Wal-Mart Wins Supreme Court Sex Discrimination Case

This is huge.

At New York Times, "Justices Rule for Wal-Mart in Bias Case."

And at Althouse, "'The Supreme Court on Monday blocked a massive sex discrimination lawsuit against Wal-Mart on behalf of women who work there'":

I hope the GOP candidates for President are smart and articulate enough to use this case in their argument against electing the Democratic President to a second term.

Word.

Rick Perry Energizes Conservatives in New Orleans

I just don't that much about him, so we'll see.

There's video at RealClearPolitics, and he sounds great. Love the accent.

And at CNN, "Perry wows at Republican conference amid 2012 buzz" (via Memeorandum).

As speculation mounts about his presidential ambitions, Texas Gov. Rick Perry delivered a rousing and unapologetic defense of conservative principles on Saturday at the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans.

Perry repeatedly brought an audience of hundreds of Republican activists to their feet with a small government message reminiscent of the one that helped him win an unprecedented third term as governor last November.

Perry said there is "too much spending, too much interfering and too much apologizing" in Washington.

"Stand up!," Perry thundered. "Let's speak with pride about our morals and our values and redouble our effort to elect more conservative Republicans. Let's stop this American downward spiral!"

See also New Orleans Times-Picayune, "Rick Perry sounds every bit a candidate at Republican Leadership Conference." (More at Memeorandum.)

VIDEO: Actor Reggie Brown, Obama Impersonator, Pulled From Stage at Republican Leadership Conference

I've never been comfortable with this kind of humor. A couple of jokes might be funny, but a whole routine is extreme. And whoever thought it was a good idea hiring this guy for a GOP presidential straw poll should ... well, I'll let readers finish the sentiment. Just plain stupid. Man.

At Washington Post, "Obama impersonator pulled offstage after making racial, gay jokes at GOP gathering" (via Memeorandum):

Additional video here, via Balloon Juice.

Again, the political stupidity boggles the mind.

Sarah Palin to Announce Candidacy Next Week?

There's a lot of speculation, stemming from Robert Stacy McCain's entry at American Spectator, "Palin Decision Expected Next Week."

The New York Times picked that up as a news item: "Is Sarah Palin Running for President?" And there's a huge buzz at Memeorandum. And I like the headline at Wizbang, "Rumor-Mongering: Sarah Palin Makes Her Presidential Decision Next Week?"

And of course McCain's milking it: "Thanks, Rush!:

One of the difficult things about reporting on Sarah Palin is that only Sarah Palin can speak for Sarah Palin, and she only talks to Fox News. So if you’re a reporter who doesn’t work for Fox News, you have to get what you can get where you can get it. Before I filed that brief report at the Spectator this morning, I made a call to try to confirm it with Palin’s people. But I guess if you don’t work for Fox News, they don’t take your call.

So damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

Michele Bachmann Jumps Into 2012 White House Race

Wednesday night's interview with Sean Hannity:

Debate Boosts Bachmann

Stokin'.

At USA Today, "Debate showing elevates Bachmann to higher tier":

"This is really her first introduction to the voters of New Hampshire and I think she made a really good impression," says Kevin Smith, executive director of a conservative advocacy group, Cornerstone Action, which is affiliated with the Tea Party movement. "Most people thought maybe she was just a clone of Sarah Palin, and what I think they saw was that she was more articulate than Palin is and probably has a better grasp of the issues."

Also, at ABC News, "Coming Off Strong Debate Michele Bachmann Takes the High Road."

Michele Bachmann Enters Presidential Race

At Bloomberg, "Tea Party Favorite Bachmann Enters Republican Presidential Race."

And New York Times, "Bachmann Announces Presidential Candidacy."

GOP Presidential Debate in New Hampshire (VIDEO)

Bachmann hit a home run, and Romney did well too. See National Journal, "EXCLUSIVE: Political Insiders Give Debate Nod to Romney, Bachmann" (via Memeorandum). Bachmann looked extremely well prepared and on point, and her announcement that she filed papers for a presidential run was a PR coup. I'll update with more information and links to additional commentary throughout the day.

Pawlenty Defends Economic Plan on Fox News Sunday

With Chris Wallace:

PREVIOUSLY: "Tim Pawlenty's Economic Speech at University of Chicago, June 7, 2011."

L.A. Times: California GOP Must Reinvent Itself to Survive

See, "To Survive, State GOP Must Reinvent Itself":

With the unveiling of the state's new political boundaries last week, California Republicans are contemplating their very survival: Without a course correction, they could be headed for the wilderness.

Drawn for the first time by an independent commission instead of Sacramento insiders, the proposed new voting maps suggest the GOP could lose as many as five seats in Congress. Moreover, Democrats may be positioned to win two-thirds of the state Legislature, potentially robbing the minority party of its ability to block tax increases, the last vestige of its governing power in the state Capitol.

