Another poll

Patrick Ruffini is running another Presidential straw poll. This time, he's put up 12 candidates: Gingrich is out, Barbour and Pawlenty are in. This is good. Barbour has acquitted himself well in the past month, and Pawlenty continues to do a pretty good job in Minnesota. Captain Ed seems very impressed with Pawlenty, and it's mostly on that basis that I went for him in this poll. My fantasy candidate is still Cheney. If this were an actual GOP primary, I'd think twice about voting for Cheney, because I'd be concerned about his ability to win the general election. But in an ideal world, I'd love to see Cheney take over the presidency; back in 2000 I expressed the wish that both major-party tickets were reversed, since both Cheney and Lieberman would make far better presidents than their respective main acts.

Unfortunately, Rudy Guiliani is once again far in the lead. All I can say is "what on earth are you people thinking", and refer you to my previous comments. I lived in his NYC, and believe me, you don't want that. I don't want to use the F word gratuitously, especially since in the past he has taken it as a slur against his ethnic origin, but believe me, "authoritarian" is putting it mildly. I shudder to think of what this man would do with the USA PATRIOT act at his disposal. Defenders of that act insist that to date it has been used judiciously, and that the current administration can be trusted not to abuse it, and all in all I tend to believe them; but they will not be in office much longer, and if Guiliani gets his hands on it the nightmares of the Bush-haters may come closer to fruition.

In any case, have your say, and, if you feel like it, comment here on how you voted and why.