A m e r i c a n  P o s t – G a z e t t e

Distributed by C O M M O N  S E N S E , in Arizona

Friday, August 20, 2010

Arizona Republic on jihad against Thomas

Likely violating campaign finance laws with its nonstop attacks on Thomas attempting to defeat him in the primary election

The Arizona Republic has gone on a jihad against Andrew Thomas, printing nonstop “news articles” and editorials against him in an over-the-top offensive attempt to influence the election and defeat him in Tuesday’s primary. Now, they are refusing to print his op-eds.

Republican candidate for Attorney General Andrew Thomas disclosed today that the editorial page editors of the Arizona Republic have refused to publish a response to the newspaper’s latest editorial jihad against him unless his campaign agreed to write only what the editors specifically allow.
In response to this latest outrage, and just as he didn’t seek their endorsement in the primary election, Thomas has pledged not to seek the endorsement of the newspaper in the general election should he win the Republican primary.
In the past week, the liberal editors of the Arizona Republic have published no fewer than four editorials (including their reprint of their previous endorsement of Tom Horne), one op-ed, and a “My Turn” column blasting Thomas on various issues. This sort of frenetic editorial activity by the newspaper is apparently unprecedented.
In response, Barnett Lotstein, a career prosecutor and spokesman for Thomas, asked for the opportunity to respond to this avalanche of editorials intended to boost Thomas’ opponent. Mr. Lotstein submitted a “My Turn” column after receiving permission from the paper to do so.
The editors then refused to run the article unless Lotstein agreed to write about merely the single, narrow issue they thought important. In other words, after devoting a week of print to lambasting Thomas, the editors censored his campaign’s lone feeble attempt to respond.
When Lotstein pointed out the unfairness of their dictating the contents of his piece, the editor then changed her objection. She claimed there was no need for Lotstein’s “My Turn” because Thomas had already discussed these matters in his own “My Turn.” The editor ignored the fact that the Republic had already discussed these matters in multiple editorials, op-eds, etc., in a six-to-one ratio criticizing Thomas. Lotstein told them their new objection was “disingenuous.” They did not respond.
“It is well known that the liberal editors of the Arizona Republic detest Sheriff Arpaio and me and our efforts to curb illegal immigration and bring legitimate corruption cases against friends of the newspaper,” said Thomas. “As a result of this latest censorship and related events, I will not seek the endorsement of the Republic should I win the Republican nomination for Attorney General next Tuesday.”
A copy of Lotstein’s submitted “My Turn” and the emails between him and the Republic’s editors are available upon request.
During Thomas’ time in office, crime rates plummeted. The 19 percent drop is more than twice the national rate of decline, in despite of an 11 percent increase in the county’s population during that time. The illegal immigrant population has dropped by anywhere from 18 percent (Dept. of Homeland Security estimate) to 30 percent (Center for Immigration Studies estimate). Like the fall in crime rates, this dramatic decline in illegal immigration is far greater than the average in the rest of the nation.
Thomas has a track record of successfully defending illegal immigration crackdowns in our courts, including his successful efforts to prosecute illegal immigrants for conspiring to violate the state’s human-smuggling law and to defend Prop 200′s voter ID requirements and the employer-sanctions law, which he defended along with the Attorney General’s Office. If elected Attorney General Thomas has pledged to expand that office’s prosecutions of illegal immigrants under the state’s human smuggling laws. The office is not currently pursuing such prosecutions.
Thomas is married with four children. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School. Prior to serving as Maricopa County Attorney, Thomas served as an assistant attorney general for Arizona, deputy counsel and criminal justice policy advisor to the Governor, special assistant to the Director of the Arizona Department of Corrections, and a deputy county attorney.

For more information about Andrew Thomas, please go to www.ThomasforArizona.com.

