Dissing the field
Mar 1st, 2010 by David Anderson
No wonder Republicans in Delaware have problems. Their own party leadership disrespects its candidates in the leading paper. I am not surprised that the party leadership is still trying to recruit a candidate for the Congressional race. I am not surprised that the party leadership wanted someone with more name recognition in the race. So did I. That is reasonable to say.
What is not reasonable is not to tout the strengths of the people who have actually stepped up. They are infusing the party with new blood from the bottom up. That is exactly what the party needs. Our recruitment is lackluster and quite frankly has had little success in the past. If we recruit a candidate by late April, will they have any more of a chance than the 4 people already in the race? The time is quickly passing for that window of opportunity. I believe that it is time to evaluate the strengths of the people in the field and get behind one of them. If someone wants to enter, do so sooner rather than later.
We need to understand that the dynamic has changed. The people are open to new faces. President Obama proved that in a campaign for the highest office. Scott Brown proved that just recently. Lt. Governor Carney has a lot of strengths. He is well known and liked. He has few enemies within his own party. His fundraising is solid. He also has some liabilities that can be exploited by an outsider. He is the ultimate insider complete with inside deals to finance a business. He presided over large increases in government expenditures while heading the finance department for Governor Carper. He was the number 2 in a second rate administration. He has few ideas at a time which demands leadership and vision.
Our people each have strengths. It is up to our party to promote them not feed into a narrative of Carney and the 4 drawfs. Our people stand tall in many ways. They are successful in their own right. We have three entreprenuers. Kevin Wade has been a problem solver and a businessman. He has just tapped a top consulting group. Fred Cullis has been a pioneer in his industry, and has developed a solid and professional team. Glen Urquhart is a real estate pioneer and served in the Reagan administration. he has the contacts and money to get top flight advise. Each is attracting attention and begining to gain traction. We don’t need the party leadership telling the media that they should be ignored.
My advise is focus on the state house. Raise a million dollars to get our house back. If we haven’t been able to recruit someone by now, it is a misplaced effort to continue to fitter away resources. We will just be recruiting for a primary when we have house seats that need candidates. We need to fill the slate and have 35 plus house races. If we have a strong bottom up organization, we will be able to add a couple of points to the top races. Build the party and the offices will come.
“Build the party and the offices will come”. Truer words were never spoken. Every two years the revelation that an election is coming up hits the Cannery and they want to build the Party. After another set of miserable election results, party building goes on the back burner. You can’t win elections with drafted players. They need to come out of your “farm club” and for the Delaware GOP there just ain’t one. Unfortunately, this precludes the raise a million dollars and win back the House concept. Organized Labor has long figured it out. Representing less than twelve per cent of the Delaware work-force, they control most of Delaware’s legislative bodies. They are obviously a cohesive organization. They groom their members to start with involvement in lesser positions such as school boards. When they have a viable candidate they support them with both finances and manpower. Business has walked away from the Delaware GOP. There are no major companies willing to subsidize one of their employees to be a legislator. The State Chamber is Democrat leaning and consistently carried Aunt Bea’s water for her. If you want to win elections, the most important candidate is for the chairmanship of the Party.
David, notice really big time business people, top capitalists, REAL heavy duty free marketeers, brainy citizens like Alan Levin and others back away? It’s because they perceive the current base of the Party is out of step out of touch, way to low information. It’s not a fertile environment for complex thinkers. The richest man in the world, America’s number one Capitalist, Warren Buffet, supports health insurance reform – wants major government intervention to revamp this terrible drag on American Industry. Buffet calls the current health insurance system a “tape worm” that will eat our economy.
But our current GOP TEA Party would not consider to the wisdom of a Warren Buffet. They would denounce that thinking enemy of America. So why should any other rational gifted intelligent business brain step up in the Republican Party in Delaware? To dodge rotten tomatoes if he says he agrees with Warren Buffet on taxes and healthcare. To be denounced as a socialist? You built this Tea Party House, now you can live in it. Without those of us who used to be very loyal to the Party.
Visit Mr. Wade’s website. Click “Kevin’s Stand”. Here’s where Kevin stands:
“Where families work and strive to build a better world for their children. Where Americans know the government is the servant of the people’s freedoms and that the American people are not servants of the government.”
That is what people are dissing. I love the Flag. Elect me. Bullshit slogans with no connection to the problems at hand. We are talking about very complex problems. The GOP is more into something else.
