Category: State

  • Inside Politics

    When I read about the results of the Utah Democratic party chairman’s race I had an interesting thought pop into my head. (Although this article originally ran in the Salt Lake Tribune I am linking to a copy at UtahAmicus because tribune articles eventually expire and disappear.) First, some background. The race for chairman was…

  • Why Bob Bennett?

    I went to the organizing convention for the Utah Republican Party on Saturday. While I was there in the nidst of hundreds of people campaigning for candidates and causes among the state delegates I made a point to talk to a variety of people sporting Bob Bennett t-shirts. With four primary challengers at present it…

  • Second Amendment Victory

    My appreciation for the second amendment just went up another notch. Opponents of gun ownership rights like to argue that guns kill people (for that matter so do hands, cars, T-bone steaks, and many other things) but they never mentioned that gun rights could also kill an illegal house seat for D.C.: Fights over gun…

  • Online Conservative Desert

    I understand that it is a commonly held belief that the political left has more influence in online political activity than the political right. Now we have research by Richard Davis that sheds a bit of light on that. Davis also queried more than 200 journalists to learn how they use blog content in their…

  • Too Little Too Late

    I was not sure whether to gag or chuckle when I heard the news that Senator Bennett wants to prevent the use of TARP money for the auto industry. To me that just sounds like he’s shutting the barn doors after the cows have escaped while insisting that there’s nothing wrong with leaving the stalls…

  • The Huntsman News

    By Monday afternoon this is, of course, old news but if you visited here you must have been at least marginally interested in my opinion on the fallout from Huntsman being tapped to become the ambassador to China. First of all, I think that Bob Bernick captured the essence of the Big Utah Political Picture…

  • A Huge (but Pleasant) Surprise

    Every once in a while I check where this blog might be ranked in the BlogNetNews Weekly Influence Index of Utah political blogs. The list has been published weekly for the last 20 months and I used to watch it every week to see where I was ranked. I always felt good whenever I was…

  • Pre-Announcement

    Looks like Mark Shurtleff just made an accidental pre-announcement about running against Senator Bennett: Of course what his choice is should be a surprise to nobody. I thought it interesting that he’s talking up how much he will be raising. My first thought was that he must be trying to scare off any competitors. Of…

  • Hoping History Holds

    Nobody with a political pulse in Utah could be surprised at the news that Sens. Bennett and Hatch plan to run again, especially considering that they both have their campaign websites up and running already (yes, even Hatch for 2012). I have often been discouraged by the assertions of a trusted friend that Hatch is…

  • How Very Ironic

    When I attended the breakfast meeting with Senator Bennett, he mentioned Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, and Arlen Specter – the three Republicans to support the Obama bailout bill – as "the three predictable crossover voters." I found it very ironic to read the results of a poll of Democratic Senators: In fact, Hatch ranks No.…