#and garcia distancing herself from all the nonsense got in the way of it all and also the plague but like. yeah.

[ssaalexblake]

I do maintain that, if emily and tara ever got together, they’d take over the world. 

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

I've only read parts of World of Ice and Fire, but one of the things I liked about it is that wrong or not Maester Yandel isn't just a strawman skeptic and that does give legit reasons for a lot of the stuff he says along with qualifiers like "Maybe whoever inspired the Children of the Forest legends really did know some lost arts that we don't understand like speaking with ravens, but that doesn't mean they had literal magic powers and could summon tidal waves and warg into beasts"

Yeah… I guess he’s not a strawman, but Yandel’s just so blatantly wrong sometimes it’s embarrassing. Like, for example:

It was the children who carved the weirwoods with faces, perhaps to give eyes to their gods so that they might watch their worshippers at their devotions. Others, with little evidence, claim that the greenseers—the wise men of the children—were able to see through the eyes of the carved weirwoods. The supposed proof is the fact that the First Men themselves believed this; it was their fear of the weirwoods spying upon them that drove them to cut down many of the carved trees and weirwood groves, to deny the children such an advantage. Yet the First Men were less learned than we are now, and credited things that their descendants today do not…

Archmaester Fomas’s Lies of the Ancients—though little regarded these days for its erroneous claims regarding the founding of Valyria and certain lineal claims in the Reach and westerlands—does speculate that the Others of legend were nothing more than a tribe of the First Men, ancestors of the wildlings, that had established itself in the far north. Because of the Long Night, these early wildlings were then pressured to begin a wave of conquests to the south. That they became monstrous in the tales told thereafter, according to Fomas, reflects the desire of the Night’s Watch and the Starks to give themselves a more heroic identity as saviors of mankind, and not merely the beneficiaries of a struggle over dominion.

Oh, and there’s this especially fun bit:

Claiming to have consulted with texts said to be preserved at Castle Black, Septon Barth put forth that the children of the forest could speak with ravens and could make them repeat their words. According to Barth, this higher mystery was taught to the First Men by the children so that ravens could spread messages at a great distance. It was passed, in degraded form, down to the maesters today, who no longer know how to speak to the birds. […] Ravens are amongst the cleverest of birds, but they are no wiser than infant children, and considerably less capable of true speech, whatever Septon Barth might have believed.

“It was the singers who taught the First Men to send messages by raven… but in those days, the birds would speak the words. The trees remember, but men forget, and so now they write the messages on parchment and tie them round the feet of birds who have never shared their skin.” –ADWD, Bran II

So, in a world where we know magic exists and the greenseers can see through the eyes of the trees, where we know the Others exist, where we know wargs exist, Yandel just comes off as stupid or deliberately ignorant. I mean, it tells us a lot about the Citadel and how their anti-magic agenda warps even curious and intelligent men into this really obvious blindspot, but it’s… sad. Sadly hilarious sometimes, but still.

And IMO it puts Yandel’s historiography in doubt in general, where how can we really believe that anything he says is true? Sure, often he’s just quoting other sources (like Archmaester Gyldayn’s histories of House Targaryen, and works by other maesters), but how many of those sources are missing magical motivations and magical events because the Citadel censored them or encouraged the writers to dismiss them as nonsense?

Furthermore, it’s not just magical things the maesters censored, but political motivations and events, depending on the whims of who they were writing for. Gyldayn quotes Septon Eustace often re the Dance of the Dragons; but Eustace was on Aegon II’s side, and wrote blatant false propaganda like saying Rhaenyra’s arms and legs were all cut up the first time she sat the Iron Throne… even though she was wearing full armor. How much else of Eustace’s words can we really trust? In addition to this, another source for the history of the Dance was Grand Maester Orwyle, who wrote his account to flatter Rhaenyra to save himself from being executed. Not to mention another major source, Mushroom’s account, which was a deliberately scandalous rag full of debauchery that may not have even been written by Mushroom himself. And to make this even more difficult, sometimes the editing of the history novellas (as published) cut out bits where Gyldayn said he was quoting Eustace or Orwyle or Mushroom, so it’s presented to the reader as straight facts!

