| Morning Jolt
. . . with Jim Geraghty August 12, 2013 Why the Cuccinelli vs. McAuliffe Race Matters to You, Even If You Don't Live in Virginia First, does anyone want to argue that Ken Cuccinelli–Virginia's attorney general, and the current GOP candidate for governor – is not a conservative? - Led the legal challenge to Obamacare.
- Defended Arizona's immigration-enforcement statute.
- Filed legal challenges to the EPA's findings on greenhouse gases being a threat to human health and thus an emission they have the authority to regulate.
- Supports right to life from conception until death, supported and pushed several pro-life bills while in the state legislature.
- Endorsed by the NRA.
We can examine his record further, but that gives you the gist. So if you're one of those folks who believes that Mitt Romney was a RINO squish, and that Republicans always lose when they nominate RINO squishes, then you really, really, really need Ken Cuccinelli to win this year. If Ken Cuccinelli – Mr. Conservative Record – loses against a flawed competitor like Terry McAuliffe, in a purple state like Virginia . . . and simultaneously, Governor Hug-Obama-After-a-Hurricane-and-Move-Left wins in a landslide up in New Jersey . . . the message to the rest of the Republican party will be pretty clear. What you fervently believe – conservatives win, moderate squishes lose – will be refuted in the eyes of many Republicans. Proud conservatives like to believe that their like-minded grassroots voters are, collectively, like a sleeping giant; they merely need to be awakened by the right candidate to transform into an unparalleled, unstoppable electoral force. Perhaps Cuccinelli and the African-American Christian minister running as the Republicans' candidate for lieutenant governor, E. W. Jackson , will indeed be swept into office by that sleeping giant. Right now, most of Virginia's big-time politics watchers think Jackson is a joke and an albatross to Cuccinelli. If the conservative grassroots are indeed a sleeping giant, so far they're hitting the "snooze" button on this race. At least through mid-summer, Cuccinelli's fundraising is pretty "meh," and he's going up against an opponent who will have roughly  dollars. Cuccinelli, 44, had $2.7 million in cash as of the end of June, compared with $6 million for McAuliffe, 56, the former national Democratic Party chairman and fundraiser. While McAuliffe had been expected to out-raise Cuccinelli, the Republican is lagging behind where McDonnell was at this point in his 2009 race, when he had $4.9 million in cash on hand. What, national conservatives, the stakes aren't high enough? You don't feel sufficiently invested in the success of Cuccinelli in November? Okay, then think of the Terry McAuliffe 2013 campaign as a dress rehearsal for the Hillary Clinton 2016 effort. Because that's how the McAuliffe team sees themselves: "She hasn't said anything about 2016, but Terry McAuliffe's 2013 gubernatorial campaign is serving as a testing ground for Clinton's clout, operatives and donors. . . . The success or failure of McAuliffe's campaign is a chance to measure Clinton's strength and organization in a critical state that now rivals Ohio as the pivotal swing state for winning a presidential election. In fact, McAuliffe and some of his top allies have suggested to big donors and consultants that supporting his campaign is a way to get in on the ground floor of Hillary 2016, several donors and operatives told POLITICO." And now she's holding a fundraiser for him September 30. McAuliffe wants to attach himself to her just as the campaign is really heating up and the low-information voters tune in. 
Donor maintenance. If McAuliffe wins, the Hillary-is-inevitable overtures in the media will become even louder and more insufferable. And if Cuccinelli loses to Hillary's grating huckster buddy, a lot of movers and shakers in GOP circles will conclude there's no way a pro-life, pro-gun, tough-on-immigration, anti-Obamacare, down-the-line conservative will beat Hillary herself in a must-win state like Virginia. Now that I've started your Monday with a disturbing thought . . . here's the latest turn in that campaign: Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli found himself hawking The New York Times to hundreds of supporters in Chesterfield County on Saturday as the Republican gubernatorial nominee sought to exploit new revelations about political influence to help a company that his Democratic opponent co-founded. "I would not normally urge anyone to buy The New York Times," Cuccinelli quipped to about 200 people at the Sheraton Richmond Park South during a nearly two hour "chat" on politics and public policy. The front-page story on Saturday featured concerns raised by the president of GreenTech Automotive, a company that Democratic gubernatorial nominee Terry McAuliffe helped found and lead, about the role the company's former chairman played in using his political connections to help the startup business. "I learned a lot of things," Charles Wang, GreenTech's president, said in an interview with the Times. "Politicians or people with political backgrounds are dangerous to business." Cuccinelli pounced on details in the story about McAuliffe's role in GreenTech, including a meeting he reportedly arranged with federal officials through the office of Vice President Joe Biden to talk about approval of special visas for Chinese investors in the clean-car company. "It certainly appears McAuliffe has not been truthful about using his political connections to seek and receive special treatment at the highest levels