Powder Blue Report

• Norby Defeats The Ackermans

  The race for the 72nd AD is finally over. Supervisor Chris Norby has defeated Linda Ackerman and the Republican establishment by an almost 2 to 1 margin when it's all said and done.
  
  There are so many things to talk about in this election. First I want to [...]
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  Posted: November 18, 2009, 2:15am EST
  

• Sheriff Arpaio/Bill Hunt Event Roundup

  Sheriff Joe Arpaio is everything as advertised and more.  It was very generous of him to come out from Phoenix to headline the fundraising event for OC Sheriff candidate Bill Hunt.  Here's a flavor of what it was like...

  
  

  So I'm pulling into the parking lot before the event and [...]

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  Posted: November 06, 2009, 1:46am EST
  

• Great Cartoon

  This a funny cartoon dovetailing off of the story of the Northwest airline pilots who flew right past their destination 150 miles last week.
  [...]
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  Posted: October 29, 2009, 7:58am EDT
  

• West Coast Movie Premiere of "For Liberty"

  Tomorrow mid morning down at the Lido Theater in Newport Beach, the Orange County chapter of Campaign For Liberty is hosting the West Coast premiere of the movie "For Liberty, How the Ron Paul Revolution Watered the Withered Tree of Liberty".  We have a great lineup of local elected officials [...]

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  Posted: October 23, 2009, 12:26pm EDT
  

• OC GOP Central Committee Roundup

  What a meeting tonight.  I've come to expect some type of excitement and drama at Central Committee meetings, but this one will be etched in my memory bank for a long time.  First things first.  It was announced tonight by chairman Baugh that an ethics complaint was lodged by Linda' [...]

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  Posted: October 20, 2009, 1:53am EDT
  

• Western CPAC Drama & Other Thoughts

  I headed over to the Western CPAC (BTW, you can follow all the tweets coming out of Western CPAC by typing in #wcpac on Twitter) new media/social media panel this afternoon.  Apparently I missed all the drama earlier in the day.  Former KFI talk show host John Ziegler was conducting [...]

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  Posted: October 18, 2009, 10:02am EDT
  

• AD70 Election Watch: Re:OC Taxpayers Assc. Tax OC Amante Endorsement

  I saw that Matt posted earlier a press release from Team Amante that he has been endorsed by the OC Taxpayers Association.  What a joke.  This is the same organization that sold out their group's namesake and endorsed the recent massive tax hiking Proposition 1A.  Whatever credibility they had' [...]

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  Posted: October 15, 2009, 1:58am EDT
  

• AD72 Special Election Watch: Desperation Time For Ackerman Campaign

  We are barely a week past the filing deadline and already the slime storm from Linda Ackerman has started.  Granted we knew this was coming, but that doesn't mean we can't question the ethics of a flier like this.  This is a desperate flier from a desperate campaign.  The absentee [...]

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  Posted: October 15, 2009, 1:57am EDT
  

• OC Sheriff Race Watch: "Sheriff Joe" Arpaio Headlining Bill Hunt Fundraiser

  Everyone knows Sheriff Joe Arpaio as the no BS Sheriff of Maricopa County Arizona.  He is coming out to Orange County along with other nationally reknown Sheriff Richard Mack to headline a large fundraiser for Bill Hunt.  Sheriff Mack gained fame as the Sheriff who sued the [...]

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  Posted: October 15, 2009, 1:55am EDT
  

• The Economics Class You Never Had

  I can't recommend this video by Peter Schiff any higher. Everyone who clicks on my blog from time to time needs to sit down, grab a drink and a snack and watch this You Tube in its entirety. This is Peter Schiff from Nov 2006 speaking a mortgage bankers conference' [...]
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  Posted: October 03, 2009, 12:01pm EDT
  

• AD72 Special Election Watch: About That Residency Requirement....

  I know I'm probably splitting hairs here and I'm definately not an election law lawyer, but I read an interesting article this morning in the Los Angeles Times about State Senator Rod Wright.  Apparently, the Los Angeles DA is investigating him for false statements he put down on his [...]

