Today, Dana Milbank has an article up on the Washington Post’s Washington Sketch blog where he basically skewers a number of Senate Republicans for employing the filibuster against President Obama’s Lefty fringe judicial picks.

The story goes something like this; given the GOP’s attempt (the so-called “Nuclear Option”) to end the filibuster for Presidential nominations during the leadership of the hapless Frist, certain GOP Senators, like Alabama’s Jeff Sessions and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell are being hypocritical by voting against cloture on President Obama’s nomination of the Left-Wing extremist and disciple of result-oriented jurisprudence that is David Hamilton to 7th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Of course, this is using that special self-serving Leftard definition of hypocrisy that seeks to apply standards to others that they would never apply to themselves.

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Election Night 2004 saw Republican Dino Rossi emerge victorious in the Washington State gubernatorial election against Democrat Christine Gregoire. Yet when the time came to take the oath of office, Christine Gregoire stood at the podium with her right hand up.

Four years later, Election Night 2008 and it was Republican Norm Coleman with the highest number of votes against Al Franken in the race for the Senate. Yet today, Norm Coleman is a private citizen and Al Franken is a United States Senator representing the state of Minnesota in Washington DC.

I’m going to avoid rehashing the blatant fraud and larceny perpetrated by the Democratic machine in King County in the 2004 race and focus instead on the more recent case of Norm Coleman.

There is not much of a need to recap in full the very worst case of out and out election theft in decades, perpetrated by the Minnesota Secretary of State in open collusion with the Franken campaign, the liberal Democrats and Fifth Column Republicans (hereafter known as “Scuzzies” - in (dis)honor of fake Republican DeDe Scozzafava) more concerned with appearing “bipartisan” to the media than protecting the votes of the people of Minnesota on the so-called “bipartisan” canvassing board that conducted the “recount.”

Suffice it to say; can there be any doubt that the fix was in when the ballot below qualified as a vote for Al Franken;

… but this (below) “strangely” did not qualify as a vote for Norm Coleman?

PS: The above episode was brought to you courtesy of the Soros funded SOS (Secretaries of State) Project; the aim of which to get individuals who have sworn to actively slant the process, lie, cheat and steal to ensure that Democrats win elections whether or not they actually get the higher number of votes (like Minnesota SOS Mark Ritchie, a direct beneficiary) elected to state Secretary of State positions (in charge of conducting elections) around the country.

Handsomely paid off in Minnesota, didn’t it?

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A few weeks ago, the Washington Post decided to once again insert itself into Virginia’s elections with its vaunted “macaca” maneuver and help its chosen candidate over the finish line. For those who don’t know, to  “macaca” (.verb) is when a news outlet seizes upon a gaffe by a politician it doesn’t like and then repeatedly pounds on it day after day, week after week in order to sabotage its target’s chances of victory. The Washington Post debuted this campaign tactic against Senator George Allen in 2006 which eventually led to Jim Webb as the now senior Senator from Virginia.

This time it was the Governor’s race between liberal Democrat Creigh Deeds and conservative Republican Robert McDonnell. Twenty years ago, while a graduate student at Regents University and in his thirties, Bob McDonnell wrote;

Republican concerns for fiscal austerity are easily impaled by an additional $1.3 billion a year in expenses. Surely the leadership recognizes that existing federal child-care programs already cost more that $6.9 billion in 1988. Further expenditures would be used to subsidize a dynamic new trend of working women and feminists that is ultimately detrimental to the family by entrenching a status-quo of non-parental primary nurture of children.

Washington Post “macaca” operative Amy Gardner read the above few sentences, stripped it bare of context and reported it thus;

Robert F. McDonnell submitted a master’s thesis to the evangelical school he was attending in Virginia Beach in which he described working women and feminists as “detrimental” to the family.

Needless to say, Amy Gardner’s er … “report” provoked Outrage!!!™ on the Left, with shrieks for McDonnell’s head on every Lefty blog, and front page stories and editorials in the Washington Post as it moved to “macaca” Bob McDonnell. Unfortunately for the Left (both online and offline) and their allies running the Washington Post, the people of Virginia are not buying the attempt to convince them that McDonnell is going to transform Virginia into some facsimilie of the planet Gor and have women stripped naked, chained to stoves and relegated strictly to cooking, cleaning and bearing children.

In retrospect this was probably foredoomed to failure since the Left never bothered to investigate any further past Amy Gardner’s deliberately misleading hit piece to launch the Washington Post’s “macaca” operation against Bob McDonnell. As it turned out, Virginians got introduced to Bob McDonnell’s career-having wife, two working daughters with advanced postgraduate degrees (one of whom served in Iraq) and his many choices of Deputy Attorneys General who happen to be women.

Nonetheless, the Online Left is still outraged at Bob McDonnell’s obvious sexism and hatred of women. Outraged, I tell you!

Whose writings are not provoking outrage on the Online Left?

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Via Ace, I saw this quote in his “Top Headlines” sidebar by by the proprietress of “It’s Only Words” - who should be one and the same as this lady here, and thought it was one of those brilliant things you’ve always thought of but never quite found the right words in which to express it.

