House Majority Leader

There is a battle brewing that the liberal main stream press do not give two bits about, but could be the most important battle in the last dozen years. With Tom DeLay resigning as Majority Leader in the House, there is an election for the new Majority Leader. The current candidates are Roy Blunt (MO), John Boehner (OH) and John Shadegg (AZ).

The reason this is important is that the Majority Leader in the House has a tremendous influence on the legislative agenda. (Bills are introduced only in the House, not the Senate.) Given the Abramoff "scandal" (which looms large) and, more importantly, the lack of fiscal discipline shown by the republicans recently, this may turn out to be critically important in the 2006 mid-term races.

In my humble opinion, Shadegg and maybe Boehner have the potential to be the next Newt Gingrich in terms of influencing reform. Roy Blunt has a ways to go to convince me that he is serious about reform.

Real conservatives (in the classic Reaganite mold) need to flex some muscles in the Republican Party. The current leadership is looking an awful lot like Jim Wright and the Democrats of the early 90s - and we know what happened there.

Stop the pork, stop the obscene level of spending growth, start being conservative again.