Althouse: The smart money is on Obama.

December 17, 2007

The smart money is on Obama.

If by smart, you mean academics.

37 comments:

Brian Doyle said...: "The smart money" is a betting term. They're giving him money to improve his chances of winning, because they like him. Not betting that he will.

But maybe you had to title it that way so you could get your dig in at those not-really-smart liberal academics.

Hack.; 12/17/07, 9:17 AM
George M. Spencer said...: Where is the fast money going?

Giuliani claims he is a NASCAR fan.

Ha!

He's attending races that happen to be in primary states.; 12/17/07, 9:17 AM
Simon said...: Doyle, you've got better things to be doing than sniping at your betters - like coming up with a coherent rejoinder to questions posed here. You don't get to question anyone's credibility until you answer those questions.

As to Obama, I'm not going even going to get started; I merely remain amazed that anyone with a triple-digit IQ can be taken in by his shallow, disingenuous, platitudinous schtick.; 12/17/07, 9:31 AM
Roger J. said...: Perhaps the correlation between education and intelligence isnt all that strong? At least when it comes to politics.; 12/17/07, 9:38 AM
hdhouse said...: Gosh. I think there is something very appealing about complete sentences, good usage, non-mixed metaphors, clear ennunciation, non-pandering prose, education not hidden like some dust on a table top with a magazine over it. The chance to hear someone at least remotely elequent after 8 years of of mediocrity and outright idiocy.

Let me think....smart or hillbilly dumb.....ok. I'll take smart.; 12/17/07, 9:39 AM
hdhouse said...: ohhh Simon...lighten up some ok? With all the GOP candidates talking like Mongo in Blazing Saddles I would think you, as the leader of the smart right wing on here would be drawn to Obama like a moth to a flame.; 12/17/07, 9:41 AM
rhhardin said...: Articulate and clean money.; 12/17/07, 9:47 AM
Cabbage said...: The academics like Obama because in a past life, he was known to the world as Adali Stevenson.; 12/17/07, 9:47 AM
Brian Doyle said...: Doyle, you've got better things to be doing than sniping at your betters

Yeah, like sniping at Ann.

And if you think I'm going to go back and refresh my memory on all your garbage about Al Gore being a hypocrite for flying in airplanes, you're nuts. My "coherent rejoinder" is suck it.; 12/17/07, 9:55 AM
Simon said...: hdhouse said...
"ohhh Simon...lighten up some ok? With all the GOP candidates talking like Mongo in Blazing Saddles..."

LOL. I have to get that movie back from my wife's cousin. Absolute classic.

"...I would think you, as the leader of the smart right wing on here..."

I appreciate the compliment (backhanded though it may be - the one-eyed man may be the leader in the kingdom of the blind, but he still looks like a pirate) but I don't think of myself as leading anything. I'm just here to read what Ann and the commentariat she's gathered around have to say and to offer my two cents. :) Honestly, at this point, I feel like I've agreed with and disagreed with nearly everyone here on one issue or another.

"...would be drawn to Obama like a moth to a flame."

Why?; 12/17/07, 10:04 AM
Anonymous said...: doesn't surprise me... except for you ANN, a lot of these elitist academics are lost in their own world.

In a colorblind society where merit should hold ultimate sway, OBAMA isn't even qualified to be assistant majority whip. He's missed the most votes in the Senate even while he wasn't running for president.

If he wasn't black, we wouldn't even have this conversation. But then again, academics will continue to defend affirmative action despite its widespread failure. Their support for Obama doesn't surprise me.; 12/17/07, 10:11 AM
Simon said...: Doyle said...
"Yeah, like sniping at Ann."

Oh please. That doesn't even warrant serious response.

"And if you think I'm going to go back and refresh my memory on all your garbage about Al Gore being a hypocrite for flying in airplanes, you're nuts. My 'coherent rejoinder' is suck it."

In other words, you have no answer to a problem that rips the bottom of the hull out of the Gorethodoxy, and refuse to even engage the problem. That leaves you as an anti-intellectual, bereft of any credibility.; 12/17/07, 10:13 AM
Amexpat said...: The best gauge of the smart money is at intrade.com where people bet on the outcome of the race. Right now, the smart money has Hillary with a 58% chance and Obama with a 34% chance of getting the Dem. nomination.

For the GOP, it's Rudy at 35%, Mitt at 24% and Mike at 16%. That seems about right to me.; 12/17/07, 10:17 AM
Brian Doyle said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 12/17/07, 10:24 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Please don't let Doyle derail this thread. Let's stay on topic. The topic is that academics support Obama over Hillary (and certainly over Edwards). Feel free to branch into the preference for Romney over Giuliani (and certainly over McCain and Huckabee). The subject is not Doyle or when he crosses the line into trolling.; 12/17/07, 10:33 AM
Mortimer Brezny said...: But, Ann, that has nothing to do with female circumscision.; 12/17/07, 10:35 AM
Brian Doyle said...: Please don't let Doyle derail this thread.