And then there’s Yandel himself. According to Elio Garcia, when Robert died, and Ned Stark was arrested and executed for treason and the War of the Five Kings began, Yandel realized his recent history, his accounts of Robert’s Rebellion and the Greyjoy Rebellion, had way too much hero Ned Stark and hero Stannis Baratheon in it. (Robert’s best friend and Robert’s brother, after all.) So he cut them out as much as he could, and rewrote. Paragraphs that originally praised Ned and Stannis for their generalship and their success in battle, were heavily edited to exclude them from the narrative after Joffrey declared them traitors. That leads to a lot of awkwardness in those sections, where some readers may go, “wait, this is missing something”… but unfortunately many readers won’t even realize what Yandel did. TWOIAF is “the untold history of the Game of Thrones”, after all! It’s got be true, right?

Although at least Yandel’s writing to please the king is extremely obvious (and odious) in the section of the Sack of King’s Landing, where he says that Tywin’s men fought “the defenders of King’s Landing” (and doesn’t mention the rape and murder and sacking of the innocent populace), and then goes on to say “it is not known” who murdered Princess Rhaenys and Prince Aegon, and raped and murdered Princess Elia. That Yandel even includes the supposed rumors that Aerys ordered it done, or that Elia murdered her children herself, instead of including any word possibly damning Robert’s father-in-law Tywin… well, that should recognized by all readers, I would hope. (Though considering how much irrational Elia hate there is, I doubt it, alas.)

Basically, Maester Yandel is a very unreliable narrator, and in some places it’s more obvious than others, more or less noticeable by the readers. I mean, it’s excellent worldbuilding, no doubt about that. It certainly deals with the concepts of history being written by the winners, and the problems of conflicting historical sources, and the nature of academia, and everything. But sometimes it still worries me when fans (especially other meta writers) accept these deliberately written-to-be-biased sources in TWOIAF and the history novellas (and eventually Fire and Blood) as absolute truth.

[blogparadiseisland]

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain http://www.nature-business.com/business-arizona-voters-will-choose-gop-senate-candidate-as-the-state-mourns-mccain/

Business

Phoenix (CNN)The day before Arizona begins memorializing Sen. John McCain, the state’s Republicans will make a major statement about the future of the party of McCain and President Donald Trump.

The national GOP establishment’s preference, Rep. Martha McSally, faces two hard-line conservatives — former state Sen. Kelli Ward and former Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio — in Tuesday’s Senate primary.

McSally distanced herself from McCain during the campaign while Ward and Arpaio openly attacked him. All three candidates are embracing Trump in a sign of the President’s power over Republican voters.

Trump infamously attacked McCain’s service during the 2016 presidential campaign, and McCain was vocal in his opposition to Trump on several issues.

The race is the headliner on a day in which Arizona, Florida and Oklahoma will select their nominees in governor’s races and Arizona and Florida will also pick their candidates for Senate contests.

In Arizona, Republican Gov. Doug Ducey is up for re-election. Democratic state Sen. Steve Farley, Arizona State University education professor David Garcia and Kelly Fryer, the CEO of the YWCA Southern Arizona, face off to challenge Ducey in a traditionally red state that has shifted to the left in recent years: Hillary Clinton lost there by just 4 percentage points.

The primary comes days before Ducey faces a major decision: Who to appoint to fill McCain’s seat. He’ll have to choose between a Trump-like Republican and someone in the McCain mold — or could try to bridge the gap, potentially with a placeholder pick.

In Florida, term-limited Republican Gov. Rick Scott is challenging Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, and the governor’s office is up for grabs in this fall’s midterm elections. Trump-endorsed Rep. Ron DeSantis is seen as the favorite to defeat state agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam for the GOP nod for governor, while several Democrats — including Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand-backed former Rep. Gwen Graham, progressive favorite Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, businessman Jeff Greene and former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine square off in a wide-open primary.

And in Oklahoma, Democratic state attorney general Drew Edmondson will face the winner of a GOP battle between Tulsa businessman Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett for the seat being vacated by term-limited Gov. Mary Fallin.

Arizona and Florida also each have several primaries for House seats that are expected to be competitive in November’s midterm elections.

Trump dominant in Arizona race

The Arizona Senate contest is for the seat of retiring Sen. Jeff Flake — not McCain, whose replacement will be appointed by Ducey. Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is the heavy favorite to take on the Republican primary winner.

Trump hasn’t endorsed a candidate. But the race has underscored how the Republican Party in Arizona has shifted from one where McCain, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, reigned supreme, to one where Trump is the dominant force.

All three GOP candidates cozied up to the President. McSally, in particular, has dropped her 2016 campaign criticism of Trump and aligned herself closely with the President — particularly on immigration issues.

