Simmons Quits in Connecticut

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Bad news for a good guy:

Rob Simmons ended his campaign for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate today, comparing a run against Linda McMahon’s money to the futility of Pickett’s Charge during the Civil War.
“As somebody interested in military history, it was a foolish waste of people and resources, with a tremendously demoralizing outcome,” said Simmons, a retired Army officer and Vietnam veteran.
Simmons . . . will leave his name on the Republican primary ballot, leaving no doubt that an endorsement of McMahon will not be forthcoming. . . .
McMahon, who had contributed $16 million to her campaign by May 1, is on pace to break all campaign spending records in the state by the Fourth of July. She says she has budgeted $50 million of her personal fortune in an effort to become the first Connecticut Republican to win a Senate race since Lowell P. Weicker Jr. in 1982.
Simmons, who won 46 percent of the delegate vote Friday night at the Republican State Convention, said today he had every right to wage a primary.
“Speaking for myself and my family, however, we understand the mathematical reality of competing against an opponent with unlimited financial resources,” Simmons said. . . . “This is not an easy decision. This is not a happy decision. But I believe it is the right decision.”

Make no mistake about my sympathies: Simmons would have been the better match-up against the fake-hero Blumenthal. And McMahon’s self-funding strategy isn’t exactly going to help the GOP shake the “party of the rich” label. Nevertheless, once the primary is over, Simmons and McMahon really ought to mend the breach for the fall campaign. One more “R” in the Senate has got to be worth something.

(Note to commenters: No fair using this argument in favor of supporting John McCain. That son of a bitch has got to go.)

VIDEO: FL-20 Republican Debate; Taxes, Herpes and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz

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Javier Manjarres at the Shark Tank got video of this weekend’s debate, but first let me give you some background: 

Florida’s 20th District (parts of Broward and Miami-Dade counties, including Fort Lauderdale) has been controlled by Democrats since the district was created following the 1990 Census. In 2004, Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz was elected with 70 percent of the vote. One of the most strident liberals in Congress, she ran unopposed for re-election in 2006, and won 77 percent in 2008.

Wasserman-Schultz actually over-performs the district’s Cook Partisan Voting Index (D+13), which suggests that a strong candidate and a strong campaign could help rebuild the GOP in affluent South Florida. (This is very important for improving Republican identification, which helps GOP candidates in statewide races — including presidential elections.)

So while Wasserman-Schultz may be in a “live boy, dead girl” situation in terms of her re-election chances, it’s important that Republicans get a strong candidate in FL-20. The good news is that there are three choices in the GOP primary: restauranteur Karen Harrington; businesswoman Donnna Milo; and real-estate developer Robert Lowry.

With that introduction, then — and with thanks to Javier at the Shark Tank — here are video highlights of the debate:

Here is Robert Lowry comparing taxes to herpes:

Conservatives might laugh at that sound-bite, but some Republican officials in Florida are worried that Lowry’s blunt-spoken habits might be a liability in the general election. Here’s Karen Harrington comparing Arizona’s new immigration law to homeowners exercising Second Amendment rights in defense of their homes:

Strong stuff, eh? And here is Donna Milo comparing the U.S. situation to troops being caught in the “kill zone” of an L-shaped ambush:

Very impressive, don’t you think? Well, brace yourself, buckaroo:

Donna Milo — a Cuban-American, conservative Republican, transgender woman running for Congress — says she doesn’t like labels.
“I’m an American. I make my way on the basis of ability. My triumphs are based on my abilities, not on a label or a crutch,” said Milo, a Miami Planning Advisory Board member running to replace U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Weston, one of the House’s most liberal Democrats. . . .
Javier Manjarres, a Fort Lauderdale-based blogger, Miami-Dade editor of RedCounty.com and founder of the Conservative Republican Alliance, said that when he first heard a transgender woman was running as a Republican against Wasserman Schultz, “I thought it was a joke.”
Then he met Milo.
“I was very impressed with her,” Manjarres said. “She’s the best-rounded candidate in that race by far. Absolutely. She can hold her own with most politicos. It shouldn’t make a difference if she’s gay, straight or transgender.”

Now that you’ve had your Ace Ventura moment — “Einhorn is a Republican!” — it’s time to ask whether conservatives agree with Javier.

Given the choice between Ms. Milo and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz . . . Well, put it this way: Like most candidates nowadays, Donna Milo accepts online contributions —  kind of like what we bloggers call a “tip jar.” So the question is, would you hit her tip jar?

IYKWIMAITYD. NTTAWWT.

Not News: Economy Still Sucks

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A commenter on an American Spectator post earlier today made a weird statement:

The economy, boosted by falling energy prices, a weak Euro, and record low interest rates and tons of liquidity is finally showing signs of life.