of the Obama administration," Cuccinelli said in a written statement Saturday. Maybe GreenTech Automotive turns into the game-changer the Cuccinelli campaign has needed – it's not like anybody's shocked by Terry McAuliffe's working secret deals to help out wealthy friends and high-level government officials. Conflict-of-interest isn't something he does; it's who he is. Oh, Lois Lerner. What Are We Going to Do With You? On the cruise, one of my questions began, "I don't want to be accused of demonizing anyone, but there's a key question around Lois Lerner: Is she the devil or merely a servant of the devil?" The latest from our Eliana Johnson: E-mail correspondence unearthed by the House Ways and Means Committee reveals that Lois Lerner, the figure at the center of the scandal, may have committed a felony by divulging information about a conservative group to the Federal Election Commission, in an incident that dates back at least to 2008, before President Obama took office. Though some conservatives have eagerly sought evidence that Obama's White House instigated the IRS's targeting of tea-party groups, the latest evidence suggests that an anti-conservative bias may instead be an endemic feature of the federal bureaucracy. And now, an FEC official is raising the specter of systemic bias at that agency, too, calling the techniques its lawyers employ a "much more sophisticated way" of discriminating against conservative groups than those used by the IRS. "When we spoke last July, you had told us that the American Future Fund had not received an exemption letter from the IRS," an FEC attorney wrote in a February 2009 e-mail to Lerner. But Section 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code provides that both "return information" and "taxpayer return information" are strictly confidential. An IRS source tells National Review Online that, within the agency, disclosing the information that Lerner appears to have provided is considered "a violation of Section 6103." Hey, At Least He's Not Getting Eaten. Ladies and gentleman, our president: Rooms have to be found for dozens of Secret Service agents, someone has to carry a selection of presidential basketballs, and of course the family dog needs his own state-of-the-art aircraft. Arriving in the idyllic coastal retreat of Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts, Mr Obama left behind him in Washington DC high profile debates over the budget, government surveillance and his health care reforms. Instead, he will spend the next eight days playing golf, going to the beach, and buying books from the Bunch of Grapes bookstore. In the air he swapped his suit and tie for khakis and a blue shirt with rolled-up sleeves, while Mrs Obama wore a yellow-and-white summer dress. Bo, the president's Portuguese Water Dog, arrived separately on one of two MV-22 Ospreys, a hybrid aircraft which takes off like a helicopter but flies like a plane. It was the first time the Ospreys have been taken on holiday by a US president. If you're wondering, "Hey, how much does that cost us?". . . "By 2010, air readiness rates for the V-22 rose 28 percent, while maintenance costs, as measured by cost per flight hour, fell 19 percent to $9,520 per hour." I suppose we should be thankful Bo doesn't have some sort of "Dog Force One" Gulfstream of his own. 
Probably still cheaper than flying Bo in an Osprey. Barbara McMahon notes Ambassador Chris Stevens and the other Americans in Benghazi sure could have used an Osprey last September 11. In our world of righty-blog readers, this will be a big deal; in lefty-blog-reader world, it will be the Missouri State Fair's rodeo clown wearing an Obama mask. Because as you know, this is the first time anyone has ever mocked a sitting president. Oh, You Mean Those Payments Cory Booker Forgot to Disclose! The gap between Cory Booker's reputation and Booker's actual record is pretty breathtaking. There's only a short time before the Democratic primary, and in the general election in October (yes, October) Booker is probably going to run over Steve Lonegan like a Mack truck. But not disclosing payments from folks with business before his city government ought to give voters some pause, right? Cory Booker pocketed "confidential" annual payouts from his former law firm while serving as Newark mayor. Booker, the front-runner in New Jersey's Senate race, received five checks from the Trenk DiPasquale law firm from 2007 until 2011. During that time, the firm raked in more than $2 million in fees from local agencies over which Booker has influence. . . . Booker did not list Trenk DiPasquale as a source of income on the financial-disclosure report he filed as a Senate candidate in May. One part asks for a listing of compensation of more than $5,000 paid by one source for services provided from 2011 to 2013. Griffis claimed Booker did not have to list his 2011 payment from the law firm because "it was not compensation for services rendered. It was a return of equity." Booker quit the firm Oct. 31, 2006. Since 2007, the firm has raked in at least $1,287,639 in legal fees from Newark's Housing Authority, $554,663 from a local wastewater agency, and $212,318 from the Newark Watershed, records show. Why does everybody love this guy? (sigh) "Forget it. It's New Jersey, Jake." ADDENDUM: Our Charlie Cooke: "The 'I don't care what you say and here is a 2,000 word email to explain why' genre is a truly bizarre one."
NRO Digest — August 12, 2013 Today on National Review Online . . . To read more, visit www.nationalreview.com
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