Moe Lane

I really, really wish that I was making this up, actually:

For those without video, it shows Rep. Maxine Waters (D, CA-35) of the House Financial Services Committee… actually, summarizing this piece is almost impossible. The CNBC folks try their best to get some sort of coherent information out of Rep. Waters, and this is what they gleaned: (more…)

Jim Geraghty’s Morning Jolt, that is.  If you subscribe, you get to read things like this:

Had CNN matched Spitzer with, say, Mark Steyn, at least we would have been treated to some amazing fireworks. Imagine:

Spitzer: . . . and that’s why I think Obama’s financial-reform proposal is a winner. Mark, what do you think?

Steyn: You treacherous, reptilian whoremonger, your foul diatribe spurs me to inch my chair further away from you, as I expect any moment now you will vomit forth a lie so reprehensible and toxic to the very metaphysical concept of Truth that God Himself will be moved to strike you with lightning.

…without his regular readers having to nag him to make it available to a wider world.

I’m not really mocking Tim Cavanaugh of Reason for writing this:

Someday we’ll all raise a glass of Sterno, pour out a 40 for our dead brothers, and remember how we survived the nightmare that was the 2010 midterm election. (For the umpteenth time, people: removing the head or destroying the brain is the only way to put them down permanently.)

…for I myself will be gibbering with relief when this election is finally over. And my side is winning.

Moe Lane

Joe is running in the Senate race that’s against Kirsten Gillibrand, and he’s determined to win it. We discussed a bit about the state of the race:

Joe’s site is here: he’s started a moneybomb today to fuel the last few weeks before the election. Check it out.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

Steven is up against long-term incumbent Gene Taylor, who has the profound misfortune of being a Blue Dog in an election cycle where people have started noticing that Blue Dogs aren’t living up to their reputation for fiscal conservatism. Steven and I talked about that, and other things:

Steven’s site is here. [UPDATE: and Steven's doing a 48 Hour Challenge.]

Moe Lane (crosspost)

Ghostbusters, Ray Parker, Jr.

There were people who did not like this movie, by the way.

Pity them.

I just got sent something that was pretty garbled, but the gist of it is: the Hill’s reporting on at least 10 House races. Of them, 2 have the Democrat ahead and the others have the Republican ahead. Or possibly it’s 22 races, and the GOP is ahead in 19, Democrat ahead in 2, 1 tie: as I said, what I got sent was a link to something that’s pretty garbled.

Names in parentheses are the Republican candidates (the Democratic ones can fend for themselves).

Democrat Ahead
IL-10 (Kirk’s old seat) (Bob Dold)
WV-01 (David McKinkley)

Republican Ahead
TN-08 (Stephen Fincher)
WA-03 (Jaime Herrera)
AR-01 (Rick Crawford)
WI-057 (Sean Duffy)
HI-01 (Charles Djou)
PA-07 (Patrick Meehan)
NH-02 (Charlie Bass)
MI-01 (Dan Benishek)

There’s a lot of embarrassing results there for the Democrats, of course – but probably the two  most embarrassing are HI-01 and AR-01.  Charles Djou was scheduled to be a pushover and placeholder (guess nobody told him); and Rick Crawford is leading his race by 12 points, in a district that hasn’t had a Republican representing it in a century.  Guess the prognosticators are going to have to do some more revising…

Moe Lane (crosspost)

I haven’t really been paying attention to this particular race – it’s admittedly one of the few where the Republican incumbent (David Reichert) isn’t quite safe, but then again, it’s a bad year to be a Democratic challenger* – but I got tipped off to what appears to be a bit of a vetting problem with Dave’s challenger (one Suzan-with-a-Z Delbene). And, yes, if I’m able to use the phrase ‘dead of a heroin overdose’ in a completely literal manner then there was in fact a vetting problem.

The story starts with Ms. Delbene, who is a member of the Board of Trustees for Reed College. Oddly, while this information is on the Reed College website, and confirmed here, it does not show up in her official campaign biography.  Which would be very odd, no?  After all, she’s an alumnus; and having that bit of academic respectability would surely be an advantage in a competitive House race.  And it would be… if it were for any college besides Reed.  You see, Reed has a certain reputation:

“When you say Reed, two words often come to mind,” Mr. Diver said. “One is brains. One is drugs.”

Mr. Diver, by the way, is Mr. Colin Diver… President of the college. (more…)

I have had a bad track record this year of getting out to see Totally Awesome movies, so I am deathly afraid that fate will conspire somehow from seeing this movie in theaters, too:

Which would be almost a sin. Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich, and Helen Mirren in an action comedy, heavy on the explosions. Yeah. DC Comics knows what I like.

For one brief – very brief – moment this morning the RCP forecast for the Senate (based on the rolling polling average, no Toss-ups) was at +10 GOP.  It then dropped down to +8 and then stabilized at +9.  Which is where it’s been for the last couple of days.

In and of itself?  Meaningless.  The polling average mechanism is merely a data point, and one whose meaning is often argued – particularly now, three weeks before the election.  But it is three weeks before the election, and it is possible to argue with a straight face that the GOP has a chance at flipping the Senate.  There were damn few people out there even six months ago who thought that such a thing was possible, and even fewer that were even willing to admit to the possibility in public.

Twenty-one days.

Moe Lane

Six years ago today, you closed your offices for a month and hid like a whipped dog because of the terrorist threat.

I’m reminded of this via Hot Air, and I’d like to make a comment of my own. You see, back in 2004 both I and my then-fiancee, now-wife worked in the DC area. My commute took me through a primary civilian target; her place of work was and is a primary military target.  Unlike yourself,  we did not have the luxury of being able to run and hide from a terrorist threat; we had to go do our jobs, every single day.  And even today, I still worry – just a little – about where my wife works, particularly when it comes to contemplating prevailing winds.

I note this not to boast of my family’s courage – it’s nothing special, really – but to make it clear just how precisely I despise your abject cowardice, Dayton.  I couldn’t come up with a better caricature of an antiwar Democratic politician than you if I tried.

Moe Lane

PS: Tom Emmer for Governor.

I spoke with Lt. Colonel Swindle yesterday on the subject, mostly in terms of Senator Barbara Boxer’s surprising pickup of the PAC’s (NOT the parent organization’s) endorsement.  Swindle was not, shall we say, particularly pleased that the PAC (which he is not a representative of) did this:

The very short version: the VFW membership didn’t authorize this, they are ticked off about this, and the VFW-PAC may not survive. As Ed Morrissey notes, plans are already underway to review the need for a VFW-PAC at next August’s national convention: three guesses how that’s going to turn out, and the first two don’t count.

At any rate, Lt. Col. Swindle would like my readers to check out Combat Veterans for Congress. He also specifically recommended Carly Fiorina, Allen West, and Patrick Murray for anyone looking to make tangible their disapproval of the VFW-PAC’s actions; I’m not sure that Jim Moran (Murray’s opponent) got the endorsement, actually – but Moran’s a Jew-hating son of a… person, so donate to Murray anyway.

Moe Lane (crosspost) (more…)