The Nevada State GOP has lost its mind.

District 1 (Las Vegas) Congresswoman, Democrat Shelley Berkley, is a 6-term incumbent.  She voted for Pelosi’s healthcare bill without hardly breaking a sweat.  Her seat is considered relatively safe, but these are volatile times and conservatives here will fight to beat her.

Now we’ve been sabotaged by our own.  Party officials recruited newcomer Michele Fiore to enter the race on the last filing date and granted her a Rule 11 Letter, which indicates national-level support.

Craig Lake, young businessman and solid conservative, has been campaigning for Berkley’s seat for months.  He works hard and has been self-financing in order to get up and running.  His obvious downside is his inexperience.  Whatever reservations I had about throwing full support behind Lake related to his political immaturity.  Our chances of beating Berkley would greatly increase if the Republicans could recruit a more seasoned candidate.

However, Fiore has no more experience than Lake.  GOP officials tried to work some (lame) deal with Lake to entice him to step aside.  Lake said no:

“I mean no disrespect, but I honestly don’t see how she is a better candidate,” he said.  “I mean, if I felt they had found a better and more qualified candidate, I would have agreed to step out.”

So why would our GOP decide to back someone lacking in credentials?  The short answer is . . . Fiore is a woman.  Will the GOP elite never learn?  At the national level or at the local level they have no idea that Republican (and Independent) voters decide based on the issues, not on the candidate’s –er, plumbing.  Criminey.  This attitude is idiotic and disrespectful.

Such a bone-headed maneuver may be just the push Lake’s candidacy needed.  He suddenly has a lot more committed Republican voters due to the Nevada GOP’s heavy-handed tactics.  If only the GOP could be as effective at defeating Berkley.

And if anyone has anything positive to say about Fiore, please chime in.  Her website does not inspire confidence.

Israel’s in trouble.

“By now the efforts of the White House to isolate and humiliate Israel because of the latter’s decision to approve 1,600 new Jewish homes in East Jerusalem (which is, after all, its capital) are well known.”  If these efforts are not well known to you, follow the link.  Peter Wehner lays out the whole case.  Part of his argument against the White House’s treatment of Israel is, “The entire theory on which the Obama administration is operating is false.”

However, what appears false is Wehner’s analysis.  He seems to believe that Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing, that Obama’s making a mistake out of some misunderstanding of the dynamics of the Middle East.  What if Obama understands the situation perfectly and has consciously decided that Israel can be destroyed as long as Obama gets what he wants?

Here’s what David Goldman, aka Spengler, has to say:

“I quoted State Department officials’ on-record invitation to Iran to play a major role in Afghanistan. Getting Iran involved IS the administration’s ‘exit strategy.’ Obama wants an ALLIANCE with Iran. And that’s why he picked a fight with Netanyahu over the non-issue of apartment construction in a part of North Jerusalem that every draft piece plan agrees will remain Israeli. If Israel hits Iran’s nuclear capacity, the deal is off.”

Goldman lays out his entire Middle East scenario.  If you want to delve in, follow the link.  The shortcut version is:

“Defense Secretary Robert Gates and former Carter National Security Advisor Zbignew Brzezinski proposed to enlist Iran’s help in stabilizing Iraq and Afghanistan in a 2004 report for the Council on Foreign Relations. . . . Obama is following Gates’ and Brzezinski’s recommendation to the letter, but also the point of absurdity. It is the stupidest, most reckless, and most destructive foreign policy action the United States has taken in my lifetime.”

Is Obama so anxious to get out of Afghanistan that he’ll ally with Iran?  That would explain his absurd deafness about the Green Revolution.  Does our great ally in the Middle East, Israel, mean so little to him?  That would explain why he treated Netanyahu during his recent visit like “an unsavory dictator.”

“Obama is saying, ‘Screw the Jews, they’ll vote for us anyway,’ a prominent American rabbi said this week. The mainstream Jewish organizations, who overwhelmingly supported Obama and share his domestic agenda, are in such a state of shock over the outcome of Netanyahu’s visit that it will take them some days to begin to blink.”