Nuance is the mantle intellectuals like to don when they espouse ideas that slap common sense in the face.

So I clicked over to Paula’s blog to see what brought on that slice of genius … and my mouth dropped open at the sheer incandescence of the stupidity Paula was grappling with. It was an op-ed by a Matthew Manweller; an associate professor of Political Science at Central Washington State University, published in the Seattle Times a few days ago. He also happens to be a member of the Washington State Republican Party Executive Committee.

He’s also an idiot, notwithstanding his obvious self-regard as some sort of intellectual. Or a Democratic plant. I don’t believe there is any other explanation for what he’s proposing that the Republican Party do to itself in 2010. Either way, it’s Republicans like him that make the Committeeman Project (which I apologize for completely neglecting - and in the cause of which ColdWarrior has been an absolute wonder to behold) so absolutely necessary.

Get this; this is Manweller’s brilliant idea for Republicans to regain the majority; not challenging vulnerable Democrats.

GOP Chairman Michael Steele should not go after the “Blue Dog Democrats” in 2010. This small group of representatives has shown themselves to value practicality over ideology. They have been willing to compromise, change their minds and even oppose their own party when necessary, characteristics that should be valued regardless of one’s own political affiliation.

This was supposedly John McCain’s trump card in 2008, according to his Primary boosters. His willingness to compromise and oppose his own party in the name of “Bipartisanship” and reaching across the aisle, his Maverick™ credentials, his popularity with the chattering classes would have the silent “moderate” majority rise up and pour money into his campaign coffers, man the phone banks and walk the precincts and then march into the poll booths to pull the lever next to John Sidney McCain III.

But that’s not what happened now, was it? It turns out the voters didn’t particular care about McCain’s catalog of “Bipartisan” accomplishments or admire his history of taking sides against his own party, including the so-called “moderate” voters that were supposed to recognize a kindred spirit in John the Maverick, and of course he lost to an opponent with the most liberal and partisan voting record in the Senate.

More will be lost than gained if the GOP attacks this coalition.

Huh? I simply cannot imagine how any Republican can think reducing the majority Nancy Pelosi has to work with would be a loss. Note again; this man has a seat on the Washington State Republican Party Executive Committee.

What message does it send to conservative Democrats if the GOP assails the very people who were willing to work with them? Republican challenges will simply drive Blue Dogs to seek cover in the liberal wing of their party and make them question why they should ever cross the aisle again. More importantly, what message does it send to the American voter if the GOP seeks to overthrow the very group of people who are actually looking (and thinking) before they leap?

The same message it sent to the American voter when the DSCC spent all that money to take out Susan Collins? The message it would send to the American voter is that Republicans are ready to lead and are willing to step up to the plate. Patton was right, and it was only after 40 years in which it completely escaped a Republican Party led by the likes Nelson Rockefeller and Bob Michel that it finally clicked with the GOP Leadership; Americans respond to winners, to confidence, not people who plan to be “gracious” losers.

The fact that Manweller - a member, I remind you, of a Republican State Executive Committee - actually seems to believe that these so-called “conservative” Democrats are not voting for the President’s Left-Wing agenda because of anything other than self-preservation is proof that education is no substitute for intelligence. And given that, does this cretin honestly believe that removing the threat of being challenged would serve as encouragement for them to continue “looking (and thinking) before they leap?”

If Republicans win a majority on the backs of Blue Dogs, they will look cynical in victory and send a message that the desire for power trumps a commitment to rational discourse and the politics of cooperation.

Cynical to whom? This is the sort of argument that lets one know without a shadow of the doubt that the person making it is severely out of touch with reality. Try to imagine the illogic of this argument. This Democratic plant is trying to sell the asinine argument that the same people who voted out their Democratic Congressman for being a vote for Nancy Pelosi to hold the Speaker’s gavel would immediately eye the man (or woman) they voted to replace him negatively for actually running and winning their votes.

Huh?

I submit that the only people to whom a Republican successfully challenging a so-called “Blue Dog” would look “cynical” to are the liberal chattering class twits that this Manweller is obviously trying to impress with this op-ed. May I remind you all again that Manweller is a member of the Washington State Republican Party Executive Committee?

Such a victory would not be good for America. After having lost the trust of the American people in 2006, the GOP needs to show that they can put country above partisan gain.

And the only way, according to this member of a Republican Party Executive Committee, for the Republican Party to regain the trust of the American people (showing that he is strangely, for his position in the WAGOP, not at all conversant with current polling) and show that they are capable of putting the country above partisan gain is for the GOP to deliberately lose in 2010. That, according to a member of the WA Republican State Executive Committee would be good for America.

