Now that Barack Obama appears to have derailed the Clinton regime’s return trip to the White House speculation is beginning to pick up on who might be the Illinois senator’s running mate.

Both Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell and our state’s Democratic U.S. Senator Robert P. Casey, Jr. are being prominently mentioned.  The Keystone state has not had a resident in either the White House or in the Vice President’s office since James Buchanan, and chances are that drought will not end this year.

It is true that selecting either Rendell or Casey would likely lock up Pennsylvania and its treasure trove of 21 electoral votes for Obama.  It is axiomatic that a nominee must win two of three swing states: Pennsylvania, Ohio or Florida, in order to claim the presidency. George W. Bush did in it 2000 (yes, he really did win) and 2004 by posting victories in Florida and Ohio, but lost Pennsylvania both times.

Ohio has been trending heavily Democratic in recent years, but Florida remains a toss-up, so winning Pennsylvania would be vital to Obama’s chances.  Right now polls suggest Penn’s woods is up for grabs.  Therefore, a move that would cement his standing here would be politically prudent if not decisive.

But there are problems with either choice.  Senator Casey’s convincing win over incumbent U.S. Senator Rick Santorum in 2006 proves the Casey name is still magic in Pennsylvania. But, part of that magic is that Casey is pro-gun and pro-life (although not as dedicated to the position as was his father).  It was not all that long ago that the party hierarchy banned Casey, Sr. from addressing the Democratic National Convention because of his pro-life stand, so his son’s selection would amount to a major turn-around.

It is inconceivable that the Democratic Party’s base would accept a pro-life vice presidential nominee.  Former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, who could do for John McCain what Bob Casey would do for Obama, has the same problem on the Republican side.  The GOP base simply won’t accept a pro-abortion nominee on the national ticket.  Thus, both Ridge and Casey are disqualified.

As for Ed Rendell, he proved his political prowess by decisively delivering Pennsylvania for Hillary Rodham Clinton in the April 22nd primary.  That is his strength and his weakness. He is not by any means a Obama insider, which is a negative.  But, his selection would go a long way toward uniting the party and bringing Clinton’s supporters - who will be disheartened after losing a close, hard-fought race - back into the fold.

Rendell himself dismissed the possibility of being on the national ticket saying he is not second banana material.  He knows himself well.  After two terms as mayor of Pennsylvania’s largest city and a term and a half as governor, Ed Rendell is used to being the chief executive and calling the shots.  Unless he is given Cheney-like responsibilities in an Obama Administration, the role would not suit him well.

But perhaps the biggest drawback when it comes to Rendell is who would replace him as Governor of Pennsylvania.  Lt. Governor Catherine Baker Knoll is the Democratic Party’s version of the crazy aunt in the attic.  She is a grandmotherly figure who is well liked, but who also completely and totally lacks the ability to function as governor of one of the nation’s largest states.

With Flavia Colgan, her erstwhile top staffer out trying to become a CBS News maven, Knoll even lacks the staff infrastructure to handle the duties of governor.  The lieutenant governor only makes the news for her frequent malapropisms, most recently for a tongue lashing she gave Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato over what she perceived as insufficient recognition at a political event. Simply put, neither Rendell nor Pennsylvania can withstand two years of Knoll in the governor’s mansion.

That having been said, this is a wild and crazy political year and anything can happen. Six months ago conventional wisdom held Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton would wrap up their respective party nominations early and embark on one of the longest general election campaigns in history. Neither will be standing at the podium this summer accepting a nomination.

So, it is unlikely either Casey or Rendell will grace a national party ticket this year - but don’t bet your sub-prime mortgage on it.

When it comes to the illegal immigration issue, Democrat Governor Janet Napolitano plays both sides of the fence. In 2006, the year of her reelection, she had shown some signs of toughness:

Arizona Daily Star — January 12, 2006
Governor defends border proposal
Gov. Janet Napolitano defended her call to deploy Arizona National Guard troops to the Mexican border Wednesday, saying the time is right for a greater state role fighting crime caused by illegal immigration. — Napolitano unveiled a multipronged $100 million border security plan in her State of the State Address on Monday.

Tucson Citizen — January 12, 2006
Governor’s border comments fuel concern from some Latinos
Gov. Janet Napolitano’s tough stance on border security has drawn praise from advocates of tighter controls, but has some local Latino leaders concerned. — Talk of a strong National Guard presence along the border with Mexico left Pima County Supervisor Richard Elías wishing she’d tone down the rhetoric.

