Who Is Jon Scott Ashjian?

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We know that he owes $200,000 in back taxes. We know that his “Tea Party” candidacy is Harry Reid’s only hope for re-election. There are many questions being asked in Nevada:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is facing Republican accusations that he’s behind the emergence of a third-party Tea Party candidate on the ballot who could divide conservative voters and help him win reelection this fall.
The charge against Jon Scott Ashjian is being led by his would-be GOP opponents, such as Danny Tarkanian, who accuses him of having weak tea party ties. “Nobody in the Tea Party knows who he is. He didn’t know any of the principles of the Tea Party,” Tarkanian told [CNN].
GOP primary field leader Sue Lowden, a former Nevada Republican Party chairman who calls herself a Tea Party voter, also questioned Ashjian’s tea party bona fides. “I don’t know who this person is. He’s never been involved with anything that I’m aware of in this state,” she told CNN.

Gee, it seems like the only person who’s not questioning Ashjian’s credibility is . . . Harry Reid.

However much we know about Ashjian, I don’t think we know enough yet. The Tea Party Express will be in Las Vegas March 27.

IYKWIMAITYD.

That Ain’t Country Music

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I’m not one of these hard-core purists, who denounces any artist who strays too far from the original formula, despite my hereditary Old School tendencies. (My mother worked for the Atlanta office of RCA Records when I was a kid and used to bring home authographed records by Eddie Arnold, etc.) And I’m OK with the general trend toward rockin’ country that has developed ever since Mutt Lange moved to Nashville.

All that being said, Carrie Underwood’s “Cowboy Cassanova” is not country music. A fine song by a fine singer, but it ain’t country.

If you’re the argumentative type, feel free to argue. But you’re just wrong.

Progressives Awaken To The Idea That Americans Hate Progressivism

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by Smitty

Mike Madden at Salon listened to Glenn Beck, and likens his war on the word ‘Progressivism’ to Reagan’s war on ‘Liberal’.

But instead of sitting back and letting “progressive” become the next American political boogieman — like what happened to “liberal” — some Democrats want to fight back. “This is the big fight about the role of government and markets,” says Robert Borosage, co-director of the Campaign for America’s Future (who also says he’s proud to call himself a progressive, because of the original economic populism of the Progressive Era). “People need a clear narrative about how we drove off a cliff, and what we need to do to get off of it, and it has to relate to a set of ideas about how we got off the cliff.” That’s where laying out a progressive agenda — and explicitly identifying the conservative agenda as opposed to it — would help.

Madden’s analysis manages to overlook the fact that the more egregious RINOs either implicitly by action or explicitly by word brand themselves ‘Progressive’.
Since 1913, there has been progressive flooding (via Insty) of power and money into Washington DC. This has been a function of Amendments 16 & 17, plus the Federal Reserve Act, the three of which bad ideas must be stricken as soon as possible.
Look, Madden, you can put whatever label you want on your collectivist ideology. It matters not. The Constitutional restoration is arriving, albeit slowly, in a great big steamroller, and Progressivism is not going to enjoy much height going down the road.

How Bad Is It for Charlie Crist?

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“At this point, it doesn’t look like he could win a Republican Primary for Dog Catcher.”
— Dean Debnam, president of Public Policy Polling

Kind of a nice plan you had there, Mr. Crist. All you had to do was to embrace Obama and get John Cornyn’s big money boys at the NRSC lined up behind you. Who cares about those stupid Republican primary voters in Florida, anyway?

The fix was in. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

How’s that plan working out for you, Charlie?

UPDATE: Oh, look, here’s a headline fresh in from Florida:

With a huge lead in Florida polls, Rubio dazzles crowd

Rubio 60%
Crist 26%

Sorry, Charlie.

NOT ONE RED CENT!

Constitutional Question: Will There Be One By The Time The 111th Congress Is Done With It?

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by Smitty

Power Line posts on “The Slaughter Solution”. As in NY Rep. Louise Slaughter; we’re still advocating against violent, illegal actions against Congress.

