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12
Dec 2011

Publius Daily Digest

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National

Event Alert: this one is online. Tomorrow, December 13, at 1 p.m. PST the Reagan Foundation is hosting a Lecture with Peter Hannaford to discuss his latest book, Reagan’s Roots. Go here to view the webcast live.

Atlas Shrugged Alert: rumor has it that some Red Box locations are now renting copies of Atlas Shrugged Part 1. Check here to see if you can reserve a copy at a location near you.

Big news from SCOTUS this morning as the Court announced it will review Arizona’s controversial immigration reform law, SB1070. We’ve previously covered that law here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. SCOTUSblog hosted an online symposium in July on SB1070 with input from numerous scholars. From SCOTUSblog:

Adding further to the historic rank of the Supreme Court’s current Term, the Justices on Monday took on the searing constitutional — and political — controversy over state power to strictly limit the way undocumented immigrants live their lives in the U.S.   Along with the politics-saturated but deeply consequential constitutional disputes over the new federal health care law and the role of federal courts in drawing up new election districts to protect minority voters’ rights, the Term that will run through late June is assured of being one of the Court’s most significant single years ever.  The federal government is involved in all three disputes, and its main adversary in each is the same: prominent Washington lawyer and former U.S. Solicitor General Paul D. Clement, who is also battling the government in lower courts over same-sex marriage.  The marriage issue, though, has only the slimmest of chances of getting to the Court this Term in any form.

* * *

The Arizona case puts before eight of the Justices — former U.S. Solicitor General and now Justice Elena Kagan will not take part — that state’s highly controversial bill, known popularly as “S.B. 1070.”  That measure set a pattern among a number of states that have been growing increasingly impatient with what they consider to be the federal government’s lax enforcement of immigration controls, and the resulting harm that they believe illegal immigrants are doing to the quality of life for their citizens and legal residents.  The Arizona measure, and one in Alabama that goes even further, were passed by state legislatures with the specific intent of making life so difficult for undocumented aliens that they would choose to leave the state.  Other states are also passing similar measures.

Arizona’s governor, Janice Brewer, in taking the fate of S.B. 1070 on to the Supreme Court, is portraying the case as a major test of the sovereignty of the states to make their own social policies under traditional “police power” principles.  The federal government, which tried unsuccessfully to persuade the Court not to get involved in the case at this point, is treating the case as a test of whether states may adopt their own immigration policies that frustrate specific goals of federal policy.

With Justice Kagan not taking part, presumably because she had something to do with the issue in her former role in the Obama Administration Justice Department, there is the possibility that the eight participating Justices will wind up split 4-4 in the case.   That would have the effect of simply upholding a Ninth Circuit Court decision, but without opinion and without setting a nationwide precedent.  The practical effect of that would be that Arizona could not enforce four key provisions of S.B. 1070, blocked by both the Ninth Circuit and, earlier, by a federal District judge in Arizona.

Big news indeed. Speaking of the administration, last week we noted Eric Holder’s testimony on the Fast and Furious operation debacle, and WSJ’s Law Blog has a good roundup of coverage from that testimony here.

Also, Steve Chapman notes that Obama is no friend of religious freedom in a thought-provoking column:

But look far enough in this pile of chaff and you find some wheat. On two major issues cited by Perry, Obama has broken with precedent to curtail religious freedom in a way that should alarm staunch secularists (like myself) as well as the devout.

The first instance arose after passage of his health care overhaul, when the Department of Health and Human Services ordered that all insurance plans cover contraceptives and sterilization for women, with no co-payment. The mandate means many Americans would have to be complicit in something their faith forbids.

* * *

Even more extreme is its position on a dispute involving an evangelical Lutheran church and school in Michigan. The school had dismissed a teacher who taught both religious and non-religious classes, and she went to court alleging illegal discrimination.

Federal courts have generally barred such lawsuits, leery of getting tangled up in church doctrine and discipline. But an appeals court ruled in favor of the teacher, and Obama’s Justice Department took her side.

Not only that, it said churches and their schools should be treated no differently from other employers. Taken to its logical conclusion, that would mean the Catholic Church could be forced to admit women to the priesthood.

When the case was argued before the Supreme Court, conservative Justice Antonin Scalia marveled at the administration’s claim: “There, black on white in the text of the Constitution, are special protections for religion. And you say it makes no difference?” Exclaimed liberal Justice Elena Kagan, whom Obama appointed, “I too find that amazing.”

more

From the 2012 primary updates:

WSJ Law blog describes how Rick Perry stumbles, again: “[W]e bring you Perry’s latest, a couple of missteps made during a sit-down with the editorial board of the Des Moines Register. In one, he blanked on the name of Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. In the other, he referred to the Supreme Court as consisting of ‘eight unelected and frankly unaccountable judges.’”

Reason presents a Ron Paul roundup with some interesting tidbits and videos.

George Will explains how a third-party Ron Paul run leads to a second term for Obama:

When recently asked if he might mount an independent candidacy, he said: “I’m not thinking about it because, look, I’m not doing badly right now. … So we concentrate only on one thing: Keep moving up in the polls, and see how things come out in a month or two.”

He is in the top tier in Iowa, and would alienate Republican voters if he indicated an interest in bolting the party next autumn. Nationally, his ceiling is low, but his floor is solid: His supporters are inclined to accept no substitutes because no other candidate espouses anything like his high octane blend of libertarianism and isolationism.

Furthermore, he is now nationally known (he campaigned for the 2008 Republican nomination, and was the Libertarian Party’s 1988 presidential candidate), has a large base of small donors, and his intense supporters probably could get his name on most states’ ballots. He is not seeking re-election to his House seat, so what has he got to lose?

Well, his candidacy might guarantee Barack Obama’s re-election, and this might hurt the career of his son Rand, the freshman senator from Kentucky. Other than that, however, Ron Paul may think what his ideology implies – that Obama is only marginally more mistaken than Paul’s Republican rivals, who do not wake up each day angry about the 1913 Federal Reserve Act.

Video of the Day

Today’s video comes from PA Congressman Mike Kelly and his recent House Floor rant, definitely worth five minutes of your time (click here to view in YouTube):

New Mexico

Check out Steve Terrell’s column in Saturday’s online Santa Fe New Mexican, in which he asks whether the Tea Party activists and the Occupy activists have received unequal treatment by the Santa Fe government:

Santa Fe Republicans indisputably are in the minority. This often leads to grumbling about their treatment by the Democratic majority. Like all political beefs, from any side, sometimes the concerns are overblown. Sometimes not.

Last week a couple of local GOP activists raised a valid question about basic fairness. Jim and Sheryl Bohlander emailed that they don’t think it’s fair that they had to pay hundreds of dollars to use the Santa Fe Plaza for tea-party events while members of the Occupy Santa Fe movement camp out at the city’s Railyard Park for free.

