Martin Kramer explains why you shouldn’t vote for Juan Cole’s blog (assuming that you were even considering doing so). The professor really is a piece of work, and makes me ashamed to be a Michigan alumnus.
[Afternoon update]
The problem with the “ABC” strategy is that it dilutes the anti-Cole vote, perhaps giving him the victory. As I noted in comments over at Michael Totten’s post on the subject:
Michael, the only problem is that by not encouraging people to coalesce around one of the non-Juan blogs, he’s likely to win by vote dilution of the “neocons” (yes, scare quotes deliberate). Perhaps you and the other competitors should go check out the poll at some predesignated time, see which of you is leading, and then “give up your delegates” to that blog via an endorsement for any remaining voters to prevent such dilution.
Unfortunately, Cole is leading in the poll. 1340 votes to 1090 for something called “israellycool.com” and 651 votes for Michael Totten.
I went ahead and voted for Totten’s blog.
FYI israellycool.com has been doing a great job live blogging the fighting in Gaza.
Totten is way ahead as of 1800 MST. I voted for the Aussie, he’s got a great site there. Totten’s no slouch either, I’ve been reading his stuff for years now.
vote dilution is one reason I support approval voting for N way elections.
As of 8:10 EST, Isreallycool is ahead of Cole by 50 votes, but Totten has 2 times the votes of either Isreallycool or Cole. Cole would need to get a lot of support to come back regardless of vote dilution.
As it should be, both of their blogs are far better than IC.
Cole is gaining again. He’s moved back ahead of Isreallycool, and Totten no longer has a 2x lead. But Totten still has a very commanding lead.