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  Posted: September 28, 2009, 10:04am EDT
  

• AD 72 Special Election Watch: Infamous Video Of The Ackerman's "Secret Gated Community" & Other Thoughts

  Once again the Powder Blue Report must be activated for content to hot to handle over at Red County. Gotta love the drama in the local blogosphere. I put up a post late last night on Red County that drew attention to a video that Jon Fleischman of [...]
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  Posted: September 24, 2009, 9:24am EDT
  

• McConnell & Cornyn In OC Today

  The Powder Blue Report is coming out of hibernation to post this important story that apparently is to hot to handle over at Red County. GOP Senate Leader Mitch McConnell and NRSC Chairman John Cornyn were in socal today meeting with local party leaders and high dollar donors(i.e Lincoln Club). [...]
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  Posted: August 18, 2009, 12:07am EDT
  

• I'm Still Here

  I guess this is as good a chance as any to let readers know I am still here. It felt good to take a nice a long break. I am doing some blogging over at Red County as well. A lot has been happening to me in my business career. [...]
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  Posted: June 16, 2009, 12:52am EDT
  

• B of A Blackmailed By Paulson & Bernanke

  Today we heard that Ken Lewis, CEO of Bank of America was told by Ben Bernanke and Hank Paulson to shut up about the "material adverse change" that took place at Merrill Lynch before their merger. I would call this "blackmail", but then again, who am I anyway, I [...]
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  Posted: April 23, 2009, 1:42pm EDT
  

• More On The Wells Fargo Mark To Fantasy Quarterly Results...

  Before I talk about the fantasy balance sheet known as Wells Fargo, wasn't it interesting to hear this morning that the Freddie Mac CFO is dead. Lots of skeletons buried in those Freddie balance sheets, my hunch is that this guy may have been "Vince Fostered". Now on to more' [...]
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  Posted: April 22, 2009, 2:13pm EDT
  

• OC GOP Votes To Rebuke Sheriff Hutchens's CCW Policy

  It's late but I just wanted to post the results of what happened about the resolution tonight. A slightly modified version passed by a vote of 41 to 14. Instead of using the committee language of "no confidence" in her CCW policy, the committee of the whole decided to amend' [...]
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  Posted: April 21, 2009, 12:06am EDT
  

• About Those Bank "Stress Tests"....LOL

  So B of A announced a large first quarter profit today and the market swoons? Haha. The Fed should careful what they wish for...i.e the stress testing of banks. As the saying goes, sometimes you can fool some of the people sometimes but not all the people all the times. [...]
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  Posted: April 20, 2009, 1:54pm EDT
  

• True Lies

  I hope everyone had a great Easter weekend. I had a relaxing weekend watching Phil & Tiger duel it out down at The Masters. The weekends are great for most because we can for the most part not focus on all the negative crap that is happening lately to our [...]
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  Posted: April 13, 2009, 4:24pm EDT
  

• All Is Not Well.....s Fargo!

  Why is everyone so surprised about the Wells Fargo earnings today? The change in "mark-to-market" accounting allows banks to hide all portfolio losses if they deem them "temporary" market dislocations. Basically, Zombie Banks have been legitimized and quarterly reports from here on out will only count gains ....no more asset [...]
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  Posted: April 09, 2009, 2:11pm EDT
  

• Quote Of The Day

  "Our fractional reserve financial system is just a gigantic Ponzi scheme. It can only survive as long as it expands, which is to say, as long as new debt is flushed through the system to finance old debt. But like all Ponzi schemes, the larger it grows the more unstable" [...]
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  Posted: April 09, 2009, 1:59pm EDT
  

• Please Sell It All Guys

  The title of the post is my advice for the IMF and any other country sabre rattling their tired old "we're gonna sell our gold" mantra. Sell it already! We watched last week as Gold moved up early in the week only to be whacked Thurs. and Friday because (oh' [...]
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  Posted: April 06, 2009, 3:37pm EDT
  

• "No Confidence" In Sheriff Hutchens CCW Policy

  This past Saturday the OC GOP Resolutions Committee held a meeting to discuss and debate a resolution submitted by Central Committee member Bruce Whitaker dealing with Sheriff Hutchens CCW Policy. The end result was that the committee voted 7 to to recommend that the full body adopt this resolution of [...]
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  Posted: April 06, 2009, 9:15am EDT
  

