To win the honors of being the Democrat on the ballot for President this November, either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama must win a majority of 4049 delegates. So, to put it another way, the first one to get to 2025 gets to claim the Gold Medal for Dems. Much has been made about how Senator Obama has been exceeding expectations, virtually in a neck-and-neck tie with Hillary at this point in the nomination contest. In fact three more states will hold their primaries today, and some say that Obama will out-delegate Clinton. But the real question is this — are all of the primaries and caucuses being held around America by Democrats just for show? Are they just beauty contests? Is it the case that the Democratic Party may be totally misnamed — because as people are just now starting to understand, there may not be much democratic (small d) input into their nominating process. Why is this? The complex and arcane rules of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) provide that of the 2025 delegates to their convention this summer, 796 of them are not chosen by rank and file Dems (whether by primary or caucus). Rather,… Read More

As I was reflected on the results of how all of the ballot measures fared in last Tuesday’s election, I was struck with a sense of déjà vu. No on 91. No on 92. No on 93. Yes on 94. Yes on 95. Yes on 96. Yes on 97. Then it struck me, and I looked back through my e-mails and sure enough, the California Chamber of Commerce put out a release urging ALL of these positions. Or, to put it another way, the CalChamber went seven for seven, or 100% on election day! All of the measures either passed or failed by pretty wide margins on Tuesday, with the exception of Proposition 93, that was so close that newspapers had to go to print for Wednesday morning without a definitive answer on whether it passed or failed.

Relative to that close measure… **There is more – click the link**… Read More

President George W. Bush will speak at 10:20 am this morning at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C., his first appearance at the annual conference as President.

During his presidency, Ronald Reagan attended every CPAC conference in person, with the exception of one, and he sent a recordedmessage to that one. He also was a frequent visitor before his election.

I can personally verify, however, that George W. Bush has been to more CPACs than just the one he is attending today, where he is certain to receive a rousing welcome and support for the troop surge in Iraq.

It was the 1988 CPAC conference. However, George W. Bush was not a speaker, rather, he was an on-sitebehind the scenesobserver of a sort of"monitoring" operation on Jack Kemp’s campaign activities at CPAC,as his father, Vice-President George H. W. Bush and Kemp were sparing for the 1988 Presidential nomination, and conservative support, in the process that would ultimately be won by George H.W. I know because I was there…..

My friendCraig Shirley was running the operation, with plausible… Read More

President Bush delivered a tremendous speechthis morningbefore a very large crowd, several thousand, of highly enthusiasticactivists at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. The crowd wildlysupported references to the war on terrorism policy.

The Washington Post had reported this morning excerpts of the President’s planned speech, which were distributed to some reporters last night,andincluded verbiage generally supportive of McCain’s quest to wrap-up the Presidential nomination very soon. The Post had suggested in the story that Bush’s speech was an attempt to shore-up support for closing down the nomination in favor of McCain. The real story was not exactly that. Bush hit on the heartstrings of the crowd, discussed his accomplishments, the crowd responded extremely well, and, according to long-time CPAC staffer Tish Leonard, Bush ended his speech "stunned" at the highly supportive response he received. The White House must be thinking now, after the speech, of missed opportunities to rally the troops in past years with the loyal conservatives here at… Read More

Here are a few itemsfrom the Conservative Political Action Conference, being held this weekend at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C……

Total paid registrations as of noon today: 6,800, and still coming. The total for last year, which was the highest ever, was 6,400.

Total credentialed media in attendance: 500.

Number of co-sponsoring organizations: 90.

The Conservative Movement is the biggest it has ever been.

Last Fall CPAC and the hosting American Conservative Union prepared a questionnaire for all the Republican Presidential candidates and asked for responses bylate last year so the information could be distributed at this CPAC. John McCain, and all the other candidates responded in detail,with just one exception. By a letter dated December 7, 2007, California’s Bill Simon, identified as "policy director" for the Rudy Giuliani campaign, on the campaign’s stationary, informed CPAC/ACU that the Giuliani campaign would not be responding to the questionnaire, and had a policy against responding to all questionnaires because of the shear volume of work.… Read More

I have been surveying tried-and-true conservatives on their reactions to the McCain speech at CPAC in Washington, D.C. yesterday, and to be honest, most want to talk about the Romney speech earlier in the day, in which Romney announcedhe was "suspending" his campaign, and not the McCain speech.

Gary Kreep of Ramona, CA, the President of the US Justice Foundation and a CPAC "old-hand" summed up the comments I am receiving. He told me this afternoon, "Romney sounded like he was running for President in 2012." Even though Romneymade it plain that the time for a Republican president was now.

I took a second to take that in, and then said, "well, do you think Romney is supportive of McCain in 2008?" And Gary answered, "yes, but my feeling is the speech was about him, not McCain, and that he is running in 2012."

Interesting.

I have had opportunity to commune with a whole lot of people. My friend Lew Uhler, who I have worked with many times, the extremely intelligent lawyer Joe Morris of Chicago, who was Don Devine’s General Counsel at the U.S. Personnel Management… Read More

As I was reflected on the results of how all of the ballot measures fared in last Tuesday’s election, I was struck with a sense of déjà vu. No on 91. No on 92. No on 93. Yes on 94. Yes on 95. Yes on 96. Yes on 97. Then it struck me, and I looked back through my e-mails and sure enough, the California Chamber of Commerce put out a release urging ALL of these positions. Or, to put it another way, the CalChamber went seven for seven, or 100% on election day! All of the measures either passed or failed by pretty wide margins on Tuesday, with the exception of Proposition 93, that was so close that newspapers had to go to print for Wednesday morning without a definitive answer on whether it passed or failed.

Relative to that close measure… There is no doubt that in the hotly charged effort by legislative leaders to extend their own terms, the Chamber’s opposition to Prop. 93 made a big difference. No doubt… Read More

The Rose Institute has done an analysis of California’s Primary results, complete with maps that shows that Liberal GOP voters (defines as Rudy/McCain) breathe sea air and Conservative GOP (Romney/Huckabee etc.)voters breathe smog and dust. Interesting… Read More