GOP’s Specter Plans to Switch Parties

Veteran GOP Sen. Arlen Specter of PA will switch parties, confirmed his run for re-election as a Dem in 2010, w/c would increase the number of Senate seats Democrats control to 58, an almost filibuster-resistant majority. Our anti-pork GOP candidate Pat Toomey´s (from Club for Growth) winning numbers in the polls and Arlen´s support of Obama Spending Bill precipitated this. The Rasmussen poll puts Toomey ahead 51% to 30%.

Specter’s real problem started with the Democratic presidential primary in 2008. With the battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama still raging last April, hundreds of thousands of moderate Republicans in Pennsylvania switched registration to vote in the Democratic primary. Most of these people normally voted for Specter. Now they are officially Democrats. With a big primary looming on the Democratic side in 2010, probably most of them will remain Democrats to vote in the Democratic primary. Thus the center of gravity of what is left of the Pennsylvania Republican Party has moved far to the right–towards Toomey and away from Specter. Under far less favorable circumstances, Toomey came within 1.7% of beating Specter in the 2004 senatorial primary. Now with the wind at his back and Specter unpopular with the right wing of the Republican Party for his occasional roll call votes with the Democrats, Toomey has an excellent chance of winning the nomination. Unfortunately, he has almost no chance of winning the general election against any of the numerous Democrats trying for their party’s nomination. He is simply far too conservative for a state Obama carried by 11 points. Thus a Toomey win in the primary means that Pennsylvania will very likely flip and give the Democrats their 60th seat in the Senate (assuming Franken is seated by January 2011). Let us hope that this doesn´t happen and that the Tea Parties are doing smarter strategies.

The move gives Democrats control of 59 votes in the Senate, leaving them one shy of 60 needed for procedural control of the chamber. One senate seat remains unfilled, in Minnesota, where a close recount remains tied up in court. But analysts say Democrat Al Franken is favored to win that legal battle in the coming weeks, giving Democrats the majority they are seeking.

A Republican who is close to Senate GOP leadership said Republican leaders still hold a glimmer of hope to hold off Mr. Specter’s party switch. But it isn’t likely.

Mr. Specter, who provided President Barack Obama the critical vote for his $787 billion stimulus plan, faced a powerful challenge in 2010 from former Rep. Pat Toomey, who hoped to unseat Mr. Specter in a Republican primary. Vice President Joe Biden had been openly courting his old friend and colleague from the Senate Judiciary Committee, making the case that he could breeze to re-election as a Democrat.

Why have Pork loving candidates around, anyway? Time to clean up GOP. Good riddance!

The Anatomy of a Socio-Liberal Brain

 

The Anatomy of a Socio-Liberal Brain

U.S. Stimulus Bill to be voted today in lieu of Pelosi´s Travel Plans

Rep. John Culberson, TX claims the “stimulus” bill must be urgently voted on today — because Speaker Nancy Pelosi is leaving at 6:00 PM for an 8 day trip to Europe! This outrageous American Political Soap Opera is really turning ugly. 

Pelosi is said to lead a delegation to Europe; there’s a meeting with the Pope and an award from an Italian legislative group. It is official that the Democrats have now broken their promise to have the public see the $790 billion bill for 48 hours before any vote.  Welcome to the new CHANGE that this Obama Administration has been promising. Empty and politics AS usual.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) predicted that none of his Senate colleagues would ‘have the chance’ to read the entire final version of the 1,071-page bill before it comes up for a final vote. Now we know why.

Pollster Scott Rasmussen reports that Democrats are currently ahead of Republicans by only 40 percent to 39 percent. Given that this generic ballot question over the years has tended to understate Republicans’ performances in actual elections,we can safely conclude that if the 2010 election for House seats were held today, Republicans would win or come close to winning a majority of seats—which is to say, they would gain about 40 seats. By way of comparison, they gained 52 seats when they won their majority in 1994. This result may just be a momentary blip, which will pass away as quickly as it appeared, and we are a long, long, long way from the November 2010 elections. *Sigh*

But any Democratic member of Congress in even a marginally marginal districtshould start worrying. Conservatives against this Obama/Pelosi stimulus package should concentrate less of lynching the three Republicans who supported the Senate version but  more on Democratic members of the House and (at least those who are up for reelection in 2010) the Senate. It will certainly be a very busy time for strategists and GOP state organizations to raise monies now to tackle this.

