Gov. Schwarzenegger and Mitt Romney

Gov. Schwarzenegger thinks Mitt Romney will win the GOP nomination for president in 2012, and I happen to agree. He might not be the best candidate, but at the moment he seems like the only grown up in the room.

Schwarzenegger also said he would make a bid for the White House if the Constitution were amended.

"Without any doubt," he said. "There's no two ways about that." I for one would be interested. I know that it won't happen. There is no big movement to chance the Constitution, at least for this issue. Still, hard to find someone who embodies the "American Dream" more that Arnold.

Mojave Cross Will Stay

Regular readers may recall we discussed the story surrounding the Mojave Cross controversy last October. I also wrote about the issue at Suite 101. The case has now finally been decided by the USSC. From the LA Times:

The Supreme Court gave its approval Wednesday to displaying a cross on public land to honor fallen soldiers, saying the Constitution "does not require the eradication of all religious symbols in the public realm."

Speaking for a divided court, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said the 1st Amendment called for a middle-ground "policy of accommodation" toward religious displays on public land, not a strict separation of church and state.

Are Republicans Geared for Historic Wins in 2010?

Could 2010 be bigger than 1994 for Republicans? Patrick Ruffini thinks so.

I'll admit that a lot of this is prediction is pure gut. I probably sounded crazy when I said Marco Rubio kinda had a shot against Crist a year ago, and that Scott Brown kinda had a shot against Coakley, but if anything I wished I'd been even bolder in those predictions given the roller-coaster volatility of this political environment.....

Voters have not had a chance to render their judgment on the 50% expansion of government power and influence since September 2008. Both candidates for President in 2008 supported the TARP bailout. The stimulus was slipped in after the election, and Obama never campaigned on a package of that magnitude. 

Voters now strongly disapprove of the three great government expansions of the last two years -- TARP, the stimulus, and the health care bill. The political impact of these events has not yet been reflected in the partisan makeup of Congress in any competitive race except one -- the Massachusetts Senate special election.

Frustrated in Massachusetts

This is absolutely embarrassing. Just three months after her historic loss to Scott Brown (R) in the Massachusetts U.S. Senate race, Martha Coakley (D) "faces the very real prospect of being re-elected as Massachusetts attorney general this fall without a Republican opponent," the AP reports.

"The shift reflects lingering weakness within the state GOP, despite its success in staging Scott Brown's upset win. It also highlights Coakley's work to rehabilitate her image, as well as the satisfaction some voters feel for her in her current role." 

 

We have a good shot at the Governor's office, and there are a couple congressional seats that look promising, but allowing a wounded candidate such as Coakely to go unopposed is plain frustrating!

Republican Governors, Guy Fawkes and V

This is interesting if a bit odd. Micheal Scherer over at Swampland has this entry:

A few years back, two left-leaning writers, Andy and Lana Wachowski, adapted the story of Guy Fawkes, a Catholic radical who is remembered primarily for his failed attempt, on November 5, 1605, to blow up the Houses of Parliament and kill King James I. The Wachowski brothers movie, V for Vendetta, made Fawkes the hero and presented the British crown as an oppressive dictatorship that was meant to echo, at least in technique, certain aspects of the administration of George W. Bush, down to the hooded prisoners, the orange jump suits and the unapologetic embrace of harsh interrogation techniques.

The Guy Fawkes legend is an equal opportunity idol however and was used yet again in 2008- for a Republican.

During the 2008 campaign, "Remember, Remember The Fifth of November" became a rallying cry for Paul boosters, who shared at least some of the revolutionary fire of both Fawkes and the Wachowskis. On November 5, 2007, Guy Fawkes Day, Paul supporters raised more than $4 million online.

Interesting tactic. I never really thought of it but this speech from V for Vendetta actually sits pretty well.

Now, the Fawkes mythology has come full circle. The Republican Governors Association has embraced the symbolism of Fawkes, launching a rather striking website, RememberNovember.com, with a video that showcases far more Hollywood savvy than one can usually expect from Republicans. Again, the Fawkes tale has been twisted a bit. This time, President Obama plays the roll of King James, the Democratic leadership is Parliament, and the Republican Party represents the aggrieved Catholic mass.

ObamaCare Leads to Higher Prices

Cue the shock. A new government report explains how the new health care reform law will lead to higher prices and employers dropping coverage. Here are the money quotes from the report by Rick Foster, the chief actuary of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Service.

