Author: TXObserver

Kansas Lt. Gov. Mark Parkinson won’t run for governor.

From the FBI we learn about 6 unnamed Senate candidates.  But who are they?

Senate Candidate 1: The favorite of Change to Win (labor).  This candidate is a woman, but took her name out of consideration.  Apparently the only thing she promised Blago was her appreciation.

Senate Candidate 2: Ben Smith at Politico figures it’s Attorney General Lisa Madigan.

Senate Candidate 3: Only mentioned in passing as a comparison to Senate Candidate 3.

Senate Candidate 4: A Deputy Governor in Illinois who could be counted on the resign the seat and let Blago take it over if he (Blago) was impeached.  From a Dec. 1 press release from this year we learn there are 3 Deputy Governors of Illinois: Dean Martinez, Bob Greenlee, and Louanner Peters.

Senate Candidate 5: Promised to raise $500,000 to Blago’s re-election campaign.  This candidate is male.  Ben Smith seems to lean towards State Senate President Emil Jones rather than Rep. Jesse Jackson.

Senate Candidate 6: A wealthy person from Illinois.  According to Blago’s advisor, it would be hard to appoint this person to the seat.

From the Washington Post:

Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) has emerged as a leading contender for Interior Secretary in the next administration, according to sources familiar with the transition.

Grijalva’s experience and background meshes nicely with some of the Obama team’s top requirements. The son of a migrant worker who grew up in Tucson, Grijalva boasts a strong environmental record and chairs the House Resources Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands.

Choosing the congressman, who was just re-elected to his fifth term, would please both Latino advocates and the environmental community. Grijalva boasts a 95 percent lifetime score with the League of Conservation Voters, and he oversaw a federal study that linked oil and gas development on public lands with the decline in Western hunting habitat. He has also questioned the cheap grazing permits the Interior Department has leased to ranchers in the West.

From the Chattanooga Times Free Press:

Former Democratic state Sen. Rosalind Kurita, who staked her political future on supporting a Republican for speaker, now is being rejected by Republicans in her bid to become Tennessee’s secretary of state.

Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, R-Blountville, whom then-Sen. Kurita helped elect as Senate speaker in 2007, confirmed Thursday that rank-and-file Republicans, as well as grass-roots activists, fiercely oppose Ms. Kurita’s election by lawmakers to the post.

“That’s true,” said Lt. Gov. Ramsey, who last week stated that Ms. Kurita, of Clarksville, would make a “great” secretary of state.

“Rosalind Kurita voted for me for lieutenant governor,” said Sen. Ramsey, who as Senate speaker also has the title of lieutenant governor. “I owed her at least a consideration there. That obviously is not going to happen, and I have no problem with that. Keep in mind I don’t appoint this position.”

A Republican state senator will take over.

From the Philadelphia Inquirer:

Lt. Gov. Catherine Baker Knoll, 78, the first woman elected to that office in Pennsylvania history, died today after a battle with a rare form of cancer…

She will be replaced as lieutenant governor by Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati (R., Jefferson).

Drew Crompton, a spokesman for Scarnati, said a decision about a swearing-in ceremony will be made tomorrow. He said Scarnati will retain the role as president pro tempore as his predecessor Robert Jubelirer did in 2001 when Lt. Gov. Mark Schweiker became governor after Gov. Tom Ridge left to become Homeland Security director.

From the Monroe News Star:

State Rep. Rick Gallot said Thursday that he will wait until after the current legislative session to decide whether to challenge incumbent 5th District U.S. Rep. Rodney Alexander in the fall election.

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Gallot, D-Ruston, is being recruited to run against the three-term Republican congressman by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

…Gallot, a two-term state representative, has been a floor leader for Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal as chairman of the House and Governmental Affairs Committee. He helped shepherd Jindal’s ethics agenda through the Legislature during a special legislative session earlier this year.

Ironically, Gallot said he recommended Alexander to the party as a candidate in 2002, when Alexander was still a Democrat.

“I still consider Rodney a friend, but we obviously have some different views on issues,” Gallot said. “He’s been a consistent supporter of the (Iraq) War and President Bush’s policies.”

(From the diaries – promoted by DavidNYC)

From the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne (likely voters, 4/14-16):

Jill Long Thompson (D): 47%

Jim Schellinger(D): 41%

Undecided: 12%

(MoE: ±4.2%)

Jim Schellinger (D): 46%

Mitch Daniels (R-inc.): 47%

Jill Long Thompson (D): 47%

Mitch Daniels (R-inc.): 48%

(MoE: ±2.8%)

“My Man Mitch” Daniels also uttered a heretical statement in front of a group of Republicans, stating that it’s “time to let Ronald Reagan go.”