes that other Washingtonians will do so as well. It is embarrassing and tragic that the Nationals are doing so well and can’t sell more than 20,000 tickets to a weeknight game.

Did you know that if the Nationals play .500 ball the rest of the year they will make the playoffs? Really… Who knew?

As for the Capitals… Your Maximum Leader’s emotional state was a roller coaster ride during the first round of the playoffs. All peaks and valleys. He isn’t sure if he’ll hold up if the Caps go far. He is anxiously awaiting word of which team the Caps will draw in the next round of the playoffs. He feels the Caps will match up well against Florida or New Jersey. He isn’t so sure about the Rangers. And he dreads Philly. Philly seems to be on a mission this year.

Well… That is about it for now… Your Maximum Leader will think of other stuff and try and get some down here…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been a long-time reader of John Derbyshire’s pieces in National Review and elsewhere. He often found himself in agreement with many of Derbyshire’s (or Derb as he is known) opinion pieces. Even some of his more off-the-wall pieces found a sympathetic ear with me. (The only one that leaps to mind right now had to do with the looting of the Baghdad National Museum after the US invasion of Iraq. Derb’s position was that the looting might be a good thing in that the looter were likely to sell artifacts on the black market and they would wind up well cared for in the hands of private collectors and at some point in the future the would likely wind up back in some museum collection.)

Even though some of Derb’s opinion pieces on race-related subjects made your Maximum Leader a little squeamish; none of them seemed to go “too far.” They were considered pieces intelligently written, even if your Maximum Leader thought them wrong-headed.

Until this past weekend…

Derb’s piece in Taki’s Magazine over the weekend on “the Talk for nonblacks” was way over the line. Your Maximum Leader will not link the piece directly. (Although it is widely linked elsewhere, including at my buddy Kevin’s place where you will find his commentary as well).

Well… The piece got Derb fired from National Review. (As it should.) It also prompted your Maximum Leader to delete the links on this site to Derb’s personal web page and to Taki’s Magazine. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t make a fuss about de-linking different people or sites. (Most of the time it is just a purge of a link that is dead, or a purge of a link to a site your Maximum Leader never reads.) But this deserves an exception. Your Maximum Leader was repulsed by what Derb wrote, and equally repulsed that Taki’s Magazine showed no editorial oversight by publishing the piece.

And so that is the end of that. No more Derb (or Taki’s Magazine) for your Maximum Leader.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader got two great comments to the post below. Let us revisit them (for those of you who don’t like clicking).

First, from Smitty: “So, do you think the protest vote, and general indifference toward this mummer’s farce in VA, will lead to embarrassment for Romney.”

No, your Maximum Leader does not. The Virginia primary will be an afterthought in the commentary on the events of today. Romney and Paul followed the existing rules for participating and none of the other candidates did. Romney will get a win (with some delegates going to Paul due to proportional representation) and that will be that. Commentary will focus on what happens in other states, like Ohio. There is only one embarrassing situation your Maximum Leader can imagine for Romney. That scenario is that he wins less than 60% of the vote. If it is down to a choice between Romney and Paul and Mitt doesn’t pull out at least 60% then the “win” will be embarrassing. But only moderately. The news remains somewhere else.

Of course, the Virginia GOP and Democrat parties could and probably should be embarrassed by the primary. The restrictive rules to get on the ballot are likely going to be dropped as more people get angered by their lack of choice. If Virginia is truly a “swing” state; both parties would benefit from a rules revision. Your Maximum Leader is disappointed by the rules as they stand; but he has a rough time getting worked up about changing them. On the one hand he wants it to be easier to have choices; but on the other hand if one is serious about running for office you should know what it will take well ahead of time and make a plan. (NB: many are critical of Mitt for having been running for President for the past 4 years. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t fault anyone for that. If you want the job you actually have to make and act on these types of plans. Your Maximum Leader isn’t saying that it is a good thing that you have to run for President for 4 years; he is just saying it is what it is.)

Second comment from Eric:

You may not like Mitt, but a vote for Ron Paul, is a vote endorsing Islamo-Fascism, and a soft on terrorism foreign policy. Yes, he’s good on economics. But that doesn’t make up for the fact that his foreign policy views are decidedly surrender-tarian.

