This morning I thought I would take a few minutes to share some of my thoughts about goings-on in San Diego County. It’s a crazy time in the county just to the south of my own…
Congressional District 50 – a.k.a. "Oatmeal vs. Acid"
What do you do when the Republican candidate in the special election doesn’t excite conservative 
voters? The only issue on which he seems to be campaigning where he is in line with conservative voters is on the immigration issue, where he has been paid to be hardcore as he has represented (as a federal lobbyist) a hard-line immigration reform group. Bilbray moved into the district. He was tapped by D.C. power-brokers. He defeated a horribly split field of conservative candidates to eek out a plurality, most likely with the help of non-Republican voters. On many issues that I care about, he is only marginally better than the liberal Democrat Francine Busby. And so I read in ‘insider briefings’ that Bilbray is neck-and-neck or a little behind in the special election to replace Duke Cunningham in this solidly Republican seat, and I don’t wonder. In this particular year, with no high-profile GOP primary contests on the ballot and conservative opinion of the President and Congress at historic lows — what is going to motivate GOP voters to turn out on election day? I’ve been in e-mail contact with a lot of folks in the 50th District who backed Bill Morrow, Howard Kaloogian, Eric Roach…and Brian Bilbray is running out of time to convince these people to go and vote for him. They are turned off by his candidacy. Perhaps Bilbray’s biggest challenge is that five of these conservative voters have said that they see this as a chance to send a message to Republicans in Washington, D.C., that a record of massive spending increases should not be ratified with their support of ‘their’ candidate. Add to all of this the fact that conservative businessman Bill Hauf is running a spirited challenge to Bilbray from the right on the regular primary ballot that is on the same ballot as the special election. Hauf is running a strong contrast-campaign, pointing out how liberal Bilbray is on many issues (his latest mail piece is attached below). Hauf’s two biggest challenges — first of all is that he has made a personal pledge NOT to campaign against Bilbray on ‘character issues’ — and the second is that a Hauf victory depends on turning out some very chafed and demoralized conservative voters. Ironically, if Hauf can turn them out, he may save Bilbray and national Republicans from having a lot of egg on their faces. Francine Busy, who recently had a fundraiser held for her by her choice for House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, is God awful. But the spending increases in Washington, D.C., since 1995 make the contrast campaign much harder for Bilbray.
Assembly District 77 – Joel Anderson deserves your vote!
There is a spirited primary taking place to see who will fill the shoes of Republican Jay LaSuer in 
this overwhelmingly Republican district in East San Diego County. Fortunately for conservatives, there is a strong candidate that should be nominated by GOP voters next week — Joel Anderson. I have known Joel for over fifteen years, since our days of involvement with Young Americans for Freedom while in school. Joel is a rock-solid conservative who would be a great legislator in Sacramento. Not only would he be a good vote in the Assembly Republican Caucus, but he would bring some much-needed backbone and conscience to a Republican Caucus who couldn’t hold together to stop a horrific Housing Bond (read: borrow from my children to buy someone else a house). Joel is someone with whom I have battled together in the trenches for so long that I can assure FR readers in this district that he is a solid conservative. Here is a link to Joel’s website.
I’ve been told by several friends that there is another fine conservative in the race — Debbie Beyer. Her campaign is being run by my good friend Joe Justin, and so I am sure it is being run well. That having been said, I don’t know Debbie. I do know Joel – who is great! I believe that Joel can win the nomination, and that conservatives should rally to his cause. I should add that the endorsement by LaSuer of Beyer has become less-than-impressive of late. Up here in Orange County, we just had a high profile "good v. evil" GOP donnybrook in a State Senate special election. LaSuer endorsed and supported the liberal GOPer up here, who narrowly won. He’s also supporting that same liberal GOPer’s even more liberal wife for the State Assembly. Thus I can no longer look to LaSuer to make endorsements based on conservative principle, and so he brings only doubt to my mind about Beyer. (By the way, that liberal GOPer in Orange County has ‘returned the favor’ – he’s listed as an endorser for Beyer.) Being a hand-picked successor means you get the good, and bad, of it. LaSuer’s actions have hurt Beyer with this conservative.
The smart conservative vote is for Anderson.
I’ll be looking to look at the Horn-Thompson dust-up for Supervisor, and the crazy race for Mark Wyland’s Assembly seat in coming days…
Take care…
Jon
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