• G-20 Summit Just Around The Corner

  Next Wednesday is April 1, commonly known as "April fools" day(and my dad's birthday), the following day is the G-20 summit. The "Dollar fraud" imposed on the rest of the world will not stand as the world has figured out what has happened (been done) to them collectively. The latest [...]
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  Posted: March 23, 2009, 1:45pm EDT
  

• Yay...Hyperinflation

  So Bernanke and the Fed officially caved in today. They are going to spend (read print) $1 trillion, to inject into the economy and buy Treasury bonds, can you say Hyperinflation! As a side note, CNBC reported "massive" call buying in long term Treasuries early today, can you say insider [...]
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  Posted: March 18, 2009, 2:00pm EDT
  

• AIG Finally Fesses Up

  AIG finally fessed up as to where the $150+ billion of bailout money went. Foreign and domestic banks got huge shots in the arm with this and TARP, TALF, etc., and where do we stand now? The system is more gridlocked, more precarious and more leveraged (due to additional derivatives [...]
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  Posted: March 16, 2009, 2:17pm EDT
  

• Economic Smoke & Mirrors 101

  In what I can only call a brazen attempt to prop up our imploding markets...this is what the instruction manual looks like to restore the underlying false confidence in our economic and monetary systems thus continuing the dominance of the global financial power elite.
  
  1) Start by having the [...]
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  Posted: March 12, 2009, 8:30pm EDT
  

• Changing The Mark To Market Rules Will Save Us All

  The debate over the so called "mark to market" rule is hilarious. This is one of my favorite subjects because it shows just how ignorant Washington and Wall Street either are, OR they think WE are. Some argue that if we just didn't require banks and brokers to mark their' [...]
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  Posted: March 12, 2009, 2:00pm EDT
  

• I'll Take JP Morgan Scandals For $1000 Alex

  Anyone who has been reading my posts about the current financial crisis knows that I've been saying that all roads lead to JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs. Watching their stock prices get hammered the last few days has been a real treat for me. JP Morgan has been Wall Street's [...]
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  Posted: March 06, 2009, 2:46pm EST
  

• Tom McClintock's Speech Saturday Night

  Here is CA Rep Tom McClintock's speech from Saturday night at the CRP Convention up in Sacramento.February 21, 2009
  
  When the Virginia Legislature invited Churchill to address them, he said, “Do you not think you are running some risk (by) inviting me to give you my faithful counsel' [...]
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  Posted: February 23, 2009, 6:03pm EST
  

• Wither Fiscal Responsilbility

  The Barnum & Bailey Circus coined the term "The Greatest Show On Earth". I think these days the greatest show on earth is in Washington DC. Today saw the President gather the troops for a conference on fiscal responsibility...LOL! Does anyone even know what that is anymore? The party that [...]
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  Posted: February 23, 2009, 3:05pm EST
  

• What's Your Tax Bite If Sacramento Politicians Raise Your Taxes?

  The Sacramento Bee has a site that calculates your increased tax burden. Click here [...]
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  Posted: February 17, 2009, 4:58pm EST
  

• No Confidence Motion In Sheriff Hutchens CCW Policy

  Last night at the OC GOP Central Committee was set to be a quick meeting because cherry pie was awaiting over at Antonellos for the pre Flag Day sale. As the meeting was getting set to wrap up, Bruce Whitaker rose to make a motion to suspend the rules to [...]
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  Posted: February 17, 2009, 2:35pm EST
  

• Quote Of The Day

  The most dangerous man, to any government, is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane and intolerable, and so, if he is [...]
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  Posted: February 11, 2009, 8:00am EST
  

• A Little Lesson In Chart Analysis

  I want everyone to look at this chart of Bank of America, and tell me what they see. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see the trend of this piece of crap stock. Train wreck is too kind of a word for this disaster. While I' [...]
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  Posted: February 10, 2009, 3:10pm EST
  

• $9.7 Trillion Dollars According To Bloomberg.....

  That was the headline this morning when I clicked onto the Drudgereport. He had linked to an article on Bloomberg that said the latest bailout "would raise the government’s commitment to solving the financial crisis to $9.7 trillion". Even Democratic Senators are starting to sound the alarm. “We’ve seen [...]
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  Posted: February 09, 2009, 2:00pm EST
  

• How's Your Retirement Doing?

