Now, the primary elections are coming on more quickly, and the pace can make it difficult to keep track of what’s really going on. Today, the Republicans have caucuses in Nevada, where, although Romney is expected to win because of a high Mormon population in that state, the other GOP candidates will be able to pick up some delegates to the Republican National Convention as well.

Then, on Tuesday, there are caucus elections in Missouri, Colorado and Minnesota. There will also be caucuses held in the state of Maine throughout the week to come.

After that.. well, take a look at the primary election calendar below:

Climate change is the most serious problem we face. Yet, Obama won’t even try to do anything about it.

That’s not cause to give up hope, however. There is another presidential candidate environmentalists can consider, one who won’t capitulate to the Republican ideology. Her name is Dr. Jill Stein.

In her own State of the Union Address, Stein warned that delay in confronting the root causes of global warming creates a national security risk. “At the recent UN climate conference in South Africa, the Obama administration worked to delay international agreements on carbon emissions until 2020,” she pointed out. “This delay will allow critical climate tipping points to be passed that will accelerate warming to the point it cannot be controlled. As renown NASA scientist James Hanson puts it, delaying action to aggressively lower carbon would mean game over for the climate and therefore for civilization as we know it.”

Yesterday, Stein repeated the warning, saying, “We’re running the campaign now because if you follow the science there we don’t have four years to wait. I mean, we don’t. We really have to start tackling this now. It’s really important for the climate and it’s time that people put their politics where their values and science argue they ought to be. I think Obama supporters are really having a rude awakening right now.”

Barack Obama is not going to promote the environmental policies that we desperately need right now. Instead, Obama is helping the oil industry begin yet more offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.

Voting Democrat won’t do. Of course, the Republicans are not a reasonable alternative. So, in 2012, the responsible vote is a Green vote. Of all the Green presidential candidates, the most effective, the most responsible, and the most clearly planned is Jill Stein.

If you truly believe in protecting the natural environment upon which our prosperity and security are founded, then vote Jill Stein for President in 2012.

Cut, cut, cut!

Then, Newt Gingrich discovered that the voters of Florida wanted some pork barrel spending on big NASA projects. Gingrich wanted the votes of people in Florida, so that he could defeat Mitt Romney in the Republican presidential primary to be held there next Tuesday.

So, Newt Gingrich came up with a new promise: Gingrich promised that, if he is elected President, he will have the federal government build a huge permanent colony on the Moon, a base for a new human community that would… collect Moon dust. What’s more, this Moon base would be built in less than eight year.

One thing Gingrich hasn’t been able to explain is how, with the space shuttles out of commission, with the Department of Education destroyed, and with spending on science slashed to a fraction of its previous levels, the federal government could possibly get a permanent human colony on the moon in just eight years. Gingrich hasn’t shared the math that explains how this big government project of his can take place while Gingrich reduces taxes and cuts the size of the budget deficit.

Remember when your mother warned you against trusting people who promise you the Moon? I hope the people of Florida remember that advice, because that’s exactly the maneuver that Newt Gingrich is trying to pull.

So, Newt Gingrich wants to be President so that he can build home for himself on the Moon? Fine. Let’s give it to him. Only, let’s not make him President of the United States of America. Let’s make Newt Gingrich President of the Moon, and then have the Russians ship him off on a Soyuz rocket to serve out his term there, in a capsule on the side of the crater, the ruler of all he can see.

Newt Gingrich for President of the Moon… also available as a tshirt, not made on the Moon, but by American Apparel, right here in the USA.

It’s unjust. It’s anti-democratic, but what can we do about it?

We can choose to vote for a presidential candidate who is not sullied by dependence on independent expenditures. One such candidate is Rocky Anderson. Anderson explains, “How will we fix our broken government? You make the quantum leap by getting people in power who are saying I’m not going to be part of that system, I’m not going to take corporate money.”

Rocky Anderson won’t take corporate money. In fact, he won’t accept any donations to his campaign that are larger than one hundred dollars.

A hundred dollars doesn’t go far these days, of course. So, what can you do to help out Rocky Anderson, after you’ve donated a hundred dollars to his campaign?

You can make an independent expenditure of effort rather than of money. You can volunteer. You can also wear a Rocky Anderson for President button, so that everywhere you go, you’ll spread the message of a campaign unlike anything your friends and neighbors will ever find out about through advertisements on TV.