“As two of the principal organizers of the 2009 and 2010 tea-party rallies on the Plaza, we can confirm that we had to secure a permit to use the Plaza, $400 for each event, plus we had to secure at liability insurance policy for both events, well over $300 each time,” the Bohlanders said in their email. “The permit fee for 2011 was $455. Additionally, we had to state specifically the time frame of the events.”

I realize some readers will be thinking, “What the heck? They’re Republicans. They can afford it.”

But setting political prejudices aside — if that’s ever possible — one can ask if it’s fair to make one group of citizens pay to use a city park for a political gathering while another group gets to use a park for free?

Read the whole column here and let us know what you think in the comments.

While we wait for the full results of the grand jury investigations into former Gov. Richardson’s conduct, the state’s most prominent current embarrassment is busy amassing additional assets, this time in Cape Cod, Mass.:

The couple secured a $675,000 mortgage from the Cape Cod Five Cents Savings Bank and purchased the 2,278-square-foot house from Gerald and Stephanie Coughlan of Wellesley. The Coughlans paid $1.6 million for the property on Nickerson Neck in 2004.

Most of the property’s value — $1.5 million — is in the 36,200-square-foot pond-front lot, according to Chatham assessing records. The assessed value of the three-bedroom house with 4.5 bathrooms was $297,900.

“Gov. and Mrs. Richardson will use this home as a vacation home,” Richardson spokesman Caitlin Wakefield emailed Friday. “Their primary residence will continue to be Santa Fe, N.M. Mrs. Richardson has longstanding ties in the Cape Cod area.”

More here. Continuing the New Mexicans in the national news theme, Murphygate has now made its way into the Los Angeles Times:

It wasn’t a good day for New Mexico’s judiciary when a district judge in Las Cruces, the state’s second-largest city, was indicted last spring on bribery charges for allegedly soliciting campaign contributions in return for political favors.

Then things went from bad to worse. The special prosecutor handling the case demanded that the chief justice of the state Supreme Court recuse himself for allegedly having made prejudicial comments and rulings.

And then came the release of a secretly recorded audiotape in which the indicted judge, Michael Murphy, could be heard casually spouting barnyard profanities, racial epithets and homosexual slurs.

The scandal has reverberated statewide, with some seeing it as evidence of rampant judicial corruption. Murphy’s allies portray it as little more than an indiscretion by someone caught talking out of school, and view the criminal charges as a broad interpretation of the bribery statute.

Full article here.

 

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Categories: 2012 Election, Constitutional Rights, Economy, Gary Johnson, Health Care, NM Politics
07
Dec 2011

Publius Daily Digest

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Cartoon courtesy of Reason’s Friday Funnies.

National

As we head into voting season, interesting news out of New York:

It wasn’t voter fraud that caused 60,000 ballots to be tossed from the 2010 election in New York – it was poorly designed voting machines.

According to a study from the New York University’s Brennan School for Justice, the new optical voting system confused voters so much that they ended up casting their votes for two candidates, or “overvoting.”

The study indicates that most of the problems “occurred far more frequently in areas with higher populations of low-income residents, people of color and immigrants.”

More here. Speaking of voting, another prominent conservative comes out against Newt:

Before Republicans put Newt Gingrich at the top of their party, they should consider what happened the last time he led it.

In the mid-1990s, Gingrich was the de facto head of the Republican Party. He helped lead it to victory in the congressional elections of 1994, which brought about real accomplishments such as welfare reform. But once he attained power, both his popularity and that of his party started to plummet. In the aftermath of his leadership, a Republican was able to take the presidency only by pointedly distancing himself from Gingrich.

Conservatives who dislike George W. Bush’s compassionate conservatism have Gingrich to thank for it. After Gingrich lost the budget battles with President Bill Clinton, it took 15 years for any politician to take up the cause of limited-government conservatism that he had discredited.

Although Gingrich isn’t solely responsible for the Republican policy defeats of those years, his erratic behavior, lack of discipline and self-absorption had a lot to do with them. He explained that one reason the federal government shut down in 1995 was that he was angry that Clinton had snubbed him during an international flight. The Clinton White House then released pictures of the two men gabbing on the plane. Later negotiations didn’t go well, with Gingrich saying, “I melt when I’m around him.”

Read Ramesh Ponnuru’s full indictment of Gingrich here. And what of the presumed Democratic nominee? David Harsani’s latest column is, as usual, great:

In Teddy Roosevelt’s era, President Barack Obama explained to the nation this week, “some people thought massive inequality and exploitation was just the price of progress….But Roosevelt also knew that the free market has never been a free license to take whatever you want from whoever you can.”

And he’s right. Even today there are people who believe they should have free license to take whatever they want from whomever they can. They’re called Democrats.

Yet the president, uniter of a fractured nation, the mighty slayer of infinite straw men, claims that some Americans “rightly” suppose that the economy is rigged against their best interests in a nation awash in breathtaking greed, massive inequality and exploitation. Or I should say, he’s trying to convince us that it’s the case.

The middle-class struggle to find a decent life is the “defining issue of our time,” the president went on. And nothing says middle-class triumph like more regulation, unionism, cronyism and endless spending. Hey, Dwight Eisenhower (a Republican!) built the interstate highway system, for goodness’ sake. Ergo, we must support a bailout package for public-sector unions—you know, for the middle class.

Read the full column here. More on Obama’s most recent nonsense from Peter Suderman:

During yesterday’s big-hug-to-Teddy-Roosevelt speech on the economy, President Obama declared that “Some billionaires have a tax rate as low as 1 percent—1 percent. That is the height of unfairness.” Billionaires who pay just a single percent of their ginormous incomes in taxes? Can you believe it?!?!

Better question: Should you?

Glenn Kessler, who writes The Washington Post‘s Fact Checker column,decided to look into the source of the data point about billionaire tax rates. Turns out there isn’t one. Here’s Kessler:

This is a striking statistic. But the only evidence that the White House could offer for it was a TV clip of a conversation on Bloomberg TV, in which correspondent Gigi Stone made this assertion during a discussion about the tax strategies that the very wealthy use to avoid paying taxes.  The TV clip was promoted by the left-leaning website Think Progress.

Stone quoted from a Bloomberg News article last month that reported on such tax strategies, which mostly involve complicated ways to defer paying capital gains taxes. But the article never made the one-percent claim. It also noted that the IRS had gotten more hostile to such transactions in recent years.

An administration official conceded the White House had no actual data to back up the president’s assertion, but argued that other reports showed that some of the wealthy pay little in taxes. [bold added]

To put it in terms Obama might use: There are some who say that that billionaires pay tax rates as low as 1 percent, but they are just making shit up don’t have have any evidence for the claim.

Today’s Political Diary also looked at Obama’s love for TR:

So the White House has decided that President Obama’s re-election model is Teddy Roosevelt, Bull Moose version, circa 1910. In his opening salvo yesterday, Mr. Obama blew into Osawatomie, Kan., where TR delivered his famous anti-bank “New Nationalism” speech, and gave it a 2012 gloss. This Progressive Era retread has liberal pundits doing cartwheels, but the speech was remarkable for its lack of substance to match the severe tone.

