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''Viva la Revolucion'' in Idaho GOP?

The Idaho Affiliate of the American Family Association

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Thursday, June 5, 2008

Bryan Fischer, Executive Director

“VIVA LA REVOLUCION” IN IDAHO GOP?

Ada County conservatives took a major step last night in returning the county and state Republican Party to its conservative roots.

A packed house of Ada County Committeemen defeated efforts by the party establishment to get them to rubber-stamp an entire slate of pre-approved delegates to the state convention, and voted instead to take the delegate selection process out of the hands of party elites and put it in the hands of the individual districts in Ada County. Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Eagle) proposed this significant change in the delegate selection process.

According to the Idaho Statesman, a number of attendees had no idea there was an advance list of pre-selected delegates until the IVA revealed its existence on Tuesday. (As the Statesman story, linked below, indicates, The IVA’s role in exposing this proposed slate was the subject of a number of critical comments from the county chairman during last night’s meeting.)

Each of the eight Ada County districts selected five delegates to the convention, with priority being given to precinct committeemen and party workers rather than to party elites. Ada County chairman Marcel Bujarski will appoint the remaining 19 at-large delegates. (Note: contains correction from original version of the Update.)

Party headliners took the unusual and untoward step of taking sides in the party primary to prop up moderate candidates. Sen. John McGee made robo calls in an unsuccessful effort to defeat staunch conservative Judy Boyle in District 9, and Lori Otter, the governor’s wife, made robo calls in a likewise unsuccessful effort to defeat staunch conservative Shirley McKague in District 20.

One newly elected committeeman saw last night’s results as a victory in the battle to return the party to its fundamental principles. “People are upset with the party as a whole for straying from its roots. People want to see it get back to being conservative.”

Blogger Adam Graham, selected by District 18 as a delegate to the state convention, recognized the historic significance of last night’s upending of party elites by the grassroots by entitling his blog entry “Viva La Revolution.”

A conservative, Redgie Bigham, nearly unseated the current chairman of the Ada County Republicans, and a principled pro-family conservative, Brad Bolicek, was elected to serve as 1^st vice-chairman. Conservatives were also elected to the second and third vice-chairmanships.

Graham’s overall assessment: “What came out of the results was a shake-up in Republican leadership the likes of which I’ve not seen at the county level in my lifetime,” adding, “The new officers are young professional people who believe in key conservative principles.”

Although a motion to hold a “no-confidence” vote on Party Chairman Kirk Sullivan failed – it wasn’t on the agenda and therefore required a 2/3 vote for discussion – 48 committeemen, who according to Graham represented a majority of Ada County delegates, voted for the motion, a potential indication of trouble for the chairman at the state convention. Sullivan’s declared opponent for the post, former state senator Rod Beck, was chosen by his district to serve as a delegate in Sandpoint.

Beck’s challenge to Sullivan is based on more than just Sullivan’s relentless and obstinate opposition to closing party primaries, but on the larger issue of whether the party is going to stand for truly conservative governing principles or not.

According to one source, Sullivan expressed unbridled confidence in his re-election chances last night. But Ada County has served as a “bulwark for establishment Republicans” (Graham’s phrase) and a lack of grassroots support from Sullivan’s home base has potentially ominous implications for his hopes of retaining his position.

Sources tell me that although party headliners might have some control over Ada, Canyon and Kootenai county committees, they have little or no influence in most of the rural counties, who are likely to vote against Sullivan, for closed primaries, and for a conservative state central committee.

According to KIVI, the local ABC affiliate, one Republican at last night’s meeting said, “The list idea was manifestly unfair and I think everybody recognized that, that we need to open up and take nominations from the floor and not just have the party elites and powerful people and lobbyists go to the convention.”

Kootenai County Republicans are so unhappy with the way in which a pre-approved slate of delegates was ramrodded through its organizing meeting last week that they have filed three formal protests with the state chairman. They complain, convincingly, that the state law, Republican Party rules, and parliamentary procedures were all trampled in an effort to get the pre-approved slate adopted by the county’s central committee.

Since Mr. Sullivan was present for the Kootenai County meeting, and therefore gave tacit consent to these procedural irregularities, it is unlikely their appeals for a new organizing meeting will be successful, which may leave litigation as the option of last resort.

In related notes, Washington County elected a strong conservative as its new party chairman. And Payette County conservatives ousted a moderate county chairman – who had served at the post for two decades - at its organizing meeting this week, further signs that the move to return the party to conservatism is gaining momentum. The former Payette County chairman opposed conservative icon Helen Chenoweth each time she ran for office.

Ada GOP changes process for picking delegates | Idaho Statesman

KIVITV.COM | Ada County Republicans Fight For Delegate Spots

Viva La Revolution

VIRGINIA GOP UNSEATS ESTABLISHMENT CHAIRMAN – TEMPLATE FOR IDAHO GOP?

In what may serve as a template for the Idaho GOP as it prepares for its state convention next weekend, fiscal and social conservatives in Virginia unseated a moderate, establishment Republican as its party chairman in favor of a young, aggressive, and unapologetic social conservative. Moderates and conservatives in Virginia, as in Idaho, are locked in a battle for the soul of the Republican Party.

The unseated chairman, John Hager, is the father of Jenna Bush’s new husband. Being the father-in-law to the president’s daughter is just about as establishment as you can get. But sentiment among delegates was so strong for a return to the party’s roots of principled conservatism that Hager, recognizing that actually posting vote totals would be an embarrassment to him, asked for his challenger, Jeff Frederick, to be elected by acclamation.

