GOP Blue Chippers Looking to Break Into Majors

Who is the next MVP of the GOP? That is a red hot topic on the beltway. Many on the left are gloating at the demise of the Republican Party. However, this is just the down part of the cycle for the party of Lincoln. The demise of the party was greatly exaggerated in 1932 and again in 1974. The party rebounded both times. The Democratic party has also faced similar trials in 1980, 1994, and 2000. This is nothing new.

Their major league roster is just getting older and more inconsistent. The republicans need fresh blood. Just like in any professional sport, they will have to dip into the minors to find new talent and replace the aging veterans. The process is not going to be quick. It usually takes a team a few years to become competitive again especially without the benefit of free agency. Blue chip talent has to be found and developed. Then, they have to be thrown out there to see which one sticks. Who is going to be the next Abraham Lincoln or Ronald Reagan? Who will bring the GOP Pachydermous (Elephants) out of the cellar and beat those Democratic Jackasses (Hey that is the correct term for a donkey. Don't get mad at me.) to win the Congressional and White House trophies?

Triple A-These are the ones who have the best shot at challenging President-elect Obama and the democrats in 2010 and 2012.

I would be remiss, if I didn't mention Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska. She has already has the capability to draw tens-of-thousands to hear her speak. A flood of money came into the McCain campaign and the RNC after the announcement of her candidacy, so you know that she will be able to compete with the fundraising ability of the democrats. Her mayoral and gubernatorial record is very impressive. She was able to cut spending and earmarks while drastically cutting taxes. She took a 10% pay cut while mayor and sold the private jet used for the governor's office in order to save money. Corruption in her state ran rampant. She fought and won to take out those who were corrupt even those in her own party. She has had approval ratings reaching over 90%. Her popularity in her state is perhaps the best in the whole country. She is without a doubt a rising star in the party and probable front-runner in 2012.

Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota, is another who was thought to be a possible VP pick. He has been the governor of Minnesota since 2003. In his first year as governor, he balanced the state budget. Minnesota went from $4.3 B deficit to more than $2 B surplus with very little up charge in state fees. He went overseas to build up trade in between Minnesota businesses and the international community.

Gov. Bobby Jindal, Louisiana, is also an up-and-comer for the republicans. He was in the running for vice-president under McCain. He showed outstanding leadership during Hurricane Gustav. He oversaw the largest and smoothest evacuation in US history. It was a huge step up from the disastrous handling of Katrina by all levels of government. He has been in office of governor for less than one year, but many say that he is very bright with a reformer's mentality.

Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana won re-election this year by a twenty point margin in a year that Obama won the state. Daniels was able to turn a $600 M deficit into a $300 M surplus in one year without any tax increases by creating the Office of Management and Budget in 2005. The new office was created to find better ways to spend the state's money and cost savings. He used the surplus to pay back money borrowed by previous administrations. Daniels, also, created the Indiana Economic Development Corporation which was started to attract new businesses to the state. From 2005-2007 they posted three consecutive record-breaking years for new investment and job commitments. The IDEC was able to lure Toyota, Honda, and Cummins into the state. To put it in perspective, over 100,000 jobs have been created since he took office in 2005. He passed the Healthy Indiana Plan that helped 132,000 people pay for healthcare. He also removed some barriers to coverage due to pre-existing conditions. He reformed property taxes to the lowest in the nation earlier this year. To compensate, he had to raise sales taxes but just by 1%. He may be a bit older than the previous mentions, but he can still make a lot of waves over the next four years.

Gov. Mark Sanford, S. Carolina, is another who has been receiving praise. He has a track record of using vetoes to cut pork-barrell spending even when bucking his own party and having them overridden anyway. He has said that he plans to retire from politics after his current term, but he could change his mind by 2010.

Double A-These next few potential blue-chippers are still very young or new to the scene but have been predicted to do great things by many pundits.

Rep. Paul Ryan has been mentioned by people like Newt Gingrich as being bright and a real future star. He has won over 60% of the vote in a district the Obama won by 53%-46%. Ryan has been coming up with a lot of new ideas that will help make republicans a party of ideas again. This past summer he released his "Road Map for America's Future." This is similar to Gingrich and the republican's "Contract With America" back in the early 90's.

There is Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia who is rumored to become the next house minority whip, the second highest ranking republican in the House.

Former Lt. Gov. Michael Steele of Maryland has become a prominent voice for conservatives as the current GOPAC chairman. He is also looking to become the next chairman of the Republican National Committee at the beginning of next year.

Returning veterans-These are some in the party that could be coming back to the scene. They still are relatively young and still have the desire in them.

Mitt Romney-He was a highly successful businessman. He was asked to return to Bain & Co. as CEO to save it from financial ruin. Within one year, he was able to turn around the company to profitability without any layoffs or partner defections. He left Bain to do the same thing to the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. The Olympic Committee was running on a $379 M deficit in 1999. After he joined as president and CEO of the committee, the games ended up with a $100 M profit. He did this by cleaning up the corruption and many budget cuts. He did this while still spending $300 M on security for keeping the games safe from terrorist threats. He gave his entire salary to charity. Upon entering the office of governor of Massachusetts, he faced a $1.2 B deficit. By 2006, he turned that into a $700 M surplus through a combination of spending cuts and raising taxes and fees. However, after the surplus was achieved, he was able to cut taxes. Romney does have a problem with his "for it before he was against it" record on abortion. Also, the tax burden was higher when he left office than when he went in, but many of his spending cuts were overridden by the state legislature.