And with her plan from 2006 and the allocated funds from it, anti-illegal immigration Sheriff Joe Arpaio, dubbed “America’s Toughest Sheriff”, was born:

Arpaio, who describes himself as “America’s Toughest Sheriff” and is best known for feeding jail inmates green bologna sandwiches, clothing them in pink underwear, and making them work on chain gangs, received praise for his anti-immigration efforts from many who believe the federal government isn’t doing enough to remove people in the U.S. illegally.

Sheriff Arpaio has been in the news constantly with his raids and captures of illegal immigration, pretty much leading the fight across the Country, in state-wide efforts to combat illegal immigration.

Governor Napolitano apparently wants none of that, and has pretty much stopped Arpaio dead in his tracks in fighting illegal immigration:

PHOENIX — Gov. Janet Napolitano ordered the state to end an anti-illegal immigration contract with a high-profile sheriff Tuesday so she can pay for a larger effort to track down thousands of felons around Arizona.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Tuesday criticized the governor’s decision as a maneuver to thwart his efforts against illegal immigrants.

“Dirty politics are at work right now,” Arpaio said at a news conference.

So, doesn’t this help hamper efforts to stop illegal immigration as some have claimed:

“It couldn’t be further from the truth,” L’Ecuyer said.

Oh ok, so you take away the manpower, funding and authority from someone who was getting the job done and effective at capturing illegal immigration and claim it’s not going to have any effect? I don’t buy that, do any of you?

We didn’t even get to November yet, and the GOP has seen it’s House caucus fall by 3. Yesterday in a special election in Mississippi, another loss was suffered in a supposedly safe Republican District and switched over to the Dems:

Democrats picked up a northern Mississippi House seat in one of the most conservative-minded districts in the country Tuesday night — an upset  that will reverberate darkly through a House Republican caucus already reeling from losses in special elections in Illinois and Louisiana.

With all precincts reporting, the Democratic nominee, Prentiss County Chancery Clerk Travis Childers, defeated Republican Greg Davis, 54 to 46 percent.  Childers was able to expand his three-point margin of victory from the race’s first round of balloting last month — even as he faced an onslaught of Republican attacks.

The victory marks the Democrats’ third straight special election pickup in three months. It will be a serious blow to the Republican Party’s already-flagging morale and will surely prompt a new round of finger-pointing among the already fractured GOP caucus.

“This loss is going to prompt serious introspection by our conference to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it,” said a GOP leadership aide. “We have time to do that, and we will if we learn our lessons leading into November. But the next couple of days are not going to be pretty.”

The special election was held to fill the seat of former Rep. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), who was appointed to serve out the remainder of Sen. Trent Lott’s term last December. Wicker had never faced a competitive race since first elected in 1994, and the district gave President Bush 62 percent of the vote in 2004.

Focusing in on this race only, what failed? Why did the voters dismiss the GOP candidate in favor of the Democrat in a safe District?:

The results amount to a rebuke of the Republican strategy of trying nationalize the race by tying Childers to Sen. Barack Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Obama held low approval ratings in the district, but the nearly $2 million that GOP groups poured into northern Mississippi failed to make the race a referendum on the national political landscape.

Republicans dispatched a lineup of heavy hitters in the campaign’s final week, including a pre-election stop Monday by Vice President Dick Cheney. President Bush, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and First Lady Laura Bush recorded automated calls urging voters to support Davis.

A GOP House leadership aide told Politico last week that “if we don’t win in Mississippi, I think you are going to see a lot of people running around here looking for windows to jump out of.”

The $1.27 million that the NRCC spent in the heavily Republican district amounted to nearly 20 percent of the committee’s entire cash-on-hand. The committee has now spent more than $3 million to defend three conservative House seats, losing all three of them, and it is ill-equipped financially to compete fully in an ever-widening playing field for November.

Was this a candidate failure or the failure of the party? The money to hold on to this seat as well as the other 2, with zero wins to show for it, took a toll on available funds and certainly creates the perception of a another devastating November.

What is the fix? and with less then 6 months to answer that question and do something about it, there may not be enough time.

To offset the huge disparity in faculty, the University of Colorado has come up with a brilliant idea, hire a few Conservatives:

The University of Colorado is considering a $9 million program to bring high-profile political conservatives to teach on the left-leaning Boulder campus.

Critics say it’s an idea whose time should never come.

CU officials want to create an endowment for a Visiting Chair in Conservative Thought and Policy.

The program would bring a rotating cast of scholars, historians, politicians and media personalities to a town often ridiculed by the political right as “the People’s Republic of Boulder.”

The first scholar could be on campus next year for a one- or two-year stint, CU spokesman Bronson Hilliard said. University officials said they hope the fund would yield the $200,000-plus per year necessary to provide a stipend and a staff person.

How much does one Conservative teacher close the gap by:

CU political science professor emeritus Ed Rozek recently bought an ad in the Daily Camera in which he tallied voter registration records of faculty and administrators.