The race’s outcome could already be decided. More than 437,000 Republican early votes had been mailed in by Friday. And if 2018’s primary follows Arizona’s trend of high early voting numbers, about 75% of the state’s primary voters have already cast their ballots.

Polls have shown Arpaio in third place — but Republican strategists say he is competing for the same group of die-hard conservative voters as Ward, meaning that his presence in the race has cut directly into her support.

A McSally win in the last competitive primary on 2018’s Senate battleground map would be a major relief for Republicans who have watched her all-but-certain opponent Sinema spend millions of dollars on

TV ads branding herself as a centrist

who would “end the partisan nonsense and protect Arizonans” on issues like health care.

It’s why Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, urged Trump to endorse McSally in a recent phone call, a source familiar with the call said.

Trump didn’t endorse, but he gave McSally a shout-out at a recent event at Fort Drum in New York. He noted that McSally is “not only an Air Force veteran, but the first woman ever to fly a fighter jet in combat in US history.”

“And I got to know her very well, and she is terrific: Congresswoman Martha McSally,” Trump said.

National Republicans see the Arizona Senate race as crucial to keeping their majority, and think McSally is the only candidate that gives them a chance to win the race. Until recent weeks, they’d been frustrated she had not put the primary away.

How McSally won over the right

McSally’s primary campaign has been a case study in how an establishment Republican — one who had sharply criticized Trump in the wake of the “Access Hollywood” video in 2016 — could win in the Trump era.

She aired an ad featuring Trump calling her the “real deal.” She withdrew her co-sponsorship of a bill that offered “Dreamers” a path to citizenship, mimicked Trump’s attacks on “chain migration.” She became a fixture on Fox News, where she aligned herself with Trump and heaped praise on the President.

And she cast Ward — who’d launched her campaign as a strident critic of Flake and McCain, a Trump opponent, with the backing of then-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon — as a Trump critic.

“McSally did a masterful job capitalizing on Ward’s ‘phonyisms,’” said Robert Graham, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman and a Trump ally. “The religious right freaked and abandoned her and the immigration people consider her soft.”

An anti-Ward super PAC spent more than $4 million on at-times misleading ads that cast Ward as weak on immigration enforcement and opposing Trump’s calls for increased military spending.

McSally’s campaign, meanwhile, aired an ad asserting that Ward “doesn’t support President Trump” on immigration. It highlighted Ward’s opposition to a Trump-backed bill that Ward labeled “amnesty.”

Another key moment came in a late-July editorial board meeting at The Arizona Republic — the only time McSally and Ward would debate, with Arpaio declining the invitation — on the topic of abortion. Both said they want Roe v. Wade repealed, but Ward called for a “more incremental” approach, including a ban on abortions after 24 weeks, while McSally said she favors banning abortion in all cases except rape, incest and when the life of the mother is in jeopardy.

Ward also said abortion is debated “in a fashion that was designed to raise money for people on both sides of the issue.”

The comments alienated anti-abortion activists who were a key part of the conservative constituency a McSally challenger would have needed.

Then, late in the campaign, Ward courted controversy when she invited Mike Cernovich — a far-right commentator who promoted the infamous “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory — on her bus tour, and then told NBC News that “attaching those things to me is ridiculous.”

Explaining her decision to invite Cernovich, Ward said: “We need to have a hook to get you guys interested in seeing the bus tour.”

Ward courted controversy late in the race, too. She apologized Monday for a Facebook comment suggesting an announcement by McCain’s family that he would end his cancer treatment was designed to hurt her campaign, saying her comment had been misinterpreted.

Arpaio, meanwhile, watched his campaign descend into chaos. The Federal Election Commission laid out a host of problems with his first-quarter campaign finance report in a letter to Arpaio’s campaign. And long-time consultant Chad Willems, who until recently was Arpaio’s campaign manager, was receiving the vast majority of the $1.3 million raised for the campaign. His campaign ended in a fizzle, as Ward attracted headlines as the anti-establishment candidate.

“McSally proved to voters for months that she has the ability to laser-focus in on Sinema’s weaknesses in a way that highlights her own strengths, even while facing competitors in a primary,” said Brian Anderson, an Arizona GOP strategist and former aide to Ducey.

“Kelli Ward continued to remind everyone,” Anderson said, “that she’s a ticking time bomb who can’t talk her way through a question about Pizzagate — let alone face an opponent like Sinema.”

