Minnesota Republicans In The Age Of Trump

Donald Trump delivered what was required of him last Thursday night: the speech of a lifetime in which he accepted the Republican Party's nomination for president. It was a remarkable climax to a year in which every bit of political wisdom was discarded outright or turned on it's head. The acclaim for his speech was near universal: even critics praised it before condemning it. Of course, the media were quick to see its effectiveness and branded it as dark, possibly dangerous.

In a 76 minute performance that never flagged, Trump leveled with the American people, telling them that the time for lies was over, that he'd talk about those things they never see on television or in their newspapers.

He then set out in systematic and devastating fashion to describe our current condition. Afterward, a CNN instant poll found 75% of those who saw it had a positive view of the speech. This was not what media wanted and they commenced to redouble their efforts to talk it down. Too late: the American people liked what they heard.

Earlier in the week Michael Moore told Bill Maher that Trump will win the election. The despair on the left was almost complete. It's worth seeing the video when Moore speaks the truth few democrats will utter: click here.

Ivanka Trump introduced her father and herself delivered a thoughtful and well received speech. Having his children speak each night of the campaign was Trump's idea and highly unusual for a political convention. It proved to be a masterstroke. Fashion mavens pointed out that the modest but beautiful dress Ivanka wore was from her own collection and cost $138. I'm told women noticed: millennial women in particular.

Remember: Trump has no idea what he's doing.

* * * * 

For the most part, the Minnesota republican delegation to Cleveland acted consistently with how I've branded them: the dumbest republicans in the nation. Again, in case you're not a regular reader, I mean this collectively and on the political plane, not in any individual case or ad hominem manner. Political acumen, or its absence really, is what I'm speaking about. 

It would be easier to explain if most of the delegates weren't bright but that's just not the case (well, for the most part). Accordingly, the mystery as to why Minnesota republicans seem unable to grasp the times in which they live this political cycle and use it to their advantage only deepens. 

The delegation made a fool of itself Monday night when it joined, then withdrew, from a last gasp Never Trump effort to have a roll call vote on issues that had been addressed in the Rules Committee, which met the week before. Apart from that, Minnesota was largely invisible nationally, fit only to be the subject of stories by the hapless local democrat reporters who were sent to cover them. In typical grifter fashion, a couple MNGOPe types thanked them for their coverage. 

But Minnesota media's coverage of the convention was uniformly mediocre and unimaginative, although the cover of that Friday's Star Tribune made up for it somewhat, eliciting complaints from liberals that the coverage wasn't tilted toward them for a change. Click here to see the front page of the Star Tribune the morning after Trump's speech. 

* * * * 

I don't know how republicans in Minnesota will do this fall but I'm fairly certain it will be less well than should be the case. The mentally retarded political reaction to Trump in this state by the republican establishment was simultaneously nauseating & infuriating. They forced me into calling them the dumbest republicans in the nation: I had nothing to do with it.

Initial reluctance to embrace Trump was completely understandable. People forget I started out as a Scott Walker supporter. His shrewd decision to leave the race early only helps his stature now. I moved to Trump by degrees, by fits and starts really. I hadn't seen anything like him before either.

There was no one moment I can recall being the tipping point. It's like how dreams have no beginning: we're just in them, that's all we recall, never the beginning.

At one point I understood. The Trump "red pill effect"some call it and there is something to that. Outside of up and coming apparatchiks, can anyone take the "rising stars" in the party seriously? Can anyone avoid the obvious influence of donors who make indentured servants out of those laughable "stalwart conservatives" who preen but never deliver?

The majority of Minnesota republicans didn't get it, preferring virtue signaling instead of substantive engagement. These types get taken down by their provincialism every time. The problem is that they have so much company at the bottom.

They're so Minnesota-centric it's no wonder we miss out on national wave elections.

Now we have crouched down Minnesota republicans, unknowingly used by local media to play into their anti-republican narratives, republicans who are spooked by not knowing what they stand for.

How could such a hollow group not be threatened by Trump?

* * * * 

When I look at Minnesota republican politics I never see a plan, a strategy, some sort of political IQ over 85. Instead, I see a disparate set of often conflicting policy positions, reflecting its ad hoc nature which is one neither of principle nor certainly of competence, engaged in by people who know each other but who just aren't very good at politics.

Trump opened enormous opportunities for a variety of republican interests in Minnesota to message against the dominant culture here. The themes were endless and could be tailored to any particular locale  in the state. 

Virtually no republicans have picked up on this amazing chance. Democrats in this state wouldn't win at the rates they do if we had a competent opposition party. We do not. 

Rep. John Kline & The Minnesota Tea Party Paulers

Coleen Rowley, former G-man, one of three of Time's People of the Year 2002, and legendary local Leftist, who I knew beforehand only by sight, sat directly in front of me two rows into the audience seating, fairly staring at me the whole time. For a long moment, it was as though we two were the only ones who knew what was about to begin.