Paid for by Thomas For AG

Before going all ga-ga with Dick Armey, there are some things you may want to know about the undistinguished congressman from Texas. According to several sources, Dick Armey has been problematic to the Republican party and conservatives from the beginning. Here’s what Wikipedia has documented:

In 1998, during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, a reporter asked him what he would do if he were in President Bill Clinton’s position. He replied “If I were in the President’s place I would not have gotten a chance to resign. I would be lying in a pool of my own blood, hearing Mrs. Armey standing over me saying, ‘How do I reload this damn thing?’”[8] Several of his former female economics students went public with stories of his sexually harassing them — harassment allegedly so severe that at least one student transferred to another school. He would later divorce his wife and marry one of his students.[9]

After heavy Republican losses in the 1998 elections, Armey had to fend off a bruising challenge for his majority leader post from Steve Largent of Oklahoma, a member of the Republican class of 1994. Although Armey was not popular in the Republican caucus, Largent was thought to be far too conservative for the liking of some moderate Republicans, and Armey won on the third ballot.[10] Soon afterward, Speaker-elect Bob Livingston of Louisiana announced he wouldn’t take the post after the revelation of an extramarital affair, Armey initially seemed to have the inside track to become Speaker. As majority leader, he was the number-two Republican in the chamber. However, he was still badly wounded from Largent’s challenge, and opted not to run. The post eventually went to Chief Deputy Whip Dennis Hastert of Illinois.

Armey served another four years before announcing his retirement in 2002. In his last legislative effort, he was named chairman of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security and was the primary sponsor of the legislation that created the Department of Homeland Security.

According to Armey, he also sparred with Focus on the Family leader James Dobson while in office. Armey wrote, “As Majority Leader, I remember vividly a meeting with the House leadership where Dobson scolded us for having failed to ‘deliver’ for Christian conservatives, that we owed our majority to him, and that he had the power to take our jobs back. This offended me, and I told him so.” Armey states that Focus on the Family targeted him politically after the incident, writing, “Focus on the Family deliberately perpetuates the lie that I am a consultant to the ACLU.”[11]

As a free-market economist influenced by the ideas of Milton Friedman, Armey favored relatively open immigration and the elimination of barriers to the movement of goods and people across national boundaries.

After Armey’s retirement, fellow Texan and Republican Tom DeLay, then House Majority Whip, was elevated to Armey’s Majority Leader position. Armey’s son, Scott, ran for his father’s seat in the 2002 election, but lost in the Republican Party (GOP) runoff to Michael C. Burgess, who would go on to hold the strongly Republican 26th District for the GOP in November.

Then there was this interesting article that appeared in the Dallas Morning News last October:

WASHINGTON – Led by former Republican leader Dick Armey , the conservative group FreedomWorks has attacked the Washington establishment this year, challenging bailouts, health care legislation and other policies that violate the group’s free-market ideology.

But for more than six years, FreedomWorks’ own chairman flourished at the heart of that establishment, earning $750,000 a year to lobby for banks, green-energy producers and companies trying to shape the stimulus package that FreedomWorks opposed.

Even Armey acknowledges that his lobbying career was part of a “curious model.” While FreedomWorks is often “antagonistic to politicians of both parties … the general disposition of the lobbyist is to be sweet to officeholders,” he said.

“This is always a problem, and people have struggled with it in Washington,” the former North Texas representative said. “Few have mastered it as I have.”

A review of lobbying reports and interviews reveals that Armey and his former firm, DLA Piper, sometimes lobbied on behalf of legislation that FreedomWorks would have opposed.

While FreedomWorks asked lawmakers to pledge to stop seeking earmarks, DLA Piper represented clients seeking them. And while Armey represented a New England wind farm seeking tax credits in the stimulus, he wrote on FreedomWorks’ Web site that “billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies have done little to make alternative energy sources more practical.”

“That sort of exposes the contradiction of him being a high-priced, high-powered lobbyist at the same time he’s positioned himself and FreedomWorks as the representatives of the angry, anti-Washington populism,” said Peter Montgomery, senior fellow at the liberal group People for the American Way.

“At least until the arrangement blew up under some scrutiny, it seemed to be working well for him to play both sides of the street,” he said.

Quitting DLA Piper in August caused him to give up his salary of $750,000 a year, which he earned on top of the $550,000 he was paid by FreedomWorks in 2008.

“I hated to walk away from that kind of money,” said Armey, who now lives in Bartonville, near Flower Mound. “How many times in your life, or anybody’s life, do they have an opportunity to earn that kind of money when they are 69 years old?”