Words fail me …

The Beltway glitterati, not least among them the Davids Brooks and Frum, were falling all over themselves in the aftermath of John McCain’s campaign for Gracious Loser in Chief in advising Republicans to jettison all those icky social conservatives and limited government weirdos and instead cater more to “Republicans” like Colin Powell, Christie Whitman and Lincoln Chafee. Republicans, according to the New York Times editorial page and other well-meaning outlets, would do better to make these types of “Republicans” - “Republicans” who contribute to Democrats, endorse Democrats, campaign for Democrats and vote for Democrats - the face of the GOP. If only Republicans would put these types of Republicans in Leadership positions, the story goes, and follow their example (especially by voting for Democrats on Election Day) somehow, Republicans would be back in the majority again.

I honestly thought no one was taken in by the obviously self-serving load of tripe from liberal commentators and their supposedly “conservative” boot-lickers. At least no one in any position of authority in the GOP. Well, I apparently thought wrong.

I’m really curious … how many people here honestly believe Matthew Manweller is not a Democratic plant? Or is this just Frum-level stupidity? Either way, how in the name of all that is Holy did he end up on the principal policy making body of the Washington State Republican Party? And how soon can he get booted off?

2006; Senator George Allen is running for re-election against former Republican Jim Webb. Despite the polls everywhere showing that the GOP was going to have a very unhappy Election Night in a few weeks, Allen was comfortably ahead and already planning his next six years in Washington DC representing the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Then he (as he says), derisively referring to a video stalker working for the Webb campaign’s mohawk style haircut, uttered one fateful three-syllable word; “macaca” - which supposedly was a racial slur in Morocco or French Tunisia sometime in the 1940s and ’50s.

Whatever the case, over the next few weeks until Election Day, on the basis of “macaca” George Allen found himself having to face charges on the front pages of Virginia’s newspapers, often leveled by anonymous “sources” or supposedly “neutral” witnesses that upon deeper investigation were revealed to be highly partisan actors that he was an unrepentant white supremacist who once stuffed a severed deer’s head in a black family’s mailbox and nicknamed college football teammates after KKK Grand Wizards.

Leading the charge was the Washington Post - the editorial board and reporting staff of which put out over a 100 articles and editorials, more than a dozen on the front page, in about half as many days on “macaca” - all very obviously deliberately calculated to plant the perception in the minds of the Virginia electorate that George Allen was a racist bigot just in time for the General Election - which Allen lost to Jim Webb by less than 1%.

The Washington Post had successfully swung an election to favor its chosen candidate … and three years later, it’s trying to repeat the same feat - this time in the upcoming Virginia Governor’s race.

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Recently, the MSM has been all atwitter and fretting about the “harsh tone” of the debate on President Barack Obama’s quest to nationalize the American healthcare sector. In apparent shock, they shriek that the President is being portrayed with a Hitler mustache at Town Halls and protests.

David Gregory had some guests on Meet The Press to discuss this “unique“, “unprecedented” turn of events.

PS: Ever notice that every time a Democrat encounters opposition or gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar, he/she immediately claims to be the recipient of “death threats”? And the media faithfully report as if it were true? I’m convinced now that it’s as much a shut-up technique as the typical liberal’s cry of “RAAAAAAAAAACISSSSSSSSST!!!” when losing an argument.

Personally, I’m disturbed that neither Armey nor Coburn recognized and took the opportunity to really let David Gregory have it on his and Fourth Estate’s hypocrisy. Where has he been the last eight years? Where was this concern for civil discourse and respect for the Presidency when the President wore an ‘R’ behind his name? Oh yes, I know … sneering at the President in the White House Press Room. The double standard is beyond blatant. It actually gets up and slaps you in the face.

Bush with a Hitler mustache has been the feature of every Left-Wing march and protest for eight years, even before 9/11 and the Iraq War. This is not to mention the posters (and a movie) calling for his assassination, accusing him of bringing down the Twin Towers, etc. and every other evil under the sun. That Rachel Madcow Maddow, once of Air America where this was SOP for eight years is claiming outrage at this is enough hypocrisy by itself to curdle milk.

Not a single member of the MSM batted an eyelid at all this for eight long years. In fact their typical response is perfectly illustrated by CNN’s disgrace of a former employee Susan Roesgen when she saw Bush being portrayed as Hitler with devil horns in 2006 - amusement and as a hook for her story.

Obama on the other hand, gets the exact same treatment and Roesgen, like the rest of her so-called impartial objective hack brethren, goes crazy.

So all this so-called “concern” by the Fourth Estate about the President being compared to Hitler and the “harsh tone” is really nothing more than whining that their new god is getting a taste of what his predecessor endured without complaint and with their tacit approval and even assistance for the whole of his two terms.

No. I haven’t suddenly become afflicted with Vichyism and become a “moderate.”

I fully expect that, as David Letterman increasingly comes under fire, the Left’s pet Republicans, i.e. the Davids Frum and Brooks, Meghan McCain, Kathleen Parker and newly minted “moderate” Peggy Noonan would explode unto our screens to come squarely down on David Letterman’s side - chiding Palin for “overreacting” and warning her that her anger at having her teenage daughter(s) attacked by a 62 year old man on national television would “turn off” “centrists” because it would be seen as “far to the Right” behavior. Kathleen Parker would probably write that Willow deserved it for having such a horrible mother in the first place, and Peggy Noonan would earnestly assure us that Letterman - deep deep down inside his soul - feels diminished and sorry about it - just like, she assures us, Ted Kennedy feels nothing but regret and sorrow for his attack on Robert Bork.