Excuse me, but “record low interest rates and tons of liquidity” isn’t good news. The Fed is pumping currency in a desperate effort to revive a comatose economy. This policy is inflationary, but prices are still flat because the economy is so weak — with the official unemployment rate at 9.9 percent and 23 percent of mortgages “underwater”  — that even five straight quarters of  a near-zero Fed rate isn’t enough to jump-start consumer demand. And the Fed can only pursue this policy because the U.S. government is on a phenomenal spree of deficit spending.

Are “falling energy prices” good news? No, just a side-effect of the weak economy, which means lower demand for oil. And the “weak Euro” is also bad news, because it will hurt U.S. exports to Europe.

After a one-day upward bounce Friday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 126 points Monday, closing at 10,066. Here’s Business Week:

U.S. stocks fell, dragging the Dow Jones Industrial Average to its lowest level in three months, as the seizure of a Spanish bank and rising borrowing costs spurred concern Europe’s debt crisis will halt the global recovery.

And here’s The Washington Post:

“If what happened in Greece were to happen in a large country, it could fundamentally mark our times,” Angelos Pangratis, head of the European Union delegation to the United States, said Friday after a panel discussion on the crisis in Greece sponsored by the Greater Washington Board of Trade. . . .
The most vulnerable European countries — Greece, Spain, Portugal and Ireland — may represent only about 4 percent of world economic activity, but “the debt crisis and its ripple effects are bad news for all corners of the world,” said Cornell University economist Eswar Prasad.
The risk of a worst-case scenario is still considered remote. . . .

However “remote” the risk may be, we ought to remember that in 2006 almost no one expected the collapse of the U.S. housing market which hit freefall in 2008. And even if the “worst-case scenario” doesn’t happen, how bad would the “kinda bad scenario” have to be, in order to kick us into another three or four years of recession?

The economy sucks, and it’s likely to start sucking even worse — possibly much worse — before the year is over.

UPDATE 9:10 a.m. ET Tuesday: As a commenter points out, European markets dropped more than 3% overnight, and Dow futures are down about 2% before the opening bell. It’s likely the DJIA will close below 10,000 today.

What Would Happen If The Supreme Court Upheld A Meaningful Interpretation Amendment X?

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by Smitty

Megan McArdle asks the negative question: what if SCOTUS strikes down ObamaCare?

I like the more positive assertion in the post title. “Judicial restraint” for the last century has seen the SCOTUS asleep at the switch, while Federal over-reach has led to government run amok. Certainly, a few generations have benefited, but the prospect of debt slaver facing us all is scant comfort.

McArdle writes:

But what if the whole thing goes? I don’t see a way forward for anything that current progressives think of as health care reform;
it basically precludes the Netherlands model, and possibly most of the other European models, though I have to think more about the latter before I’m sure. But there’s a strong possibility that any ruling that eliminated the individual mandate would make anything but single payer or a national health service illegal. Ironically, a conservative court might push health policy to the left.
Or maybe a better way to put it is that it would polarize the choices: incremental tweaks, or single payer. (I assume, perhaps incorrectly, that our legislators would not pursue the folly of guaranteed issue and community rating without a mandate). Where would it go?
Not, I think, in the direction of single payer. The bill would be staggering. Yes, yes, I know you want to raise taxes to pay for it, but the price tag would still give American voters sticker shock. You’d never get it through the Senate unless the composition of that august body radically changed.
My hope is that in this unlikely event, it would open the way for something more like what I’ve proposed: catastrophic income insurance for everyone (i.e., the government will cover health care costs above some fairly high percentage of your income), with less support for first-dollar coverage.

How about a national Come-to-Beavis meeting, where States reclaim responsibility for citizens, and citizens decide how European they want to be?

Breaking the ObamaCare yoke could trigger the chain-reaction replacement of the rest of the unsustainable entitlements, replacing them with, you know, honest systems founded upon sustainable revenue models.

Why is everyone looking at me like I’m off my meds?

Nikki Haley Is Now Nationally Famous for Not — Not — Having Sex With a Blogger

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Hell hath no fury like a blogger scorned:

State ethics filings available online indicate that Haley’s campaign for State Senate paid Will Folks’s company, Viewpolitik, a bit more than $1,100 in consulting fees for the months of January and February of that year, along with a reimbursement of $173.50. . . .
South Carolina Republicans said he’s paid by a number of Republican candidates, though often listed as a subcontractor because he is a controversial figure.

So maybe his motive for saying he got some action from the candidate was that he wasn’t getting any financial action this time around?

I’ve heard of consultants getting screwed by campaigns, but . . .

