Yes, it’s only a straw poll, but not many folks thought anyone but the supposed big three would be faring well, even at this early juncture. All of a sudden Duncan Hunter’s picture is being shown alongside McCain’s and Giuliani’s. Check out Fox News. The latest from the AP on the South Carolina contest:

John McCain Pulls Even With Rudy Giuliani, Duncan Hunter in South Carolina Straw Poll

Sen. John McCain pulled even with two of his Republican rivals when counting resumed Friday morning in a presidential straw poll in conservative Spartanburg County.

Though most of the roughly 800 votes were counted on Thursday night, ballots tallied Friday morning weighed heavily in McCain’s favor, said GOP county chairman Rick Beltram.

The updated count put McCain in a dead heat with former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and California Rep. Duncan Hunter. Beltram would not release any specific numbers and said a final tally would be known Friday afternoon.

The count was suspended because of severe weather that… Read More

Bad Bill Alert! (well, actually, silly bill alert)

Sometimes good intentions lead to really terrible laws. Everyone wants people to be responsible and save for the future. But making a law that gives $500 to every baby born in California (regardless of their parent’s legal residency status) in hopes they will save it is just plain silly.

SB 752 authored by Democrat Senator Darrel Steinberg and co-authored by Republican Senator Bob Dutton will give every newborn $500 – which will cost taxpayers a whooping $283 million per year – in hopes that their parents will be encouraged to save for their children’s future. Another nanny-state bill that believes that people aren’t capable of taking care of themselves, so the government should.

Notwithstanding this literally pays illegal immigrants $500 to come to California and have a baby, it also fails the math test. In an article in the… Read More

Rudy Guiliani received a very warm welcome today from the delegates at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C., as he recounted his record of reducing crime and taxes whileMayor of New York City, and his support for the war on terrorism. And there was a Californian in Rudy’s entourage — Bill Simon, who joined Rudy in the walk to the podium of the CPAC speech.

Mitt Romney is scheduled to speak this afternoon at 2:45 pm Eastern Time, and that speech will be covered by C-SPAN. Romney is holding a special reception later in the day, at 5:45 pm, and he snagged popular Conservative leader Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform to speak at that event.

I had a chance to talk to Guiliani for awhile in the Green Room before his speech. I asked Rudy about his record on taxes. He told me he was successfulin cutting23 taxes while Mayor of New York City and tried to get more taxes cut, but wasn’t able to get all the cuts he wanted from a Democrat City Council.… Read More

What does premiere conservative political consultant Wayne Johnson have in common with famed-Clinton supporter Dick Morris?

What ‘special bond’ does former Reagan senior advisor Ken Khachigian share with Mary Matalin? Campaigns and Elections Magazine, one of the nation’s top publications on all-things related to campaigns, has revamped their editorial board, bringing onto it a lot of notables from around the country, clearly reaching to both sides of the political aisle to amasse quite a bit of talent.

Johnson and Khachigian, both good friends of this website, will serve on the editorial board along with Benjamin Ginsberg, Donald Green, Mary Matalin, Dick Morris, James Pindell, David Rebovich, Jeanne Shaheen, James Thurber, David Yepsen and John Zogby. While I could tell you what I think of Johnson and Khachigian, I’m sure they will agree they would rather have me tell you what Campaigns and Elections… Read More

This last week we have witnessed the declaration by Al (Sore Loserman) Gore that the problem of global warming is a "no longer a scientific debate, it is a moral issue." Yesterday, I saw a commercial that showed some old white guy who said that the "scientific evidence shows that the irreversible effects" of global warming won’t occur until thirty years from now. Of course, the fellow is standing on a railroad track with the train coming. He announces "that won’t affect me" as he steps off the track. The picture then moves to a little girl, who, the commercial implies, gets run over by the train. This obviously contends that an indifference to global warming now will kill our children.

As the rhetoric on the issue heats up (so to speak), we must congratulate the California government for solving the crisis. Less than two months after AB 32 took effect, California and the rest of the country have suffered record low temperatures. I am impressed at how well that bill has worked. Although, given its effectiveness so far, no further action is necessary to implement the bill, I… Read More

I spoke with a prominent California pollster yesterday who called to inquire about whether or not Decline-To-State voters would be able to vote in the Republican primary for President, should they choose to do so. The question is not as silly as you might think. Several years back, after the United States Supreme Court tossed out California’s open primary law as being unconstitutional, a state law was passed that allows any political party to "opt in" to allowing Decline-To-State voters to participate in their primaries. The California Republican Party made a decision to allow DTS voters to particulate in GOP primaries for federal and state legislative, as well as for statewide constitutional office, which has been taking place for multiple election cycles now. But the Party Bylaws relative to the Presidential primary is abundantly clear. Delegates are awarded based on a tabulation of ONLY the Republican votes. Of course, the CRP could always change its rules, but to do so at its next convention might very well place the CRP in violation of the Republican National Committee deadline for submitting its rules… Read More

I spoke with a prominent California pollster yesterday who called to inquire about whether or not Decline-To-State voters would be able to vote in the Republican primary for President, should they choose to do so.

The question is not as silly as you might think. Several years back, after the United States Supreme Court tossed out California’s open primary law as being unconstitutional, a state law was passed that allows any political party to "opt in" to allowing Decline-To-State voters to participate in their primaries.

The California Republican Party made a decision to allow DTS voters to particulate in GOP primaries for federal and state legislative, as well as for statewide constitutional office, which has been taking place for multiple election cycles now.

But the Party Bylaws relative to the Presidential primary is abundantly clear. Delegates are awarded based on a tabulation of ONLY the Republican votes.

Of course, the CRP could always change its rules, but to do so at its next convention might very well place the CRP in violation of the Republican National Committee deadline for submitting its rules on selecting delegates to… Read More

The Assembly did not take up SB 113-Calderon today, nor will it happen Monday, perhaps not til the following Monday, March 12.… Read More