John McCain Bold Leadership

With the markets in turmoil and a bill and a bailout package up for debate in Congress, Senator McCain has suspended his campaign and returned to Washington to work on the bill. Last night prior to Senator McCain's decision to return to Washington ABC's George Stephanopoulos reported,

ABC News' George Stephanopoulos reports: If Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain doesn't vote for the Bush administration's $700 billion economic bailout plan, some Republican and Democratic congressional leaders tell ABC News the plan won't pass.

"If McCain doesn't come out for this, it's over," a Top House Republican tells ABC News.

A Democratic leadership source says that White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten has been told that
Democratic votes will not be there if McCain votes no -- that there is no deal if McCain doesn't go along.

With the ball in Senator McCain's court, and concerns about the President's current proposal, Senator McCain is heading back to Washington. The debates and future campaign events are in limbo, as this bold decision has put a priority on the economic package.

Bold Leadership from John McCain

Al Franken: Unfit For Office

Bill Smith, ARRA Editor: Al Franken says "I'm very proud of my career." What exactly is Franken proud of? His rape jokes? His foul mouth? His anger? His racist porn? His porn-o-rama?Rape jokes, porn and foul-mouthed anger do not make for "good training" for the United States Senate. More at http://www.FranklyFranken.com

Udall's Day Off & Broken Promise Hurt All Americans

The blockbuster broken promise of the year. In a debate last week, Rep. Mark Udall promised he'd vote to keep Congress in session to address the energy crisis, but two days later he broke that promise -- in fact, he didn't even show up for the vote. Mark Udall goes on a five week vacation while the rest of Colorado pays. Now, he wants to be Senator.

Kick Udall to the curb. He can't be trusted and Colorado deserves better. VOTE FOR Bob Schaffer of U.S. Senator

Virginia GOP picks Senate nominee, Congressional races about to start

Hello everyone!

Before I begin, let me do a quick introduction. I'm a sophomore student at George Mason University in Fairfax majoring in Government. I serve on the Executive Board of the GMU College Republicans. In addition to my writings here, I also write for GMU CR's blog, and the VA CR Blog. 

I hope you enjoy my writings.

Now that the introduction is out of the way, let's get to work shall we?

Last weekend The Virginia GOP elected a new Chairman and picked the Republican nominee to face Democrat Mark Warner this fall. They narrowly elected Former Governor Jim Gilmore in a close race between him and Delegate Bob Marshall. They also elected Jeff Frederick over current Chairman John Hager (father of Henry Hager). It is understandable that Frederick beat Hager. After all, after three years of failed elections, the higher ups normally get blamed. In my own opinion, Gilmore's name recognition helped him out some, yet the election was a lot closer than some would have liked.

It has been a tough few years for Virginia. (For more info on Virginia as a new "battle ground" state, check out the blog Battle Ground States '08 to see my upcoming posts on Virginia.) Just to give you an idea of how bad its been for Virginia, let me go over the last three election in VA. In 2005, the GOP lost the Governor's mansion for for a second term again. In 2006, Jim Webb defeated first term Senator George Allen in a hard fought election. Democrats are getting smart in VA in nominating moderate and conservative Democrats in order to win. In 2007, the GOP lost control of the State Senate, while only narrowly holding on to the House of Delegates.

The vote total was 5,222 for Gilmore and 5,156 for Marshall. Gilmore, a popular Governor has a lot of work to do, starting with holding on to his base. Strong pro-lifers are slightly dissatisfied with him, as he does agree with abortion in the early stages of pregnancy. As Governor, he successfully passed legislation that banned partial birth abortion.

In current polls, Gilmore is loosing heavily to Warner. However, there is some good news. In every campaign that Gilmore won, he was an underdog by a wide margin and did a quick turn-around to win. Also, Warner's broken promises, tax hikes, and failed transportation bills promise to be good campaign material.  For more on Warner's broken promises, click here.

While I will talk about all of VA's upcoming races in this blog, I will probably focus the majority of my time on VA's Senate race and the Congressional Races of Northern Virginia, which consist of the 8th, 10th, and 11th districts. 

On Tuesday, the the 8th district of VA will hold its GOP primary. Two candidates are running: Amit Singh and Mark Ellmore. Whoever wins will face Democratic incumbent Jim Moran. I'll post the results here Tuesday night. This could also be interesting for Moran. He is being challenged in a primary- a sign that Democrats are starting to get tired of him. This could help the GOP this fall.