The brackets above are to indicate the fact that Letterman has apologized for - as he’d have it - inadvertently attacking 14 year old Willow Palin when he really meant to attack Bristol Palin - which apparently makes it all better.

That said; to explain the title, I believe in the concept that in politics, one should not use an M16 on an enemy when a perfectly good JDAAM is available - unlike the typical celebrity-worshipping “moderate” Republican I believe that the Palins are under-reacting.

David Letterman attacked their daughter on national television. Issuing a Press Release, no matter how strongly worded, just seems not quite commensurate as a response to a 62 year old man joking about a 14 (or 17) year old being raped in a stadium, to his audience’s appreciative hoots and applause, and repeating a joke along those lines the very next night.

A boycott of sponsors won’t work - I say this because I’ve seen calls for a Great Conservative Boycott dozens of times on a myriad of subjects, only for the whole thing to fizzle after a week or less. It’s a pipe dream as far I am concerned.

I would instead recommend a video response; with Todd and the Governor facing the camera and tying this episode firmly around Letterman’s neck, ending with Governor Palin quietly asking Letterman to extend the same courtesy he continues to extend to President Obama’s two beautiful daughters to her children - partisanship should take a back seat to basic decency. First of all, this should be uploaded to YouTube, LiveLeak, etc.

Next, have a web page for contributions so it can be put on the air, nationally.

Letterman’s sponsors would respond very quickly.

Please take a look at this interchange between John Ziegler and Contessa Brewer on Barack Obama’s MSNBC. (H/T: crippy)

John Ziegler just demonstrated the picture-perfect attitude to take towards the “reporters” and “anchors” at any and all of the Democratic networks; ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, etc.

Some variant of disdain, contempt or somewhere in between. No liberal-talking point assertion or premise should be left unchallenged. Openly and repeatedly question their honesty and integrity. Highlight their hypocrisy in their coverage. Change the subject when you feel like it or stay on a subject even if they want to move on. Ask them questions that they have to answer before the interview can go further.

Monday Morning Quarterbacking; Ziegler only made a few mistakes as far as I can see;

1. not directly asking Contessa Brewer if she thinks it’s fine that David Letterman attacked Palin’s 14 year old daughter and why she didn’t show that part of Letterman’s act? Why is she deliberately ignoring the attack on Willow Palin? As a mother, would she let it slide? Is she a mother? Why is she and her network trying to make the American people think Palin was only complaining about the attack on her while deliberately, dishonestly, keeping the creepy attack on her daughter off the radar?
2. when Brewer brought up the silly factoid about the poll showing Palin as not being seen as one of the spokesmen for the GOP, he should have pointed it out and dismissed it for the irrelevancy that it is, and pointed out that it’s only out-of-touch journalists who think it’s significant - Palin is the Governor of a vast state, with an environment tougher than any other state, she doesn’t have time to waste on such nonsense as an irrelevant poll.
3. when he touched on the fact of the media portraying the GOP as being solely comprised of old white men {NRSC endorsing Charlie Crist doesn’t help} Ziegler should have added that the only time the media covers Governor Palin is when they’re attacking her with knowingly false Democratic talking points (like Keith Olbermann on “plagiarism”) or from the fever swamps of the Left-wing blogosphere, so of course, the poll results will reflect that.
4. when Contessa Brewer (at 3:50) challenged Ziegler about asking Palin “tough questions“, he should have reacted, first of all, by letting loose with a long and hard laugh. And then he should have answered that the day any reporter at MSNBC stops swooning at Obama’s feet and actually asks Obama a question tougher than “Why are you so soooo dreamy? Can I have your autograph? On my chest?”, that’ll be the day MSNBC can question anyone else on asking tough questions.

But then, I wasn’t the one in the hot seat, I’m critiquing in hindsight, and even with all that Ziegler did very very well in that interview. He was properly mocking, disdainful, disbelieving and made it very clear that he considered Contessa Brewer and her network to be no more than Democratic mouthpieces.

Which happens to have the benefit of being the truth.

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Moe wrote about Hiram Monserrate back when the story broke about his Christmas-time attack on his girlfriend with a broken beer bottle for having another man’s business card in her purse. The woman needed 20 stitches around her eye.

In reaction, the brand new incoming NY Democratic Senate Majority closed ranks around their man and one of their number, State Senator Eric Adams, went so far as to criticize the police for trying to “humiliate” the State Senator-Elect by making such a fuss of his girlfriends bottle-carved face.

Anyway, after a little flash-in-the-pan coverage of the entire incident, the rabidly Democratic/liberal New York media conveniently “forgot” all about Hiram “Slasher” Monserrate and his girlfriend. In case one doesn’t know, the Democratic media and its journalists are very capable of strategically ignoring violence against women for political ends. (see Kopechne, Mary Jo and one Kennedy, Edward Moore).

