Kowabunga

State Central Committee Report

Today was the Minnesota State Central Committee meeting, where new officers for the MNGOP are elected. Indeed, this is the main focus of the event, especially with reitred Army Colonel Joe Repya challenging Ron Carey for the party leadership within the state.

Is was a full event…acutally overfull from a delegate standpooint. All delegations were filled with a large number of alternates left in the wings to stand by and watch. For my on district, authorized 47 delegates, 43 showed up with somewhere arund 30 alternates. Consequently, only four alternates were seated.

This is, no doubt, a result of the challenge for the party leadership.

Marty Seifert spoke for a bit on how this year’s legislative session went, praising Governor Pawlenty for getting good use out of his veto pen and for theHouse Republicans standing together to uphold the Gov’s vetoes. We were reminded that if it were not for the Gov, we would be facing $5 Billion in new spending, and more taxes.

Once things really got moving, and the alternates seated, we went through the nominations and election of a new party chair. I thought that Joe Repya (with the great campaign phrase “GOP Joe”) made, by far, the best speech, including giving a look of what he would like to do to help get the MNGOP rolling again and win big in 2008. This included leveraging new technology as much as possible and starting “Camp Reagan” to train candidates and activists, a project similar to the hard-left training ground, “Camp Wellstone.” Carey talked about the grassroots campaign.

Both are important factors. We need to leverage technology as well as local activists as much as possible to win big in ‘08.

I admit that I was rooting for Joe Repya. I thought he had the better plan and showed better leadership. He also walked the talk on Iraq by reutrning to active military service after being in retirement for some years.

This is not to say Carey isn’t a good guy. Kind of like him, too, which made things difficult. He also had the support of some of the big-wigs in the MNGOP, making Repya’s challenge a bit up hill.

The vote came out 195 for Carey and 150 for Repya, with 174 needed to win. A decent margin for Carey, and enough support for Repya to get across a lot of the points he has been making over the last several months on what we do in order to win in 2008. Repya’s ideas are excellent and he should be leveraged to help lead the MNGOP going forward, including the implementation of “Camp Reagan.”

Selecting a new deputy chair was interesting as it was an open seat, with five candidates vying for the position. It was a truly good field of candidates, all of whom would bring different skills and knolwedge to the position. Two ballots were taken to get the job done of selecting a new deputy chair, with Dorothy Fleming carrying the day.

I remember Dorothy from working on the 2004 Bsh Campaign. I have no doubt that she will serve the MNGOP well in her new position.

My Congratulations to both Carey and Fleming for thier victories, and wish them well thier continued and new roles within the State GOP. Now let’s win some seats!

Tags:

GOP Joe Repya Carey Fleming Minnesota GOP