Patrick Ruffini notes the ongoing efforts by Ron Paul supporters to elect delegates to Republican county conventions, who in turn elect state convention delegates, who often elect the delegates to the GOP’s national convention in the Twin Cities. Ruffini links to stories from Alaska, Florida, Missouri and Minnesota. For example, in Kansas City, the caucus elected more than 170 Paul delegates out of an estimated 187 available; Paulians ultimately snagged about a third of the 2,137 state Republican delegates. Paulians are also making inroads in Washington state and Paul’s home state of Texas.
Ruffini suggests:
[T]he biggest impact delegates can have is through floor demonstrations. In some ways, their reactions to the speeches set the tone for the convention, amplifying messages from the stage. Remember how Pat Buchanan enraptured the floor at the 1992 convention but lost the country? Or how the Texas delegates turned their backs on gay Republican Congressman Jim Kolbe in 2000? Now, imagine, Paul loyalists get 20-30% of the seats on the floor in St. Paul, controlling delegations like Missouri, with a significant presence in Minnesota, with closest promixity to the stage. Can the speakers safely voice a pro-victory message in Iraq without a significant amount of boos and catcalls? How will this look on television? And don’t forget, national conventions are also heaven for reporters trolling for off-message quotes from delegates.
Beyond that Ruffini overlooks the impact the delegates can have on the party’s platform for the campaign and its rules for the next four years (including the next presidential campaign). Indeed, delegates bound to vote on the first ballot for McCain (and many are only informally bound “soft” delegates) are not so bound regarding a vice-president. Ruffini does note the longer-term effect Paulians can have on state Republican parties:
Even the social conservatives who traditionally filled this role have punted, drifting into lifestyle-based forms of self-identification. What is remarkable is that this is being pulled off by an historically smaller and smaller base of people using the Internet. All because the regular Republican organization across the country is demoralized, demobilized, and eviscerated.
Meanwhile, the GOP’s presumptive nominee, John McCain, is supposedly running a decentralized general election organization. Campaign manager Rick Davis has been picking regional campaign managers who know their regions. But if Minnesota is any indication, McCain’s people seem quite blase about the phenomenon. In September, they may wish they had been paying more attention. The Democrats may not be the only party that has to worry about a fractious convention.
Comment by happyfeet on 4/19 @ 6:54 pm #
Tom Delay really is a lot underappreciated I think. He helped Republicans a lot not be such pansies.
Comment by happyfeet on 4/19 @ 6:56 pm #
John Boehner is a lot a tepid vagina is the problem.
Comment by The Lost Dog on 4/19 @ 7:51 pm #
Karl =
Thanks for yout posts. They are always interesting.
BUT – Today I had an epiphany (it might even have been God himself talking to me).
And this is what has been going through my mind all day, just like one of these crappy songs that you can’t get out of your head:
“Fuck it, Tom. Just fuck it”.
I’m not listening (yet), but I do find this thought to be somewhat depressing. Ignorance is on a rampage lately, and there is no arguing with ignorance.
Otherwise, it wouldn’t be ignorance.
And by the way, don’t let me catch anyone on this blog asking a question of Obama that he doesn’t approve of! You slimeballs! How dare you? O’s political philosophy has nothing to do with electing a true “healer” who is, by the grace of God, going to raise taxes because it is “only fair”.
Revenue has nothing to do with it, you steenkeeng white racists!
“Fuck it, Tom. Just fuck it”.
Comment by thor on 4/19 @ 8:00 pm #
The jungle drums getting louder and louder?
Comment by The Lost Dog on 4/19 @ 8:21 pm #
Ummm…
Jeff –
Just wondering where my comment went. If there is a problem, you have my e-mail.
Just curious, because it was there a few minutes ago, and it was actually approaching humorous (I thought).
Was this a “glitch”, or am/was I somehow over the line?
If I am/was, please let me know why.
Tanx
Comment by The Lost Dog on 4/19 @ 8:30 pm #
Wel, well, well. That’s three holes in the ground, and one embarrassed Dog.
I don’t really have a clue as to what just happened, but I think it was sort of like when you could still smoke in restaurants. The only sure way to get your food was to light a cigarette.
Sorry, ev’ybody. That was just plain weird.
Four tries to find my comment, but it doesn’t show up again until after I have made a complete and total fool of myself.
Oh well. My first 58 years were AWESOME! What’s a couple of years of eating dirt, compared to that?
OH NO! I just gave it away!
No problem. I think my license and birth certificate are wrong, anyway.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 4/19 @ 8:35 pm #
- Heres some more grist for the mill. CNN is pushing the meme that all the pissed off blowback coming from the fly-over bitter bunch is a form of “uppity black”.
- In other words, not only is it rank temerity to ask the bamamessiah pointed questions, what such questions represent, if they’re coming from whitey, then its a not so silent form of racism to the script of uncle Tom redux.
- It won’t work, anymore than any other evasion, but its temporary relief and red meat for the protected group.
- In the end the Marxocrats ship always flounders on the shoals of voter freedom. Until they figure out a way to outlaw that its always a roadkill looking for a place to happen.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 4/19 @ 8:44 pm #
- Back on topic. Paul simply does not have a ;arge enough base to carry anything like the National vote levels he would need to be a serious contender, leaving aside his craziness for the moment.
