The preview strikes a personal chord. As with these candidates, there is a feeling that I have to blog. My motives differ strongly from those of Stacy McCain, who’s trying to make a living. For me, there is the notion that I have been blessed and equipped to stand athwart history in the ranks of the Whiskey Tango Foxtrot Chorus, and would face judgement if I merely sat about and watched while Rome burns and a Progressive fiddles.
Right to Laugh looks good, too:
Disclaimer: Evan Sayet’s 2009 Heritage appearance was what prompted Stacy to recruit me for this gig, so I’m biased in favor of the fellow.
Heh: Charlie Crist’s flip-flop makes John Kerry look like the Rock of Gibraltar.
And. . .
Just a month ago, he was proud to be a member of the party of Teddy Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, and Ronald Reagan. Now, suddenly, he can’t associate with them any longer because the system is broken.
Marco Rubio’s already got an ad out using Crist’s own words against him. If Crist thinks he has a prayer of winning this as an independent, then he is delusional, baby.
Well if he won’t listen when Mamma Cassie tries to talk to him and tell him how to live, he can always return to his punk roots:
It’s been a very good week for Burns, who was featured Tuesday on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show and got a big push Wednesday from Newt Gingrich. Polls have shown the PA-12 contest “neck-and-neck,” as Burns campaign manager Tadd Rupp said, but Palin’s online endorsement Monday turned up the energy and focused national attention on the western Pennsylvania district. USA Today and the L.A. Times have both featured the race in the past 24 hours.
Burns’ staffers were in a celebratory mood after a candidate forum last night at Westmont Hilltop High School, where Democrat Mark Critz — a former Murtha staffer — apologized for a misleading TV ad run by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. FactCheck.org labeled that ad false last week, saying, “For Democrats, misrepresenting an opponent’s anti-tax position as an anti-jobs position is getting to be a bad habit.” . . .
You can read the whole thing. Unfortunately, local news reporters didn’t seem immediately to catch the significance of the Critz apology, but I just got off the phone with the Burns campaign, which expects to have video online this afternoon highlighting what one source called a “huge blunder” by Nancy Pelosi’s handpicked candidate.
When the question was put to them, would [you] like to vote for someone like John Murtha or would you like a fresh start, the fresh start won 63-34, not a good sign for the Democratic contender who used to work for Murtha.
But it’s still neck-and-neck going into the home stretch, and it will take an all-out-effort for Republicans to beat the Pelosi machine in this Democratic stronghold. Learn more at TimBurnsForCongress.com.
UPDATE II: Here’s the clip of Mark Kritz apologizing:
Note the weasel-word method here:
So I want to take this opportunity, that if I’ve misstated Mr. Burns’s position on something, that I apologize. I didn’t mean to do that. It was my understanding that he did support the Fair Tax, and if that’s wrong, I apologize.
Beyond the two “ifs” which render the whole thing conditional, what Critz is apologizing for is not what he actually said previously during the debate, nor does it cover the distortions of his attack ads. It makes no difference whether or not Burns supports the Fair Tax. In his own ad, Critz portrays Burns’s signature on an Americans for Tax Reform no-tax-increase pledge as a job-killer (????), and the DCCC ad — called “quite misleading” by FactCheck.org — presents Burns as supporting a “23% national sales tax on just about everything” without mentioning that the proposed Fair Tax would eliminate all federal income taxes and abolish the IRS.
A cynic might suspect that Critz’s hypothetical “apology” is a clever attempt to prod Burns into denouncing the Fair Tax.
It always starts rather innocently, doesn’t it? Somewhere around “There oughta be a law” or “I have a cunning plan”.
Is that a sandwich, or a metaphor for Congress?
And then what happens? Some jacknut sees that mitigated disaster of an idea and says “What the world needs right now is an unmitigated disaster”
Awww yeah. . .KFC Double Down on peanut butter toast.
Now, while it’s a good thing that the American people elected a Hawaiian, let us hope that Congress doesn’t discover the Loco Moco, or what is merely a bad situation now could become worse than a Taco Town Taco.
What do you do when you’re a Republican in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, and you’ve just stomped Nancy Pelosi’s handpicked Democrat into smithereens in a public debate for the congressional seat formerly held by the late Jack Murtha? Tim Burns headed straight to Coney Island Lunch for the world-famous “Sundowner” burger:
The Johnston Tribune-Democrat story about the debate is so “fair and balanced” as to be soporific. It’s 3 a.m., I’ve just driven 240 miles round-trip and I’m too tired to give you the full gonzo account until I get a few hours of sleep. But the neutral objective fact is that Burns wiped the floor with Critz so bad, it reminded me of when the Alabama Crimson Tide made Tim Tebow cry.
How good is Burns? Driving home, I called Pamela Geller and told her, “You’re gonna loveTim Burns. And not just the Let’s-Call-Islamic-Jihad-What-It-Is factor. Frankly, this guy makes Scott Brown look homely by comparison.” (On the other hand, Burns doesn’t have a 6-foot-tall “American Idol” singer in his family.)
Sources close to the Burns campaign informed me that, in the first 72 hours after Sarah Palin’s endorsement Monday, the campaign collected more than $80,000 in contributions — but don’t stop now, folks. The special election is May 18 — just 19 days away. Pelosi and Obama are pouring big money into this district trying to hold onto Murtha’s seat, and the Burns campaign will need every nickel you can spare.
I’ll have much more to report later Thursday. Thanks to Tim Burns for being a good sport, and thanks to his campaign staff for their cooperation. Thanks to Da Tech Guy for the continuing loan of his increasingly famous fedora. Thanks to Chris Renner for valuable assistance. Thanks to everyone who contributed to the Shoe Leather Fund to pay for this road trip. And thanks to Mrs. Other McCain, for letting me make this trip on our 21st wedding anniversary.
Note to Ace of Spades: Start checking out air fare to Pittsburgh for Election Night. Don’t forget to bring lots of pudding.
Liberty Pundits bring the schadenfreude for the Senator from Arkansas.
Out on the left coast, where redeeming the Congress will require perhaps greater effort, Valley of the Shadow is attending a Republican debate, and plans to report tomorrow on who is packin’ the gear in the effort to oust Waxman. Also your attention is drawn to the VotS tip jar to help keep the reporting coming.
Stacy McCain went over the Pennsylvania border, in search of vanilla pudding the Burns story, in the special election to replace Murtha. Support bloggers out there fighting the good fight!