"The additional demand for health services could be difficult to meet initially with existing health resources and could lead to price increases, cost shifting, and/or changes in providers' willingness to treat patients with low-reimbursement health coverage."

"A number of workers who currently have employer coverage would likely become enrolled in the expanded Medicaid program or receive subsidized coverage through the [Health] Exchanges. For example, some smaller employers would be inclined to terminate their existing coverage, and companies with low average salaries might find it to their -- and their employees' -- advantage to end their plans..."

Crist, Rubio & Independent Bids

According to Nate Silver it looks like Charlie Crist may not have found the answer to his senate campaign woes by switching to an independent .

"Right now, Crist is preferred to Rubio by about one-third of Republican registered voters, according to Quinnipiac. But, even though there are some moderate Republicans in Florida (38 percent of the Republican presidential primary electorate in 2008 described themselves as moderate or liberal), it's asking a lot of a Republican identifier to continue to support a candidate who has just ditched the party -- particularly when it seems to be motivated by expediency rather than ideological resolve (Crist's lack of grivatas, even when compared with someone like Arlen Specter or Joe Lieberman, will hurt him here). Plus, Rubio, already very well liked by conservatives, will get to do a bit of a victory lap as the sole viable candidate on the primary ballot, and can immediately turn his attention to broadening his appeal among party moderates. This might not even require all that much effort; Rubio's favorability rating among Republicans is 67-7 (!) according to Quinnipiac, and while quite conservative, he seems from a distance to avoid coming across as any kind of dangerous extremist."

Americans Prefer Moderates

With the retirement of Justice Stevens President Obama has his first chance make his influence felt for generations to come. If he chooses wisely ( in terms of age) his pick could be impacting America for the next forty years. However, before Obama picks a liberal activist judge he should listen to what Americans actually want on the nations most important court. From The Hill:

Most Americans would prefer to see President Barack Obama name a "moderate" or conservative justice to the Supreme Court, a new poll shows.

37 percent of adult Americans say they would like to see Obama nominate what they consider to be a "moderate" jurist to the high court, while 36 percent would like to see a somewhat or very conservative appointee.

25 percent of adults would like to see a somewhat or very liberal justice replaced to fill the vacancy to be left by the retiring liberal Justice John Paul Stevens, according to a CNN/Opinion Research poll released Tuesday.

NH Good News

A  Public Policy Polling survey for the upcoming senate race in New Hampshire shows Kelly Ayotte (R) with a solid lead over Paul Hodes (D), 47% to 40%.

"There's a long way to go until this fall but for now this race looks like it will be the first real bright spot for Republicans in the state since 2002."

Romney Continues to Lead

Fromm PPP:

Mitt Romney continues to lead the way among the top Republicans likely to run for President in 2012. He's polling at 33% nationally to 27% for Mike Huckabee and 23% for Sarah Palin.

PPP state by state polling has found Huckabee strong in the South and Romney winning everywhere else and the national numbers confirm that trend. Huckabee leads his home region with 37% to 25% for Palin and 23% for Romney. But in the Northeast, Midwest, and West Romney leads with anywhere from 37 to 39% with Palin second in her territory and Huckabee getting runner up honors everywhere else.

MA GOP Ready for Fight

The Massachusetts Republican Party cleared the field for Charlie Baker and are now ready to take on Obama-clone Deval Patrick in November. Massachusetts Republicans "gave an overwhelming endorsement" to Charlie Baker (R) for governor at their state convention over the weekend, giving him "a massive margin that forces GOP rival Christy Mihos out of the race and frees him from what could have been a bitterly divisive primary battle," according to the Boston Globe.

Baker won a dominating 89% of the delegate votes, while Mihos got just 11%, short of the 15% needed to qualify for the September primary ballot. Of course many MA Republicans still did not forgive Mihos for his independent bid last cycle which many feel put Patrick in office in the first place.

Happy Patriot's Day

Living just a few miles away from the start of the Boston Marathon it is hard not to be constantly reminded of the fact that Monday is Patriot's Day. It is a civic holiday celebrating the anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord, which began the American Revolutionary War. It is observed in Massachusetts and state of Maine which was once part of Massachusetts. In honor of the day this week's book review will be of The Revolutionary Paul Revere. This new biography promises to detail many of the most interesting facts about once of the leading figures in our nation's birth. From Amazon:

The Revolutionary Paul Revere starts at a gallop and never slows down. Follow Revere's adventure-filled life from childhood through the French and Indian War; from the prerevolutionary economic disasters through the incendiary tax fights and riots; from military occupation of Boston through Revere's part in the Boston Massacre trial; from his role in the Boston Tea Party through his early service as express rider for the Massachusetts patriots; from the tragic death of his first wife through the whimsical pursuit of a new love; from his role as waterfront spy through his famous midnight ride; from his participation in the worst American naval disaster before Pearl Harbor through his eventual vindication.