According to Mr. Obama’s larger economic narrative, “the basic bargain that made this country great has eroded,” in particular “an America where hard work paid off, and responsibility was rewarded, and anyone could make it if they tried.” The speech leaned heavily on growing income inequality, stagnant middle-class wages and the supposed GOP philosophy of “a free license to take whatever you can from whomever you can.” He didn’t precisely date when this decline began but repeatedly mentioned that it had been building “over the last few decades.” Mr. Obama said that one root of the problem is that the economy has grown more efficient and productive. Two culprits he mentioned were “ATMs and the Internet.”

Given these structural and irreversible changes, and that the other political party only supports “a prosperity that’s enjoyed by fewer and fewer of our citizens,” Mr. Obama might have mentioned solutions commensurate to the moment. Instead he offered this: Making education “a national mission”; more federal “investments” in infrastructure, scientific research and high-tech manufacturing; “pushing” Wall Street to delay home foreclosures; and raising top marginal tax rates so “the wealthiest Americans go to the same tax rate they were paying when Bill Clinton was president.” Mr. Obama concluded, “That’s what will transform our economy.”

In other words, the Osawatomie address was just another reworking of Mr. Obama’s familiar plea to preserve the government we have, without any major reforms. Federal and state spending on public schools remains at historic highs, while budgets for core government responsibilities like roads and bridges are being crowded out by the rapid growth of transfers and entitlements. What the government calls “payments to individuals” have climbed to 66% of the fisc, up from 28% in 1965. And how does returning to the Clinton tax rates fix the inequality that in Mr. Obama’s own telling has been building for decades?

Mr. Obama’s closing peroration saluted a company called Marvin Windows and Doors in Warroad, Minn., that has declined to lay off workers or close plants while its competitors did. This may be laudable, and it might be a good business strategy, or not, but is Marvin Windows and Doors a useful or realistic economic case study in the 21st century? Mr. Obama thinks it is. “That’s how America was built. That’s why we’re the greatest nation on earth.”

Jacob Sullum has a related column chronicling Obama’s reliance on the straw man, check it out here.

Political Diary also noted Obama’s most recent difficulties in getting judges confirmed:

It’s been a tough couple of weeks for the Obama administration on judicial nominations. First they faced off with the American Bar Association over the unusually high number of nominees that were judged unqualified even by the liberal-leaning group. And yesterday, the president’s D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals nominee, Caitlin Halligan, failed to get cloture in the Senate, 54-45.

The event drew an indignant response from President Obama, who said the nomination “fell victim to the Republican pattern of obstruction” and that the vote “dramatically lowers the bar” used to justify a filibuster, which had required “extraordinary circumstances.”

That’s a bit rich coming from Mr. Obama, who, as Ethics and Public Policy Center’s Ed Whelan noted, voted against cloture for Bush Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito as well as appellate court nominees Janice Rogers Brown, William Pryor and Priscilla Owen. In 2007, Sen. Obama was one of 35 Democrats who voted against the nomination of Leslie Southwick, and when Judge Southwick was confirmed he pledged to “fight any other Bush nominations that threaten the very basis of our freedom and democracy.”

Starting with Miguel Estrada in 2003, Senate Democrats made sport of filibustering President Bush’s judicial nominees, a tactic that had never been used as a first-line tool against a president.

The seat to which Ms. Halligan is nominated was previously benchmarked for Peter Keisler, the impeccably credentialed Bush nominee whose nomination stalled in committee for three years and never got a vote. In his statement yesterday, President Obama said Republicans were blocking nominees for seats deemed “judicial emergencies.” Except, oh yeah, the D.C. Circuit isn’t one of them. In 2006, Sen. Pat Leahy, who was the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, was sanguine. “Republicans used to argue that its workload did not justify an 11th or 12th judge,” he said. “Well, its workload is lower than it was and Mr. Keisler is nominated to fill the 11th seat.”

Republicans take issue with Ms. Halligan’s views on abortion, affirmative action and gun rights, as well as her position on the detention of enemy combatants. A 2004 report by Association of the Bar of the City of New York’s Committee on Federal Courts that was signed by Ms. Halligan and other members challenged the Bush administration’s position on the detention of enemy combatants and argued for their trial in civilian courts. Ms. Halligan distanced herself from the report during her confirmation hearing.

Ms. Halligan is only the second Obama nominee to get shot down, following Goodwin Liu’s 52-43 no-cloture defeat in May. We’re no great fans of filibusters around here, but what did Democrats expect?

For those who don’t know, today is the anniversary of the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor, which leads to today’s video. From the description of the video, an interview with author Craig Shirley:

The bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese on December 7, 1941 killed over 2,400 Americans and led directly to the entry of the United States into World War II.

In his powerful, thickly researched new book, December 1941: 31 Days That Changed America and Saved the World, Craig Shirley chronicles the day-by-day shifts in American culture, politics, and national identity through that horrible month. Before December, Shirley tells Reason’s Nick Gillespie, a solid majority opposed entry into World War II and the “eminently respectable” America First movement was poised to help select the next president of the United States. Non-interventionism was so universal that Franklin Roosevelt himself had campaigned for his third term as president on a promise to keep “American boys” out of European wars.

By the start of 1942, says Shirley, the long tradition of isolationism was over, never to be seen again. The nation that had rejected the League of Nations after World War I helped create the United Nations and America quickly became not simply a global economic, political, and military power but the dominant player on the globe.

(click here to view in YouTube):

New Mexico

If you haven’t yet, check out Francisco d’Anconia’s latest post noting Gary King’s Latest Embarrassment.

For those who think questioning the methods used in the war on drugs is inappropriate, take a look at this local story:

Norman Davis was sitting on the couch in his Taos County home, feeling a bit under the weather, on a summer day five years ago when he “heard this helicopter overhead.”

“It was loud. Very loud,” Davis, 76, said in a recent interview. “And I looked out the window and I see these guys hovering over me.”

It was a drug raid by New Mexico State Police, with the assistance of the National Guard.

At least six armed officers, some with semiautomatic weapons, took part in the bust. Five or more vehicles from different law enforcement agencies converged on Davis’ property as the chopper hovered overhead.

A judge refused to throw out evidence in the drug possession case but did find “merit to the claim that police swooped in as if they were in a state of war, searching for weapons or terrorist activity,” according to a recent New Mexico Court of Appeals opinion.

And what did the raid yield?

“I had 14 marijuana plants,” Davis said. “For personal use. It just seems like an enormous waste of resources for a plant that poses no harm or threat.”

Davis was 72 at the time. He said he smokes marijuana to help him with ailments that include osteoarthritis and is in the process of applying for entry into the state’s Medical Cannabis Program.

Davis grudgingly gave his consent for officers to search his property during the 2006 raid, figuring he didn’t have a choice, he said. After the plants were found inside his greenhouse, Davis was charged with possession.

But Davis now appears to have the law on his side.

The Court of Appeals recently overturned a District Court ruling that denied Davis’ motion to throw out evidence police found that day, agreeing that his consent to the search was “the product of duress and coercion or acquiescence.”