In other words, given a choice between weakening the Democrats’ hold of the NY State Senate - finally achieved after several long frustrating decades - and not risking that by ensuring that justice is done for a battered woman (as they certainly would have if Monserrate was a Republican), they predictably went with the former.

Which is why Hiram Monserrate just made a big mistake. The only reason his face and that of his erstwhile girlfriend’s with the twenty stitches have been largely off the radar in the NY media, and he hasn’t been hounded into stepping down before he spent a single day in court, was because of the ‘D’ he wore behind his name.

He just exchanged it for the hated ‘R’ - and now the journalists, their editors and all the liberals who have hitherto been all-too-happy to ignore his legal troubles so long as he was a vote for a Democratic Majority Leader are going to suddenly - very conveniently - rediscover their outrage.

Oh well … can’t say I feel sorry for him. I do feel sorry for his girlfriend and I hope she’s fully recovered and carried on with her life. But I feel even more sorry for the people of New York.

This is in response to gsy987 here, complaining that the GOP needs to adjust itself to make “moderates” more comfortable. Of course, his advice, like that of David Frum, Rick Moran, David Brooks, etc. is that we jettison social conservatives and demand less loyalty of “moderates” toward the party.

My father here is exhibit A right now in everything that is wrong with the Republican party right now. [He’s] a classic, northern Virginia moderate Republican, who felt isolated from the GOP through the continued emphasis on loyalty and social issues, and actually in the end voted for Obama.

I have to agree with the man - it sure does sound like gsy987’s Dad is exactly the type of “moderate” Republican that is everything wrong with the GOP right now. As Specter, Jeffords, Chafee, Schwarz, Leach, Gilchrest, etc. have proven - it is now too much to expect the very basic expectation of partisan loyalty from “moderates”. That would require them to take a side and stick to it, something we all know “moderates” are congenitally incapable of. Let me be blunt; I am yet to see any of the media’s designated “moderates” in the GOP stand strong on an issue the instant it is labeled “divisive” or “controversial”.

So far what I’ve found out is that the bulk of so-called Republican “moderates” are remarkably shallow thinkers with practically no original or worthwhile idea beyond splitting the difference on any of the issues that matter. They outsource their thinking to the liberal Press, to polls, to Beltway Conventional Wisdom, and are forever trying to please Democrats so they can get what they think is “respect.”

If people really want to know why moderates in the GOP get such a bum rap, it is not because of their positions on social issues, but the enervating jumble of cowardice, self-loathing, masochism and Quisling impulse towards capitulating collaboration with the other side when they’re needed most. Add that to the constant whining self-righteousness that they’re not getting the respect they’ll never earn thanks to a manifest lack of principle and conviction, and it’s not that difficult to see why the typical Republican would seriously consider sitting out an election if a “moderate” is on the ballot.

The fact is that when we look at the Democrat’s own “moderates”, we notice a few things. Whenever they’re on print and broadcast, they’re not bashing their own party. They do not call their fellow party members “extremists.” They do not sabotage their own leadership. They do not place Bipartisanship™ above achieving their party’s legislative goals. They do not repeat the other side’s talking points. They do not go on talk radio to agree with Conservative hosts that other Democrats are intolerant knuckle-draggers. They do not proclaim to one and all that the mainstream of their party as “too liberal” or “too far to the Left.” In other words, when it counts, and even when it doesn’t, they’re loyal, they’re Democrats.

But “moderate” Republicans are an entirely different kettle of fish. Now, all indications are that not only do they want to vote with the other side with regards to policy, they want to go along with Democrats on procedural votes (e.g. “Gang of 14″) as well.

Before on RedState, defenders of “moderates” tried to pass off the fantasy that moderates were “staunch fiscal conservatives” even while being social liberals when, to be honest, the only living breathing example of such a creature was Rudy Giuliani and Bill Weld (back when he was a Republican). The “fiscally conservative socially liberal” shibboleth was held on to quite strongly though, that is; until Snowe, Collins, Specter (with able support by “moderate” Govs like Crist and Schwarzenegger) sacrificed the nation’s financial health - not because they thought it would work, they never even read the bill - on the altar of Bipartisanship™ and getting invitations to talk to liberal news hosts on TV. Now, every one of the defenders is silent.

Thanks to their constant badmouthing of their own party, most of the “loyalty is too much to ask of us” “moderates” in Congress (the ones that would have voted with Obama on the ‘Stimulus’) were voted out in 2006 and 2008 by Independents convinced by their own words echoing (as usual) the Democrats that the GOP is full of extremists, “theocrats,” racists, sexists, homophobes, anti-environmental neanderthals. Apparently, according to what passes for “strategy” in “moderate” circles, this “Republicans Suck! Except Me!” message was supposed to prime listeners to troop to the polls on Election Day and pull the lever for the Republican on the ballot.

Which highlights another thing about “moderates” - without the advantage of incumbency or the success of a conservative predecessor to conveniently associate themselves with, they can’t win elections without help from the very same people they spend their time on TV denouncing, including the base they need to carry them over the finish line. Many of the so-called “moderates” that were booted by their district’s voters in 2006 and 2008 only got elected in the first place by riding Reagan’s coat-tails in the 1980s and Gingrich’s coat-tails in 1994.