But even fellow lobbyists say Armey’s “curious model” was bound to cause problems for FreedomWorks and DLA Piper.

“There are inherent conflicts in running a grass-roots organization and representing clients professionally,” said Vin Weber, a well-known Republican lobbyist who served in Congress with Armey.

“Presumably your grass-roots organization is motivated by principles, ideology and the people who give $25 and $50 or larger sums and believe the decisions are being made based on a commitment to an ideological agenda. When you lobby professionally for a client, that is not necessarily the case. You are motivated by the clients’ interests.”

When it came to other bailouts – of the financial sector in 2008 – Armey and Freedom Works again opposed the legislation, known as TARP. The group called it “unconstitutional” because the law delegated so much power to the executive branch to make over the financial sector.

But between 2005 and 2008, Armey lobbied for Citizens Financial Group, the U.S. banking arm of the Royal Bank of Scotland, which received about $34.5 billion from the British government in October 2008, a few months before it posted the largest loss in U.K. corporate history.

Senate lobbying reports indicate Armey lobbied for Citizens Financial on legislation related to student lending and housing, including a law that created a program to help troubled homeowners refinance their mortgages. Some banks, seeking to cut their losses on bad mortgages and related investments, supported the housing legislation.

A spokesman for Citizens Financial said the bank “monitored” the housing legislation but didn’t take a position on it. FreedomWorks strongly opposed the housing legislation, equating it to a bailout of irresponsible borrowers.

In an interview, Armey said he didn’t recall his work for Citizens Financial. “I was very careful with the work I did,” he said. “I just simply don’t remember in any detail what work I did, if any, on behalf of that client.”

DLA Piper reported that its lobbyists, including Armey, lobbied on the $700 billion bailout on behalf of Raytheon. A Raytheon spokesman declined to comment about any of the company’s lobbying efforts.

Armey and others also reported lobbying for Cape Wind, a planned offshore wind farm, on tax matters in the stimulus. In February, FreedomWorks said the stimulus was too expensive and would fail to revive the U.S. economy. Soon after Congress approved the $787 billion stimulus package, the conservative group belittled the legislation with “bailout bucks” it distributed on Capitol Hill.

A Cape Wind spokesman declined to talk about Armey’s lobbying for the project, but it appears the company was interested in the stimulus because it extended a valuable tax credit that helped provide financing to many wind-energy developers.

In fact, the credit was often claimed by Wall Street investors who provided capital for the projects. With many of these investors wiped out by the recession, Congress converted the credit to a cash grant in the stimulus. Armey said his lobbying on the issue didn’t run afoul of FreedomWorks’ position because the group always advocates “reducing the burden of taxation on all persons who pay taxes.”

Perhaps a real TEA Party activist may better qualify Dick Armey’s so-called “TEA Party” ties:

“Dick Armey and his group do not and will not represent the tea party movement, and they will not take ownership of it,” said Phillip Dennis, a Little Elm resident and co-coordinator of the Texas Tea Party Patriots. “Too close to the boys in the RNC,” or Republican National Committee, he said.

I guess that one could say that former Congressman Dick Armey is in no position to criticize US Senate candidate, JD Hayworth.

By Captain Dreadlocke and RAP

 Numerous persons ‘involved’ with the ‘other’ Arizona senate campaigns have posted on  blogs throughout Arizona, that J.D. Hayworth was named by C.R.E.W- Center for Responsibility and Ethics in Government as one of the most corrupt candidates in 2010.  Well, Who is “CREW ” and WHAT are they all about?  Are they what they sound like, an organization committed to ethical government and responsible conduct, or is there more to know regarding this group?

Well one of the best sources for such information is David Horowitz, a former ‘Red Diaper Baby’ (A child of Marxists) and his website, “Discover the Networks” – A guide to the Political Left.

http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/groupProfile.asp?grpid=7309

According to David, CREW was established in 2001 by far left Democrat activists who see themselves as a counterbalance to the conservative leaning Judicial Watch.  They describe themselves as, “…as a ‘nonpartisan’ public interest group that litigates and brings ethics charges against ‘government officials who sacrifice the common good to special interests’ and ‘betray the public trust’.” Hmmm, so they’re looking to protect the public, eh?  Not so fast, there’s much more to know.