  I was just alerted to a Forbes article by a friend about how much public saftey employees are making these days. I knew it was outrageous, but after looking at some spread sheets of total annual compensation for these guys for the city of Costa Mesa...well all I can [...]
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  Posted: February 03, 2009, 4:25pm EST
  

• That Was A Helluva Start For The Month In Stocks Wasn't It?

  We just finished the worst January in history for the Dow Jones Industrial average. This should not surprise anyone, especially those who don't have their heads buried in the sand while listening to the mainstream media. The credit crunch is now about 18 months old and the "recession" that we' [...]
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  Posted: February 02, 2009, 3:21pm EST
  

• Why Are Young Voters Not Voting Republican?

  So I fire opened the Sunday Register and right there on the front page of the front section was a big story about why younger voters are fleeing the Republican Party. I'll go over the reasons in a second, but I loved this quote from our Chairman Scott Baugh...' [...]
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  Posted: February 02, 2009, 10:38am EST
  

• Change Is Coming To The OC GOP Endorsement Process

  There is change in the air for the Orange County Republican Party endorsement process. After numerous botched endorsements the last few years, the Chairman of the party Scott Baugh has temporarily deep sixed the Endorsement Committee of the party and has created an Ad Hoc committee made up of myself, [...]
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  Posted: February 02, 2009, 9:28am EST
  

• So How Would A 21st Century Gold Standard Work?

  Ron Paul was on Fox Business yesterday and talked about how some type of gold standard would work today.
  [...]
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  Posted: January 31, 2009, 9:40am EST
  

• What About Our Money?

  So I was having a nice little cordial debate with Dan C from over at The Liberal OC blog this morning via Facebook IM. He and most of the Obama supporters are really hopeful that this stimulus bill winding its way through Congress is going to turn things around [...]
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  Posted: January 29, 2009, 1:14pm EST
  

• Quote Of The Day

  "If the American People ever allow the banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property, until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their" [...]
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  Posted: January 28, 2009, 5:43pm EST
  

• It's Almost Over...Brace For Impact

  The last few days of watching this financial debacle continue has been like watching a slow motion train wreck of our financial system. It's almost over. If anyone talked or wrote 18 months ago that the credit quality and solvency of the U.S. Treasury would come into question they would' [...]
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  Posted: January 22, 2009, 3:01pm EST
  

• Timothy Geithner Is Leading By Example...LOL

  So the man who would be Treasury Secretary says he made some "innocent mistakes" on his taxes. Does anyone believe this guy? I just heard about the Senate committee's approval of Timothy Geithner as our next Treasury Secretary. My first thought is how sad this is. How arrogant and brazen' [...]
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  Posted: January 22, 2009, 12:13pm EST
  

• The Allan Bartlett 30 Day Action Plan(if I ever became President)

  This would be my 30 day action plan to turn the country around if I was elected President. Apologies to Lew Rockwell who first came up with this list over 20 years ago. It's just as good of a plan today as it was back in 1991.
  
  DAY ONE:' [...]
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  Posted: January 20, 2009, 12:44pm EST
  

• Bank [owned by] America

  We didn't even get a dead cat bounce for the banks. Yesterday the Dow rallied back some 200 points and the banks could only make the sound of a thud. Citi[no longer a group] is breaking up [as if two bankrupts are better than one], Bank [owned by] America needs' [...]
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  Posted: January 16, 2009, 2:25pm EST
  

• A Mixed Bag Of Verdicts

  The Mike Carona jury has spoken. He was found not guilty on counts one through five which consisted of conspiracy and mail fraud charges. He was convicted of the sixth count of witness tampering. There's really not much to celebrate here except the fact that Mike Carona is now a' [...]
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  Posted: January 16, 2009, 2:02pm EST
  

• Standby For Carona Verdict at 11:45am This Morning!!!!!

  [...]
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  Posted: January 16, 2009, 11:09am EST
  

• OC GOP Central Committee Officer Races Taking Shape

  Over the last few days I have been receiving emails & calls from prospective candidates for First Vice Chair and Assistant Treasurer for the Executive Committee of the Orange County Republican Central Committee. As a newly elected member, I will have a chance to cast my vote in these elections. [...]
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  Posted: January 15, 2009, 3:17pm EST