Between now and next year's elections, Republicans must scramble to reinvent themselves, recruit more moderate candidates and find common ground with more Californians if they are to be at all relevant in Golden State politics, according to independent experts and partisan analysts alike. Then voters in the considerable number of new swing districts that the maps show could opt to elect moderate Republicans just as easily as centrist Democrats.

There's more, but you get the drift.

It's almost comical. Here's the Los Angeles Times, still a respectable paper, but hopelessly left-wing, arguing that the state's GOP should be moving left, becoming more moderate than it already is. And that's after 7 years of Arnold Schwarzenegger, who did virtually nothing to repair the state's battered fiscal existence. And for decades we've had surging immigration, especially illegal immigration from Mexico and Latin America, that has formed a steady supply of future Democratic Party voters. And for what? Much of California is run down and governed like a Third World kleptocracy. Recall that I was briefly in a funk after last November's election. I spoke semi-seriously about relocating out of state. And I might be dropping the "semi" over the next few years as I approach retirement. Communists are everywhere. Moral bankruptcy and rampant corruption fill the schools, and unions are fiscally bankrupting that state. That's not to say there aren't lots of conservatives, but as the Times points out, they won't have much of a voice in government if trends continue. I'll have more on this. My sense is that right-wing activists have to keep doing what they're doing, and work on mobilizing newcomers to the state, and young people, to conservative values. And then encourage these people to hold the state's GOP accountable to limited government principles. There's no other way, really, short of pulling up the drawbridge to stem the tide of illegal immigration's revolving door and the permanent radical voting block that's consolidating. It's ridiculous.

RELATED: At New York Times, "Redistricting Offers Republicans Few Gains in 2012."

Tim Pawlenty's Economic Speech at University of Chicago, June 7, 2011

The complete text is at Wall Street Journal. And check the report at Los Angeles Times, "Tim Pawlenty slams Obama on economy."

He makes some radical proposals, a constitutional amendment to balance the budget and temporary emergency executive authority to freeze federal spending. He also offers a familiar list of economic proposals, like an aggressive flat tax and a restructuring of the tax system, eliminating a number of taxes, from capital gains to inheritance taxes. I listened to the whole thing, but check the text if you're short on time. He's a very gracious and polite man. I'm learning more about him, and he's hitting hard against the administration, calling out President Obama for his anti-Americanism and rejection of American exceptionalism. That's good to hear. I'm interested to see how Pawlenty does in the Iowa straw poll coming up, especially since Mitt Romney's not attending. He's also the former governor of Minnesota, so that will make for some interesting exchanges with Michele Bachmann (a congresswoman from Minnesota) if she enters the race, and I think she will.

Wall Street Journal Weekend Interview: Michele Bachmann, 'On the Beach, I Bring von Mises'

I think Bachmann gains the most by Romney's decision to skip the Iowa straw poll in Ames, but we'll see.

And from Stephen Moore's interview:

"If I'm in, I'll be all in," says Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, artfully dodging my question of whether she's running for president. Given that she just hired campaign strategist Ed Rollins, whose past clients include Ross Perot and Mike Huckabee, rumors abound. "We're getting close," she says, "and if I do run, like all my races, I will work like a maniac."

That's pretty much how she does everything, and it helps explain how the relatively junior congresswoman has become a tea party superstar—and uniquely adept at driving liberals bonkers.

After spending a good part of two days with her in Washington as she scurries from one appointment to another, I have no doubt that Ms. Bachmann will announce her presidential bid soon. And it would be a mistake to count her out: She's defied the prognosticators in nearly every race she's run since thrashing an 18-year incumbent in the Minnesota Senate by 20 points in 2000. Says Iowa Congressman Steve King, "No one has electrified Iowa crowds like Michelle has."

Ms. Bachmann is best known for her conservative activism on issues like abortion, but what I want to talk about today is economics. When I ask who she reads on the subject, she responds that she admires the late Milton Friedman as well as Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams. "I'm also an Art Laffer fiend—we're very close," she adds. "And [Ludwig] von Mises. I love von Mises," getting excited and rattling off some of his classics like "Human Action" and "Bureaucracy." "When I go on vacation and I lay on the beach, I bring von Mises."

RTWT at the link.

She needs to fire Ed Rollins before making a formal announcement. I doubt it's a good thing to be going negative on potential opponents before you've even thrown your hat in the ring. And Palin won't take that stuff sitting down. I like both of these women. My preference ordering is Palin first, Bachmann second. After that I'm still undecided. Thus whatever happens, should they both be candidates for the nomination, we could see some ugliness among two of the top tea party favorites. But that's politics.