In reality, according to Discover the Networks,  “CREW’s ultimate purpose is to use ‘the rule of law to bring about constructive social change’ in a manner the organization likens to the 1960s civil rights movement. The ‘social change’ sought by CREW is the transformation of America into a nation that more fully embraces leftist values and policies.”   In pursuit of this goal, “…CREW strives to discredit conservatives and Republicans it deems vulnerable to attack, with the objective of decreasing their numbers in political offices nationwide.”  SO, THIS IS THE GROUP John McCain and Jim Deakin uses to discredit JD Hayworth!?  That says MUCH MORE about those two senate candidates than anything about JD!

CREW has received financial backing from groups such as George Soros’s Open Society Institute, The Tides Foundation, The David Geffen Foundation and The Barbara Streisand Foundation as well as several other institutions that are noted for supporting far left causes.

  Many C.R.E.W officials have ties to the political left.  Melanie Sloan, the groups Executive Director worked for Charles Schumer, John Conyers and Joseph Biden.  Other officials also have ties to the political left such as Media Matters and ACORN.  Naomi Seligman, a former Deputy Director who had formerly worked for Media Matters was quoted in Wikipedia as saying “We are Progressives. We work within a large progressive infrastructure.”

How apropos that McCain would be very comfortable with quoting this group!

  In March 2002, it was reported in “The Hill” a weekly newspaper, that “House Democratic Leaders are honing in on an election strategy to taint the entire Republican caucus by demonizing Majority Leader Tom DeLay Rep. TX.”  Shortly thereafter CREW sent out letters to all Democrat House members in an effort to get someone to file an ethics charge against DeLay. Texas Congressman Chris Bell, who had just been defeated in a Texas Democratic Primary, volunteered.  The House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct investigated and found Bells accusations against DeLay unfounded. Melanie Sloan told the Wall Street Journal, “Since I started [with CREW] the main thing I wanted to do was go after Tom DeLay.”

 The group prides which themselves in initiating litigation, also took on the legal case of Valerie Plame and her husband Joe Wilson against Vice President Cheney, Carl Rove and Lewis “Scooter” Libby.

The group also led other campaigns to discredit President George W. Bush among them was to tie the administration and many other Republicans to Jack Abramoff.  Ironically they never mentioned Abramoff’s connections to many Democrats.  To quote Mark Margolis and Mark Noonan of Townhall.com on 1/1/2007, “Several Democrats have participated in trips paid for and/ accompanied by Abramoff, including Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS.), Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), Rep. Michael McNulty. (D-NY) and Gregory Meeks(D-NY).  They also reported that Harry Reid also received some $68,000 in donations from the Abramoff firm, partners and clients.

CREW also wanted Sarah Palin and the Republican Party to be investigated because of the party’s purchase of the clothing she wore during the presidential campaign. The group consistently targets Republicans primarily the most conservative ones.  Since it began compiling and publishing a list of the worse and most corrupt elected officials in 2005 until the present; Out of 116 officials named by them 82 were Republicans  and only 34 were Democrats.  On their most recent list of the worse Governors listed were 9 Republicans and 2 Democrats.

Even in an article written shortly after the death of  Jack Murtha, D-PA, titled “A Profile in Arrogance” in which CREW’s Melanie Sloan is quoted criticizing Murtha as the “King of Pork”; CREW is described as a group “… which reserves most of its criticisms for Republicans.”

http://frontpagemag.com/2010/02/17/a-profile-in-arrogance/

 Prominent left wing radicals and groups funded by the likes of George Soros have targeted the most Conservative members of Congress, the ones they know they cannot buy.  However it appears like a few    progressive Republicans elected officials may be neutralized when they receive funding from Soros etc. for the foundations and “Institutes” they chair.

 Were does that leave J.D. Hayworth?

  Having been listed this year on CREW’s report J.D. joins some of the best and most conservative Republican elected officials in the nation, such as Bobby Jindal, Marsha Blackburn, Haley Barbour and Roy Blunt.

