About that Christie-Rubio flap last Saturday

The New Neo Posted on by

I mentioned the other day that I was going to write more on the Christie-Rubio exchange during the last debate, the one that has everyone abuzz. I’ve been working on an article that I might ship out (if it doesn’t get published elsewhere, it will appear on this blog soon), but I thought in the meantime I’d just summarize what I discovered.

Strangely enough, when I actually went back to the transcript of the debate (something very few people seem to have done), I was very surprised to find that Christie was startlingly wrong. What’s more, Christie was repeatedly ignoring Rubio’s main point and repeating his own flawed premise. Rubio was repeating himself in response because Christie kept restating the error.

When people (and that most definitely included me) listened to the debate, they didn’t catch it. It happens fast, and you have to be tracking the back-and-forth very very carefully. But going back to the transcript and reading closely, I found it fairly clear.

Unfortunately, because of Christie’s emphasis on Rubio’s repetition (as though that has any deep meaning), Rubio’s point got lost. Rubio would have done well to have specifically said something like “You keep repeating your error and that’s why I’m repeating my answer,” but that was his biggest failure, and it was rhetorical.

Those who believe that it was Christie who had a good night must believe it’s true that Obama is a bad president because of inexperience, because that was Christie’s position. In other words, Christie’s answer to the “knave or fool?” question for Obama is: fool.

That, IMHO, makes Christie a fool about the biggest question of Obama’s presidency, and in addition a fool about the danger the left presents. Rubio was trying to say that. Too bad Christie’s belittling of Rubio’s method of saying it fooled so many listeners.

I wonder: would people have liked it better if Rubio had just let the analogy of his inexperience with Obama’s inexperience—and the idea that that’s the source of Obama’s “errors”—stand? Or would it have been better if, instead of saying “Obama knows exactly what he’s doing” several times, Rubio had said “Obama is aware of the meaning and consequences of his own actions, and is therefore culpable rather than incompetent?” Yes, Rubio repeated himself for emphasis, but he also said plenty of other things that evening (and elsewhere) that weren’t in his stump speech. And of course Christie, and the others, repeat themselves all the time.

Rubio is not necessarily my frontrunner. I’m most simpatico with Cruz’s stances on most things, although I worry about his “electability” (I’m growing to hate that word). And in the past I’ve been somewhat positive towards Christie, as well as of Rubio. My defense of Rubio here is because of what I found when I went to the transcript—and not just what I found about Rubio, but what I found about Christie.

[NOTE: And by the way, although I don’t happen to think repetition is a crime when you’re making an important point, here’s a piece on how Christie repeated himself during the same debate.]

[ADDENDUM: I plan to be more specific in my longer piece. But in response to a commenter request, here’s a really quick listing of what Christie got wrong in terms of content:

(1) the idea that Obama’s flaws stem from inexperience rather than intent, a serious and dangerous underestimation of the man’s agenda, and the left’s agenda. That was why Rubio was hammering that point home. Not only did Christie have no effective answer, he didn’t even attempt to answer at any point, just kept repeating his error.
(2) Christie had no answer to Rubio’s charge about his snow removal faux pas (and it was Christie who cited snow removal as some sort of experience relevant to the presidency, which it is not)
(3) Christie had no answer to Rubio’s charge about Christie’s budget failings.

Actually, of Rubio’s three points, Christie only even attempted to answer one—the snow removal charge. And he did so ineffectively.]

Post-debate thoughts on the debate I mostly didn’t watch

The New Neo Posted on by

I watched about one-third of this evening’s debate. After that I turned it on intermittently, but what I saw convinced me to finally call it quits, and to eat my (very late) dinner in blessed silence.

Maybe this really wasn’t one of the worst debates ever, but it sure felt that way. But maybe it felt that way because my disgust is cumulative. So I suppose that what I’m about to write refers to the entire debate process as it’s evolved (or devolved) over the years.

I could say that there are now too many debates, and that they’re too long. And there are, and they are.

I could say there were too many people up there, and that each GOP debate should instead have consisted of two groups of roughly equal size, randomly selected each time and both appearing in prime time, and running two hours each maximum.

I could say that the candidates should each have to answer the same question, until all on the stage have answered, and each should get the same amount of time to answer.

I think these things would go a long way towards improving the situation. But I also think those things will never happen, so they are probably irrelevant.

