Game on!

Ostensibly, the news at the Iowa Fraud Poll on Saturday night was that Michele Bachmann eked out the victory, outdistancing the runner-up…Ron Paul…by the scintillating margin of 152 purchased votes. The state of Iowa has 610,000 registered Republicans, but apparently the Bachmann spinners would surely have us believe that she has the Big Mo because she tallied 4823 of them.Wow, is that event a bellwether or what? We might just as well assume that the major league baseball pennants will hinge on the next Class A clash between the Wilmington Blue Rocks and the Lynchburg Hillcats.No, the only real news (aside from Tim Pawlent’s abrupt sayonara) was down around sixth place, where Mitt Romney, who was on the ballot, actually garnered fewer votes than Rick Perry, who was not on the ballot. Think about that one. Romney, the supposed front-runner who has been toiling for a presidential nomination virtually nonstop since 2006, drew only 567 votes – whereas Texas governor Perry, whose candidacy was roughly two hours old, got 718 write-ins.Those two numbers signal the start of the real Republican presidential race. To the many conservatives who yearn for purity, Romney has long seemed overly adulterated…whereas Perry, with his overt Jesus invocations and right-wing Texas pedigree, seems like the real thing. And, with his corporate connections, he’s the only one who can match the Mittster buck for buck.So, game on! I’ll have a full assessment tomorrow.——-My newspaper column today deals with the paralysis of the U.S. political duopoly, and the voters’ unprecedented disgust. I’ll be doing a live chat tomorrow at 1 p.m.——-I’m now on Twitter. Be a follower.