Tobin seeks special election on redistricting

House Speaker moves forward to address problems with IRC

The Arizona Capitol Times is reporting that House Speaker Andy Tobin has introduced a host of measures that would set a special election enabling voters to decide whether to use legislative and congressional maps drawn by elected legislators representing constituencies — as was the practice prior to the passage of Prop. 106 in 2000. Democrats and Republicans worked together to draw the lines.

Arizonans are currently faced with oddly configured and decidedly partisan maps approved last month by Arizona’s Independent Redistricting Commission.

As we have noted, the Commission is hardly “Independent” but actually leans left. Read our previous post to reacquaint yourself with the sham that masquerades as being impartial committee of volunteers.

Colleen Coyle Mathis, the problematic “Independent” chairwoman the commission is a case in point. Mathis’ husband, Christopher, a Democrat lawyer, served as treasurer for a Democrat legislative candidate in 2010 and the duo donated to other Democrat candidates. As chair, Mathis’ tie-breaking vote with the commission’s Democrat members resulted in the hiring of Strategic Telemetry – a company with strong ties to high-profile Democrats as the mapping consultant. Registering as an Independent served as a cloak to conceal her actual bent.

Mathis would have us believe it was sheer coincidence that Ken Strasma, the national target director of Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign is president of Washington D.C. based Strategic Telemetry.

Kelly best positioned to win CD 8 primary

Polling numbers look good for conservative candidate

In a survey of likely Arizona Congressional District 8 primary voters released this week, Jesse Kelly holds a strong lead over the other prospective Republican candidates.

Kelly’s lead far surpasses that of both State Senator Frank Antenori (R-Dist. 30) and Tucson sports broadcaster Dave Sitton. Kelly, a conservative, has a combined 35% of definite and leaning voters. The same measure for Antenori is 15%, while Sitton holds 7%.

Primary voters support Kelly over Antenori by a ratio of 2.4 to 1.

In response to the results, Kelly stated, “We are humbled by the strong support from the people of Southern Arizona. I have heard from many families who are ready for Congress to focus on improving the economy and helping the private sector create good paying jobs in Arizona.”

The TelOpinion Research poll was conducted on the 24th and 25th of January, 2012 and sampled 300 likely primary voters from throughout the current Congressional District 8 in Arizona. 

Jesse Kelly works in the private sector as a project manager for a construction firm. He and his wife live in Pima County, where they are raising their two sons.

GOP debate tonight: Thurs. Jan. 26, 2012

Time: Thursday, January 26, 2012, 6:00 pm AZ time — 8:00 pm ET

Where: University of North Florida, Jacksonville

Live Stream: CNN.com

Sponsors: Republican Party of Florida, CNN and the Hispanic Leadership Network

Participants: Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum.

This is the high stakes debate preceding the Florida primary. The latest public opinion polls show that the battle for Florida’s 50 winner-take-all delegates — the largest prize so far this primary and caucus season — is becoming a two-man race between Romney and Gingrich. According to a CNN/Time/ORC International survey released Wednesday, 36% of people likely to vote in Tuesday’s Republican primary in Florida say they are backing Romney as the party’s nominee, with 34% supporting Gingrich. Romney’s 2-point margin over Gingrich is well within the survey’s margin of error. The other two candidates lag far behind, with Rick Santorum polling at 11% and Ron Paul at 9% –  7% still remain unsure.  With their low numbers, the time is ripe for Santorum and Paul  to bow out and endorse the candidate who can beat Barack Obama – Mitt Romney.

Check out all of the latest Florida polling here courtesy of Real Clear Politics.

Conservatives drop united bomb on Gingrich

Newt Gingrich: Pants on fire

In this two page commentary in National Review Online, Newt Gingrich is exposed as repeatedly insulting President Ronald Reagan in the 1980‘s. It is written by Elliott Abrams, an assistant secretary of state in the Reagan Administration and deputy national security adviser in the George W. Bush Administration

Newt Gingrich has been touting service in the House under Ronald Reagan, yet in 1988, he warned George  H. W. Bush not to run as “a continuation of Reaganism,” saying he wouldn’t win. Watch this telling video.