So here’s my advice to gsy987’s “Republican”-for-Obama Dad, and this is with all due respect; he should switch his registration to Democrat and be done with it. Like Meghan McCain (proving that the apple seldom falls far from the tree) he sounds like someone who sees no redeeming value in the party he claims to be a member of and everything to admire in the Democrat Party - the fact that we nominated John ‘Maverick Moderate’ McCain, the man who for eight years exemplified the capitulating Bipartisanship™ that “moderates” have been clamoring for, the man the New York Times endorsed for us, and yet he voted for Barack Obama anyway, says this more convincingly than any words he (or gsy987) can say to the contrary.

At this point, unless they get over their aversion to loyalty and paralyzing fear of journalist disapproval, “moderates” like gsy987’s Dad are no different from Fifth Columnists - it’s far more harmful to have them within the Tent than without it.

Update (05/14/2009): A little change; I’ve decided to concentrate the number of precincts per county first and the number of currently serving Committeemen in each county before drilling down to the precinct level.

What is the Committeeman Project? Read all about it here. Achance’s comment here neatly captures one of the whys of what we’re doing; returning control of the GOP back to the base and away from the consultants, lobbyist and hack incompetent political operatives in Washington DC and the state capitals.

We need to organize at the precinct, district, and state level so that you cannot win a Republican endorsement, caucus, or primary without being vetted by activist Republicans, rather than a group of lobbyists in a hotel suite or Capitol office.

Rather than waiting for some miracle (H/T: Jack Savage), I’m thinking we can get the ball rolling here on RS by utilizing our numbers and getting answers to some basic questions … just in case.

The beginning of most projects is research. We need to know;

• … how many precincts there are in each of the nation’s 3140 counties,
• … how many and which of these precincts have Republican Precinct Committeemen,
• … what ZIP code (or codes) correspond to a particular precinct,
• … how does one become a Precinct Committeeman in a particular locale (i.e. state, county),
• … etc.

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I firmly believe today that former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell’s Conservative Resurgence Plan was the best thing to come out of the race for the RNC Chairmanship earlier this year. With its focus on precinct-level organization, it not only provided the best blueprint for rebuilding the Party in locales where it has completely collapsed but also the often neglected aspect of strengthening it where it’s strong so the GOP can be competitive again in every part of the nation. Blackwell promised that, as RNC Chairman, he would spend unprecedented amounts of money and resources to rebuild the Republican Party’s organizational and campaign infrastructure from the most local of levels (i.e. the precinct) on up. The logic of it was simple;

If we are organized at the precinct level, our organizations at [every] other [level] will be [that] much more efficient and productive.

To be specific, the Conservative Resurgence Plan called for the recruitment of a “new generation of precinct leaders” who would be the GOP’s first line of command on the field, interconnected online and operating neighborhood by neighborhood, recruiting volunteers, canvassing and talking to voters, explaining the GOP’s stand on the issues, organizing events, etc. In addition, these “Precinct Organizers” and their lieutenants would have access to a specially developed set of online party-building database, multimedia, voter mapping, fundraising, volunteer management and task tracking applications to enable them inform, plan, coordinate and direct their on-ground activities and resources in their areas of responsibility in and out of campaign season.

The Republican Party must be a civic institution again, with a volunteer base that is active year-round and is given real responsibility beyond showing up at a phone bank. In this last election, it should have been possible for volunteer leaders to organize their precinct or neighborhood for McCain, tasking them with knocking on doors, distributing signs, and most crucially, recruiting other volunteers to build the party exponentially. Instead, virtually all volunteer activity was channeled towards driving casual phone contacts, not personal neighbor-to-neighbor door knocks.

Our technology should give Republican activists the ability to connect with fellow activists at the precinct level. We must encourage the growth of standalone volunteer communities, giving them the tools to organize themselves online, with the official party taking a step back and not trying to control them.

Unfortunately, Ken Blackwell’s campaign never gained any traction within the cliquish environment of the 168 members of the Republican National Committee. I was hoping that when he withdrew his name from the ballot and endorsed Michael Steele, it was a sign that even though his candidacy was dead, his Plan was going to see some semblance of life in Michael Steele’s RNC.

I’m not quite so hopeful anymore.

But then, recently, I started thinking; why wait for the RNC? What, exactly, is preventing Blackwell from seeing his precinct rebuilding Plan through? Does one really need to be Chairman of the RNC to get something like this done? In fact, considering the recent depressing displays of fecklessness, blindness and incompetence (i.e. NY20, Specter) from the official GOP establishment and its various arms, perhaps Blackwell not having to balance the interests of the rank-and-file against the narrow interests and warped conventional wisdom of Beltway Republicans, which (he would have had to as RNC Chairman) is a blessing in disguise.

With this, let me (re-)introduce an idea I only just touched on a few weeks ago; The Committeeman Project.