RELATED: At Legal Insurrection, "Michele Bachmann Needs To Dump Ed Rollins Now."

Signs of Rising Momentum for Herman Cain

I met him briefly at CPAC. Robert Stacy McCain was already pumping up his candidacy. And perhaps to good effect. See New York Times, "A G.O.P. Hopeful Gathers Momentum as More Voters Like What They Hear." (At Memeorandum.)

MANCHESTER, N.H. — Michele Bachmann was campaigning just north of here, the Sarah Palin tour was rumored to be arriving soon, and Mitt Romney was on his way to announce his entry into the presidential race.

Yet here was another voter swooning for Herman Cain.

“I watched you at the Republican debate, and I have to be honest, I’d never heard of you, but ever since that. ...” said Nathan Lyons, 29, his voice trailing off wistfully. “You say it like it is.”

Joan Silvernail, 68, pumped Mr. Cain’s hand, then turned to her husband. “It’s his enthusiasm,” she said. “Wasn’t that what we felt with Ronald Reagan, his enthusiasm?”

Those not frequenting Tea Party rallies or the living rooms and coffee shops of New Hampshire and Iowa might dismiss Mr. Cain, a talk radio host and former chief executive of Godfather’s Pizza, as a frivolous candidate — “the pizza guy” as some call him.

But there are signs of what Mr. Cain, in his booming baritone, calls “Old Man Mo — Momentum!”

A Gallup poll released last week showed Mr. Cain with the highest voter intensity score of any Republican presidential contender — far higher than Ms. Palin, a former governor of Alaska, or Mr. Romney, a former governor of Massachusetts. While Mr. Cain’s name recognition was at 37 percent, it had risen 16 points since March.

Many pundits and voters declared him the winner of the first Republican debate last month. And he won the straw polls at the Tea Party Patriots convention in February and the Conservative Values Conference in Iowa in March.

If few people think Mr. Cain can win the nomination, he is satisfying voters’ desire to fall in love with a candidate. Their passion for him says as much about what the Republican field is lacking as it does about any specifics he is offering.

RELATED: At Daley Gator, "Herman Cain Leads Newt Gingrich By 2-1 Margin Among Georgia Voters."

Howard Dean, Former Presidential Candidate and DNC Chair, Says Sarah Palin Could Win

And economic conditions are going to be key, as I noted this morning.

At The Hill, "Howard Dean Warns Dems Sarah Palin Could Beat Obama in 2012" (at Memeorandum):

“I think she could win,” Dean told The Hill in an interview Friday. “She wouldn’t be my first choice if I were a Republican but I think she could win.”

Dean warns the sluggish economy could have more of a political impact than many Washington strategists and pundits assume.

“Any time you have a contest — particularly when unemployment is as high as it is — nobody gets a walkover,” Dean said. “Whoever the Republicans nominate, including people like Sarah Palin, whom the inside-the-Beltway crowd dismisses — my view is if you get the nomination of a major party, you can win the presidency, I don’t care what people write about you inside the Beltway,” Dean said.

VIDEO HAT TIP: Nice Deb.

Mitt Romney Officially Launches 2012 Campaign

From PBS:

And at NYT, "Romney, Opening Race, Presents Himself as the Candidate to Face Obama."

I like Romney. But as I've said, I worry he's not conservative enough to generate enthusiasm, and if he's the nominee he may not differentiate himself enough from Obama, especially on the RomneyCare albatross.

Sarah Palin Releases Video Ahead of Bus Tour

Via New York Times:

Background at Los Angeles Times, "Sarah Palin to launch bus trip through U.S":

Reporting from Washington— In the clearest indication to date that she is seriously considering a presidential run, Sarah Palin plans to launch a nationwide bus tour Sunday from Washington.

"Gov. Palin and the SarahPAC team will begin a trip through our nation's rich historical sites, starting from Washington, D.C., and going up through New England," said a statement posted Thursday on Palin's political action committee website. "The 'One Nation Tour' is part of our new campaign to educate and energize Americans about our nation's founding principles, in order to promote the fundamental restoration of America."

The website RealClearPolitics, which first reported the story, said the tour could last several weeks and would be divided into separate geographical stretches, according to unnamed sources close to the former Alaska governor and 2008 vice presidential nominee.

The first stop will be at the Rolling Thunder Memorial Day weekend motorcycle rally in Washington. A New England tour would seem to suggest a visit to New Hampshire, which hosts the first 2012 presidential primary.

Palin said as recently as last week that she was still considering a run, but refused to offer any clues as to her timetable for making a decision. Her website said the tour was being funded through her PAC.

Also, from Chris Cillizza, "Fast Fix: Is Sarah Palin back? (VIDEO)."

Kimberley Strassel: 'Who's Winning the Budget War?'