Here Newt Gingrich is exposed as rewriting his Reagan connection.  What he said in 1983 was Reagan was responsible for “national decay.”

R. Emmett Tyrrell, founder and editor-in-chief of the conservative American Spectator, exposes Newt Gingrich as William Jefferson Gingrich.

Ann Coulter, conservative columnist and legal correspondent for Human Events states the facts clearly in “Re-elect Obama: Vote Newt!”

Tom DeLay, a top deputy to Gingrich during the Republican revolution of the mid-1990s, joined the chorus of other conservative members breaking their silence about Gingrich’s erratic leadership style. In this radio interview with KTRH‘s Michael Berry, DeLay said: “He’s not really a conservative. I mean, he’ll tell you what you want to hear. He has an uncanny ability, sort of like Clinton, to feel your pain and know his audience and speak to his audience and fire them up. But when he was speaker, he was erratic, undisciplined.”

Conservative media are united in exposing the sham that is Newton Leroy McPherson Gingrich.

AZ Gov. Jan Brewer holds her own with rude Obama

Gov. Jan Brewer, extending gracious hospitality in her role as Arizona’s chief executive, greeted President Obama on an airport tarmac when he arrived in the Valley during a campaign swing yesterday.

But all did not go well.

The rancorous Obama was miffed about her depiction of their previous, private 30-minute White House meeting in June 2010. “He was a little disturbed about my book,” Brewer told a reporter after the incident, referring to her political memoir, “Scorpions for Breakfast.” In the book, Brewer depicted Obama as “patronizing” during that earlier meeting. “I said to him that I have all the respect in the world for the office of the president,” Brewer said. “The book is what the book is. I asked him if he read the book. He said he read the excerpt. So.”

Brewer said Obama told her “that he didn’t feel I had treated him cordially.”

“I said I was sorry he felt that way but I didn’t get my sentence finished,” Brewer said. According to reports, he walked away from her while they were still talking. “Anyway, we’re glad he’s here. I’ll regroup.”

Brewer and Obama “spoke intensely for a few minutes” after he left his plane, according to a report. At one point, the GOP governor shook her finger at the president.

This isn’t the first time Obama and Brewer have been at odds. Last year, the governor filed a lawsuit accusing the Obama administration of failing to enforce immigration laws or maintain control of Arizona’s southern border.

Had she been less of a lady, courteously greeting the temperamental and grudge-carrying Obama, Gov. Brewer might have imitated her Democrat predecessor Janet Napolitano. When then-President George W. Bush came to town, that ill-mannered governor took off for a trip to the Grand Canyon. Today’s edition of the left-of-center local newspaper editorially berates Brewer for her response to Obama’s petulance, but remained characteristically mum when Napolitano snubbed Bush.

Although such rudeness is not a hallmark of Gov. Brewer, she does have a right to defend herself – and got high marks for doing so from the local audience. Real Clear Politics has the audio of Gov. Brewer being interviewed by Mike Broomhead on 550 KFYI-AM after the incident. Listen here.

Read Gov. Brewer’s statement regarding President Obama’s visit to Arizona here.

Come on in: The sheriff’s water is fine

Retired Police Sergeant Paul Penzone, a Democrat, has declared his candidacy for Sheriff by filing an exploratory committee in his liberal zeal to challenge popular Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

Penzone joins Scottsdale Police Lt. Mike Stauffer, a onetime Republican who opportunistically switched his affiliation to Independent to run.

That trickery didn’t work out so well for perpetual loser Dan Saban, who took a colossal trouncing when taking on Arpaio in 2004 as a Republican and later as a Democrat in 2008. This telling video of Saban, who “can’t distinguish between false and true,” exposes the level of challengers who are primed to step forward attempting to take down the esteemed law enforcement Goliath.

Saban, who has filed, withdrawn and then re-filed, campaign documents, makes no bones about his desire to give the green light to the continued flow of illegal aliens into our state and nation — a decidedly odd take on law enforcement. Rick Romley, a previous county attorney who continually clashed with Sheriff Arpaio, weakly endorsed Saban during his last foray onto the political scene here — distilling his support to one word, “change.”