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This could be a liberal letting the cat out of the bag prematurely (i.e. “loose lips sink ships“), or a conservative cleverly parodying ACORN types and giving us a heads-up on what to expect from the Left today.

As you may know a bunch of redneck traitors are planning a protest on April 15th involving waving around a few tea bags and demonstrating mild irritation at Prez. Obama for making them pay taxes. Here is your chance to do your duty for your president and country and send these fools an unmistakable message.

First of all you can sign up at Huffington Post to become a tea party reporter. It would be a good idea to meet some people to take names and also pictures if possible which should also be forwarded to Janet Napolitano at the DHS.

Next you can join with our comrades at ACORN who have plans afoot to disperse these traitors.

Basically the plan works like this - ACORN has infiltrated the redneck groups that are planning all this. On the 15th at the proper moment a van pulls up with 5 young black women with pro Obama signs. They will be peaceful and respectful. Our infiltrators will verbally attack them with profanity and racial slurs and physically push them around while our camera crew films. In a minute they take off and it is all over.

Doesn’t seem like much till that night when the video gets put on the news and all you see are crazy hillbilly conservatives attacking innocent black counter protesters, shouting racial slurs and pushing them around.

You too can be a part of the glorious moment in history and help keep these traitors in check.

So be careful out there.

And most importantly, don’t forget to have fun.

I remember some time last year, mortified Texas Republicans found themselves having to explain how it was that they granted a vendor selling campaign pins saying; “If Obama is President will we still call it the White House?” space at their convention.

All over the blogosphere, the Left went nuts with joy; and remarkably echo-chamber like talking points “See? See?!” they shrieked in smug elation “The GOP is filled with nothing but racists! Racists!! YAAAAYYYY!!!!”

As for me, my first thought was that this was far more likely to be a Democratic dirty trick. As far as I’m concerned, only a Democrat would believe that such a sentiment on a campaign pin would draw appreciative laughs from a Republican audience, so I looked for any story about this vendor - his name is Jonathan Alcox - that would also spare a few a lines to shed some light on his partisan affiliation, donation records, etc.

No such luck - for some reason, no one in the media thought to check up on that.

What I did discover though was that he was something of an equal-opportunity offender i.e. he makes political pins, stickers and buttons for sale to both Republicans and Democrats at their conventions. This was the button he sold at the TXGOP convention that got him into the news. The one on top is the one that got him and the TXGOP as collateral damage in the news. The one at the bottom is one he made to sell at the TX Democratic convention.

The kicker is this though - on the “Obama button” at the TXGOP convention;

“I only made 12 buttons to test them out … And, I only sold four. Two were sold to journalists who were looking for a controversial story to bring out of the convention.”

On the Bush-Chimpanzee button at the TX Democratic convention;

“… they sold out almost immediately.”

Ask yourselves, which one better reflects the mindset of its target market? And how come only one of these buttons made the news?

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Yesterday (and I swear I had no idea what was coming down the pike the next day), I responded to a comment by one of Redstate’s more clever mobies (he is clever because he avoids the blam stick by carefully limiting himself to one comment per month or so). Yil, of course, was trying to plant the meme that former US Attorney Chris Christie, the man increasingly looking like a very very serious threat to Jon Corzine’s plans for re-election as New Jersey Governor, was engaged in partisan politics when his office began an investigation of Bob Menendez just before the 2006 elections.

I responded thus;

Yep … Christie wasn’t as smart as those Democrat DOJ staffers that went after Stevens.

Those guys not only prosecuted Stevens in DC, where a Republican is about as likely to escape conviction as a snowball escaping hell in solid form, they leaked slanted info to the AK Press, they also hid exculpatory evidence at trial, and managed to win a conviction right on time for November.

Those guys were pros.

That was yesterday.

Today, totally coincidentally, the papers are saying this;

The Justice Department has moved to dismiss former Sen. Ted Stevens’ indictment, effectively voiding his Oct. 27 conviction on seven counts of filing false statements on his U.S. Senate financial disclosure forms.

“After careful review, I have concluded that certain information should have been provided to the defense for use at trial,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement released this morning. “In light of this conclusion, and in consideration of the totality of the circumstances of this particular case, I have determined that it is in the interest of justice to dismiss the indictment and not proceed with a new trial.”

The Justice Department filed its motion to dismiss the case this morning.

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From just September till now, Sarah Palin has accumulated a personal dept of over $500,000 in legal fees defending herself against fake/false/frivolous ethics charges. That’s Five Hundred Thousand Dollars.

A group of Alaska liberals, with the apparent cooperation of members of the Alaska Democratic Party have been filing ethics charge after ethics charge against Sarah Palin. The aim? Not to get her impeached and booted from office, because every single one of the charges are frivolous, baseless and even fairly deranged - one was even filed in the name of a soap opera character - but something far more personal.

These people want to bankrupt the Palins and leave them destitute. They want to empty their bank accounts so that they cannot afford the basics and necessities of life after Governor Palin leaves office.

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NOTE: Was responding to this and it got too big.

