There are thousands of those places, all under one umbrella organization.

Those places are called Republican Party committees.

Mine is the Legislative District 17 Committee, which covers part of Tempe, AZ and Scottsdale, AZ.

We meet monthly.

As precinct committeemen.

And despite all the recruitment efforts some of us have employed since the 2008 election at tea party events and town hall protests (our congresscritter, Harry Mitchell, refuses to have public town hall meetings), and on the web sites of some of the groups you mentioned (see links below), we haven’t even gotten up to half strength, which is below the national average for the Party, in terms of PC strength.

Some numbers:

After the 2008 election, we had only 31.9 per cent of our 6,231 PC slots filled in Maricopa County, and only about 72 PCs in LD 17 despite having 263 slots, which is about 27 per cent. Pathetic.

We’ve made some improvement, but not much, in my opinion. Here are the results as of the 6/15/2010 files posted on the Maricopa County Recorder?s site, which includes most if not all of the write-in PC candidates for the ?canceled? PC elections(I’ll explain what that means in a minute): (you can view and/or download the files here:

http://recorder.maricopa.gov/web/candcamp.aspx )

Total number of Republican PC candidates in Maricopa County: 3,147 (that?s an ?overage? of 151 by my count from the ?Over Quota Report?), so we?ll have 2,996 total elected PCs in the county. We had gotten up to about 3,300 through the appointment process, but many of them were damn lazy to go get 10 signatures on a nomination paper, apparently. (To become an interim “appointed” PC, all one had to do was fill out one piece of paper. They were eligible to vote for the “at large” county Executive Guidance Committee members, but could not vote for the Legislative District or County leaders, and could not be eligible to be delegate to the State convention, unless they became an elected PC.)

Regarding the “canceling” of PC elections, in PC primary elections where there’s fewer PC candidates than PC slots, the Recorder can “cancel” the election and deem all of the unopposed candidates elected on the last day to file their paperwork to get on the ballot. I just got re-elected through this process because there were only 8 candidates for the 8 PC slots for my precinct.

As I understand it, we had 1,989 PCs after the 2008 election, so we?ve gone from 31.9 per cent of our slots filled to about 48 per cent strength (using the total available slots number, 6,231, from 2008, which may a little bit different now).

By comparison to the other parties, we are in good shape, but keep in mind almost a third of registered voters in Arizona are “independents.”

Total number of Democrat PC candidates in Maricopa County: 713 (they only have one precinct with an ?overage? of 1 candidate, so they?ll have 712.

Total number of Libertarian PC candidates: 26

Total number of Independent PC candidates: 1

LD 17 has 118 candidates but 4 of them will not be elected. Tempe 27 precinct has 5 candidates for 4 slots, Tempe 49 has 6 candidates for 4 slots and Tempe 53 had 5 candidates for 4 slots. But, the good news is that those who don?t actually get elected will, I would hope, simply become an unofficial PC ?helper? for those who do get elected. So, LD 17 will have a whopping 114 PCs for about 263 available slots, so we?ll be at about 43 per cent.

Progress, but, still, in my humble opinion, still PATHETIC. Our Republican Party, the best tool we have for ridding the country of leftist elected officials, is at less than half strength going into the most important election in our lifetimes. Just pathetic.

Maricopa County has almost 700,000 registered Republicans, but about 697,000 of them aren’t involved INSIDE the Party as elected precinct committeemen. There has to be at least 3,300 hard core conservatives among those 697,000, and my aim is to find them and recruit them to become PCs — it’s easy to become one, the time commitment is minimal, the effect of that time is great when used to help Get Out The Vote, and, plus, it’s fun.

Bottom line: we conservatives have to keep recruiting conservative PCs and can do that now by encouraging Tea Partiers and other conservatives to help us Get Out The Vote for conservative Republicans in the primary elections and in the general election.

Here are the numbers down in Pinal County, a much more rural county with far less population, which I received yesterday from a PC there:

2008 – 99 elected PCs, 442 slots (22%)

2010 – 154 elected PCs, 506 slots (30%)

While the number of elected PCs is up 56% we have a long way to go.