What was this?

I ran late driving to Buffalo, MN for a fundraiser for Wright County republicans the evening of November 23rd, having been asked a few weeks earlier in a Twitter direct message by Walter Hudson (who was the evening's moderator) if I wanted to be on a "foreign policy" panel. Sure, I said, me being me. Only later did a friend point out that on Facebook Walter had styled the event as "Hawks vs. Doves."

Right.

Milling about at the Buffalo American Legion were both Tom Emmer and Phil Krinkie, making small talk with those who had showed up. Where was my candidate, Rhonda Sivarajah? Cloistered away by those who know nothing about how to run a federal campaign? Beats me. Rhonda's running as bad a campaign as Tom did when running for governor. No one, apparently, can penetrate her bubble. Sound familiar? Here's hoping there's still time for her to turn it around.

At any rate, there I was: defending Israel, my neo-conservative piñata status certified. The Rowley crowd was weirdly stuck in time: what about Vietnam? Seriously. And: can we ever expunge the stain of overthrowing Mosaddegh? The line of questioning was, frankly, as stale as an Almanac show with a panel of Larry Jacobs clones. I was ready to be passed a joint.

Some current events managed to be referenced: what about civilian casualties of drone attacks? A pity, to be sure, but war has always had collateral damage. As I pointed out by way of contrast, Palestinian terrorists deliberately target civilians. The Israeli military does quite the opposite. So does the United States of America.

This meant nothing to the co-panelist seated on my right: he managed a reference in due course to John Mearsheimer, the co-author along with Stephen Walt of "The Israel Lobby." I didn't have time to unpack that coded little mention for my audience; we would have been there all night if I had gotten started. The latent anti-semitism of Ron Paul and his ridiculous followers fairly filled the room. When I called Ron Paul anti-semitic the gentlemen to my right stood up to leave in a huff, refusing "to be called an anti-semite." This, of course, I had not done and he was easily persuaded to stay on the dais. Most people are.

My ideological ally on the panel, David Strom, later remarked that immediate umbrage was taken at the mention of Paul's anti-semitism while the two of us, in the course of the evening, were compared to Nazis. I can't speak for David but I would have gotten a bit more concerned about being called a Nazis if I took those who thought such of me more seriously. Or seriously at all.

Foreign policy was uni-dimensional in that crowd: military action alone. In fact, as I tried to explain, foreign policy entails much more than that and, indeed, military action can be said, in certain respects, to represent its failure. To paraphrase Mia Farrow's Twitter biography, I was trying.

What empire was the United States claiming in undertaking President George W. Bush's wildly successful PEPFAR program in Africa, which has saved tens of millions of lives? Engagement with China has been crucial, never more so than after the death of Mao and the ascent of Deng Xiaoping whose policies lifted hundreds of millions of souls out of desperate poverty and in our very lifetimes. The West and its forces of freedom (quaint, I know) won the Cold War against the USSR without firing a shot (proxy wars admittedly excepted). I mentioned Natan Sharansky tapping on his prison walls to other captives that Reagan had called it the focus of evil in the modern world. I had kind, although not wholly unreserved, words to say about Edward Snowden, whom Ms. Rowley had seen in person in Russia a few weeks earlier. It takes genuine courage to make such a trip and, though it might strike some as incongruous, I had a lot of respect for her in undertaking it. These people are living out their principles at no small cost. It's not hard to respect them more than the parasitical lobbyist types like Weber, Coleman & Pawlenty, even though I disagree with much of their world view.

Experience trumps ideology. Except when it doesn't. I made a point of looking directly at Rowley when I said "If the predicate of your foreign policy views is that what's wrong with the world is America, I don't need to know anything more about you. I've seen that movie."

*****

I recapitulate my little adventure in Buffalo because it further informs my thinking about what is going on in Minnesota's Second Congressional District, currently represented by John Kline. Here we have the clearest example of the remnants of Ron Paul's followers in Minnesota reorganizing under the Tea Party rubric. What's deceptive, of course, is that while the general Tea Parties organized around the country are quite tired of ever expanding government and its infringement on personal liberty, almost none have the blame America and/or the Jews mentality that so infects Ron Paul and his minions. In other words, they're adults. 

I understand the need for refurbishment: by the time he left the national stage Ron Paul was a laughing stock. His candidate for senate in the 2012 Minnesota race was an object lesson to republican parties around the country what not to let happen in their own. Some of that candidate's enablers still seek higher office this cycle. They fail to see that 2012 was Paul's high water mark; that the tide has gone out. 

Being mostly a spent political force in their own right, the "liberty" movement has either invaded or created Tea Party groups by which to advance their goals. I call it Paulism Without Ron. Shrill and strident, dogmatic and insecure, this group attempts to pass itself off as somehow representative of the larger republican body politic. They are not, of course, but that doesn't stop them from demanding that they be treated as such. 