At Wall Street Journal:

Here's the Washington headline of the week that nobody in America got to read: Paul Ryan, 40. Barack Obama, 0.

Forty is the number of Senate votes that went in favor of Mr. Ryan's reformist budget, a tally that included nearly every Senate Republican. Zero is the number of votes President Obama got for his own tax-and-spend budget, a blueprint that not one of his own party had the backbone to support. It went down, 97-0.

Washington is in a game of high-stakes chicken over raising the debt limit, though so far only one side is flinching. According to the headlines (and Democrats), Republicans are on defense over Mr. Ryan's plan, are risking America's creditworthiness, and are delaying sensible compromise by refusing tax increases. It is only a matter of time, goes the betting, before the party swerves.

This has little relation to reality, in which it is Democrats who keep calling their own bluffs. It was Mr. Obama who first swerved, submitting a "do-over" of his initial, embarrassing budget. It is Democrats who have since swerved on the debt-limit debate, agreeing to spending-cut negotiations, then continuing to up the size of a package.

By refusing to blink, Republicans keep forcing Democrats to acknowledge a very simple political reality: Voters do want spending reform, and do not want tax hikes. That's why this debate has so far moved in the GOP's direction.

RTWT. Strassel mentions NY-26's special election, and she predicted the Democrat victory a couple of weeks ago in any case, "A New York Warning for the GOP":

Good news for a politics-weary nation: Come May 24, the debate over the Paul Ryan budget reform plan will be over—almost before it began. Democrats win. Republicans lose. Long live blowout entitlements.

That, at least, is the narrative being cast on the upcoming special election in New York's 26th congressional district. GOP candidate Jane Corwin had been handily ahead until several weeks ago, when Democrat Kathy Hochul began attacking her for supporting Mr. Ryan's plan. Polls have tightened, and Democrats and the media are now pitching the race as a "referendum" on GOP hopes to cut spending and reform entitlements such as Medicare. A Hochul victory, goes the line, will prove the Ryan plan is a bust even with conservative voters.

Fascinating, if utterly untrue. In their drive to nationalize this story, Democrats and the media are deliberately ignoring the real (if mundane) reasons why the Corwin campaign is struggling—namely, GOP infighting that has allowed a third-party candidate to siphon votes. New York 26 does offer the GOP some important lessons about the entitlement debate—just not any that Democrats are flogging.

See also, John McCormack, "NY-26: Democrat Kathy Hochul Wins with 47% of Vote."

For GOP Contenders, Love Always Means Having to Say You're Sorry

From Ronald Brownstein, at National Journal, "After Glasnost: Why the 2012 Republican presidential hopefuls are facing multiplying demands to renounce earlier positions":

In the 2012 Republican presidential race, love apparently means always having to say you’re sorry.

On an array of issues, the field of GOP contenders is facing enormous pressure from an ascendant conservative base to renounce earlier positions that challenged orthodoxy on the right. Their response to those demands could cast a big shadow over not only next year’s Republican primary but also the general-election contest against President Obama.

The emergence of these pressures testifies to a decisive shift in the GOP’s balance of power. The ideas now drawing the most fire from conservative activists—including support for a cap-and-trade system to limit greenhouse-gas emissions, a mandate on individuals to purchase health insurance, and a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants—all flowered in Republican circles during the middle years of George W. Bush’s presidency, especially among governors.

In different ways, each of these proposals embodied the common belief that Republicans had to broaden their message beyond a conventional conservative argument focused almost exclusively on reducing government spending, taxes, and regulation. Intellectually, these initiatives reflected an impulse to redefine conservatism in ways that accepted a role for government in empowering individuals or promoting market-based solutions. Politically, they reflected the belief that to build a lasting majority, Republicans needed to attract more minority voters, especially Hispanics, and to loosen the Democratic hold on blue states by reclaiming more suburban independents.

More at the link above.

Basically, RINO-Republicans are getting deep-sixed, and thank goodness for that.

RELATED: At Snooper's Report, "Obama Praises Romney for 'Assist' in Passing Obamacare." Figures.

EXTRA: At CNN, "GOP contenders: Obama has 'thrown Israel under the bus'" (via Memeorandum). Well, perhaps there's a ray of hope after all.

Newt Gingrich Dancing Queen!

Hey, feel the beat from the tambourine.

Newt's hoping "anybody could be that guy" for the nomination, and idiot Alex Pareene's jonesin' for it.

A Michele Bachmann-Sarah Palin Showdown?

I've thought about this a lot, actually. At this point, I'm backing Bachmann unless Palin throws her hat into the ring. See National Journal, "Palin Still 'Considering' 2012 Bid, While Bachmann Gears Up." Here's Sarah from last night, in top form once again: