Thursday, June 17, 2010

Walsh smacks down Kasich

John Kasich and Joan Walsh were guests on Hardball with Chris Matthews. Kasich kept droning on and on. He talked about the liberal elite. Liberal elite? Kasich is a millionaire who is accustomed to flying on private jets. Isn't that elite?

Joan Walsh gave an appropriate smack down to Kasich. Yes!

Salon:

On "Hardball" today former Ohio congressman and GOP gubernatorial candidate John Kasich was hawking his new book as well as his pro-Tea Party politics. By modern standards, Kasich (at least during his House career) might be considered a moderate: He was a fiscal hawk, but he wasn't a demonizer. He voted for President Clinton's assault rifle ban (and he's currently paying for it; the NRA has endorsed Gov. Ted Strickland in the race) and he was even known to collaborate with former Rep. Ron Dellums to cut Pentagon waste.
The 2010 Kasich likes to boast that he was "in the Tea Party before there was a Tea Party," has reversed his stand against assault rifles, and is of course running to his right to try to defeat Strickland. On "Hardball" today, he was disowning the fringe, Birther element of the Tea Partiers and talking up the wholesome anti-tax, small government, energizing strain of the movement. He claimed moderate GOP Sen. Scott Brown as a Tea Party victory, and he didn't like it when I noted that Brown has been running away from the right ever since he got elected. But Kasich got to me when he started talking about the Tea Party's anti-elitism, that they're "blue collar Democrats" worried about the future. This is likewise Pat Buchanan's line, and of course I'm supposed to be the symbol of liberal elitism. So I thought it was fair to point out that Kasich left Congress and went to work at Lehman Brothers Holdings, hardly a bastion of anti-elitism. The video's below.
It's become an issue in Kasich's race for governor, because the Ohio employees pension fund, like many, took a big hit when Lehman collapsed. (The same thing happened in Florida, and will be a big reason why former Lehman guy Jeb Bush might find a comeback difficult.) The Columbus Dispatch reported that Kasich himself pitched Lehman holdings to the pension fund board in 2002, although that conversation didn't directly result in Lehman business. Only today, the Associated Press revealed that a Kasich operative advised a state pension fund executive on how to minimize Lehman's role in the fund's losses when talking to reporters. So Kasich was understandably a little sensitive about the issue, accused me of a "smear" and complained that I was "picking on" him. He also advised me to read his book "so you can learn how to control yourself." Yikes! It's called "Hardball," sir....

Kasich looked like a fool trying to sell his book while jabbering on and on and on. I'd like to thank Joan Walsh for smacking down Kasich and turning him into a whimpering whiner.

*** A person who works for Kasich has attacked Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy, and lied about her record.

Thirdbase Politics:

....Do you think her Big Labor friends will be ticked off when they find out Kilroy wasn't even in congress when TARP was voted on?

Note to Mr. Thirdbase--- Kilroy was in Congress and voted against TARP.

These Republicans can't even get their facts right.