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It’s actually fairly easy to explain Donald Trump’s rise

I guess we should start here: he’s not going to win the GOP nomination. He might run top-3 for a portion of the primaries, but he won’t win. I don’t even think he thinks he’ll win; I doubt any staff… Continue Reading

Clinton vs. Rubio (Bush?): Will 2016 be first true ‘Big Data’ election?

2016 Presidential Election and Big Data

With Hilary Clinton declaring yesterday and Marco Rubio declaring today, this seemed like a good time to write this post. Interesting point made here: FDR mastered the radio like no President beforehand. JFK mastered the TV like no President beforehand.… Continue Reading

Is the Hillary Clinton waiting game actually good for democracy?

Hillary Clinton Waiting Game

There’s basically two options here. None of them are really very good for the United States’ belief in themselves as a true democracy. Continue Reading

The Koch Brothers are 2016

Koch Brothers 2016 Election

Dark money — and the ultimate human representation of dark money, that being the Koch Brothers — should probably terrify you. You can ultimately look at this in 1 of 2 ways, best I can tell: To have a set of… Continue Reading

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Here’s President Obama’s 2015 State of the Union word cloud

SOTU Word Cloud 2015

Here are the word clouds for the third State of the Union of every President since Roosevelt — i.e. the penultimate ones — and below (in large format, as well as to the side here in smaller format) is President… Continue Reading

There are more states under single-party control now than at any time since WW2

GOP State Control

When you speak of “single-party control” in state politics, you mean both houses of state government (House/Senate) and the Governor’s office. Just before the 2010 midterm elections, the Republicans had nine such states. Today, they have 23. Via Mother Jones, they… Continue Reading

Why do we still find the Kennedy family relevant?

I’ve been seeing a lot of Kennedy stuff on the news recently — RFK Jr. married Cheryl Hines (RIP Suburburgatory) this weekend with a bunch of mostly-famous people around, the Michael Skakel case is still in the news, and there… Continue Reading

Here are some of the best lines from the Joe Biden New Yorker profile

I just read this on a plane from BOS to DFW. I laughed out loud about six times; when the plane landed, the guy across the aisle from me was like, “Hey, I have to ask … what could possibly… Continue Reading