“Darcy Richardson is the best way for Democrats sick of the past three – and 30 – years’ needless compromises to register their dissent,” says the New Progressive Alliance.

Unlike Stephen Colbert, Darcy Richardson is actually on the ballot – in Texas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Louisiana. Activists are currently at work to get Richardson on the ballot in other states as well.

Since the day he became President, Barack Obama has been disregarding the wishes of the liberal Democrats who put him into the White House in the first place. In 2012, it’s time for liberal Democrats to return the favor. Put on this Darcy Richardson for President campaign button to show that you’re willing to make the change that Barack Obama could only promise.

Earlier on in the Republican presidential contest, we also spent a good deal of time looking into the politics of Texas Governor Rick Perry. For a little while, it looked like Rick Perry might have strong footing to take the Republican nomination away from Mitt Romney. Then, people learned about Perry’s politics, which turned out to be only barely more realistic than the agenda of Vermin Supreme.

Rick Perry’s barely-better-than-insane status was solidified in yesterday’s New Hampshire presidential primary. With 96 percent of precincts reporting this morning, Rick Perry has just 1,711 votes from the entire state. Vermin Supreme isn’t far behind that, at 813 votes.

Rick Perry has been campaigning with millions of dollars. Vermin Supreme has spent a couple of thousand dollars.

In spite of his plainly awful performance in New Hampshire, Rick Perry has vowed to press on to South Carolina. Vermin Supreme is not on the ballot in South Carolina, so Rick Perry will have less competition for the bottom slot. Although there will be no Vermin Supreme in South Carolina, we can expect Rick Perry to fill that niche as the supreme vermin.

Unless there’s a major upset in the New Hampshire primary today, it’s unlikely that any other candidate besides Mitt Romney can prevail. The other GOP presidential candidates have all proven to be remarkably weak.

Ron Paul supports some ideas that make conservatives upset, and some ideas that make liberals upset. Newt Gingrich built his 2012 image upon accusing reporters of trying to get Republican candidates to fight with one another, but is now picking fights with all the other Republican candidates, hitting them with massive blasts of anger, poorly aimed. Rick Santorum can’t seem to speak without uttering an offense to basic reason. As for the other Republican presidential candidates, well, can you remember any of their names?

We liberals should also speak plainly about Barack Obama: He has not been a great President. Some things he’s done in the White House have been worthwhile, but overall, Obama has done at least as much harm as good on the issues that liberals care about.

Working on behalf of Barack Obama would feel just plain dirty, given the kinds of things that he’s done in the White House. So, we’re left with just a couple of good options:

1. We can support a true liberal presidential candidate, Jill Stein.

2. We can put our energy into opposing Mitt Romney.

(Pulling out of the political sphere in disgust isn’t a good option, because it gives more power to the anti-liberal forces that disgust us in the first place.)

Speaking out against Mitt Romney is something that do a great deal of here at Irregular Times. Writing online is just one form of political opposition, of course. Another form of activism we sincerely believe in is the simple act of wearing a political button. Wearing a button wherever you go lets people know where you stand, and often, a button provokes interesting political discussions with people who were complete strangers.

Given the importance of opposing Mitt Romney’s presidential candidacy, we are in the process of putting together a collection of campaign buttons dedicated specifically to the task of expressing opposition to the Romney for President campaign. This collection is getting bigger by the day, but already it’s the largest selection of anti-Romney anywhere online.

These buttons are available here in our anti-Republican collection of political pins, but they’re also mirrored in a more concentrated, searchable form at ProgressiveButtons.com. The buttons are in two categories there: General anti-Romney pins and anti-Romney pins designed for each one of the 50 states in the USA.

When he was wearing an activist button with the words 99 Percent on it, Mitt Romney’s campaign staffers wouldn’t allow him to come inside. He was told to go away, while other people were allowed in.

Then, the same guy took off the 99 Percent political button, and got back in line. This time, the Mitt Romney campaign allowed him in to the rally.

The message is pretty clear: If you’re part of the 99 Percent of Americans who earn less than half a million dollars a year in income, then Mitt Romney will accept your support, but only if you don’t actually say that you’re part of the 99 Percent. If you openly admit that you’re not a millionaire, the Mitt Romney for President campaign regards you as a threat who shouldn’t be allowed into the presence of Mitt Romney himself.

If Mitt Romney thinks that 99 percent of Americans aren’t good enough to be allowed to enter one of his campaign events, what makes him think that he can represent us in the White House?