In CD 2 they have fallen in behind the specious David Gerson, who seeks the republican endorsement which the Tea Paulers™ hope to deliver, thereby forcing Rep. Kline into a primary if he wishes to return to office. They pillory Kline for his record and large parts of it should come in for excoriation. That said, it's folly to the point of political suicide to remove him from the ballot and replace him with some low rent demagogue who could be easily beaten by a competent, moderate democrat. 

The anti-Kline people like to hold up fatuous things like Freedom Works' scorecards, which for Kline shows only something like a 42% rating. Have they a clue about the frauds constituting Freedom Works? Are they aware it paid Dick Armey 8 million dollars to go away and never bother the group he helped start? Probably not, but every time you get an email from the sleazy Matt Kibbe, Freedom Works' current head, be sure to give generously because don't tread on me! I'm certain CD 2's middle-class and lower middle class won't mind it when he again spends $15,000 in a single 3 day weekend at a  luxury hotel, as has been his wont. 

Freedom Works is playing them for suckers, although no one currently can match the fleecing ability of the repulsive Glenn Beck. If you're hitching your wagon to either of these two stars, your destiny does not lie in future Minnesota republican politics. And if your idea of a constitutional scholar is Kris Anne Hall, I'm to be forgiven for laughing in your face. You can stay dumb but you're not about to dumb me down, thanks. Nor, I would guess, are most other republicans in or out of CD 2. 

The juvenile attempt to deny Rep. Kline the endorsement is of a piece with the juvenile foreign policy on view in Buffalo last month. However they want to mask themselves, the Ron Paul followers are fellow travelers with Rowley on many, if not most, issues. They are by no stretch of the imagination republicans in the traditional sense of the word. Consequently, those of us who want to win elections in order to change public policy have every justification for calling them out, for marginalizing them, for defeating them.  

It's hard to say if Kline will be denied the endorsement. If he is, it's hard to see how he would not win the primary and go on to win another term. If Gerson obtains the endorsement, it would be more confirmation that when the inmates take over the asylum, a recommendation from the asylum's management is worthless. The same holds true for the race in CD 6 to replace Michele Bachmann, as it does in the governor's race and as it could in the US Senate race. 

The future viability of the Minnesota republican party lies in the primary process, far from the out of touch, inbred activists who take turns upholding one cult after another in that strange process known as the endorsement. To the extent that the Tea Paulers™ hasten the day of the endorsement's demise, I'll be the first to thank them. 

The Michele Bachmann Denouement

Very early today we learned via email that Rep. Michele Bachmann had decided not to run for reelection in Minnesota's Sixth Congressional District. Anyone who said they got a heads up about this news is simply lying.

The reaction in Minnesota was typical and frenzied. The reaction nationally was typical and frenzied. Suddenly all of political life seemed exceptionally stupid. I spent most of the day next to my friend and client Andy Parrish, who, as twice chief of staff for Bachmann, was in high demand by the media. He, we, were both criticized on the Twitter by those without a clue for doing so. Validation by the stupid is both depressing and reassuring.

I can't imagine what it must be like to live in Minnesota and care what others think about you. This sets me apart. I watch what other people think about what other people think about them. I'm clinical about it now.

The Bachmann exodus from next year's race sets up a host of possibilities for republicans. Initial reactions were not reassuring. Those who had thought of running in CD 6 as a secondary or tertiary consideration now had that race advanced substantially in their thinking, if only to decline it.

Mostly, however, it emboldened the worst among my party to think that they, too, could be a Congressman. Even granting that the bar is low, what I saw today challenged my gag reflex.

First, though, why announce now? I have my theories, none of which violate attorney-client confidences. Bachmann bought a modest buy of airtime a few weeks back. Mostly that was seen as a sign she was running again and a warning to lesser talent not to challenge her in a primary. I'm amused by the idea we possessed any republicans at all with the onions to challenge this woman. We don't. To do so might even be considered mean.

Clearly something substantive has happened between that ad buy and today. Yet only Steve Perry of Politics In Minnesota asked me that question directly out of all the media calls I had today. I hope the story he writes isn't paywalled because sometimes you need a reason to get people to subscribe. The usual free PIM usually doesn't do that. But I'm no expert on their business model; maybe once in a while they could make an exception to it? For good business reasons, too, actually.

Bachmann fears legal consequences sometime down the road. View her video again: notice the not subtle segue from political blather to legalese, probably written by her $20,000 per month attorney William McGinley at Patton Boggs. Between the ad buy and this retirement announcement did he receive a "notice" letter from the FBI? That notice letter would have put him and his client on, well,  notice that she was now a target or subject of an ongoing FBI investigation.

This is rank speculation on my part. I have no knowledge or information to support my hypothesis. But, as Joseph Heller once titled a book, "Something Happened." A better book, by the way, than his famous "Catch 22."

Now then, to the grasping attempting the greasy pole.

