SAFE cost Byron Brown #2 spot
Interesting bit in this article from the Buffalo News:
“… The Buffalo mayor [Byron Brown] has taken great pains over the years to maintain his spot on the Conservative line, even losing a party primary to new best friend Kevin Helfer in 2005. Brown can only wonder what might have been without that “C” behind his name. His reluctance to embrace Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s SAFE Act gun control law may have very well cost him a shot at becoming lieutenant governor last year …”
The fallout from SAFE will go on for years and years.
Poughkeepsie press conference
I attended a press conference outside Poughkeepsie City Hall in opposition to a proposed mandatory firearms storage law.
In the picture are, left to right:
- 4th Ward Councilman Lee David Klein
- 9th District Dutchess County Legislator Gwen C. Johnson
- NYSRPA Tom King
- 105th Assemblyman Kieran Lalor
- City of Poughkeepise Mayor John Tkazyik
Hillary announces, Cuomo evaporates
Hillary Clinton has kicked off her Presidential campaign.
“… Clinton, the first to enter the Democratic presidential field, enters the race as the prohibitive favorite for the nomination … A CNN/ORC International poll in March found that Clinton held a 50-point lead over her closest competitor, Vice President Joe Biden. What’s more, the three Democrats most actively teasing a presidential run — former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, former Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia and independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont — all received no more than 3% support among Democrats and independents that lean Democratic …”
Where’s Governor Cuomo in all this? According to their poll, he went from 1% in December to N/A in March.
Guess Democrats weren’t as impressed with him being a national leader on gun control as much as Andrew thought they would be.
They never learn
I have seen this many times before:
“… “Every time a Democrat starts talking about guns, they lose numbers because it is the Second Amendment,” said Dave “Mudcat” Saunders, a Democratic strategist and lifelong gun owner. “How many gun owners are there in America now? Look it up. There is a bunch of them, and anytime you start talking about guns, you are going to take from your numbers. So there is just less talk [about gun control] now than there has been in forever.” …”
The problem here is that while Democrats aren’t talking about gun control, that does not mean they have given up on the idea.
“… Gun control groups, powered by potentially tens of millions of dollars from former New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, vow to press the issue and force candidates to take a stand …”
Who was the last Democrat to listen to Bloomberg? Governor Cuomo. The result of him listening to Bloomberg effectively ended his presidential aspirations.
Will Hillary (and others) learn from this? I wouldn’t count on it.
Rand Paul running for President
Senator Rand Paul officially announced he is running for the 2016 GOP nomination for President.
I like the guy too, but as with Ted Cruz, he’s got to show early on that he has the ability to raise serious money. He also needs to keep the crackpots his father attracted away from the campaign.
Top Republican challengers to Schumer
From Fred Dicker’s column in the Post, “Top Republican candidates to challenge Chuck Schumer“:
“Three sitting congressmen and the newly chosen Manhattan GOP chairwoman are on a short list of potential Republican challengers to Sen. Charles Schumer next year, The Post has learned. Two of the congressmen, both from upstate, are pro-choice and pro-gay-marriage, making them exceptions in a socially conservative New York party but also making them “promising’’ as statewide contenders, said a knowledgeable Republican activist …”
Not our issues.
“… The third congressman, Rep. Peter King of Nassau County, is conservative on social issues but is also a high-profile critic of some of the GOP’s most prominent national conservative activists … While King, 71, has toyed with the possibility of mounting a presidential campaign himself, he’s demonstrated little popularity with the national GOP base and is widely seen as unlikely to do so. “I really think King might be interested in going after Schumer,’’ the GOP activist contended …”
Pete King is a major league antigun RINO asshole.
“… Adele Malpass, wife of former New York Senate hopeful and Reagan and George H.W. Bush official David Malpass, took over the long-struggling Manhattan, or New York County, GOP Committee in December, and is touted as having a promising future. She’s also a social liberal with considerable financial resources, but she told The Post that she’s not interested in running next year …”
Dear God, No. She’d make Pete King look like an attractive alternative.
“… The two socially liberal congressmen are Chris Gibson, of Kinderhook, who recently announced that he’ll leave Congress after next year, and Richard Hanna of Utica …”
Gibson is my Congressman. I don’t have a problem with him. Hanna I’ve only spoken to on the phone. I don’t know his full record, but on guns he has been supportive.
Bottom line is either Gibson or Hanna would be an improvement over the incumbent.
“… While GOP insiders concede that defeating the long-tenured Schumer, who is now in line to succeed the retiring Harry Reid and become the next Senate Democratic leader, would be difficult, they point to polls showing President Obama with a negative rating among New York Jewish voters and the strong upstate showing last fall of Republican gubernatorial hopeful Rob Astorino as offering hope to a Schumer challenger …”
Say what you want about him, but Chuck Schumer is one of the best politicians out there. I don’t agree with him on much, but in the art of politicking, manipulating the public and media, bullshitting and ass-kissing, nobody is better than Chuck. That is why he has been so successful and why he’d be tough to beat.
Sarah Brady dead
Good riddance. She was a horrible person.
From a political standpoint, it doesn’t matter. While the Brady Campaign will continue on without her they have long since been eclipsed by Mayor Bloomberg and his proxies at Everytown.
Wasting money
Rich, antigun crackpot shows how to waste money:
“The Newton nonprofit that for two decades sponsored the eye-grabbing billboard along the Massachusetts Turnpike that inveighed against gun violence is promising to keep that message fresh in the minds of motorists with a new series of targeted ads. Beginning Tuesday, Stop Handgun Violence will be “saturating” highway signs at three-dozen locations across the state, an interim solution until cofounder John Rosenthal finalizes construction of the Fenway Center complex over the turnpike …”
These billboards have been up for decades. What have they accomplished?
“… Jim Wallace, executive director of the Gun Owners’ Action League, the state affiliate of the National Rifle Association, laughed at the words and imagery used for the billboard when a reporter described it … Wallace called Rosenthal’s turnpike billboard an “eyesore,” and said it hasn’t amounted to anything in the 20 years since it was installed. He expects the same could be said about Rosenthal’s latest push. “The billboards are ineffective. I don’t think they have any effect at all, and I don’t think they’ve had any effect on firearm safety in general,” he said …”
Exactly. A small gun group tried that in New York with similar billboards calling for repeal of the SAFE Act. The result? Tens of thousands of dollars wasted and nothing to show for it.
Still overpriced
A follow-up to my previous post on why the Daily News is losing money, Reuters reports, “Cablevision to make $1 offer for New York Daily News“:
“U.S. cable T.V. operator Cablevision Systems Corp is planning to make an offer for the New York Daily News as early as this week, valuing the troubled tabloid at just $1, according to a person familiar with the matter. The offer would come one month after New York media and real estate magnate Mortimer Zuckerman said he was considering selling the newspaper and had hired Lazard Ltd to assist with the process. It underscores the declining readership and plunging advertising revenue that have plagued the tabloid for years. Cablevision’s $1 bid takes into account the New York Daily News’ reported $30 million annual loss and $150 million investment in a printing press, and declining circulation that relies heavily on newsstand sales rather than on subscriptions, the source said …”
Perhaps sales would not be an issue for the paper if they stopped attacking gun rights, among other things.