When police asked permission to search his place, Davis “was surrounded by numerous uniformed, armed law enforcement officers and several law enforcement vehicles while a helicopter hovered overhead,” the appellate court stated in its October opinion.

District Judge John Paternoster of Taos had found the search “just barely permissible,” according to the Court of Appeals.

The state Attorney General’s Office has taken the case to state Supreme Court, which has agreed to hear it.

That’s OK with Davis.

“I think it’s a good thing,” he said. “My lawyer thought this was an important constitutional question of what police can and can’t do.”

Hunt for ‘plantations’

State Police were conducting “an operation to identify marijuana ‘plantations’ in Taos County.” The operation included two National Guard choppers and two ground teams of officers.

Davis, in his interview with the Journal, said such high-profile searches are nothing new around Carson, the small community where he lives. “They’ve been making a habit out of doing it for 20 years,” he said. “It’s been random.”

A spotter in one of the helicopters observed ” ‘vegetation’ in the greenhouse and ‘plants at the back of (Davis’) house,’ ” according to the appeals court narrative. Armed officers then formed a perimeter around the property.

One approached Davis and told him “the helicopter (was) looking for marijuana plants and they believe they’ve located some at your residence.”

The officer asked for permission to search. According to a police recording, when Davis asked what would happen if he said no, the officer replied, ” ‘Well, then we’ll secure the residence. That’s up to you.’ ” Davis gave permission.

He subsequently said he wasn’t thrilled with the idea and said, “I don’t know if I should do this; I don’t know if it is in my best interest.”

Davis again asked the officer what would happen if he refused and the officer said the police “would go forth and try to execute a warrant through the District Attorney’s Office.” Davis “ultimately signed the consent form.”

‘Swarmed’ by police

Davis’ public defender lawyers argued “that the helicopter surveillance of his property violated federal and state constitutions and that his consent was not voluntarily given.”

The appeals court noted the “obtrusive” presence of officers, vehicles and a helicopter and that the officers were “heavily armed, carrying both their service handguns as well as AR-15 semiautomatic weapons.”

The appeals court ruling said that when the officer told Davis it would take only about 30 minutes to get a search warrant, Davis had reason to believe that “his refusal to consent was futile.”

The Attorney General’s Office said it won’t comment on a pending case, and State Police Chief Robert Shilling said in an email, “I’d rather not comment on operational issues and the justification of resources on any given case.”

“The case centers on the issue of consent and Fourth Amendment issue(s),” Shilling said.

But Davis believes the case also is about where police chose to focus their efforts.

“It’s like a big, stupid, mistake,” he said. “Hundreds and billions of dollars are being spent to put people in jail for growing a harmless weed.”

Asked whether he still grows pot, Davis said, “I don’t know if I should answer that.”

[— This article appeared on page A1 of the Albuquerque Journal]

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Categories: 2012 Election, Drug War, Economy, NM Politics
01
Dec 2011

Publius Daily Digest

By Leave a Comment

National

John Stossel has another great column out noting ways the government is Blocking the Paths Out of Poverty:

Have you noticed how often government takes sides against the little guy?

Street vending has been a path out of poverty for Americans. And like other such paths (say, driving a taxi), this one is increasingly difficult to navigate. Why? Because entrenched interests don’t like competition. So they lobby their powerful friends to erect high hurdles to upstarts. It’s an old story.

Now, growing local governments are crushing street vendors.

The city of Atlanta, for example, has turned all street vending over to a monopoly contractor. In feudalist fashion, all existing vendors were told they must work for the monopoly or not vend at all.

For more on the issue, check out the Institute for Justice’s lawsuit pending against Atlanta.

Speaking of the economy, Reason.tv has an interesting collection of videos related to the Occupy Wall Street movement, most interesting are the Peter Schiff videos. Check them all out here.

The 2012 GOP race continues to fascinate, check out this Talking Points Memo graphic of how things have progressed in Iowa (visit TPM for additional graphics from New Hampshire and the national race):

H/T Peter Suderman. According to Business Insider, as we get closer to the election there are 50 pundits–and only these 50–that we should pay attention to between now and next November:

Back in the days of the cigar smoke-filled backroom journalists like Walter Lippmann told you what to think while you drank your morning coffee. And then Edward R. Murrow told you what to think while you ate a T.V. dinner.

Those days are no longer.

These days the backroom has moved to Twitter and the front page is the viral video.

Nowadays things are a lot messier and a whole lot more fun. And for better or worse very few of the old standards and definitions apply.

In that spirit we’ve put together a list of the 50 essential pundits in no particular order you should be reading between now and election day.  These are the true influencers.

Check out the full list here, it’s an interesting one. In terms of the candidates themselves, it seems Newt Gingrich is the most on the move toward positive gains, as noted in yesterday’s Political Diary:

At a campaign event in Naples, Fla., last week, Newt Gingrich announced, “I’m not the comeback kid. I’m the comeback grandparent.” And the latest polling seems to confirm the former House speaker’s claim.

The latest average of national polls from Real Clear Politics gives Mr. Gingrich a slight 2.5-point advantage over former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. But that advantage is extended in several early primary states. An Insider Advantage/Majority Opinion Research survey released Tuesday found that 28% of registered GOP voters in Iowa support Mr. Gingrich — a 15-point advantage over number two Mr. Romney. The same poll found that Mr. Gingrich garners 38% of the vote among Republicans in South Carolina — a staggering 23-point lead over Mr. Romney.

Mr. Gingrich is also gaining ground in New Hampshire, where the most recent Rasmussen poll shows him just 10 points behind Mr. Romney. That’s by far the closest a candidate has come to the former governor in any Granite State Rasmussen survey. It was also the first poll taken after Mr. Gingrich picked up a key endorsement from the New Hampshire Union Leader newspaper. The same endorsement gave John McCain’s struggling campaign a boost in the 2008 primary.

“I don’t claim to be the perfect candidate. I just claim to be a lot more conservative than Mitt Romney and a lot more electable than anybody else,” Mr. Gingrich told WSC-AM radio in South Carolina Monday. Mr. Romney fired back in an interview with Fox News’ Bret Baier, saying Mr. Gingrich was “a lifelong politician.” He also contrasted their records. “He [Gingrich] spent his last 30 or 40 years in Washington. I spent my career in the private sector. I think that’s what the country needs right now.”

It will be interesting to see if today’s featured video has any impact on Gingrich’s surge. The Ron Paul campaign uploaded this to YouTube yesterday and more than 170,000 people have already viewed it, many sharing on social media sites like Facebook (click here to view in YouTube):

New Mexico

The biggest local news is, of course, the latest in the grand jury probes of former Gov. Bill Richardson’s conduct:

A federal grand jury is investigating an accusation that former Gov. Bill Richardson had supporters pay off a woman during his 2008 presidential campaign to keep quiet about their alleged extramarital affair, the Wall Street Journal is reporting.