Right now it’s become a multi-candidate press conference conducted by a small number of “gotcha” journalists who are far more interested in “winning” the debate themselves than in helping the viewers get an idea of what the candidates would do about certain substantive issues. Yes, there are a small number of the latter type of questions, but way too few, and the rest are either attempts to trip up whatever candidate[s] they’ve decided needs tripping up, or to get one of them to trip up another, on and on in succession.

Because the candidates are, after all, in competition with each other, many are only too happy to oblige. And then it becomes a verbal duel to see which of the two who are warring at any particular moment can come up with the best sound bite put-down of the other. But there’s really no time for a takedown that’s meaningful and substantive, and someone can get away with a very bad answer in terms of the facts if it just sounds aggressive enough.

It’s an Attention Deficit Disorder debate with a World Wide Wrestling format. This is not just a frivolous objection about tone. I believe that the debates have become at least part of the reason we have come to choose presidents on a more and more superficial basis in recent years. This format not only lends itself to superficial, it pretty much requires superficial, plus a huge and growing emphasis on looks.

I can’t speak on who “won” tonight’s debate. I didn’t watch enough of it. I know that I’m usually very impressed with Cruz, because he manages to stay calm and focused, and because his mind is stupendously organized he probably gets in more statements of substance that anyone else there. I know that Donald Trump has never said anything in a debate that shows an understanding of issues, and that he shies away from detail and just want us to believe his bluster and boundless self-confidence is enough. It’s not. I know that Rubio looked shaky tonight during the time I watched, and Christie like the New Jersey prosecutor that he is. Carson said he wouldn’t attack Cruz and then seemed to go on to sort of attack Cruz. Kasich and Bush were there, I think, as they always are. Fiorina wasn’t.

GOP debate thread

The New Neo Posted on by

Ah, here we go again. And on a Saturday night, too!

Here’s what Carly has to say: “You’ll just have to find out, won’t you?”

If any of Carly’s advisers are listening, I have an idea: I think they should wheel in a big cake, and she should jump out of it.

And if anyone says she’s too old for that sort of thing, she’s not even close. See this:

I’ll be watching the debate this evening as long as I can stand it.

8:35 PM: I already can’t stand it. Seriously.

I don’t know whether any of you are watching, but this is just a stupid bunch of fighting on a personal level. Christie getting tough, Rubio getting tough back, none of it having anything to do with anything of substance. To me (and I’ve always been okay with Christie), it makes Christie look bad. I have no idea how other people react, though.

Everything I hate about so-called “debates” is on display. Well, not everything, but one big thing.

8:49 PM: I have a feeling this debate will get the lowest ratings of all.

9:11 PM: As far back as I can remember I have always hated debates.

Not actual debates with a regular debate format, but these things that they call debates, which are all about attacking each other in ways that seem stupid and petty to me, and then seeing how the other person manages to parry the attack. I suppose that measures a useful skill of some kind or other, but I don’t see it as part of being president. But apparently it’s become a mandatory part of how you get to be nominated to run for president.

It doesn’t entertain me, it makes me almost ill in addition to boring me. It’s an odd combination, stress and boredom, and not a pleasant one.

I do think Ted Cruz is doing well. Nothing rattles him, and I think that’s because (a) he’s really smart, and (b) he’s participated in so many real debates over his lifetime that mounting arguments in an organized way is second nature to him. But it gives him that controlled quality that a lot of people find offputting.

Hmmm, Jeb Bush finally mentions what Trump did to Vera Coking in Atlantic City, and Trump no like.

Dance teachers I have known: Stanley Holden, revisited

The New Neo Posted on by

A while back I wrote a tribute to a ballet teacher of mine, Stanley Holden. A little recap is in order:

One doesn’t ordinarily think of comedy in connection with ballet dancers, but Holden was a master of it, best known for originating the en travesti character Widow Simone, choreographed on him by Frederic Ashton in 1960 as part of the ballet “La Fille Mal Gardee” with the Royal Ballet.

Holden is said to have performed the role””and its most famous number, the clog dance””with far more humor than anyone has ever managed to bring to it since. But alas, there is no video of him that I can find online…

Since I wrote that in 2010, guess what? A video has appeared on YouTube of Holden in the role.

Before I present it to you, here’s a bit more from my post, to refresh your memory:

Holden didn’t look like a ballet dancer at all; more like a jockey. He exuded a tremendous amount of energy and an unforced cheeriness that was both unusual and infectious. He never yelled or was even cross, unlike so many temperamental dance teachers.

…Holden excelled at giving the class what are called “combinations,” those little pieces of choreography that make a dance class interesting rather than a mere repetition of the same steps every day.