Read More | Eric Bradner, CNN,

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain, in 2018-08-28 11:40:20

[captainblogger100posts]

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain http://www.nature-business.com/business-arizona-voters-will-choose-gop-senate-candidate-as-the-state-mourns-mccain/

Business

Phoenix (CNN)The day before Arizona begins memorializing Sen. John McCain, the state’s Republicans will make a major statement about the future of the party of McCain and President Donald Trump.

The national GOP establishment’s preference, Rep. Martha McSally, faces two hard-line conservatives — former state Sen. Kelli Ward and former Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio — in Tuesday’s Senate primary.

McSally distanced herself from McCain during the campaign while Ward and Arpaio openly attacked him. All three candidates are embracing Trump in a sign of the President’s power over Republican voters.

Trump infamously attacked McCain’s service during the 2016 presidential campaign, and McCain was vocal in his opposition to Trump on several issues.

The race is the headliner on a day in which Arizona, Florida and Oklahoma will select their nominees in governor’s races and Arizona and Florida will also pick their candidates for Senate contests.

In Arizona, Republican Gov. Doug Ducey is up for re-election. Democratic state Sen. Steve Farley, Arizona State University education professor David Garcia and Kelly Fryer, the CEO of the YWCA Southern Arizona, face off to challenge Ducey in a traditionally red state that has shifted to the left in recent years: Hillary Clinton lost there by just 4 percentage points.

The primary comes days before Ducey faces a major decision: Who to appoint to fill McCain’s seat. He’ll have to choose between a Trump-like Republican and someone in the McCain mold — or could try to bridge the gap, potentially with a placeholder pick.

In Florida, term-limited Republican Gov. Rick Scott is challenging Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, and the governor’s office is up for grabs in this fall’s midterm elections. Trump-endorsed Rep. Ron DeSantis is seen as the favorite to defeat state agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam for the GOP nod for governor, while several Democrats — including Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand-backed former Rep. Gwen Graham, progressive favorite Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, businessman Jeff Greene and former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine square off in a wide-open primary.

And in Oklahoma, Democratic state attorney general Drew Edmondson will face the winner of a GOP battle between Tulsa businessman Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett for the seat being vacated by term-limited Gov. Mary Fallin.

Arizona and Florida also each have several primaries for House seats that are expected to be competitive in November’s midterm elections.

Trump dominant in Arizona race

The Arizona Senate contest is for the seat of retiring Sen. Jeff Flake — not McCain, whose replacement will be appointed by Ducey. Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is the heavy favorite to take on the Republican primary winner.

Trump hasn’t endorsed a candidate. But the race has underscored how the Republican Party in Arizona has shifted from one where McCain, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, reigned supreme, to one where Trump is the dominant force.

All three GOP candidates cozied up to the President. McSally, in particular, has dropped her 2016 campaign criticism of Trump and aligned herself closely with the President — particularly on immigration issues.

The race’s outcome could already be decided. More than 437,000 Republican early votes had been mailed in by Friday. And if 2018’s primary follows Arizona’s trend of high early voting numbers, about 75% of the state’s primary voters have already cast their ballots.

Polls have shown Arpaio in third place — but Republican strategists say he is competing for the same group of die-hard conservative voters as Ward, meaning that his presence in the race has cut directly into her support.

A McSally win in the last competitive primary on 2018’s Senate battleground map would be a major relief for Republicans who have watched her all-but-certain opponent Sinema spend millions of dollars on

TV ads branding herself as a centrist

who would “end the partisan nonsense and protect Arizonans” on issues like health care.

It’s why Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, urged Trump to endorse McSally in a recent phone call, a source familiar with the call said.

Trump didn’t endorse, but he gave McSally a shout-out at a recent event at Fort Drum in New York. He noted that McSally is “not only an Air Force veteran, but the first woman ever to fly a fighter jet in combat in US history.”

“And I got to know her very well, and she is terrific: Congresswoman Martha McSally,” Trump said.

National Republicans see the Arizona Senate race as crucial to keeping their majority, and think McSally is the only candidate that gives them a chance to win the race. Until recent weeks, they’d been frustrated she had not put the primary away.

How McSally won over the right

McSally’s primary campaign has been a case study in how an establishment Republican — one who had sharply criticized Trump in the wake of the “Access Hollywood” video in 2016 — could win in the Trump era.

