Read the full article. Erickson isn't exactly a Flake admirer.
@EasyAce I read the full article with interest, and find myself in total agreement with Mr. Erikson, which doesn't happen that often. I'd like to start off by highlighting these two paragraphs from it:
Jeff Flake had a 100% lifetime Club for Growth record in the United States House of Representatives. He was a conservative’s conservative and stood up to the House GOP leadership. He used that reputation to catapult himself into the Senate with the backing of most every major conservative group. He towed a tough line on the budget, Obamacare, immigration, etc.
Then he got to the Senate and promptly caved on it all. Friends of his tell me that he had no support system in the Senate. In the House, at least, there were other Club for Growth candidates. The smaller Senate with even fewer conservatives unleashed Jeff Flake’s need to be liked. He went from being a reliable Club for Growth members to a reliable Mitch McConnell member.
@EasyAce, I am as close a student of AZ politics as you are of Baseball (but not nearly as eloquent a writer), and that is exactly how it went. He had a really good record in the House, one of the best in fact, and he started throwing it all away the instant he was elected to the Senate, before he was even inaugurated. But he had already blown it for me in a very important way, years before he hitched his sail for his ride to the Senate.
Back in the day, back in the 90's, I was a Republican Precinct Committeeman. In '94, I saw my Congressional District yanked away from a Democrat in the Gingrich revolution of '94, by good voters and a fellow named Matt Salmon. A good man, who is now a Representative in another district (Things changed, I'm now in a safe Dem District
). When he ran in '94, he promised "three terms and I'm outta here."
In 2000 he honored that pledge, and after a 5-candidate Primary, Jeff Flake was victorious and went on to the General, where he won. During the Primary campaign, I
personally asked Mr. Flake during a Candidates' Forum at our PC meeting about Term Limits (It's a big issue for me), and he said "What was good enough for my friend Matt Salmon is good enough for me. Three and out."
Fast-forward to 2006, and Flake was running for re-election, after promising me and many others he would retire after three terms! By then I was out of the PC system, but I saw on TV another PC asking him "What about your promise?" He replied, "I guess I lied, ha ha." He won, and took an extra three terms until he ran for the Senate in 2012. Needless to say, he won those elections minus my vote. But despite my distaste for him, he did stick to a very conservative record in the House, for which I applauded him.
So, in 2012, he won his Senate seat, and I was hopeful (despite his reneging on the promise he made to me) he would carry on his solid conservative tradition in the Senate, but before he was even inaugurated he was best pals with John McCain, whom I'd detested for years because of his double dealing with the Democrats. Flake announced he was going to go with McCain on Shamnesty for the illegal aliens and joing the "Gang of Eight," which is anathema to his AZ constituents. As Erikson states above in the graphs I pulled,
"He went from being a reliable Club for Growth members [sic] to a reliable Mitch McConnell member."I cannot be more thrilled he dropped out of the race. Now, I hope Kelli Ward (or whoever wins) can keep the seat safe from Kyrsten Sinema, the likely Democrat to get the Dem Nomination. She will be a very difficult challenger to beat, even had Flake stayed in the race. She's my Representative, because they redrew my district to include all of Tempe, a college town (ASU), and the central corridor of Phoenix. As I said earlier, safe Dem.
@Slip18 
