Michelle Malkin Edorses Christine O’Donnell

Conservative pundit Michelle Malkin has endorsed Delaware GOP Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell over her rival, Rep. Mike Castle (R-DE).  In her endorsement, Malkin makes one point that stands above all others:

I’ve said it before and Republican voters need to hear it again:

Entrenched incumbency is not an argument for more entrenched incumbency.

She’s absolutely right.  She’s also right on on regarding many of O’Donnell’s fine qualities AND the relatively liberal voting record of Castle.  While Malkin focuses almost exclusively on Castle’s vote for “Cap & Tax”, Mike Castle has hardly been a beacon of conservatism during his tenure in the House.

That said, I remain a reluctant supporter of Castle.  Why?  The simple reason is that I hold conservatives to a higher standard.  Given that the issues are on our side, there is no need to fudge the truth or pander – IF you are a true conservative.  O’Donnell’s attacks on Castle and her campaigns laughable speculation that Castle would, if elected, resign and allow Delaware AG Beau Biden to take the seat make me believe that O’Donnell simply lacks the character to sit in the US Senate.  Mike Castle does.  Despite his less than wonderful voting record in the House, Castle would still be the best Senator from Delaware since Bill Roth.

H/T – Frank Knotts @ DelawarePolitics

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GOP “Outsider” Raises More Questions Than Answers

Reading the lead of this morning’s Baltimore Sun piece by Paul West might make you think, as I did, that we’re about to be treated to another puff piece designed to help freshman 1st District Rep. Frank Kratovil (D-MD):

For more than a year, Republicans have been carefully plotting the ouster of Rep. Frank Kratovil of Maryland, one of the most vulnerable Democrats in the country.

Party strategists never expected to contend with Rob Fisher, however. An upstart candidate with an outsider message, the conservative businessman has emerged from obscurity, thanks to the most extensive TV ad drive of any Marylander running for Congress.

"We need to change what’s happening Washington," Fisher said in an interview. "The only way we can do that is by changing the kinds of people we send to Washington."

If so, you would be just as mistaken as I was.

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Boehner Panders to Tea Party

If the stakes weren’t so high, this would be laughable.  The GOP leadership can’t control the Tea Party movement and seem to be scared to death.

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) simply doesn’t know what to do.  Commenting after the first meeting of the House Tea Party Caucus, organized by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN):

Mr. Boehner, who said he has attended several tea party events throughout the country, acknowledged the gatherings typically include smatterings of "disaffected Republicans," Democrats and "a couple of anarchists who want to kill all of us in public office."

But "75 percent of these people who show up at these events are the most average, everyday Americans you’ve ever met," he said. "None of them have ever been involved in the political process, and I would guess half of them have never voted."

Mr. Boehner added that tea party activists represent "the tip of the iceberg" of Americans disenchanted with their government.

"They represent the same values, concerns, frustration, anger and fear that you see from tens of millions of other Americans who aren’t in the streets yet," he said. "They should not be dismissed, they shouldn’t be mocked."

75%?  The Tea Party movement is far more independent than Boehner believes.  Sure, the vast majority will vote for Republicans this fall, but that has nothing to do with the GOP’s lack of a genuine conservative message and everything to do with what they’ve witnessed since Barack Obama was sworn in.

Boehner and his buddies better understand that this fall is like a free pass.  If the GOP can’t show that they can actually lead, it’s game over.  Either it’s back to the minority or conservatives and libertarians in the GOP will be demanding that Republican candidates pledge to purge themselves of a leadership that simply cares more about power than philosophy and policy.

The time for pandering is over John.

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O’Donnell Calls Castle “Borderline Schizophrenic”

Christine O’Donnell is clearly the conservative choice over Rep. Mike Castle (R-DE) for the GOP nomination for Joe Biden’s old senate seat.  Whether she’s the more electable choice, only time will tell.  In the year of the “Tea Party”, O’Donnell’s shot at garnering the GOP nod hinges on how many disaffected Republicans will turn out for her and / or to deny Castle (the “RINO” candidate) a place on November’s ballot.

To that end, O’Donnell is coming out swinging:

“Mike Castle’s voting record proves beyond a reasonable doubt that he is for special interests, against the free market, anti-Second Amendment, pro-abortion and he’s even for sanctuary cities.  It’s a preposterous record,” O’Donnell said. “Calling himself a Republican is borderline schizophrenic, confused about his own political identity.”

“Mike Castle is the most liberal congressman in the Republican Party,” said Yates Walker, campaign spokesman.

O’Donnell points out that National Journal, hardly a conservative organ, ranks Castle as the most liberal GOP House member.  To overcome the electability argument, O’Donnell can how point to a Rasmussen poll showing her with a 2 point lead over presumptive Dem nominee Chris Coons.

Given Castle’s length of service as Governor and Congressman, along with a huge fundraising advantage, will painting Castle as a RINO be enough?  Time will tell.  However, if it can be done, Delaware is a great state to do it in.  If O’Donnell is able to organize a real grassroots effort, you can easily contact just about every registered Republican in the First State.

It may just boil down to who wants it the most….  who will will work harder.

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The Tea Party – Exactly What We Do Need

It seems that many of GOP “leadership” don’t think too much of the Tea Party movement.  They didn’t have much regard for those of us who supported Ronald Reagan in 1976 either.  Granted, it can be a fine line between nominating strong, conservative candidates and unelectable loons, but better to nominate a loon than keep supporting the same Do-Do’s that have turned the Regan Revolution into “borrow and spend” Dem-lite.

Trent Lott is mistaken.  More Jim DeMints are exactly what we need.