Learn about Revere's life in the Freemasons and the secret political clubs of Boston. Discover his role in Massachusetts' ratification of the U.S. Constitution. Get the inside picture of his business dealings, and see how he transformed himself from poor artisan to wealthy industrialist, making everything from kettles to cannons. Revere's life story is the quintessential American story.

Pataki, Iowa and a PAC

Well, this will do nothing to quell the speculation about a possible run for the White House. According to the Des Moines Register, former New York Gov. George Pataki (R) wil go to Iowa next week.

Pataki will be launching his own pac, Revere America. "[D]edicated to advancing common sense public policies rooted in freedom and free markets." 

And of course,  the 235th anniversary of Paul Revere's ride to Lexington on the night of April 18-19, 1775 is fast approaching. Revere America....Tea Party tie in? Certainly seems so, though I don't see the former NY Gov as a natural for that movement.

Pataki Eying 2012 Bid?

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) told The Hill he thinks former New York Gov. George Pataki (R) decided against a Senate run because he has other, perhaps bigger, plans.

Said Cornyn: "I've been talking to him for a year and a half, and I've been reading the polls. I think there's real opportunity there. But he's decided he's not running for it. My thought is, of course, he's rumored to be a potential candidate for president, and I think he's got his sights set on other offices, maybe including running for president. That'd be my guess."

I would certainly be willing to listen.

The Problem with Poverty

The left has always been the party of the poor. Having as one of your planks the goal of raising as many people as possible out of the clutches or , for the most part, inner city poverty is a noble idea. The left is to be commended for its altruistic aims. However, as New York City's Opportunity NYC–Family Rewards is showing, there may be little government can do about it.

Heather Mac Donald, writing for the City Journal, give an excellent overview of the program and the nature of inner city poverty in America. Bloomberg's initiative basically bribes the poor into doing things that should aid them in climbing up the socioeconomic ladder, staying in school, keeping a job etc. It works under the premise that the poor are so focus on daily survival that they can not focus on those things that would break the cycle of multi-generational poverty. However, as Mac Donald writes that is misunderstanding the issue.

Of course, it’s ludicrous to suppose that what keeps America’s inner-city residents poor across generations is a struggle for subsistence in an economy of limited opportunities. The main drivers of poverty in America are family breakdown (in 2004, single-parent households nationally were six times as likely to be poor as married families) and nonwork (only 5 percent of all families with one full-time worker were poor in New York City from 2005 to 2007, compared with 47 percent of families with no workers). The antisocial behaviors that contribute to multigenerational poverty also have nothing to do with suffocating economic pressures: very few inner-city students cut classes or drop out of school to help their parents work; they do so because their peer culture is toxic and because their parents exercise little control over their lives.

Nor does American poverty bear any resemblance to Third World poverty. New York City is awash in welfare programs that confer on the poor benefits that would be unthinkable in rural Mexico or Africa, such as free high-tech medical care, monthly welfare checks, and free or subsidized housing. Family Rewards is an add-on to an already generous safety net; the Mexican version is the safety net. New York’s poor also enjoy a clean, reliable water supply, a public health system that controls environmentally borne infectious disease, a sound transportation infrastructure, and the rule of law. The city’s officially classified “poor” teenagers can be regularly observed sporting the latest designer sneakers.

[L]urking beneath the Family Rewards rhetoric about “our impoverished campesinos” was an implicit acknowledgment of a truth rarely spoken in antipoverty circles: it’s the behavior of the inner-city poor that perpetuates poverty, not just “structural inequalities,” rapacious capitalism, or racism. That covert acknowledgment was enough to earn the initiative the opprobrium of many in the traditional poverty industry.

All of this of course begs the question. If social programs, incentives and safety nets cannot stop multi-generational poverty, can anything do the job? Is poverty simply a bi-product of a civilized society? I don't have any answer...but it is an interesting, and need I say important, question.

Obama Killing Clintonian Democrats

Great article over at RealClearPolitics today on how Obama's push to the left is wreaking havoc on the New Democrat image that Clinton had created in the 90's. The basic premise being that Democrats, for a time, were able to claim a mantel of fiscal responsibility which translated into votes, and therefore power. Obama is shedding that image which the solidly leftist base loves, but that much of the country doesn't.