Mike Huckabee-He ran for president this year and finished second overall. He has a huge following with black conservatives. He received almost 50% of the black vote when running for governor of Arkansas. He reformed healthcare which made it more available to low-income families. While he was governor in 2001, he was named a "friend of the taxpayer" by Americans for Tax Reform for his statewide spending cuts even though he did raise some taxes on gas and nursing homes. His tax policies and rise in state debt have garnered a lot of controversy though. However, overall he was able to cut those on welfare by almost half and grew the economy by 4.4% which was larger than the national average.

Dark horses-Those that have an outside chance at rising in the party.

Former Gov. Jeb Bush, Florida, would have been a bigger contender, but the unpopularity of W. will more than likely prevent his rise to higher office, unfortunately.

Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi is also a dark horse to make some noise within the next few years. He handled Katrina tremendously and has cut a lot of frivolous spending.

Gov. Rick Perry of Texas has been a bright spot in the party. He has been sucessful at balancing the state budget, improving the transportation infrastructure, and bringing jobs into Texas.

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has also been talked about making a comeback in the next few years. He is still a very polarizing figure, however. That might make it hard for him to make a run for the presidency in 2012.

The Senate has been pretty much depleted of any young talent for the republicans. However, these are some of the names of some possible long shots to be a phoenix that rises out the ashes in the Senate: John Cornyn of Texas, Bob Corker of Tennessee, John Thune of S. Dakota, Lindsay Graham of S. Carolina, and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma.

The Republican Party might be down, but they are not out by any stretch of the imagination. Both parties have been down before and have risen back into power. In time, it will happen again. The GOP must focus on what brought them to the show in the first place lowering taxes, reform, and fiscal responsibility.

Dueling Effigies Warrant Double Standards

The passion that is felt for this election is unprecedented. We have the first black nominee for president ever, and the other ticket has the first woman VP pick for that party, second overall. This comes after the after a primary that almost produced the first female nominee for president ever. In addition, there is the dynamic of having a candidate that can win with a party that can't and the other party that can't lose with a candidate that can. To say this is a historical election is an understatement of gigantic proportions. Either way, a glass ceiling will be broken.

When emotions run this high, people do stupid things and lines are crossed. This past halloween season has brought up two good examples of this. In West Hollywood, California, a mannequin, with a Gov. Palin likeness, is found hanging from a rope attached to a chimney that has John McCain burning in it. In retaliation of the Palin effigy, two University of Kentucky students set up a halloween display featuring a dummy with an Obama mask hanging from a tree by a rope in Lexington. Both displays are reprehensible, yet only the Kentucky pinheads have been arrested or charged with anything. The UK student and resident were arrested for disorderly conduct in reaction to the display earlier today. These two need to have repercussions for their stupidity. However, where is the same outrage and consequences for the pinheads in Hollywood?

If Palin would've been black, the Hollywood men who put up the Palin display would have been charged with a hate crime. Instead, the authorities can't do anything to them. It is considered part of their right to free speech.

What about her race makes the act any different? Nothing should make it any different. It doesn't matter about which race or gender one is. Hate is hate. I understand that there is more of a sensitive history with lynching and black males, but the hatred for Gov. Palin is just as real and strong.

Why is it criminal to have a display of Obama hanging and not Palin? If there is a hate crime law enacted, why does it only apply to certain segments of society? If hate crime legislation is passed, it needs to cover everyone or none at all. "Separate but equal" laws are what got us into the problem of segregation in the first place.

Martin Luther King, Jr. would be equally as appalled by both effigies. He taught us to judge each other not by the color of our skin, but that is exactly what the law is doing. They are treating one act worse than the other just because one is black and the other is white. We will never be post-racial until we make the law equal to all of Americans.

Obama Invents New Math

This week the economy has come to the full attention of the entire country. With the fall of Fannie and Freddie, the rest of the credit industry of this country came down as if someone took away a card from the bottom of a pyramid of cards. McCain and Obama have been pointing the finger of blame at each other, but neither have come up with anything concrete. McCain has not really come up with anything of importance. At least he's trying. Obama had to get with his team to discuss what he would do for this crisis. After all of the discussion and planning, his big solution was that he needs more time. Apparently, he is voting present again. Maybe this is above his pay grade too.

From both economic plans that the candidates as they have been presented, we will have deficits no matter who we elect. The real question who will be able to trust to control the amount of spending the best.