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Fear the Cooch

It seems that the national GOP establishment is a tad squeamish about Virginia AG Ken Cuccinelli.  Little wonder.  Virginia went for Obama in 2008.  The establishment GOP types thought anti-Obama backlash might yield victories by nice, safe, MODERATE Republicans.  Instead, Virginia elected Bob McDonnell AND Cuccinelli.

“We agree with his positions, we don’t like his style,” said a senior official with a national Republican organization. He spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of antagonizing Cuccinelli allies.

Why do they fear the Cooch?

Cuccinelli offers no apologies for his stands, which delight the tea party wing of the GOP. His federal lawsuits are just a way of making good on his campaign to fight what he views as unconstitutional federal usurpation of states’ rights.

“What we have started on in these first two months is … reasserting the state’s role vis-a-vis the federal government in determining its own destiny and in pushing back on the growing, overreaching federal power,” Cuccinelli said during a recent interview with The Associated Press. “And that isn’t just a Democrat occurrence. That happened under Republicans, as well.”

The 41-year-old Cuccinelli is a pugnacious, ruggedly handsome champion of the right who is able to publicly articulate its beliefs and aims without sounding shrill or mean. And he has clashed with what he considers apostates within his own party as much as he has Democrats.

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Should Grassroots Conservatives Support the MDGOP?

Today, MDGOP chairwoman Audrey Scott begins her 5 day “Take Back Annapolis and Washington Town Hall Tour” with stops in Annapolis (noon, Conte-Lubrano) and Salisbury (6:30 PM, Wicomico Youth and Civic Center).  The tour criss-crosses Maryland and finishes up Friday in Bowie.

Scott is to be commended for her efforts.  If the MDGOP were a functioning party, I have no doubt that Scott would be an excellent chair.  Sadly, the MDGOP is not a functioning party and has little sign of becoming one in the near future.  Check out successful, conservative, state Republican parties.  They’re NOTHING like the MDGOP.

Why?  Grassroots conservatives have no say in how the party is governed and aren’t particularly welcome.  The party deliberately separates itself from the grassroots by promoting a layered, “big fish in a little pond” approach to governance.  At a recent county central committee meeting one member went so far as to claim that, “They (Tea Party activists) need us more than we need them.”  This fool obviously has never had any real experience in WINNING campaigns.  My money is on the folks that seem to be willing to knock on doors, make phone calls, and write letters.  That ain’t the folks who think that the Republican Party elects candidates in this state.

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The Left’s Strategy to Defeat the Tea Party Movement

Attacking the grassroots conservative / libertarian coalition of Tea Party activists hasn’t worked after a year.  Calling us names or claiming that we’re bigots hasn’t worked.  Ridiculing us hasn’t worked.  So, the left (through their allies in the mainstream media) have found a new tactic – let us destroy ourselves.  Shamefully, the tactic just might work.

Can Tea Party activists band together around the issues which they agree on AND agree to disagree on others?  That is the core question facing us as the media attempts to prod Tea Partiers into an internecine war.  Their first target – former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, his FreedomWorks group, and the issue of immigration.

The success of the Tea Party movement has been that it is a loose coalition of individuals and groups focused around economic and tax issues.  We opposed the stimulus.  We opposed TARP.  We opposed “cap and trade”; not because we support pollution, but because we question the science upon which “climate change” is based and we are worried about the economic impact of such a measure.  We opposed ObamaCare.  Some of us opposed the measure solely because of its probable negative impact on the world’s greatest health care system and on our economy..  Others opposed it because of its assault on our individual and corporate liberty.  Many of us fought the measure for both of these reasons; and a few more.

To date, the Tea Party movement has not come together around social issues or other issues that don’t have a direct economic impact on our nation.  However, there is one issue which has an economic impact AND on which many of us within the Tea Party movement disagree.  That issue is ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION.

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Marco Rubio Responds to Charilie Crist’s Attacks

Is there any wonder that Florida Governor Charlie Crist just keeps sinking lower in polls?  Without saying one bad word about Crist, conservative candidate Marco Rubio shows Floridia Republicans why he should be their next US Senator:

H/T – Kevin Holtsberry @ RedState

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Ken Cuccinelli … On Liberty

While the nation’s “economic pie” can be grown through good economic policies, the “liberty pie” is a zero-sum game – it doesn’t grow or shrink – and there are only two slices:  government power and citizens’ liberty.  If the current notions of centralized health care are enacted, government’s raw power over citizens’ lives will increase, and their liberty will be reduced by the same amount.

So writes Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli in this month’s issue of the American Spectator.  (sorry, the actual article won’t be available online until April)

Cuccinelli is fast becoming one of the leaders of the conservative movement.  While Cuccinelli has been using the power of his office to fight federal tyranny in the courts, he is also using the pen to make a reasoned argument for all that conservatives hold dear.

During the current resurgence of the conservative movement and the semi-conservative populism inherent among the tea parties, some may dismiss the need for the intellectual strength displayed by officials like Cuccinelli.  Don’t be fooled.  Without its intellectual underpinnings, the conservative movement never would have grown beyond the Bob Taft years.

As I have noted here in the past – Yes, it is important to believe the right things.  However, without a firm understanding of WHY we believe what we do, those beliefs will not survive the test of time.  This is precisely why we need elected officials like General Cuccinelli.

Yes, we all know that ObamaCare is bad policy.  We all know that it would be fiscally disastrous.  We all know that the world’s best health care system would be greatly diminished.  Yet, Cuccinelli has managed to succinctly explain why we should fight ObamaCare – even IF these things were not the case.  If we wish to forfeit our God given individual liberty for a promised blanket of economic security then America ceases to be that shining city.  Liberty forfeited is liberty lost forever.

Thanks Ken.

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