State Senate candidate Todd Zink (R) responded to my question with this email:
"If Todd Zink's campaign emails me a single position that they claim shows that he is a moderate Republican I will post it on the front page."Brian,
In response to your statement above, I hope you will honor your commitment after showing a photo of myself without explanation and using that photo to draw conclusions as to my political positions. I would imagine that, before you posted the photo on your blog, you did your due diligence on the positions found on my website before posting your conclusions. To be fair, I would imagine you have researched both candidates thoroughly before siding with one side or the other.
I have no affiliation with Allen West. In fact, while attending Congressman McKeon's fundraiser I did not know who he was. I did speak to him about his military career.
Your definition of moderate and mine might be very different. Labels are not something that I look to have attributed to me.
Below however, are a few things that make me very different from the other Senators that I will be serving with later this year:
1) I will likely be the only Republican State Senator in California that has not signed the No Tax pledge that has been promoted by Americans for Tax Reform. It isn't that I have any desire to raise taxes - I just don't believe in political pledges.
2) My campaign and my actions as a State Senator will be focused on three policy issues. They are job growth and economic recovery, maintaining public safety, and improving our public school system. Most of the others want to focus on social issues and legislation regarding the unionization of baby sitters, or resolutions about non-substantive issues. Social issues and distractions are not what motivated me to run for office.
3) I am not someone that has been part of the political process for a long time. Every member of the Senate Republican Caucus has held some sort of elective office prior to serving in the Senate. Those years as an elected official shaped their views. I am coming into office completely free to chart the best course for this region of the state.
4) My experience in the military has included executive experience. Few legislators in Sacramento have this sort of experience. It is easy for someone to throw rhetorical bombs and take extreme positions when part of a larger body of reasonable people. That can't happen when you are responsible to make the trains run on time. That is where you have to make things work and balance the competing interests. Some might say that these sorts of decision-making experiences create moderation of views. I think it creates experienced leaders that are desperately needed in our state.
Thank you for considering my points above.
Todd Zink
Thanks for replying Todd Zink. As I wrote I would post this on the front page. Keep me up to date on your campaign.
I see Zink is continuing in the GOP tradition of just plain making stuff up. He posed for a photo with Allen West, put it on his Facebook Page, seemingly proud of it AND HE DIDN'T KNOW WHO HE WAS?
Yeah, right.
I would not be bragging about my complete lack of political and policy experience if I were you, either. It's like any other job. You need to know what you are doing before somebody will consider hiring you.
So far, not at all impressed.
It is true that the picture was posted on the Facebook page for Todd Zink. Did he know who it was when the picture was posted?
Mr. Zink. Besides the 15 untrue things that Paul Ryan said in his speech the other night they have now proven he lied about his marathon time. How can we trust a man like Ryan who even lies about little things like how fast he ran a marathon? Also several GOP delegates were kicked out of the convention after they threw peanuts at an African American camera woman for CNN and screamed "This is what he feed animals down here!" Why do you think these kind of things are still happening in the GOP?
I find it interesting that the Democrat Kool-Aid drinkers continue to parrot the alleged Fact-Checker (more like Obama water-carrier) claims that Paul Ryan made false statements in his Convention Speech. Not a single one of the 5-7 claims amount to more than a disagreement over the application of policy. The one claim about the GM plant in Ryan's home state has been proven accurate in that the plant was in operation well into Obama's 1st term. Democrats must discredit this claim because of the broader implications it represents. GM was not saved by the bailout. Thousands of dealerships were closed and production is nowhere near where it was a decade ago. And than God, because hundreds of thousands of GM vehicles were produced but never sold and are rusting away in storage yards.
As for whether or not Todd Zink knows who Allen West is, I question why Todd would distance himself from a fellow Republican who is, in essence fighting the same battles in Washington D.C. that Zink will face in Sacramento with a single-minded entrenched Democrat caucus that spends and grows the size of government while asking the productive class of America to pay for it.