The map to the left shows Obama's current approval ratings. Again, the left base, New Elgland and the left coast are still in love. The rest of the nation is not too happy with the "Change". 

President Obama's policy choices to date are wreaking havoc on the brand that Democrats cultivated carefully over the past twenty years. Bill Clinton worked long and hard to make it so that voters could say "fiscal conservative" and "Democrat" in the same sentence, but voters are finding it difficult to say that again.

If brand damage is truly seeping over into Congressional races - and the polling suggests it is - then the Democrats are in very, very deep trouble this election. There is a very real risk that they could be left with nothing more than Obama's base among young, liberal, and minority voters, which is packed into relatively few Congressional districts. It would be the Dukakis map transformed onto the Congressional level, minus the support in Appalachia. That would surely result in the Democratic caucus suffering huge losses, and in turn produce historic gains for the GOP this November.

Newt Gingrich, George Orwell & Wishful Thinking

*

If only.

If only Gingrich did not have so much professional and personal baggage he could be just the type of conservative that could bring together the disparate elements of the Tea Party and make a legitimate run in 2012. As it is he is attracting more and more attention. A new CNN/Opinion Research poll shows  Huckabee  ahead of Mitt Romney, 24% to 20%, and Sarah Palin in third place with 15%. The surprose though is that Gingrich only trails Palin by one point at 14%. He is up six points from the previous poll. 

This week at The Heritage Foundation he reiterated why Republicans need to stand for something. We need to be a party of "Yes", with new and fresh ideas for today's problems. Just standing in the way of the left is not enough. He is right. Anger will only get us so far. We need solutions too. He also presented a new slogan which alluded to a book everyone should read, 1984. From The Foundry:

Gingrich also has a slogan for conservatives – “2 + 2 = 4” – which he describes as a way to slow down the political debate in America and serves as a reminder of what he says the left’s agenda is really about – an Orwellian government machine that tries to sell Americans on the notion that two-plus-two equals three, when in reality, it’s not.

And it is today’s political reality that is most disconcerting to Gingrich. He describes President Obama’s government as a “secular socialist machine” that is “destructive of our society.” Its hallmark? He says it’s a combination of the bad economics of the 1970s, the Welfare state of the 1950s, Springfield corruption, Chicago-style politics and Saul Alinsky’s rules for radicals.

 A smart politician with real ideas and solutions who could destroy Obama in a debate. This is just the candidate we need. If only.

*Picture credit "The Foundry

Maybe Voters Should Have to Pass a Test....

...I am kidding of course; but only partly. On a 12 question political news quiz, Pew Research found that the average American scored a measly 53%. In fact while the entire nation consistently expressed strong interest in the health care debate, few Americans can correctly answer two questions related to the Senate's consideration of health care legislation. Very sad.

Thomas Jefferson, Banks & Liberty

 I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs. - Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson, statesman and third president of the United States, was born in Virginia on this day in 1743.

ACORN & Misinformation

Just a few days ago I brought up the fact that MSNBC was highlighting the McVeigh tapes as a way of furthering the meme that Tea Party-styled groups were connected to home grown terrorists groups. I derided the station for purporting to be a news organization when it was engaging in agenda driven propaganda. This is nothing new for the left. During the Bush administration's management of the Iraq War the left regularly misinformed or at the very least presented slanted versions of the facts to court public opinion. However, they are not alone in letting journalism slide while sensationalism drives the programming. The Right is just as guilty.

Apparently those infamous ACORN sting videos were purposefully edited obscuring what actually happened in those offices. And many of us fell for it, myself included, due to the high profile FoxNews among others gave the story. Does this mean ACORN was justified in all its actions? No. Does this vindicate them for financial misdeeds? No. But it does seem to mean that what most of America found egregious about the organization, the support of prostitution and child trafficking, were largely a creation of selective editing.

This story went so far that the video's creators/editors, O’Keefe-Giles-Breitbart, were almost officially recognized by congress for their "service" in outing ACORN. So, what do we take away from this? That most people have an agenda and all sources of information need to be vetted. Both the Right and the Left engage in this kind of political propoganda and we the public need to view everything with a critical eye. I know I for one will be more vigilant in this regard in the future.

Where is the Post Healthcare Bounce?

President Obama's job approval rate hit a new low over the weekend and the Gallup daily tracking poll three day rolling average sank to 45%. I thought conventional wisdom said once ObamaCAre passed that the Democrats and specifically Obama would get a lift? Guess not.

