This whole scene began unfolding the Sunday before North Carolina voters were to cast ballots on a proposed constitutional amendment to define marriage exclusively as the union of one man and one woman. At the same time that Biden was popping off that he was “very comfortable” with men marrying other men, polls were starting to show that the marriage amendment would likely pass. This after Obama had publicly opposed the North Carolina marriage amendment. Recall that North Carolina is so important to Obama’s reelection plans that he selected the state to host the Democratic nominating convention this September. Obama’s response to this unfolding drama was to cancel a scheduled Election Day campaign trip to the state. Then Arne Carlson, the barely-known Education Cabinet Secretary, upped… Read More

The biggest loser was Barack Obama. The entire field presented itself as credible, articulate and capable. The range of cogent attacks on the Obama Administration serve as a great early-indicator of what next year’s General Election is going to look like. He’s vulnerable on the economy, jobs, federal spending, entitlements, energy independence, bailouts, immigration and so much more.

The second biggest loser was Sarah Palin. If Palin is actually looking at getting into the race (who knows?) her apparent strategy is to arrive late into a weak field and suck up all the energy in the race. However, the field last night showed that it is not weak, it is quite strong. We have businessmen, former Governors, former Senators and members of Congress past and present speaking forcefully, intelligently and candidly about why Barack Obama has failed the country.

Mitt Romney had a very good night. Romney entered the debate as the favorite, and nothing occurred… Read More

Schwarzenegger’s fundamental problem as governor is that nobody could ever trust him. Lacking any core principles, his mood and his style of governance seemed to change with the weather. One day he was a leftie environmentalist, the next a conservative born-again tax cutter. One day he is crusading to recruit jobs, the next he is driving jobs away with ill-considered policies. One day he promotes the Hummer, the next a hybrid. One day he says that the state must live within its means, the next day he is proposing an expansion of government. Negotiating with Schwarzenegger was like negotiating with a stick of butter in the hot sun. This is why he accomplished so little of substance – nobody could ever trust that they were dealing with someone who would stick to the deal for the long term.

Arnold Schwarzenegger utterly lacked principles except for one – Arnold comes first. And that is the sad story that has now been revealed with the… Read More

As with any mission, success was far from certain, yet Obama gave the order. Good for him. Had it backfired, the news today (and for a longtime afterwards) would have been that Obama is an incompetent leader. We would have had a replay of Jimmy Carter’s disastrous April 1980 attempt to rescue 52 American hostages in Iran. In that failed mission, several helicopters crashed, no hostages were rescued and eight American servicemen lost their lives. The event played a major role in Carter’s defeat to Ronald Reagan later that year.

Instead, today we are celebrating the death of one of the most horrific terrorists in the history of civilization as a… Read More

Kamala Harris is simply unelectable as Attorney General. She has the worst criminal conviction rate in the state, having barely won over 50% of her felony trials. She presides over a Sanctuary City and actually provides support and legal comfort for illegal immigrants. She is on the hot seat for failing to disclose massive negligence in the San Francisco crime lab, a failure that could result in the release of thousands of violent criminals. She opposes the death penalty. She was THE most liberal candidate in the Democrat primary, and now she is toast. (PS – How do you feel today, Chris Kelly? $10 million for a 2:1 loss. Ouch.)

Steve Cooley is certainly not a perfect candidate. He’s got big problems with his administration of the Three Strikes law, especially his office policy not to pursue a third strike unless it is a violent felony. He also authored a ballot initiative to weaken the Three Strikes law.… Read More

Levy on tax on lobbyists to finance a “pilot project” that would pay the campaign expenses of candidates in the next two elections for Secretary of State.

But like many ballot initiatives that promise one thing and deliver something quite different, Prop 15 is not what its backers say it is.

Prop 15 doesn’t stop with two elections. It would repeal the ban on tax-supported campaigns statewide. With a simple majority vote, legislators could finance their own campaigns with taxpayer dollars. The same is true for city councils and boards of supervisors.

And it doesn’t stop with the lobbyist tax. Prop 15 invites legislators to use the General Fund or “other sources” to pay for campaign expenses. Those “other sources” include new taxes and fees – not to pay the salaries of police officers and teachers, but to pay for negative ads and junk mail.

Four years ago, 74 percent of voters said NO to Prop 89, a plan to tax businesses to finance political campaigns. In 2000, two-thirds of voters rejected another public campaign financing scheme, Proposition… Read More

At the core of the challenge to Proposition 8 was a challenge to California’s initiative process itself. Opponents of Prop 8 argued that this plain-language 14-word amendment constituted an illegal “revision” of the state Constitution that only the Legislature can initiate. Prior Court rulings had defined constitutional revisions to be those proposals that resulted in a fundamental restructuring of governmental power. How, one might wonder, does a 14 word proposal that simply inserts the age-old understanding of the definition of marriage constitute a fundamental restructuring of government? Fortunately, the Supreme… Read More

According to a new survey by the Field Institute, voters aren’t buying it.

First, let me say that I have not changed my opinion of the Field Poll as a historically unreliable source of information on how voters view pending ballot measures. They have been so far off on so many issues I have been involved in that I always take their data with a slab – not a grain – of salt. That said, the trend that Field is reporting (all of the above measures are trailing badly) is almost certainly correct and reflects the results of other recent polling.

That 1A thru 1E appear headed for the trashcan is not the most interesting finding of the Field Poll. The most interesting finding is that 72 percent of voters agree that voting down the measures “will send a message to the governor and state Legislature that voters are tired of… Read More