Five at (Twenty Past) Five

Patrick Swayze is upset that we haven't been "sensitive" enough in the Iraq War. Not that he's going to go over there himself or anything, since he's afraid of being killed. No word on whether Sean Penn thinks he's a pussy, too.

Iowahawk has the last word on John and Liz Edwards:

"For too long, Republican-fueled hate has kept gays fearful and in the closet, often with tragic consequences," she explained. "For example, even today gay men are frequently locked in loveless marriages of convenience, for no other reason than to provide a flimsy facade to society."

"This is a tragedy for everyone, particularly the unsuspecting wife," said Edwards. "She is that plain small town girl who meets the handsome -- yet oddly fussy -- prelaw student at the fraternity smoker, her undeveloped 'gay-dar' too weak to recognize his obsessive hair primping and unusual effeminate chattiness. Soon they are dating, but he shows little interest in sex, always claiming he has 'a big tort midterm' or other excuse. Still, she would rather stay with this eerily pretty man who shows no interest in other women, even if it means letting him have his regular Wednesday through Saturday 'boys nights out' in Charlotte or Raleigh or Atlanta."

Fellow Ohio blogger Peter Schramm says that Ohio is not in play for the Dems:

Ohio is very much of a GOP state, it is not a swing state; the Democratic party is hardly to be found; and there is no interesting state-wide Demo candidate running for any position that in any way will help Kerry; Voinovich will be re-elected with about 63% of the vote. Second, the social-moral issues (gay marriage, abortion) and security concerns have a huge impact in Ohio, especially among women and African-Americans. This is even reflected in nation-wide polls. Kerry cannot break even with Bush with female voters; he needs to get at least 10% more of them than Bush and Bush will pick up about 13% of the black vote. Third, only fools will think that the roughly 800,000 newly registered voters are all going for Kerry; they will end up breaking about 50-50; pay attention to the large number of voters the GOP has registered, these guys have not been napping for the last five months; there are new voters in rural counties too, they’re not all up in Cuyahoga County. Fourth, Bush will get a much larger percentage of Independents than some folks think. Fifth, there is no enthusiasm for Kerry, even among his supporters. Nobody likes this guy, and his wife seems to justify the worst tendencies of the French Revolution; it is impossible for people to envision her in the White House as first lady. I will predict that Bush will win the state by one or two points less than "Issue 1" (no gay marriage) will pass with: "Issue 1" will pass by about 6%, and Bush will take Ohio by 4 or 5 percent.

I hope he's right (so to speak). Problem is, it doesn't look like he's taken obvious voter fraud like this into account:

Ohio’s Republican Governor Bob Taft painted a disturbing picture of widespread vote fraud in his state.

Taft told CNN’s Bill Hemmer that in four Ohio counties, more people have registered to vote than live in those counties and are of voting age.

"We have four counties where you have more voters registered than you have 18 and over population," Taft said.

Taft noted the role of Democrat 527 groups that have inflated Ohio’s voter registeration rolls.

If it's close, the Democrats will cheat.

Doggy zen, featuring Barney Bush. (Today's picture kind of sucks. Look at yesterday's.)

So go the Redskins, so goes the election. For the past 17 elections, the outcome of the last Washington Redskins home game has presaged the outcome of the presidential race -- if the 'Skins win, so does the incumbent. Weird.