From a conservative Point of  View, that is a list  JD Hayworth can be proud of having a very prominent place!

The kind of politician you can’t trust

Yesterday morning Jim Ward, the candidate for Congress who moved here from San Francisco last year to run for office, took the Fox News logo off his website, essentially admitting that he lied to the voters in person, in mail pieces – telling them that he had been profiled as an up-and-comer.

As Jim Ward’s campaign deflates amid lies, runaway spending, and ideological gaffs, he has shown that he is ill prepared to run for Congress if the dethroned marketing executive can’t even market his own platform for Congress.

Which, by the way, what does Jim Ward stand for outside of not being David Schweikert?  Not real border security.  Not free trade.  Not protecting taxpayers or demonstrating a fiscal conservative record.  He’s a cocktail show-hound who thought he could buy a Congressional seat by shaking hands, buying young people rounds of drinks — fooling the voters through false advertising.

Jim: We’re not buying it.  Your product is dishonest.  And we can’t trust you.

Apologize.

Signed,

The Voters of CD5

Jim Ward’s website BEFORE and AFTER he took the Fox News logo off

On Monday, June 28, 2010, conservative talk show host and best selling author delivered a scathing monologue on John McCain at the same time he reaffirmed his commitment to and endorsement of JD Hayworth.

Here are several videos in which JD Hayworth counters John McCain’s negative attacks.

If the mainstream media will not do their fact checking, the campaign will be glad to do it for them.

Its really no wonder that the Arizona Republic has lost a good percentage of its readership after reading the latest John McCain love fest article titled “Tea Party Courter J.D. Hayworth was an active earmaker”. Although there were one or two half-positive remarks about Hayworth, this was really nothing more than a JD Hayworth slam piece, falsely depicting him as a fan of earmarks and painting McCain as some sort of fiscally conservative hero. The piece brought up old news regarding Hayworth appearing in a infomercial in 2007 advocating the use of federal grant money. JD Hayworth had already responded to McCains ‘infomercial’ attack ads during an interview with ‘Round Table Politics‘ and on his campaign website, which the AZ Republic conveniently failed to mention in the article. No where in the write-up did it state that John McCain’s own website had a section advocating the use of federal grant money. Once news broke out about the page, McCain’s campaign deleted some of the page information from the website (although you can see it on some browsers). McCain contemptuously wants you to believe that Hayworth’s activities with the company were wrong…but then deceitfully fails to publicly reveal that his own campaign had received over $10k in contributions from the owner of the company that Hayworth advertised for. Hypocrisy at its best.

Facts are funny things, mostly because people forget about them when they are not favorable for the candidate that they are supporting. Truth really is in the eye of the beholder during election season. The AZ Republic article wants you to believe that JD Hayworth played the political earmarking game while he was a Congressman and that he somehow enjoyed spending taxpayer money at the drop of a hat. Fact is that members of Congress do not have veto power over a spending bill. Its the whole bill or nothing in most cases. Anyone that knows a thing or two about spending bills knows that they are normally loaded with earmarks. Does that make it right, no, but thats how the current system works. Good Congressman know that if the overall bill is a good thing for America – that they will have to vote on it with the earmarks attached to pass. For the Arizona Republic to say that Hayworth isn’t a Tea Party worthy conservative candidate because he voted on bills that included earmarks is just ridiculous and misleading. Hayworth cannot be blamed for the entire way that Congress votes on spending bills. The article really attempts to paint John McCain as a “spending hawk” because he doesn’t attach earmarks to his bills; but then again fails to even mention that McCain voted for one of the largest bailouts in Americas history at the expense of the taxpayer. He has never once publicly apologized for the $700 billion dollars spent on TARP…which did include at least $150 Billion in earmarks; nor has he apologized for the billions of dollars that Arizona taxpayers have had to pay for the cost of illegal immigration during his years as Senator.