Richardson’s political allies allegedly “gave $250,000 to placate a woman who was considering suing the governor in 2007, exposing their alleged extramarital affair, according to people familiar with the federal probe,” the Journal is reporting.

The Journal quoted the sources as saying the woman, who isn’t named in the article, “was a state employee at the time that she allegedly became romantically involved with Mr. Richardson around 2004.”

Richardson didn’t return calls and e-mails from the Journal seeking comment, and his office “declined to provide the names of his lawyers,” the article states.

More here.

Several good posts up at Errors of Enchantment, don’t forget to visit for more local info and commentary.

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28
Nov 2011

Publius Daily Digest

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National

Big news of the morning is Barney Frank’s retirement:

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) will announce Monday that he is not seeking re-election, ending a 32-year career in the House.

Frank, 71, is the top Democrat on the Financial Services Committee and the architect, with former Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), of the sweeping Wall Street regulatory reform law enacted in 2010.

He is scheduled to hold a press conference at 1 p.m. in his district, according to a spokesman, who said the congressman would announce at that time the reason for his decision. His retirement will deprive the House of one of its most colorful characters, a man known for his quick and often caustic wit.

Elected in 1980, Frank survived scandal early in his career and rose to become the nation’s most powerful openly-gay elected official. After coming out publicly, he became a champion for gay rights and helped campaign for an end to the military’s ban on gays serving openly, which ended this year.

More from The Hill here. Also keep up with the breaking story on Townhall.com, which is currently noting:

(1) With Frank out, the Democrat next in line to become the ranking member on the House Financial Services Committee is Rep. Maxine Waters of California.  In other words, another ethically pristine,meek personality.

(2) With Frank out, both authors of the controversial 2010 Wall Street “reform” bill (which enshrined “too big to fail” and left Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac unscathed) will be out of Congress — each with anethical cloud hanging over his head.

(3) With Frank out, a scramble is already underway to replace him.  Several Democrats are moving to run in Franks recently re-drawn district, and Republican Elizabeth Childs had already announced plans to challenge Frank in 2012.  Massachusetts lost one Congressional seat in reapportionment; two sitting members from the state’s 100 percent Democratic House delegation have now announced they won’t return in 2013.

PubliusNM friend John Dendahl has recently posted about the implications of Ohio’s recent election for Big Labor. On November 16, Dendahl noted:

Two ballot issues in Ohio produced the most talked-about results, at least in part on account of the appearance of voter Schizophrenia.  By a margin of 61-39 percent, about 3.5 million Ohioans voting on Issue 2 “vetoed” Senate Bill 5 enacted last March. That law placed limits on public employee unions’ bargaining rights and stepped-up employees’ financial responsibility for their health insurance and retirement contributions. (Arguments pro and con can be seen here.)

The Issue 2 vote is seen as a big victory for organized labor and for the national leader who has advocated for union interests in Ohio and Wisconsin elections, Pres. Obama.

Not so fast, though. By an even larger margin, 66-34 percent, the same voters approved Issue 3, a constitutional amendment barring that state’s citizens from being required to purchase the health insurance that is the lynchpin of the Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act, ObamaCare in shorthand. Since ObamaCare looms as a major issue in the 2012 presidential election, this is seen as a huge loss for Obama. Hence the appearance of voter Schizophrenia.
The union side on Issue 2 spent some $30 million, perhaps three times the opposition’s spending. For perspective, John Kasich’s campaign spent under $19 million last year getting him elected governor. Remaining to be seen is whether in fact this turns out to be the win for organized labor that is superficially apparent. Gov. Kasich had said repeatedly that the changes in law are mandatory for the state and political subdivisions to finance operations without severe layoffs.
Webinar guest speaker John Fund, until recently a respected political analyst and reporter for The Wall Street Journal and now writing a book, called the union win “a Pyrrhic Victory,” suggesting that unions will now pay the price of job losses.
In a follow up post on Nov. 23, Dendahl explained further:

After I blogged the other day about who really won in the Ohio ballot fight over public employee unions, over at News21, my kids who live there sent a related piece published in Columbus by the mayor of a nearby small town, entitled “A few tweaks could improve collective bargaining.”  They commended it to me as “thoughtful.”

My reaction was that (a) the mayor had indeed written a thoughtful piece, but that (b) I still can’t share his faith in binding arbitration. A city’s elected leadership should not be barred from deciding to take a strike or instituting a lock-out. So, in that view, one might argue that the mayor is nibbling around the edges. I do understand, though, that he was writing from a position materially weakened by the election (Issue 2 on the Ohio ballot on November 8) and, perhaps, attempting to get some cheese out of the trap.

If a business executive and/or board of directors agrees to a labor contract that is economically ruinous, sooner or later the executive, the board or the entire company is gone.

John J. Pitney has an interesting piece up at the Washington Post discussing five myths about Newt Gingrich:

1.Gingrich is an academic.

He earned a PhD in history and taught college before winning a seat in Congress. He has often spoken of himself as a historian. In 1995, he told CNN’s Bob Franken: “I am the most seriously professorial politician since Woodrow Wilson.”

But whereas Wilson spent years publishing scholarly works, Gingrich was more like the professor who wins popularity awards from undergraduates but doesn’t get tenure because he doesn’t publish anything significant. He even told a college newspaper in 1977 that “I made the decision two or three years ago that I’d rather run for Congress than publish the papers or academic books necessary to get promoted.”

Since then, he has given countless lectures and written more than 20 books, but has never produced truly serious scholarship. A typical Gingrich work is full of aphorisms and historical references — and devoid of the hallmarks of academic research: rigor, nuance and consideration of alternative views. Conservative political scientist James Q. Wilson once assessed materials for a televised history course that Gingrich was teaching as a “mishmash of undefined terms .?.?. misleading claims .?.?. and unclear distinctions.”

Yet Gingrich has been quick to cite his credentials as a source of authority. In a letter to Reagan budget director David Stockman, he once wrote: “From my perspective as a historian, you don’t deal in the objective requirements of history.” And recently, he suggested that mortgage giant Freddie Mac had paid him for his historical expertise, not his Capitol Hill connections.

Read the other four myths here. Speaking of the 2012 primary, Gary Johnson is now contemplating an LP run:

Former two-term Gov. Gary Johnson (R-N.M.) tells the Santa Fe New Mexican that he feels “abandoned” by a Republican Party that shut him out of all but two of GOP presidential debates so far. As a result, he’s mulling over the idea of running for the Libertarian Party’s presidential nomination.

“If I’d have been included in 16 of the last debates we wouldn’t even be having this conversation,” Johnson said.

Johnson said there have been “overtures made” by the Libertarian Party. While there’s no guarantee he’d win the nomination, Johnson believes he’d have a fair chance….

* * *

There’s little doubt that Johnson – who unambiguously supports an end to the drug war, a non-interventionist foreign policy, reproductive rights, liberalized immigration policy, free trade, and many other libertarian position – would be the highest-profile LP candidate at least since Ron Paul hit the hustings back in 1988. As a pol who won election twice in a Democratic-heavy state and governed to bipartisan acclaim, he’d also be the first one who could point to administrative experience and success, which would surely help with publicity for the LP’s existence and positions.