The New Poster Child for Unqualified Candidates:”Senator” Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg?

Earlier today, I found out that Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, the 51-year-old environmental lawyer, daughter of President John F. Kennedy and Jackie Onassis (and sister of handsome John Kennedy, Jr.) who has shied away from the political arena for most of her life may be considered to replace Sen. Hillary Clinton for Senate seat. 

Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg with Obama during 2008 Campaign

The niece of Edward and Robert Kennedy. The powerful Kennedy clan is fully behind her rising to the office previously held by her uncle, Robert Kennedy who held the New York seat from 1965 until his assassination in 1968. 

Once Clinton is confirmed to President-elect Barack Obama’s cabinet, New York Gov. David Paterson will appoint someone to fill the seat for two years. Democratic officials say Caroline Kennedy has spoken to New York Gov. David Paterson about the Senate seat. Paterson’s office says that the governor had been approached by several candidates for the job but that he would not discuss private conversations.

Of course, since she took on a much more high-profile role during the presidential campaign and, if she does it, would be more than New York’s junior Senator; she’d have closer ties to the Obama White House than any of her colleagues, a direct line to the East Wing.

Ok, so she´s educated. But what are her qualifications, except being the daughter of a President as a child? She’ll probably last two years, to be replaced by future Senator Rudy Giuliani (he has started to schmooze to Obama with his praises). How hypocritical is the media praising Caroline´s interest, while trashing Gov. Sarah Palin´s credentials? Excuse me that many of us have not gone to the famous liberal Harvard University for the elites. 

I am not complaining. In fact, this is AWESOME NEWS. Give the seat to Caroline. If the Dems appoint Caroline to the Senate, Sarah Palin’s credibility will earn massive points! Palin ACTUALLY has experience! If this happens, anytime a liberal or a media rep (and SNL)  mock Sarah’s qualifications, intelligence, or any other quality, the other side can simply point to Caroline and say, “Yeah, well, let’s talk about Caroline.” I mean, let’s face it…if you’ve ever heard Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg speak (without a script–and most of these politicians who were hyped up…ehrm…), then you know she’s not a very bright woman. And if we’re being totally honest she’s really that attractive, either. So wouldn’t it be perfectly delicious if the Dems unconsciously replaced Sarah Palin as the next national laughingstock with the last surviving member of JFK’s family? *Let me start my childhood signing of the cross á la Catholic*

Sarah Palin is smarter than what the media gave her credit for. But then the media thought that Ronald Reagan was stupid, but Reagan outsmarted them every time. Let´s face it, the global financial crisis were  handled by Harvard and other Ivy League alums. We all know that classrooms and real world are VERY different. So pedigrees and grad school doesn´t really mean a lot when it comes to crisis. It is all about character.

Let us see how “fair” the media will treat her, I hope that they give her as much attention as they did to Sarah.

America, welcome to the  new poster child for unqualified and incompetence: Senator Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg!

2008 U.S. Presidential Elections Synopsis Part 2

The 2008 U.S. election proved that a new dawn for politics has arrived. We now have seen the power of web 2.0 and how it can shape a political landscape. We also saw how the Millenials are engaged. How did this all happen? The answer is two words: MARKETING and MONEY. The rule of the game (anywhere) is the one with the bigger war chest, wins. But there is something else about this election that was also not seen in a long time: STRONG MEDIA BIAS.

We can go on and on (which I will because there will be other things I will be ranting about this election), but for the sake of this page, I can safely say that Obama won because he vastly outspent McCain. Even Chris Cilizza of Washington Post (one of the newspapers who endorsed Obama) agrees with many of us who observed the political circus. 