46 of the 99 PCs from 2008 did not run for reeleection.

81 of the 124 appointed PCs did not run for election.

Yesterday, the head of a Tea Party group asked me, “What do we do now about training the new PCs?” Here?s my reply:

A PC down in Pinal County put together a PC training packet for Pinal County and some PCs here in LD 17 have put one together, too. We can give copies of them.

Also, there are free resources on web sites like www.americanmajority.org and www.icaucus.org and www.anystreet.org and www.thevoicesofamerica.org .

I believe the training now should be focused on Get Out The Vote tasks.

Two other efforts that you should know about: www.wethepeopleaz.com and www.myvotetote.com . I have also set up a Ning site for organizing conservative Republican precinct committeemen online — it’s not “live” yet but will be soon.

Also, you?ve probably seen Ron Robinson?s article about his Procinct software. It?s free and it can be used with walking sheet info ? much better than Voter Vault.

http://www.redstate.com/elronaldo/2010/06/02/precinct-captains-powerful-online-gotv-tool-is-now-in-your-hands/

http://www.redstate.com/elronaldo/2010/06/11/we-won-big-now-whip-it-take-a-walk-in-the-sunshine-with-my-departed-son/

Also, you should read this Martin Knight article and all the links, including the Ken Blackwell proposal for the RNC. http://www.redstate.com/martin_a_knight/2009/05/05/the-committeeman-project/

Bottom line: every precinct is unique; every legislative district is unique, every county is unique. We?ve got to individually start at our precincts ? find out who the other conservative PCs are, if any, and then organize and work together. If you?re the lone PC, then get your walking list and start walking your precinct, trying to identify conservatives through a short survey ? like the 21 question questionnaire our county GOP chairman has developed (attached) for vetting conservative candidates — it’s based on the Republican Party Platform. If you identify a very concerned and motivated conservative, recruit them to help you.

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Here’s an example of a “PC recruitment page” I created on one of the sites you linked to for recruiting conservative precinct committeemen:

www.resistnet.com/group/invadethegop

I’ve created similar pages on The 912 Project, Smart Girl Politics, Team Sarah, The Conservative Underground, AsAMom, and similar sites.

Bottom line: there IS a place where conservatives can unite where and how it matters — POLITICALLY. Logically, the BEST kind of organization where we should all UNITE is that ONE kind of political organization that produces VOTES and CONSERVATIVE CANDIDATES. That single organization, for this political war we’re in, is the Republican Party. No?

There is a step one can take beyond being a “mere” registered Republican, and that’s becoming a voting member of the Party. HALF these slots are vacant! Precinct committeemen IS rightfully described as “the most powerful political office in the world.” Some here at Redstate have taken the plunge. I wish ALL would.

Conservatives would OWN the Republican Party if enough of them from all the groups you mentioned, and from Redstate, would get to their local GOP committee meetings and become PCs.

See my blog linked below for more info.

For Liberty,
ColdWarrior, PC (that?s ?precinct committeeman,? not ?political child!?)
Conservatives, UNITE! CHANGE the Republican Party and save the world by UNITING INSIDE the Party as precinct committeemen. NOW! (138 days until Nov. 2 — what are YOU DOING to help get out the vote in your precinct?)

Yeah I’m form the UK and I’m a fairly libertarian Conservative (different capitalisation over here) and yes I haven’t got my perfect government, but I’m very thankful that I’ve got a vastly better government than the alternative. Thinking that it’s better to have a bad government elected now because you’re convinced that you’ll somehow win in four years is often deluded and nearly always a bad choice.

You can have your principals and still be want to campaign for something that doesn’t really meet them in the face of something completely opposed to them. I’m a taxpayer and a business owner and as such I needed to get a government elected that would stop the country going bankrupt, not let the other lot get elected so it would and they would take the blame.

Of course you’re not quite there yet, but in 2012 or 2016 you just might have to make that choice.