State Senator Jeff Denham is clearly the frontrunner for the GOP nomination for Lt. Governor — he's been running for a while now and has built up money in the bank and a mega-sized endorsement list.

Denham talked about winning election to a Senate Seat gerrymandered to elect a Democrat. Denham talked about how, with the help of Republicans statewide, he crushed a cynical recall attempt against him funded by Sacramento Democrats.

Denham talked about the importance of a bold message from Republicans — drawing a clear distinction between our party and that of the Democrats.… Read More

FR Publisher Jon Fleischman had the opportunity to chat with U.S. Senate hopeful Carly Fiorina for about a half hour yesterday afternoon and here is his take-away from their conversation…

The California Republican Party’s Fall Convention starts tomorrow out in Palm Desert – and as someone that has been regularly attending these semi-annual confabs since the late 1980’s, I can tell you that this particular convention is considered the “opening bell” for the upcoming statewide elections – and of course the primaries that will precede them in June. Next year there will be a lot of offices on the ballot – the two most significant of which will be the positions of Governor and United States Senator – Arnold Schwarzenegger is term-limited out of the former and Democrat Barbara Boxer currently sits in the latter.

In the primary for Governor, delegates to the convention will get to hear from Steve Poizner, Meg Whitman, and Tom Campbell in person – as each has a prominent spot on the agenda. As for candidates for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, only one of the two… Read More

Last week GOP Gubernatorial candidate got kudos from us here at the FlashReport for being the first candidate for the GOP nomination to sign the Americans for Tax Reform No New Taxes pledge. Poizner called on his opponents to sign it as well, and we said at the time that they should absolutely do this.

This morning I was told by FR friend Patrick Gleason over at Americans for Tax Reform that yesterday they had faxed into them a signed ATR Pledge form from Meg Whitman! Outstanding.

Tom Campbell, you are next… It’s time to stop calling for higher taxes, and instead make it clear that state government is too big and spends too much…… Read More

The Meg Whitman for Governor campaign is engaged in creating a professional "videography" of the entire campaign — a big endeavor which involves a lot of work. We see some of the work of these professional video folks when they roll our in-house videos here and there.

One can only hope that they were allowed to do video and audio taping of Whitman’s campaign team folks as they have been dealing with the results of an investigation undertaken by the Sacramento Bee, released today, that looks both at Whitman’s extremely poor voting record as well as the sparse and inconsistent statements coming from the Whitman campaign on the issue of Whitman’s past voting (or lack thereof) record. I just think it would be fascinating the see the back and forth that lead to this, her official statement (thus far) on this controversy:

MEG WHITMAN STATEMENT ON HER VOTING RECORD … Read More

From today’s Wall Street Journal Political Diary E-mail…

Are Whitman and Fiorina California Dreamin’?

… Read More

Dear California Republican Party Leaders, We, the undersigned Board of Directors of the Veterans for Good Governance, know that you support our troops. You might wear a yellow ribbon in their honor, and if you see an active duty military member in uniform you likely thank them for their service to our country. Each time you cast a ballot, you might remember that it is because of their sacrifice that you have the freedom to vote in safety and in liberty. And now, we ask you to ensure that our troops are allowed the same voting rights that you … Read More

FR Publisher Jon Fleischman had the opportunity to chat with U.S. Senate hopeful Carly Fiorina for about a half hour yesterday afternoon and here is his take-away from their conversation…

The California Republican Party’s Fall Convention starts tomorrow out in Palm Desert – and as someone that has been regularly attending these semi-annual confabs since the late 1980’s, I can tell you that this particular convention is considered the “opening bell” for the upcoming statewide elections – and of course the primaries that will precede them in June. Next year there will be a lot of offices on the ballot – the two most significant of which will be the positions of Governor and United States Senator – Arnold Schwarzenegger is term-limited out of the former and Democrat Barbara Boxer currently sits in the latter.

In the primary for Governor, delegates to the convention will get to hear from Steve Poizner, Meg Whitman, and Tom Campbell in person – as each has a prominent spot on the agenda. As for candidates for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, only one of the two… Read More

Dave Bossie, the head of Citizens United, is normally not described as self-effacing or recalcitrant. However, as the man responsible for what the New York Times described in editorial yesterday as one of the biggest cases to go before the U.S. Supreme Court this year (it is surely the biggest campaign finance casesince 1976), he is circumspect. "Don’t quote me!" Bossie chuckled, over a glass of Qupe Chardonnay at the Capital Grille in Washington, D.C. last night with me and Floyd Brown. "I don’t want to jinx the case."

Bossie produced a moviecritical ofHillary Clinton a la the style of Michael Moore, and intended to commercially release it and promote it during her last presidential campaign. The Federal Election Commission didn’t like that idea and they got into a legal tangle. The result was Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission, a case Bossiewon before a three-judge panel with the help of well-known constitutional lawyer Jim Bopp of Indiana. I know Bopp and was co-counsel with him… Read More