As the columnist, Robert Robb of the AZ Republic correctly stated, the Tea Party isn’t a single issue movement. However, Mr. Robb incorrectly implies that Hayworth is somehow seeking out Tea Party support to be perceived as a fiscal conservative. Tea Parties are seeking out Hayworth to support (not the other way around) because they know that they cannot afford another 6 years of John McCain. The Tea Parties realize that aside from the safety concerns presented at the border; illegal immigration alone costs Arizona hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in social programs, medical expenses, educational costs and incarceration expenses. The fact is that there are many reasons why the Tea Parties are seeking out JD Hayworth to support rather than John McCain, and the other Republican candidate Jim Deakin. McCains actions are typical of a long time incumbent, as he wants to control the talking points and promote his “success on earmarks”, while avoiding the many other issues like immigration, which he has failed miserably on during his tenure.

After 120 days, John McCain finally accepted a public challenge for a debate by JD Hayworth. There won’t be any hiding behind campaign attack ads on July 16th and 17th as all three candidates (McCain, Hayworth and Deakin) attend a televised debate in Phoenix and Tucson. For more information about the debate click here.

Poll: Has John McCain failed Arizona as Senator?

By Steve Benen (Washington Monthly)

Bookers for the Sunday shows have shown admirable restraint of late. They continue to book Joe Lieberman, Lindsey Graham, and Newt Gingrich with painful frequency, but they’ve gone two whole months without inviting John McCain back on.

Don’t worry; the Sunday shows just can’t quit him that easily. “Meet the Press” made this announcement the other day:

This Sunday: Exclusive! Sen. John McCain

President Obama relieves Gen. Stanley McChrystal of his command in Afghanistan after his comments about the president’s diplomatic team causes a firestorm in Washington and undermines the President’s strategy in Afghanistan. How will Obama’s decision impact the war going forward? Will McChrystal’s replacement, CENTCOM Commander Gen. David Petraeus, be able to successfully lead the effort in Afghanistan? Plus, the upcoming midterm elections and the future of the GOP. We’ll ask a man in the center of it all: fighting his own tight re-election battle to the Senate and serving as the Ranking Member of the Armed Services Committee, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).

I especially enjoyed the “Exclusive!” with the exclamation point, as if this were a rare, special occurrence. It’s not.

For those keeping score — and you know I am — this will be McCain’s 22nd appearance on a Sunday morning talk show since Obama’s inauguration. That’s an average of 1.3 appearances a month, every month, for over a year — more than any other public official in the country.

Since the president took office 17 months ago, McCain has been on ABC’s “This Week” three times (9.27.09, 8.23.09, and 5.10.09), CNN’s “State of the Union” four times (1.10.10, 10.11.09, 8.2.09, and 2.15.09), CBS’s “Face the Nation” five times (1.24.10, 10.25.09, 8.30.09, 4.26.09, and 2.8.09), and “Fox News Sunday” five times (4.18.10, 12.20.09, 7.2.09, 3.8.09, and 1.25.09). His appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” tomorrow will be his fifth since Obama’s inauguration (6.27.10, 2.28.10, 12.6.09, 7.12.09, and 3.29.09).

Obviously, there’s no reason for this. In the announcement, “Meet the Press” seemed to justify the invitation by saying it was a big week with regards to U.S. policy in Afghanistan — and it was. But John McCain has never demonstrated any meaningful understanding of the war policy. On the contrary, he’s been routinely confused. “How will Obama’s decision impact the war going forward?” It’s a good question, but McCain’s hardly the best person to answer it.

McCain lost a presidential election; he’s not in the GOP leadership; he’s not especially influential with anyone; he’s not playing an active role in shaping any legislation; and he doesn’t appear to have any expertise in any area of public policy. The Sunday shows seem to book him out of habit. It’s farcical.

One other video from The Cafferty File (CNN)

My latest frustration stems from the media giving John McCain another free pass on Arizona’s newest immigration law, which I remind everyone has yet to go into effect.

On April 19th, the Phoenix Business Journal asked John McCain for comments on Arizona’s new immigration law, SB 1070. Here was his response:

“I think it’s a good tool,” McCain said during a conference call with reporters when asked about the bill. “It’s a tool that needs to be used.”

(Is it a good tool or perhaps, a good law?)