Uh, Ann? You'll notice it was Simon who wanted me to go back and address his Al Gore jihad.; 12/17/07, 10:36 AM
Simon said...: I suppose it does demonstrate that even putatively smart people can be taken in, particularly when a candidate speaks in terms that flatter their preexisting prejudices. I suppose another point that could legitimately arise from the post is from Caron's second list: that not only do academics favor Obama among the democrats, but that the top three faculties by monies donated split grossly one way: "Harvard ... (81% Democrats, 19% Republicans)[,] Stanford ... (85% Democrats, 15% Republicans)[, and] Columbia ... (81% Democrats, 19% Republicans)."; 12/17/07, 10:41 AM
J. Cricket said...: Ann,
Are you also a scold in class or do you save it for the blog?
J.C.; 12/17/07, 10:43 AM
hdhouse said...: Simon...

I like the percentages. But what is it that makes the GOP constantly attack the "liberalness" of colleges and, incidently, intelligence - well educational achievement (perhaps not really intelligence)? I just don't get it.

Can't an equally (or more) compelling case be made that smart people see life as change and growth and nuance and and and (definition of a liberal) and then there are those who don't like change, personal growth, nuance and and and (conservative)? I'm just wondering that's all.

Since the candidate preference seems to be more in line with "match.com" than policy or platform and that few voters seem to grasp more than one issue, isn't all the stuff other than "that man/woman matches up pretty much with what I like" the decider here?

Do you have a figures on the % of academic types who preferred Bush?; 12/17/07, 11:01 AM
Trooper York said...: If the academy favors a candidate, that is reason enough for regular people to run the other way as fast as they can. They wouldn’t know what the “smart money” would do if it bit them in the ass.; 12/17/07, 11:04 AM
Laura Reynolds said...: J.C. Her students are better behaved than some folks here.

However they feel now, they'll vote democratic in November 08, regardless of the nominee. Favoring Obama over Hillary would be safe conversation at a holiday party.; 12/17/07, 11:06 AM
Trooper York said...: Unless of course it was the bus drivers on the Academy Tranist Line. They are honest workingmen and I would be very interested to hear what they think.; 12/17/07, 11:15 AM
Simon said...: Harry, I think there's an undeniable strain of anti-intellectualism that runs through both parties, usually the populist sections that decry sophistication as sophistry, and in truth, the GOP probably has more of it than the Democratic party. Newt's given voice to the frustration with that too. I don't know why that should be the case, to be honest - I don't think there's anything inherently anti-intellectual about conservatism or libertarianism; even Oakeshott, who wrote with great clarity about the risks of rationalism was not hostile to rationality, but rather concerned with the limits of reason and a certain arrogance on the part of some intellectuals rather than a hostility to reason and intellect.

I don't have the figures on how many in the academy preferred Bush, but my suspicion is that it was about 0% in the primaries and about the same figure as the numbers above in the general.; 12/17/07, 11:15 AM
Simon said...: ^ I guess the main reason is just that so many intellectuals are identified with liberalism, as Caron's numbers show, and so mistrust of the academy (like that of the media) has become a proxy for disapproval of liberalism.; 12/17/07, 11:16 AM
garage mahal said...: Possibly a bigger surprise is the early money coming in from the military is Ron Paul and Obama, respectively. 2 people that opposed the whole operation from the get go.; 12/17/07, 11:25 AM
Brian Doyle said...: That's only surprising if you expect the military to be as easily duped about the Iraq War as the people who hear about it (for a couple minutes a week) on Fox News.; 12/17/07, 11:36 AM
Simon said...: Garage, is there a breakdown of those numbers between those on active duty (particularly those presently serving in Iraq) and those who are reserve, former military, or serving in units not slated to be in Iraq?

I'd also ask if you'd go back to the global warming thread and pick up the discussion there - Doyle somehow misread my comment as asking him to import the discussion into comments on this post, but I think there's more to talk about on that subject and no reason why we can't continue discussing it there without taking this thread into a detour.; 12/17/07, 11:38 AM
Hoosier Daddy said...: But what is it that makes the GOP constantly attack the "liberalness" of colleges and, incidently, intelligence - well educational achievement (perhaps not really intelligence)? I just don't get it.

I guess when conservative speakers are shouted down, intimidated or have food thrown at them by supposedly ‘progressive’ students’ it should be obvious. Seems many liberals adhere to the adage that you can have any viewpoint you want as long as I don’t disagree with it.