According to Nielsen Company, from June through November, Obama ran 419,667 ads in local markets while McCain ran 269,992 ads — a difference of nearly 150,000 ads. In the final month of the election, the ad difference was even greater with Obama’s campaign running 210,425 local ads as compared to just more than 97,000 for McCain. Obama also had one-and-a-half times as many spot TV ads than John McCain during the general election season (6/08 to 11/08), double when he started running ads in January during the Primaries.

SPOT TV ADS: June-Nov 2008

Barack Obama	419,667
John McCain	269,992

 

Local Ad Spending by Both McCain and Obama

Other notable campaign facts from Nielsen’s research

• Obama’s ads were on the airwaves over twice as much as McCain’s in the final month before the election (210,245 vs. 97,023 ad buys).
• McCain took early advantage of Obama’s long primary battle with Hillary Clinton, which ended on June 3rd. McCain bought over three and a half times more spot TV ads than Obama in June (26,594 to 7,251), the only month that McCain beat his opponent in that category.
• McCain made a major push with national buys in September, out placing Obama 10 to 1 in cable and network ad buys.
• The two candidates alone combined for almost 850,000 total ad buys dating back to January.

 

Here are some statistics presented by ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group: 

 

Daily Tracking versus Actual Popular Vote From ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group

This figure show results of the daily tracking polls, and the actual popular vote (blue). Main pollsters are colored, so that relative bias can be seen. The trend line is a less smooth through all points. 

 

State tracking results from ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group

The result for each state (blue, red) and polls for each state over the week leading up to the election are shown as a dot plot. From top to bottom, the order of the states is from most Republican to most Democratic.

Median is represented as a black dot, all polls as large white dots, and median of last week’s as a grey dot. Vertical lines mark 5% points difference. 

 

Obama tracking results from ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group

 

McCain tracker from ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group

These figures show the daily tracking results separately for Obama and McCain, and the actual result. Tracking polls low-balled the McCain %.

So, how fair was U.S. Elections this time compared to the 2000 or 2004?

Lesson learned here is that politics still truly local and money greases the machines. It is a dirty world we live and work in.

2008 U.S. Presidential Elections Synopsis Part 1

Fourty-eight days to January 20, 2009, before the spectacular fanfare of the historic 44th United States Presidential Inauguration, when an African-American takes center-stage and recite the oath on first entering office specified in Article II, Section 1, of the U.S. Constitution:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect,  and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

The theme for the 2009 inauguration of Barack Obama is “A New Birth of Freedom,” which honors the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth. People scrambling to get the hottest “non-existent” tickets in town. Yes, “non-existent” because they are not issued yet and there are scammers selling them for $1000+ already. So if you contemplate of buying them through the web, STOP IT NOW.  These tickets are FREE and you get them from any U.S. Congress and Senate Officials and usually they are only allotted with a couple of hundred tickets depending on their constituents. Some public officials have even started doing lottery to be fair. You cannot get these if you are not American constituent in that district that the particular elected official (or ask your American friends).

Washington D.C. is expecting about 1M visitors and a massive planning is taking place to keep the city in order. All this hysteria because people want to hear the man who used a Kennedy-King-Lincoln-esque platform and echoed throughout his campaign:

“I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton’s Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I’ve gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world’s poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.” Excerpt from A More Perfect Union

 

Electoral Vote tally

We sat with astonishment to the meteoric rise of this obscured Arab-cheered Messiah 46-year-old political virgin to become the first African-American to capture DNC nomination. (Thanks to the Iowa Caucus and Obama´s brilliant grassroots strategy through David Axelrod´s brainchild, he surprisingly rose above Clinton) Weeks later, he wins an overwhelming mandate of 365 Electoral votes versus the 173 that McCain  got.  World Leaders like Merkel, Sarcozy, Brown (pro-Americans to Obama´s advantage) reacted warmly and  with expectations,  tests and warnings. 

