Over here (if that linky thing works) I wrote a bit about why I'm not panicking.  And some of that was about concern trolls, which led to some people asking whether I thought they were concern trolls simply because they were worried.  A concern troll or just a "nervous nellie", as one commenter put it.

First, about concern trolls.  Being concerned doesn't make someone a concern troll.   A concern troll sounds something like this:

(Concern troll mode ON!) 
Oh crap!  Have you seen the latest electoral college projections?  I don't see how Obama can win now.  I really don't.  Why are liberals such idiots?  Can't they see that Palin was a masterful choice by McCain?  Of course she was fully vetted!  And why can't liberals see that pointing out Palin's lies is only going to backfire on them?  I'm a loyal Democrat but I'm afraid I'm just going to have to wait until 2012 to have any hope of seeing a Democrat in the white house, thanks to Obama and his obnoxious Obamabots who keep calling me a concern troll even though all I'm doing is pointing out that they're stupid and Obama has doomed the Democratic party.
(Concern troll mode OFF!)

Some concern trolls are more subtle, but that's the gist of it.  Take out the "concern" part and it's mostly wingnut talking points.  Deliberate and repeated attempts to exaggerate negatives and minimize or ignore positives, wrapped up in feigned concern.

And common another characteristic of concern trolls is certainty about doom.   It's not "I'm worried that the Republicans might eat our lunch again this year."  It's "here's why the Republicans are going to eat our lunch this year."  

Their purpose is to spread gloom and doom, and asserting that the gloomy outcome is inevitable is a better way to spread doom and gloom.   And if they can't find legitimate arguments, they'll latch onto whatever they can get.  In their most desperate state you might even find one of them quoting some wingnut pundit as "proof" that the Republicans are going to eat our lunch this year.   Nothing else, just quoting some wingnut pundit who is high on Palin fumes.  But from that they conclude .... we're dooomed, doooooooomed, doooooooooooooooooooooooooomed!


The thing is, I'm a "nervous nellie" by nature.  But I'm not panicking about November, at least not yet, although I remain poised to leap into full panic mode, because, as I said, I'm a nervous nellie by nature.

But I find the concern trolls encouraging, believe it or not.  You know that if there's a valid concern to find they'll find it and bring it here to express their deep, deep concern.  In between reminders that they're loyal democrats and just concerned at the way Obama is dragging the party down to certain doom, of course.

But are they finding valid concerns?  Let's take a look at the Palin angle.  How do they get from the choice of Palin for a running mate to gloooooom and dooooooom?

They point out, accurately, that Palin could turn out to save McCain's campaign. Well sure, in theory, that's not impossible, but they make their case by ignoring the huge, huge negatives that Palin brings to the ticket.  Having to use his veep pick to lock up the base vote took a lot of flexibility away from McCain. 

He ended up with an unvetted, incompetent, dishonest, vindictive running mate, and with no choice but to join with her in trying to sell a facade of lies for six more weeks.   I'm not denying her positives.  She's got an undeniable knack for playing to the camera, and a life story and views that appeal very strongly to social conservatives.  It could be a disaster for Obama.  But she's barely gotten started, and there are so, so many ways she could take down the ticket.  But you'll only hear the pro-Palin case from wingnuts and concern trolls.

They adopt a "voters don't care about lying" premise, and with a shoulder shrug and a sigh they pull a blanket of helplessness and defeat over their heads.   And yours, too, if you let them.

They start from a "Rove can do no wrong" premise."  Palin looks like a desperate, unvetted choice, and the McCain/Palin campaign has degenerated into nothing but a facade of lies.  But Rove is behind this campaign, isn't he?  Therefore ... it must be a trick!  She must be a brilliant pick!  Etc. 

Then of course they look at the convention bounce as if it were something other than a convention bounce, they look at old polls and polls within the margin of error and so on and cherry-pick the "evidence" that Palin is clobbering Obama.  And so on, and so on, and so on.

Go back over the case they make and strip out the half-truths and the cherry-picked evidence, push back on the gloom-doom-and-helplessness assumptions that are the foundation for their case, and what's left?

Not much. 

It's the absolute best case for concern they can come up with.  A few of them are very good at wrapping even half-assed concerns in powerful rhetoric, but strip that away and they don't have much at all to use to pump up concerns.  If they had a stronger case for concern, they'd be making it.

When they can make a strong case for concern, without the disingenuous arguments and exaggerated negatives and gloomy assumptions, then I'll panic.  It could happen.  But so far the concern trolls are as desperate and as dishonest as McCain himself. 

I'm not panicking.  I keep reading the concern trolls and the wingnut blogs, because if there's a reason to panic I don't want to be oblivious to it.  But I'm not panicking, at least not yet.  Here's why.