Islamism is the greatest threat this country faces. And anyone who appeases Islamists are siding with our enemies. It’s unconscionable that any Republican could vote for Paul, knowing this fact.

First off, thank you Eric for your comment. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t believe he’s ever seen you comment here before. He appreciates you taking the time to comment.

Your Maximum Leader, to be honest, doesn’t like any of the candidates running for President. He doesn’t want President Obama to win a second term. He can’t stand Rick Santorum. He really cannot abide by Newt Gingrich. And he feels mostly “oh hum” about both Paul and Romney. Your Maximum Leader disagrees with Ron Paul on more items than one can easily enumerate in the time he has to write this post. Your Maximum Leader believes that Ron Paul’s general conceptions of economics and foreign policy are impractical, unworkable and would be disastrous if attempted. That said, Paul’s positions are consistent and more or less understandable in the context of the type of libertarianism that he has always espoused. Would Ron Paul be a good President of the United States? No, he would not. The best a conservative can hope for is that Paul’s presence in the race will cause people to give more thought to smaller government and more liberty. Those overarching themes are positive and the GOP would do well to endorse and act on them.

As for Romney. Your Maximum Leader will have to fall back on William F. Buckley Jr.’s old maxim of voting for the most electable conservative available to you. Of the four candidates we’ve got to chose from, Mitt is it. That isn’t a ringing endorsement; but it is all he’s going to get from your Maximum Leader. Your Maximum Leader will not even claim that Mitt Romney is “conservative.” He is more to the right than President Obama is and he is more electable than the other three. Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure where people get the idea that Rick Santorum (who cannot win re-election in his own - swing - state) and Newt Gingrich (who has never won anything except his - now former - congressional district) are more electable than Mitt Romney. Admittedly, Romney has lost elections too (famously the MA senate race to Teddy Kennedy) but in a race that will be a nail-biter it seems like you need to have a broad appeal to regular voters. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t see how Santorum or Gingrich or Paul are widely appealing. Don’t get him wrong, your Maximum Leader isn’t trying to claim that Mitt Romney is widely appealing to all voters. He is only claiming that Mitt Romney is more appealing to voters than the others.

All that said, your Maximum Leader still believes that all things being equal, President Obama will win re-election.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader mused yesterday evening on Twitter (@maximumleader) about a number of things. For the sake of this post, he will focus on his tweet asking for whom he should cast his vote in Virginia’s “Super” Tuesday primary. Your Maximum Leader isn’t thrilled with his choices of Mitt Romney or Ron Paul.

So, your Maximum Leader and Mrs Villain did the logical thing… We split our two votes. We flipped a coin to decide who got to vote for whom and then bucked-up and did the deed.

So there you have it. Word from two Virginia voters. One for Mitt and one for Ron.

Your Maximum Leader notices over on The Other McCain that Smitty cast his non-Romney protest vote earlier today. Like Smitty, your Maximum Leader & Mrs Villain were outnumbered by election officials. Our ratio was 5:2. Your Maximum Leader was the 13th person to vote this morning. Smitty had to produce identification in order to be allowed to vote; your Maximum Leader did as well. Your Maximum Leader doesn’t understand why so many people (generally Democrats) have a problem with requiring people to show a photo ID in order to vote. It seems completely rational to have a person establish their identity before voting. But then again, who said anything involving democracy has to be rational.

Your Maximum Leader will take issue with Smitty on one issue. Smitty’s post implies (by my reading) that the Virginia GOP is solely responsible for the “no write-in” policy and the tough process by which a candidate has to get onto the ballot in the first place. (A process that was, for a time, contested by the Santorum and Gingrich campaigns.) It is your Maximum Leader’s understanding that these requirements are not just GOP’s - but are in fact just as applicable to Democrats. Many would argue that both parties in Virginia have a long history of making it hard to get on the ballot. This has been to give the state parties more control over the election process (and to depress voter turn out it is often alleged). Your Maximum Leader doesn’t disagree with the rules per se. The rules are the rules and are subject to change. Perhaps Smitty’s involvement in local GOP committees will help to change the rule.

Anyhoo…

If you are in a “Super” Tuesday primary state - go vote.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is always seeing signs of the impeding doom of the United States (specifically) and the West (in general). Please file this bit from Professor Mondo into the “impending doom” folder: Teacups Against the Ocean.