Like so many Braudels of the French school of history, the Annales, local media counted. Look, look, they can count! How they can count and who! They made lists, yes, lists and this passed for journalism but time was short and local media are the definition of Minnesotans who care what others think about them. Especially within their own, dead, self-referential world.

Ken Martin, the DFL in general, Carrie Lucking, so many others did themselves no favors in their glee to see Bachmann leave. I'm completely undercut by their conduct when I say to my fellow republicans that we should at least get to know each other a bit. Well, given what was tweeted today, where's the attraction in that? I really do want to lead, with the help of the sublime Amy Koch, a contingent of republicans to next year's Minn Post Roast. I'm hoping this is forgotten by then. Yes, yes, politics ain't bean bag but don't whine when my side questions media objectivity or the marital status of Carrie. & to whom. I keep looking for a circuit breaker to this nonsense but I've not yet found it.

On a national note, one would have thought Bachmann had inserted a cigar into the vagina of her intern, taken it out, put it in her mouth and said "Mmm. Tastes good."

No, this man they praise, Bill Clinton, who did precisely that. Media wonders why they're hated?

On to the list of possibles:

1. Tom Emmer: said by some to be a field clearer. Mostly by those not paying attention. Yes, you can trot out the 2010 results but so what? So incompetent a candidate he could not beat Mark Dayton. But hey, you people are dumb enough to vote for Michele, why not me? That, in essence, is his campaign appeal. Don't kid yourselves: Emmer makes Jim Graves competitive. He should stick to saving David Fitzsimmons from the crazies.

2. Phil Krinkie: not even voters in the 6th are dumb enough to vote for him. No, a thousand times.

3. Amy Koch: yes. Friend. Client. Friend. She should run. Believe that it happens & it happens.

4. Tim Sanders: who? No.

5. Michelle Benson: great woman. Already said to have said no because of her young child.

6. Peggy Scott: no. We don't need a mini-me Bachmann candidate, thanks just the same. After tip credit Emmer, probably Jim Graves' favorite opponent.

7. Rhonda Sivarajah: I'm old enough to remember when Sue Jeffers said she couldn't pronounce Rhonda's last name. Rhonda is the best candidate we can field. The same stupid, ineffectual people who maligned Parrish for doing media today probably want a purity candidate. That candidate just retired, having come within 4300 votes of losing. Thanks but we're not going to pay attention to you.

8. Matt Dean: his wife's money isn't particular about the uses to which it is put. Matt's for sale.

9. Pete Hegseth: no. Still looking for someone to be somewhere, he has yet to digest the lessons of his loss in the senate race of 2010. The same people looking for work with him, their collective poor judgement, their sycophancy. That he can't tell a friend from a leech is troubling but I know something of this particular blindspot. That said, no Pete. Stop being a construct. You'll know which race is yours; you won't have to be talked into it.

10. Sen. Mary Kiffmeyer: Close but no cigar. OK not really but no. If I have to explain you don't follow Minnesota politics closely enough.

11. Pat Shortridge: that name made me laugh! He was crazy enough to be MNGOP Chair and thank you for that! Running in the 6th? You don't know Pat.

Where are we now, to quote the 66 year old David Bowie? I think we are in a state of enormous flux with early conventional wisdom the least credible.

Why is that?

Because I believe that the race in CD 6 is a definitive moment for republicans in Minnesota.

Not the same old stale men with their mediocre record of accomplishment only their wives can applaud.

No, republicans should nominate a woman to replace a woman in CD 6. I'm hardly a quota person but there is always a certain inherent logic to some things.

This is one of them.  The race belongs to a woman.

Which one shall we pick?

With A Wimper: M Stebbins Is Sixth Alternate

Last night the undisputed leader of the poisonous Ron Paul invasion of the Minnesota Republican Party, Marianne Stebbins, was elected sixth alternate from SD 33 to the State Central Committee which meets on April 6th to select new party leadership, among other tasks. She may as well have not been elected at all. Alternates are just that and her last place position essentially means that assassins would have to take out all of the delegates and the five preceding alternates before she could cast a vote at that meeting.

This is an amusing descent from her apotheosis at Tampa and the Republican National Convention last August. There she lead a delegation that was overwhelmingly in support of Ron Paul and voted accordingly. It was all for naught, of course, because Ron Paul wasn't going to win the nomination, just like he hadn't won anywhere else. Most Paulers are not in politics to win elections but an argument. I have taken up the helpful nomenclature of Nancy LaRoche (soon to be the next Chair of CD 5) who refers to builders and destroyers when looking at the infusion of people who came into local republican politics under the Ron Paul liberty banner. This keeps me, as I had done previously, from sweeping too broadly about them. Builders welcome. Destroyers must be destroyed. Destroyers delenda est.