Speaking of illegal actions, will the Constitution’s stated intent for having revenue-generating legislation originate in Big House (the one with 435 seats) before moving over to the Little HouseSenate retain any meaning whatsoever after this debacle

Under Slaughter’s scheme, Democratic leaders will overcome this problem by simply “deeming” the Senate bill passed in the House – without an actual vote by members of the House.

What is the point of rules if they are mere bits of clay to be shaped around some emergent concern?
These godforsaken clowns have sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution, only to use it as so much toilet paper. The Democrats don’t have the votes, I don’t care what Pelosi says. But how debauched can things possibly get as she staggers toward a final, Botox-enhanced rigor mortis.
People tell me I’m mad to think that some kind of state-level Article V convention is out of the question. That may be, but the atrociousness of Pelosi and company drag that Article V cramdown just a little closer toward being within the question every single day.
Worst. Speaker. Ever.

Update: Case in point, from Big Government:

As is the new DC operating procedure for major legislation, there are almost no firm details on the current language. We know there will be a large new federal bureaucracy, somewhere within government, to provide “consumer protection” for financial products. We know there will be a $50 billion tax on banking customers to provide a permanent bailout fund, or as Sen. Corker would describe it, a “wind-down” fund. Unfortunately, we also know that the bill will do nothing to reform Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, who continue to drain billions from the U.S. Treasury.

Vast, unread bills passed at odd hours. That’s one way to kill representative government, I suppose.

Update II: More from Another Black Conservative.

Eric Massa’s Next Job?

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He’s snorkeled his way out of the Navy, groped his way out of Congress and flunked his tryout as a Fox News regular contributor, so obviously Mr. Tickles is going to need another career that suits his unique abilities and interests. Public school teacher?

They do such a good job teaching us to read . . . who better to teach us about sex?

That’s from Enoch Root at Piece of Work in Progress, and here’s Veronique de Rugy at BigGovernment.com:

Based on the Recovery.gov data, more than two third of the 594,754.3 jobs “created or saved” with the stimulus funds were “created or saved” in the Department of Education . . .

Hmmm. Once they’re through with Eric Massa, maybe the Obama administration can “create or save” a job for Charlie Crist, another guy who’s going down hard.

IYKWIMATIYD.

Ambien Alert: Looks Like Patrick Kennedy Has Fallen Off the Wagon Again

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Watch CBS News Videos Online

Ace of Spades headline:

Patrick Kennedy Vows to “Destroy” Stone Cold Steve Austin & The Undertaker in Wrestlemania 47

I’ll try to get a partial transcript of Kennedy’s demented gibberish, just as soon as I can stop laughing. This could take a while . . .

UPDATE: Via CBS:

“If anybody wants to know where cynicism is, cynicism is that there’s one, two press people in this galllery. We’re talking about Eric Massa 24-7 on the TV, we’re talking about war and peace, $3 billion, 1,000 lives and no press? No press. You want to know why the American public is fit? They’re fit because they’re not seeing their Congress do the work that they’re sent to do. It’s because the press, the press of the United States is not covering the most significant issue of national importance and that’s the laying of lives down in the nation for the service of our country. It’s despicable, the national press corps right now.”

Honest, congressman, I’d be more than happy to cover your ridiculous drunken ramblings in person, but nobody in the “national press corps” is willing to pay me to make fun of you. And speaking of “despicable” . . .

Kennedy has repeatedly said he did not drink alcohol before the car accident, and he was disoriented from two prescription medications: Ambien and Phenergan. Police on the scene said he appeared to be intoxicated; however, no sobriety tests were conducted that night to prove he had been drinking.

Mary Jo Kopechne could not be reached for comment.

UPDATE II: Fortunately, Allahpundit could be reached for comment:

Funny, but I don’t remember many Democratic complaints about the sustained media swarm over Mark Foley in fall 2006 while Iraq was falling apart. I’m sure there’s an explanation for the difference somewhere.

True dat.