UPDATE: This is my second post on this story, but the first post was getting too long, and now the story’s developing rapidly. Ben Domenech was also on the story early and updates:

Columbia’s alternative paper reports that rumors originally surfaced over a year ago. That would square with what I’m told — it’d be around the time Folks got pushed off Haley’s payroll after some minor consultant work — but this is all still hearsay. Haley’s denial remains unequivocal.

UPDATE II:  Michael Brendan Dougherty says we’re underestimating the Will-Meister:

I happen to know that Will Folks is a bit of a ladies man. He is very funny, extremely capable, and a raconteur. From what I hear, Folks is rumored to have had “physical relationships” with nearly every female consultant in the state. His affair with Haley supposedly began after he had done some writing work for her.

Well, everybody knows Republican political consultants are notorious whores, but . . .

UPDATE III: The point of the headline, in case you don’t get it, is that it would be unusual if Haley did have sex with a blogger. As a rule, we bloggers spend all our time staring at our SiteMeters and begging Instapundit for linkage, so we don’t have much time for l’amour. 

Evidently the Will-Meister has found a way around that. Maybe they should get him to present a seminar at Right Online: “How to Run a Successful Blog and Also Get Jiggy With Every Female Consultant in the State.”

To analyze the scorned-consultant angle: The primary is June 8, and Folks isn’t getting paid by Haley this year. She just got endorsed by Sarah Palin, which means the money ought to be rolling in, so . . . Well, you do the math. Palin isn’t surprised:

Well, whaddya know? South Carolina’s conservative candidate, Nikki Haley, recently zipped to the front of the line in her state’s race for governor; and lo and behold, now accusations of an affair surface.

You betcha!

UPDATE IV: Add Dan Riehl to the list of bl0ggers that Nikki Haley never had sex with. You see how this could spiral out of control. Once word gets around that a chick dates bloggers . . .

UPDATE V: Ace of Spades also never had sex with Nikki Haley. However, Margaret Thatcher  . . .

UPDATE VI: Will Folks cites as his “smoking gun” (no pun intended) a report that the rumor was being pursued by a free weekly alternative tabloid in Columbia, S.C.

Full stop.

My head just exploded. You’re compelled to “admit” (brag, really) that you banged a politician because you were afraid one of those scrungy little weeklies with the transvestite-hooker ads in the back was going to write about a rumor?

Wait — this breaking news flash just in:

WILL FOLKS IS A CLUELESS DOUCHEBAG

EXPECT UPDATES . . .

Yankees Invade Georgia — Again!

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Da Tech Guy is on the prowl this week near my hometown of Atlanta, but I made him promise to leave his matches in Massachusetts.  Of course, Atlanta’s been utterly overrun with Yankees in the past few decades — I blame air-conditioning, interstate highways and Hartsfield Airport — and it figures that the first person Da Tech Guy interviewed in Georgia would be from Boston.

He’s already Dixie-fied the Axis of Fedora, but apparently hasn’t yet made it to the world-famous Varsity drive-in yet. (I told him to try the onion rings, the Frosted Orange and the fried peach pie.) However, does he seem to have enjoyed breakfast at Mamie’s in Lithonia, and he had a very interesting interview with local journalist Jennifer Parker:

In 2008 she was surprised that Hank Johnson had run unopposed, this had not happened in her memory in the district. . . .
Speaking of surprises another surprise is the number of Republicans running for the nomination. Usually a republican runs and is soundly defeated, she is surprised that so many people are vying for the right to have that experience. She mentioned the possibility of the tea parties encouraging people to run. As a person who hosted the first candidates’ forum she had met with the candidates but thought none of them would be able to win in a district where President Obama drew his highest percentage of victory even higher than his home district.

Be sure to keep track of his Georgia trip — he’s covering Republican 4th District candidate Liz Carter — at Da Tech Guy’s blog. And hit his tip jar!

Right Online Conference July 23-24

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The announcement:

From July 23-24 AFP Foundation will host the third annual RightOnline Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. . . .
RightOnline will bring together the foremost new media experts to train attendees on how to be influential grassroots activists and sway public policy debates through the use of online tools and strategies. . . . .

The “foremost new media experts“:

Congressman Mike Pence
Congresswoman Michele Bachmann
Herman Cain, Nationally Syndicated Radio Host
Erick Erickson, RedState.com
Stephen Moore, Wall Street Journal
John Fund, Wall Street Journal
Ed Morrissey, HotAir.com
Guy Benson, Radio Host
Stephen Kruiser, Fox News Contributor
Phil Kerpen, AFP Foundation

Be sure to attend Right Online 2010 — and give my regards to Erik Telford, who made sure I wasn’t invited. Again.