Rozek’s finding: Of 825 faculty members in arts and sciences, business, education, journalism and law, he found only 23 registered Republicans.

Rozek did not break out the number of registered Democrats or independents.

Still, Rozek said he found the idea of an endowed chair in conservative views “humorous” and said it smacks of tokenism.

Not so close. And the idea comes with criticism from the right:

The most vocal criticism so far is coming from the right.

“Like Margaret Mead among the Samoans, they’re planning to study conservatives. That’s hilarious,” Will told The Wall Street Journal in a story pubished Tuesday.

Why the big announcement from the school about this new “project”?. Why not just go out and hire Conservative teachers without the fanfare.

Reading George Will’s comment about the school “planning to study conservatives”, reminded me of the Twilight Zone episode where Roddy McDowell crash lands on another planet and is placed in a cage in the shape of a house, in a zoo like setting, for the planet’s residents to study other species in their natural habitat.

Murray Sabrin outlined a whole host of smart, Conservative ideas to right the slumping economy, decrease spending and lower our future debt:

Contending that Washington is “bankrupt” of both money and ideas, Dr. Murray Sabrin said the country is in a “perfect economic storm” that demands a return to free enterprise and confines the federal government to the role outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

“There’s nothing (in the Constitution) about agriculture, housing, education, or energy,” Sabrin, an economics professor at Ramapo College, said. He proposes that the federal departments bearing those names and functions be eliminated.

Social Security would also be phased out under Sabrin’s plan, with new workers shifting their contributions to 401(k) plans.

The Defense Department would remain, but much downsized, limited to defending our own borders and security, while withdrawing from places such as Germany, South Korea and Iraq.

Sabrin also advocates returning power back to the States, and letting free enterprise dictate the energy issue.

Sabrin has been the only candidate consistently talking about the issues and not just easy issues that have a one sentence bumper sticker slogan.

New York State Senator introducing legislation to install cameras on NY Police guns:

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) ― In a flash, a police officer draws a handgun from its holster. Less than two seconds later, a red laser and bright light shine at whatever is in the gun barrel’s path while a mini-camera records it all.

That’s how mini-cams on police handguns would work under a proposal gaining support in New York, which would be the first state in the nation to require the technology. State police were briefed on the technology and are reviewing it for a possible pilot program, said Michael Balboni, the state’s deputy secretary for public safety.

The device could create a critical visual and audio record of police shootings for use in court, said state Sen. Eric Adams, a Brooklyn Democrat and former police officer. He is drumming up support for testing the cameras with the state police SWAT squad.

Adams said recordings from the $695 cameras couldn’t be altered by a police officer and would quell many questions after controversial police shootings, like the deaths in New York City of Amadou Diallo in 1999 and Sean Bell in 2006.

Police have not commented, but an ex-cop Republican lawmaker is on board:

Adams knows many police won’t embrace the idea at first.
There was no immediate comment from the police department and police officers union in New York City. Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s office said it will review any legislation that comes from Adams’ effort.

But in Albany, there is growing support.

Republican Sen. Dale Volker of Erie County, a former police officer who would be critical to passing the Democrat-backed bill, already sought funding for a pilot program. But that $300,000 request to test the technology in state police SWAT squads was cut in the budget this spring as part of efforts to close a deficit of about $5 billion.

I wonder what the ACLU and other civil liberty groups would have to say about this. In addition, there could be some concern that the “bright light shine” could turn on at the wrong time and put police officers in danger.

While most people will be looking at the Democrat primary results in West Virginia, between Clinton and Obama, the GOP will have all eyes focused on a special election taking place in Mississippi, and hope to hold on to the seat:

After losing two special elections in conservative-minded districts over the past two months, the GOP is now at risk of losing a seat in the heart of the Deep South — and is pouring all its resources into hanging on to it, including a rare campaign trail appearance by Vice President Cheney on Monday.

A third loss in Tuesday’s 1st District special election would prompt new predictions of electoral doom in November, hurt the party’s already flagging morale and usher in a new round of public finger-pointing among an already fractured GOP leadership.

Southern Democrats, turned off for decades by the party’s liberal-leaning leaders in Washington, seem to be coming home. This special election comes one week after Rep. Don Cazayoux (D-La.) picked up a House seat in the Baton Rouge area that Republicans had held for three decades.

All hands on deck for this race:

President Bush recorded an automated message sent to thousands of districtwide voters. Cheney appeared with Davis on Monday night. Popular Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Wicker campaigned alongside Davis.

Desperate for a win, aides at the NRCC have fired off automated calls from first lady Laura Bush, Arizona Sen. John McCain and Barbour to Mississippi voters to encourage them to turn out.

