The 5th Assembly District, which is centered in Sacramento County, is currently occupied by Roger Niello who, fortunately, is forced to retire due to term limits. FR readers will undoubtedly recall Niello’s infamous vote for the largest tax increase in California history, and his vote tie even more massive tax increases to Proposition 1A should it have passed (fortunately the voters overwhelmingly rejected 1A). Niello, while being a truly nice guy, is too smart to get any kind of pass for abandoning the most significant premise of our party — which is that government is too big and spends too much.
I hear the argument from Republicans all of the time that we need to nominate “moderate” candidates in primaries because conservatives can’t win in swing districts. While I don’t agree with this argument at all, I can see why some people would buy into that logic. I believe you best defeat the other party by contrasting their views with ours — but some feel that you need to be "like them" to beat them – go figure.
That said, what I do not understand is why some believe we should nominate liberal or moderate Republicans in safe Republican seats such as Assembly District 5. What the point is of having liberal Republicans such as Roger Niello represent solidly Republican districts when they cast votes for the one thing Republicans in California should be standing against: tax increases. To be fair, by the way, to the voters in AD 5, Niello conveniently did not run in any of his three elections on a platform of, "for the right budget deal, I would be the deciding vote to increase your income, sales and car taxes." Niello’s looking to run for State Senate in 2012 — and at that time Republican voters can express their feelings about that he did this year.
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