…He kept them coming at us rapid-fire. Whether he planned these combinations ahead of time or made them up on the spot, or whether he had a secret book with lists of them that he’d memorized, I have no idea. But I do know that””especially towards the end of class, when the combinations featured large jumps and other big movements across the diagonal of his huge studio (a space that, unlike most dance classrooms, was constructed without any obstructive pillars or columns)””the feeling most of us had, along with exhaustion, was sheer joy.

“I want to die teaching” Holden said in an interview in 1997. “That’s my life. I love it.” He managed to convey that love not in any conventionally schmaltzy (or balletic) way, but through his own exuberance.

So, here’s the video. I hope you can see what I mean about Holden’s exceptional personality. Although he could certainly do classical ballet, here you’d never know he had ever danced in anything but the British Music Hall tradition, and you can see how very much he is enjoying himself. So now you can enjoy it, too:

Here’s a video I included in my earlier post. It’s of a more recent dancer doing the same variation. He’s very good, but to me he can’t compare. This dancer’s training as a ballet dancer comes across too strongly, which is at variance with the character. In the same role, Holden hid his ballet background and seems very natural, and that included his facial expressions.

Holden also added a lot of funny bits you don’t see in the later video. Note in particular Holden’s slide (at around 1:34 on the first video) vs. this one (at about 1:44). This guy slides a lot longer and more dramatically. But it doesn’t seem like an integral part of the dance, it seems like a forced thing to show off the fact that he can do it. But, more importantly, you may have noticed that right at the end of Holden’s slide he does a subtle little bit where he looks back and down at the floor as though wondering what on earth he just slipped on (just like a regular person might really do), whereas the modern guy just sliiiides, then turns around and runs back. No rhyme or reason to it. And the omission of those sorts of telling details, those little touches, are part of what makes the difference between Holden and the others.

RIP, Stanley Holden (1928-2007).

Over There: Bush predictions back in 2007

The New Neo Posted on by

This certainly seems prescient. It’s a 2007 interview with President Bush. He uses the phrase “failure in Iraq,” but we didn’t actually fail; we (Obama, that is) abandoned it very prematurely. I don’t think that, at the time of this 2007 interview, Bush could conceive that his successor would voluntarily do that, although the Democrats in Congress had certainly been trying for a while. Bush also uses the term “Al-Qaida,” because ISIS did not yet exist. But what he’s doing here is predicting something like ISIS:

Failure in Iraq will cause generations to suffer, in my judgment. Al-Qaida will be emboldened. They will say, “Yes, once again, we’ve driven the great soft America out of a part of the region.” It will cause them to be able to recruit more; it will give them safe haven. They are a direct threat to the United States.

And I’m going to keep talking about it. That’s my job as the president, is to tell people the threats we face and what we’re doing about it. They’re dangerous, and I can’t put it any more plainly to the American people, and to them, we will stay on the offense. It’s better to fight them there than here.

And this concept about, well, maybe, you know, let’s just kind of just leave them alone and maybe they’ll be all right is naive. These people attacked us before we were in Iraq. They viciously attacked us before we were in Iraq, and they’ve been attacking ever since.

They are a threat to your children, David. And whoever is in that Oval Office better understand it and take measures necessary to protect the American people.

This is a later interview with Danielle Pletka, who was “the president for foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute” and “a former Republican staff member at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee”:

If we retreat, if we surrender in Iraq, then I think we should have no doubt that there will be places from which they can plan and operate. That doesn’t take away from their ability to plan and operate elsewhere. That’s why we need to be fighting them in Iraq and elsewhere.

But the second part of this is, it reminds me of the discussions that we had with the Clinton administration about Afghanistan in the 1990s. There was a huge amount of frustration that the rise of the Taliban, at the fact that the Taliban was giving al-Qaida a safe haven, and that the administration wasn’t doing enough about it. Now, to be fair, the Congress wasn’t doing enough about it, either.

But, again, you heard the same sort of complacency about where they would be doing their planning. No, they’re not going to operate and plan against us in the United States. They’re focusing on Africa. Or they’re focusing on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

I think that they are focusing on us. And where we give them room to breathe, they will operate, and they will plan, and they will strike us, and they will be encouraged and emboldened if we retreat and allow them that headquarters in Iraq.

Obama gave them plenty of room to breathe, and now they have that headquarters in Iraq and Syria, and they’ve already been striking at the west after wreaking tremendous havoc in the Middle East.