“In these closing hours, we need to go that extra mile to turn out the vote … and to remind everybody in the 1st District of what’s at stake when they go into the voting booth tomorrow,” Cheney said in his election-eve appearance. “What we need in Washington is a strong conservative congressman from Mississippi — not another Democrat going to bat for Nancy Pelosi.”

But despite the national support — and the fact that this district is one of the safest Republican areas in the nation — Davis is finding himself facing a tougher than expected battle. Childers, a gregarious courthouse official in Prentiss County, has demonstrated widespread appeal among the district’s largely rural population, and has effectively made the race a geographic referendum rather than an ideological one.

Even though a win is a win, this win doesn’t necessary mean the bleeding has stopped for the GOP as we move towards the 2008 elections, but a loss of this seat, piggybacked to the previous 2 losses over the last 2 weeks, certainly sends out red flags that a storm is coming.

This news has pretty much floored me. I mean, no one saw this coming, right?A Democrat controlled social program of taking money from taxpayers and subsidizing schools in troubled areas of New Jersey has led to corruption, misuse of funds, wasteful spending, Federal investigations and State led investigations:

New audits of New Jersey’s most troubled school systems question more than $83 million in spending by the heavily state-subsidized districts — from excessive travel expenses and legal fees to Christmas parties and food.

While 71 percent of all purchase orders examined were found to be “reasonable,” the auditors concluded more than 25 cents of every dollar spent by the districts was unnecessary, excessive or lacking documentation.

The audits looked at all 31 of the state’s neediest school districts — known as “Abbott districts” — which have been coming under increasing fiscal scrutiny in recent years. Overall, the Abbott districts — serving about 275,000 students — spent nearly $4 billion this school year, with about $3.1 billion funded by the state.

One school district, Pleasantville in Atlantic County, is the focus of an ongoing federal criminal investigation, while at least one other, Asbury Park, is being probed by the state Attorney General’s Office, officials confirmed.

Auditors reviewed more than 30,000 purchases totaling nearly $290 million in the 2004-05 and 2005-06 school years — everything from textbook contracts and teaching materials to cell phones and hotel bills — to determine whether amounts spent were excessive, benefited students and were properly approved.

Someone is enjoying the benefits of this program, but it sure ain’t the students.

The speculation is over and the while the watch was on to see what he was going to do, he was called many different names, spoiler among them, now you can add Presidential Candidate to the list:

Former US congressman Bob Barr on Monday announced plans to run for president on the Libertarian Party’s ticket, in a move some analysts say could hurt Republican presumptive nominee John McCain.

“My name is Bob Barr and I’m a candidate for the presidency of the United States of America,” said the former Republican lawmaker, who played a key role in the congressional impeachment of former president Bill Clinton.

Barr said he was running because there was not “currently or anywhere on the horizon” any candidate who understood the principles of fiscal conservatism and basic principles on which he said America was founded.

The former Georgia congressman, who announced his plans at a press conference here, must first win the Libertarian Party’s nomination before throwing himself into the 2008 field for real.

The 59-year-old said he was not concerned about the prospect of damaging McCain, possibly among conservative voters whom the Republican candidate has had trouble courting.

“If Senator McCain … does not succeed in winning the presidency … it will be because Senator McCain did not present, and his party did not present, a vision, an agenda, a platform and a series of programs that actually resonated positively with the American people.”

Can’t argue with any of that. If people are attracted to a Ralph Nader or a Bob Barr candidacy, the fault lies with the other candidates not because Third Parties had the gall to nominate candidates and run.

Even though the field is crowded for the nomination to run for president in the Libertarian Party; with a millionaire sports handicapper and a far left wing former US Senator from Alaska who was lower tier 2008 Democrat presidential candidate among them, Bob Barr should be the front-runner to win the nomination the Libertarian Party Convention in the summer.

You can hear our interview with Bob Barr from 2 weeks ago.

You have to wonder what role, if any, Ron Paul plays in this. With Paul NOT endorsing John McCain, his endorsement could be key for Barr and could lead to a TON of money and millions of supporters from around the Country for Barr.

I wonder if this is over the line just a little:

Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn, an Obama supporter, compared Clinton to the Glenn Close character in “Fatal Attraction” — a spurned woman turned stalker who was apparently drowned in a bathtub only to jump up one more time to be shot dead.

“Glenn Close should have stayed in that tub, and Sen. Clinton has had a remarkable career and needs to move to the next step, which is helping elect the Democratic nominee,” Cohen said during a local TV interview. He later apologized for his comments.

A spurned woman turned stalker, drowned and shot dead?? Are we seeing a meltdown of the Democrat Party unfolding before our eyes?