We know Obama’s disdain for the will of the people.  During the healthcare debate he cared little for the voters’ opinion.  The Jewish vote is 3% of the electorate.  Add in pro-Zionist Christians and you still aren’t going to grab Obama’s attention.  It sounds like a bad lightbulb joke: How many voters will it take for Obama to change his policies?

In the meantime, Netanyahu has a crisis.  To accept Obama’s crazy demands for Israel would be “supremely dangerous.”  And if Bibi denies Obama’s demands, who knows how far Obama will go?  Diplomatic isolation?  Active U.S. opposition to an Israeli strike?  Either option puts Israel in an existential bind.  A third scenario for Israel becomes much more likely, considering Obama’s actions:

“Israel completely reshuffles the deck by attacking Iran.”

For America to pawn off the decision to strike Iran is cowardice.  Israel should not be put in this position.  Obama’s America, however, is looking less like a timid partner to Israel and looking more like a back-stabbing traitor.

[Title quoted from Spengler.]

Cross-posted.

What’s he up to?

‘President Obama next week will announce a loan guarantee to build the first nuclear power plant in the United States in almost three decades, an administration official said Friday.’

Partly, he’s treading water.  A loan guarantee only allows The Southern Co. to apply to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a license, a process which will take years.  In the meantime Obama pleases the Right by introducing fresh options (finally!) for energy production.  The Left knows he’s throwing us a bone that will rot in the environmental licensing Black Hole.  Mostly, though, this is about Yucca Mountain.

Just yesterday South Carolina governor Mark Sanford (hasn’t he been kicked out of office yet??) announced he ‘is protesting the Obama administration’s planned termination of the Yucca Mountain Project, including asking the state’s attorney general to “pursue every legal action possible” to stop the shutdown.’

South Carolina, like a lot of other states, is temporarily storing a lot of nuclear waste, waiting for Yucca Mountain to receive it all.  However, Obama at the beginning of this year actually fulfilled one campaign promise and formed a commission to study other options for disposing of nuclear waste.

‘“We’re done with Yucca. We need to be looking at other alternatives,” said Carol Browner, the top White House energy adviser. “The debate over Yucca Mountain is over as the president has made clear.”’

So Obama (and Harry Reid) say Yucca is off the table.  This sounds very good to Nevadans.  However, Obama doesn’t really hold the power on this issue.

‘Yucca Mountain remains on the books as the law of the land, singled out in the 1987 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the so-called “Screw Nevada” bill, as the nation’s dumping ground for such waste primarily from civilian reactors. The law states that only if the Energy Department declares the site unsuitable can it be withdrawn from consideration.

‘Moreover, the Energy Department still has an application to license Yucca Mountain as a repository pending before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Just last week judges met to review the merits of the application. The process that began in 2008 is expected to take three more years. A six-month deposition period begins in February.’

Yucca is a zombie issue, impossible to kill.  Sanford, desperate politician that he is, has apparently done his homework and has found an issue with legs.

Watch the bouncing Yucca Mountain ball go back and forth.  Obama (and Harry Reid) want us to re-elect them so that the horrible Yucca can be kept at bay indefinitely.  This is a card Reid loves to play, emphasizing his importance in derailing Yucca.  The fact is that almost anyone representing Nevada would do the same.  Sen. Ensign is as solidly against Yucca as Reid is.  However, Reid may have a point.  Nevadans have never wanted Yucca, have protested its designation vehemently, and had their refusal to allow Yucca overridden in the U.S. Congress.  If Harry had been Majority Leader then, Yucca would have never proceeded.  Nevada would not have had to bring court case after court case in an effort to stall the project.  The undead Yucca would have had his head removed a long time ago.

Nevadans hatred of, and aggrieved sense of injustice about, Yucca will not be enough to save Harry.  He and Obama are clutching at straws if they’re raising Yucca for re-election reasons.  However, the nuclear energy industry, sadly, will never succeed until the issue of waste disposal is solved.  Going round and around about Yucca is a potentially losing gambit because Nevadans will fight tooth and nail against this imposition on our state sovereignty.  When will some politician champion French-style waste reprocessing so that less waste needs disposing of?  And why can’t the states that generated the waste bury it in their own backyard instead of trying to hijack Nevada’s backyard?  Somehow I think Obama, resident of a state sitting on a lot of waste, will not be that champion.