As Hillary flails, there’s talk of Biden

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve seen a number of articles recently about it, such as this:

A prominent Democratic donor worried about the party’s chances of winning the presidency emailed dozens of fans of Vice President Joe Biden on Friday, urging them to remain prepared to donate if Biden jumps into the race.

The donor, Bill Bartmann, cited new polling showing Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont nearly tied with the Hillary Clinton, eroding the 30-point lead the former secretary of state held at the end of last year. Bartmann and other party insiders are concerned that Sanders, a self-proclaimed Democratic socialist, is too far to the left to win against a Republican in the Nov. 8 presidential election.

“We cannot afford to lose the White House,” Bartmann wrote in the email, seen by Reuters.

The problem isn’t really the emails, although it’s often framed that way. The problem is that apparently Obama was being too kind when he said to Hillary in 2008, “You’re likable enough.”

At the moment, Hillary isn’t likable enough. I think she would be forgiven the emails by most Democrats if she was.

Study that video from 2008. It seems to have been taken not long before the New Hampshire primaries, so that’s eight years ago. Hillary was a mere slip of a girl at the time at 60, and now she’s 68. The difference—particularly for a woman—is generally quite large between those two ages. That’s not an indictment, it’s just a reality of life. You can see a certain hardness in Hillary when she listens to what is in fact a rather rude question, but that hardness passes and she makes what actually is a pretty good (and almost charming) comeback under the circumstances. Notice, also, the smooth nastiness of Obama, whom I have never found the least bit likable and have long been amazed that anyone does.

These days not only does Hillary look considerably older, but that hardness has taken over the image she projects, and any humor seems a lot more false. She seems brittle and ill-at-ease, quite angry at something or many things, and not angry in a good way. I think she’s frightened, and well she might be. It’s not going well for her.

The Democrats’ problem—and it’s why she seemed to be coasting to an anointment in the first place—is that they have few alternatives. Biden could be nominated, and he even could win (depending on who the Republican is, I suppose). But he’s a weak candidate, too, and he’s now 73.

The Democrats realize they have a dilemma, and that’s why they continue to cling to Hillary (bitterly). I’ve never understand why Elizabeth Warren didn’t run, because although she’s no spring chicken either (in fact, at 66 she’s almost Hillary’s age) she looks pretty good for her age, and doesn’t have the same sort of baggage as Hillary. Of course, she has different baggage, but in the scheme of things it’s rather light.

I’ve read many analyses of why the Democrat bench is so shallow, and most of it boils down to the fact that Democrats control fewer state governments and governorships and that therefore they don’t have the same volume of choices.

But I don’t think that is enough to explain it. After all, there are governors who are Democrats, and there certainly are members of Congress, plenty of them. I think it’s that the Democratic governors don’t have such great records for the most part, and/or are in very liberal states and probably have the same drawbacks as Warren and Sanders do, which is that they are pretty far to the left. The entire party has moved to the left. Obama was able to hide his leftism from a lot of people (although I think it was pretty obvious) because he had less of a record, I suppose, and because he’s gifted at hiding things. But other people probably can’t do it so effectively.

The Democratic Party has for the most part rejected the previously-winning strategy of Bill Clinton, which was to pull to the middle or to seem to pull to the middle. In recent years Obama has been so far left, and the party has also been so far left, that unless the population follows suit, the Democrats are in some difficulty. The voters certainly have become more leftist in recent years—for example, 52% of Hillary supporters now view “socialism” positively (even more of Sanders’ supporters do), and 32% of all Americans view it positively.

But it’s still not a majority. Not yet, although they’re working on it.

In the snows of New Hampshire

The New Neo Posted on by

Candidates have snowball fights with the press:

kasich

And yes, that’s Kasich. He’s still a candidate, having spent a lot of his money and effort so far in New Hampshire, and he’s doing pretty well there. That New Hampshire snowball he’s got in his hand is in the nature of a Hail Mary pass.

Donald Trump’s jet didn’t make it back to the state Friday night and he had to cancel that rally (he jets home every night to sleep, and he keeps a much lighter appearance schedule than all the others without meet-and-greets or answering of citizen questions). I’m assuming he’s in New Hampshire by now. But I thought you might like to see the following. After viewing it, it occurred to me that Air Force One would be a step (or several steps) down for Mr. Trump:

That photo of Kasich made me think of this, from my art history classes so long ago:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Your Trump tidbit for today

The New Neo Posted on by

Look, I almost did it. Almost stayed away from Trump posts today.

