Inside the Beltway

RIGHT WINGETTES

“Come for the culture war … stay for the chicks. Right-wing women rock,” says Ian Robinson, a columnist for the Calgary Sun and a fan of certain ideologically inclined females who serve red meat at the dinner table with aplomb and favor high heels over Birkenstocks.

“Left-wing drabs recycle. Right-wing women shop - and the government measures how much they shop every month to find out whether we’re still in a recession. Basically, the world economy depends on right-wing women buying shoes,” says Mr. Robinson.

“In case you’re not convinced, to indicate the utter superiority of the right-wing woman over the left-wing variant, just turn on ABC’s ’The View.’ The left has Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg. We’ve got Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Checkmate,” he adds.

But wait. Surely this bold Canadian was subjected to the ire of those who couldn’t fathom his opinions. Well, yes.

“People from way out of my coverage area have clogged my inbox calling me unpleasant names, plus some express the desire that I expire painfully from cancer, or that I perish in a house fire,” Mr. Robinson tells Inside the Beltway. “Is it just me, or do people just not get jokes anymore unless the suffix ’LOL’ is appended to each one?”

BUMPER PATROL

Quick, somebody call Congress. Another time-sensitive bumper sticker, this one seen in Springfield, Va.

“Be conservative. Get the Old Flu.”

TWICE THE FUN

Just like Levi Johnston’s ego, health care reform legislation just keeps growing. And the Republican Study Committee is there to do the math so you won’t have to.

“H.R. 3962, the version of Obamacare unveiled by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrat leaders, is a stunning 1,990 pages long. Compared to the original version of the bill (H.R. 3200), which came in at 1,017 pages, it’s essentially the same bill. The one obvious and major difference? The version introduced today is almost twice as long,” the committee says.

“It is nearly 2,000 pages of higher taxes, job-killing employer mandates, choice-restricting individual mandates, government-run insurance, budget-busting entitlement expansions, and countless provisions that set Washington bureaucrats firmly between you and your doctor. And with a thousand extra pages, obviously it’s even more prescriptive this time around.”

Ergo:

“The legislation that created Medicare and Medicaid in 1965, which now cost nearly $800 billion annually, was less than 300 pages long. So at 2,000 pages today, that’s a whole lot of government input for a plan the speaker says won’t result in Washington taking over health care.”

CONSERVATIVE ESTIMATE

They are banded together under the auspices of the National Conservative Campaign Fund (NCCF), and in the name of Douglas Hoffman, now running for Congress in New York’s 23rd District:

Ed Meese, NCCF chairman; David Keene, American Conservative Union chairman; David McIntosh, former congressman from Indiana; Brent Bozell, president of the Conservative Victory Committee; Al Regnery, author of “The Ascendence of American Conservativism”; Colin Hanna, president of Let Freedom Ring; Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America; James C. Miller, former Reagan-era budget director; Richard Viguerie, chairman of ConservativeHQ.com; Tom Winter, editor-in-chief of Human Events; Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council PAC; Craig Shirley, author of “Rendezvous with Destiny: Ronald Reagan and the Campaign That Changed the World”; Ron Pearson, Conservative Victory Fund; J. Kenneth Blackwell, former Ohio Secretary of State; Jeff Hollingsworth, executive director of the NCCF.

Whoo-hoo. Uh-huh. There you have it. The entire list of national conservative heavyweights who have endorsed Mr. Hoffman.

“He represents the clearest choice for those citizens who believe the current administration and Congress are out of control and out of touch,” they say.

FOX TROT

The Fox News Channel is viewed by Americans in “more ideological terms than other television news networks,” says the Pew Research Center weekly news analysis and viewer survey.

The bare numbers: 47 percent say Fox is conservative, 14 percent called the network liberal, 24 percent said Fox was “neither.” In contrast, 31 percent said CBS was liberal, 14 percent said it was conservative, and 37 said the network was “neither.”

See the report here: https:// people-press.org/report/559/

READ IT AND WHIP

Hurray. More Republicans join the modern age on Thursday.

House Republican Whip Eric Cantor of Virginia and House Chief Deputy Whip Kevin McCarthy of California debuted a snappy new communications tool. And that would be WhipCast, a new BlackBerry application, which provides instantaneous alerts, audio updates, video features and additional messages to the politically engaged.

Mr. Cantor vows that the new app represents a “commitment to modernize” the Grand Old Party.

“WhipCast is more than just the House Republicans gaining technological ground. It’s a new and better way of communicating,” Mr. McCarthy adds.

Political junkies can download the WhipCast here: https://republicanwhip.house .gov/WhipCast

POLL DU JOUR

• 61 percent of Americans will celebrate Halloween.

• 30 percent of Americans say the economy has influenced their plans.

• 88 percent plan to spend less.

• 71 percent will hand out candy; 47 percent will spend less on it.

• 33 percent will wear a costume; a third will either reuse last year’s costume or make one.

• 42 percent will carve a pumpkin, 30 percent will throw or attend a party.

Source: A National Retail Federation survey of 8,526 adults conducted Sept. 1-9.

• Bellows, caterwaul, policy statements to jharper@ washingtontimes.com