President Obama’s proposed NASA budget certainly polarizes opinions.  Low funding is explained away as a boon to commercially-funded space companies.  States with NASA-funded jobs foresee an economic crisis.  Some, who I suspect are relieved to see any reduction in the budget, see the cuts as a mixed blessing.

Libertarian-leaning conservatives are quite happy.  They make a persuasive argument that Obama has acted, for once, wisely.  Removing government funding and letting private industry take the lead?  Conservatives have clamored for just such an outcome in other areas (especially “green” technology).  Why would we object now?

My first and obvious answer is that the space program is also a national defence program, which is the only true function of government.  For instance, China isn’t looking toward the moon for the sheer joy of exploration.  How wise is a decision that lets Russia control access to the Space Station?  When Iran, and subsequently the entire Middle East, goes nuclear wouldn’t a space-based defense system come in handy?  I’m surprised the libertarians gloss past these issues.

Those are only the nuts and bolts arguments.  Does this flashback hold any power to persuade:

President John F. Kennedy ‘answered his own rhetorical questions about the wisdom of a trip to the moon in his initial space-race challenge at Rice Stadium in September of 1962:

‘But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why 35 years ago fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?

‘Many years ago the great British explorer, George Mallory, who was to die on Mount Everest, was asked why did he want to climb it. He said: “Because it is there.”‘

King Arthur sent his knights after the Holy Grail for the glory of God, but also to keep his men from getting bored and beating the piss out of each other.  A wise and useful sentiment.  Kennedy understood that man must have a mission and that a strong leader can determine the course for his country.  Obama abdicates that responsibility.  The true irony is that Obama himself is a man in need of a mission.  In his determination to turn America socialist he misses all the opportunities, including this crossroad moment in space exploration history, to become the pivotal president he wishes he could be.

Cross-posted.

New York Times Magazine has a friendly little (well, long actually) piece about Harry Reid.  He’s so interesting!  He looks like a cadaver but he’s so nice!  Politically, he’s such a savvy fellow:

“And he has done what he could to choose his opponent. Jon Porter, a three-term member of Congress, was considered one of Reid’s toughest potential foes — until he was defeated in 2008 by a Democrat, Dina Titus, who benefited from the largess of Reid’s political operation. Last August, Dean Heller, a Republican member of Congress and another potentially strong challenger, called Reid to tell him that he would be sitting this one out; Nevada Democrats suspect Heller reconsidered the wisdom of abandoning a safe seat to challenge an incumbent with $25 million in the bank. That leaves a bench of second-tier candidates like Tarkanian and Lowden, who have far less campaign experience, money and institutional backing than Reid.That might be the single-best thing going for him right now.”

Interesting that the Times forgot the matter of Brian Krolicki.  I blogged back on December 12 of Krolicki’s vindication after Reid did ”what he could to choose his opponent.”  (Charges against Krolicki of misappropriation, conveniently filed at the end of ’08, were dismissed by the court at the end of ’09.)  Currently Nevada’s Lt. Governor, Krolicki is considered one of the top Republicans in the state.

Now Krolicki is strongly considering a shot at Reid’s senate seat.  Yesterday’s Las Vegas Sun has this:

“‘There are serious people making compelling arguments to me both in the state and out of the state to reconsider the Harry Reid race, and based on that pressure and those conversations I am indeed looking at it,’ Krolicki said.”

John McCain, who asked Krolicki to chair his ’08 presidential run in Nevada, is one of the “serious people” urging him on.  Also, the Scott Brown miracle is as persuasive for Krolicki as it’s been for other Republicans across the country.

So, let’s say Krolicki gets in the race.  How does that shake up the primary?  As I’ve said in earlier posts, I don’t feel the love for Sue Lowden, although I would vote for her in the general with little regret.  Danny Tarkanian has been at the top of my list up until now.  He’s solidly conservative, works hard and has name recognition.  He and Sue break almost even in polling against Reid.  And, unlike Sue, he’s not worth $50 million.