Frederick, a Virginia legislator, is known around the statehouse for his ardent support of the sanctity of human life and his opposition to illegal immigration, showing that principled conservatism is still the path to electoral victory. Frederick, again in what may be a template for Idaho politics, promised to return the party to its roots and reject the “topdown Richmond-knows-best-approach.”

One of Frederick’s supporters said, “I’m sick and tired of the bipartisan BS that means we’re giving up our ideas.”

Even Hager acknowledged that his defeat was a rebuke of the old guard and a sign of rank-and-file distaste for the party establishment.

Frederick, correctly in my view, said his views will strengthen the party, saying, “We have to be a party which stands for something.”

Conservatives believe that a platform built on the planks of smaller government, a pro-life stance, and protection of gun and property rights is the key to victory. Said Virginia’s House Majority leader, “Whenever you are committed to standing on principles, people will rally around you. It’s hard to rally around principles built on a bowl of Jell-O.”

Even the Washington Post conceded that last weekend’s result was a “clear signal to GOP legislators and office-seekers that they need to oppose taxes and abortion to succeed,” and noted that it was a coalition of “social and anti-tax conservatives” that teamed up to unseat Hager.

One conservative legislator said, in what should inspire ordinary Idahoans, “This is a message that the grass roots still have a controlling voice when they choose to.”

In another parallel to Idaho, Virginia’s governor is scheduled to ask the state legislature for a tax increase for transportation, and convention results are certain to stiffen GOP opposition to a tax boost.

The Post naturally found moderate and liberal Republicans who now feel they no longer have a place in the party, which of course will allow them to identify with conservatives who have felt that way for years.

Moderate Republicans have often taken the position, either explicitly or implicitly, that conservatives will have to stay in the party because they have no other place to go. Virginia – and possibly Idaho – may serve notice to moderates that the balance of power is shifting, and the day may soon come when it will be moderates who discover that they are the ones who have no place to go, unless it is to defect to the Democrats.

Perhaps if Idaho’s GOP elites see the handwriting on the wall, they may ask Sullivan to step aside at the state convention in favor of compromise candidate Norm Semanko, who could, in the interest of unity, be elected party chairman by acclamation. Rod Beck would be willing to step aside in favor of Semanko, but Semanko will only run if it becomes clear that Sullivan does not have the support necessary to win re-election.

New GOP chairman releases party plan - politics - inRich.com

Frederick elected to lead state GOP - News - inRich.com

Republican Convention In Va. Sends a Message - washingtonpost.com

GOP factions battle for party's heart and soul | PilotOnline.com

Republican party has new chairman - Examiner.com

BONUS BYTES

Ø      U. S. Senate Republicans are finally showing some spine. (Regrettably, they only seem to fight for conservative principles when they are out of power.) Fed up with Democrat obstructionism over Pres. Bush’s conservative nominations to the federal bench, they shut down the Senate yesterday on a procedural move. (Democrats had promised a vote on three of Bush’s nominations by Memorial Day but reneged on the promise.) The way they did it was delicious: the cap-and-trade global warming bill currently being debated is a 492-page monstrosity. Customarily, a bill will be “presented as read” so that the entire contents of a bill do not need to be read aloud. But if even one senator insists on a full reading of the bill, it must be read aloud in its entirety. And so Senate clerks spent last night droning on and one through the evening hours while each side developed its own battle plans for today. (Guardian: Climate bill stalls in Senate after dispute)

Ø      While Idaho’s graduation rate of 76.6% is above the national average of 70.6%, this still means that almost one in four of Idaho’s children drop out before completing high school. To put a human face on it, this means we are losing 28 students every single day. This is a powerful argument for reform at the secondary level, perhaps including granting high school diplomas to all 10^th graders who pass the ISAT exam, at which point they can start college, pursue an apprenticeship, or attend a trade school. (Graduation Rates - Idaho)

Ø      More bad news for global warming hystericists, whether of the secular, evangelical or senatorial types: global temperatures took another nose dive in May of 2008, resulting in spring snows in Arizona, an extended ski season in Colorado, and delayed snow melts in many parts of the northern hemisphere. Here is the most significant fact: global temperatures have dropped by .774 degrees C over the last 16 months, equal to all of the global warming that has taken place in the last 100 years. In other words, the globe is now the same temperature it was in 1908. (Click on the following link for a temperature graph from 1979 to the present.) At the very minimum, this should bring the screeching about an imminent global catastrophe to a screeching halt while more data is gathered. It increasingly is becoming evident that all the alarmism around global warming has been much ado about nothing. Meanwhile – and I am not making this up – scientists in New Zealand have a developed a “flatulence inoculation” to cut down on methane emissions from sheep and cows, all to save the earth from global warming. According to the London Telegraph, sheep and cattle “burped and farted about 90 percent” of New Zealand’s methane emissions. New Zealand’s farmers have taken to sending parcels of manure to members of parliament in protest of a proposed “flatulence tax.” (UAH: Global Temperature Dives in May « Watts Up With That?; Sheep flatulence inoculation developed - Telegraph)

Ø      Follow-up to yesterday’s Action Alert: my conversation with Sen. Crapo’s staff in his D.C. office yesterday indicated that the Senator has decided to oppose the global warming cap-and-trade bill. Thanks for your phone calls – it sounds as though they were heard!

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