In many ways the California Republican Party and their elected leaders are similar to the current attendees at an Oakland Raider game. The only folks who attend Raider games anymore are the diehard true believers in the Raider Nation. Raider fans are a wonderful bunch of people who love the Raiders no matter what the outcome of the game or the season. Their current slogan at tailgate a parties at the Oakland Coliseum (or whatever corporate name they are using these days) is, “It is not about football. It’s a Raider game!” I have to wonder, as I watch the California Republican party continue to shrink down to its base of true believer conservatives if their slogan ought to be, “It is not about winning elections, it is about being ideologically perfect!”

With this attitude, no wonder California Republicans can’t even win one for the Gipper!

If things don’t change soon the question will be if California Republicans on the verge of extinction in the Golden State? They certainly are in the Bay Area. As I stated last week if Abram Wilson does not win in the 15th Assembly District say good bye any partisan seat in the Bay Area.

Recently State Assembly leader Mike Villines showed up for a campaign event for Abram Wilson. Republican leader Mike Villines seems like a nice enough person. I have had the occasion to meet him in the past. He is even well thought of by many of the State Democrats. He gave a typical red meat speech about how they triumphed on the budget over the Democrats. But the facts are that the Republicans in Sacramento have not mattered for a long time. The only time they have anything to do is at budget time. The rest of the time nobody cares. Republicans could be off playing Texas Hold-Em in a corner of the capitol or at one of their retreats in Lake Tahoe (Nevada Side). Things have become so bad for the vaunted GOP Caucus Republicans that many Democrats are worried that there will not be any type of loyal opposition to even marginally shape legislation.

So here is a proposal to help the Republican Caucus in Sacramento. I know this sounds crazy, but I believe that the Democrats in charge of the state legislature in Sacramento should create an Affirmative Action program for minority Republicans so they can feel relevant. Let the Republicans propose a few bills and pass some bills out of committee. If Assembly Republicans get too uppity or radical, the Democrat majority can vote them down in the main chamber. You know Governor Arnold will support it. Maybe over time Republicans will learn to be somewhat more bipartisan. Just think, if they learn how to be a little less ideological maybe the bipartisanship can work both ways and we can have a better state government.

Then Ward Connerly can have a ballot initiative to repeal it, and just maybe the Raiders will have a winning season!

Republican Mayor of San Ramon, Abram Wilson, who also is running for the Assembly 15 seat has recently announced a host of purportedly influential endorsements from the Contra Costa Times and the Stockton Record. Wilson also announced support from San Joaquin County Supervisors, Livermore Democrats, and bipartisan support of the San Ramon City Council and leaders throughout the Diablo Valley, Brentwood, Oakley, Pleasant Hill, and Walnut Creek.

Meanwhile, Allen Payton’s campaign for Mayor of Antioch, announced the support of two-term Assemblyman Guy Houston (AD15).

California voters rejected the Peripheral Canal (Proposition 9) when it was on the ballot in 1982. “96% of Contra Costa County voters opposed this because it would harm our water quality and damage the ecosystem,” explained Arne Simonsen, Delta Protection Commissioner. “Our local economy depends on water from the Delta. Giving it to LA would destroy agriculture,” added Mayor Bruce Connelley of Oakley.

Those wishing to view Ms. Buchanan’s statements of support and denial may visit http://www.youtube.com/doubletalkbuchanan

Mayor Wilson’s press conference may be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/user/JoinTeamWilson

The Democrats are rallying for the final crushing defeat of the GOP in the Bay Area. Obama is surging in Contra Costa County and it looks like he is sweeping all of his fellow Democrats with him. Down ticket Abram Wilson is fighting for his life with massive cash injections from the California Republican Party, to hold off Buchanan who is the best funded Democratic candidate to ever compete for this seat. In the other big race the 11th Congressional District Dean Andal is a lost cause. Terrible fundraising and being left hanging out to dry by the Republican National Congressional Committee who has canceled funding for all the folks they recruited to run for office in 2008. Instead the RNCC decided to fund the incumbent House Republicans who ran the control of Congress into the ground.

In 1996 Bill Clinton swept Contra Costa County in the wake of the miserable Bob Dole Campaign and left a lot of carnage in his wake. Congressman Bill Baker was crushed in defeat. Lynne leach (running for the 15th State Assembly) and Richard Rainey (running for the 7th State Senate) narrowly won by a few hundred votes. In a normal election all would have won comfortably.

What Republicans in Contra Costa are facing is 1996 on a nuclear scale. The terrible McCain-Palin campaign will never gain traction in the San Francisco Bay area. The Democrats are coming to take the 15th Assembly District. Don’t think for a minute that they were not hoisting piñatas of all the old time Tri Valley Republicans who tormented them into defeat all of these years.

I don’t care what my conservative friends say Buchanan is a very attractive candidate with deep roots in the Tri Valley. She will galvanize moderate Republicans and Liberals into new Buchanan brigades. If elected she will be there for six years and her seat will be jerry-mandered in 2010 into a safe seat for the democrats!

If you are a Republican failure is not an option. It is time to make a last stand here in the 15th Assembly District. Ground zero if you will. Yes Wilson is a moderate Republican but as any war veteran will tell you, “there are no atheists in a fox hole.” If he can win he will have a great future. Maybe he could be leader of the Republican caucus. God knows they could use some better leadership.

The time for political triage has arrived. Republicans need to abandon the failed campaign of Dean Andal. Andal the “chosen one” by the brain dead RNCC is going to be slaughtered by Jerry McNerney. Republicans need to face facts It is going to happen. The only hope is to come out and support Mayor Abram Wilson!

This is it. The time has come to Ride to the sound of the guns!!

The political he-said she-said carnage continues in the Assembly 15 race as the campaign of Republican Abram Wilson issues a video clip that purports to document
Democrat Joan Buchanan’s support for the Peripheral Canal. During a recent candidate debate, moderated by Lisa Vorderbrueggen, Buchanan denied the charge, but Wilson waved a piece of paper as proof and now has produced this video clip as documentation.