She aired an ad featuring Trump calling her the “real deal.” She withdrew her co-sponsorship of a bill that offered “Dreamers” a path to citizenship, mimicked Trump’s attacks on “chain migration.” She became a fixture on Fox News, where she aligned herself with Trump and heaped praise on the President.

And she cast Ward — who’d launched her campaign as a strident critic of Flake and McCain, a Trump opponent, with the backing of then-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon — as a Trump critic.

“McSally did a masterful job capitalizing on Ward’s ‘phonyisms,’” said Robert Graham, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman and a Trump ally. “The religious right freaked and abandoned her and the immigration people consider her soft.”

An anti-Ward super PAC spent more than $4 million on at-times misleading ads that cast Ward as weak on immigration enforcement and opposing Trump’s calls for increased military spending.

McSally’s campaign, meanwhile, aired an ad asserting that Ward “doesn’t support President Trump” on immigration. It highlighted Ward’s opposition to a Trump-backed bill that Ward labeled “amnesty.”

Another key moment came in a late-July editorial board meeting at The Arizona Republic — the only time McSally and Ward would debate, with Arpaio declining the invitation — on the topic of abortion. Both said they want Roe v. Wade repealed, but Ward called for a “more incremental” approach, including a ban on abortions after 24 weeks, while McSally said she favors banning abortion in all cases except rape, incest and when the life of the mother is in jeopardy.

Ward also said abortion is debated “in a fashion that was designed to raise money for people on both sides of the issue.”

The comments alienated anti-abortion activists who were a key part of the conservative constituency a McSally challenger would have needed.

Then, late in the campaign, Ward courted controversy when she invited Mike Cernovich — a far-right commentator who promoted the infamous “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory — on her bus tour, and then told NBC News that “attaching those things to me is ridiculous.”

Explaining her decision to invite Cernovich, Ward said: “We need to have a hook to get you guys interested in seeing the bus tour.”

Ward courted controversy late in the race, too. She apologized Monday for a Facebook comment suggesting an announcement by McCain’s family that he would end his cancer treatment was designed to hurt her campaign, saying her comment had been misinterpreted.

Arpaio, meanwhile, watched his campaign descend into chaos. The Federal Election Commission laid out a host of problems with his first-quarter campaign finance report in a letter to Arpaio’s campaign. And long-time consultant Chad Willems, who until recently was Arpaio’s campaign manager, was receiving the vast majority of the $1.3 million raised for the campaign. His campaign ended in a fizzle, as Ward attracted headlines as the anti-establishment candidate.

“McSally proved to voters for months that she has the ability to laser-focus in on Sinema’s weaknesses in a way that highlights her own strengths, even while facing competitors in a primary,” said Brian Anderson, an Arizona GOP strategist and former aide to Ducey.

“Kelli Ward continued to remind everyone,” Anderson said, “that she’s a ticking time bomb who can’t talk her way through a question about Pizzagate — let alone face an opponent like Sinema.”

Read More | Eric Bradner, CNN,

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain, in 2018-08-28 11:40:20

[computacionalblog]

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain http://www.nature-business.com/business-arizona-voters-will-choose-gop-senate-candidate-as-the-state-mourns-mccain/

Business

Phoenix (CNN)The day before Arizona begins memorializing Sen. John McCain, the state’s Republicans will make a major statement about the future of the party of McCain and President Donald Trump.

The national GOP establishment’s preference, Rep. Martha McSally, faces two hard-line conservatives — former state Sen. Kelli Ward and former Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio — in Tuesday’s Senate primary.

McSally distanced herself from McCain during the campaign while Ward and Arpaio openly attacked him. All three candidates are embracing Trump in a sign of the President’s power over Republican voters.

Trump infamously attacked McCain’s service during the 2016 presidential campaign, and McCain was vocal in his opposition to Trump on several issues.

The race is the headliner on a day in which Arizona, Florida and Oklahoma will select their nominees in governor’s races and Arizona and Florida will also pick their candidates for Senate contests.

In Arizona, Republican Gov. Doug Ducey is up for re-election. Democratic state Sen. Steve Farley, Arizona State University education professor David Garcia and Kelly Fryer, the CEO of the YWCA Southern Arizona, face off to challenge Ducey in a traditionally red state that has shifted to the left in recent years: Hillary Clinton lost there by just 4 percentage points.