Watch for the local media, especially the left-leaning open borders advocates at the daily newspaper and their plummeting Gannett-owned sibling, Channel 12 KPNX-TV now openly housed in the same building, to jump on the bandwagons of these wannabes.  It won’t matter which one. Their only hope is that it isn’t Joe Arpaio.

It’s only the voting citizens of Maricopa County who give Arpaio accolades. But after all, those are the opinions that actually matter.

Jonathan Paton hopping into CD 1 race

Former state legislator Jonathan Paton announced today that he is entering the race for the (current) Congressional District 1.

The sprawling, oddly reconfigured new district — thanks to the redrawn maps curtsey of the Democrat heavy Independent Redistricting Commission — extends from north Tucson in the southern part of the state up to the northern point where Arizona abuts Utah’s border. It also includes Flagstaff and a good portion of easternArizona.

After losing in the 2010 CD 8 Republican primary to Jesse Kelly, Paton has returned to dip his toes in the political pool. Voters might want to acquaint themselves with the Paton Fact File from the previous election. In that match up, newcomer Kelly beat Paton by a 49 -41 margin.

Paton currently has a single web page up, minus bio, District number or issues, but asking for donations.

State of the State: Obama foments class warfare

“Economic fairness” Obama’s keystone

In his third, and hopefully last, State of the Union address, Barack Obama continues in his irresponsible efforts to divide us by ingratiating himself with some Americans by castigating others. Ignored is the fact that we are all aboard the same ship with a charlatan captain who has sailed us into a sea of unfathomable debt, which now stands at a whopping $15.24 Trillion.

Under Obama’s administration, the federal debt has surpassed that of all previous U.S. presidents from George Washington combined. It far exceeds our economy, yet he has given no indication of putting the brakes on his reckless spending spree. Even in view of these dire circumstances, he was able to rally over 100 Democrats to his call for another disastrous “stimulus.”

As America teeters on the brink of bankruptcy, he enjoys the opulence of endless extravagances unknown to most Americans and lavish vacations, while continuing to drive a wedge between the citizenry based on class warfare and redistribution of wealth — utilizing the Saul Alinsky tactics he honed as a Chicago community organizer. Obama’s call for “social and economic equality,” reads like a page from the manifesto of Communist Karl Marx: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”

As Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels said in the GOP rebuttal last night, “In three short years, an unprecedented explosion of spending, with borrowed money, has added trillions to an already unaffordable national debt. And yet, the President has put us on a course to make it radically worse in the years ahead. The federal government now spends one of every four dollars in the entire economy; it borrows one of every three dollars it spends. No nation, no entity, large or small, public or private, can thrive, or survive intact, with debts as huge as ours.”

Right on, Gov. Daniels!

Congratulations, Senator Burges!

 In a unanimous vote, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors appointed state Rep. Judy Burges to the Legislative District 4 Senate seat, replacing former state Sen. Scott Bundgaard.  Bundgaard resigned during an ethics hearing earlier this month.

Republican Burges, of Sun City West, has served in the state House of Representatives since 2005.

Attorney Eric Spencer and former Maricopa County Republican Chairman Lyle Tuttle were also nominated by the elected precinct committeemen in District 4.  All three names were then sent to the Board of Supervisors.

During the 2011 legislative session, then-Rep. Judy Burges attained the highest score of any House member, as rated by the conservative PAChyderm Coalition.

State GOP Chair endorses Pearce

On Saturday, January 28, Arizona State Republican Committeemen will elect their officers for the next two years. Those offices are First Vice-Chair, Second Vice-Chair, Third Vice-Chair, Assistant Secretary, Assistant Treasurer, Sergeant-At-Arms and Assistant Sergeant-At-Arms.

The Honorable Russell Pearce, author of the nationally emulated SB 1070, is running for First Vice Chair. Pearce has the strong endorsement of State Party Chairman, Tom Morrissey. 

The position of First Vice Chair is vital to the party structure because that person is key to the successful administration of the chairman, facilitating a smooth, coordinated team effort. Pearce’s favorable contacts, earned over years, will enhance the chairman’s efforts in this vital election year.

Pearce and Morrissey have worked closely together in advocating the conservative agenda along with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Pearce’s challenger lacks comparable credentials on the national, as well as the local scene.

The choice is clear.