Thursday, February 18, 2010

The National Republicans Dig In Their Heels on Fiorina

Posted by Erick Erickson (Profile)


Wednesday, February 17th at 11:20AM EST


With friends like these rallying around Carly Fiorina, she doesn’t really need many enemies.
“Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who has done more than any Democrat to keep climate legislation alive this year” went out to California the other day to campaign for Carly Fiorina.

After being battered for the ridiculous Demon Sheep web ad, Fiorina probably could use the help, but with Dana Milbank praising Graham around the same time for out doing the Democrats on keeping cap-and-tax alive (a position Fiorina supports) it probably wasn’t a wise move.

But it’s not just Graham who is going all in. In a concerted NRSC effort, all the major leaders who have been sabotaging GOP gains in recent years are rallying around Carly.

Mitch McConnell is holding a fundraiser for her. No doubt he will regale her with tales of how she too can kowtow to the Democrats and obstruct people like Tom Coburn who simply wanted the health care bill read.

Lamar Alexander is helping too. You remember Lamar! right? He’s the Senate Republican leader who lectured the GOP on offering up “differentiating legislation”, i.e. legislation that would highlight Democrat vulnerabilities, and instead insisted the GOP offer up “common ground legislation” so they could show the public the GOP is willing to work with the Democrats.

No worries for Carly though. She’ll fit right in with her support of the bailouts. And given Carly’s successful job creation program at Hewlett Packard, I’m sure Mitch and Lamar! will haul her off to the White House to stand with Barack Obama to discuss how to create new jobs!

How many job cuts has Hewlett-Packard had over the past decade?

The answer shocked me: 75,505.

That includes people who were fired or took early retirement. Despite the cuts, HP’s workforce has tripled in size as the company hired people in new areas and bought companies such as Compaq and EDS.

Meanwhile, the NRSC is pushing out a story to the Wall Street Journal that Chuck Devore won’t do in California what Carly Fiorina will and the NRSC will be helping Fiorina.

Were I Chuck DeVore or even Tom Campbell, my response would be “you’re damn right I won’t do what Carly Fiorina will do.”

Redstate