Since we’ve got some interest in voter fraud (discussed more below), here’s  a lengthy but relevant video for today. On November 11, at the Federalist Society’s annual convention, the Free Speech & Election Law group hosted a panel discussion on the issue featuring, among others, John Fund former WSJ columnist (click here to view in YouTube):

New Mexico
Heath Haussamen’s latest opinion piece decries Secretary of State Dianna Duran’s recent report on possible electoral fraud as “snarky” and untrustworthy:

There should be no doubt that electoral fraud can and does happen, at least occasionally, in New Mexico.

Two of the most recent examples come from Doña Ana County, where a former Sunland Park judge wassentenced to 18 months on probation in 2009 for fraudulently voting and registering as a candidate for judge, and where someone involved in the county GOP allegedly altered seven voter registration forms to change new voters’ party affiliation from “declined to state” to Republican.

There should also be no doubt that there are problems with New Mexico’s voter rolls. Secretary of StateDianna Duran knows it. County clerks from both parties know it.

There should be a bipartisan way to address these issues. Voters essentially charged Duran with leading such an effort when they elected her last year, making her the first Republican secretary of state in eight decades. Duran had the support of many Democrats, including some county clerks.

In electing Duran, voters sent a strong message that they’re tired of shenanigans in the Secretary of State’s Office and want integrity in their elections.

But instead of leading a bipartisan effort to address problems with the voter file, Duran has created division with a months-long investigation that lacked transparency and integrity. As a result, the likelihood of county clerks and legislators from both parties coming together to address issues with the voter rolls is lessened.

Read his full piece here and get back to us in the comments: is Haussamen correct? Is Duran’s report snarky and untrustworthy?

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Categories: 2012 Election, Gary Johnson, Health Care, NM Politics
25
Nov 2011

Weekly Rand

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Thanksgiving is a typically American holiday. In spite of its religious form (giving thanks to God for a good harvest), its essential, secular meaning is a celebration of successful production. It is a producers’ holiday. The lavish meal is a symbol of the fact that abundant consumption is the result and reward of production. Abundance is (or was and ought to be) America’s pride—just as it is the pride of American parents that their children need never know starvation. | The Ayn Rand Letter, III, 23, 1

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23
Nov 2011

Publius Daily Digest

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National

Interesting development from the notoriously liberal (see first item) ABA:

The American Bar Association has secretly declared a significant number of President Obama’s potential judicial nominees “not qualified,” slowing White House efforts to fill vacant judgeships — and nearly all of the prospects given poor ratings were women or members of a minority group, according to interviews.

The White House has chosen not to nominate any person the bar association deemed unqualified, so their identities and negative ratings have not been made public. But the association’s judicial vetting committee has opposed 14 of the roughly 185 potential nominees the administration asked it to evaluate, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The number of Obama prospects deemed “not qualified” already exceeds the total number opposed by the group during the eight-year administrations of Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush; the rejection rate is more than three and a half times as high as it was under either of the previous two presidencies, documents and interviews show.

Full story from the New York Times here, and related story from WSJ Law Blog here.

On the campaign front, Newt now heads up the GOP pack according to Quinnipiac:

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich more than doubles his share of the Republican presidential vote to lead the presidential pack with 26 percent and in a head-to-head matchup tops former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney 49 – 39 percent, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today. But Romney is tied with President Barack Obama.

Former pizza magnate Herman Cain drops from the top spot with 30 percent in a November 2 national survey by the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University to third place with 14 percent today. Romney goes from 23 percent November 2 to 22 percent.

Gingrich, who topped out at 10 percent 20 days ago, zooms to the top as he convinces 48 percent of GOP voters that among all GOP contenders he has the knowledge and experience necessary to be president, compared to Romney’s 22 percent. Gingrich leads Romney 34 – 24 percent when GOP voters are asked who is a strong leader, a key quality Americans historically seek in a president. On foreign policy, he is seen as better by GOP voters 46 – 16 percent. But Gingrich trails Romney 32 – 9 percent when voters are asked who has “a strong moral character.”

More here. If you haven’t yet, maybe now is the time to take Reason’s matchmaker quiz to find your perfect GOP presidential candidate.

David Harsanyi takes on the supercommittee today:

Our government has the time to worry about school lunch menus in Boise, Idaho, but the Senate hasn’t found the time to pass a budget in Washington, D.C., in nearly three years. H.L. Mencken famously wrote that every decent man is ashamed of his government. This one gives you little choice.

Gridlock is ordinarily the most constructive and moral form of government, but with entitlement programs on autopilot self-destruct, we’re in trouble. So Americans turned their weary eyes toward a dream team, a supercommittee, a 12-member panel of our brightest lights, charged with identifying a measly $1.2 trillion in deficit savings over 10 years. Save us.

Alas, for Democrats, it boiled down to the most important issue facing the nation—maybe ever: “revenue enhancement.”

Politico reported that during the supercommittee hearing, both sides agreed to produce “wish lists” to offer some notion of where negotiations might go. Republicans—believe them or not—claimed to want to save $700 billion by block granting Medicaid, another $400 billion in spending cuts, $1.4 trillion in cuts to some mandatory health care programs, and about $150 billion in cuts to the federal workforce.

Democrats, on the other hand, reportedly wanted to pass a new $447 billion spending bill (perhaps forgetting that this was a wish list for a deficit reduction committee) and $1 trillion in tax hikes on those 1-percenters. Since Washington spent $1 trillion more than it took in just last year, this would provide nearly no purpose over 10 years—well, other than a political one.

Read the full column here.

Judge Andrew Napolitano is a great tv host and fascinating speaker. Today’s video is his interview with Reason.tv’s Nick Gillespie (click here to view in YouTube):

New Mexico

A couple of good stories up at NMPolitics.net. First, NM ranks low yet again:

In 2010, Attorney General Gary King’s office recovered 53 cents for every $1 it spent to fight Medicaid fraud, the Albuquerque Journal is reporting.

Only Alaska had a worse record than New Mexico, according to the newspaper. Leading the pack was Missouri, which recovered more than $31 for each $1 spent. The national average was a recovery of $10 for every $1 spent.

Full story here. In other news, apparently 19 folks who have voted in NM may be foreign nationals:

A report the secretary of state sent to lawmakers Thursday claims that her office has found 105 registered voters who may not be U.S. citizens, and 19 of them have cast ballots in New Mexico elections.

That is on top of the two foreign nationals who recently came into Duran’s office to self-report that they were illegally registered to vote.

That’s fewer than the 117 potential non-citizen registrants – including 37 voters – that Secretary of State Dianna Duran claimed during a legislative hearing in March to have identified. Duran’s office is referring information about the 105 registrants who may be foreign nationals to the attorney general.

You can read the secretary of state’s report here.

Full story here.

As always, don’t forget to check out Errors of Enchantment regularly for some good updates.

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Categories: 2012 Election, Economy, National Politics, NM Politics
21
Nov 2011

Publius Daily Digest

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National

Interesting column by Patrick Caddell and Douglas Schoen in today’s WSJ about The Hillary Moment:

When Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson accepted the reality that they could not effectively govern the nation if they sought re-election to the White House, both men took the moral high ground and decided against running for a new term as president. President Obama is facing a similar reality—and he must reach the same conclusion.

He should abandon his candidacy for re-election in favor of a clear alternative, one capable not only of saving the Democratic Party, but more important, of governing effectively and in a way that preserves the most important of the president’s accomplishments. He should step aside for the one candidate who would become, by acclamation, the nominee of the Democratic Party: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Never before has there been such an obvious potential successor—one who has been a loyal and effective member of the president’s administration, who has the stature to take on the office, and who is the only leader capable of uniting the country around a bipartisan economic and foreign policy.

Certainly, Mr. Obama could still win re-election in 2012. Even with his all-time low job approval ratings (and even worse ratings on handling the economy) the president could eke out a victory in November. But the kind of campaign required for the president’s political survival would make it almost impossible for him to govern—not only during the campaign, but throughout a second term.

More polling suggests the inevitability of a Romney nomination, according to today’s Political Diary:

Republicans might not particularly like Mitt Romney, but they may have to learn to live with him if they want to take the White House next year. So suggests a poll released today by Purple Strategies, which surveys voters in 12 swing states: Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin.

President Obama’s approval rating in the swing states is in peril — just 41% overall and 37% among independents — but his saving grace seems to be that voters there are even more sour on the Republican candidates. This critical block of voters gave all of the top GOP contenders lower marks than the president, which may be due in part to the barrage of negative media that Republicans have been facing as the race heats up. The scrutiny, however, will only intensify after the party settles on a nominee, so Republicans may want to choose a candidate who can withstand criticism.

Mr. Romney has the lowest negatives of the field, with 45% of voters giving him the thumbs down. Those numbers aren’t great, but compare them to Herman Cain’s. Fifty-two percent rate Herman Cain negatively and 22% say they definitely wouldn’t vote for him. Just 10% say the same of Mitt Romney. Mr. Romney also fares the best of all the candidates in a head-to-head match-up against the president, running even with him at 45.

“Based on traditional metrics, Obama remains in perilous position,” conclude the pollsters. “He is overperforming his approval rating by 4 points (he gets 45% of the vote against Romney, while 41% offer him a positive job rating), and still remains well below 50%. In recent re-election campaigns, no president has out-performed his job ratings by more than a couple of points.”

The survey also found that Newt Gingrich doesn’t poll much worse than Mr. Romney. The former House speaker trails the president by just two points and has been ruled out by 16% of voters. However, the poll was taken early last week, just before he came under fire for his ties to Freddie Mac and his prior support for cap and trade and the individual mandate for health insurance. Such issues are likely to be more important in the primary contests than in the general election, but whether he can deflect or sidestep the attacks as adroitly as Mr. Romney will determine the strength of his candidacy.

Meanwhile, Steve Chapman asks, Why Not Huntsman?

He’s a responsible, well-spoken adult with a good record in office, a soothing style, bipartisan appeal, and ample knowledge of the world beyond our shores. But Jon Huntsman, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, somehow imagines he can overcome those handicaps.

He’s running at 2 percent in the polls, but working in his favor is that his rivals have defined themselves mostly by their lapses, failures, and gaffes. At the moment, Republicans seem doomed to choose between the fraudulent (Mitt Romney) and the incompetent (almost everyone else). One contender after another has risen to challenge Romney, only to self-destruct in the most mortifying possible way.

That leaves an opportunity for someone who can avoid the exploding cigar, as Huntsman has. Besides being a telegenic master of the complete sentence, he was the highly popular governor of the most Republican state in the country, Utah.

And Peter Suderman discusses the “inevitable” rise of Newt:

The inevitability of Newt Gingrich’s moment in the sun was itself inevitable. Like finicky department store shoppers trying on an endless series of not-quite-right outfits, Republican voters have been indecisively trying out candidates looking for someone, anyone who is both a perfect fit—or at least a decent Not Mitt. And if the GOP base had not stopped to browse Newt’s offerings, enterprising members of the campaign media, always desperate for a newer, more interesting story, would have dropped the Newtron bomb anyway—if only to keep themselves interested.

But the risen Newt is neither as interesting nor as compelling a candidate as he clearly wants people to think he is. The new Newt thing is the same as the old one—frivolous, flighty, flip-flopping, mildly corrupt, and tremendously self-important.

Speaking of Newt, does anyone remember Newt’s commercial with Pelosi back in 2008? We do (click here to view in YouTube):

New Mexico

Paul Gessing’s latest post at Errors of Enchantment takes on the “Supercommittee”:

The so-called “Supercommittee” is done. Failed, kaput. The gulf between Democrats and Republicans was simply too great. Let the finger-pointing ensue. But who is to blame?

The left would point to anti-tax activist Grover Norquist and his “no new taxes” pledge for preventing Republicans from going along with Democratic demands to raise taxes. I agree that Grover has been very effective in fighting tax hikes and for this he should be celebrated, not derided.

After all, the $1.2 trillion in spending cuts that was supposed to be the target of the Supercommittee was less than this year’s deficit! And, as I’ve noted before, the size of the federal government has doubled (from $1.9 trillion to $3.7 trillion) since Clinton left office. Clearly, the “Supercommittee” needed to focus on spending cuts and, if Congress was allowed to further increase spending (absent Grover’s pledge) it would have done so.

So, thanks Grover for keeping tax hikes at bay. Now, we need to force Congress to allow the supposedly “automatic” cuts to happen.

Our friend at The Westerner notes that the Land of Enchantment has now been connected to the Fast & Furious operation by the Department of Justice:

The congressional report showed a major link between Fast and Furious and the arms trafficking ring in Columbus[, NM]. According to the congressional report, New Mexico border patrol agents pulled over Blas Gutierrez, a village trustee and the mastermind behind the Columbus gun-running ring in January of last year. Inside the car, agents said they found a stash of weapons, including AK-47s and pistols known as “cop killers.” According to the report, a number of the guns had been purchased by the main suspects in Operation Fast and Furious just days before. But instead of running the serial numbers while the guns were in their hands, border patrol agents said they handed the weapons back and let Gutierrez go. The guns were then smuggled across the border, and police said one wound up at a murder scene in Mexico.

More here.

Michael Swickard has an interesting column up at NMPolitics.net arguing that Now is the Best Time Ever for Young Workers:

At a fast food style restaurant, I had a nodding relationship with the young fellow behind the counter. We would each say, “Howdy.” Last week he ventured an observation, “You sure were lucky to be young when it was still possible to become wealthy.”

