GOD

Wooh. That picture's kinda scary. Anyhoodle, today we're going to talk a little bit about Jeezus. Jeezus will be watching over the next few months reeeally carefully. Everywhere you turn, there he'll be, tripping up perfectly ordinary issues with his big old feet, shouldering his way into debates you never even dreamed he might show up at.

in 2004, George Bush Junior won 78% of the evangelical Christian vote, to John Kerry's 21%. While the Evangelical vote isn't, as most Europeans believe, a MASSIVE voting block, when elections are as close as they were in 2000 and 2004, how everyone votes is crucial. The Evangelical vote made a real difference. There are two types of Evangelicals: hard-line conservatives, and what some pundits term "freesyle" Evangelicals. Freestyle Evangelicals tend to be pretty moderate, and not necessarily Republican voters. It's worth noting that in the 90s Bill Clinton won not just the Freestyle vote, but quite a bit of the Crazy vote as well. The again, Blinton really liked Jeezus a whole lot. Jeezus with the babbling and the snakes and all.

While Evangelical Christians are not necessarily the batshit conservatives that Europe sniggeringly terms them, they do like the Lord, and they're not alone in America. Fred Thompson has just waved buh-bye to everyone by admitting that he only goes to church when his mom drags him there by the ear. "I know I'm right with God, and with those I love." he says. Yeeeah. But why don't you like church? Makes you feel a little uncomfortable, huh Fred? OR DO YOU HATE BABY JESUS?

Polling Station: As They Stand

The slogan of the State Tourist Board reads 'Welcome to New Hampshire, You're Going To Love It Here." Apparently,the fall foliage is to die for. It's over 97 % white, and 80% Christian. It calls itself the Granite State, and it casts the very first votes in the presidential election cycle. Nobody really knows why. The people of New Hampshire take their responsibities very seriously indeed. Out stumping for his wife, Bill Clinton looked a little haunted, and said "They really put you through it...they kind of - kick the tires and see whether you can run or not." And boy, they really do:
For the next several months, everyone will poll the living crap out of these people. 52% of people like cupcakes, 30% do not own a dog, 97% think yellow is a nicer colour than pink. The media will slavishly report national statistics squeezed from polls of less than 100 people. Oh, but they know what they're doing, the Granitas. They're like those canny old people who know how to jump a queue properly, are always the first in the buffet line, ask awkward questions, insist on being fed dinner at 4 p.m. and generally affect the whole tone of the weekend by being grouchy and self-involved. And so, polling what may as well be a tiny cross-section of the 8th-grade class of the Gladys Mackintickle School for the Performing Arts, CNN reports that:

In the Blue Corner, Clinton leads Obama 33% to 27%, and in the bottom half of the draw Governor Bill Richardson has overtaken John Edwards 11% to 9%. This means that Edwards has fallen from 16% in June, and Richardson polled at 11% in both months. We Love Bill Richardson! Check him out in the recent debate:

Pity he STILL looks like a guy also speaking in sign language, but we're sure it'll even out. More on Richards later. (In Other news, Mad Joe Biden is polling at 4%, Little Denis Kucinich at 3, and Crazy Old Mike Gravel, who really should have dropped out by now, at 1)

Mitt Romney, the MORMON! HE'S A MORMON! is leading the Republicans 34% to Rudy's paltry 20, and poor old McCain has dropped to 12% from 20. Behind somebody called Fred Thomson of Tennessee.

But here are The Monocle's favourite stats: 16% would never ever vote for Clinton, 15 would rather die than vote for Obama, but a whopping 24% never want to see John Edward's face again. We will do our own polling anaysis here at the Monocle. Stats will be hereafter read like this: while the people of New Hampshire aren't that keen on women, while they're not too sure about black guys, they really, really hate pretty boys. Time to shoot a duck, Senator Edwards, time to shoot a duck.