As I noted last night, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison is failing to keep pace with Governor Rick Perry's endorsements. 

Now, some are accusing her of failing to do her job as a U.S. Senator, as well.

Rick Perry's gubernatorial campaign has pointed out that Senator Hutchison was AWOL on an important vote to defund ACORN. 

As the Dallas Morning News reports:

The Senate voted Monday to cut off funding for ACORN, the anti-poverty group that has become a target of the conservative talk radio and Fox TV. The vote was overwhelming, but Kay Bailey Hutchison didn't vote. And Rick Perry's campaign wants to know why.

Says Perry spokesman Mark Miner: "Less than one week after the Senate returned to work, Senator Hutchison skipped a key vote to prevent ACORN from receiving taxpayer funds from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is yet another example of Senator Hutchison failing to protect the taxpayers of Texas. The Senator made time to vote for a $700 billion bailout for Wall Street, but when it came time to prevent tax dollars from going to a liberal activist group, she was nowhere to be found."

Aside from the obvious point that ACORN has dominated conservative talk for the last week or so, the other problem for KBH is that going AWOL is not new for Senator Hutchison. The Dallas Morning News has previously reported on her missing key Senate Committee Hearings:

Hutchison has been absent from the committee's work on two top priorities of Congress: health care legislation and consumer protection. When she recently announced her departure from the Senate in the fall, she said she'd stay in Washington long enough to participate in the health legislation. [However,] Hutchison missed all four Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee hearings that explored problems with health insurers, including one that showed insurers "purge" small-business beneficiaries if their claims exceed underwriters' expectations.

 
It is inherently difficult to oust an incumbent, especially one in your own party.  But this task is made nearly impossible when you fail to show up to work.   It's hard to imagine her calculus on this ...

Former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina has yet to officially throw her hat into the ring for Barbara Boxer's U.S. Senate seat in California -- but that hasn't stopped conservative bloggers from bringing the heat.

A post yesterday on RedState cites news that Fiorina will not self-fund her Senate race, should she decide to run.  A call to her exploratory committee, Carly for California, led me to Beth Miller who told me that, in fact, Carly has never said she would self-fund and had made that clear from the outset to the folks at the Republican National Senatorial Committee. 

“Carly has said all along that she would not self-fund and would actively raise money from both big and small donors,” Miller said.

Miller added that, as with many candidates, Fiorina will support her own effort but it will not be in a fashion that some have come to expect from California candidates. (Read: Silicon Valley Billionaires and CA candidates for Governor Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner.) 

Apparently her position not to self-fund also didn’t come as a surprise to the National Republican Senatorial Committee.  The NRSC has not currently endorsed any candidate for this race.

Of course, for conservatives who have grown understandably skeptical of the NRSC (and their support of candidates like establishment figure Charlie Crist over conservative Marco Rubio) -- their comment is of little import. 

And Fiorina's decision not to self-fund is not the only thing of interest.  RedState's piece implies Fiorina may be violating FEC rules by not formally filing for office:

FEC rules require that if a candidate receives or spends $5000.00, the candidate must begin formal filings with the FEC as a candidate. Given Fiorina’s hire of big-money consultants like Hollywood-based Fred Davis, you’d think Carly for California would have burned through that limit in about twenty minutes.

As one source emailed me, "If I had to guess, I'd say Carly for California blew through $5,000 well before Labor Day. (A poll, an official spokeswoman, Fred Davis, Dresner Wickers and Marty Wilson don't come cheap!)"
 
Aside from the FEC/self-funding controversy, Fiorina also finds herself defending her positions on a range of hot-button issues, including everything from Life to bailouts. 

Her team assures me she is, in fact, pro-Life (as backed up by this LA Times mention) and that she opposed Obama's "stimulus" (they point to her comments during an appearance on "This Week" as evidence). 

It is probably safe to say that Fiorina will not be the most conservative candidate in the primary race.  But conservatives may also want to ask: Is she the most conservative candidate with a realistic chance of ousting Barbara Boxer in California?

I don't know the answer to that -- nobody does.  It's too early to tell if Fiorina's background, experience, and connections will be baggage -- or a huge plus for her.  But as conservatives seek to take back seats in 2010, these are questions worth asking ... 