I'm not sure that this won't keep the local media and the laughable Prof. Larry R. Jacobs of the shopworn Humphrey School from putting Stebbins on their stale, tired programs or stale, tired panels. At some point, however, even these democrats with a byline will have to recognize that the future of the MN GOP does not, and never did, belong to this group of people. I don't fault them, actually, for including Stebbins but to position her in the manner they did was simply to hurt the overall image of the republican party. I'm not interested in appearing on these shows or panels (we're trying to attract not repel people) but I can give interested producers a dozen names of smart, savvy, hard working activists who know far more than Annette! Meeks or Andy Brehm or just about anyone else you see on those programs, Ben Golnik specifically excluded.

We'll see if that happens. In the meantime, republicans who want to fight the awful overreach of a one party state should be gladdened by last night's denouement. Keith Downey seems very well positioned to become our party's next Chair, something I now welcome and about which more another time. I think he can reach out to all sorts of republicans, including the builders. Our choices for deputy chair are deeply disappointing and the current field is the best argument for abolishing the position altogether and saving money. The elimination of this position would only strengthen the role of executive director, something long overdue. In fact, without a deputy chair, we could pay someone who is very good (do we ever search for national talent or is Minnesota still too xenophobic?). We shouldn't duplicate the senate and house caucus example which simply hires leaderships' friends regardless of how good they are or how much they had a hand in losing the majority in each chamber. For a party that insists on measuring outcome, not intent, I'm always surprised by the junior varsity teams we deploy based purely on cronyism. To be sure, there are other reasons for our shocking lack of messaging which the fishbowls of caucuses seem worried about not at all.

I've thought for some time Minnesota is in a post-party environment and that the DFL realized this long before republicans. The new chair will necessarily have to take this into account. The tasks are daunting but not insurmountable. Fortunately our Portlandia political opponents are doing their best to show normal Minnesotans just how out of touch and embarrassingly far left they really are at heart. Their relationship to unions is a classic example of the Stockholm Syndrome. Their overreach is necessary but not sufficient. In addition, the republican party's endorsement means virtually nothing (as opposed to being an outright kiss of death) given the Kurt Bills fiasco. The primary will be moved to June and republicans will select quality candidates who can win; not hot house flowers that wilt and die in the heat of political battle.

The withering of the Ron Paul destroyers is a much needed and welcome sign that the worst of this hostile take-over is behind us. Yes, small skirmishes likely remain but the overall direction of the party back toward something voters would like to trust with a majority again has commenced. Republicans need to keep that momentum going by admitting our failures in the last cycle while providing principled opposition to one party rule during the current one. As always, the future is unwritten.

Left Implosion: Has Twitter Made Democracy Impossible?

When I saw this full page ad in The New Republic when it came in the mail today, I knew the comprehensive defeat of liberal ideas was at hand. One can nit pick about the time frame but when liberals are asking themselves if something as freedom enhancing as Twitter can be the demise of democracy, their end has already arrived. They simply don't know it.

Brittle ideology is brittle but isn't it rather early to throw in the towel on democracy because of a social media network that limits any single contribution to 140 characters or less? Is the Obama post-mortem this easily scheduled and by asking a deadly, revealing question? Even if Obama squeaks out a win, the left seems spent, adrift and dissatisfied with itself. The latter is a new development.

I already wrote that Twitter effectively destroyed the Fourth Estate, regardless of how long that takes to play out. Click here to read possibly my best received blog post to date.  Recently, a reporter from a local news outlet in the Twin Cities said on Twitter that she had "never been prouder to be a member of the Fourth Estate." It was left to me to reply: "We're all members now; hate to be the one to break it to you."

Naturally, then, it is democracy that is destroyed next by Twitter after it obliterated media as we used to know it. I should have seen this coming.

Except one can only empathize so long with opposing political views in the teeth of complete chaos and incompetence by the president. By now the left and their clones in media and academe have disgraced themselves into a corner with their transparent, shameless shilling for him. Trapped, they attack the medium of their own self-exposure. They're not stupid; they're just clueless. Don't ask me what the difference is.

Yet here, however, regarding democracy they are dangerous because they are so wrong about the subject matter. How do I know when the panel hasn't happened yet? Because it takes no great imagination to suggest that the shortness of Twitter will be the focus. The shortness of Twitter is only half the story: the other half is its ability to shape to the point of killing media narratives.

Ergo liberals necessarily must equate Twitter with the end of democracy because it fatally undermines the idea of a Fourth Estate. How can democracy flourish in the face of wrong opinions and ideas? Media exist to promote one and only one: liberalism. Feel free to call it progressivism. In fact, it's rather big of the left and their media allies to allow for multi-party freely contested elections.

Conservatives will smirk at this panel and its overheated suggestion that Twitter imperils--rather than advances--democracy. They should not. One abiding thing we know about liberals is how very deeply they take themselves. It's a burden that comes with always being right.

I wouldn't mind getting to NYC and attending this panel presentation. I already dress mostly in black so that's half the battle with this crowd. I could practice walking around without an expression of astonishment at what I was hearing. Total focus on the person speaking to me to reaffirm their self-importance: that's the ticket for schmoozing this scene.