The title of the article, “McCain voices support for immigrant trespassing bill,” let the reader to believe that McCain supports the legislation. However, reading further into the article, Mike Sunnucks continues:

McCain spokeswoman Brooke Buchanan said the senator was not officially endorsing the trespassing bill in his comments, but was saying he understood Arizonans’ frustration with the lack of federal resources dedicated to dealing immigration and border security.

Did you catch that? McCain says he thinks its a good tool and then has one of his staffers deny he was endorsing the bill. To borrow a quote from our senior senator, even I was “misled.” (Read my earlier post.)

Back to the title of my post. Did Mike Sunnucks ever ask John McCain directly if he supported or would have even voted for the legislation? Sadly, I don’t think Sunnucks had the courage to press the question.

On Tuesday, April 27th, John McCain went on Sean Hannity’s television show to discuss Arizona’s newest immigration law. Hannity posed the following question to McCain:

Senator, as we were discussing earlier tonight, this bill which obviously you support has been compared to a form of terrorism, Nazi Germany, Jim Crow. People are calling for a boycott. I mentioned people calling for the burning of the city of Phoenix for crying out loud.

What is your reaction to people saying this? And obviously there’s been a misinterpretation of the bill. What is your reaction of — what they’re saying about it?

John McCain responded with the following answer:

Look, this is not a perfect solution. If I had written the bill, obviously it might have been somewhat different.

Then, last Friday, Greta Van Susteren had John McCain on her show as the so-called authority on border security and illegal immigration. According to the video and transcript, Greta asked McCain the following question:

There are many people — not so many, I guess, in Arizona, but certainly outside the state of Arizona giving Arizona an awful lot of heat over this statute that’s been passed and that Governor Brewer has signed into law. What’s your thought about the federal government and the state government in this battle over immigration?

John McCain responded in this fashion:

So my answer is that this law I probably would have written a little differently.

Is anyone picking up on this? McCain’s response is to thread the needle on this issue. Wonder why Somos Republicanos has been so silent lately? John McCain’s special interest group partner which has been pushing for “comprehensive immigration reform” is suddenly quiet voicing no opposition to McCain’s facade of support for the law. Could it be that he quietly reassured them that he actually does not support the law?

Why has Somos Republicans voiced adamant opposition to the law but has yet to utter an ill word toward John McCain?

The answer is that John McCain does NOT support Arizona’s new immigration law.

Where are the professional journalists who are supposed to ask the senior senator the hard questions. Why has no one pressed McCain on whether he actually supports the law? Are they intimidated or infatuated? Where is Howard Fischer when we need him? (Yes, that was a respectful hat tip to Howard Fischer who has always been good about asking the tough questions even when I don’t agree with him.)

John McCain has been using the word “frustration” in all his latest talking points dealing with the issue. He’s correct.  We’re all a little frustrated with the situation of illegal immigration. But many conservatives have also been frustrated far too long with John McCain’s position on the issue, his lack of action and most recently, his credibility during this election year.

Disclaimer: I am currently serving on the campaign of JD Hayworth 2010. However, I have been publicly critical of Senator John McCain for several years. If you don’t like what I’ve written here on my blog, you can go elsewhere or start your own blog.

Congressional candidate, Janet Contreras was on Fox & Friends this morning. In case you missed it, here is the video from her appearance.

Janet is in an uphill battle against bunkered, no-show Ed Pastor. She can use our help. Please take a moment to visit her website (www.Vote4Janet.com) and support her financially.

John McCain was a maverick when it was cool to be a maverick

In the April 3rd edition of Newsweek, David Margolick writes:

Many of the GOP’s most faithful, the kind who vote in primaries despite 115-degree heat, tired long ago of McCain the Maverick, the man who had crossed the aisle to work with Democrats on issues like immigration reform, global warming, and restricting campaign contributions. “Maverick” is a mantle McCain no longer claims; in fact, he now denies he ever was one. “I never considered myself a maverick,” he told me. “I consider myself a person who serves the people of Arizona to the best of his abilities.” Yet here was Palin, urging her fans four times in 15 minutes to send McCain the Maverick back to Washington.

