Get Used To It
He’s old, he’s crotchety, he’s uninspiring – and soon he will be your Republican presidential nominee. Meet John McCain., the new (old?) face of the Republican Party, a guy who has spent most of his professional life in the backrooms of Washington, D.C., not a place where new ideas flourish.
Still, McCain will win the GOP nomination fair and square (at least within the fair and square standard of hardnosed, nasty politics). McCain was more consistent and didn’t pander as much as Mitt Romney. Romney would be a better president, but it wasn’t pretty what he had to do to try to win. Utahns, knowing the real Mitt Romney, were more tolerant of his inconsistency, but most of the rest of the country never caught on. And it appears the South just isn’t ready to vote for a Mormon.
McCain vs. Hillary Clinton or McCain vs. Barack Obama each present fascinating possibilities. Left with a bad taste in their mouths, Utah Republicans won’t warm to McCain quickly, but they’ll eventually come around.
Outdoor Retailers: Big Impact
This week’s Economic Review newsletter.from EDCUtah touts the economic benefits of outdoor recreation in Utah and the $30 million impact of the Outdoor Retailer Winter and Summer Markets, held annually in Salt Lake City. The newsletter also says 40 private equity groups (PEGs), with over $20 billion under management, have registered as exhibitors at the ACG Utah Growth Conference and Capital Connection, Feb. 12. The PEGs are in search of opportunities to acquire and invest in Utah businesses.
Washington Watch
Hatch: Make Tax Cuts Permanent
Sen. Orrin Hatch expresses "his support for President George W. Bush's budget for Fiscal Year 2009. Although the budget isn't perfect, Hatch supports the President's goal to rein in spending and make the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts permanent" (see press release).
Today in Political History
Feb. 6, 1778: France and the American colonists sign a treaty making France an ally with America in the American Revolution.
Feb. 6, 1788: Massachusetts joins the Union. (Perspicuity)
Feb. 6, 1911: Ronald Reagan, 40th president, is born in Illinois. Reagan served two terms, from 1981-1989, and died June 5, 2004. (NBC5)
Feb. 6, 1912: New Mexico becomes the 47th state.
Wise Words
“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”
-- Ronald Reagan (Quotations Page)
Communications Tip
Online Tactics: Influence Via E-Mail
For years, advocacy campaigns have been bombarding Congress with mass emails from supporters. Unfortunately, all the evidence points to the fact that they don’t work very well. Hill offices largely ignore them and will often treat thousands of identical messages as essentially a single message.
According to research by the Congressional Management Foundation, part of the problem is the simple volume of email: in 2004 alone, congressional offices received almost 200 million messages. Besides the sheer volume of email, however, many staffers doubt the legitimacy of mass messages and think that organizations send them out without consulting the supposed signers. Some offices have grown so tired of mass emails that they’ve enabled “logic puzzles” to restrict email to individual messages from individual constituents sent through the members’ own web pages.
Individual e-mail messages from real people can still be very effective. It takes more time and effort to get supporters to write their own messages, but it’s clearly worth it. (Epolitics)
National Politics
Best Stories From . . .
-- The Hill: "Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) emerged as the big winner in the hunt for the GOP nomination on Super Tuesday while Democratic Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and Barack Obama (Ill.) split states and delegates throughout the night. McCain's strong showing was undercut only by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee's refusal to concede as he followed a win in West Virginia early Tuesday with a slew of victories across the South."
-- The Politico: "The Super Tuesday fault lines broke along gender and race for Democrats and along political philosophy for Republicans, as they have throughout the 2008 primary race."
-- Washington Post: "More Democratic voters in nine key Super Tuesday states were motivated by a desire for change than by experience or electability, while Republican voters in seven of the nine primarily focused on the nation's sagging economy, according to network exit polls."
-- Commentary Magazine: Columnist John Podhoretz says conservatives who oppose McCain "are confusing ideological convictions with political tactics, and infusing a disagreement on how to approach problems with a moral edge it does not deserve. ... McCain would, there is no question, be a lousy leader of an ideological movement. But the Republican party is not an ideological movement. It is a political vehicle for the American right-of-center. Those who confuse the Republican Party with the conservative movement are indulging in a fantasy -- that there is purity in politics and that there is something immoral about ideological impurity."
Blog Watch
-- Paul Rolly reports: "When the Utah House of Representatives went into a floor session [Tuesday] afternoon, Speaker Greg Curtis made a gesture that caught many of the members by surprise, and left a few choked up. With so much contentiousness between the political parties these days, this gesture will be remembered. Curtis, a Republican from Sandy, suddenly relinquished his chair to Rep. Carl Duckworth of Magna, one of just 20 Democrats in the 75 member House. Duckworth, in the 2006 election, survived a vicious campaign in which about two dozen fliers accusing him of everything from being a socialist to not caring about disabled children were sent to homes in his district in the weeks just before the election. Those fliers came from the Utah Republican Party. But this time he was treated far differently by a Republican. Curtis had him run the House as Speaker pro tem for about a half hour. Duckworth is suffering from pancreatic cancer and has been looking frail during the session this year. But he gamely has come to work and represented his district. The Republican speaker made sure today that everyone appreciated that." (For more on the Legislature, see The Democratic Caucus, SLCSpin, Lincoln's Legislative Blog, and Utah Moms Care.)
Lighter Side
Bill and Hillary Clinton are driving in the country near Hillary’s hometown. Bill stops at a gas station, and the attendant comes out to assist. He recognizes Hillary and says, “Hey, Hillary! Remember me? We used to date in high school.”
They talk for a few minutes, Bill pays, and they drive away. Bill is feeling rather smug, looks over at Hillary, and says, “You used to date that guy? Just think what life would be like if you hadn’t married me.”
Hillary looks back, and says, “Well, Bill, I guess you’d be pumping gas and he’d be president.” |