For one thing, I can see that a lot of the concern trolling about polls is based on cherry-picking the worst polls and ignoring the best, AND ignoring the to-be-expected convention bounce, AND ignoring margins of error in electoral college projections, etc.  I think some of the concern trolls understand this and just like to throw people into a tizzy by tossing concern bombs into the cafe.  

I see Palin as a net weakness for McCain.  AT BEST McCain's selection of Palin forced McCain to go into full-time lying mode.  And not subtle lies, but lies so blatant that McCain has lost a lot of the free passes he used to get from the media.  He's got no choice.  Palin's story without the facade of lies would send all but the hardest of hard-core evangelical wingnuts running. 

And that's the best case.  There's still a very good chance of any number of things blowing up in a way that would be fatal to McCain's campaign.  Troopergate <i>might</i> get squashed.  But it might not.  The boldest of the concern trolls and the boldest of the wingnuts try to explain away Palin's interview answers as being crafty or even brilliant, but that's wishful thinking.   She's out of her depth and bluffing and lying non-stop.

She might pull it off, learning enough to wing her way through the debates and interviews, and stonewalling investigations until after the election at least, and brazenly lying about everything else, but that just puts her in the position of having to sell those lies for six more weeks.  That's not a strong position.

And more importantly, it puts McCain in the position of having to sell those lies alongside her, alienating the pundits who used to have some inexplicable respect for his alleged integrity. 

I'm not saying that it's impossible for Obama to lose.  Obviously there are any number of things that could go wrong.

But I am saying, ignore the concern trolls. 

Wait and see how the polls start to settle out over the next few weeks, as more data and more up-to-date data becomes available on the electoral map analyses.  And be sure to read up on "margin of error" if you don't understand it so the concern trolls who don't understand it or pretend not to understand it can't use statistically bogus analysis to sell their concerns. 

Wait and see if the "McCain is lying" meme catches fire, since the results so far look promising.  He's losing a lot of the free pass and presumption of integrity that he's gotten for too long.

Wait and see how the media treat interviews with Palin, when they're given the chance.  Charlie Gibson of all people gave a semi-tough interview for Palin.  The disdain McCain is showing for the media now may provoke more of thesame.

Wait and see what troopergate brings out, or other results from the vetting that's finally happening for Palin. 

None of these things have been happening long enough yet for extrapolations to be meaningful.  Wait a bit.  There will be enough time to panic later, if necessary. 

Twice in two days I've heard Hillary supporters argue that it doesn't really matter whether the wingnuts dominate the Supreme Court by a small margin or a large margin.  "A majority is a majority."

In comments on a thread this evening I pointed out that among the differences between a 5-4 margin and a 7-2 margin would be that the larger the margin, the longer it will be before sanity might be regained in the Supreme Court.

The reply was one word:  "So?"

So??

A McCain presidency would mean more years, perhaps decades, of a Supreme Court that caters to wingnuts, with everything that implies about privacy and liberty.

A McCain presidency would mean more stupid wars and more avoidable deaths of soldiers and civilians.

I hear Hillary-supporters-turned-McCain-supporters or potential-McCain-supporters talk as if these things don't really matter all that much.  Not as much as hurt feelings over what some blogger wrote about Bill or about rude chat room comments from Obama supporters.

I don't understand a willingness to drag your country through these things in defiance of your own preferred candidate urging you to do the exact opposite  simply because your feelings are hurt.  I've had candidates I liked a lot lose before, and it can be depressing and discouraging, but I never felt the desire inflict something like McCain on anyone as a result.

So let me try a different appeal.  Some of you have children of an age such that they might be drafted to be cannon fodder in McCain's stupid wars, if McCain is allowed to start the wars he wants to start.

Some of you have children who would, if McCain can shift the Supreme Court balance even further to the right so that the wingnuts dominate the Supreme Court for another decade or two, possibly grow up without the right to marry the person they love, or without the freedom to make their own basic reproductive choices.  

And these are just some of the non-trivial consequences that might fall on the heads of your own children as a result of a McCain presidency.   Or if not your own children, then your nieces and nephews.  Children of your friends.  Children of people you don't know.   My children.

So.  

Perfect = Hillary/Obama or Obama/Hillary or Kucinich/Gravel or whatever other outcome you imagine would have made you happy even if in reality it had no real chance of ever happening or even if in reality it would have meant throwing the election to McCain.

Good = Obama/Biden

Evil = McCain/some-other-warmonger

You have to choose between Good and Evil. 

If you say that the Good and Evil choices aren't different enough to matter, then (a) you're lying for rhetorical effect but it only makes you look like a moron, and (b) you really are a moron, and (c) your choices are still only Obama or McCain, and either you're going to help get McCain elected or you're going to help get Obama elected.

Pick one.   Throw a little hissy fit first if you find it cathartic.  But then pick one of the two available options.