Archive for January, 2007

Politico Column

Published by Ryan Sager January 25th, 2007 in Misc. Self Promotion. 0 Comments

Today I have my first column in The Politico. It’s on my favorite topic: the West. The main analysis certainly won’t shock anyone who’s been following me on the topic. But there’s a short preview of the down-ticket races that will be important in ‘08. The seat being vacated by Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) is likely to be a big pick-up for the Democrats; and it will solidify the state’s emerging “blue” status.

UPDATE: Also, the column was part of a package. Here, James Antle offers a take skeptical of any sort of “libertarian” sentiment in the West — he thinks the trend is more outright liberal. I’d just note, as I have before, that no part of America is actually “libertarian.” Bad ideas like the minimum wage are going to pass pretty much anywhere you put them on the ballot. But, relatively speaking, this is a region that wants low spending and little regulation of people’s private lives. It’s a broad definition, to be sure, but I’m convinced it’s closer to libertarian than liberal.

**, the Nameless Fool

Published by Ryan Sager January 24th, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 1 Comment

I share Virginia’s frustration with the attention paid by the New York Times book review to dunces like *inesh *’Souza (and I share her outrage over the kinds of books they don’t review — though, I may be biased by the examples she cites).

Judging your opponents by their most ostentatious fools is a mistake and leads to intellectual laziness and overconfidence (see: Michael Moore, MoveOr.org, the GOP, and the 2006 election).

That said, however, I don’t think conservatives or liberals should waste their breath or knuckle strength responding to **’s Coulteresque ravings. He and his publishers apparently thought they could make money just by saying something stupid enough to get people talking. The best solution to this sort of thing is to ignore it — let it hit their bottom line and their credibility. Talking about it only encourages more of it.

And, with that, I’ll start taking my own advice. Fin.

McCain: Sinking Fast

Published by Ryan Sager January 18th, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

McCain is sinking fast in New Hampshire and sinking fast with his beloved independents.

I reiterate my belief that any media reference to McCain as the “frontrunner” is a fact-free media wet dream.

Spitzer’s Deal

Published by Ryan Sager January 16th, 2007 in Misc. Self Promotion. 0 Comments

I forgot to link my article on Eliot Spitzer and charter schools from the New York Post on Friday. And a book review (of John Samples’ new campaign-finance-reform book) from the New York Post on Sunday.

Shorter Sager:

* Spitzer is proving to be pretty good on charter schools at this early date.

* John Samples is smart and right; campaign-finance reform is a scam.

Have a nice day.

UPDATE: Also, a correction to my charter school piece. In the piece, I say the Department of Education commissioned a review of the Williamsburg Charter HS. Actually, the school’s board of directors commissioned that review.

Boxer’s Astounding Low

Published by Ryan Sager January 12th, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

An astounding low yesterday from Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA).

I’m speechless.

Baghdad: The Ungovernable City

Published by Ryan Sager January 12th, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

Today, Rudy Giuliani and Newt Gingrich take to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to argue that the solution to Iraq is … workfare.

Color me skeptical.

This strikes me as an idea — like the Surge — that might have had a chance within the first six months after the invasion, but which is monumentally underwhelming approaching the end of year four. We had a window where people were willing to listen to us, willing to cooperate with us, willing to ally with us. Now, Iraq is in a state of full-fledged anarchy/civil war. With scores of bodies turning up beheaded every other day in Baghdad, I’m not sure the situation is quite comparable — even at a theoretical level — to New York City in the 1990s.

I’d love to think reconstruction money could solve our problems — I’d rather America spend cash than blood to end this mess. But it seems like worse than wishful thinking.

McCain Still Disliked by Fiscal Conservatives

Published by Ryan Sager January 12th, 2007 in Misc. Elephantitis. 2 Comments

An rhsager.com exclusive…

On Thursday, I got hold of some early results from a large survey the fiscally conservative Club For Growth is doing of its membership. McCain is near the rock-bottom of the pack when Club For Growth members are asked whom they would like to see made the GOP presidential nominee in 2008, and he comes in at the very top when members of the group are asked whom they would not like to see nominated. His favorable/unfavorable rating is also very poor with this crowd.

The Club For Growth is in the midst of conducting an extensive presidential survey of its 40,000 members, by phone and by email. So far, they’ve gotten roughly 3,300 responses.

