Erick Erickson's Blog, page 16

Self-Awareness Matters

In politics, self-awareness matters. It does. When I was a political consultant, I told my clients my first two rules. The first was to know when you were in the minority, even when you thought you were right. The second was to know yourself as others see you. Self-awareness matters. Were I to run for the Senate, it would be a terribly nasty campaign. It’d | Read More »

Cliff Diving

Only a fool would think that the same Congress that got us in this mess can get us out of this mess. The fiscal cliff is the byproduct of multiple congressional compromises to kick several different cans down the road. Now they’ve all landed in the same spot. Both sides are trying to kick multiple cans at one time and are kicking each other instead. | Read More »

Update on the RNC Consultants

A short time ago, I talked to Sean Spicer of the RNC. He tells me that Jeff Larson will not be doing the autopsy and, according to Sean, there had been no plans for Larson to do it. He also wanted to make clear that Jeff Larson is fully divested of his interest in FLS Connect. Additionally, he said that FLS Connect and Targeted Victory | Read More »

The Incestuous Bleeding of the Republican Party

If money is the root of all evil, for the Republican Party evil is located on the fifth floor of 66 Canal Center Plaza, Alexandria, VA 22314. Strip away the candidate and coalition and it is on the fifth floor of 66 Canal Center Plaza where the seeds of Mitt Romney’s ruin and the RNC’s get out the vote (GOTV) effort collapsed — bled to | Read More »

Ted Cruz’s First Decision is a Huge Deal

One of the biggest tragedies that befalls new members of congress is the propensity to draw from K Street to pick staff, in particular a Chief of Staff. Many tea party supported candidates came into Washington in a wave of conservative glory in 2010 and promptly chose lobbyists for Chiefs of Staff. On the Senate side, Mitch McConnell’s office was professionally slick in easing new | Read More »

I’m Not Sure What Republicans Stand For in Congress

I was once an elected Republican. There isn’t much that the Republican Party has to do with trash collection, but I was a Republican on the Macon, Georgia City Council and I supported trash collection privatization. It wasn’t the Republican thing to do. It was the conservative thing to do. It was the right thing to do. Multiple times it had been tried and multiple | Read More »

FLS: Screw Up, Lose, and Spin

On January 2, 2009, I wrote about FLS Connect. FLS Connect received over $1 million from the National Republican Campaign Committee in 2008. It was also, back then, the third largest recipient of expenditures from the Republican National Committee, netting around $30 million. As I wrote then, “Rich Beeson is the Political Director of the RNC. Before going to the RNC (and after leaving the | Read More »

Regarding Saxby Chambliss

Saxby Chambliss is waffling around like a dog off its leash for the first time. He says he does not care about a “twenty year old pledge” he signed. He’s talking about the Americans for Tax Reform pledge that says he pledges not to raise taxes. He has clarified his remarks to mean he wants tax reform that increases revenue through job growth. Everyone knows | Read More »

A Primer for Rich Donors Who Got Taken to the Cleaners by Republican Consultants

When consultants told rich donors who were funding them that they were not making money off the Super PAC’s that the rich idiots . . . er . . . donors funded, they were being honest. They probably were not. But ad heavy Super PACs outsourced the ad buys, the mail, the data collection, etc. to other groups that got commissions and you can be | Read More »

I Think CNN.com Badly Mischaracterizes This Site

I tried to ignore this piece at CNN.com by Tom Cohen, but given how it continues to crop up in my inbox from people on both the left and right, I think it is worth responding to. I reached out to my friends and colleagues over at CNN.com to tell them I thought both I and RedState were being badly mischaracterized. While making an edit | Read More »