the united states of america. how is that for small government? the ron paul campaign so far refusing to comment on tpm s reporting on this. so far, at least as far as we can tell, the ron paul campaign making no efforts to distance themselves from their kill the gays supporter who they ve been touting. if there s a big picture story to tell about iowa a week out, it s a story of constant motion, desperation and chaos. yay. the bottom line today is probably ultimately the same bottom line you would have had a year ago today. for all of the ups and downs and headlines and gaffes and scandals, mitt romney, in ç fact, telling a republican audience last night, i think i m going to get the nomination if we do our job right. again, the breaking news in iowa this hour, the state co-chair of the michele bachmann campaign just up and jumped ship and endorsed ron paul.
founder of the political calculous blog 538.com, nate silver. thanks for being here. yeah, thanks, rachel. i realize this is breaking news and it is spectacularly nonquantitative. if there was going to be a benefit to ron paul from he who formally supported michele bachmann, what would we look at to discern that? the polls are going to change on a daily basis from here on out. one thing we learned, the newest poll really is usually the best. people are still making up their minds, about 6% of voters will decide in the last week essentially. looking for any movement at all. i think this is more bad news for michele bachmann than it is good news for paul. bachmann, perry and santorum are competing for the same group of voters and all were at 10%. each time the candidate is not viable, that the ship is not sailing the right direction, could lead voters to abandon that ship and jump on to
times spreadsheet psychic and founder of the political calculous blog 538.com, nate silver. thanks for being here. yeah, thanks, rachel. i realize this is breaking news and it is spectacularly nonquantitative. if there was going to be a benefit to ron paul from he who formally supported michele bachmann, what would we look at to discern that? the polls are going to change on a daily basis from here on out. one thing we learned, the newest poll really is usually the best. people are still making up their minds, about 6% of voters will decide in the last week essentially. looking for any movement at all. i think this is more bad news for michele bachmann than it is good news for paul.ç bachmann, perry and santorum are competing for the same group of voters and all were at 10%. each time the candidate is not viable, that the ship is not sailing the right direction,
i think on the republican side, there are people who are going to go uncommitted there as well but there are certainly people interested in ron paul because of his stand on the wars, afghanistan and wars that might be breaking out elsewhere. and also his opposition to the patriot act and to the recently passed detention provisions in the national defense authorization act. there are people who find fred cargill s message of quality for gay and lesbian americans empowering. he s a republican activist running as well on that side. i think what some people liked what gary johnson had to say about immigration reform. some people were pleased with what huntsman said about climate change. overall, there is grave dissatisfaction with the field of candidates across the spectrum. and i think that s why this movement is so important that it s not i mean, to me, voting is very important. we also have to have a protest movement in order to let it be known that people are really, really fed up, a
this is one of msnbc contributor ezra klein s graphs of the year of 2011. he did graphs of the year to give you a snap shot of where things are in american politics and the american economy. this is one of them. he said it helps explain what the year has been like. this is a graph of the standings for the republican nominating process among iowa residents polled over the course of this year. this is the iowa republican polling this year. when you look at that graph, what does that graph say to you? any one thing? yes, that graph says one thing. it says chaos. and if not chaos, at least constant motion. even before this dramatic news about the michele bachmann campaign co-chair jumping ship to ron paul tonight, this was already proving to be the really, really fun part of the political year. stuff is just a mess in ç republican politics right now. there are a million things going on. behold, first we now have the