Over at FOXFORUM, Ken Blackwell and Ken Klukowski call on Attorney General Eric Holder to order a RICO investigation of ACORN:

Now that a third ACORN video has surfaced, a pattern emerges of ACORN workers willing to help people engage in prostitution, tax fraud, housing fraud, and even human trafficking. Under federal law, a RICO investigation is now warranted. Three strikes and you’re out, ACORN.

If endorsements can be viewed as a signal as to the health of a campaign, Kay Bailey Hutchison's campaign is on life support.

Over the past few weeks, incumbent Republican Governor Rick Perry has lined up a long list of endorsements while Senator Hutchison has remained silent. 

Following are a few of the recent Perry endorsements:

RNC Committeewoman Cathie Adams
Texas Right to Life
Texas Alliance for Life
Texans for Life President Kyleen Wright
Free Market Foundation President Kelly Shackelford
Americans for Prosperity Texas State Director Peggy Venable
Texas Republican County Chairman Association President Linda Rogers
Texas Municipal Police Association
Texas Chemical Council
Texas Society of Professional Engineers
Houston Realty Business Coalition
Texas Apartment Association
Heidi Group Founder Carol Everett
Texas Department of Public Safety Officers Association PAC
Texas Home School Coalition PAC
Conservative Republicans of Texas President Dr. Steve Hotze
Texas Chiropractic Association
State Director of Americans for Prosperity Peggy Venable
Texas State Association of Fire Fighters

Governor Perry has also received the unanimous support of the 160 member Board of Directors of the Texas Association of Realtors. 

So why is Hutchison running? Unfortunately, when you hear her campaign speeches she has taken a page from the Obama playbook of offering “Change” without any plan on how she would actually accomplish it.

Senator Hutchison’s biggest challenge is going to be selling her, “Texas can do better” theme when the state is widely considered a model other governors should aspire to.

And as the endorsements stack up against her, will she risk costing taxpayers $30 million dollars to fill her seat in a special election?  ... Especially as her campaign continues to falter?

The race for Congress in NY-23 is an interesting one.  It pits a Republican against a Democrat and a member of the Conservative Party. 

The Republican candidate is reportedly very liberal and pro-labor union, so many conservatives are rallying around the Conservative Party candidate, Doug Hoffman.  The NRCC, of course, is siding with the Republican.

Interestingly, though, the media is picking up on the fact that of the three candidates -- only the Republican has filed the required disclosure reports. 

Stay tuned as this one looks to become a donnybrook.

Whoa ... The Hill reports,

Virginia gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell (R) is likely to regret his interview on Friday with WTOP radio, in which he accidentally drops the F-bomb while discussing transportation policy.

"So no tax will be raised during your four-year term?," host Mark Plotkin asks the candidate.

"I'm going to find other ways to be able to fund transportation. I've outlined 12 f--king funding mechanisms that are creative, that are entrepreneurial," McDonnell answers.

Guess this sort of changes the subject from the Regent University thesis stuff ...

Update: A couple of folks on Twitter point out that he was probably trying to say "funding."  Also, it is understandable that candidates are under intense pressure, and always must be "on," yada, yada, yada.

With the start of the NFL season, I asked political insiders like FOX's Martha MacCallum, Hugh Hewitt, NBC's Chuck Todd, Ken Blackwell -- and several others -- for Super Bowl predictions.  View their picks here.

Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell is out with a new ad which seeks to respond to a series of WaPost stories about a graduate school paper he wrote a decade ago.

Since about 7pm last night, the ads have been ubiquitous in the DC/NOVA market.  In my estimation, the ads are good and will likely be effective.  But you be the judge ...

Mixed netroots reaction to Obama’s big health care speech (01:48)
Joe Wilson’s outburst and the lack of adult supervision on the right (07:38)
Will the Supreme Court kill campaign finance reform? (04:31)
Jon Henke’s WorldNetDaily boycott falls flat (08:33)
The GOP’s complicated dance with the birthers (03:21)

I guess they can turn these things around pretty quickly these days ...