I debated with Carney and Markell and the issues are there for a Republican to win. I would guess Charlie Copeland and I have pretty high recognition numbers from 2008 but others do not. At this late stage, name ID would be a game breaker for the republican candidate as the record of self financing candidates is pretty bleak.
As for the ‘base’ issues, yes there are many conflicts within the Republican party and yes there are solutions. They are simply not the big government solutions proposed by the Democrats.
David, great post.
Mike Protack
think123 is the ultimate sycophant sheep. “Lead me, oh dear brilliant leader Obama/Biden/Buffett/insert any run-of-the-mill socialist Democrat.”
Buffett is no oracle. By the rest of the think’s socialist ramblings here one would think Buffett would be condemned by think123 as just another greedy billionaire looking out for his own interests on taxpayers backs.
Think123 would be right to do so. But think123 can’t even be consistent on that. Why? Because Buffett supports the government orgy of #1 Dear Leader Barry Obama.
Buffett also got bailed out by it. He must have needed the money.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2009/04/05/65496/buffett-champion-of-bailout-is.html
“SACRAMENTO — Billionaire investor Warren Buffett has been lauded for his plainspoken denunciation of the greed and foolishness behind the economic crisis. He’s pushed the massive federal bailout of imploding banks as the essential response to an “economic Pearl Harbor.”
When Buffett speaks, people in high places listen. He’s so highly regarded that in a fall debate, both presidential candidates said they’d consider him for Treasury secretary.
A Sacramento Bee examination of regulatory records has found that his extensive holdings in financial firms have made Buffett, the world’s second-wealthiest person behind Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates, one of the top beneficiaries of the banking bailout.
Just 28 companies received more than 90 percent of the funds so far disbursed to financial firms by the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Buffett’s company, Berkshire Hathaway, hasn’t received any of that federal aid, but Berkshire, based in Omaha, Neb., owns stock valued at more than $13 billion in the top recipients of TARP funds, including Goldman Sachs Group, US Bancorp, American Express and Bank of America, which analysts all thought were in deep trouble before TARP was approved in October.
That total, The Bee found, ranks Berkshire fifth among all investors in TARP-assisted companies. Berkshire’s TARP holdings constitute 30 percent of its publicly disclosed stock portfolio, and that proportion reflects at least twice as much dependence on bailed-out banks as any other large investor.”
So mr. think123 take your Buffett/Obama worship and your constant harping for government interventions to save the world and cram them sideways—with walnuts.
Name recognition, shame recognition. Ignoring ridiculous accusations by progressives like think123 and focusing on whats important here…this is EXACTLY why the voter registrations only include about HALF of the people who reside in Delaware. It’s also why looking at THOSE records have gotten the GOP in the trouble they are in. They’ve failed to see the big picture. Sure 47% of REGISTERED voters are Democrats with Republicans numbering 30%. Let’s also remember that maybe 4-5% of those “Democrat voters” are from downstate and are FAR more fiscally conservative and more likely to be “TEA Party” voters than think123 Obama worshippers. Let’s also remember that groups like ACORN and SEIU have been preying on the inner city voter base as well. They have been determined to get these folks to vote Democrat. With the continual slide in the economy, the fall of ACORN and the fact that even mighty SEIU and VP Joe Biden couldn’t stop the auto plant shutdowns (or replace them with similar jobs), the Democrat party is going to lose votes and possibly party registration numbers. The inner city folks aren’t going to just pull levers for Democrats anymore. They’re engaged. Union households (or former union households as many of the auto workers I’ve spoken to are finally seeing what their unions have become) are less likely to vote Democrat as are the middle class. The problem is that the GOP isn’t offering anything to contrast the Democrats. They’ve trotted out “the most liberal Congressman” to run for the U.S. Senate and they’re still looking (despite the plethora of excellent candidates vying currently for the position) for someone with name recognition.
Anyone here know who Doug Hoffman is? Most of you do by now. Did you know who he was round about July of last year? The answer from anyone who isn’t a political hound (or who isn’t a trivia buff on the 1980 Winter Olympic Organizing Committee) is: Doug who? So why do we know him now? Because he had a message that resonated with the people. It’s the MESSAGE that matters more than the name. I look at Rose, Kevin, Glen and Fred and personally, to be honest I’m having a real hard time choosing a side. Why? Because they all GET IT. It’s clear from the article that the GOP here in Delaware simply DOESN’T get it.
