Live blogging the US Sen. race, the CPAC, P5 edition

After languishing in the shadows of the Republican presidential race, the U.S. Senate race just took center stage at Conservative Public Action Conference and the Republican Party of Florida Presidency 5 event this morning.

First up at CPAC: Adam Hasner, the former Republican leader in the Florida House, a post he was given by former House Speaker and current Sen. Marco Rubio, whom Hasner invoked to much applause in the first 30 seconds of his 15 minute speech.

"He called me the most partisan Republican in Tallahassee. He meant it as a compliment. The mainstream media tried to make it an insult. I made it a badge of honor," Hasner said.

Hasner soon took a subtle shot at opponent George LeMieux, the former right hand mand of Charlie Crist, the Republican-turned-independent governor who lost to Rubio last year. Before Obama took the reins of power, Hasner said, "the establishment in the Republican Party was saying the best way for Republicans to beat the Democrats was to be more like them. I didn’t buy into that philosophy."

Hasner,, however, made himself sound like more of an opponent to the establishment and Charlie Crist than he was. As this story of ours shows,Hasner also supported a watered-down climate-change law that the Legislature now wants to repeal. And he voted for a budget with $2.2 billion in tax and fee increases and billions more in federal stimulus money. He also favored high-speed rail and SunRail, which tea party activists came to abhor. Though he privately mocked and fought Crist behind the scenes at times, Hasner also boasted of working with the governor on the federal stimulus program.

Hasner spoke forcefully at CPAC, garnering wild applause for his shots at Obama.

"The Obama administration doesn't have a messaging problem. They have a policy problem. They are waging class warfare," Hasner said, noting he has been a lifelong Republican despite being the son of two liberal Jews from New York.

http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2011/09/live-blogging-the-us-sen-race-the-cpac-p5-edition.html

"Life as a Republican isn’t easy," Hasner said. "Being a pro-life pro-second amendment conservative from Boca Raton hasn’t made it any easier." 

NYT: Obama rebuffed as American influence wanes

UNITED NATIONS — A last-ditch American effort to head off a Palestinian bid for membership in the United Nations faltered. President Obama tried to qualify his own call, just a year ago, for a Palestinian state. And President Nicolas Sarkozy of France stepped forcefully into the void, with a proposal that pointedly repudiated Mr. Obama’s approach. 
Bailey Comment: What was that saying about the dog (France) that bites the hand that feeds it! http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44624040/ns/world_news-the_new_york_times/

I know how to create jobs!

Fire all of the politicians and replace them with the laid off, out of money, out of work average American. Americans that could take care of their families on $50,000 a year. Why do we elect career politicians that are whining about they're only making $600,000 a year. Duh!!

Obamateurism of the Day

http://hotair.com/archives/2011/09/21/obamateurism-of-the-day-596/

Who will eclipse America?

According to Voltaire, the Roman Empire fell “because all things fall.” It is hard to argue with this as a general statement about decline: nothing lasts forever. But it is also not very useful. In thinking, for example, about American predominance in the world today, it would be nice to know when it will decline, and whether the United States can do anything to postpone the inevitable.

Contemporary commenters despaired of the Roman Empire for several hundred years before it finally collapsed. Could America find its way to a similar extension?

In terms of providing an essential structure for discussion of this problem, Arvind Subramanian’s new book, Eclipse: Living in the Shadow of China’s Economic Dominance, is a major contribution. (Full disclosure: Subramanian and I are colleagues at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and we have worked together on other issues.)

In particular, Subramanian develops an index of economic dominance that should become a focus of conversation anywhere that people want to think about changes in world economic leadership. There is no need to know any economics in order to be fascinated by this book: it is about power, pure and simple.

The basic facts are incontrovertible. The United Kingdom was the world’s dominant economic power from the rise of industrialization in the early nineteenth century. But it lost its predominance and was gradually eclipsed by the US, which, at least since 1945, has been the undisputed leader among market-based economies.http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/09/20/who-will-eclipse-america/

Job Wars / other side of the nickel

One week after President Obama addressed a joint session of Congress and proposed the American Jobs Act, House Speaker John Boehner responded for the Republicans. Not with a plan to address the U.S. jobs' crisis, but with conservative talking points that indicate how difficult it will be to pass meaningful legislation.

The Problem: The two Parties disagree on the origin of the crisis. In his September 8th addressObama indicated the crisis resulted from erosion of America's social compact: "[belief] in a country where everyone gets a fair shake and does their fair share -- where if you stepped up, did your job, and were loyal to your company, that loyalty would be rewarded with a decent salary and good benefits."http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-burnett/boehner-jobs-act_b_968381.html

How Privatized Social Security Works in Galveston

 GALVESTON — Gov. Rick Perry has repeatedly called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme” and said that people ought to control their own retirement money. But if the social safety net program created in 1935 were eliminated — something President Eisenhower once said would be a politically stupid move — what might take its place? Go to the link and get the facts before saying no way! http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/18/us/how-privatized-social-security-works-in-galveston.html?_r=1