Economics is the dismal science indeed. Made more dismal by the realization that so few people in the world “get it.”

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader must have the issues where there is a difficult confluence of religious and political debates on the mind. Perhaps it is that Lent is upon us. Perhaps it is just because these issues seem to be front and center in our current political dialogue. Thanks to the GOP Presidential primaries and HHS mandates there is a lot of Church/State discussion. But it is another area of the Church/State discussion on which your Maximum Leader would like to expound.

If you have been following news about Virginia recently you will know that the General Assembly has been moving on a bill that would require women to get an ultrasound before getting an abortion. That bill has come under heavy scrutiny because the language of the bill can be interpreted (rightfully one can argue) as possibly requiring a vaginal ultrasound before a woman can get an abortion. (The story of the moment is that VA Governor Bob McDonnell has gone from strong supporter of the bill to a man uncommitted to sign it.)

Now, your Maximum Leader is not going to comment on abortion or abortion restrictions in this post. What he would like to comment upon is his long-standing disgust at thoughtlessness in lawmaking.

Long-time readers will know that your Maximum Leader is not a fan of the Patriot Act. He has never been a supporter of the Patriot Act. He felt it was rushed through Congress without consideration paid to unintended consequences. What is happening in Virginia is a more glaring example of this same situation.

For those of you who do not know, and your Maximum Leader suspects that might be many of you, the Virginia legislature is a part-time legislature. The legislators serve for 60 or 90 days a year (depending on the year). They have a full-time staff, the Office of Legislative Services. The job of the staff is to help write laws, research existing laws that might be affected by new laws, and generally to think through consequences of potential legislation if it were to be enacted.

This abortion law under debate in Richmond appears to have been a) poorly drafted; b) poorly researched; or c) incompletely thought through. A combination of those three failings is also possible.

This drives your Maximum Leader nuts. As he sees it, either the sponsors of the bill ignored the (non-partisan) staff and went ahead with the bill in the form it was introduced; or the staff did a crappy job of vetting the bill. Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure which it is; but either of these scenarios is bad.

Your Maximum Leader doesn’t care that legislatures are (in general) slow to act. But he does care that they aren’t (generally) deliberative any more. This lack of deliberativeness (or perhaps the inability of most elected officials to actually deliberate) is as much a danger to our nation as any enemy - foreign or domestic.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader and Mrs Villain had a big blow-up the other day. The root cause of this tiff? The President’s health care mandate that Catholic employers provide (by hook or by crook) insurance coverage for contraception, abortion inducing drugs and sterilization.

Your Maximum Leader’s position is rather close to that of his friend FLG (who’s post you should read). This is to say that Catholic employers should be given a broad exemption based on their long-held beliefs. The number of individual Catholics who disagree with church teachings on these matters is largely immaterial.

Mrs Villain’s point is that having insurance coverage for a particular drug or procedure doesn’t mean you have to take advantage of a potentially offensive drug or procedure and therefore the mandate is really harmless to those who care and a boon to those that don’t.

Your Maximum Leader attempted to make a favorite point of his, namely that if his money is going to pay for a thing he would like input into how that money is spent. This argument most often comes up when he and Mrs Villain are discussing school curricula and how it is made. (Your Maximum Leader arguing that if public dollars are spend on education, then the political process must be involved in making the curricula. That doesn’t make the process neat, efficient or even sensible; but it is a requirement.) Anyhow, our conversation deteriorated quickly and we broke to our own corners and tabled the discussion indefinitely.

The point that your Maximum Leader would have liked to make as well, but didn’t have the chance to, was that the Catholic Church will eventually lose out on this argument all together and will wind up having to pay for insurance coverage that offends their moral teachings. Furthermore, in the foreseeable future when there is a single payer system in place in the United States, Catholic hospitals will be forced to close, be sold to other entities, or will just have to knuckle under and actually perform abortions and sterilizations because the government will require them to do so. The Catholic Church (and most any other civil institution) cannot, in the long run, stand up to the power of the government leviathan.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader pronounced the word “rabbit” to you all as it is the first of the month.

He also wonders if Herman Cain will be out of the running for the GOP Presidential nod by tomorrow. Truth be told, he is already out. Your Maximum Leader wonders if Cain will officially announce he is out by tomorrow.