The Delaware GOP is so caught up in name recogniton and “paying your dues” that it ignores things like picking the right candidate for the job and listening for the message that resonates. Is that an indicment of the party leadership? Maybe, but I don’t think it’s unwarranted. Simply put, the people are telling the GOP…rather screaming at them LISTEN TO US!!!! It’s now up to the GOP to listen.
“Warren Buffett would scrap health care bill”
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/33693.html
“Buffett urged Obama to say that “we’re going to cut off all the kinds of things like the 800,000 special people in Florida or the Cornhusker kickback, as they called it, or the Louisiana Purchase, and we’re going to — we’re going to get rid of the nonsense. We’re just going to focus on costs and we’re not going to dream up 2,000 pages of other things. And I would say, as president, `I’m going to come back to you with something that’s going to do something about this, because we have to do it.’”
Like Democrats in Congress, Buffett would like to expand access to health insurance, but he said he does not “believe in insuring more people till you attack the cost aspect of this.”
“If it was a choice today between plan A, which is what we’ve got, or plan B, what is in front of — the Senate bill, I would vote for the Senate bill,” Buffett said. “But I would much rather see a plan C that really attacks costs. And I think that’s what the American public wants to see. I mean, the American public is not behind this bill. And we need the American public behind the bill, because it’s going to have to do some tough things.”
David,
I am so afraid because I hear Copeland has been taking photo-shop lessons and is dying to get back at me 
LOL
It’s my fault! The party is waiting in me to make up my mind to run for congress
But for real ,I don’t think any party should just jump out and endorse a candidate. Also, it doesn’t mean they are running for the party and perhaps just as a Republican. Big difference!
Kilroy…you make a great point, no reason for the GOP to endorse anyone (heck I think holding their convention in May and the primary in September is bass akward as it is) at this point. I don’t think that’s the point here. If you read the article, Tom Ross is rather critical of the candidates in a round about way by attacking the fact that none of them are establishment candidates. I think this may be by design. “The Delaware Way” as they say, is likely in place here and it wouldn’t surprise me to hear that there were some “discussions” that took place involving who would be running for what office when.
With that said, I do think that any of the candidates for U.S. House who decide not to run or who do not make it through the primary would do well to consider looking at other races in the state. They’re all excellent candidates for a spot in Washington and would be welcome additions in Dover as well.
Upcoming Election. Question. Where do you stand on malpractice reform?
Democrat candidate:
I support voluntary state by state reform, with emphasis on making sure injured parties are the first concern. On the matter of restricting malpractice jury awards, it is important to remember jury trial is the foundation of our legal system. Those injured at the hand of a negligent doctor must have access to every legal remedy. Reform is best left to individual states. Malpractice suits have been cut in half by voluntary reform over the past ten years. It’s interesting to note only 30% of premiums doctors pay are actually paid out to injured parties.
Tea Party candidate:
That is just double talk so lawyers can donate to Democrats. Where Americans understand that our rights are given to us by our Creator at our conception and therefore can’t be taken by any man or any group of men neither Congress nor King nor Court. That’s my Tea Party and we are smart.
Tea Party Candidate: “I forgot to say I don’t think the Government should be involved in the legal process. That’s what we have a free market for. If a new law is needed there’s no need to get the government involved. It’s right there in the Constitution. The People make the laws not the government.”
What Tom Ross is doing is NOT leadership. A leader champions those beneath them, and stands up for them. A leader helps them be victorious. Tom Ross should thank his lucky stars that three GOP candidates have stepped forward to carry the GOP banner and run for elective office. Now it is the people’s turn to determine who is that candidate.
DEGOP HQ is just as broken as Washington, and they are out of touch with the rank and file working Republican.
I differ about the convention. The convention does not force anyone to do anything. It is a relatively democratic (small d) elected group of activists who often make or break campaigns. They represent conservatives and moderates, Pro-life and pro-choice, business and labor, state employees and taxpayer, gun owners and ministers. They are a cross section of the Republican party. The convention is not a small group of elite political insiders. Being able to garner support at the convention is a test of a candidate’s message and organizational ability.
It is the first test for a candidate. It does not have to be the last. It does serve a valuable purpose of helping candidates who are not ready to not waste 5 months. It can help candidates have an early deadline. They have to hone their message by May instead of floundering until late summer.
