By John Hrabe

Jim Brulte was elected chairman of the California Republican Party in a landslide vote on Sunday. But despite winning support from 90 percent of convention delegates, the former state senator kept campaigning until the end.

“Leaders lead by example,” Brulte, who served as Republican leader in both houses of the California Legislature, told reporters shortly after the party closed its 2013 spring convention. “That’s why I campaigned right up until the votes started to be cast.”

Brulte’s chief adviser, Michael Schroeder, himself a former state party chair, told CalWatchdog.com that Brulte spent the weekend “campaigning around the clock.” At a Sacramento Hyatt that was blanketed with hundreds of “Brulte for Chairman” signs and stickers, he spoke to 10 Republican groups on Friday, followed by 11 more speeches on Saturday, before hosting a 15th-floor hospitality suite late Saturday night.

Leadership, candidates, fundraising all faulted

If he’s to orchestrate a Republican renaissance, Brulte needs his take-nothing-for-granted leadership style to rub off on legislative leaders.

“There were three Assembly seats that were lost because we got lazy,” the state’s new Republican chairman said. “Leaders lead by example, and we have to be in the precincts working, standing shoulder to shoulder with our volunteers.”

Brulte did not specify which districts he believed Republicans should have won in November. However, state Republicans have been heavily criticized for being caught off-guard with lackluster campaigning and poor fundraising in several Assembly seats during the 2012 cycle.

Perhaps the most egregious case: the 36th Assembly District in the High Desert. Republican candidate Ron Smith reportedly stopped campaigning after the primary and ultimately lost by 145 votes.

“Smith’s loss is typical of the self-inflicted wounds that have destroyed the Republican Party in California, leaving it with fewer legislators than any time in the state’s history,” wrote Tony Quinn, a political commentator and former Republican legislative staffer, in a scathing election post-mortem on Fox and Hounds. “Once he was the only Republican in the runoff, he coasted, assured of election in this ‘safe’ Republican district.”

Smith was too busy hiring staff and hanging pictures, according to the Sacramento Bee.

“I had most of my staff getting ready to be hired, my picture was up on the wall, I had my office that was assigned to me, and I already had two pieces of legislation that were going to be introduced Monday,” a perplexed Smith said in December.

In Orange County, a lack of mother’s milk of politics

If Smith’s loss epitomized lazy legislative campaigning, GOP incumbent Chris Norby’s surprising defeat in the 65th Assembly District in Orange County symbolized the party’s fundraising problems in the lower house. In a span of 18 days, late in the campaign, six Democratic county central committees contributed $292,200 to the Assembly campaign of Sharon Quirk-Silva.

Allan Hoffenblum, publisher of the California Target Book, told CalWatchdog.com that legislative Republicans struggled in 2012 due to a lack of funding.

“The caucus’ problem with the last cycle was the lack of money,” Hoffenblum said. “The one who influences the targeting is the one who raises the money.”

Hoffenblum believes that Brulte’s coronation as chairman will change the party’s fundraising and targeting.

Brulte was less critical of Republicans’ poor showing in state Senate and congressional races.

“We lost some congressional and Senate seats and frankly I’m not sure in a plus-23 election we could have won those,” he said, referring to President Obama’s 60 percent to 37 percent pasting of GOP nominee Mitt Romney in California.

More than 1,300 people attended the state party’s convention. In October, delegates will reconvene in Anaheim.

As a libertarian who still seethes over Newt Gingrich’s and George W. Bush’s betrayal of small-government conservatism, I have tons of issues with the modern Republican Party. But I have to say the GOP has my sympathy most national elections because of my incensed reaction to the heavy-handed bias of the national media.

Here we go again.

Who could have imagined that 2012’s October surprise would be the mainstream media simply choosing to ignore a huge geopolitical scandal on the president’s watch? It is now a matter of public record that within a day of the Sept. 11 murders of four Americans in Benghazi, the administration had vast signs it was an organized act of terror. Yet two weeks later, in a speech to the U.N., Barack Obama repeatedly suggested it was a spontaneous assault triggered by a YouTube video.

This is cut and dried — an administration caught peddling lies to cover up incompetence and worse. This isn’t complex. It’s Scandal 101.

But not according to ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Occasionally, when I kid a liberal member of the media about how in the tank the national media are, I get an honest acknowledgement that this is undeniable.

But sometimes I get pushback. The last few weeks, whenever that has happened, I’ve sent along a transcript of ABC News’ coverage of the aftermath of the first debate. Why? To highlight George Stephanopolous’ “analysis”:

STEPHANOPOLOUS:  Does a tie go to the challenger?

Wow. The pivotal event that revived Mitt Romney and made this a very, very close election, and within minutes of its conclusion, ABC News is spinning it as a tie. Is Stephanopolous the Greek word for Maviglio?

But that’s just one journalist. The media’s de facto/tacit cover-up of the administration’s Benghazi cover-up involves literally dozens of journalists at many different institutions suddenly deciding to go soft on a debacle at the upper reaches of the U.S. government so as to protect the guilty. It’s a sad comment on American journalism.

And maybe I’m naive, but I still have been surprised by this. Benghazi, I thought, was too big a screw-up to be ignored. Even when they were inclined to be in the tank, there were standards, I thought, for the well-educated, highly paid, prideful Washington media.

Boy, was I wrong.

By Chris Reed

After Barack Obama’s 61% to 37% wipeout of John McCain in California in 2008, we were spared the quadrennial tradition of some senior Republican peddling the idea that the GOP had a chance at the Golden State’s 50-plus electoral votes this campaign. The last time a Republican actually won California was George H.W. Bush in 1988.

But as strange as it may seem to talk about Mitt Romney having coattails in a state in which he has no chance of winning, it just might be true.

Over the past three weeks, on statewide races, the news has gotten worse for Prop. 30 and better for Prop. 32. In San Diego, where I live, polls seem to be moving in Republicans’ favor in the San Diego mayor’s race between Republican Carl DeMaio and Democrat Bob Filner and in the congressional race between GOP incumbent Brian Bilbray and Democratic challenger Scott Peters. Redistricting, it was assumed, left Bilbray at risk, leading to millions of dollars in super PAC ads targeting the 52nd congressional district race.

But I haven’t heard an insider talking up Peters’ chances for weeks.

What changed? Maybe we’re seeing a California version of the national dynamics that turned Romney from a clear underdog before the first debate on Oct. 3 to arguably a narrow favorite today.

The top of the ticket matters. More Republicans want to vote. More Democrats are disillusioned about the president.

Sometimes, it’s that simple — even in a state that regularly elects people like Pete Stark, Laura Richardson and John Burton.

By Chris Reed

Last night, when President Obama repeatedly described government spending as “investments,” no one batted an eyelash. This is how Democrats now talk. But few are aware of the California roots of this linguistic gambit.

Flash back to a decade ago. Not many remember this now, but back in the early 2000s, Republicans’ success in national politics led many Democrats to believe there had to be some other reason for their failure than their policies. One academic ended up convincing them that much of their problem was language and marketing.

It was UC Berkeley’s George Lakoff. Four years ago, on my late, lamented America’s Finest Blog, I noted how Lakoff had tried to sell his theories to California Democrats. But his first apostle was an L.A. Times reporter. Strange but true!

Here’s some of what I wrote on Oct. 21, 2008:

Now I happened to tape a “Which Way, L.A.?” segment with Halper and others that will air today, and he was gracious with me, so I don’t want to pile on him in any way.

But I do wish at some point, the “fact checkers” would contemplate the honesty of depicting generic government spending as an “investment.” It will take some gymnastics to make it seem reasonable.