Halfway down the Danube

Over the Border

This is really Claudia's story, so I'll be brief.

When we come to Moldova, we get tourist visas, good for 90 days.  Generous!  But if we want to stay longer, we have to get special permits called legitimatsiyas.  (Pronounced like the first half of "legitimate" and the back end of "not see ya".)  With a legitimatsiya, one can breeze in and out of Moldova.  Without it... 90 days.

Well: we arrived here in mid-March.  In early May we applied for our legitimatsiyas.  Normally, we were told, this takes two weeks; in no event should it take more than 30 days.

Six weeks later, we still don't have them.

Well, we couldn't hang around waiting.  So Claudia left at 6 am this morning to drive to Germany, with Alan and David in the car.

Long story short: she got stopped at the border, turned around, sent to court, and fined twice -- once for overstaying (about $50) and once for driving a car that had overstayed (about $140).  She reached the border around 7:30, but didn't actually get across it into Romania until about 1 pm.  On one hand, a huge and incredibly annoying waste of time and money.  On the other, everyone is okay and they're on their way -- just half a day behind schedule -- and Claudia wasn't expelled, so she and the boys can re-enter the country.

I'm bringing the two younger children to Germany by plane on Saturday morning.  Will my legitimatsiya arrive by then?  Watch this space.

The 2012 Republican Presidential nominee

Mitt Romney, barring catastrophe.

Yes, Mormon, perceived as flip-floppy, approved a health care plan for Massachussetts.  Won't matter.  He's got good staff, he's organized and diligent, and he's going to out-fundraise everyone by a comfortable margin -- he raised $10 million in a single night a couple of weeks ago.

There's a lot of cheerful noise in the left side of the blogosphere about how ridiculous this year's Republican candidates are.  True, but it misses the point: you only need one reasonably okay candidate.  The process weeds out the crazies and the gag candidates quickly enough.  Pause for a moment and think back to 2008.  Here, I'll help:  Mike Gravel, Dennis Kucinich, Bill Richardson, Chris Dodd, John Edwards.  Yeah, suddenly the Domino's Pizza guy doesn't look so bad, am I right?  Okay, then there was Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama.  But most of that field was bloody horrible. 

Anyway, Romney.  He won 11 primaries last time, including six -- Wyoming, Nevada, Maine, Colorado, Utah, and Alaska -- by 20 points or more.  He came in second in 11 more.   Meanwhile, nobody else in the race has ever run for President before. 

Oh, sure, he'll have problems.  Iowa hates him.  Whether or not to skip Iowa -- I'll bet he's sweated over that one.  South Carolina won't like him either.  And New Hampshire disappointed last time; it was supposed to be a sure thing for him, but in the event McCain took it 37 - 32.  If I had to guess, I'd say that's the weak spot -- losing Iowa and NH to the same guy.  (If it happens, it'll be a guy.)  But if he wins NH, or even if he loses Iowa and NH to two different rivals, he's fine.  He loses SC, takes Nevada, and then advances to Super Tuesday -- where his funding, experience, and staff advantages should enable him to crush any plausible opponent. 

Maybe I'll be wrong!  I've been wrong about stuff before, goodness knows.  (On the other hand, this post from a year and a half ago is still looking good.) But hey, it's a testable prediction.  Come next summer, one way or another, I'll link back to this.