But those cookies…they were in the jar…and I just couldn’t help myself…I reached out…and…and..I found my hand going in…and then…

Thus, this post. But it will be mercifully short. Just a link.

There. Done now.

Fiorina should be in the debate on Saturday

The New Neo Posted on by

Of course she should. I don’t even think those who don’t like her think there’s any real reason to exclude her if Kasich, Bush, and Christie are there.

Take a look at the Iowa results. At this point, as the only actual voting that’s occurred, these figures should matter far more than any poll.

It would be different if there were still an undercard debate, and she could appear there. But right now Fiorina is the only candidate excluded from the big stage, and there will be no undercard debate. Either have another undercard debate (personally, I’d like to see the number of main debate participants be limited to three at this point) or include everyone in the main debate, unless one person is so obviously way way way below all the others that it’s clear he or she doesn’t belong (for example, Gilmore, who is also excluded, and whose exclusion no one seems to be protesting because even he knows he’s not a serious candidate). That’s not true of Fiorina, so her exclusion is both absurd and an unconscionable interference with the public’s right to see the candidates spar with each other.

Legal Insurrection’s Kemberlee Kaye suggests that the other candidates should escort Carly onto the stage on Saturday. Not a bad idea, although I doubt they’ll do it. But such disparate people as Romney, Gingrich, and Ben Carson have tweeted their support for her appearance.

Forecasting the New Hampshire primary

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve read some pundits who say that New Hampshire voters like to reject what Iowa voters do (for example, from Pat Caddell, but he’s not alone in saying it):

[Cadell] doesn’t think New Hampshire really loved Clinton [when she won there in 2008 after losing in Iowa]. Rather, given that Obama had won Iowa, New Hampshire voters were confronted with a dilemma: If we vote for Obama, essentially Obama is the winner of the entire primary. Back to back wins will make him nigh-unstoppable.

Caddell’s idea is that it wasn’t that New Hampshire was really backing Clinton, so much as it was saying “Let’s make sure this Obama is really acceptable, let’s have a longer nomination process.”

I beg to differ. I don’t think New Hampshire voters have any thought of whether they agree or disagree with Iowans, or whether they’re anointing a winner. In fact, why wouldn’t they want to anoint a winner? No, I think it’s just that Iowa and New Hampshire could hardly be more different in the composition of their Republican voting population.

For example, evangelicals make up a huge percentage of the Iowa GOP voters—well over half. Although there are some evangelicals in New Hampshire, it’s a lot smaller group than in Iowa:

Four years ago, just 22% of the state’s primary voters described themselves as evangelicals, well below the 57% in Iowa and the lowest rate among swing states. A 2013 Gallup poll ranked New Hampshire as the second least religious state in the country, behind Vermont, based on churchgoing and the importance of religion in daily life.

“Candidates definitely tone things down regarding social issues when they come to the state,” said Stephen Scaer, a 52-year-old special-education teacher who helps run a prayer vigil outside a Planned Parenthood clinic in Manchester, N.H., and favors Republican Carly Fiorina. But, he said, “that’s simply pragmatic. If candidates want to win, they have to.”

The common wisdom on New Hampshire is that it’s fiscally conservative and socially liberal, and there are a lot of libertarians there, too (“Live Free or Die” is still alive in New Hampshire).

So when New Hampshirites vote, they’re not consciously thinking of being different from Iowans—they just are different from Iowans.

I also keep reading how New Hampshire is natural Trump country or Trump territory. I disagree there, as well. New Hampshire is not natural Trump territory anymore than Iowa is, but for different reasons. Historically, New Hampshire has tended to favor local New Englanders when they’re running (Romney and Henry Cabot Lodge for the GOP—and Romney came close to McCain there even in 2008; Tsongas, Dukakis, Muskie, and Kerry for the Democrats) and to favor moderate Republicans more often than conservatives (although Pat Buchanan edged out Dole there in 1996). Since there’s no New Englander this year, that would make it natural Christie country or Kasich country or Jeb country (or Rubio country, because at this point he’s considered a moderate, compared to Cruz). And indeed, those candidates have all had surges in New Hampshire polling, and some (Bush and Kasich, for example) are still doing a lot better in New Hampshire than they’re doing in most other states.

That’s not to say that Trump can’t or won’t win there; he most definitely could. But if so, it’s because of the unusually high number of other candidates splitting the remainder so many ways rather than some huge amount of New Hampshire love for Trump.

