By Martin Wisckol,(OC Register)

Red County is a small world after all.

The debut issue of the slick, glossy Orange County magazine hit last week, with about 50,000 copies distributed. O.C. favorite and presidential hopeful Mitt Romney was the cover boy and gets a lengthy Q&A – a nice score, given Romney's increasingly high profile.

The second feature is on the Lincoln Club of Orange County, written by Red County/OC Blog Editor Matt Cunningham. The first essay in the mag, "Why Red County?" is by Tracy Price, immediate past president of the Lincoln Club. The Lincoln Club's Chip Hanlon and Keith Curry also contribute articles, and the club has a full-page, inside back cover advertisement.

A story on Orange County political blogs features a single photo with two images of Cunningham. (The caption, in part: "(A)re they just talking to themselves?") and he is the first source quoted in the story. Next quoted is Jon Fleischman of FlashReport.org.

While they stumbled with the spelling of Fleischman's first name, they did get "Wisckol" right. So we won't complain that, despite extensive quotes from us in this story about blogs, they never mentioned our well-traveled Total Buzz political blog.

So … there's a considerable Lincoln Club glow to this. In any event, it does meet its promise of being a GOP magazine for business, lifestyle and politics. Stories range from women in politics to pension reform to barbershops to wine parties. And lots of ads from O.C. companies run by active Republicans.

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Splitting headaches

The local Republican and Democratic parties aren't the only ones who would like to reduce their field of the candidates in the Feb. 6 supervisorial race and avoid being victims of a split vote.

County GOP boss Scott Baughhad a meeting two weeks ago with four prospective Republican candidates to discuss the prospects of a crowded field, but it doesn't look like it's had much effect. All four are still poised to run.

The Vietnamese-American community has had two meetings with prospective candidates – there are at least five of them – with the hope of narrowing the field. But it appears that, at very least, three will run.

There are also at least four prospective Latino candidates and three white-guy candidates. Plenty of votes to split. Stay tuned – filing deadline is Tuesday.

Nguyen: Naughty or nice?

Tan Nguyen's campaign will have to wait a week or two to see if it's getting a lump of coal from Attorney General Bill Lockyer.

You'll recall that in Nguyen's long-shot challenge of Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Garden Grove, letters were sent out to 14,000 foreign-born voters with Latino surnames. The letters warned of the consequences of voting illegally and were condemned by top Republicans and Democrats alike as being an effort at voter intimidation.

Lockyer seized the campaign's computers as part of its investigation into the incident, which occurred shortly before the November election. Lockyer spokesman Nathan Barankin told the Buzz that the investigation is continuing, but that his boss hopes to decide whether or not to file charges by Jan. 8. That's the day Lockyer hands the office keys to his replacement, Jerry Brown.