Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney continued to rack up Congressional support this week with an endorsement from Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.).
Romney will announce the House Veterans&rsquo; Affairs chairman&rsquo;s backing today, according to a campaign source.
Almost three dozen Republican Members have announced their support for Romney, the highest tally in the GOP presidential field.
&ldquo;I am proud to support Mitt, and look forward to working with him to help create jobs in Florida and provide the care that our servicemen and veterans deserve,&rdquo; Miller said in a statement.
Twenty-one Republican senators up for re-election in 2016 filed into the National Republican Senatorial Committee on the morning of Nov. 19 to meet with party strategists about campaign preparations.
Leading the confab with the incumbents and their chiefs of staff were incoming NRSC Chairman Roger Wicker, the Mississippi senator elected to the position a week earlier, and Ward Baker, the 2014 political director who was promoted to executive director for the new cycle. Unlike the past four NRSC administrations, this one is charged with defending a Senate majority.
Later that day, in his first newspaper interview since being elected chairman, Wicker spoke candidly about the challenges ahead. He declined to detail the meeting but said, “I guarantee you the issue of fundraising arose.” While Republicans are primed to net nine seats in 2014 with a win next month in Louisiana, the party faced two noteworthy hurdles in the midterms: a late organizational start and being significantly outraised by Democrats.
With Baker in place — about two months earlier than when Rob Collins took the helm of the committee in 2013 — Wicker already has avoided the first issue. Now, his goal is to overcome the financial disparity.
“It’s all about putting together a good staff and fundraising,” Wicker told CQ Roll Call. “And getting the right message, and more fundraising. And it all comes back, every other day, to fundraising — then spending it smart.” Wicker beat out Nevada Sen. Dean Heller for the chairmanship in a closed-door Nov. 13 GOP conference meeting. Six days later, seated behind his desk on the fifth floor of Dirksen, Wicker was confident in the party’s ability to hold a potential 54-seat majority, despite a map that puts the Senate in play for Democrats.
With limited offensive opportunities, Republicans are defending 24 seats in 2016, including seven in states President Barack Obama won twice. But Wicker, who said he&apos;s not expecting a single GOP retirement, was adamant that with a strong GOP presidential nominee, the party would be well-positioned to hold seats in swing states — Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Florida, New Hampshire and beyond.
“I’m not conceding the electoral votes from any of those states to a Democratic presidential nominee, much less a senator like the ones we have who have done a good job, have stayed in touch, worked across the aisle and have been stalwarts and stood up for their states,” he said. “I would feel good about those candidates in a presidential year or a midterm.”
The 63-year-old held his first job in the Capitol in 1967 as a page for Democratic Rep. Jamie L. Whitten. By the time of Whitten&apos;s retirement in 1994, he had become the longest serving member in House history — so long that Wicker successfully ran to succeed him, but as a Republican.
Wicker is one of more than two dozen House or Senate pages who went on to later serve in Congress. Retiring Rep. John D. Dingell, D-Mich., may be the only other one to replace the member who appointed him — in Dingell’s case, it was his father.
After receiving undergrad and law degrees from Ole Miss, Wicker joined the Air Force Judge Advocate General Corps. In 1980, he went back to Capitol Hill to serve as House Rules Committee counsel to Mississippi Republican Trent Lott. After a few years he returned to Tupelo, Miss., and in 1987 was elected to the state Senate — a race Wicker said cost him a grand total of $25,000, including for TV and radio ads.
He spent $750,000 to overcome a crowded field and replace the retiring Whitten in the Republican wave of 1994. Soon after, he was elected president of that massive freshman House class. In 2007, then-Gov. Haley Barbour appointed him to replace Lott in the Senate.
In the interview, Wicker said he would be reaching out for advice about his new role to the other chairmen of the GOP campaign committees and to former Virginia Rep. Tom Davis, who once chaired the National Republican Congressional Committee. But among his first bit of outreach before the leadership elections was to Lott.
“He called some time ago and wondered what I thought,” Lott told CQ Roll Call. “I said, ‘Golly, Roger, why would you want that job? It’s the toughest job in the Senate leadership.’ But he felt like he could do the job, and he asked if I had any advice. I said, ‘Well, do your whip work.’ And apparently he did.”
"I’ve known Roger since he was in college," Lott continued. "Roger has always done well in anything he’s done."
As Wicker noted, incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell often makes the final decisions at the NRSC. That includes naming Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio as vice chairman for finance last cycle. That structure could be repeated for 2016.
“While the chair of the NRSC was no doubt consulted, it was a motion that came straight from the leadership,” Wicker said. “So we’ll be visiting with the leader about co-chairs for areas of emphasis. And I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if an announcement is made early on.”
