The word of the day is "clusterfuck"

So, in my rush to deal with a bunch of other stuff yesterday (including getting sentimental about Chicago), I completely ignored the fact that yesterday was the primary in Michigan. In a nutshell:

• Willard "Mittens" Romney took the win by a solid 9 points over John McCain, and 23 points over Mike Huckabee. The Bill Buckleys of the world are breathing a sigh of relief: Romney has a harder road to the White House than the others, but the GOP would rather have a punching bag from the opposition party in the Oval Office (say, Hillary Clinton) that would unite them again, rather than a punching bag from their own party that they can't control and don't want to bother defending.
• Hillary Clinton took the win from the Democrats, which is allegedly a hollow victory. There is still talk of the Michigan delegates being seated at the convention, which would give her another nudge, but as far as its effect in the sort term, there's a lot of debate over whether this will give her any momentum or whether people see it as a hollow victory and ignore it, because most of the people I've talked to have no damned idea what's happening with the "undecided" delegates (the best explanation of this debacle is, ironically enough, from the BBC).
• The GOP, after the initial primaries, still has three considerable front-runners (and one ex-front-runner who keeps losing to Ron Paul and Fred Thompson) going into Super Tuesday, and they each have their target audiences that will show up and give them some delegates. For the Democrats, Hillary Clinton is up on delegates, but we won't have an idea who's really going to win until at least Super Tuesday, and maybe not long after that. Edwards is doing his damnedest to keep his numbers up so he can act as a spoiler/kingmaker, waiting until someone needs him enough to cut a deal and take his endorsement and his delegates. As a result, political junkies (people like me) are foaming at the mouth at the thought of not just one but two party conventions that may actually mean something.
  

Andrew Sullivan, by way of my good friend Wyl, has just informed me that today is the 30th Anniversary of William Shatner's performance of "Rocket Man" at the Science Fiction Awards. I've been known to have sort of a . . . perverse taste in music. Shatner is one of my favorites. I love his stuff, and not in an ironic way. So unlike that Sullivan fellow, I'm going to be kind and embed the video.