The Weekend Book Review: Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America

Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America will be released on May 4th seems appropriate to review as we head toward Earth Day 2010. Though Teddy's style of environmentalism would probably not be accepted today, it is good to remember that Republicans once owned this issue and that there is no reason we couldn't work across the isle on this issue again. One can be an environmentalist without being a disciple of Man made Global Warming. Appreciating the need to protect the natural resources we have should be universal.
From the New Yorker:

Theodore Roosevelt spent the day of July 1, 1908, the tenth anniversary of the Battle of San Juan Hill, creating forty-five national forests. In this biographical study of T.R.’s campaign to save hundreds of millions of acres of wilderness, Brinkley writes that “the forestry movement would be forced down his opponents’ throats.” Roosevelt’s intense love for nature was, Brinkley makes clear, a conqueror’s love—triumphal Darwinism—and included a “blood lust” in hunting the wildlife he championed. The baby bear that, in popular myth, T.R. refused to shoot was actually an adult bear that he directed to be dispatched with a knife. Brinkley fully inhabits Roosevelt’s mind, a condition that has its disadvantages—the book, with blow-by-blow accounts of college hiking trips and squabbles between naturalists, does not entirely earn its nine hundred pages, making it harder to see the forests (and the story of how T.R. rescued them) for the trees.

This new book also makes a timely companion to Ken Burns's The National Parks: America's Best Idea. 

The Taxes Are Coming! The Taxes Are Coming!

According to the Tax Policy Center, 47 percent of Americans will pay no federal income taxes for 2009.  That's right, fully half of all Americans pay no federal taxes. This is a real problem when we have an administration that has endorsed a $12.8 trillion deficit for 2009 and next year’s projected deficit is record breaking at $1.6 trillion.  With only half of us picking up the tab it seems clear that something is going to have to give.

The first option is to cut some of the waste and over-reaching government spending, such as bailouts,  entitlements, and the Stimulus. However, a progressive administration's whole reason for being is to grow governement so that it is the dominant factor in people's lives. As I have said before, this is not a sinister plot, but a philosophical belief. According to progressives, the government is the best vehicle for positive social change and enduring societal happiness. Those of us on the right believe the opposite, and history seems to bear us out. So, what is Obama to do when deficits are rising, and he philosophically can not cut services? Of course...raise taxes.

The latest way of taxing those 47% who currently don't contribute to the national coffers (as well as double dipping the rest of us) is the VAT. A VAT is a national sales tax collected by retailers. It can also be imposed on products as they make their way through the manufacturing process, which of course will lead to higher prices where the consumer will end up paying the tax indirectly. 

There is an argument to be made for the VAT- as a replacement for our current system of taxation. But the Obama administration will be adding this to our current system. Here come the taxes!

Today's Anti-Government Extremists

Liberal MSNBC host Rachel Maddow will anchor an April 19 retrospective on terrorist Timothy McVeigh and whether his murder of 168 people could be linked to "today's anti-government extremists."  MSNBC is clearly operating under an extreme leftist agenda and are blatantly attempting to color the Tea Party movement as violent and "anti-government".

A transcript of the ad, currently airing on MSNBC:

ANNOUNCER: For the first time ever-

TIMOTHY MCVEIGH: I lit the two minute fuse at the stoplight.

ANNOUNCER: -you'll hear from the man responsible for the horrific bombing in Oklahoma City.

MCVEIGH: Kids are fair game. Women are fair game.

ANNOUNCER: From decorated soldier to domestic terrorist.

MCVEIGH: I felt absolute rage.

ANNOUNCER: 15 years later, can McVeigh's words help us understand today's anti-government extremists?

MCVEIGH: I feel no shame for it.

ANNOUNCER: The McVeigh Tapes. April 19 at nine on MSNBC.

I have no problem with a station having an agenda, but let's just stop calling MSNBC a news station.

Some Raise Idea of Rubio in 2012

Let me get this straight. Conservatives spent most of 2008 railing against the idea of a largely inexperienced and young politician taking on the most important job in the world. Then we have, for the last two years, witnessed and chronicled how that inexperience has led to a nation more deeply divided than it was during the Bush years. 

Now some are claiming that the answer to Obama is...Marco Rubio? Someone who hasn't even won his Florida primary yet? This from Ben Smith:

The buzz for a Rubio candidacy is broad, and deep... and my impression is that if a swath of conservative leaders haven't talked up his candidacy, it's only because they haven't been asked. I was talking to the Southern Baptist Convention's Richard Land earlier this year for another story when he brought Rubio up, unasked.