A friend of mine in the Army explained to me once, why the bulk of servicemen from the top officers to the lowest enlisteds are against the allowing of open homosexuality in the Armed Forces. Primarily, it was unit cohesion, and he gave me an explanation, that I thought made sense.

Unit cohesion depends upon members of a unit trusting each other with their lives - no favoritism, no hesitation. Sex brings all of these things back (and heavily) into the equation. This is the reason why allowing gay men to serve in the Armed Forces is not in any way related to desegregation - there is no equivalence (of military import) between them.

There is a reason why brothers and other close relatives are not allowed to serve in the same unit where they can conceivably fall under the same command line - and where one may possibly command the other directly.

The Armed Forces do their best to avoid such situations not just because they want to avoid “Saving Private Ryan” type situations but also because they want to avoid having situations where one brother has to, for the sake of the mission or the lives of other members of the unit, command his brother (because of a specialty in his training) to do something that would almost certainly mean he gets injured badly, or even his death.

The psychological impact of giving an order and a man of yours dying or being maimed in order to carry it out is not something many outside the military (and rescue services) can contemplate - the guilt, second-guessing, the self-recrimination, can destroy all on its own.

Now imagine if that man was your brother.

Allowing open homosexuality into the Armed Forces presents the same issues. One single gay man in a unit may not be much of a problem - it’s entirely possible (if difficult to imagine) that his unit mates would not really care that he prefers men to women as sex partners.

It’s when you have two or more gay men in a unit that you may have a problem. Fighting units live in close quarters with each other, and their members are at the peak of fitness and I would assume, attractiveness. It’s the same problem that presents itself with putting women in combat units.

How do you stop relationships from forming? L/CPL A and Private B competing for the affections of Private C to the detriment of the rest of the unit that will almost certainly be aware of it? Note that A, B and C could be any combination of genders. Private C could be a woman or a man.

Imagine the battlefield again, CPL A has to order his lover, Private C, the specialist in X, to go do X. If X is not done, the platoon is not going to make it without suffering heavy casualties. But the person doing X, while saving the rest of his/her unit and helping them achieve their objective, is not likely to make it back.

So the Armed Forces are back to square one. Avoiding putting brothers in the same units is fairly easy. Limiting the mixing of men and women in order to prevent the formation of complicating relationships is harder, as the Navy has discovered with the phenomenon of female sailors falling pregnant while at sea. Three guesses who’s impregnating them - civilian tag-alongs (i.e. NCIS), aliens or their male fellow sailors?

Now we’re asking them to find a way to ensure that gay servicemen are distributed enough to minimize the risks of sexual relationships forming between members of the same unit.

Somehow, I don’t think this is likely to end well.

The floor is open for discussion.

Who is your GOP precinct committeeman? Your GOP county chairman? Your county’s representative(s) on the state’s central committee? What if you’re looking for any local upcoming Republican Party events in your county or district? What if you want to host one such event yourself? What if you want to organize with other Republicans in your locale in support of a reform-minded conservative Republican running for a seat on the local school board, city council or to fill a state legislative seat? How do you go about making where you live, if already friendly to Republicans, even friendlier, and if hostile, less so?

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Unfortunately, I have to disagree with EPU and everyone else that the Democrats picking Rush as their current target for destruction now that Dubya is back in Crawford for good “can’t possibly end well” for them. I personally think it can, and that actually, if things continue the way they’re going, we’re going to find ourselves talking about how to mitigate the damage somewhere down the line.

The main disadvantage of being a politics junkie interacting so often with other politics junkies is that you tend to forget that you’re far from the typical voter.

It’s not so much what Rush says, or the fact that he’s what the media and their menagerie of tame “Republicans” like David Brooks consider “controversial.” To me, those are all positives, especially when you add the fact that, unlike Bush, he bites back.

But ultimately the issue here is tactics and strategy. Rush hitting back, daring Barack Obama to debate him, taking Michael Steele to the woodshed, defending his “failure” comments, etc. is all well and good. Except that he’s doing it only on his show. Which, I suspect, is exactly what Rahm Emanuel and the rest of his crew were counting on.

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Newt Gingrich is right. Republican campaign consultants are probably the dumbest, most short-sighted unimaginative pedestrian minds working in politics today. And, in hindsight, even while acknowledging the great job he did in 2004, I think I’ll lay some of the blame at the feet of Karl Rove as one of the major reasons why in recent years with his 50+1 strategy. On the surface, it sounds smart to “go where the votes are” and write off “unwinnable” districts and demographics, but in the long term, it’s the mark of a dying party. We can’t keep writing off entire regions and segments of the population and expect to remain viable as a party.

A rule in business is that you either grow or you die - and we can’t grow if we refuse to compete in Blue districts and states. Yet this is what out latte-sipping, pencil-pushing army of consultants continue to suggest we do.

An example of this type of thinking is amply demonstrated by this post here. Note that I’m not calling this person out and I mean no disrespect, but nonetheless I feel I have to take the time to show just how utterly boneheaded this sort of thinking is, and how important it is to purge it from the GOP before it does any more damage.

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