The primary comes days before Ducey faces a major decision: Who to appoint to fill McCain’s seat. He’ll have to choose between a Trump-like Republican and someone in the McCain mold — or could try to bridge the gap, potentially with a placeholder pick.

In Florida, term-limited Republican Gov. Rick Scott is challenging Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, and the governor’s office is up for grabs in this fall’s midterm elections. Trump-endorsed Rep. Ron DeSantis is seen as the favorite to defeat state agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam for the GOP nod for governor, while several Democrats — including Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand-backed former Rep. Gwen Graham, progressive favorite Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, businessman Jeff Greene and former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine square off in a wide-open primary.

And in Oklahoma, Democratic state attorney general Drew Edmondson will face the winner of a GOP battle between Tulsa businessman Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett for the seat being vacated by term-limited Gov. Mary Fallin.

Arizona and Florida also each have several primaries for House seats that are expected to be competitive in November’s midterm elections.

Trump dominant in Arizona race

The Arizona Senate contest is for the seat of retiring Sen. Jeff Flake — not McCain, whose replacement will be appointed by Ducey. Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is the heavy favorite to take on the Republican primary winner.

Trump hasn’t endorsed a candidate. But the race has underscored how the Republican Party in Arizona has shifted from one where McCain, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, reigned supreme, to one where Trump is the dominant force.

All three GOP candidates cozied up to the President. McSally, in particular, has dropped her 2016 campaign criticism of Trump and aligned herself closely with the President — particularly on immigration issues.

The race’s outcome could already be decided. More than 437,000 Republican early votes had been mailed in by Friday. And if 2018’s primary follows Arizona’s trend of high early voting numbers, about 75% of the state’s primary voters have already cast their ballots.

Polls have shown Arpaio in third place — but Republican strategists say he is competing for the same group of die-hard conservative voters as Ward, meaning that his presence in the race has cut directly into her support.

A McSally win in the last competitive primary on 2018’s Senate battleground map would be a major relief for Republicans who have watched her all-but-certain opponent Sinema spend millions of dollars on

TV ads branding herself as a centrist

who would “end the partisan nonsense and protect Arizonans” on issues like health care.

It’s why Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, urged Trump to endorse McSally in a recent phone call, a source familiar with the call said.

Trump didn’t endorse, but he gave McSally a shout-out at a recent event at Fort Drum in New York. He noted that McSally is “not only an Air Force veteran, but the first woman ever to fly a fighter jet in combat in US history.”

“And I got to know her very well, and she is terrific: Congresswoman Martha McSally,” Trump said.

National Republicans see the Arizona Senate race as crucial to keeping their majority, and think McSally is the only candidate that gives them a chance to win the race. Until recent weeks, they’d been frustrated she had not put the primary away.

How McSally won over the right

McSally’s primary campaign has been a case study in how an establishment Republican — one who had sharply criticized Trump in the wake of the “Access Hollywood” video in 2016 — could win in the Trump era.

She aired an ad featuring Trump calling her the “real deal.” She withdrew her co-sponsorship of a bill that offered “Dreamers” a path to citizenship, mimicked Trump’s attacks on “chain migration.” She became a fixture on Fox News, where she aligned herself with Trump and heaped praise on the President.

And she cast Ward — who’d launched her campaign as a strident critic of Flake and McCain, a Trump opponent, with the backing of then-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon — as a Trump critic.

“McSally did a masterful job capitalizing on Ward’s ‘phonyisms,’” said Robert Graham, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman and a Trump ally. “The religious right freaked and abandoned her and the immigration people consider her soft.”

An anti-Ward super PAC spent more than $4 million on at-times misleading ads that cast Ward as weak on immigration enforcement and opposing Trump’s calls for increased military spending.

McSally’s campaign, meanwhile, aired an ad asserting that Ward “doesn’t support President Trump” on immigration. It highlighted Ward’s opposition to a Trump-backed bill that Ward labeled “amnesty.”

Another key moment came in a late-July editorial board meeting at The Arizona Republic — the only time McSally and Ward would debate, with Arpaio declining the invitation — on the topic of abortion. Both said they want Roe v. Wade repealed, but Ward called for a “more incremental” approach, including a ban on abortions after 24 weeks, while McSally said she favors banning abortion in all cases except rape, incest and when the life of the mother is in jeopardy.

Ward also said abortion is debated “in a fashion that was designed to raise money for people on both sides of the issue.”

The comments alienated anti-abortion activists who were a key part of the conservative constituency a McSally challenger would have needed.

