Newt Opens California/Silicon Valley Office

Excellent news -- Newt Gingrich's American Solutions group has opened an office in Silicon Valley.

Video announcement

PALO ALTO, Calif., Feb. 26 -- American Solutions for Winning the Future announced today that it will expand its organization with the opening of a new office in Silicon Valley that serves as the organization's technology headquarters. This new office makes
American Solutions one of the few national grassroots organizations with a visible presence in Silicon Valley.

Former Speaker of the House and American Solutions General Chairman Newt Gingrich made the announcement in a video posted on American Solutions' YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/americansolutions.

"We're excited to be in Silicon Valley and to learn from the best of the private sector so we can utilize the latest technological breakthroughs to fundamentally transform government from the world that fails to the world that works," said Gingrich. "We believe it's possible to create a
world that works and to move the bureaucracies of the past - obsolete, slow, cumbersome, paper-based institutions - into a very dynamic, networked, information technology future."

"Our office will be looking to work with the innovative and entrepreneurial people located in Silicon Valley to establish ourselves as a leader in online politics and serve as a model for successful online political efforts," said David Kralik, Director of Internet Strategy for
American Solutions and manager of the Silicon Valley office. "We want to engage in a dialogue with technology leaders and to communicate a message of free market principles where consumers decide who wins and not the government."

American Solutions is committed to utilizing the latest technology to connect elected officials at all levels and millions of activists to form a diverse, decentralized, collaborative network that will aggregate the best ideas and solutions to move government into the 21st century.

An example of American Solutions' dedication to using new technology occurred when Newt Gingrich made an appearance in the virtual world of Second Life for a Solutions Day workshop on September 27, 2007.

American Solutions for Winning the Future is a new, non-partisan organization built around three goals: to defend America and our allies abroad and defeat our enemies, to strengthen and revitalize America's core values, and to move the government into the 21st Century. Its General
Chairman is former Speaker Newt Gingrich. For more information about American Solutions visit http://www.AmericanSolutions.com.

Bill Jones Re-emerges as Major Statewide Player

Former California Secretary of State Bill Jones is no stranger to Californians, especially California Republicans. He has served as a statewide constitutional officer, Assemblyman, Assembly Republican Leader, and a county Republican Chairman in his native Fresno.

This year, Bill has emerged as a key statewide player in the 2008 campaign as the California state chairman of Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign. This is great news for both Senator McCain, and California Republicans.

While Bill's focus will of course be the election of Senator McCain, as an Assembly Republican leader, Bill understands the needs of our state legislative candidates as we work to build our numbers in the Capitol this year. And as a former county chairman, he understands and appreciates the important role our volunteers play in registration and turnout efforts.

Beyond his experience, Bill is simply a good, solid Republican guy from the Central Valley: sharp, committed, and easy to work with.

I'm incredibly enthusiastic about working closely with Bill this year to support Republican candidates up and down the ticket this fall.

California’s budget mess stems from too much spending, not insufficient taxes

Residents of the Golden State are among the highest taxed people in the West. Our high taxes continue to drive businesses and residents to nearby low tax states like Nevada, Arizona and Idaho.

Governor Schwarzenegger is absolutely right to concentrate his efforts to balance the budget on controlling state spending while resisting Democrat calls to raise taxes. Experience shows that tax increases rarely if ever produce the revenue anticipated, while at the same time they depress economic activity and give people more incentives to move elsewhere.

Meanwhile, government continues to grow to consume all available revenue, plus more in the form of debt. The Governor and Republican legislators are right to support reforming the state’s budget process to end the pre-programmed increases in state spending and restoring control and accountability to those who are elected to determine the size and growth of government.

Members, Not Party Leaders, Determine Candidates

One big difference between political parties in California versus those in, say, Europe is that it's our members who choose the candidates. In many European countries, by contrast, party leaders draw up the lists of who gets to take office if their party wins on Election Day. Our members choose our candidates directly in primaries.

This party will continue to support the nominees selected by our members. That's a function of respecting the decision of our members in terms of who they nominate for federal and state offices.

In local government, because there are no primaries, our county central committees - consisting of the elected representatives of our members - act on our members' behalf in endorsing/nominating candidates for county and city offices, and special districts.

San Diego Republicans Back Open Competition

Project Labor Agreements are anti-competitive, which is why President Bush signed an Executive Order banning them on public works projects where federal dollars are involved. Such agreements, known as PLA’s, restrict construction to only unionized firms. With most minority-owned contracting firms being non-union, the impact of PLA’s is often to eliminate such firms from bidding on public works projects, while at the same time driving up costs to taxpayers by prohibiting merit shop firms from bidding on projects. The Republican Party of San Diego County on Monday night endorsed the principle of open competition just as proponents of an ordinance requiring open competition is about to go into circulation in the city of Chula Vista.

Vice Chairman DelBeccaro in San Diego

Tom Del Beccaro really knows how to get our volunteers and activists excited about a campaign, and he proved it Monday night in speaking to our Republican committee in San Diego. The standing ovation Tom received followed an excellent talk focused on unity and winning Republican issues going into this year’s Presidential election. Great job, Tom.

Northwest Leaders Organize

One way to fully grasp how big this state is: attend a regional meeting of county chairs in the Northwest. Fort Bragg in Mendocino County is 236 miles north of San Francisco airport by car - I checked. Congratulations to Vice Chair Mark Pruner and the leaders from this region for an excellent meeting over the weekend to coordinate programs and share information as we head into the general election season. Although the legislative districts in this region are held by Democrats, Republicans have been very successful in local government. With the leadership I’ve seen in these counties I expect Republicans will continue to make gains locally, building the farm team while putting our ideas into action in local government.

Broadcast Journalism School for Conservatives

The Leadership Institute is considered the nation's leading training organization for conservative candidates, elected officials, and activists (the group is non-partisan). One program highly recommended for conservatives interested in a career in television and radio news is LI's Broadcast Journalism School, which will be held on the campus of Pepperdine University on March 29 and 30.

The Broadcast Journalism School is an intensive, two day program that teaches many of the skills and provides the background necessary to move into this important field.

Click here for complete information on this very high quality program.