Today’s front page story of the New York Times about the new importance of California in presidential politics as a result of moving our primary to February includes a quote from former 
State Senator Jim Brulte. Brulte’s comment is pretty simple: a candidate who campaigns in California will learn more about our state and be "a better president for California." As a result of the new primary, all the major presidential candidates are spending time in California seeking to be "our President."
And here today and this weekend in Washington, D.C. at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference at the venerable Omni Shoreham Hotel on Calvert Street, a bevy of the leading Republican presidential candidates are also seeking to be "our" president — the "conservative" one. With one major exception.
Every leading candidate, with the exception of John McCain (who has now passed on attending three separate conferences staged by National Review, Heritage Foundation, and now CPAC) will 
be here. The excitement today surrounds Rudy Guiliani’s speech to delegates at noon. Mitt Romney is here, Kansas Senator Sam Brownback, too; and Newt Gingrich will make the final address to the conference this Sunday.
But it is the pending reaction to Rudy Guiliani’s speech that seems to be of most interest today. Mitt Romney has been getting slammed by a concerted effort to portray him as a "flip-flopper" on issues, with a costumed "Flipper" marching the halls of the conference handing out literature about Romney’s switches on key social issues such as gay marriage and abortion. No one is quite sure who is supporting "Flipper," but there is no such "street theater" antics going on to criticize other candidates, including Guiliani, for their positions, flips or not. It will be interesting to observe the delegates reaction to Guiliani’s speech, which will be covered by C-SPAN live.
I’ll have more as the conference progresses…
[Publisher’s note: I went online and found a photo of the Romney "Flipper" and put it into Jim’s piece — Flash].