I admit it.  I’m a populist bigot.

Thus, my question about Krolicki.  Take anything the liberal LV Sun says with a grain of salt, but the following summation makes me nervous:

“If he is the preferred candidate of Republicans in Washington, he could see a quick cash infusion and pressure on other candidates to bow out.”

My sense of fair play is bothered by the notion that kingmakers in DC may pick my next senator.  They buggered up NY-23.  They tried to bugger up Rubio in Florida.  Krolicki deserves his shot if he wants to take it, and Harry Reid is the juiciest target in Democrat politics right now, but the Republican elites need to back off.  Scott Brown has shown that a light, genuine touch is the key to winning.

Cross-posted.

The conservative blogosphere has been abuzz about Carly Fiorina’s hard-hitting GOP weekly radio address criticizing mammography guidelines.   I do agree that the guidelines (mammograms not necessary for women before 50 years old) were prompted by a political desire to cut healthcare costs, which is no way to decide procedures.  Fiorina, running in the California Republican primary for a chance to unseat Senator Boxer, has the authority of a recent breast cancer survivor.  The topic and the timing are good for her.

However, a mammogram did not detect, by her own admission, Fiorina’s cancer.

“I discovered my own lump two weeks after receiving a clear mammogram. So had I not been in the habit of self-examination, I doubt I would have found it.”

I also recall when Laura Ingraham had breast cancer that a lump was discovered through examination.

“Laura’s breast cancer was picked up during a simple breast examination by her OB/GYN. . . . The tumor was not even visible on a mammogram!”

Now, I’m sure that flattening a woman’s breast every two years to perform an x-ray (which can cause cancer after overexposure) is a reasonable medical decision, but I would appreciate a little perspective.  Conservatives are quick to jump on the Mammogram Bandwagon because a fight against healthcare rationing is essential.  In the process, though, let’s not sing Hallelujah too loudly to the Church of Medicine.  Doctors are not God and their recommendations should be considered rationally and not just on faith.  Shame on Fiorina, who owes her survival to her own diligence, for reinforcing the medical establishment’s talking points.  Healthcare is so expensive, in one part, because patients will trust a doctor over their own common sense.  A slight fever and they’re off to the emergency room.  Fiorina took a great opportunity to discuss the folly of Obamacare’s public option, but she has so far missed the chance to discuss the fact that personal responsibility in our healthcare is the only way to ensure lower costs and higher availability.

Cross-posted at thefilthybeast.com

Sue’s letter to Bishop Pepe:

“November 21, 2009

“Bishop Joseph Anthony Pepe,

“I am a lifelong Catholic and regularly attend Mass at St. Elizabeth’s in Las Vegas. I raised my children as Catholics and believe in the tenets of the Church. I support the Church’s stance on abortion and believe the Church should stand firm in opposing any and all government funding of abortions.

[snip]

“This [healthcare] bill must be stopped. It is unconscionable to allow Federal Funding of abortions. This overturns decades of non-partisan agreement on this issue.  People of conscience can agree to disagree on the abortion issue but there is overwhelming public sentiment against the government funding abortions.

“Please let me know if there is anything I can personally do to help you keep this abomination from coming to fruition.

“Sincerely,

“Sue Lowden”

Smart move, Sue, and morally sound to boot.  Poke at Reid, who is ignoring constituents, and his horrendous healthcare bill.  More interesting, though, is the implied poke at Bishop Pepe.  As Roman Catholic bishops across the country speak out against this bill and its abortion funding, a word from the head of the Vegas Diocese would be timely and highly effective.  Harry isn’t Catholic, but Sin City has a lot of Catholic faithful who could use the Bishop’s pastoral guidance.  His leadership has been sadly lacking in bringing the Traditional Latin Mass to Vegas (one parish offers one TLM on First Fridays).  A forceful response from Bishop Pepe is a long shot, but Sue was right to take it.

