Moe Lane

Fascinating.

WASHINGTON – Hillary Clinton says running for office isn’t on her “radar,” but she still has an eight-person political team and sports two overflowing campaign war chests.

Her team transformed the former Democratic White House contender’s massive campaign debts into a $3 million mountain of political cash, according to federal fund-raising records through the end of June.

[snip]

By comparison, Sen. Chuck Schumer, who is up for reelection next year, had just three people on staff last quarter.

Via Andrew Malcolm, who likewise finds this fascinating.  Also, before you ask: Clinton was and is not allowed to pay herself back for the money she lent her own campaign.  That’s gone forever. (more…)

Bach – Brandenburg Concertos No.3 – i: Allegro Moderato, Freiburger Barockorchester

Because they seem to be having fun.

I find some of the rhetoric going on between Senator Hutchison and Governor Perry to be already a bit harsh, so here are the bare bones of the story:

Hutchison told WBAP-AM (820) host Mark Davis that she would officially kick-off her campaign in August.

“Formal announcement: I am in. Then the actual leaving of the Senate will be sometime — October, November — that, in that time frame,” she said.

It was her most definitive statement yet that she would leave the Senate in the middle of her third term.

This being a Senate seat, there will be an appointment made by the Governor, followed by a special election for the remaining two years of Senator Hutchison’s term.  As the disclaimer below makes clear, my recommendation for Governor Perry is to appoint Texas Railroad Commissioner Michael Williams for the position, on the grounds that Williams is a). a solid conservative; b). prepared (thanks to his role as Railroad Commissioner*) to be a powerful voice on energy policy; and c). actively running for the spot.  Oh, and d). he’ll be talking at the RS Gathering.  (more…)

After all that sturm und drang and haggling over the price on the Blue Dogs’ part, I just got told that the start of the Energy committee’s markup’s been delayed until at least tomorrow.  36/23 Dem/GOP partisan breakdown and Henry Waxman still can’t run a committee to save his life.

Alas, not being able to do the simplest legislative things will do little to destroy his career: the things that Beverly Hills voters find truly inexcusable have very little in common with the rest of the country, or indeed observed sentient life.  And I include dolphins, orangutans, Border Collies, and several breeds of parrots in that category.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

[Another UPDATE]: Yeah, yeah, yeah: I mucked the name up thoroughly.  Sue me.

I say ‘curse it’ because if McDonnell had been just one point lower the title could have been

McDonnell/Deeds: 54/40, no fight.

Anyway, more details here (via @PatrickRuffini). August should prove interesting…

Moe Lane

PS: McDonnell for Governor. Contribute here.

Crossposted to RedState.

It’s sad when a sitting US Congressman loses his ability to remember the basic details of the shenanigans he went through to bring in the cash.  Via Boot Berry, this classic moment of what we call a Kinsley gaffe:

To those without video: it’s of Berry first confidently denying that he personally gets farm subsidies (in 2007), then (yesterday) momentarily forgetting that he denies personally getting farm subsidies, cheerfully admitting that he personally gets farm subsidies, then visibly stopping and going to himself Wait a second.  I’m supposed to pretend that I don’t personally get farm subsidies.  It’s the stop-and-wait-and-visible-oops moment that makes this video: by all means, watch it.

And then check out his opponent Rick Crawford.  Because if Berry can’t even keep up on this, him returning to private life seems best for all concerned.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

There are enough blogwars going on right now that I decline to add to their number, particularly since Liber Ex Machina might actually have a point (I’m studiously ignoring that it might have been due to Shatner’s other recent spoken-word shenanigans, mostly because I don’t feel like getting mad at the man).  So here is Liber Ex Machina’s precious hat tip.

I write this smiling.

It being Wednesday, we say good-bye – until November17th – to Star Trek, and say hello to 12 Monkeys, which is otherwise known as A Time Travel Movie That Didn’t Suck.

Well, many of them do.

Moe Lane

There is – some – good news for the administration in this latest NPR poll (via Political Wire, h/t Soren Dayton), but when you’re a Democrat getting these kinds of results among registered* voters**:

Those are the chief findings of the latest NPR poll of registered voters conducted nationwide Wednesday through Sunday by a bipartisan team. The pollsters found 53 percent approving of the president’s handling of his job, while 42 percent disapproved — the narrowest gap of the Obama presidency to date. Most of the approving group said they approved strongly, and an even greater majority of the disapproving group said they disapproved strongly.

Poll respondents liked a Democratic statement on solving health care problems better than a Republican statement (51 percent to 42 percent). However, when asked about the plan now moving through Congress, a plurality of 47 percent was opposed and 42 percent said they were in favor, based on what they had heard about the plan so far.

…you have a problem. The poll results also report that voters are also currently favoring generic Republican candidates over Democratic ones, 43/42 (and hastens to add that it’s within MoE): Rasmussen, of course, reported yesterday that the GOP lead the Democrats 42/39 among likely voters (that’s the fifth week in a row that the GOP’s lead on that question).  It’s going to be an interesting August, particularly since it looks increasingly likely that there will be a lot of Democrats that are going to be asked how they plan to vote on healthcare rationing, rather than why they voted for healthcare rationing.  Either one would have been fun to work with, but I suppose that it’s unreasonable to expect to have both.

Moe Lane

*Although the actual poll says “likely” at the very beginning.  I assume that there’s an arcane reason for that.

**Gallup had him at 54% on Tuesday.  All of these numbers will go up, by the way: the President’s approval ratings are linked to his job performance, and presumably at some point he’ll appear to be performing it.  But the days of the President being the One Who Ejaculates Roses are well and truly gone. (more…)

Please understand: it gives me no pleasure to do these. But you understand that I can’t be seen as being the sort to make idle promises.

Spleen/Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, William Shatner
Amazon.com

There’s more like that out there, you know. There’s so, so, so much more.

Moe Lane

OK! Need a list?

This throwaway line in a Hill article (“Dem healthcare infighting intensifies”):

And on Tuesday it prompted Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) to hint that more liberal members of the party should consider challenging centrist Blue Dogs in next year’s primaries.

…eventually led me to this (via The Patriot Room: he also has a related video there) article about what has to be one of the more, ah, creative strategies floated out there this year: taking down ‘conservative’ Democrats in conservative districts by weakening them or replacing them with liberal Democrats.

Wait, what?

Asked if she would recruit more liberal candidates to run against Blue Dogs, Waters said, “That’s normally not done.”

But she added: “There may be people out there listening and observing all of this who may get motivated based on what they’re seeing and throw their hat into the ring.”

She also criticized White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel for recruiting many of the House’s more conservative members when he headed the House Democrats’ campaign arm. Now, she said, “The chickens are coming home to roost.”

(more…)

What, you thought that would be a joke?

He’s got an album and everything: The Crow: New Songs for the Five String Banjo.