Then, late in the campaign, Ward courted controversy when she invited Mike Cernovich — a far-right commentator who promoted the infamous “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory — on her bus tour, and then told NBC News that “attaching those things to me is ridiculous.”

Explaining her decision to invite Cernovich, Ward said: “We need to have a hook to get you guys interested in seeing the bus tour.”

Ward courted controversy late in the race, too. She apologized Monday for a Facebook comment suggesting an announcement by McCain’s family that he would end his cancer treatment was designed to hurt her campaign, saying her comment had been misinterpreted.

Arpaio, meanwhile, watched his campaign descend into chaos. The Federal Election Commission laid out a host of problems with his first-quarter campaign finance report in a letter to Arpaio’s campaign. And long-time consultant Chad Willems, who until recently was Arpaio’s campaign manager, was receiving the vast majority of the $1.3 million raised for the campaign. His campaign ended in a fizzle, as Ward attracted headlines as the anti-establishment candidate.

“McSally proved to voters for months that she has the ability to laser-focus in on Sinema’s weaknesses in a way that highlights her own strengths, even while facing competitors in a primary,” said Brian Anderson, an Arizona GOP strategist and former aide to Ducey.

“Kelli Ward continued to remind everyone,” Anderson said, “that she’s a ticking time bomb who can’t talk her way through a question about Pizzagate — let alone face an opponent like Sinema.”

Read More | Eric Bradner, CNN,

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain, in 2018-08-28 11:40:20

[blogcompetnetall]

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain http://www.nature-business.com/business-arizona-voters-will-choose-gop-senate-candidate-as-the-state-mourns-mccain/

Business

Phoenix (CNN)The day before Arizona begins memorializing Sen. John McCain, the state’s Republicans will make a major statement about the future of the party of McCain and President Donald Trump.

The national GOP establishment’s preference, Rep. Martha McSally, faces two hard-line conservatives — former state Sen. Kelli Ward and former Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio — in Tuesday’s Senate primary.

McSally distanced herself from McCain during the campaign while Ward and Arpaio openly attacked him. All three candidates are embracing Trump in a sign of the President’s power over Republican voters.

Trump infamously attacked McCain’s service during the 2016 presidential campaign, and McCain was vocal in his opposition to Trump on several issues.

The race is the headliner on a day in which Arizona, Florida and Oklahoma will select their nominees in governor’s races and Arizona and Florida will also pick their candidates for Senate contests.

In Arizona, Republican Gov. Doug Ducey is up for re-election. Democratic state Sen. Steve Farley, Arizona State University education professor David Garcia and Kelly Fryer, the CEO of the YWCA Southern Arizona, face off to challenge Ducey in a traditionally red state that has shifted to the left in recent years: Hillary Clinton lost there by just 4 percentage points.

The primary comes days before Ducey faces a major decision: Who to appoint to fill McCain’s seat. He’ll have to choose between a Trump-like Republican and someone in the McCain mold — or could try to bridge the gap, potentially with a placeholder pick.

In Florida, term-limited Republican Gov. Rick Scott is challenging Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, and the governor’s office is up for grabs in this fall’s midterm elections. Trump-endorsed Rep. Ron DeSantis is seen as the favorite to defeat state agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam for the GOP nod for governor, while several Democrats — including Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand-backed former Rep. Gwen Graham, progressive favorite Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, businessman Jeff Greene and former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine square off in a wide-open primary.

And in Oklahoma, Democratic state attorney general Drew Edmondson will face the winner of a GOP battle between Tulsa businessman Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett for the seat being vacated by term-limited Gov. Mary Fallin.

Arizona and Florida also each have several primaries for House seats that are expected to be competitive in November’s midterm elections.

Trump dominant in Arizona race

The Arizona Senate contest is for the seat of retiring Sen. Jeff Flake — not McCain, whose replacement will be appointed by Ducey. Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is the heavy favorite to take on the Republican primary winner.

Trump hasn’t endorsed a candidate. But the race has underscored how the Republican Party in Arizona has shifted from one where McCain, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, reigned supreme, to one where Trump is the dominant force.

All three GOP candidates cozied up to the President. McSally, in particular, has dropped her 2016 campaign criticism of Trump and aligned herself closely with the President — particularly on immigration issues.

The race’s outcome could already be decided. More than 437,000 Republican early votes had been mailed in by Friday. And if 2018’s primary follows Arizona’s trend of high early voting numbers, about 75% of the state’s primary voters have already cast their ballots.