The preliminary numbers I have obtained are as follows:

* Club members’ top choice for 2008 GOP nominee for president: McCain received 5%

* Club members’ least favorite choice: McCain received 43% (first place)

* McCain’s favorable/unfavorable rating with Club members: Favorable 16% / Unfavorable 76%

(On those first two questions, Club members were asked to pick from a list, including: Romney, Pataki, McCain, Gingrich, Hunter, Huckabee, Hagel, Giuliani, Brownback, or no answer.)

Asked to comment, Club For Growth President Pat Toomey offered a rather bleak assessment of McCain’s chances at wooing fiscal conservatives in the GOP primary.

“This is a real reflection of a serious challenge McCain has with free-market conservatives and with limited-government conservatives,” Toomey said. “He very prominently spoke out against the Bush tax cuts … He spouted class-warfare rhetoric usually voiced by the Democrats.”

What’s more, Toomey said it would be a mistake to underestimate the importance of McCain’s role in bringing campaign-finance reform to American politics with his McCain-Feingold bill. “Frankly, our members, almost by definition, are concerned with weighing in on issues and having a voice in American politics,” Toomey said. “His willingness to diminish the First Amendment is a matter of great concern.”

Despite the fact that McCain is good on trade policy and on opposing pork-barrel spending, Toomey said, “Fundamentally, limited government requires limited taxes, and economic growth requires lower marginal taxes.”

Asked whether McCain could do anything to woo back fiscal conservatives, Toomey offered only: “You never say never in politics.”

Of course, McCain has already spent some considerable time trying to win back fiscal conservatives, flip-flopping on the Bush tax cuts (calling for their renewal after having opposed their original passage) and flip-flopping on the estate (a.k.a. death) tax.

McCain and the Club For Growth — a so-called “527″ organization — have long been at odds. McCain has repeatedly cited the Club For Growth as the type of group that made his campaign-finance-reform bill necessary, because they run lots of hard-hitting (and sometimes even negative) ads in House and Senate races in the days leading up to federal elections. In 2000, the Club ran ads boosting the candidacy of now-Rep. Jeff Flake, a rising fiscal-conservative star, for an Arizona congressional seat — leading to the defeat of an opposing candidate hand-picked by McCain.

Nonetheless, the vehemence of the opposition to the purported GOP frontrunner by the leadership and membership of the Club For Growth is pretty striking this early in the game.

Developing… 

And it’s … Denver!

Published by Ryan Sager January 12th, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

Though others have already been weighing in on my behalf, let me congratulate Howard Dean for taking my advice on how to save the Democratic Party. OK, I was trying to save the Republican Party. But as long as someone is listening…

Really, though, the choice of Denver over New York City for the 2008 Democratic National Convention was a no-brainer. The Democrats had nothing to gain coming to NYC, in terms of symbolism or “changing the map” coming into the next presidential election, and everything to gain by going out West.

Howard Dean put it well in a statement this morning:

There is no question that the West is important to the future of the Democratic Party … The recent Democratic gains in the West exemplify the principle that when we show up and ask for people’s votes and talk about what we stand for, we can win in any part of the country. Additionally, we have a number of strong Democratic leaders in the West who will be a part of showcasing the vision of Democratic leadership for America as we introduce the next Democratic President in the Rocky Mountains.

There is no part of the country more full of opportunity for the Democrats or danger for the Republicans than the interior West.

The Times notes the trend here:

Five of the eight states in the interior West now have Democratic governors. The party picked up about 25 state legislative seats in November’s elections as well, gaining ground in Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Arizona, Colorado and Idaho, while suffering a net loss of seats to the Republicans only in Montana. The United States Senate swung to Democratic control partly on the shoulders of [Jon] Tester, who defeated Senator Conrad Burns.

And while the Democrats are out courting the libertarian-ish interior West, the Republicans will be staking their claim in the populist Midwest, specifically Minneapolis.

Thus, the realignment realigns on.

House: Awesome and Politically Useful

Published by Ryan Sager January 10th, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

House

Over at Hit & Run, Jacob Sullum writes up last night’s episode of “House.” Not only was it a pretty good one — finally ending the whole Tritter/House-getting-busted-for-pain-killers plot in a clever way — it’s a politically daring one.

Instead of House learning the error of his ways (that is, taking ridiculous amounts of Vicodin to overcome chronic pain), he finds a way to get the government off his back while holding on to his life-and-career-saving habit.

One of the most remarkable things about “House” as a series is that one of its major plots — really, its central plot — has constituted a sustained defense of drug use. It’s a pretty big departure from the Just Say No ’80s (and ’90s), and I’m surprised there hasn’t been more outcry.

I guess it’s only nipples that get people excited these days. (That came out wrong.)