2008 U.S. Presidential Elections County by County Results

The 2008 U.S. Elections cracked a lot of ceilings. Both GOP and DNC parties made historical marks with their two women, Sen. Hillary Clinton (NY) and Gov. Sarah Palin (AL). The former proving to be a formidable candidate with 18M behind her and the latter, a female maverick that became GOP´s first female for top ticket. Then you have the massive money that got poured in through Obama´s internet fundraising, garnering aroung $650M in total which afforded him to release a 30 minute infomercial in all major networks. 

The RESULT: The longest, historic, exciting, most expensive U.S. Election ever!

Obama’s ’Change’: Recycling Clintonistas

What’s with Obama’s choice of old-time Clinton cronies and recycled Washington insiders to run the transition to his new politics of change?

Can’t the anti-Washington-insiders and the president-elect find anyone who isn’t a Beltway has-been?

Judging by the appointments to his transition committee and leaks about possible top staff and Cabinet choices, Obama appears to be practicing the politics of status quo, not the politics of change.

Obama based his innovative campaign on an emphatic and convincing commitment to change the culture of Washington and bring in new people, new ideas, and new ways of doing business.

But now, Obama has definitely changed his tune. As president-elect, he’s brought back the old Washington hacks, party regulars, and Clinton sycophants that he so frequently disparaged. Like Jimmy Carter, the last president who ran as an outsider, Obama has reached out to the same old folks who dominate the Democratic Party and represent the status quo.

His transition committee looks like a reunion of the Clinton administration. No new ideas of how to reform the system there. The chairman, John Podesta, was Clinton’s chief of staff. He presided over outrageous last-minute pardons and his style is strictly inside-the-Beltway and make-no-waves.

Then there’s Carol Browner, Clinton’s competent former EPA administrator who became the consummate Washington insider. She’s Madeline Albright’s partner and recently married mega-lobbyist and former Congressman Tom Downey. During the uproar over Dubai taking over U.S. ports, Browner brought Downey to meet with Sen. Chuck Schumer to plead Dubai’s case. Downey was paid half a million dollars to push Dubai’s position. He’s also a lobbyist for Fannie Mae, paid half a million to try to cover their rears on the subprime mortgage mess. Is this change?

Federico Pena was Clinton’s secretary of transportation and of energy. The president felt he was unduly soft on Air Florida after a crash and lost confidence in him. Now he’s back as a transition committee member.

Bill Daley, Clinton’s former secretary of commerce and the brother of the mayor of Chicago, is the epitome of the old Democratic establishment. Clinton appointed him to the Fannie Mae board and his son worked as a lobbyist for the agency. Aren’t these the kind of folks that Obama ran against?

Larry Summers, president of Harvard and former Clinton secretary of the treasury is not exactly an outsider either. He’s also alienated more than a few with his bizarre suggestion that women may be genetically inferior to men in math and science.

Susan Rice, assistant secretary of state under Clinton advised John Kerry and Mike Dukakis. Does that tell you enough?

Obama has named one of his big bundlers — Michael Froman, an executive at Citigroup. Is this supposed to symbolize change?

Obama’s choice of a spokesperson for the transition is also surprising; she is definitely not the face of reason and new politics. Stephanie Cutter is the brash and combative former Clinton, Kerry, and Ted Kennedy mouthpiece. The liberal DailyKos.com once described Cutter as “a moron to the nth degree” when she tried unsuccessfully to force The New York Times’ Adam Nagourney to treat her unsolicited e-mail criticizing Howard Dean as “background” without mentioning her name.

Speaking of brash, Rahm Emanuel, the new White House chief of staff, makes Cutter look timid. Rahm is also a former Clinton White House staffer — and a very obnoxious one. He spent his White House years leaking to The Washington Post whenever he didn’t like what the president was doing. Even Bill Clinton stopped trusting him. Any hopes of Obama keeping his commitment to reach across the aisle would go right out the window with Rahm’s appointment. Instead of extending a hand to the opposition, it would be like raising just one finger. And Rahm’s strident demeanor laced with the ‘F’ word in every sentence will do little to elevate the bipartisan dialogue in Washington.