I would like our primary to be moved up in the year, but the convention is an avenue to test the message, fundraising, and organization of candidates.
By the way, I agree that this was a failure of leadership, but I do not know that it is normal for Mr. Ross. Everyone has a bad day. I know because it has happened to me.
I am calling attention to this to fix it not to dump on the man. He is doing a ridiculously thankless job that I don’t want. He always has people (like myself today) second guessing the way he is doing his job. That is why I try not to make it personal.
The problem is that he did make a glaringly obvious error that if unchallenged could hurt our candidates and party. I know that he does not want that. I hope that he sees this for what it is. I am a friend moving to cover a gap. I am not an enemy attacking. I know the same is true of you, Jason. You have been an asset for many years to this party.
P. S. Ms. Izzo may have noticed that I gave her no strengths. It is because I do not know her yet, not because she has none.
David,
Don’t protect them. You’re better than that. It’s time to call a spade a spade. This party has been absent real leadership for some time so maybe all of that doesn’t fall at the feet of Mr. Ross but he and the rest of his cronies certainly aren’t doing anything to make it better. I’m not referencing this one quote as the only example of their failures either. In the last year the GOP leadership as succeeded in attacking the TEA Party (a group they shouldn’t be “affiliated with” but that they would be smart to “support”) groups by promoting conflicting events instead of working to make their events work in conjunction with TEA Party events; the leadership has said publicly (on live radio) that the “Patriot movement” has no bearing or effect here in Delaware despite the THOUSANDS that show up at major rallies across the state; and now Tom Ross grossly underplays the current crop of GOP candidates because simply put they aren’t his pals.
Jason is dead on balls accurate here, the DEGOPHQ is simply out of touch with its base and is playing to the voter registration database. They’ve been doing that for years and low and behold we’ve seen record losses in Dover. Why? Because we are a state of pale pastels and not bold colors. Because Mike Castle, who should really have switched parties a year and a half ago is leading the DEGOPHQ around by a leash. My job is thankless too but that doesn’t mean I don’t TRY. I can’t see how the DEGOP leaderships actions over the past year have helped their cause at all.
And just to address tweedle dee and tweedle dumber (Bill Holt and think123):
Your analysis of a TEA Party candidate’s response to the question of tort reform is both ignorant and illuminating. It shows that neither of you actually have a CLUE what the TEA Party stands for and it speaks generally to your progressive ideology. In fact, your “Democrat candidate” argument is closer to what a TEA Party candidate would likely argue. Though each persons opinion differs I believe that addressing tort reform in either of the following ways would be acceptable to most in the “TEA Party” movement:
1.) Congress has the power, per the Constitution, to convene special courts in cases it deems necessary. One way to effectively end malpractice abuse is to have the United States Congress create district courts that have the express purpose to handle medical malpractice cases. The review board for the cases will include judges, lawyers and even practicing doctors who may be called in at any time (like jury duty) to give their opinions on a particular case. Once the review board determines the validity of the case it may issue a ruling either to press the case forward or to return it based on it’s lack of legal or medical merits. This would provide more of a buffer of safety by removing the very costly and time consuming abuses of the trial system. It will also ensure that cases with merit recieve the attention they deserve and not bogged down by frivolous claims that lack merit.
2.) As your “Democrat” candidate suggested we could leave it to the states to decide. Texas did just such a thing and they were able to drastically decrease their malpractice insurance costs while still maintaining a record of faily adjudicating malpractice claims. Delaware candidates have also recently proposed similar legislation that would create special healthcare courts that would be similar to our current chancery court system (which is the envy of many states). Most of these suggestions have come not from Democrats as you might suggest but from TEA Party leaders and Republican candidates.
Incidentally, your argument by the “Democrat” candidate is not likely to be one you would hear outside of Kent and Sussex counties. A more likely scenario by a Democrat candidate when asked about tort reform would be:
“Uh, yea, we’ll think about it.”
In fact, these are pretty much Barack Obama’s exact words from his State of the Union speech. Why wouldn’t they act? Because the trial lawyers pay most of the Democrats expenses. Come back when you two have a clue.
The Socialist-Democrats are a wholly-owned subsidiary of the trial lawyers’ association. And the teachers union. And the SEIU. Bought and paid-for.