Conservative Summit

Published by Ryan Sager January 10th, 2007 in Misc. Elephantitis. 0 Comments

Seemingly, my apostasy of the last year or so hasn’t yet gotten me written out of the conservative movement. Thus, I will be speaking at the National Review Institute’s Conservative Summit, January 26-28. Specifically, I’ll be debating Ralph Reed as to the role of the Religious Right in the GOP (at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday, the 27th, I’m told).

There are also going to be some other debates, including:

On immigration: Mark Krikorian v. Tamar Jacoby

On energy: James Woolsey v. Jerry Taylor

A fuller roster of speakers includes:

Jeb Bush, Tony Snow, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, John Boehner, John Bolton, Rich Lowry, John O’Sullivan, Kate O’Beirne, Mark Steyn, Laura Ingraham, Kathryn Lopez, Robert P. George , Maggie Gallagher, Ramesh Ponnuru, Ed Whelan, Marvin Olasky, James Woolsey, Jerry Taylor, Ward Connerly, Byron York, Jonah Goldberg, Rob Long, Pat Toomey, Ralph Reed, Ryan Sager, Mark Krikorian, Cliff May, Tamar Jacoby, Charles Murray, John Miller, Rick Brookhiser, Bill Kristol, Terence P. Jeffrey, Michael Steele, Abigail Thernstrom, Mona Charen, Ed Gillespie, Andrew McCarthy, Charles Kesler, Edwin J. Feulner

You can register for the Washington, D.C., event here.

Divided We Stand

Published by Ryan Sager January 9th, 2007 in Misc. Elephantitis. 0 Comments

Reason asks some folks (including yours truly): How awesome is divided government?

Public Financing

Published by Ryan Sager January 9th, 2007 in Misc. Speech. 0 Comments

It’s nice to see it put so forthrightly:

Public financing of political campaigns — the true end-goal of all campaign-finance regulation efforts — has one aim, and one aim only: to entrench a permanent Democratic/statist advantage in the American system of government.

As I’ve been arguing for years, there is no more serious threat to our democracy.

CNN.com Catches Baby-Panda Fever

Published by Ryan Sager January 3rd, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

Now, this is odd:

Baby Pandas

Looks like it was take-your-daughter-to-work day at CNN. One of the kiddies must have gotten hold of a keyboard.

A Bumper-Sticker Menace

Published by Ryan Sager January 3rd, 2007 in Misc. Speech and Misc. Self Promotion. 0 Comments

In the New York Post today, I write up the latest outrage campaign-finance reform has visited upon free speech:

It looks like John McCain has a little explaining to do to the NASCAR set.Kirk Shelmerdine — one of the greatest pit-crew chiefs ever, most famously for the late Dale Earnhardt, Sr. — is today engaged in a less-successful second career as a driver. But to the Federal Election Commission, he’s just a reckless campaign-finance law violator.

The day after Christmas, the FEC announced that it was sending Shelmerdine a “letter of admonishment” for his actions during the 2004 presidential campaign — namely, putting a “Bush/Cheney ‘04″ decal on a panel of his car for a total of four races.

It seems the FEC sees the decal as a “contribution.” The definition of possible “contributions” is expanding rapidly — bumper stickers on celebrity cars, ads for movies (see: Michael Moore and “Fahrenheit 9/11″ during the 2004 campaign), ads for newspapers that have incidental mentions of candidates names (see: Santorum vs. Casey Senate race in 2006), and, most egregiously, out in Seattle a while back, talk on a talk-radio program against a gas-tax increase.

Next up? Political t-shirts on rock stars? Bumper stickers on celebrities’ private cars? Who knows?

All we do know is that if there’s somebody willing to complain to the FEC, innocent civilians will have to answer to federal regulators for their unsanctioned political activities.

Thank John McCain.

Rudy’s Memo

Published by Ryan Sager January 2nd, 2007 in Misc. Elephantitis. 0 Comments

Today, my old New York Sun colleague Ben Smith gets hold of a 140-page memo from the Giuliani camp laying out soup-to-nuts everything they’re trying to do and everything they’re worried about over at Rudy HQ.

It’s a hell of a scoop, and there are some interesting tidbits. But, at first glance, it doesn’t look like there’s anything particularly damaging in there — just a lot of acknowledgments of things of things we already knew (e.g., Bernie Kerik and Rudy’s ex-wives will be problems).

Happy New Year

Published by Ryan Sager January 1st, 2007 in Misc. Miscellany. 0 Comments

New Year's Eve Times Square

 

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