...[T]here's a lot of competition in the media world in this quasi-reality show, it seems, that's being created in the GOP primary. It's just the nature of the beast right now..."

--Sarah Palin
[quoted recently on the subject of the media hype about the Republican primary contenders, and the mini-uproar over her calling "Herb" [sic] Cain the "flavor of the week."]

So You Think You Can President?!?

Welcome back, everyone, to this week's edition of So You Think You Can President?!?

Just to remind everyone, this year we've got the Republican field of candidates for the party's nomination to take on Barack Obama in next year's exciting presidential race. After the American television-viewing audience expressed its dismay over stale and boring formal debates, we here at Fox jumped at the chance to winnow the field down in the exciting format of a reality show, where our contestants get to prove they know how "to president" by performing various wacky tasks for our collective amusement.

To recap last week's show: Rick Perry's up! Rick Perry's down! Will he be eliminated by our panel of pundits and party bigwigs, or will he get a second chance from our audience participation voting system (brought to you by the wonderful folks at Diebold, of course)? Stay tuned!

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The Republican presidential field continues to defy the expectations and easy story lines from the political media and the rest of the inside-the-Beltway crowd. Just last week, this was supposed to now be "a two-man race," but in a week's time the story has shifted to almost utter chaos. A new Fox News poll out shows that the easy read of the electorate the media was pushing last week is now completely wrong.

Now, I understand that a single poll is not conclusive. In fact, I rarely comment on single polls for exactly this reason -- you can wind up making sweeping conclusions based on one poll that was statistically off in some way. It's a lot better to watch multiple polls over time to spot trends.

But, hey, it's Thursday, so I couldn't resist. I hope my readers will excuse this lapse.

The Fox News poll has the candidates in the following order, with their percent:

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I know I'm supposed to be writing a breathless article about whether New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is thinking about jumping in the Republican presidential primary today, but since so many other fine commentators are addressing this burning issue, I thought I'd skip it. The man keeps saying "No," and the media keep hearing "Maybe," so I'm just going to leave it at that for now.

Instead I'd like to talk about the backroom struggling within the Republican Party this week which is a lot more interesting and will likely be a lot more germane to the race -- the question of who goes first (or, more to the point, who goes fifth) in the Republican primary calendar.

The Republican National Committee has valiantly tried to lay down the law for the Republican primary season. Their plan will (one way or another) be somewhat of a radical change for the party. The RNC envisions a three-phase schedule -- early states, a free-for-all, and then wrapping things up in dignified fashion.

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The United States Postal Service very quietly changed one of their bedrock rules this week. Up until this point, in America, you had to be dead to be on a stamp. Now, anything goes -- the living will get their chance to be immortalized on an American stamp alongside the dead. This is a very bad idea, and Congress should really step in and put a stop to it as soon as possible.

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[Note: I get a lot of emails from politicians, political groups, and other inside-the-Beltway types, all the time. Occasionally, I get added to a mailing list that I quite obviously shouldn't be on. Today, the following arrived, from the "Republican Party Establishment." I'm sure they never meant for it to go public, but it was too good to pass up. Perhaps it was some sort of email addressing mistake -- we've certainly all had those, right? In any case, please enjoy the following, in the spirit in which it was written. Heh.]

MEMORANDUM
From: The Republican Party Establishment
To: Governor Rick Perry
Subject: How can we miss you if you don't go away?

Rick;

Well, it's been great fun and all, but we are sorry to inform you that your viable candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination is hereby over.

Truth be told, we're kind of surprised you haven't picked up on this yet. After all, we've unleashed the Right-Wing Commentariat (both the Punditocracy and the Blogosphere, just so you couldn't miss it) in the past week, and they've been in full-on "obituary-writing mode" ever since, on the subject of your former campaign. We even helpfully ran some of these pieces with headlines of a single syllable, in case the point was too subtle for you to grasp.

We realize the news of the end of your candidacy must come as a blow to you personally, especially because we were so enthusiastic about it ourselves, mere weeks ago. But things change, and we're just not that into you any more. Our apologies for leading you on in this fashion. Tell you what, you can even keep all the gifts we sent -- how's that for magnanimity?

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Well, let's see what this week brought us all, shall we?

A satellite is falling out of the sky, but it probably won't hit anybody. Probably. I personally got over this fear by listening to Creedence Clearwater Revival's "It Came Out Of The Sky" (which I heartily recommend, just on general principles).

A Republican audience booed an American soldier actively serving his country in an overseas war. Well, to be fair to the audience, I'm sure if you asked the ones who booed that they'd respond they were merely booing the soldier's self-professed gayness. But still -- a Republican crowd booed a serving soldier. Way to "support the troops," guys!

