CPAC Day One Part 2

The Curious Case of the Leaf Blower that Didn’t Roar

Sen. Marco Rubio walked on stage and contrary to rumor, he wasn’t wearing a sombrero. In fact he gave what could be called a surgical speech, because he completely buried any reference to his amnesty mistake late last year.

In fact he talked about almost everyone’s border but that of the US. Rubio is for protecting Japan’s border. Ukraine’s border. Even Israel’s border, but not a peep about the border violations Mexico encourages. We’ve being invaded, too but no one but the taxpayers seems to care.

Rubio’s new focus is obviously on foreign policy, since amnesty policy was disastrous for him. He goes East and Easter, touching no points South. He touched on the tax code, regulations and energy. And he still has that problem with words–per–gallon. In a speech that was only 15 minutes long, Rubio still had to stop to take a drink.

Verdict: Nice young man, but not ready.

In a very fitting bit of scheduling, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie spoke just before lunch.

The bully governor used his bully pulpit to talk about his fight against public employee unions and the struggle to reform their pensions. Christie told the audience how he faced union members in their den as he went to the firefighter’s convention and walked through the crowd to get to the podium. But Christie misses the point. No one questions his courage. Conservatives question his convictions.

At the end of his firefighter’s speech he said two–thirds of the audience was cheering him. I don’t know if two–thirds of the conservative base will be cheering for a candidate who also favors amnesty. A topic Christie also failed to bring up.

Christie wants the party to start talking “about what we are for and not what we are against.” He contends that government is about “getting things done.” But that’s what intrusive Democrats say, too.

It was obvious from his speech that all the Sandy storm money is now in the bank, because the governor felt liberated to criticize his new best friend Obama, “What the hell are we paying him for, if he won’t lead?”

Christie summarized by saying under his administration there are fewer state employees, less spending and teacher tenure reforms. He added he’s pro–life but did so in the third person. But there was not a word about smaller government or less intrusive government. I get the feeling he’s Teddy Roosevelt with bariatric surgery. Activism got us in the mess we’re in today.

Christie got a standing ovation, but it was as he was leaving.