Palin has had experience in cutting budgets. McCain has already been against the overuse of earmark pork spending. Obama has made campaign promises that, if kept, will put the deficit of into astronomical amounts. He is chastising the Bush administration for increasing the national deficit, but his plans will raise it even more. He wants to add more spending to the federal budget. His health care plan will cost at least about 50-60 billion. Last week, he also pledged at least another 50 billion to fight worldwide poverty. Many believe that the final amount to both will be substantially higher, possibly in the hundreds of billions. Other than getting out of Iraq, he has not proposed any other spending cuts. He still going to fight in Afghanistan. Even though he chastises the Bush administration for the leap in the amount of the deficit, he has not come up with anything that will cut it. So far, it will seem to only increase under his administration. His tax increases to the wealthy isn't going to be enough to cover his ambitious aspirations.

Apparently, he has found out that if he spends more, we will get a surplus. He seems to believe that if you subtract money from the budget, it will actually add money to our budget. My elementary math teachers were wrong all of this time.

I want to go into the topic of the probable spending of hundreds of billions for worldwide poverty. Donating money to the poor is a very noble thing to do, but shouldn't we use that money to take care of our own poor. Recently there have been tent cities or "Hoovervilles", as they were called in the Great Depression, have been popping up accross the nation. From Reno to Seattle to Athens, Ga. they are growing at alarming rates. Many inhabitants of those "cities", whose homes were foreclosed on, have nowhere to go, and the shelters are full. With the amount of growing homeless population and economic insecurity, shouldn't we focus our limited financial resources on our own poor before we focus so much on other countries?

Cleaning Up the Mud

A lot has been said ever since John McCain picked Palin to be his VP. When the US magazine cover said "Babies, Lies, & Scandal", they were referring to Palin, but they should have been talking about themselves and the rest of the media. In this case, it is certainly true that the same hand that the media had pointing an accusing finger at Palin had four other fingers pointed right back at them. Gibson needs to do a little more research next time. His question to Palin about the "Bush Doctrine" was very misleading. There are at least 4 statements that have been called the "Bush Doctrine" over the past 8 years. Which means there is no real Bush Doctrine.
Let me, also, get things straight about ads coming from both campaigns.
First: McCain. Obama wasn't directly calling Palin a pig, but I believe it was too soon and too much of a coincidence for it not have been at least a slap to her. Obama didn't pass a law that kindergarteners should learn about sex but rather how to avoid sexual predators.
Second: Obama. McCain isn't incapable mentally or unwilling to learn to use a computer or do email, but his war injuries make it physically impossible to type or use a PC efficiently. He needs to stop talking about the GOP's role in covering up for Freddie and Fannie. In just 4 yrs, he managed to make it to 2nd in the Senate all-time money received from those two companies. McCain on the other hand only received $20,000 over 20 yrs. Here's some more advice to Obama. Don't take a page out of Biden's '88 campaign playbook and plagerize in his speeches. He took almost a direct quote out of a cartoon when make fun of McCain's declaration that he will shake up Washington in his RNC speech. The Obama campaign has made some gross misquotes by cutting them out of context. They said that Karl Rove said that McCain has gone too far in his ads and Carly Fioriona said that neither McCain or Palin can run a corporation. They conveniently forgot that Rove also said that Obama went too far, and Carly said that Obama nor Biden could be CEOs either.
Come on let's be real.

RNC "Changes" the Game

The RNC this past week revealed their attack on Obama's change platform. This moves the campaign in a whole new direction. I believe that McCain thinks that he has experience locked. The left are attacking Palin's experience, but there one important difference. Obama is the #1, and Palin is the #2. I will get to Palin and the experience issue in a later article. Obama has left the change window open.

Everyone knows that McCain has often bucked his own party. He has often voted with Democrats on environmental issues. He has been apart of most of the bipartisan "gangs" to reach compromises on tough issues. He had gone after Bush for his mismanagement of the war early. He went up against both Republicans, including Bush, and Democrats in going for the surge. He picked Sarah Palin, a reformer governor from Alaska and Washington outsider, as VP. She went after the corruption in Alaska including Republicans.

Obama has opened the door by promoting himself as the personification of bipartisan and post-race America. One of the main reasons for his victory over Clinton was his ability to energize younger voters by being "different". That support has dwindled, since he has lost a lot of that "new" look.

His bipartisan and post-racial claims has taken a hit because of his antics. His use of McCain's "5 million" joke, that he made at Saddleback, as proof of McCain's beliefs reeks of same old politics. His flip-flops on public financing isn't new politics. His love for the small-town America and the middle class in Scranton and disdain for them in San Francisco with the charge of them clinging to Bibles and guns shows that he will say what he has to say, depending on who he is talking with, to get their support. That is not anything new but the oldest of political ploys. His charge that the right will try to scare people cause he "doesn't look like the rest of the people on the dollar bills" or because "he's black" before anyone brought up race shows that he doesn't really transcend race. He embraced the Wright church and the Chicago political machine to help him get ahead. Then, he throws them aside when it hurts him politically is not new. His constant changing of positions on Russia's invasion of Georgia shows that he is only saying what he feels is more politically beneficial to his win. All of this has cost him support, especially among younger voters.

Will McCain be able to steal this advantage? Possibly. He will definitely blunt it at least. Obama has left himself vulnerable on this issue lately. McCain's pick of Palin and previous bipartisan record will help take advantage of Obama's vulnerability on it. His pick of Palin could re-energize some of those younger voters especially women except this time in favor of McCain/Palin.