- So then, can the moles in the skunk works cause a little chaos, yes. Will it matter in the end, no. Floor fights and all the other rigamarole that you’ll see at any lively convention makes great drama for political groupies, and TV sound bytes, but they peter out almost as fast as they start because everyone has some “problem” that forces even the most obstreperous nutcase back to earth. After so undetermined length of time the delegates will fold like lawn chairs, plank or no plank, org or no org. About all that will happen of any consequence behine the scenes will be a few more markers will be exchanged, a few more promises made. Business as usual, particularly with a candidate like McCain.
Comment by Terrye on 4/19 @ 9:24 pm #
How can Paul get the Missouri delegation? He did buckus there. I mean, Huckabee I could see getting enough support to cause some trouble…but Paul? The guy is a loon. I feel like I am missing something here.
I would never vote for Ron Paul. Never ever ever. And neither would 96% of the country.
I hear people say the base is demoralized, but I think a lot of those people are talking about themselves, they assume they are the base. But right now, I see more craziness on the Dem side. The conservatives are pissy, but they almost always are. At least one group or another is. That is the problem. There are too many people to please. Can’t be done.
Comment by serr8d on 4/19 @ 9:47 pm #
The Paulbots have been strangely quiet lately. But I still see Paul’s campaign signs, and rarely any others, in yards and nailed to trees.
A big Paul play at the convention? Some spoilage planned, perhaps? I don’t think that’s Ron Paul’s game; he doesn’t strike me as that much bloodthirsty. And surely he can’t be sniffing for a VP offer.
Maybe he’ll just be off to attend his daughter’s wedding or something.
Comment by Karl on 4/19 @ 10:07 pm #
The Paulians’ stated goal is to get Paul a speaking gig at the convention. And you can find some of the loonier ones with grander ambitions like stealing the nomination. The real damage occurs somewhere in between. As for how Paulians are picking up delegates at the county level? They are showing up, as Woody Allen advises. It is a byproduct of having a nominee who lacks support among the GOP activist base. If Maverick’s people shine it on, the Paulians may end up in a position to hand the MSM the “GOP in disarray” story they love so much.
Comment by Karl on 4/19 @ 10:08 pm #
Lost Dog,
It would be fair to say that the blog’s comment filter is… idiosyncratic. I have been a victim myself, and it’s annoying, so no one should hold your reaction against you.
Comment by happyfeet on 4/19 @ 10:12 pm #
Oh yeah but when I do it all of a sudden there’s prescription drug abuse involved. I see how y’all are.
Comment by Saul Goode on 4/19 @ 10:13 pm #
D’ya suppose the reason that Jack Cafferty is always so cranky over there at CNN is cuz his weiner rope is too tight?
Comment by Topsecretk9 on 4/20 @ 12:21 am #
The Paulbots have been strangely quiet lately. But I still see Paul’s campaign signs, and rarely any others, in yards and nailed to trees
the only ones I see are handmade.
there is this creepy one stuck into a school yard chain link fence ” v o t e RON PAUL” that all the kids make fun of. according to my son, they think the paulbots are synonymous to south park version of truthers.
so he doesn’t have the 7th grade vote rapped up!
Comment by The Lost Dog on 4/20 @ 2:46 am #
“Oh yeah but when I do it all of a sudden there’s prescription drug abuse involved. I see how y’all are.”
hf –
OMG! I hadn’t even considered that it might have something to do with my prescriptions!
What has happened to the days when even NON-prescription drugs could get your helmet polished?
If only I could remember the poem about “what used to be my sex appeal is now my water spout”.
I thought it was very funny when I was 20 years old. Now it just really pisses me off…
Comment by datadave on 4/20 @ 5:39 am #
maddad or lost dog…sometimes the wordpress thing gets a little slow and I think Jeff’s got sort of a hands off policy of late letting dan and karl run things for free or sort of?
appreciate youz and thorz goodz. lol-la
karlz, thanks for the diversion. I wondered where the Republicans have gone for awhile. Just letting the demo’s lose again isn’t good enough policy me thinkz. Bob Herbert nails it as “Road Map to Defeat” but perhaps the title should be “brother from another planet”. from one brother to another: “Instead, Mr. Obama is allowing the Clintons and the news media to craft a damaging persona of him as some kind of weak-kneed brother from another planet, out of touch with mainstream America, and perhaps a loser.”
Damn, I don’t care what you say about Herbert, I like that guy.
Thor, get you ass over there to Chicago headqtrs and get that Brother off of that Harvard Law kind of thing and down to Earth.
or else the cackling gnome is winning this in a landslide and Phil Gramm will run the country into the ground.
Comment by datadave on 4/20 @ 5:44 am #
“The Paulians’ stated goal is to get Paul a speaking gig at the convention.”
Streaking pig! I really thought that’s what you said at first glance.
Comment by datadave on 4/20 @ 6:44 am #
From the Minnesota Star/Tribune:
Ron Paul Compared to John Brown
They said John Brown was a little crazy too, but was ahead of his time. – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVC4JUg9A9A
posted by sbuffalo on Apr 12, 08 at 9:28 pm |
Comment by syn on 4/20 @ 7:43 am #
After the Truthers destroy both the Democrats and the City of Denver during the Democrat 2008 Convention, I doubt any of the Paulbots will be out of the Colorado jails by the time the Republican Convention rolls around.
Comment by McGehee on 4/20 @ 8:08 am #
I think there are occasions where the first glance gets it right.
Comment by B Moe on 4/20 @ 11:13 am #
dave, you understand that we typically try to link to something that is remotely related to our post?
Pingback by GOP 2008: rEVOLution in Reno [Karl] on 4/28 @ 5:30 am #
[...] have been similar scenes playing out in Alaska, Florida, Missouri and Minnesota, Texas and Washington. The Politico notes [...]
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