I shouldn't joke, really, because the question, even to be posed, represents a tombstone over the grave of liberal ideology. This is as it should be: it spent these last four years on its deathbed.

Let the dead bury the dead.

Before The Deluge

Mitt Romney will be our next President. The only genuine, interesting question remaining between now and the election is the margin of victory. Romney is up 7 points in Gallup's daily tracking over President Obama. The second debate confirmed to an almost equally-as-large as the first debate television audience that we are overdue adults in our government.

Picture President Obama today in New Hampshire, of all places, hawking the binder line from that second debate to his unresponsive, deflated base. The smarter ones know it's over. No less a stalwart liberal on FOX News than Bob Beckel said so today, assuming all the numbers in the most recent Gallup poll were, in fact, accurate. And he had no reason to doubt them.

Some in the media knew it was over last month. I know I did when I saw the SEPTEMBER 13th article in The National Journal by Reid Wilson. The article's title?

"What if there is an election wave?"

Yeah, what if? My own instinct at that time was confirmed by this article and Wilson was clever in laying down a marker indicating he'd thought of it long before the wave's arrival. Read his article by clicking here.

I supported Mitt Romney from the moment he got into the primaries. I've endured a fair amount of nonsense from my fellow republicans in doing so and not just the usual back and forth of preferring different candidates. I heard a great many stupid things about Romney from people who now can't wait to vote for him. That's good, I suppose. Most have said to me at one point or another lately that they had radically under-judged the man. I actually do understand how that is possible. I always felt Romney a far stronger general election candidate than primary one. But the primaries helped him as a candidate so it all worked out in an excellent way.

I've already said on Twitter to liberal Minnesota activists that if Obama is kept under 5% I think republicans keep both majorities in the legislature. I could be fantastically wrong on that score, however, and, unlike the presidential race, we'll actually have to wait until Election Day to find out.

A Romney restoration of America is coming soon. The American people have requested it.

Locally, the hapless Republican Party of Minnesota must be dealt with by activists. Mostly it needs to be trimmed, made slightly more irrelevant than it currently is and put on the shelf. Those who enabled the Ron Paul interlopers will be held to account. The builders must destroy the destroyers.

Momentum is clearly on the side of those who realize we are already in a post-party political structure and need to adjust accordingly. In fact, republicans are shockingly behind. To this end I have a few ideas and projects that I'll be promoting:

• Minnesota Media Monitor: They Do It To Themselves™

This is both a short and long term project about which more later. Media have disgraced themselves beyond description this election and the fallout from that has only just begun. This inflection point, to use a hideous phrase, is a good opportunity to explore local media in myriad ways. News in Minnesota will never be the same.

• The Balance Project™

Minnesota republicans and conservatives will step up after the election and assist in massive programming changes at both TPT and MPR. Tax payer funded news outlets can no longer have the bias and luxury of reporting from the left of life's center line. Simply by showing up and demanding coverage of the center right we win: how can it be otherwise? But we have never done it and ceded the field to liberalism for a very long time. Breitbart always said politics was downstream from culture. Shall we help ourselves to their inner sanctum?

Balance also needs to be brought to higher education, the Humphrey School in particular. Poor academic quality wholly to one side, the lazy left/liberal tilt of its curriculum must come to an end.

Public institutions are the easiest for conservatives to approach and change. One came to me in an email today: Friends of the Hennepin County Library. Let's make sure a "range" of authors are invited to speak under its auspices. When you start thinking balance, an endless number of organizations, structures and activities can be reclaimed by the right. All things in their time.

For now though, I'll enjoy the remaining days of the campaign, watch the third and final presidential debate and look forward again to believing in America. Fortunately for liberals, they can go back to being ashamed of it.

The Clint Eastwood Political Rorschach Test

Clint Eastwood's brilliant interview of an absent President Obama during the Republican Convention's final night is a singular example of an earthquake happening while the political classes and media pretend not to notice.

Of course, they did notice but only to bemoan the performance they completely failed to comprehend. Media, dishonest & low as ever, dilated on the unscripted nature of the performance. Really, it doesn't take much thought to realize had Eastwood been scripted the effectiveness of his address would have been muted to the point of failure. It worked in large measure because every moment while we watched him we knew Clint was making it up as he went. Authenticity is often demanded by the media yet when it is encountered in real time--at a Republican National Convention no less--the whining begins.

Make no mistake: the press understood instantly that Eastwood had broken through their filter with a withering criticism of a failed president the media has protected at all costs, including the scraps of whatever integrity they possessed.

More distressingly to me, however, were those on my side who didn't get it. The Empty Chair has become a national meme. Twitter is filled with pictures of various empty chairs in an enormous range of settings and locales. The symbolism of an empty chair is perfect for the vapid, badly educated Obama and his disastrous administration. Photos of empty chairs will remain a hilarious leitmotif of this election down through November 6th.

