Larry — on the subject of who the Independents are, I recall reading, some years ago, that for the most part they are Democrats to the left, and Republicans to the right of the party mainstreams. People like Bloomberg want to pretend that Independents are those in some imaginary middle, or who mix strands of each party’s basic views. Rather, they tend to be those further at the extremes. I wish I could recall the source for this…

On the matter of Huckabee and the question of ending birthright citizenship — I read Mark’s view — that changing his position to favor ending it would be the height of hypocrisy — with interest. Sure it would. On the other hand, suppose a politician from out of nowhere, who all of a sudden thinks that he has a chance, decides to embrace a more normative position, held by a majority of his party — just for the sake of winning the support of voters. What is wrong with that? I’d take it. To argue that he is betraying some big principle of his doesn’t seem very relevant to me. Who cares about his principles? I care about his positions. Mainly I care about how close they are to mine. If they change as he becomes more serious about winning, well, good. An honest politician, as the saying goes, is one who stays bought.