[Unlike the President, Congress, the Iraqi Parliament, and the entire workforce of France, I do not get a month's vacation in August. But I may occasionally write pieces like this one, so you'll just have to forgive me.]

This article should properly be titled "What's Wrong With Science Fiction Movies And Television," or even "Science Fiction Fan Bill Of Rights Should Be Imposed On Hollywood," or possibly "Chris Goes On A Rant." I rejected these for various reasons, but they more accurately convey my purpose.

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Much appreciation to Harrison Smith for the original concept. But I, of course, take full responsibility if you don't like the drawing!

-- Charles W. Cunningham

Tomorrow is the date of the quadrennial celebration of silliness known as the Ames (Iowa) Republican straw poll. The mainstream media will be all over it, which is the entire point of the exercise. Much will be said, pundits will pontificate profusely, and perhaps a few presidential campaign dreams will wither up and die.

But don't kid yourself. It has nothing to do with democracy.

The Iowa straw poll started out as a fairly good idea -- take an early vote in Iowa (the first state to caucus) that didn't count. The purpose is the purpose of any "poll" -- to gauge public support of the candidates. Think of it as a telephone poll, just in person.

That was the idea, at any rate. What it quickly devolved into, however, is a showcase for how to run as corrupt an election as is humanly possible. Continue Reading »

Debates for everyone!

Tonight will be a landmark on the road of acceptance for gay rights, as the Democratic candidates (well, most of them) will appear onstage together to debate in front of the Human Rights Campaign and the television network Logo.

Chris Dodd and Joe Biden will not be appearing. HRC (that's the group, not the candidate) initially declined to invite Mike Gravel, due to his apparent lack of support. They wisely changed their tune when they found out he was one of only two candidates (the other is Kucinich) who fully support gay marriage (and also due to a ferocious online backlash). There will, of course, be no Republican gay debate, as none of the Republican campaigns expressed any interest in attending when contacted. No surprise there.

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[The scene as the curtain rises -- A young woman staggers into a police station. Her hair is a mess, her clothing is torn in places, and she is visibly bruised. One of her eyes is almost swollen shut. She is dragging an elegant handbag, but her grip on the purse strings is tenuous, at best. She staggers up to the desk sergeant.]

"Please, you've got to help me. I've been mugged."

"Certainly, Ma'am. Please follow me," the sergeant replies. He escorts her up a dingy flight of stairs to the detectives' area, and sees that she is comfortably seated. Because she's in such bad shape, he gets her a cup of coffee and introduces her to Detective Justin Farce, before returning to his post.

"What seems to be the trouble?" asks Farce gently.

"I think I've been mugged," she replies forlornly.

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[This is the second part of a two-part article. The first part ran yesterday, and looked at the plausible scenarios for Democrats in the early primaries.]

OK, on to the Republican race. For this race, I am first going to provide you with polling data from all the early primary states, and then (just because it's easier for me to stomach), I'm going to address the question of: Which GOP presidential candidate would be the best for any generic Democratic candidate to run against? In other words: Who are Democratic partisans going to be rooting for to win the GOP nomination?

Republicans, it should be noted, are pretty dispirited going into this campaign. They feel the weight of the Iraq fiasco, they feel the weight of the fact that they've got a pretty disappointing field, and they feel the weight of President Bush dragging them ever downwards. In other words, Republicans are not happy campers when they think about the 2008 campaign.

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Much like the Iraqi Parliament, our own Congress has just departed on their own month-long vacation. So begins the dog days of summer political news. Which means it's a good time to take a look at next year's presidential primaries -- now only five months away.

On the Democratic side, there is a wealth of good candidates to choose from. Even the longshots and dark horses look pretty good at this point. On the Republican side, there is much consternation over their choice of candidates. Republicans are going through the same agonizing choice that Democrats faced in 2004: which candidate will be the most "electable" come next November? This triangulation, in essence, concedes that you will be running an "underdog" campaign, admitting that the other side's candidate will be stronger. This, it should be noted, didn't exactly work out real well for Democrats in '04.

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[Note: I'm going to try running these standalone cartoons every Tuesday morning, and every Saturday. Tuesday is usually a light day for me, and the weekends have never had any posts, so hopefully this schedule will work out for everyone.]

What if the core issue in the warrantless wiretapping arguments currently raging is one that nobody has mentioned? What if the real secret that has yet to be exposed is a logical next step in technological wiretapping capabilities, but one that our legal system has never been faced with before? What if -- in essence -- computers are the ones deciding which calls to tap, rather than NSA agents or judges?

Before I get started here, let me state for the record that everything in this article is pure and utter speculation. I do not have access to anything other than publicly available documents. I have no secret sources. I do not claim anything I say here is the truth -- merely rampant speculation and educated guesses.

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