Barbara Boxer Draws An Opponent

Happy 68th Birthday, Senator Boxer — here’s your possible GOP opponent:  Assemblyman Chuck DeVore!

DeVore, R-Irvine, is declaring his candidacy just one week after winning his third and final term in the 70th Assembly District, representing Laguna Beach, Irvine, Newport Beach, Tustin and other portions of Orange County.

DeVore has scheduled an Internet news conference at 1 p.m. Wednesday to make the announcement. He confirmed his intention Tuesday in a phone conversation with Capitol Alert.

In targeting Boxer, DeVore is taking on a veteran Democratic congresswoman who served 10 years in the U.S. House of Representatives before moving to the Senate in January 1993.

DeVore is a Republican Party whip in the Assembly who served this year as vice chairman of the Revenue and Taxation Committee. He also served on the Assembly Budget and Veterans Affairs committees.

Based on the dude’s own blog, he seems to be a typically delusional GOP. Here’s what blogged about the results of last week’s election:

Scratch the surface of Sen. McCain’s 24.3 percent loss in California, with President-elect Obama winning by the widest margin in modern California history, and you have the makings of a California comeback in 2010. To even entertain the possibility of a comeback, however, Republicans have to fully understand where McCain and President Bush failed.

He provides some "evidence" for the poised-for-a-comeback assertion: Democratic pickups in the Assembly and the State Senate, and possibly no change in the California Congressional delegation, despite the mere 451 votes separating Charlie Brown and carpetbagger McClintock in CA-04.   He’s a Reaganaut of the "there’s gotta be pony in here somewhere!" variety.

Then he makes clear that his good cheer is based on the victory of Prop 8. And likely Obama overreach. Not that he’s rooting for Obama to fail, mind you; that would be unpatriotic.

To sum-up, President-elect Obama is going to have some big challenges in the next four years. He cannot please both his base and the majority of Americans. The Moveon.org, DailyKos, and NetRoots crowd will demand leftwing action while most Americans, including substantial numbers of the people who voted for Obama, will expect prudent governance. Further, Congressional Democrats will be pushing their own agenda and may have high expectations for rapid progress – expectations, that, if Obama is seriously eyeing a full two-term run, he’ll have to temper.

For our nation’s sake, I hope President-elect Obama meets the test of the next four years. If he fails, though, last night’s results give me encouragement that the next conservative resurgence is only one election away.

This guy sounds like the California GOP’s wet dream. Barbara Boxer must be praying no one else runs.