Last Wednesday I featured a guest commentary is this space from State Senator Tom McClintock. Entitled Ethanol Economics, McClintock made the case against a recent decision by the California Air Resources Board to mandate that by 2010, every gallon of gasoline sold must be made up of at least 10% ethanol.

Bonus link: What is ethonal? The Wikopedia entry is here.

Today I am pleased to feature a ‘rebuttal piece’ penned by former California Secretary of State Bill . Jones, the Republican Party’s nominee for U.S. Senate a few years back, is now the Chairman of the Board of Pacific Ethanol:

**There is more – click the link**… Read More

This morning, I went through my usual routine of getting up, turning on ‘The Higglytown Heros’ for Ella, putting a pot of coffee on to boil, and reading the news. Near the top was the latest installment from the San Francisco Chronicle, entitled “State GOP Chief Flayed Over Scandal”.

Now I grew up in a small country town of fewer than 900 souls. I’ve seen a hog bled, boiled, and flayed. It’s not a pretty sight. And unless you have dogs around, there usually there is considerable clean-up involved. So the Chronicle painted a pretty ugly picture in my head of what they were about to do to Chairman Ron Nehring.

But then I actually had to laugh out loud. Literally. The best quote the Chronicle could get ‘flaying’ Nehring was from San Diego’s own pro-illegal immigration activist and all around gadfly Raoul Lowery Contreras. Specifically:

"I have talked to a number of money people, and they have told me as long as Nehring stays chairman, they will not give a dime," said Raoul Lowery Contreras, a Southern California GOP activist who writes the CalNews.com blog and has called for Nehring’s resignation.… Read More

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Last week, I had an opportunity at the invitation of the California Chamber of Commerce to participate on a couple of panels at a meeting of their advocacy council at the Chamber’s amazing offices a block from the State Capitol. Right before lunch, as a panelist, I got to take on 3-1 odds going up against three proponents of weakening term-limits, Rob Stutzman, Tim Hodson, and the iniative’s chief flack Gale Kaufman. The lunchtime speaker at the event was none other than conservative syndicated columnist Bob Novak. Below is an article that Novak penned, inspired by his recent visit to the Golden State…

As I read it, I tried to remember the Governor, in all of his recent lobbying of Congress to take on the battle against global warming, just once call for making permanent the tax cuts passed a few years back…… Read More

Monday was another historic day in presidential politics. Nearly a thousand Romney supporters gathered on the floor of the Boston Garden to raise money for his campaign.

We had done it before in January (at the Boston Convention Center that time) and raised over $6,000,000 on that day. Although the numbers are not all in, we probably pulled in at least a few million yesterday. This is not your usual name-tag-at-the-door, chicken-veggies-and-a-speech fund raiser.

The Romney Team does everything better, faster, bigger.

Sunday evening over 1,000 Romney supporters had a barbecue at Fenway Park where the Boston Red Sox Play. Governor Romney rallied the troops, his wife Ann did too. His son’s four of five of whom are working full-time campaigning for their dad told some funny stories about the campaign trail.

But the best part about Sunday evening was getting to go down on the field at Fenway and walk where so many legends of Baseball have played.

This photo shows us at the ball park. From… Read More

Last Wednesday I featured a guest commentary is this space from State Senator Tom McClintock. Entitled Ethanol Economics, McClintock made the case against a recent decision by the California Air Resources Board to mandate that by 2010, every gallon of gasoline sold must be made up of at least 10% ethanol. Bonus link: What is ethonal? The Wikopedia entry is here.

Today I am pleased to feature a ‘rebuttal piece’ penned by former California Secretary of State Bill . Jones, the Republican Party’s nominee for U.S. Senate a few years back, is now the Chairman of the Board of Pacific Ethanol:

… Read More

Readers will know I have been covering progress of the Wisconsin Right to Life case, which challenges the portion of the McCain-Feingold campaign reform law that bans late election issue advocacy communications that mention a candidate’s name, but do not contain words of express advocacy of election/defeat of a candidate. The Supreme Court today decided the case in favor of the First Amendment rights of Wisconsin Right to Life, an Internal Revenue CodeSection 501(c)(4) advocacy organization. This is a big win for issue advocacy speech in an election context and couldchange the way issues are addressed in an election context — it means nonprofit advocacy groups funded by unions and corporations will not be afraid to speak out during election periods on the records of legislators and candidates, as long as their underlyingintent is to address their issue, and not the election itself. The court, in a 5-4 vote, upheld an appeals court ruling thatthe anti-abortion group should have been allowed to air ads during the final two months before the 2004 elections. The ads asked voters to contact the state’s two senators, Democrats… Read More

I am participating in a national conference call right now with election lawyers and professors, and am concluding that the consensus view is that the Supreme Court’s decision today in Wisconsin Right to Life does gut McCain-Feingold, but also establishes a new standard for regulated electorial speech: express advocacy of a candidate PLUS words about candidate character/qualifications/fitness for office. And interestingly this is anEXPANSION of the old Buckley v. Valeo case. Nevertheless, the sum is less regulation of speech in elections. If a policy-oriented communication from a nonprofit, corporation or union avoids the types of words mentioned above,it can mention candidates and be outside the realm of FEC/FPPC regulation. This is a big win for the First Amendment, because McCain-Feingold banned such communications based on timing, regardless of content. Thus, the new analysis is content-based, ad-by-ad, so political consultants: careful review of text is critical.… Read More