Which brings us to the post-Iowa polls in New Hampshire. New Hampshire’s primary is February 9, which is next Tuesday, but the situation in the state is still so fluid that polls seem nearly worthless—except as confirmation that indeed, the situation is very fluid.

Why do I say that? Let’s take the recent CNN/WMUR poll, a rolling poll in which 2/3 of its likely-GOP-primary-voter respondents were polled before Iowa and 1/3 after, 362 and 209 respectively. The questions were asked by landline and cellphone, and note the margin of error: plus or minus 5 for the first group, and plus or minus 6.8 for the second. That’s an enormous margin of error, and that’s not all that’s problematic in the results of the poll. We also learn that only 41% of respondents have definitely decided on a candidate, with an additional 25% only leaning and a full 34% totally undecided.

Makes me almost want to give up even looking at the poll. But hey, I’ll soldier on.

Trump gets 29%, Rubio 18% (that’s a marked improvement over pre-Iowa polls), Cruz 13%, Kasich 12%, Bush 10%, Christie 4%, Fiorina 4%, and Carson 2%. Trump’s “would NOT vote for under any circumstances” numbers are far higher than anyone else’s, 37% for Trump to Cruz’s 13%, Jeb’s 7%, Rubio’s 5%, Carson’s 3%, and Christie’s 3%.

Another recent New Hampshire poll was taken by UMassLowell/WMUR, which also contains both pre-Iowa and post-Iowa results. In that poll, 2/3 were interviewed after Iowa, and there were only 487 likely GOP primary voters, with a margin of error set at plus minus 4.87, not as high as the previous poll but still fairly high.

This poll also shows a post-Iowa uptick for Rubio, but not as strongly as the other one. For respondents polled on 2/4 (the final day of the poll) it shows Trump leading by 34 to Rubio’s 15 to Cruz’s 13. But once again, there are a lot of undecideds, with 41% of all respondents saying they could change their minds. The highest “could change mind” responses were for Rubio, Bush, Christie, and Carson, but even Trump (whose voters generally seem to be most dug in) had 28% who could change their minds.

So it seems to me that the most valid things these polls reveal are (1) Trump is leading right now, in a race where the vote is split many ways; and (2) so many people are still undecided that it’s anybody’s race.

And if you think that’s a ridiculous amount of number-crunching just to get to those conclusions, you might be right.

[ADDENDUM: I just noticed this Politico article that’s all about New Hampshire’s late deciders and how often the polls in the state are just plain wrong:

“These people really are volatile,” added Monmouth University pollster Patrick Murray. “They really are undecided. Even if they pick a candidate today or tomorrow, they can change their mind.”

New Hampshire’s closeness in time to Iowa presents problems, too, because a bounce right after Iowa doesn’t necessarily last till the voting in New Hampshire. What’s more, in NH Independents can vote in either primary, and there are a lot of Independents. In addition, voters are so heavily surveyed that they get tired of answering polls and that can skew the population of respondents.]

To be a candidate, you must have energy

The New Neo Posted on by

A lot of energy.

As an example, I just want you to take a look at the pace most of these candidates maintain in the final push in New Hampshire. And they’ve been doing this since last summer, including a lot of back-and-forth between Iowa and New Hampshire.

Those who stay in the race will keep doing it till Election Day. And that doesn’t even count the preparation before their initial declarations of candidacy. It’s a marathon, but a marathon composed of sprint after sprint after sprint, all day and pretty much every day, for well over a year. Among other things, you pretty much have to love it to stay in the game.

What fuels them (besides doughnuts and coffee)? It’s easy to be cynical and say “narcissism,” and that’s not a bad answer, because obviously there’s some of that (and sometimes a great deal of that). But I think there’s more. The best politicians feed not only on adulation but on crowds and also on interacting with people one on one, something most candidates must do a lot in these two states with very small populations (Iowa has about 3 million people and New Hampshire less than half that).

Obama was apparently an anomaly in that way; he didn’t like it, but did it as a means to an end. For the current GOP crop, I would imagine the ones most naturally interested in doing that sort of thing and having fun with it would be Trump, Christie, and Rubio.

[CLARIFICATION: I didn’t mean Obama didn’t like campaigning in general, particularly the adulation of the crowds. When I wrote that he didn’t like “it,” I meant the “it” to refer to the “interacting with people one on one” part.

Same for “that sort of thing” in that last sentence—it’s meant to refer to “interacting with people one on one.”]