Do you want the Ron Paul followers to fill up all the vacancies inside the Party at the precinct level? Well, stopping that from happening means conservatives must figure out what’s necessary to fill those vacancies and then show up to fill them. According to this article, in Maine, Nevada and Iowa, sufficient numbers of Ron Paul fans have shown up when, and how, necessary to become voting members of the Party apparatus to change the inner make-up (and rule making) of the Party.

Maine:

The (alleged) bias against Paul may also be the product of an organic opposition to the libertarian Congressman and his army of ardent fans. Paul volunteers tend to be young and relatively new to party politics, and their presence has many state GOP stalwarts feeling territorial.

“People feel threatened — they don’t want to see a bunch of kids who may have voted for Barack Obama take over,” Wead said. “They feel a sense of ownership over the party — but there has to be an accommodation.”

But state party machinations are already starting to backfire. The Paul campaign believes it has won the majority of Maine’s delegates — and the perceived election fraud has galvanized Paul supporters to demand their votes be counted in the state’s straw poll ‘beauty contest.’

Caucus chaos has also proved to be fertile ground for Paul’s quiet takeover of the Republican Party. Since 2008, the campaign and Paul’s Campaign for Liberty PAC have made a concerted effort to get Paul sympathists involved in the political process. Now, tumult in state party organizations has allowed these supporters to rise up the ranks.

“We like strong party leadership when it comes from us,” Paul campaign chair Jesse Benton told Business Insider. “Our people work very hard to make sure that their voice is heard.”

In Maine, the caucus disaster has made the state GOP prime for a Ron Paul takeover. And that means that Paul’s hard-won delegates will be protected as the delegate selection process

“We are taking over the party,” Wead told BI. “That’s the important thing — and that is what we are doing in Maine.”

Iowa:

The fruits of this labor are evident in Iowa, where Paul’s former state campaign co-chair A.J. Spiker was just elected as the new chairman of the Iowa Republican Party. Spiker replaces Matt Strawn, who stepped down over this year’s Iowa caucus dustup.

Nevada:

In Nevada, the state chair has also resigned over caucus disaster, and several Ron Paul supporters are well-positioned to step up to fill the void. These new leaders not only expand Paul’s influence at the state level, but also help protect Paul and his hard-won delegates from state party machinations as the delegate-selection process moves to district and state conventions, and eventually the Republican National Convention this summer.

Read the rest here: Ron Paul Is Secretly Taking Over The GOP — And It’s Driving People Insane
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In Pennsylvania, it’s more an issue of how “the Establishment” GOP officers employ rules to prevent local, county and state Party committees to give any support to non-incumbent Pennsylvania Republican candidates, including preventing them from even speaking at Party committee-hosted events.

The PA Republican party issued a memo Monday to county chairmen and women around the state, in which it laid out the protocol in races where state committee has endorsed.

“As our endorsed candidates travel on the campaign trail, they should receive concessions in regards to official party events,” the memo stated. “As members of the PA GOP and leaders of your county party, we request respect for the following longstanding traditions associated with our endorsed candidates.”

Namely, non-endorsed candidates are to have nothing to do with any official party functions. They are not permitted to speak at county functions (dinners, etc), and county party members should only circulate petitions and literature for endorsed candidates.

The full memo is below.

And those are on top of the standard benefits of a state committee endorsement: a significant fundraising boost, the support of PAGOP staff, direct mail paid for by the party, and more. Those are on top of the inherent advantage of establishment support in a party whose voters have historically been comfortable deferring to the establishment.

Since the news came out, conservatives activists have flocked to social media to criticize the party.

“This top-down enforcement of ‘traditions’ that stifle any meaningful debate among candidates is ruthless,” the Bucks County based Kitchen Table Patriots Tea Party wrote of the memo.

Read the rest here: PAGOP to County Chairs: Non-Endorsed Candidates Need Not Apply
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Similar underhanded misdeeds are happening at the Ohio Republican state committee level (as reported here at Redstate by by bytor3bp):

Kevin DeWine is going to go down in history as the most corrupt chairman of the Ohio Republican Party ever. And he doesn’t seem to care. The more people that turn against him and call for him to resign, the more desperate and brazen he seems to become.

As a brief recap, remember that just a couple of weeks ago, in an attempt to save his chairmanship and disqualify people running to defeat him, he and his allies proposed an amendment to change the rules of who can be seated on the State Central Committee, even though candidates had already filed for the election weeks ago. On Friday, the committee met and voted on several issues, including the rule change.

The committee consists of 66 members, and a majority of them, 34 or more, is required to make such a rule change. However, DeWine declared a victory for the rule change with a 29-28 vote, claiming a majority of members present. This is clearly a violation of the party bylaws, and is bound to be challenged in court.

We now have some new information about Friday’s events. Most votes of the committee, and even most of the votes on Friday, are conducted in the open. However, for the proposed rule change, they used a secret ballot. So, it appears that to protect their seats from a fair election, DeWine and his allies are willing to:

Change the rules after candidates have already filed, and early voting has already begun,
Violate the party bylaws in order to enact their rule change, and now…
Hide behind a secret ballot so voters can’t hold them responsible.

Unbelievable, despicable and very, very cowardly. I spoke with a SCC member on Sunday, who informed me that in his 8 years on the committee, it was only the 2nd time he could recall a secret ballot being used.

Read the rest here: Kevin DeWine and his Ohio Republican Party cowards hide behind secret ballot.

Those who show up, and create a majority, make the rules. I don’t want a Party run by Ron Paul supporters or Republicans In Name Only. I’d rather have conservatives in the majority. So I show up.

I hope you can, and will, too.

Thank you.

ColdWarrior
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In 2012, will YOU become a “voting member” of the Republican Party in your precinct?

Where it all started. Twitter @kaltkrieger
Learn how to GOTV at The Concord Project and at Procinct and Unified Patriots.