Month: September 2016

I’m 71 today, and I’m celebrating, right after I finish this post.  Babbie’s off at a three day Quilt Camp, so I’m free as a bird.  I’m going to go for a walk in the woods, and have a couple beers, and think about BAAM.  It’s coming together.  I’m pretty sure it’s going to happen.

The key to longevity is staying active, and at this rate I should last a while.  Means and methods are the key to success, and I’m getting close to nailing down the means, and I’ve got the methods all figured out.  It’s a piece of cake.  One of the easiest political hits I’ve ever made.  Most of the other ones I did I had help.  This one is all mine, and if I pull it off it will be the capstone of my political career.  Life is good.

On the Trump front, it’s all up to him, and his demeanor at the debate.  People expect Presidents to act like Presidents, not reality TV stars.  We’ll see if he’s got it in him.

I’ve put aside my book project for now, but I’m looking forward to getting back to it.  I’ll have a new chapter to write.

Three years ago, when I started this blog, and got back into politics, I did it because I sensed that the great progressive political tide that began a hundred years before was, at last, turning.  This election would be a turning point in American, political history, equivalent, in its impact, with elections like 1828, 1860, 1912, 1920, 1932, and 1980.  The new direction of American politics would be away from the center, and back to the States, and the people.  I really didn’t care much who the candidate in 2016 was.  Kasich looked all right for a short time, then Rubio, then Cruz, and now Trump.  Quite an evolution.  I never thought he could pull it off until the very end.  But he gets to be the leader in one of the most transformational elections in American history. In the history books he’ll be known as Trump the Improbable.

I can’t admire Trump, because of the kind of man he is.  But I can respect him.

The long hot summer is finally coming to an end.  Fall in the Gold Country is mild and pleasant.  A good day to be thankful.

 

In Anchorage, at nine in the evening of November 3rd, the 2016 Senate election in Alaska will probably be decided.  This is the traditional statewide TV debate, held in the spacious studios of the Public Television Station.  I’ve been watching these things since 1978, when I saw Tom Fink stand his ground in the gubernatorial debate.  He won the debate, and took enough votes from Hickel to elect Hammond.  I was in the Hammond camp, and have wanted to express my appreciation to this day.

On stage you’ll have the clueless incumbent, Lisa Murkowski, the Republican nominee, then the Democrat, loony old Ray Metcalfe, and the Libertarian, fire breathing Joe Miller.  Margaret Stock, a sensible Democrat, is running as an independent, and she’s the one all the Democrats in Alaska want to win.  Except for the Bernie Sanders types  – –  they’re with Metcalfe.  Add a couple vanity candidates and the stage is set.

I think Miller wins that debate, the way Fink won his.  Stand your ground, but not in a disagreeable way.

All that talk about Begich doing a write in was a head fake.  BAAM is still on, the papers mailed to the FEC today.  BAAMB will be put on ice.

The way they did these debates back when I was a candidate you got to ask your opponent a question.  The first Democrat I debated, Steve Tackett, a scab home builder, was afraid to debate me before the Public Television debate, which he had to go to.  He was scared to death about what question I was going to ask him.  I didn’t have anything on him, so he got off easy.

Not so the Democrat they recruited to run against me in 1984, a timid bureaucrat named David Hedderly-Smith.  I looked up his voting record and found a gem.  This guy hadn’t voted in the last Anchorage Municipal election.  Which meant he didn’t actually vote for the property tax limitation initiative that he claimed to favor.  Which meant he didn’t care about the hard working tax payers of Anchorage.

I set him up just right.  I asked him if he supported the tax limitation, and he said he did.  I then told him that I’d looked up his voting record, and found that he had neglected to vote in that election.  An important limitation on property taxes, which you didn’t vote for.  And then I got to the question.  “You’ve accused me of voting “no” too much, but when you had a chance of voting on an important protection to property owners, you didn’t even vote at all.”  That was the question.  This mild mannered clerk acted like I’d smacked him in the head with a two by four.   I enjoyed that.

So doing debate prep can be important, if you know what you’re doing.

My son Darren convinced me of the rule of three. You say, or do, three things, not four or two.  So with Murkowski I’ll just concentrate on these three.  With her I could do more, but I’ll settle for three.  For instance, I could talk about how she’s really not a Republican at all, just a Republican in name only.  Or I could talk about her arrogance, and sense of entitlement.  Or I could talk about her being a beltway insider, a member of the ruling elite with Potomac fever, and not really Alaskan any more.  But you really need to concentrate on just three, so for now I’ll concentrate on her lying, incompetence and corruption.

Her first lie was the first thing she said, when her father appointed her to his Senate seat.  She said she had offered herself as a potential replacement, right along with a number of much more prominent and accomplished Republicans, such as former State Senators Halford of Chugiak and Binkley of Fairbanks.  Frank Murkowski actually went through the motions of pretending to do job interviews with these men and others who wanted to be considered for appointment.  I knew both Halford and Binkley, two very bright guys.  Rick Halford was one of my closest allies when we served in the state legislature.  I generally followed his lead.  He actually knew a lot more about the issues than I did, and he was damn near as conservative as I was.  Since I didn’t believe in unnecessary work, on a lot of things, especially complicated ones, I didn’t bother to learn too much.  I just voted the way Rick voted, and figured I’d be right 99% of the time, which was good enough for me.

I wasn’t in Alaska when all this happened in 2002.  I’d figured out what these lying Murkowskis were up to back in 2000, and Babbie and I decided it was only fair that she got to move back to her friends and family in the Bay Area.  I wouldn’t allow Frank Murkowski to piss on my leg and tell me it was raining.  But Rick did it, and a bunch of other people.  And, after great deliberation, the announcement!  Frank had unexpectedly found that the most qualified person in the State, to replace him in the Senate, was his half witted daughter!  Who knew?  What a surprise!

