If you haven’t seen it yet, the Rolling Stone website has an interesting Q & A with partisan political strategists James Carville and Frank Luntz. Carville, as most of you know, was Clinton’s head strategy person in the 1992 presidential campaign. Luntz, a rightwing pollster, worked with Newt Gingrich in 1994 to draft and market the Republican Party’s “Contract With America.” Now, they’ve both got some interesting insights on what we might expect come November. Here are a few quotes:

LUNTZ: This election is going to be closer even than 2000. There are only about a dozen states that are in play. The biggest of these states — Ohio, Florida, Minnesota, Pennsylvania — represent about twenty percent of the vote. Roughly ninety percent of Americans aren’t going to switch their preference between now and Election Day. That means that only about two percent of Americans really matter in this election. Close to $400 million is going to be spent trying to win their votes. My prediction is that Bush will win the election by a slim margin — about two points.

CARVILLE: John Kerry is going to win by four points. Bush lost the popular vote by half a million votes last time, so in order to win this time he’s going to have to bring a whole hell of a lot of new people out in his favor. That’s not going to happen. Ninety percent of the people who voted in 2000 will vote in 2004. I defy anyone to tell me that there are a few hundred thousand people who voted for Al Gore in 2000 who have been so impressed with Bush that now they’re going to vote for him.

LUNTZ: I’ve met plenty of Gore-to-Bush voters, particularly in the Jewish community. I recently talked to a room of several hundred Jewish voters. When I asked who voted for Bush in 2000, about two people raised their hands. When I asked who was voting for Bush this time around, almost half the room did. You’ll also see an increase in the Hispanic vote, which appreciates Bush’s focus on the immigration issue. And I think he will do better among suburban moms, who appreciate his focus on education.

His focus on education? He cuts $8 billion from what he says he’ll put into education, and yet people still think that he’s pro-education because of that damned “No Child Left Behind” marketing campaign. Say what you will about Karl Rove, the man’s a fucking genius… And I knew that Bush had been pandering to Jewish voters in the past few weeks, but for some reason it hadn’t even occurred to me that it might be because he sees the potential to win over some of those that voted for Gore-Lieberman in 2000… Presidential politics are as fascinating as they are disgusting.

Half my fucking day was wasted trying to figure out how to get things transferred from Tivo to videocassette. Its been on my list of things to do for the past year and a half, but Id been put off by the enormity of the task. You see, I tried early on, when we first got Tivo, and eventually got frustrated and gave up. Id tried about ten different ways and I just couldnt get it to work. And, since then, Ive just let the task build up in my mind to Herculean proportions.

I would have been happy waiting until this kid that Linettes carrying around in her belly got old enough to figure it out for me, but Id fucked up and promised my friend Jeff Kay that Id send him the last few episodes of The Sopranos and Deadwood.

Jeff called me last week from what he and his family were calling a camping trip, and he was pissed off. Apparently, the campground they pulled their air-conditioned trailer into only offered basic cable, so they couldnt get HBO on the TV theyd brought with them. So, in an act of desperation, he called me from his cell phone to ask me to Tivo his shows. Being a good friend, I said yes and hoped that hed forget.

But he didnt forget. Apparently hes obsessed with counting all the naughty words that get said in each episode of Deadwood and he just cant let go. The emails started almost immediately upon their return to civilization.

So, there was no way out of it. This afternoon, I scooted the TV away from the wall, dusted away the cobwebs, and got to work. It took a few hours, but Im proud to say that Ive finally got his fucking tape done

And now I know exactly who to turn to first when I need a kidney.

I have never in my life done this much work for a friend. Ever.

I brought a lot of work home and Im not going to be able to post tonight. I did, however, want to link to something that my friend Steve put up on his site today. Its a piece on Americas booming Prison Industrial Complex. After you read his post, check out the comments section. Some pretty interesting stuff is getting said.

The fact that this subject isnt even one of the top ten that I track is embarrassing. More that that though, its testament to just how fucked up the world has become. I cant believe were living in a world where the fact that prisons are becoming for-profit industries, pimping out below minimum wage slave labor, doesnt even register on my outrage meter. Five years ago, I think I would have been marching in DC if Id heard that a greater percentage of black men would see the inside of a prison than a university. Now, I just tacitly accept it. Its like were all living inside of some elaborate reality television series, and this stuff is happening so quickly that there isnt even time to react.

Even more upsetting, my friend Arun just wrote in to tell me that legislation was pending in New Orleans to outlaw low-riding, pubic bone-baring jeans Will the ramifications of Janet Jacksons tit never end? The damned thing is like Michael Meyers in the Halloween movies.

On a much happier note, another fellow Ypsi blogger, Laura from the Ypsi Dixit just made me aware of that fact that Leonardo da Vincis notebooks are now available on-line.

OK, I said that I didnt have time to post, but it looks like thats exactly what I did Im stopping now though.

See, I can stop.