I wanted to start typing up some notes for Friday, then do my usual horse race post, but everything hit the fan this morning at work. Power suddenly went out, and our UPS failed, so we’ve been scrambling to get back up over 70 websites, applications, or more for our clients.

• The news media may be rooting for Romney against Obama, but they have given us a two man battle thanks to asking stupid questions once again to Newt Gingrich. Twice this week, Newt has pounced faster than a cat on a laser pointer, making the media look like idiots. The Marxist-Socialist NBC fools have gone the day after both days, to try and accuse Gingrich first of racism (Tuesday), and now sexism (Friday), further proving the point they are shills for the White House.
• Rick Santorum best not be throwing bricks around in glass houses, when it comes to who is more fiscally conservative. His record can be slammed pretty hard, supporting as he did all of George W Bush’s initiatives.
• Democrats aren’t worried about Santorum for just that reason. They can trot out all their anti-Bush garbage and dump it on Santorum.
• Newt’s ex blasted him in a story via ABC News. The result is zero, because we heard this story before in 2010. The social conservatives who would put this against Gingrich are already backing Santorum. This was going to be the infamous “October Surprise” but was flushed out by Matt Drudge and they had to release early.
• The Keystone XL Pipeline was rejected by the State Department this week, causing a furor. Well, guess what, folks? Transcanada and the states found a loophole. The pipeline can be built, just not cross the border yet. So, all but 100 ft of pipeline can be built before it is revisited by either this, or the next, administration. Suck on that, Obama!

Rick Santorum won Iowa!

Maybe…

See, according to the Iowa GOP, after final tallies, Rick Santorum ended up 34 votes ahead of Mitt Romney. Considering today is going to be inundated with Gingrich news, this is great for the Santorum campaign.

Except…

Eight precincts votes are missing from the tally. Where these votes have disappeared, no one knows. Of course, conspiracy theorists are going to cry bloody murder. They will claim all those votes are for Ron Paul and he really won the primary. Problem is, we will never know. After reports of some of the districts voting on pieces of paper instead of official ballots of any sort, of vote counters possibly deliberately miscounting votes to the wrong candidate, and now these missing votes, Iowa just proves how easy it is to bungle an election.

Delegates are not completely dependent on the caucus vote in Iowa, so they should be able to weather any delegate challenge from the Ronulans at the National Convention, but it does make the state look bad.

It is a very old and tiresome insult to say Iowa stands for ‘Idiots Out Wandering Around’, but those eight precinct vote totals are doing just that right now. In the end, this incident will jeopardize the massive economic influx Iowa gets every four years as a number of states will now challenge Iowa’s first in the nation status with this debacle.

Considering Nebraska and other surrounding states also benefit from this, all I can say is “Thanks, Iowa.”