All a lie  – – the Lisa lie.  Her Senate career was founded on a lie, and everyone in the State knows it.

Against the charge of incompetence Murkowski has no proof to offer into evidence for her defense.  Pork barrel spending is not an accomplishment.  Any half wit can do that.  What has she accomplished in getting Alaskans our land?  Nothing.  She’s not smart enough. There are ways it can be done.  I know of one myself, which I may soon share with some of my Alaska friends.  We could open ANWR next year, if we had somebody back there who knew what they were doing.

Some people are just  born dumb, and Lisa Murkowski is one of those.  I remember her the first day I met her, in her father’s campaign office, where she was volunteering.  It was the fall of 1980, and the campaign was in its final stretch.  She was 23 years old, and not a bad looking girl.  But when you looked in her eyes it was a blank.  There wasn’t anything there.

As for corruption, that would require too much detail, and I don’t want to tip my hand.  I spent five minutes looking at her FEC filings, and I had all I needed.  It’s an easy case to make, and prove, in the court of public opinion.  I have a good imagination, and see things that a lot of people don’t see.  And then I think of ways to sell it.  I really wasn’t much of a lawyer, But I do know how to advocate.  I’ve done a lot of it, and I’m not bad.

It will be good to get back up there for a little while.  There’s a couple guys in particular I’m looking forward to seeing.  I just decided to go this morning, and already I’ve got the use of a car.  I’ll find a place to stay for free, and all I’ve got to do is feed myself.  I’ll live off the land, politically speaking.

I’ll be flying to Anchorage early next month to run Bipartisan Alaskans Against Murkowski (BAAM).  (This assumes Begich doesn’t run a write in, the chances of which grow slimmer by the day.)  The Superpac will be formed tomorrow, and I’ll need to get a P.O. Box in Anchorage where donors can give money.

We’ll have our first meeting on Friday, October 7th, place to be determined.  I  look forward to seeing a lot of old friends.  This is going to be a lot of fun.

At the American Thinker, Thomas Lifson has a clip of Trump on the Tonight Show last night.  He’s hamming it up with the host, and he’s like a pro.  At one point he looks at the camera, as if to say, Am I really going to do this?    He reminded me of the Great One, Jackie Gleason, when he was in his prime on The Honeymooners.  He can do timing.

In the WaPo, Herr Doktor Krauthammer,  who’s never really cared for the guy, expresses astonishment at the New Trump.  The man has a second act after all, and Herr Doktor is as amazed as I am.  He’s on a roll, at exactly the right time.

In the WSJ, Peggy Noonan reminds us all of the travel office scandal, and its chief victim, a guy named Billy Dale. Few people remember this story.   It’s from 1993, and it’s Hillary Clinton at her worst.  Billy died last year, but I’ll bet he’s got some children who could tell his story for him.  Talk about a guy getting screwed over, just because he was in the way.  Put his son or daughter, or widow, on camera and let them tell the story.  It’s something 60 Minutes would do, if they weren’t partisan hacks.

Trump’s talking to some veterans today, again on Fox Business, and I don’t have time to watch it, but I noticed the staging.  In the crowd behind him, in camera, there’s a black guy, and, more importantly, over his right shoulder, a black woman.  Probably a vet herself, or maybe, even better, a Gold Star mother.  This is a sign of true professionalism.   It was the same yesterday, at the New York Economic Club.  There, over his right shoulder, in the background, was Mr. Professional, the strong right hand man, Mike Pence.  He was obviously enjoying himself, and why not?   Becoming Trump’s VP was the smartest move he’s ever made.

I tried watching a little WADR yesterday, but had to turn it off.  The brass at Bloomberg and MSNBC have decided that praise of Trump will no longer be allowed.  Some things are more important than maintaining a semblance of impartiality.  It’s game on,  and all hands on deck.  Trump could win, and that simply can’t be allowed to happen.  The media is on trial in this election.  If Trump wins their credibility will, for the most part, be blown.  It almost brings a tear to your eye.

Babbie’s decided to try some new house cleaners.  The ones she’s been using are making close to $45 an hour, and aren’t up to snuff.  The wife of one of Darren’s friends in Bozeman runs some kind of house cleaning business, with several employees.  I told her what our house cleaners are making, and she said it’s about the same in Bozeman.  It costs Babbie’s girl friends in the Bay Area about half that, but they hire illegal immigrants, so they work cheap, even in an expensive area like Piedmont.  They all think Trump is a bigot because he’s down on illegal immigration.  But if these illegals weren’t around they’d probably be hiring black women, like their mothers did.  Pay someone $45 an hour, in cash, and you’d be surprised who shows up for work.

A lot of people wonder how someone like Sarah Palin could ever get elected as the Governor of a State.  You have to understand Alaska in order to figure it out.  The guy she beat in 2006, incumbent Republican Governor Frank Murkowski, the father of Sen. Lisa Murkowski, was unelectable after four years in office.  Soupy Sales could have beaten him.

The debate’s a week from Monday, and Trump’s task is really simple: don’t be a bully.  He’ll be tempted, and taunted, but he’s got to keep his cool.  I think he can pull it off, for one simple reason.  His whole family, Ivanka included, will be there to watch.  He won’t let them, and especially her, down.

When a man loves a woman.  Speaking of which, we’re off to our nine year old granddaughter’s birthday party, and soccer game.  Life is good.