Now John McCain finds himself if the fight of his political life and he runs from being a maverick. As much as I don’t like giving a voice to liberals even they’ve caught on.

and,

If John McCain’s new persona is not a “maverick” that means that he is now selling himself as just another good ol boy in the Senate.

All this leads the average voter to ask, “Does anyone really know who John McCain is anymore?”

A m e r i c a n  P o s t – G a z e t t e

Distributed by C O M M O N  S E N S E , in Arizona

Foot in Mouth Disease   Phoenix New Times catches bad case

A recent, bizarre, satirical article in the New Times titled “Jew Roundup”, falsely attributes anti-Semitic remarks to conservative political and law enforcement leaders in Arizona. The author, Michael Lacey, Executive Editor of the New Times, managed to smear Bishop Olmstead, Senator Russell Pearce, JD Hayworth, Andrew Thomas, Mark Spencer and Darrell Ankario, with one stroke of his poison tipped pen. None of these people ever said the vile things Lacey of which accuses them. Lacey illustrated his work with a hideously unflattering Nazi era caricature of a Jew. Nobody born a Jew ever asked for that privilege. It just happens, like the allocation of ten toes and fingers. The Jew might be blonde with blue eyes, oriental Asian, black African or even Middle Eastern in appearance. There is, you see, a Jewish nation and religion, but not a Jewish race. Michael Lacey doesn’t know this. However, even uneducated people are well aware of the difficult history of this people. Small in number, they make convenient scapegoats for bullies  – people like Lacey who have a public platform they use for their own, twisted personal objectives. Lacey’s rambling and marginally coherent piece evokes images of the most vile Nazi propaganda, directed at stirring up hatred against the vulnerable, as a precursor to annihilation. Lacey’s graphic imagery is no less powerful today than it was 70 years ago, and therefore equally as dangerous. It’s like finding a WWII landmine while digging for clams. The potential for an explosion is the same in 2010 as it was in 1943. Anti-Semitism is similarly deadly, and its devices must never be deployed even as satire. You do not play with mines; you do not play with anti-Semitic iconography. This is not a game. Lacey apparently disagrees with those who would protect our borders. What he seems incapable of grasping is that they are Constitutionally sworn to do this work. Until our borders are legally made porous, they must be protected against illegal infiltration from the north or south, regardless of the race, national origin, religion or skin color of the infiltrator. As Russell Pearce says: “Illegal is not a race; it is a crime.” A publisher ought to be someone with maturity and common sense. Lacey seems devoid of both having employed adolescent techniques of false attribution. None of Lacey’s targets uttered anything even remotely close to the statements Lacey reports in his tawdry article. Lacey lies! He cannot be getting very good advice these days. The modern Jew is nothing like his ghetto ancestor. Living in the valley are American and Israeli Jewish miitary veterans with combat training and CCW permits, some of them blonde, blue eyed women. Why would anyone in their right mind want to irritate them? His other targets are legislators and law enforcement folks. What is the penalty for slander in Arizona? Lacey must either be very brave or not very bright. What do you think? http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2010-04-08/news/jew-round-up-they-re-pouring-over-the-canadian-border-to-flood-graduate-schools-and-bank-parking-lots-legislations-from-state-senator-russell-pearce-aims-to-make-them-rue-the-day-they-ever-entered-arizona/

Recently, several new outlets were tricked into running stories about the slanted ratings of the front-group Arizona Education Network (AEN.)

The spokes person for the group, Ann Eve Pedersen, is a former reporter with the Arizona Daily Star and now defunct Tucson Citizen. She has donated to Democratic candidates, $825 to Grijalva in 2009, $500 to President Obama in ’08, plus donations to Reps. Giffords and Pastor. She is so involved with the Democratic Party, the Tucson Weekly stated “she is inextricably linked with Tucson’s Democratic politics.” She is married to Peter Eckerstrom, brother of Paul Eckerstrom (former chair of the Pima County Democratic Party, a position once help by Ann’s own father.) This is not your average PTO mom concerned about education funding. Ann Eve Pedersen is a highly connected Democrat activist who is the spokesperson for a group set up for the sole purpose of slamming Republican candidates right as election season gets under way. It is disappointing that more media outlets did not investigate the people behind AEN before publishing their obviously biased report.