Tom Campbell

Scott Brown was an obscure suburban lawyer/legislator.

Carly Fiorina was the former CEO of one of America's top corporations.

These ads--direct and authentic--are why Brown is getting sworn into the U.S. Senate tomorrow. Voters get a clear , unfiltered sense of what Brown's message is 

This art house web ad, is why Fiorina probably won't get to the Senate. To the extent it conveys useful information about her opponent, it's lost in bizarre metaphors.

This is part of the reason not to recruit self-funders; they seem enamored of expensive creativity that just doesn't work, like this nonsense from Ned Lamont in 2006.

We need a lot more Wrentham in our 2010 campaigns and a whole lot less Hollywood.

While Obama sacrifices and ‘finds’ TWENTY BILLION DOLLARS in spending cuts…. I’d say “WHAT?!!!” – but my editor yells at me when I get redundant. The hutzpah of this bunch, from the President right on down, is BREATHTAKING. With Democrats under challenge in states all over the union you would think that Congressional Democrats would understand that a highly motivated and IRATE electorate is watching their every move with the intensity of a laboratory technician studying a virulent microorganism. Good simile though. With Illinois, like Massachusetts, no longer a guaranteed lead-pipe cinch Democrat playground.

States all over the nation are experiencing the same transformation. California’s Senator Barbara Boxer is being challenged by former Congressman Tom Campbell (R). Tom has a comfortable lead on the GOP pack but get this… he is running only FOUR POINTS behind Babs in this West Coast liberal wonderland.  For him to be this close early in the race does not bode well for Boxer. In the severely economically depressed Central Valley all GOP candidates are running ahead of her.

Tom Campbell

With the extreme left wing California Assembly about to fall upon Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s veto sword over the absolutely preposterous TWO HUNDRED BILLION DOLLAR California State Single Payer Health Care Bill now sitting in the Assembly, California with an almost 40 billion dollar budget shortfall  and the state about to declare itself out of money again, voters are likely to come out of their self-induced stupor long enough to remember that it is Democrats that are doing all this to them and that probably won’t do Boxer much good either.

FIVE POINT SEVEN PERCENT GROWTH in the GDP… and over half of it attributed to inventory replenishment,  most of that dependent on fiscal and monetary stimulus. Economist Nouriel Roubini, who predicted the  banking crash and recession, stated that the second half of this year will fade to just  1.5 % growth as stimulus dollars decline and fade away WITH NO JOB GROWTH. Watch for Obama to trumpet TEMPORARY CENSUS JOBS as a spectacular INCREASE in employment. But then we’ve seen that he’ll do or say just about anything.

California Patriots should be pounding out the faxes, emails, phone calls, letters and visits to State Assembly members’ offices – remind them that what happened in Massachusetts could happen  in California as well. Meanwhile Congressional Democrats WITHOUT a single Republican vote plunged this country ONE POINT NINE TRILLION DOLLARS FARTHER IN DEBT. Undoubtedly clearing the way for more Democrat drunken spending binges. These people have to be stopped… It’s my job… it’s your job… IT’S OUR JOB!!

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

I spoke with Tom Campbell for over 45 minutes on a range of topics, and I’ve split my posts on that discussion into two posts, one here and one over at QandO. Here at The Next Right, I’m going to cover new media, elections, and the politics of enacting fiscal-conservative governance for a state like California. Over at QandO the topics have more to do with policy.

Tom Campbell isn’t your typical candidate.

Pitted against two Republican candidates with far less experience but much greater personal wealth, he’s opted to reach out directly to voters with new media, doing substantial blogging himself and even personally answering hundreds of questions about the gritty details of policy in the comment sections of his campaign website.

Going against the grain, he’s pushed to be far more specific about necessary painful budget cuts than his fellow Republicans. Still he appeals to demographics that have tilted Democrat – Northern Californians and young people – giving him a polling advantage over his fellow Republicans in a general election matchup.

Campbell isn’t some upstart: he has extensive experience in politics and government, having been elected to Congress five times starting in the late ’80s and having ran against Dianne Feinstein in 2000. He seems to be a contender in the race. So I was interested to hear his take on how things have changed and how he might translate electoral victory into governing power.