Here's a tip to my fellow republicans: if media collectively start screaming bloody murder about something we've done or are doing, carry on. That's the surest sign that we are effective in the moment.

And it was just a moment. Some say it knocked Romney off message but there's approximately zero evidence for that. To the contrary, his and Ryan's appearances since the convention concluded have been packed. August represents the third consecutive month Romney has raised 100 million dollars. The selection of Ryan fundamentally changed, to use an Obama phrase, the presidential race. At a minimum we've argued Medicare to a draw, if not slight edge. The enthusiasm gap terrifies the democrats, as well it should. Media know it and consequently will never write about it.

I've gotten a sense that a lot of people are changing their minds since last Thursday night.  Eastwood gave something unlike anything anyone had ever seen before at a national political convention. But by today there's not much excuse for seeing this performance piece as anything but brilliant. Do yourself a favor and watch it again. Click here.

That sensible democrat Mickey Kaus noticed the shift in how to understand Eastwood. He wrote the day after:

Old CW: Eastwood a  disaster.
New CW: Eastwood brilliant, but Romney incompetent because his advisers fell for previous CW that Eastwood a disaster.

Too many republicans, and not just Romney advisors, fell for that media generated conventional wisdom. Do you think Andrew Breitbart would have? Well do you, punk?

Equally astute was Teri Christoph, co-founder of Smart Girl Politics, who tweeted:

"The fact that Obama and his campaign team are now saying nice things about Clint Eastwood tells me Clint is very popular with independents."

That's pretty much the game, isn't it? Let's hope republicans can be as smart as Team Obama, enjoy the laugh Eastwood provided, smile at the new verb "Eastwooding" and suppress laughter at the discomfort it brought the media. Phew, how much more can one 82 year old man do in a 12 minute speech?

Paulers Lose Rules Vote, Whine About Tyranny

Friday the Republican Party in Tampa, through its rules committee, voted to tie the selection of convention delegates to the results of each state’s Republican primary. How extraordinary is this? Not very to any balanced observer but to the Ron Paul zombie delegates and their toadies it was the definition of "an Establishment power grab." Please.

As the Washington Post put it: "Romney allies said primary voters expect national convention delegates to be loyal to the primary winner." Again, just how out of control is this expectation and now rule? Why have primaries at all if the results will not carry through to the convention delegates?

Unfortunately, the usual Ron Paul drones decried the move, effectively bemoaning that a political party acted in its own perceived interest to keep it for those who believe in its principles. The bastards! Ron Paulers, by their own admission, are not republicans. Am I the only one listening to them? Perhaps. At this May's endorsing convention I was called by The Weekly Standard the convention's "persona non grata." I was so pleased by that I could hardly stand myself (thereby joining many, no doubt).

Marianne Stebbins, the accomplished organizer behind the strength of Ron Paul in Minnesota, said last week in an interview that liberals had many good ideas. What would those be, pray tell? Partial birth abortion? Confiscatory tax rates? Oh, sorry: legalizing pot. Got it. This is a small, intellectually stagnant world. You're welcome to it. No Jews allowed.

Sen. Julianne Ortman rightly observed on Twitter that the rule change was a good thing. No, she was promptly scolded (what is it with scolding in the MN GOP?) by Chair Pat Shortridge. It's a bad thing. That was it. Ex Cathedra like. Why preventing the damage the Paul people have done to the state party is something he can't grasp is only a mystery until one realizes he was put in place with the help of Pat Anderson and just enough "liberty" types at last year's State Central Committee meeting. Here, however, the national party had to step in because of the manifest incompetence and shameful collusion of the state party (Minnesota isn't alone, however). I suppose it's natural that children whine when adult supervision appears.

Both Anderson and Shortridge asked me to stop tweeting about Ron Paul and his insane supporters for the two weeks before that meeting in order to woo enough of them to put Shortridge over the top. I did because I wanted Shortridge to be chair. Nothing has changed in that regard despite the two of us slapping each other around a bit on Twitter last night. I personally loathe Twitter fights so I feel I've let myself down. And Shortridge doesn't have a proper forum to explain why he thinks this is bad for the future of the Republican Party because he's busy in Tampa. I would invite him to write something for this blog about his perspective and I will publish it unedited. I ask only one thing: has he forgotten all the non-Ron Paul people in the party? Anything for us from leadership?

Stebbins tweeted a link to the laughably left-wing Buzz Feed (which probably has the most disliked "reporters" on Twitter) that carried a story which was negative against the change generally and against Ben Ginsberg in particular. Go figure.

Fired RNC Committeewoman Pat Anderson tweeted that the vote was "fairly close." The vote was 63 to 38. Words must have different meanings when you're high on liberty and in Tampa.

She also said that "this was a states' rights issue." Stop and appreciate this comment.

What does Anderson think is a states' rights issue? No matter her response, the self-regulation of any political party of any political creed is not a matter of states' rights by definition. Political parties, this just in, are not sovereign states. Anderson plans, I'm told, to vote for Ron Paul. Q.E.D.