He said it like, “Nice weather… how about those Aggies… whatcha want?” I was startled by the notion that I grew up in a better time. Truth is, I only went to school because I was physically placed on a school bus with instructions to not hit anyone. For the record, I only hit back, but the second kid is usually the one caught, so I was typecast. I was also typecast as a kid who could not wait to get away from school. This they got right.

I was born in 1950, and this fellow behind the counter was born in 1990. Without a doubt they were different societies. In school I practiced the “Atomic bomb attack drill,” while he has to worry about getting a bad case of “Texting thumb.”

Growing up, there were no seat belts in our cars. Also, my father smoked all the time and we did not think about second-hand smoke. We kids did not wear bicycle helmets, and my school lunch was usually a potted meat sandwich I brought from home wrapped in waxed paper.

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Categories: 2012 Election, NM Politics
18
Nov 2011

Weekly Rand

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?”You–who leap like a savage out of the jungle of your feelings to the Fifth Avenue of our New York and proclaim that you want to keep the electric lights, but to destroy the generators–it is our wealth that you use while destroying us, it is our values that you use while damning us, it is our language that you use while denying the mind.” | Atlas Shrugged P3C7

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18
Nov 2011

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2011-11-18

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17
Nov 2011

Publius Daily Digest

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National

Steve Chapman today makes The Case Against Newt Gingrich:

Republican voters’ esteem for Newt Gingrich has been rising fast. At this rate it might someday equal, though not surpass, his regard for himself. Gingrich is not a person with an ego. He’s an ego with a person.

Just listen to his explanation of why it took him a while to catch on with voters: “Because I am much like Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, I’m such an unconventional political figure that you really need to design a unique campaign that fits the way I operate and what I’m trying to do.”

Other GOP candidates sound like they are merely campaigning for office. Gingrich, however, hurls verbal thunderbolts like Zeus, as the lights flicker and the earth shakes. Hopelessly in love with the sound of his own voice, he exhibits a stern, overbearing self-assurance that gives his pronouncements weight even when he is uttering nonsense.

See also Shikha Dalmia’s op-ed: Keep Newt undercover. Meanwhile, Ann Coulter makes the case FOR Mitt Romney:

There may be better ways to stop Obamacare than Romney, but, unfortunately, they’re not available right now. (And, by the way, where were you conservative purists when Republicans were nominating Waterboarding-Is-Torture-Jerry-Falwell-Is-an-Agent-of-Intolerance-My-Good-Friend-Teddy-Kennedy-Amnesty-for-Illegals John McCain-Feingold for president?)

Among Romney’s positives is the fact that he has a demonstrated ability to trick liberals into voting for him. He was elected governor of Massachusetts — one of the most liberal states in the union — by appealing to Democrats, independents and suburban women.

* * *

Instead of sitting on our thumbs, wishing Ronald Reagan were around, or chasing the latest mechanical rabbit flashed by the media, conservatives ought to start rallying around Romney as the only Republican who has a shot at beating Obama. We’ll attack him when he’s president.

It’s fun to be a purist, but let’s put that on hold until Obama and his abominable health care plan are gone, please.

Read her full column here.

Former Supreme Court Justice weighed in on “conservative” Judge Sutton’s decision upholding the constitutionality of ObamaCare:

When Judge Jeffrey Sutton of the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals became the first Republican-appointed judge to uphold President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul, retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens took note. The opinion, Justice Stevens says, may be good on the law, but not so good for Judge Sutton’s own career.

* * *

[T]oday, with every Republican presidential candidate opposed to the health law, Judge Sutton’s June opinion may have killed his chances of elevation to the Supreme Court, Justice Stevens said. The irony, he added, is that Judge Sutton probably believes the health law is bad policy, even if it isn’t unconstitutional.

More here.

So, in case you were still wondering, the Congressional Budget Office director made it clear in testimony earlier this week that the so-called stimulus spending is indeed bad for long term growth:

Testifying before the Senate Budget Committee today, Congressional Budget Office director Douglas Elmendorf reiterated his initial assessment of President Obama’s $800 billion “stimulus” package — that while it may boost the country’s GDP in the short-term, in the long-term, the effect of such spending is a net negative on GDP growth.

Needless to say, Elmendorf’s assessment would also apply to the president’s most recent jobsstimulus package, which would spend $450 billion over the next year, making it larger — in annual terms — than the first stimulus package, which spent $800 billion over two years.

Go here for the video of testimony. Speaking of economics, John Mackey had a great op-ed yesterday about economic freedom:

Is the United States exceptional? Of course we are! Two hundred years ago we were one of the poorest countries in the world. We accounted for less than 1% of the world’s total GDP. Today our GDP is 23% of the world’s total and more than twice as large as the No. 2 country’s, China.

America became the wealthiest country because for most of our history we have followed the basic principles of economic freedom: property rights, freedom to trade internationally, minimal governmental regulation of business, sound money, relatively low taxes, the rule of law, entrepreneurship, freedom to fail, and voluntary exchange.

The success of economic freedom in increasing human prosperity, extending our life spans and improving the quality of our lives in countless ways is the most extraordinary global story of the past 200 years. Gross domestic product per capita has increased by a factor of 1,000% across the world and almost 2,000% in the U.S. during these last two centuries. In 1800, 85% of everyone alive lived on less than $1 per day (in 2000 dollars). Today only 17% do. If current long-term trend lines of economic growth continue, we will see abject poverty almost completely eradicated in the 21st century. Business is not a zero-sum game struggling over a fixed pie. Instead it grows and makes the total pie larger, creating value for all of its major stakeholders—customers, employees, suppliers, investors and communities.

So why is our economy barely growing and unemployment stuck at over 9%? I believe the answer is very simple: Economic freedom is declining in the U.S.

Check out Mackey’s interview with Reason on health care here. Which leads to our video of the day, involving Mackey’s long interview with Reason (click here to view the long version at Reason and here for the excerpt at YouTube):

New Mexico

If you haven’t yet, go check out Francisco d’Anconia’s latest post on Heinrich and Udall. Speaking of NM politicians that are a disgrace, check out the latest on Bill Richardson:

A federal grand jury is investigating potential “financial irregularities” related to former Gov. Bill Richardson’sunsuccessful 2008 presidential campaign, the Albuquerque Journal is reporting.

From today’s Journal article:

“The grand jury has been hearing testimony in secret since at least September, and a number of witnesses have been granted immunity, according to defense attorneys familiar with the general outlines of the investigation.

“… the Journal has learned that one area under scrutiny is whether money from campaign supporters was used to settle a threatened lawsuit against Richardson in the fall of 2007 by a woman who formerly worked in state government.

“Several people familiar with some aspects of the investigation have mentioned similarities to pending criminal charges against former presidential candidate John Edwards on allegations that his campaign supporters paid to shield the candidate from a public scandal.

“The legal issue is whether the money constituted a de facto campaign contribution made in furtherance of the candidate’s bid for federal office.”

According to the Journal, the investigation “involves several other matters tied together by potential election law violations, including possible coordination between so-called ‘soft money’ from political action committees and the campaign.”

More from Heath Haussamen here.

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