"The longer nobody catches fire, the more space there is for Marco," he said.  "It wouldn’t be unheard of for a freshman senator from Florida to be the nominee — particularly one who was speaker of the [Florida Assembly].

And there is more. Here is Matt Lewis:

On a blogger conference call held Monday, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani of New York, a Republican, referred to former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio as "new blood" and "the future of our party." I couldn't agree more, and although this will undoubtedly sound premature to some, I believe that if Marco Rubio goes on to win the U.S. Senate seat in Florida in November, he should immediately think about running for president -- possibly in 2012.

I am sure Rubio is a bright and exciting young politician but let's not try to one-up the Democrats on youthful inexperience shall we.

Gary Johnson 2012?

Former New Mexico Republican Gov. Gary Johnson is a triathlete, libertarian leaning Republican who looks like he comes straight out of the Mountain West. But Johnson is also starting to sound like a Ron Paul-style populist with an eye cast on 2012 and the building fury aimed at Washington.

For your consideration:

Sad Day For the Idea of Freedom

The Heritage Foundation no longer ranks the United States as a free country. We're now just "mostly free." Curious how they come up with their rankings? Click here.

Long-Winded Answer

At a speech in North Carolina the other day a woman stood up and asked whether or not we are being over taxed in connection with ObamaCare. What came next must be a record.

He then spent the next 17 minutes and 12 seconds lulling the crowd into a daze. His discursive answer - more than 2,500 words long -- wandered from topic to topic, including commentary on the deficit, pay-as-you-go rules passed by Congress, Congressional Budget Office reports on Medicare waste, COBRA coverage, the Recovery Act and Federal Medical Assistance Percentages (he referred to this last item by its inside-the-Beltway name, "F-Map"). He talked about the notion of eliminating foreign aid (not worth it, he said). He invoked Warren Buffett, earmarks and the payroll tax that funds Medicare (referring to it, in fluent Washington lingo, as "FICA").

Apparently yawning soon followed.

Rudy Giuliani Endorses Rubio

Rudy Giuliani ran for president as a moderate Republican, yet he favors Rubio over fellow moderate Crist? Giuliani emphasized Marco Rubio's trustworthiness Monday as he endorsed him for Florida's open Senate seat over an opponent he said broke a promise to support him in his presidential bid.

The former New York City mayor said it was an easy choice to back the former state House speaker over Gov. Charlie Crist in the GOP primary race, calling him "the one candidate that we can trust to represent Republican principles in Washington and remain a Republican if he goes to Washington."

This sounds more like political payback for Crist endorsing McCain.  Giuliani worked hard to get Crist's endorsement in his 2008 presidential run, and said the governor promised he'd get it.

Happy Easter

HAPPY EASTER

New Featured Video: The Large Hadron Collider

In one of the largest science experiments in human history, the Large Hadron Collider was the scene of a proton collision last week. Located 300 feet underground, between Switzerland and France, sits the Large Hadron Collider, designed to use enormous amounts of energy to try and unlock the secrets of the birth of the universe.

Tuesday, the first major test of the collider was held, as two proton beams crossed paths and collided, setting off a "little bang," that also set off a worldwide celebration of physicists, which included champagne.

While on the one hand I have always has a fascination with cosmology and its attempts to understand reality at its most base levels, the whole idea of scientists setting off a mini-big-bang seems a little disconcerting.

The new featured video has Frank Wilczek who has received many prizes for his work in physics, including the Nobel Prize of 2004 for work he did as a graduate student at Princeton University, when he was only 21 years old, explaining exactly what the  Large Hadron Collider is.

Centrist Pundits

Here at The Moderate Republican I strive (not always successfully) to represent a center-right point of view. While I may from time to time tilt to full on right winger I still respect those who can intelligently adress the vast middle of our nation's political spectrum. With that in mind I read the latest from The Daily Beast with interest, The Top Twenty-Five Columnists and Commentators.

Just as independent voters are now the largest and fastest-growing segment of the electorate— 42 percent, according to the most recent CBS/New York Times poll—an increasing number of centrist columnists and commentators are rejecting the ideological straitjacket and extremists on both sides.

I don't agree with everyone on the list- John Stewart as a centrists seems a bit of a stretch to me, but I do get that satire cuts both ways. I also feel Joe Scarborough is more of a solid right then a centrist, but he is also one of my favorite Republicans so I am glad to see him get recognized for his civility.