Meritlessman why is it you republicans claim to be moral, yet you tell lie after lie and then try to defend those lies? The GM plant closed under Bush, anyone claiming differently is either stupid or a liar of both. Here are some more facts from CNN. During the GOP convention strip bars saw a 40% increase and calls for both male and female prostitutes jumped by 50%. Are these the actions of a "moral" party?
Also in the future Meritlessman don't answer questions intended for Zink or anyone else, understand, or was that said too fast for you?
Never mind Paul Ryan. What about all the fertilizer Bill Clinton was spreading around in his 60-minute speech that went about 40 minutes over his allotted time?
In all the b.s. he was throwing out there, he made not one compelling (true) reason why we should elect Barack Obama for another four years. It was all fluff and distortions, which Clinton has proven to be an expert at, dating back to all the lies and half-truths surrounding the Monica Lewinsky affair.
Sorry, but I would not buy a used car from this man.
The fertilizer was in Tampa and was in the mouth of Romney and Ryan. Ryan and Romney were caught in lie after lie and then said they would not let the facts and truth get in their way. The Romney plan to cut taxes for millionaires and billionaires will lead to a huge tax increase on everyone making under 200k a year because they want to take away your deductions on your home and charitable giving and they want to destroy medicare and social security. You can really tell Clinton kicked their butts the way they are crying!
Please, Mr. Biden, stop yelling. You're scaring my children.
The only thing scary to children is Romney and his pack of lies. Romney wants to increase taxes on everyone making under 200k a year so he can give himself and the Koch Brothers a big tax cut. Romney wants to throw millions of little children out into the streets so they will be hungry and homeless.
Very uninspiring and, as usual, short on specifics speech by the Speechmaker-in-Chief, Obama. It contained nothing of substance and was the same old hope and change garbage he spewed four years ago that he then failed to deliver on.
He gave no specifics on what he was going to do to help mend the flailing economy and get people back to work. That's what's on everyone's mind right now. Not what new government program he is going to come up with to enable people to continue living off the government rather than get back to work.
Romney-Ryan win the convention bounce hands down!
Very uninspiring and, as usual, short on specifics speech by the Speechmaker-in-Chief, Obama. It contained nothing of substance and was the same old hope and change garbage he spewed four years ago that he then failed to deliver on.
He gave no specifics on what he was going to do to help mend the flailing economy and get people back to work. That's what's on everyone's mind right now. Not what new government program he is going to come up with to enable people to continue living off the government rather than get back to work.
Romney-Ryan win the convention bounce hands down!
BWAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!!!!! READ THIS! OBAMA GETS A BIG BOUNCE!!
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama remained ahead of Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney in a Reuters/Ipsos released on Sunday, maintaining a boost in popularity that followed the Democratic National Convention.
Of the 1,419 likely voters polled online over the previous four days, 47 percent said they would vote for Obama and 43 percent for Romney if the November 6 U.S. election were held today.
The president's margin over Romney in the daily rolling poll was unchanged from Saturday's numbers, turning up the heat on Republican strategists who were hoping for a more muted post-convention "bounce" for Obama in the wake of Friday's release of weak employment numbers.
"It means (Democrats) are on good footing going into the rest of the election," Ipsos pollster Julia Clark said.
They have traced the rotten egg smell over SoCal to a Romney speech!
Obama has no plan, except to increase the presence of government in our daily lives.
Obama has no plan, except to raise taxes in order to take money from those that have earned it and give it to those unwilling to work for it (the textbook definition of Socialism).
Obama has no plan, except to continue to decrease our support of our long-time friend and ally, Israel, by making overtures to Arab nations filled with terrorists.
Obama has no plan, except to continue to disallow oil drilling in coastal regions of the U.S. and in Alaska, thereby increasing our reliance on Arab nations that hate our guts.
Bottom line: Obama has no plan.