Wicker’s most prominent role in the midterms was on the stump for his endangered Mississippi colleague, Thad Cochran, for whom Wicker first door-knocked as a 21-year-old Ole Miss college student in 1972. This year, Wicker assisted Cochran in the primary and then helped lead an all-hands-on-deck effort that resulted in Cochran emerging victorious in the runoff.
“I was certainly happy to swing into action,” Wicker said. “I think we did the country a favor, and certainly the party a favor, because we got a good man back in office.”
With Republicans back in the majority and Cochran expected to reclaim the Appropriations gavel, Wicker said that will only help the Senate run more smoothly and ultimately help endangered Republicans in 2016.
“To look better than we have the last six years is a pretty low bar, but I think we’ll look far better,” Wicker said. “And I think that’s good politics.”
Related: Senate Republicans Up in 2016: No Shutdown Roger Wicker Elected NRSC Chairman Senate Map Script Flipped in 2016 A Day With Rob Collins at the NRSC Roll Call Results Map: Results and District Profiles for Every Seat Get breaking news alerts and more from Roll Call in your inbox or on your iPhone.
We actually slept in a little on day four, if you consider sleeping until 7:00 am sleeping in but at Disney it is! We did take things slow that morning, made coffee in the room, and Drew ran up to The Artist’s Palette to get us my favorite Disney breakfast, cheese danishes!
Our plan for the first part of the day was to rope drop the World Showcase and hit several of the Food and Wine booths. They have a great seating area set up behind the booth from Belgium so I sat at the table, or command center as Drew called it, and he walked to all of the nearby booths to pick up what we wanted.
I’m writing up posts for each booth but I’ll give you a quick run down. We started with the waffle and chocolates from Belgium and grabbed a mimosa and baklava from Morocco. I have to say that was pretty much the perfect brunch.
Drew also tried the scallop from New Zealand was brave enough to try the escargot from France. I tried the Eiffel Sour Cosmo Slush from France and I have to say I liked it better than usual drink offerings from France pavilion. Next Drew sampled the mahi mahi from Singapore and the California roll from Japan.
After eating all of that we decided to take a short stroll and set up a new command center in the American Adventure Pavilion. There are several picnic tables set up in the back of the pavilion. Drew again ate a majority of the food, I had a majority of the drinks. He tried out the Florida Local booth, it got rave reviews, Hops & Barley, and Italy. I tried the Red Stag Honey Tea Lemonade from the Fife & Drum Tavern, it was so good, and we tried out the vegetarian option at the Poland booth.
We decided to take a break from the heat and the food and went inside to watch the Voices of Liberty and see the show which is one of our favorites. Afterwards we decided to visit the last two booths we needed to visit on the UK side of the lagoon and set up our command center in the butterfly garden in the UK pavilion. We hit up the Ireland booth and I had what may be my favorite Food and Wine offering, the spanakopita from Greece.
As you can probably imagine we were pretty full by this point so we decided to head over to Hollywood Studios for the rest of the day. As it did every afternoon, the sky started to get dark and we knew rain was on the way. Luckily we made it to the car before it started.
Once we got to Hollywood Studios we rode Star Tours, visited One Man’s Dream to get our traditional photos. No matter how often we visit we take each other’s photo in the same spots. I think we need to change up our wardrobe though because I am pretty sure Drew has already worn that shirt for this photo.
Since it was beginning to rain again we went over to the Animation Academy to see if any characters were out. We hit the jack pot and were able to get our photos taken with Gepetto, the Evil Queen, Captain Hook & Smee, Bolt, and Drew’s girlfriend Pocahontas.
No visit to Hollywood Studios is complete with out visiting The Great Movie Ride so we headed over there and it would be distinctly unpatriotic if we didn’t visit MuppetVision 3D.
Since the park was going to close soon we went over to Toy Story Mania to get in line since fastpasses were long gone by the time we got there. We waited about 40 minutes but had the coolest experience. We were the last people off the ride. Seriously. We had to wait for the wheelchair party in front of us to go through so we could use the accessible ride vehicle. By the time they came back there was no one else in line. We were the only people in the building other than the Cast Members. It was so weird but extremely cool!
After that we took a leisurely stroll out of the park and headed back to our resort. It had been an awesome day but I was ready to curl up with my Dumbo pillow pet and get ready for day number five.
You had me worried in yesterday’s post when you said you were going to “sleep in” for this leg of the trip (Sleep? At Disney? Whaa..?) but 7:00 A.M. and making a rope drop is, indeed, a great morning! That food looks awesome. And being the last one off a ride is wonderfully surreal — I often try to get the last boat on Pirates at DL.