Larry Flynt has just offered up to a million bucks for anyone who can prove that they had sex with Rick Perry -- "gay or straight" (either is fine with Flynt). One assumes this offer wouldn't include the Texas governor's wife, since that wouldn't exactly be scandalous. Kidding aside, though, that's a lot of money. And Flynt's record on taking down sexually hypocritical Republicans is well-established (after all, what other pornographer can say he forced a guy about to become Speaker of the House to resign from politics?). Had sex with Rick Perry, anyone? Can you prove it? Call the "hotline" at (323) 951-7911. It could be a lucrative phone call!

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At some point, television is going to have to start limiting which Republican candidates get invited to the debates. The herd of hopefuls must be thinned. This may happen soon, and tonight may be the last of the mega-debates of the season. One can only hope.

Of course, the Republican field is somewhat self-thinning itself already. Tim Pawlenty dropped out early, after realizing the only people he had on board were media pundits who had declared he'd be a dandy candidate. Republican voters didn't agree, and Pawlenty was smart enough to realize it sooner, rather than later.

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Elizabeth Warren is currently running for Ted Kennedy's old Senate seat. If the first week of her campaign is any indication, this could wind up being the most interesting Senate race in the country next year, and certainly the most positive for the Democratic Party to watch. It was always going to be a tough race, because incumbent Scott Brown is generally well-liked by Massachusetts voters (even though he's a Republican), and Warren has never run for public office before in her life. So far, though, she appears to be up to the challenge. Of course, it is still very early in the race, so forming sweeping predictions or conclusions is impossible at this point. But still, it's been a very good first week for Elizabeth Warren.

Only one statewide poll is out since her announcement, and it shows her popularity spiking dramatically. Previous to her announcement, three polls put her 9-to-19 points behind Brown. The PPP poll just released shows her beating Brown 46-44 percent. That's a big bump in such a short period, but it is just one poll -- so we'll have to wait for further data before drawing solid conclusions. Her rise in support could also just be an initial spike after her announcement that she's entering the race, and could quickly fade away. Even with these caveats, the numbers certainly look better for Warren now than many were predicting even a few weeks ago.

Elizabeth Warren is a polarizing figure. Liberals love her with a fierce passion. Republicans hate her with a fiery passion. What this means is that lots and lots of money from outside the state will be pumped into this race. The reason why Democrats are going to be watching this race closer than any other Senate race next year is easy to see: this may be the only state Democrats have a good chance to pick up a seat from the Republicans. The math isn't good for Democrats this time around in the Senate, and they are in danger of losing control of the chamber next year. Warren may be the sole bright spot in this environment for Democrats.

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[Program Note: Work continues apace on the book proposal I am working on, but I'm going to try resuming the Tuesday and Thursday columns here in the meantime. These columns may be a bit briefer than the others, so I can continue to work on my other project. In any case, just wanted everyone to know that the full weekday schedule at ChrisWeigant.com will be resuming. Thanks for your understanding as I pursue writing projects which actually might pay me some money.]

Today marks the end of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy of not allowing gay servicemembers to openly do their duty in the American military. There are plenty of other columns out there celebrating this fact, so instead of going into details, I'd like to offer an excerpt from a book I recently read. The book is One Nation Under Sex, by Larry Flynt and David Eisenbach, Ph.D. Whatever you may think of Flynt for his other activities, his books are always a good read and always exhaustively researched and annotated. Which is why his telling of this particular story is the best I've yet come across. Gay people have been in the United States military from the very beginning. They've always served, the only change now is that they'll be able to do so without having to hide who they are. Which is why this is such a good lesson to ponder on today of all days.

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"Populism" is a word that gets thrown around with abandon by folks masquerading as journalists on television these days. Sarah Palin had the word used to describe her, and later, the entire Tea Party movement was labeled "populist" by the chattering classes. Today, President Obama unveiled a truly populist agenda, by proposing to tax millionaires at the same tax rate that middle-class Americans pay. By doing so, Obama will (hopefully) redefine the term "populism" in the political conversation. Or, to be technical, he will re-redefine the word back to what it originally meant.

Because while Sarah Palin can (barely) make the case that she's a populist (she did take on oil companies as governor), the Tea Party simply cannot make the same argument. Lazy inside-the-Beltway types began using the word "populism" to describe the Tea Party when they really should have said something like "popular movement," or even "grassroots." Washingtonians apparently were ready to slap the "populist" label onto any political action which took place outside the Beltway. The lesson to be learned is: spend five minutes researching a term, if you really don't know what it means. But it's a pretty safe bet this lesson will not, in fact, be learned by the media at large.

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