Pat, a bogus 10th Amendment bromide to the tribe is best directed to the Tea Party. Your melting base in the MN GOP are the Ron Paulers. You do know, don't you, what they say about Answered Prayers?

Equally pandering but considerably more constipated was Jeff Johnson. Jeff. Johnson. Tweeted he:

"Convention Rules Cmte supports allowing RNC to change Party Rules w/o convention vote. Terrible change."

He never elaborated but hopefully he's taken his own smug advice condescendingly given out to the state convention in May and gotten over it. Get over it, Jeff. How does it feel?

I understand MN GOP Deputy-Chair Kelly Fenton flew to Tampa on Saturday. She's used to figuring out which way the wind blows so I'm not worried about hurricanes. 

Herewith how she, Kurt Bills, Doc Severson & Pete Hegseth appeared on your television Thursday:


John Gilmore & Barbara Malzacher. Yes, this is what its come to. We're as alarmed as anyone.


I was contacted late Wednesday evening and told Kurt Bills would endorse Romney the next day. Delegates and Alternates were being sent an email that night and media the next day would be alerted with a "kick ass" statement. A written statement was all that was being planned. I could hardly believe my ears.

I hung up and called Mike Osskopp, campaign manager for Kurt Bills. I stressed that this was a perfect earned media opportunity that should not be missed. Hold a press conference, please. I could feel the heat of the light bulb going off over his head through the phone. He thanked me and said he needed to talk to David Fitzsimmons and Dave Strom. Right. Before the call ended, I encouraged him to edit the press conference video, embed it in an email and send it Friday morning to every republican in the state asking for ten dollars.

When Hegseth arrived for the press conference he noticed there was no signage. He contacted Malzacher for help who in turned contacted Kelly Fenton. She was at the state fair. No one had contacted the party to alert them of this endorsement and press conference. She dropped everything and got there timely. Signage appeared as well.

So while Pat Shortridge can sneer to me on Twitter that he'll put his time in the trenches up against mine any day, I was trying to help the senate campaign as best I could, as was Barbara Malzacher. We're not exactly fans of Kurt Bills but his endorsement of Romney was an overdue and welcome development. One could say we got over it and jumped in--unpaid and scrambling--to help pull off an unremarkable press conference. The bar is so very low.

Obviously I can appreciate Shortridge's view that people who blog and tweet don't really do much for the party, although messaging is always important. Speaking of which, it would have been nice to have had some push back when our imbecile of a Vice President, Joe Biden, came to town. But no, nothing. When Romney came, the vapid mayor of Minneapolis pushed back and the usual tattered group of people happy to be dependent on government were trotted out for a fake protest near one Romney fund raising event. See how this works?

The fund raising was enormously successful from what I've heard; close to four millions dollars. Or eight Alida Rockefeller checks. Still, such is the state of republicans in Minnesota that Jack Meeks was unable to successfully beg for a mere $25,000 to stay behind. I can't blame the Romney people; why waste money?

Today the whining by the fake republicans reached fever pitch. In a press release that is the, shall we say, gold standard of sore losing, Stebbins complained that "Liberty Republicans" were being frozen out. Excellent. Ron Paul and his supporters are a kook fringe element that have no place in mainstream, conservative republican affairs. Instead of showing leadership in opposing them in Minnesota, Pat Anderson, Jeff Johnson, Pat Shortridge and Kelly Fenton, each in varying degrees and kind, accommodated them with disastrous results. They should be the last to complain about matters being set right, having made a hash of things themselves. Your narrow self-interest is not synonymous with the party's.


Nauseatingly, Stebbins claims the high road of principle when she's never addressed Paul's long, well-documented history of anti-semitism, belief that 9-11 was an inside job and other odious ideas. Instead, she brays that “[e]ven non-Ron Paul delegates and MNGOP party officials recognize the significance of the RNC actions goes beyond its direct effect on Liberty Republicans."

Even? That's telling. Don't be fooled, Marianne, that the Gang of Four with you in Tampa represents Minnesota republicans. Does 51.5% ring a bell with you?

Even Craig Westover was dragooned into Stebbins' press release [or maybe even wrote it; something about the tendentious style was familiar], obediently saying that Romney might just be as bad as Obama. Now there's a mainstream republican sentiment! At the end of the day, the Ron Paul people, as befits any cult, are simply tiresome.

Apparently Paulers are getting the vapors on that thing known as Face Book and predict some sort of dramatic floor fight over these changes. Rest assured the rest of the convention delegates loathe you even more than the substantial majority on the rules committee. The changes will be approved in a flash. Minnesota republicans thank Ben Ginsberg and the other adults at the RNC for solving a problem our local leaders not only refused to confront but collaborated with for their own gain. I hear housing prices in Tampa are cheap. Perhaps the Minnesota delegation should think of buying. There's nothing here for them should they return.