Your Maximum Leader is still waiting for Newt to fade. It is going to happen at some point, just when? Your Maximum Leader thinks Gingrich could coast in first place until about the middle of December. At that point he’ll start to fade. Your Maximum Leader is thinking that Rick Santorum is still waiting for his turn as the frontrunner…

Your Maximum Leader took a gentleman’s bet ($1 American) that President Obama will win reelection next year. Your Maximum Leader bet that Obama will be reelected. All things being equal, the math is in his favor. Your Maximum Leader knows it will be a very close run thing. But he thinks that the electoral math will break for Obama. It is conceivable that Obama will lose the popular vote and still win. In the states where Obama lost in 2008, he will lose by bigger margins. In states where he won big he will win by slimmer margins. It is in those handful of close states (Virginia included for a change) is where the battle will be fought. Your Maximum Leader thinks he’ll pull it out. But look for it to get nasty.

In other news…

Your Maximum Leader is worried about his beloved Washington Capitals. He expects the Caps to get plastered by the Pittsburgh Penguins tonight. New coach, Dale Hunter, will need a few weeks to get the team into whatever system he wants. All in all the Caps need to get performance from the big stars. By big stars he means Alexander Ovechkin. Your Maximum Leader wonders if Ovechkin is satisfied with himself right now? Really… Does Ovechkin believe in his own mind that he is doing all he can to play hard and win? If he really believes that, then there is nothing any coach or mentor will be able to do to help him. We’ll have to see how this plays out… We’ll have a better feeling about the team’s trajectory by January…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader thought he’d give you all a quick update on the blog.

Let us see how the past few weeks have gone…

They started with your Maximum Leader being in a car accident that totaled the Villainmobile. He should now remark that it is the late Villainmobile. Sadly his 2003 Mercury Marauder is no more. It was shattered on the Falmouth Bridge in icy conditions Halloween weekend. Your Maximum Leader is fine; but he is a little sad to see that great American made behemouth with its 400 horsepower engine leave his garage. Your Maximum Leader has a new Villainmobile. It is a 2012 Volkswagen Passat. Better mileage, sufficent space, 4 doors, German engineering. It is a wonderful change. So, there is that.

Also… The computer situation at the Villainschloss as improved - somewhat. Mrs Villain has a netbook computer she is using now (Thanks Kevin! I still owe you for this.) She is pleased with it. Villainette #2 saved up money from odd jobs and such and bought herself an HP laptop. So she is set with computing. Now Villainette #1 has also saved up money and decided to get a very nice HP laptop as well. It is a refurb from Woot in fact. Your Maximum Leader was a little weary about getting a refurb computer, but his experience (through his daughter) has been a positive one. So your Maximum Leader has been left to deal with his aging desktop. The desktop he built (with the help of a friend) back in 2003… It has served a long and distinguished life, but it is slow and beginning to be persnickedy. (The most aggrevating thing is the boot time - which has now topped 9 minutes.)

Your Maximum Leader contemplated buying new guts for the desktop and having it solider on, but in the end he’s decided to go with a laptop. So, he broke down and went the way of his elder daughter and bought a refurb off of Woot yesterday. It is a Samsung with an i7 processor, LED display, blu-ray, 750GB storage, a very high end NVIDIA graphics card and 6GB of RAM. And it was only $600. (He configured a similar laptop at Dell, Samsung, Sony, HP and Alienware and found the prices ranged from $1200-$1500 for new.) Your Maximum Leader figures he got a deal. He’ll find out when it gets to him.

Of course, all this laptop computing around the house leads your Maximum Leader to think that he needs to upgrade his 5 yrs old wireless router to something with a higher capacity…

Anyhoo…

Your Maximum Leader has been following teh politics recently. He was pleased to see Rick Perry falter. Your Maximum Leader will vote for a no-chance 3rd party odd-ball before he votes for Rick Perry for anything. If you need to know why… 3 words. Cameron Todd Willingham. As far as your Maximum Leader is concerned, Governor Perry cannot retreat to Texas fast enough and from there proceed to obscurity.