Polls have shown Arpaio in third place — but Republican strategists say he is competing for the same group of die-hard conservative voters as Ward, meaning that his presence in the race has cut directly into her support.

A McSally win in the last competitive primary on 2018’s Senate battleground map would be a major relief for Republicans who have watched her all-but-certain opponent Sinema spend millions of dollars on

TV ads branding herself as a centrist

who would “end the partisan nonsense and protect Arizonans” on issues like health care.

It’s why Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, urged Trump to endorse McSally in a recent phone call, a source familiar with the call said.

Trump didn’t endorse, but he gave McSally a shout-out at a recent event at Fort Drum in New York. He noted that McSally is “not only an Air Force veteran, but the first woman ever to fly a fighter jet in combat in US history.”

“And I got to know her very well, and she is terrific: Congresswoman Martha McSally,” Trump said.

National Republicans see the Arizona Senate race as crucial to keeping their majority, and think McSally is the only candidate that gives them a chance to win the race. Until recent weeks, they’d been frustrated she had not put the primary away.

How McSally won over the right

McSally’s primary campaign has been a case study in how an establishment Republican — one who had sharply criticized Trump in the wake of the “Access Hollywood” video in 2016 — could win in the Trump era.

She aired an ad featuring Trump calling her the “real deal.” She withdrew her co-sponsorship of a bill that offered “Dreamers” a path to citizenship, mimicked Trump’s attacks on “chain migration.” She became a fixture on Fox News, where she aligned herself with Trump and heaped praise on the President.

And she cast Ward — who’d launched her campaign as a strident critic of Flake and McCain, a Trump opponent, with the backing of then-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon — as a Trump critic.

“McSally did a masterful job capitalizing on Ward’s ‘phonyisms,’” said Robert Graham, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman and a Trump ally. “The religious right freaked and abandoned her and the immigration people consider her soft.”

An anti-Ward super PAC spent more than $4 million on at-times misleading ads that cast Ward as weak on immigration enforcement and opposing Trump’s calls for increased military spending.

McSally’s campaign, meanwhile, aired an ad asserting that Ward “doesn’t support President Trump” on immigration. It highlighted Ward’s opposition to a Trump-backed bill that Ward labeled “amnesty.”

Another key moment came in a late-July editorial board meeting at The Arizona Republic — the only time McSally and Ward would debate, with Arpaio declining the invitation — on the topic of abortion. Both said they want Roe v. Wade repealed, but Ward called for a “more incremental” approach, including a ban on abortions after 24 weeks, while McSally said she favors banning abortion in all cases except rape, incest and when the life of the mother is in jeopardy.

Ward also said abortion is debated “in a fashion that was designed to raise money for people on both sides of the issue.”

The comments alienated anti-abortion activists who were a key part of the conservative constituency a McSally challenger would have needed.

Then, late in the campaign, Ward courted controversy when she invited Mike Cernovich — a far-right commentator who promoted the infamous “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory — on her bus tour, and then told NBC News that “attaching those things to me is ridiculous.”

Explaining her decision to invite Cernovich, Ward said: “We need to have a hook to get you guys interested in seeing the bus tour.”

Ward courted controversy late in the race, too. She apologized Monday for a Facebook comment suggesting an announcement by McCain’s family that he would end his cancer treatment was designed to hurt her campaign, saying her comment had been misinterpreted.

Arpaio, meanwhile, watched his campaign descend into chaos. The Federal Election Commission laid out a host of problems with his first-quarter campaign finance report in a letter to Arpaio’s campaign. And long-time consultant Chad Willems, who until recently was Arpaio’s campaign manager, was receiving the vast majority of the $1.3 million raised for the campaign. His campaign ended in a fizzle, as Ward attracted headlines as the anti-establishment candidate.

“McSally proved to voters for months that she has the ability to laser-focus in on Sinema’s weaknesses in a way that highlights her own strengths, even while facing competitors in a primary,” said Brian Anderson, an Arizona GOP strategist and former aide to Ducey.

“Kelli Ward continued to remind everyone,” Anderson said, “that she’s a ticking time bomb who can’t talk her way through a question about Pizzagate — let alone face an opponent like Sinema.”

Read More | Eric Bradner, CNN,

Business Arizona voters will choose GOP Senate candidate as the state mourns McCain, in 2018-08-28 11:40:20