Scene One – With the smack of a riding crop, petite Mistress Kirra Lynn introduces herself and orders you to your knees. In a very hot POV scene, this tiny but vicious blonde reveals her amazing flesh, her plump pussy lips and tight buttocks. She shakes her ass in your face, then beckons you to follow her dazzling butt as she crawls up the stairs
While cleaning her kitchen, Kirra catches a peeping tom looking in at her. It's neighbor Bladimir who claims he's just there to borrow some sugar and cream. Did he pick the wrong house! Despite his panicked protests, she leads him to the bedroom where she binds him like a mummy in clear plastic wrap. She throws him onto the bed and stands on his chest while she strips.
Mistress Kirra proceeds to FACESIT, REVERSE FACESIT, and SIDE-SADDLE FACESIT the helpless man. When she allows him brief moments to breathe, he tells her that he's married and can't be doing this. “You're wife isn't here!” she says as she grinds her pussy on his face. “Tell me that my pussy tastes better than your wife's” she demands. When he refuses, she SMOTHERS him to the brink of brain damage.
Kirra furiously bounces and shakes her ass on his face, stunning his brain. She swirls and rocks it back and forth just inches from Bladimir's face, hypnotizing him, eventually turning him from a devoted family man to her DEVOTED ASS SLAVE. Now he eagerly tongues her asshole until she CUMS.
Scene Two – That sexual loose cannon known as Mistress Flower Tucci is once again unleashed. Her POV scene is frenzy of ass shaking, hole fingering, and explosive SQUIRTING in your face. She calls you a pervert (and worse) as you wantonly gaze up at her tan, jiggling flesh and dripping crotch.
Flower releases Slave Hugo from his under-the-stairs cubby hole. She leads him out by his leash and makes him lie on his back on the stairs. She FACE SLAPS him to get his full attention before plunging her thick buttocks down on his head. She bounces on his outstretched tongue, making him drive it into her anus. She turns and SMOTHERS him with her fleshy pussy lips, masturbating wildly until she SQUIRTS like a fire hose all over his naked body.
She leads him to the couch for some ASS KISSING and ASS WORSHIP, but Hugo fails to satisfy her. She ties up his raging hard cock with his leash and yanks it painfully as she sits on his face. His cries of pain and gasps for air only make her even more crazed. She orgasms on his face screaming in pleasure!
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We thought we would let our readers know that Romantic Times has announced their nominations for this years RT Awards. I was pretty excited when I seen a few of my favorite authors on the list including my girl DB Reynolds, Elizabeth Amber, Jeaniene Frost, Karen Hawkins and Lora Leigh. The list is quite extensive so I cannot put everyone who is nominated on here so anyone interested the link is:
When Christiana married the earl, she thought she'd found the perfect marriage. Turns out she was wrong. From the moment they both said "I do", Dicky treated her like dirt under his feet. Miserable, Christiana settled in for a life of misery, hoping against hope he'd quickly die and end her suffering.
When she realizes her husband is dead, she's afraid it will interfere with her younger sisters coming out in society, so she does the only logical thing-puts her husband on ice and goes to a ball. But when she sees her husband walk into the room, she's sure the evening won't end as planned.
Richard is the true earl. Cheated out of his title by his scheming twin, he returns to England in time to learn not only is his brother dead, but he's married. Thinking the best thing to do is step back into his life, he's in for a rude awakening when he realizes the extent of the mess his brother left in his wake. Not only that, but admitting the truth would cause a scandal, since it turns out his brother's marriage to Christiana isn't truly legal. Marrying her will be the best thing, but he's not sure if he'll be content with his inherited bride. That is, until they share their first kiss...
While I've read several books from Lynsay Sands, this was the first historical of hers I've picked up. I'm thrilled that it didn't disappoint. There's the perfect balance of humor, intrigue, romance and disbelief to make it a great read. It was great to see Christiana and Richard floudering about the first day they met, both trying to keep secrets from the other, only to have it blow up in their faces.
I enjoy Lynsay Sands as a writer because she does an amazing job of seamlessly blending all elements of the story together in such a way that it makes you have to finish the book. I finished this book in less than a day, start to finish, and I'm thinking of buying the next book in the series, even though I don't buy historical. Bravo, Lynsay Sands, and keep up the good work.
I was a little worried about reading THE COUNTESS only because the last historical I read by Lynsay Sands disappointed me which has never happened as she is one of my favorite paranormal authors. Well, she definitely came through this time I loved the story it made me laugh and there was never a lull in the storyline from Christiana and Richard to the secondary characters. I will be buying the next book in the series THE HEIRESS to see what more mischief the Madison sisters can get themselves into.
I really enjoyed the Countess as well & The Heiress was equally good (although part of it runs concurrent w/ the 1st book, it's interesting to see the events from the other characters viewpoint).