Every conservative blog I visit seems to have a banner ad of Harry Reid’s ugly mug and a “donate to Sue Lowden” link underneath him in fine print.  Sue is bombarding conservatives across this nation for money and, by doing so, making herself seem the inevitable Republican candidate to replace Senator Reid in 2010.  With an insipid article at BigGovernment and favorable pushes at Townhall.com Sue is on a steamroll.  Ugh.  I’m sick of her already.

Sue is seeking national support because she has a Nevada problem.  Republicans could do a lot worse, certainly.  Sue, former beauty queen, has an attractive resume.  Anchorwoman, Nevada State Senator, defender of low taxes.  She checks all the right Republican boxes and, as a strong female candidate, Sue can ride the Sarah Palin bandwagon.

However, Sue is also a former casino executive and, with her husband, owner of the Santa Fe Casino.  Paul Lowden is a truly inspirational capitalist; the Lowdens appear to be remarkable businesspeople.  As a candidate, though, this kind of power and money is a handicap, especially at this time.  Voters are tired of the elite, the in-crowd, running Washington.  When the call is “throw the bums out” Sue is not a fresh enough face.  She and Reid have a history which makes Republicans nervous: in the ’80s when Reid was “independent” the Lowdens “donated $8,000 to Reid over several election cycles.”

Nervous Republicans are small potato-sized troubles, though; outraged libertarians are after her scalp.  A PAC has been formed to oppose Sue’s candidacy:

 “Sue Lowden betrayed the trust of hundreds of delegates to the state Republican Convention in April of last year. She did so by abruptly halting the convention without the approval of the convention delegates and in the middle of vote counting. This prevented the election of delegates to the National Convention. Halting the convention without approval of the delegates was contrary to the rules of the convention and also violated an agreement that the state party had with the Republican National Committee to elect delegates at the convention.

“As state party chairperson, Sue Lowden played a leading role in subverting the election.  The election was halted so suddenly that one ballot box was carried away before the counting was completed. No explanation of the results for that ballot box has ever been made. It simply disappeared as if it had never existed. The delegates to the national convention were later selected by Sue Lowden and a few others, contrary to state law and party rules, which require that the delegates be elected by the state convention.”

Sue created an epic disaster.  She p*ssed off every Ron Paul supporter in Nevada and they will never forgive her.

If you recall, Ron Paul actively campaigned in Nevada in ’08.  His radio ads were constantly played here during the Rush Limbaugh show.  Handmade campaign signs for Paul were on every major street corner.  In my Republican caucus room the Ron Paul votes almost tied the Mitt Romney votes.  These supporters were dedicated and very smart.  Once the caucus rules were explained the Paul-ers literally put their heads together and strategized how to maximize votes.  No cheating, just quick and savvy politics.  Republicans in Nevada absolutely need these people on our side.  Sue has alienated them all.

The nail in Sue’s coffin was the discovery of the missing, uncounted ballot box last month, which was opened and tallied.

“A group of disaffected Republicans said they felt vindicated Friday night after a count of missing delegate ballots from last year’s GOP state convention proved three delegates supporting U.S. Rep. Ron Paul should have been sent to the national convention.”

The stink of shenanigans, whether true or not, is deadly in this political climate.  Harry Reid is a Democrat first and a Nevadan last, and many independents are ready for him to go.  Don’t think he’ll go easy, though.  This ad is already playing during prime time.  If your stomach is too weak, or you don’t want to give Harry the hits, know that the ad is professional and effective, focusing on his power to bring money to the state.  As awful as Reid is to Republicans, we must field a clean candidate in order to convince the rest of the state to Thune him out.

Nevada Republicans must decide: is Sue’s baggage too heavy, or can she rise above her elitism?  Sue’s personal story is very likeable and she could be a good senator.  She’s stepped in it with the Ron Paul-ers, though, and at this point she’s only digging a deeper hole.  If she can get Dr. Paul to stand at her side and endorse her, Sue will be golden.  If she can’t successfully appease the Paul contingent, she should step aside so conservatives can back another candidate in the primary.

Cross-posted at thefilthybeast.com