Christopher Edley, another member of the transition team, is dean of the Berkeley Law School. He was a member of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission under Clinton, and his wife, Maria Echaveste was Clinton’s deputy chief of staff.

Transition committee staffer Christine Varney was a federal trade commissioner under Clinton and worked in the White House.

Throughout the early debates, Obama criticized Hillary Clinton as part of the inside-the Beltway establishment that needed to go. But now he’s reaching out to these exact same folks. Some change.

Republicans WILL Rise from the Ashes and Emerge Stronger

If ever there was an election that was not worth winning, it was the contest of 2008. While it was hard-fought on both sides, had McCain won, it might have spelled the end of the Republican Party. As it is, the party is well-situated to come back in 2010 and in 2012, if it learns the lessons of this year.

Simply put, all hell is about to break loose in the markets and the economy.

The mortgage crisis will likely be followed by defaults in credit card debt, student loans and car loans. We will probably be set for two years of zero growth, according to economists with whom I talk. And the federal efforts to protect the nation from the worst of the recession will probably lead to huge budget deficits and resulting inflation. We are in for stagflation that could last for years.

Had McCain won, he would be the latter-day Hoover, blamed for the disaster that unfolded on his watch. Now it is Obama’s problem. With the Republicans suffering a wipeout in congressional elections (although not as bad as they feared), the ball is now squarely in the Democratic court. Good luck!

If Obama raises taxes, the situation could get even worse. With a liberal Congress on his hands, he will be constrained to move to the left, if he needs any pushing.

When Clinton was elected in 1992, the Democrats in control of Congress gave him a clear message: Either you govern within the four walls of the Democratic Caucus or you won’t get our support. Crossing the aisle to get Republican votes, even including the GOP in negotiations, was a no-no for which the president would pay dearly if he transgressed.

The result was predictable. Moderate initiatives like welfare reform were scrapped, the Congress passed tax hikes and legislation became festooned with liberal amendments.

Faced with the need to round up every last vote in the Senate and House Democratic caucuses, Clinton had no choice but to load up conservative bills like an anti-crime measure with liberal pork (like a provision for midnight basketball courts in urban areas) to get unanimous caucus backing.

Obama will have to move left to appease his caucus. He will become their hostage, and they his jailers.

This dynamic will produce extreme-left-wing governance, which the Republicans can blame for the continuation of the recession and for any worsening. The party will recover, fed by anger at Obama’s policies, and will emerge from this defeat stronger than ever.

But the Republicans must learn the lesson of MoveOn.org. Founded in the bleak days of the Clinton impeachment, MoveOn developed a grass-roots Internet base. Building up its e-list of activists and contributors, MoveOn laid the basis for the incredible Internet appeal of the Obama campaign. At last count, Obama has 4.5 million donors, most online.

Conservatives cannot count on the Republican Party to fight their battles for them, and certainly cannot count on them to win. The right needs to develop cyber-roots conservative organizations to rival the power of groups like MoveOn.org.

The stellar efforts of Newsmax.com and its ally, GOPtrust.com, illustrate the power of such efforts. Together, these groups raised $10 million for an independent expenditure on media in swing states featuring the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s anti-American bombast.

And their efforts worked.

Virtually all the polls agreed that Obama would win 52 percent to 53 percent of the vote, but the surveys varied in the amount of undecideds they found.

On Election Day, virtually every undecided voter went to McCain, and Obama’s final vote share was no more and no less than the 52 percent to 53 percent the surveys had predicted. This unanimity among undecided voters is attributable to the endgame of groups like GOPtrust.com and Newsmax.com.

These groups have to lead the way in running media to battle against the leftist legislation that will undoubtedly emanate from the Obama administration and the liberal Congress America has just elected. Then they can become the basis for a Republican resurgence, just as MoveOn.org was this year for the Democrats.