Can't an equally (or more) compelling case be made that smart people see life as change and growth and nuance and and and (definition of a liberal) and then there are those who don't like change, personal growth, nuance and and and (conservative)? I'm just wondering that's all.

Well your case doesn’t mean much considering that your definitions hardly pass muster with what passes for liberal/conservative thought today. My definition of conservatism is individual liberty, personal responsibility, meritocracy and indeed the celebration of personal growth. If anything, the current crop of liberalism I hear coming from the likes of Hillary! Obama and Edwards is an abdication of all that in favor of the state ensuring ‘fairness’ above personal achievement. In other words, conservatives want the state to stay out of their lives whereas liberals can’t imagine life without the state.; 12/17/07, 11:48 AM
rhhardin said...: drawn to Obama like a moth to a flame

Moths actually aren't drawn to flame. They keep it at a constant bearing, thinking it's the moon, so as to fly straight. Since it's right nearby, however, if the constant bearing they keep it at is ahead of abeam, that results in them spiraling into the flame.

It's not the moth's intention, however. He's heading for dew covered meadows in the mountains, as far as he knows.; 12/17/07, 11:53 AM
Beth said...: I'm going to hop down a rail on the academic ladder to high school--hopping, not derailing. one of my friends started teaching in a New Orleans Recovery School District school this year, his first year teaching (big career change, but not just for altruism. The pay is good, he gets summer off, etc.)

His students are all black, from an insulated neighborhood known for high crime and low income. In a recent conversation, he talked about their interest in the election, and they're very interested. Some will be old enough to vote. Many of the girls are for Hillary; they want to see a woman president. The expected support for Obama just isn't there, and it's related to an interesting aspect of the kind of insulated thinking common to these kids' culture. They buy into conspiracy theories and gossip really easily, and the prevailing thinking seems to be two-fold: first, that a black man will never be president in America, so it's a waste of a vote (they really believe the votes for Obama won't be counted), and second, many of these kids believe Obama is Muslim and there's no way they're voting for a Muslim.

I don't know how representative these kids are of urban black people in America, but I find it interesting that there are currents going on that probably don't show up in the polls.; 12/17/07, 11:56 AM
hdhouse said...: rhhardin...of course assuming that the moth in question is male.; 12/17/07, 11:58 AM
reader_iam said...: They buy into conspiracy theories and gossip really easily

See, they're not so different from other groups within the U.S. after all!; 12/17/07, 12:05 PM
Beth said...: reader, that's exactly right! Podunk, Iowa, and Ninth Ward, New Orleans: they're both the pulse of America.; 12/17/07, 12:14 PM
Revenant said...: Can't an equally (or more) compelling case be made that smart people see life as change and growth and nuance and and and (definition of a liberal)

The main problems with that is that education is INVERSELY correlated with liberalism until you get to the post-graduate level. Inasmuch as education denotes intelligence it can be said that liberal ideas appeal to idiots and geniuses, while people of merely average or above-average intelligence are generally conservative. It is hard to argue that liberalism's appeal lies in it nuance when the smart liberals are significantly outnumbered by the ones who can't actually SPELL the word "nuance".

The other major problem is that it doesn't take much intelligence to be a college professor in most subjects -- and the ones that DO require intelligence tend to be not all that left-leaning. I work with people who are much more intelligent than almost any professor I had at the University of California.; 12/17/07, 3:08 PM
SGT Ted said...: Perhaps the correlation between education and intelligence isnt all that strong? At least when it comes to politics. Simon

That is evidenced every time one hears some whackademic extolling the virtues of marxoid political theory. Which means, everyday, we see just how stupid allegedly smart people can be.

I mean, where else can you find whole scholarly departments, full of PHDs and other letters of the alphabet, that have a failed political philosophy, Marxism, as their basis, but Universities?

Because that's what all the Black, Womyns, -insert favored victim group- "studies" courses are.

So, no, I'm not surprised that "Academics" could be fooled by the attractively superficial. They live by it everyday.; 12/17/07, 3:12 PM
hdhouse said...: SGT Ted said...
"That is evidenced every time one hears some whackademic extolling the virtues of marxoid political theory"

Ok Sgt Preston, what university do you go to regularly where Marxism is the subject of attention and extolliation? Just curious. I was in Moscow last fall and I have friends who teach in University there and they don't. So what planet are you living on that has this as a bill of fare?

and by the way Sgt. Preston, when you dodge this question like you always dodge questions, I'll just keep asking it again so your little dog just doesn't hunt and not only doesn't he hunt, you can't find him.; 12/17/07, 4:19 PM