[Cross-posted from Red County/National Politics]

What is the difference between rats deserting a sinking ship, and anonymous McCain campaign leakers?

Rats can’t talk.

And another factor in the rats’ favor is they don’t point fingers and shift blame — they just bug out without a word.

The anonymous McCain staffers trying to blame their campaign’s failure on Sarah Palin could learn a thing or two from the rats.

The McCain campaign has no one to blame but itself, and the anonymous shanking of Gov. Palin dishonors Sen. McCain.

These leakers are behaving more like Daily Kos bloggers, not professionals, and they to face a few facts:

1) From the perspective of the Republican rank-and-file, the choice of Sarah Palin turned a funeral march into a real campaign. The grass roots were energized in a way they hadn’t been in years. Here in Orange County — the GOP heartland — volunteer headquarters were… Read More

Wherever one or more TV cameras may gather, there you shall find Gloria Allred.

The left-wing media hound attorney is going to announce a lawsuit against Proposition 8 in a few minutes.

On what legal basis? Who knows.

The political basis, of course, is media exposure for Gloria Allred.… Read More

The race between Tom McClintock and Charlie Brown for the 4th CD is still too close to call. Right now McClintock is up 451 votes and the absentee ballots are expected to break heavily for him. Provisional ballots are the real unknown factor. Knowing that Democrats have engaged in dirty politics throughout this election, the McClintock campaign is taking every precaution to ensure that there is no vote tampering.

Senator McClintock issued the following statement earlier today: “I wish to thank everyone who voted in the Fourth Congressional District. I am gratified and thankful that my campaign emerged after election night with the lead. I have full confidence in the hard-working and dedicated election officials who are counting the remaining absentee and provisional votes. I am confident that once the process is completed I will be the Representative for the Fourth Congressional District.”

This story is developing as quickly as the votes are being counted. Stay tuned for more updates…… Read More

Back in the early 1990’s all I heard about was how the Republican Party needed to be a “big tent.” The idea was to embrace anyone who wanted to be a Republican regardless of what that person stood for.

Of course that is how we get tax raising Governors like the one here in California. But what you also get are politicians that will put a bullet in your back as soon as the going gets tough.

Let’s look at John McCain. John McCain is no conservative. There are many issues where he went “maverick” rather than the generally excepted conservative position. Joe Lieberman reminded us of all those things during the RNC Convention.

So who stabbed him inthe back? Was it conservatives?

Collin Powell. This guy was made by Ronald Reagan and then the Bushes (not conservatives either). An enormous amount of Republican resources were spent promoting the General. Unfortunately, he isn’t the only one.

Former Republican Senator Lincoln Chafee, and Sen. Charles Mathias Jr. , Former Congressmen Jim Leach, Cong. Wayne Gilchrest and Former Mass. Governor Bill Weld all joined the team. How much did the Republican Party spend on behalf of these guys?… Read More

Day after thoughts on some local “stuff”….

SD City Attorney… Aguirre is evacuated, victim of his huge mouth and even larger ego, mixed in with delusions of grandeur and a tad paranoia. Jan Goldsmith will make a great city attorney.

52nd Congressional… Congrats to Duncan D. Hunter (now simply Duncan Hunter). Registration was tough enough to beat, add the name factor and the combo was lethal. Virtually everyone knew this was over a year ago, except for a handful of Mike Lumpkin supporters that became constant commenters on GOP blogs. And, every moment spent trying to convince GOP activists on a center-right leaning blog that Lumpkin had a chance was time that could have been used with real swing voters. And, they say the blogs have no impact.… Read More

I started my day today the way I usually do…I read my Bible and prayed for all the people on my prayer list…until my kids starting fighting over the breakfast table, and I felt like I was in the middle of the Seinfeld episode with George’s dad running around saying, “Serenity Now!” In fact, the Serenity Prayer is printed on a coin I carry in my pocket: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference.” How apropos for the morning after this election. Last night, I was asking the question, “What happened?!”, and desperately trying to make sense of the past year and the outcome of the election. It was only leading me down a path of sadness and disappointment, because I’ve been so very proud to support Senator McCain all this time.

So this morning, I asked a new question, “What now?” And I asked it prayerfully, and not in hopes of finding the answer from another person, because we’re all… Read More

The 2nd District, Wally Herger’s, came thru strong, with nearly 57%. Dan Lungren did OK, too, in the 3rd with 49 to 44% in a 4 way race. I’m at McClintock HQ right now in Roseville, where the numbers are very close…much closer than this district should be but it’s obviously a wacky year. Right now it sits at a 500 vote lead for Tom with a bunch left to count in Nevada County, where they have quit counting for the night. The McClintock crew is on top of it, monitoring thecounty officeswhereneeded overnight and early tomorrow morning.Thisseat has no business falling into the wrong hands and should be ours at the end of it, as Tom feels good about how the numbers will break to him. What a night.… Read More

The elves all had other plans this morning, so I am busy trying to compile the main news page. Look for it around 9am. After that, I will start tackling the 15 or so short analysis pieces that I would rather be writing right now! But, first things first…… Read More