Mitt Romney’s campaign seems to have been especially worried about what happens when the 99 Percent speaks plain economic truth. From the audience of the Mitt Romney rally tonight came this chant: “Mitt kills jobs!”

These people were seized by security guards and forced out of the building. This is what it means for Mitt Romney to be campaigning as a corporate leader. Romney only wants Yes Men around him. Dare to question Romney’s wisdom in his presence, and you’ll be taken away to somewhere far away, where Romney won’t have to be confronted with your uncomfortable dissent any more.

All Santorum needed to do was gather 296 signatures in the District of Columbia. Alternatively, Santorum’s campaign could have paid a $5,000 additional fee, gathering no signatures at all.

I remember, in a recent local election, explaining to activists who were being asked to petition for a candidate that the process of petitioning isn’t just a burden that prevents some people from getting on the ballot. Petitioning for signatures is an important democratic form of campaigning, getting a candidate’s message out to the people through direct human contact. It’s also like a little election before the election, determining which candidates have the organizational ability to compete.

In Washington D.C., Rick Santorum has shown that he doesn’t have that basic ability. He’s not the only one to fail the test, however.

Rick Perry, Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich will be on the Republican primary election ballot in Washington D.C., but none of these three candidates gathered a single signature there. Their campaigns sniffed at having to actually get out on the street and talk with people, asking for support. Instead, Perry, Paul and Gingrich chose to play the money game, and pay off the system, buying an exemption from petitioning rules by paying an extra fee. This decision by these three candidates demonstrates a failure to commit to one of the basic aspects of the democratic process – direct contact with the people that the government is supposed to represent.

Presidential candidate Jill Stein got on the ballot for the Green Party primary election in Washington D.C., even though the Stein for President campaign isn’t accepting big money from corporations, lobbyists and political action committees. Dr. Stein was simply able to organize her local supporters, who were dedicated enough to get out and knock on residents’ doors and talk to them, face to face.

Where Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul and Rick Perry have failed, Green Party candidate Jill Stein has succeeded. That fact ought to give Americans pause, as they consider who is really “electable”. Dr. Stein was simply able to organize her local supporters, who were dedicated enough to get out and knock on residents’ doors and talk to them, face to face.

Searching for insight, I found one explanation for Santorum’s success in the words of another Republican radical: Glenn Beck.

Glenn Beck said on his radio show, “I think the next President has got to be Abraham Lincoln, he has got to be somebody who knows exactly who he is, knows exactly where he stands and is willing to, in the end, turn those reins of power back over. The temptation and the pressure is going to be absolutely enormous. If there is one guy out there that is the next George Washington, the only guy that I could think of is Rick Santorum.”

If you take Glenn Beck at his word, and you trust Glenn Beck’s judgment, then you shouldn’t vote for Rick Santorum. After all, Beck says that the next President of the United States has to be Abraham Lincoln. But, Beck then says that Rick Santorum isn’t Abraham Lincoln at all. He’s the next George Washington instead.

Of course, Glenn Beck’s logic simply got garbled, as often happens for him. If we take the larger attempted point that Rick Santorum would make a great next President of the United States, though, we’re still left with a problem.

How can the next President of the United States be the next George Washington? The very essence of George Washington, the reason that he’s significant in American history, is that he wasn’t the next anything. George Washington was the first President of the United States. There can’t be the next first President. That doesn’t make any sense.

Rick Santorum isn’t like George Washington in any other way, either. He isn’t a great military leader. Santorum wasn’t an effective leader in Congress. George Washington was never voted out of power. Rick Santorum was.

Most importantly, George Washington was regarded as an effective leader because he was absolutely non-partisan. George Washington was the only President in American history who rejected the idea of political parties. Rick Santorum has always been a strident Republican partisan.

What on earth could Glenn Beck have been getting at when he compared Rick Santorum to George Washington? The thing George Washington was most famous for was his leadership in the violent overthrow of one government in order to establish a new kind of government. Is Glenn Beck trying to suggest that Rick Santorum would begin an armed revolution against the democracy of the United States of America?

Whichever way you look at it, this George Washington meme can only expose Rick Santorum’s profound inadequacies. Santorum is no Washington, and he’s not up to the task of commanding the Oval Office.

We’ve created a new collection of anti-Santorum political buttons to aid in the effort to resist Santorum’s growing regressive force. Take a gander.