Your Maximum Leader was a little disappointed to learn of Herman Cain’s troubles. Cain was entertaining and engaging, even if your Maximum Leader had no intention of ever voting for him. Your Maximum Leader was disappointed because of Cain’s handling of the sexual harassment situation. He’d hoped that Cain might just put everything out there and move ahead. You see, your Maximum Leader had a pet theory that in the post-Bill Clinton age old sex scandals weren’t going to derail a candidate. It appears as though Cain will not be the test case for this theory. To test the theory the candidate would have to fess up to everything and then say it was “all in the past” and that he’s learned and grown since then and then see if the mess blows over.

Of course it is possible that this theory might only be true for Democrats - who don’t seem to have problems with sex scandals by other Democrats any more.

Your Maximum Leader was taken aback by the sudden surge of Newt Gingrich in the polling. Great jeezy chreezy! Is every one of the candidates going to get a moment in the sun? Is Rick Santorum next? (By your Maximum Leader’s count the leaders have been: Romney, Bachmann, Paul, Romney, Perry, Cain, Gingrich. It would seem to be Santorum’s turn.)

The most crazy thing about all these changes in the polls is that they just reinforce the weakness of the field. One of the weaknesses of the field to your Maximum Leader (but he doubts it is a weakness to the great majority of poll-ees in the Republican party) is that none of the candidates seems to be terribly serious about anything except beating Obama. All in all they are not particuarly innovative thinkers in any sort of policy way. They don’t seem to have clear messages on any particular subject. And they don’t seem particularly presidential.

Of course the primaries don’t engender a “presidential atmosphere.” They do promote the articulation of a plan and sound positions. They do promote the hectic and harried pace at which someone might have to actually be President. So, in a way, they simulate the job - without really giving you the trappings of the job. (The trappings of office which give you some respectability and decorum - two elements lacking in primaries.)

Your Maximum Leader believes that the Republicans will likely default to Romney (it is his turn afterall) and that it will be a close election. If the economy does not improve by next fall - it will be perilously close for Obama. All things being equal, it is hard to unseat a sitting president - and that is the only thing one can be certain of for next year.

Your Maximum Leader never did sum up his thoughts on the baseball season past… Since it is already well into hockey season he will give the short version. Congrats to the Cardinals! There is a lot to like about the Washington Nationals for next year and the upcoming years. Your Maximum Leader was worried that Davey Johnson’s day had past - but it apparently has not. Your Maximum Leader thinks the Nats could be a .500 team next year (or even a little better than .500).

Also, thank goodness that Wilson Ramos was rescued from his kidnappers.

That is about it for now… Your Maximum Leader is ruminating over a few other posts… So you might see more in this space in a little bit.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader was reading the Washington Post the other day and this piece by Anne Applebaum provoked him to want to write a post… This is that post.

In the Applebaum piece one part stood out to your Maximum Leader. She wrote: “Democracy is based on the rule of law. Democracy works only within distinct borders and among people who feel themselves to be part of the same nation.” Your Maximum Leader completely agrees with the second sentance there; but was lost by the first.

Is democracy based on rule of law? If you are talking broadly about those nations that are part of the Anglo-Western tradition (the UK, USA, Canada and Austrailia); then you might have a point that rule of law and democracy go hand in hand. But in and of itself, there is nothing inherent in democracy that would lead one to assume that rule of law is part of said democracy. One could have an open democratic process to elect a dictator with sweeping and arbitrary powers. Democracy is only means that the people vote on things. In most countries that are fully-functioning (or seemingly functioning) democracies the people elect leaders to “rule” them. But again… Rule of law, while we take it for granted here, is not part or parcel of democracy.

This line of thinking also applies to “rights.” We have politicians talking about a “right” to healthcare in our democracy. There is nothing in a democracy that grants rights to people. Rights are (depending on your outlook) either given to you by the state or are granted to you by God/Nature/outside forces.

Your Maximum Leader doesn’t disagree with the general thrust of Applebaum’s argument; but it annoys him that she (and so many others) think that democracy is so much more than it is. Let’s just say that if you believe in the political system we’ve worked on in the United States for over 200 years; then you need to work on change within that political system to get the outcome you desire. Street protests are fine to call attention to a problem, but the protests don’t do anything to fix a problem.

Unless of course the protests lead to widespread discontent and revolution. But your Maximum Leader isn’t sure that is what the Occupy (fill in name of street) people are looking to do…

Carry on.