Fiorina's tough blasts at Boxer

Steven Greenhut: Carly Fiorina is speaking now. “This is a ticket that represents the diversity and prominence and the common sense of California,” which perhaps is accurate in a strange kind of way. She promises to put an end to Barbara Boxer’s 28-year “partisan reign.”

Fiorina’s talk is tough and conservative and the crowd is loving it — given that this GOP candidate appears to be the most conservative of a mostly moderate bunch.

“The difference between business and politics,” she said, “is you get to make stuff up in politics, but in business we have to deal with facts.” She points to Boxer’s claim that the stimulus is working. The unemployment rate was 10.2 percent when the stimulus was passed and is and now over 12 percent. California has 10 of highest unemployment counties in the nation.

Boxer claims she is fighting for small businesses, Fiorina said. But Boxer voted for more than a half-trillion dollars in tax increases in her years in the Senate. She must know that one of our most important industries, agriculture is built on families, Fiorina added. But she voted for the death tax 18 times. It will rise to 55 percent on January 1 along with the largest tax increase unless something is done about it.

She says she is concerned about the deficit, but she won’t even vote to modestly slow an increase in the rate of growth, the Senate candidate added. Fiorina says Boxer claims to be fighting for every job. “Really? That’s why she failed to turn the water back on our great Central Valley.”

“Here is the reality, Barbara Boxer: The only job you are fighting for is your own.” Fiorina calls her “a bitter partisan who has said much but did little.”

Fiorina says the government is out of control and out of touch and questions whether the public will expand Boxer’s employment contract to 40 years. She promises to fight for term limits for every member of the House of Representatives and the Senate.

She calls for a two-year payroll tax holiday, for promoting innovation and for getting the government off the back of business owners.

She endorses Prop. 20, the congressional gerrymandering measure. She outs Prop. 27 accurately as an attack on redistricting by special interests.

Washington has become a place of vast unaccountable bureaucracies where every budget has gone up for the past 60 years, she said. “Clearly results don’t matter.” This isn’t tolerated in the real world and it shouldn’t be tolerated in government she said — a nice sentiment, but we all know that nothing will ever change on this score. I am glad she is talking about transparency.

The crowd laughs when she reminds people that Boxer is the chair of the Senate Ethics Committee.

She said she talks to people up and down the state from all parties who are becoming members of the Had Enough Party.

It’s pretty good stuff, especially as she talks about Washington’s ruling class that “saps the life out of working families in every corner and every county.” She says that Boxer represents those who always want more money and more of our freedom to fix things. “It’s up to us to take back control,” she said.

Fiorina is by far the candidate who is drawing the most excitement from the delegates and attendees that I’ve talked to and it’s easy to see why. She’s a strong speaker and her message — although standard conservative boilerplate — hits the right notes. She comes across as someone who actually believes her own rhetoric, unlike Meg Whitman, the gubernatorial candidate who changes her message depending on the audience.

And Boxer is a great target. Fiorina might actually win. Stranger things have happened.