Republicans
September 14, 2022 — Scott Johnson
New Hampshire held its late party primaries yesterday. The only interesting races were on the Republican side and Democrats had a hand in two of them. In the Senate contest to pick a challenger to vulnerable incumbent Maggie Hassan, Don Bolduc faced off against Chuck Morse. Democrats supported Bolduc because he is the less viable candidate. With 87 percent of the vote tabulated, Bolduc leads Morse by about 1300 votes
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August 25, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Dr. Scott Jensen is the Republican gubernatorial candidate running against Governor Tim Walz. He is a former state senator and leader of the opposition to the authoritarian Walz Covid regime that did so much damage to Minnesota. I support his candidacy without reservation. Jensen appeared with the rest of the slate of Republican candidates for Minnesota’s constitutional offices before our local chapter of the Republican Jewish Coalition this past Tuesday
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August 18, 2022 — Scott Johnson
In the Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll (revised 1980 edition), Janet Maslin wrote the chapter on Bob Dylan. She included the photo of the folkie Dylan posing with a cigarette dangling from his lips and a guitar in his lap. Maslin supplied the caption: “The conscience of a generation, trying to smoke and sing simultaneously.” (The photo is accessible here.) Liz Cheney followed in Dylan’s footsteps with
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August 15, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Former Minnesota Senator Al Franken waited until the last minute to bestow his coveted endorsement on Rep. Liz Cheney via Twitter (below). Cheney is of course contending for the Republican nomination to stand for reelection to Wyoming’s single seat in the House. I’m sure Rep. Cheney appreciates Franken’s confidence as she seeks to persuade Wyoming conservatives that she is deserving of their continued support to represent them in Congress. It’s
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August 10, 2022 — John Hinderaker
The Elephant In the Room, subtitled “Donald Trump and the Future of the Republican Party,” is a collection of essays on that subject edited by Andrew Busch and William Mayer, professors at Claremont McKenna and Northeastern University, respectively. There are nine essays in total. In addition to Busch and Mayer, contributors include Glenn Reynolds and Charles Kesler, among others. I contributed the least substantial essay to the collection, titled by
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August 3, 2022 — John Hinderaker
Scott wrote a little while ago about the debate between Minnesota governor candidates that took place earlier today, at FarmFest in southern Minnesota. FarmFest is like a State Fair for farmers and the ag industries. My wife and I spent the day at FarmFest helping to man the American Experiment booth there, and we attended the debate. This is our booth. We had a wheel you could spin to win
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July 31, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Minnesota Sixth District Rep. Tom Emmer is chairman of the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee. He appears weekly for a segment on Jon Justice’s morning news/talk show in the Twin Cities. Jon let me ask Emmer a question about the passage of the CHIPS bill spenderama with the support of 17 Senate Republicans and 24 House Republicans while the Democrat tax-and-spend Bummer Beyond Belief was still in play. Tom referred to
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July 29, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Kim Strassel observes in her weekly Wall Street Journal column that the $270 billion so-called CHIPS and Science Act served as the predicate of the Schumer/Manchin $750 billion Bummer Beyond Belief light that is now to be moved via the reconciliation process. CNBC drily observes that Senator McConnell had “previously warned that Republicans would not back the China competition bill [i.e., the CHIPS bill] if Democrats continued to pursue an
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June 19, 2022 — Steven Hayward
Let us pause on this holiday weekend (Father’s Day today, Juneteenth tomorrow) to bask in the glory that is our supremely eloquent president: How can anyone think this can go on much longer? If you look around very closely, you can find a few perceptive Democrats who are worried that Democrats aren’t just looking at a bad election this year, but also in 2024, when the Senate map is much
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June 2, 2022 — John Hinderaker
I have always bristled at descriptions of the Republicans as the “stupid party” (as opposed to Democrats who are the “evil party”). But, to be fair, there have been plenty of times when the stereotype fit. These days, however, the Republicans are fighting a spirited and often creative battle against the worst administration since James Buchanan’s–coincidentally, another Democrat. I have no idea who Tommy Pigott is–it might even be a
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May 16, 2022 — Scott Johnson
I have been wondering about the marketing genius behind Joe Biden’s slurs of “Ultra MAGA Republicans” and the “Ultra MAGA agenda” along with the slur of Donald Trump himself as “MAGA King.” I have accordingly dug out the choices presented to the focus groups “helmed” by Anita Dunn, the Krupskaya of a leftist DC power couple of many talents. In its story on the origins of “Ultra MAGA Republicans,” the
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April 12, 2022 — John Hinderaker
Steve has started a midterm wipeout watch series that I hope will have many more installments, culminating in November. I want to note this piece by a Democrat who warns his fellow Democrats that the wipeout likely will extend well beyond 2022. The author is Simon Bazelon, just a kid but a kid who can do arithmetic. He argues that even if the Democrats are able to maintain their average
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February 25, 2022 — John Hinderaker
Check out these numbers from Texas. The map shows counties where votes cast by Republican early voters already exceed the 2018 Republican vote totals. Dark red counties are ones where early voting has already more than doubled 2018 Republican totals: The number of Republican early voters has already exceeded the total number of 2018 Republican voters (early+ED) in 18 counties, and that was as of Wednesday. Several more will cross
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February 5, 2022 — Paul Mirengoff
A.C. Cordoza is a newly-elected member of the Virginia House of Delegates. He’s Black and he’s Republican — the only member of the Virginia legislature who answers to that description. As such, Cordoza sought membership in the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus. It excluded him. Cordoza says he was excluded because of his answers to a questionnaire from the caucus. Among the question he apparently answered “incorrectly” were ones pertaining to
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January 31, 2022 — Scott Johnson
My wife is a naturalized American citizen who seethes over illegal immigration. When we see the stories on FOX News that highlight the cancellation of our border under the Biden administration, she always asks why the GOP isn’t doing a blessed thing about it. Drawing on the recent news that we have followed on Power Line, Miranda Devine channels and amplifies my wife’s thoughts in the New York Post column
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January 30, 2022 — Paul Mirengoff
Recent polling shows they do not. However, it also shows that Republicans still like Trump enough to nominate him in 2024. Dan Balz notes that on the eve of the 2020 election, 54 percent of Republicans and independents who lean Republican said they considered themselves more a supporter of Trump than of the Republican Party, compared with 38 percent who said they considered themselves more a supporter of the Republican
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January 14, 2022 — Paul Mirengoff
Mitt Romney, whose 2012 presidential campaign was set back when Candy Crowley sided with Barack Obama in a debate, has denounced the RNC’s proposal to bar Republican presidential candidates from participating in debates sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD). Romney calls the proposal “nuts.” The proposal comes from Romney’s niece, Ronna McDaniel. Romney’s argument is this: The American people want to see candidates for president debating issues of
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