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Smith talks to the French newswire about elections
By punch bowl | January 20, 2008
To the Agence France-Presse:
Charlie Smith, the 23-year-old head of College Republicans, a broad grouping of conservative students, tried to put a positive spin on young people jumping the Republican ship.
“It’s in the nature of our demographic — we’re more idealistic.
“But they’ll have time to turn away from their chemistry books or work-study jobs to study the key issues like Iraq or government-funded healthcare, and make a decision by election day.
“I think they’ll come back to our side,” he said.
Let’s hope they come back, Charlie. All the Obama students here are putting the “O” in OSU.
Topics: Presidential Primary, Charlie Smith |
January 20th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
Is anyone else disgusted how much positive attention SDS got in that article? Not even the College Dems, but SDS, of all organizations.
January 21st, 2008 at 12:30 am
Sometime people have to ask whether they want the government running their health care (they’ve done such a great job with everything else). Winning the “youth vote” is one thing, but performing better than we are right now is essential to victory.
January 21st, 2008 at 12:55 am
I’m glad Charlie is talking to the French as opposed to other national officers…
From what I hear the CRNC office doesn’t communicate with the regional vice-chairs or even with other executive board members. I further hear that the reason behind this is that the CRNC office fears that if they communicate with the national officers that the national officers will, you know, ask questions, such as how much money do we have or how is the field rep program coming. Questions that that the CRNC, in all likelihood, probably doesn’t want to answer.
January 21st, 2008 at 1:14 am
Is there not going to be a field rep program because of a lack on money?
I thought Charlie was supposed to be the “change” candidate for the CRNC. I thought he was supposed to do things differently.
If Charlie isn’t communicating, if he doesn’t want questions to be asked or answered, if the CRNC has no money and if the CRNC field rep program sucks; then how has anything “changed”?
If Former CRNC Intern is right, than it sounds like “just more of the same” out of the CRNC.
January 21st, 2008 at 2:02 am
In Charlie’s defense, I’ve talked to Charlie or Ethan or another CRNC Officer at least once a week for the past few months.
As a state chair, I feel it’s important I learn what the CRNC is doing so I can report back to my state board on national matters.
While Charlie has given me a few calls (along with Ethan, etc), I expect him to be out there raising money and simply getting to work.
If you feel you haven’t heard from Charlie or anyone from CRNC in a while, I’m sure they’d love to hear from you. I know when I want an update on STORM or the field program, I simply pick up the phone and call the CRNC office.
In fact, they even have someone there to answer the phone! Try it sometime: (888) 765-3564
January 21st, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Some people like to talk about what they think and stir up trouble, while some people are actually out there working and making a difference (i.e. Charlie, Ethan, CRNC Officers and state chairs who care). Former Intern and Minnesota CR obviously have their head buried in the sand or just have a bone to pick and enjoy outright lying.
January 21st, 2008 at 4:30 pm
I don’t have any communication problems with the CRNC either. I’ve talked to several CRNC officers, including Charlie, within the last few weeks. I never have any problems getting prompt answers to any questions I have.
January 21st, 2008 at 5:28 pm
I don’t know much about the CRNC, but maybe that is a testament to what CRNC intern is saying. But I do know this, two people who write in and say that the CRNC doesn’t have communication issues, doesn’t mean there aren’t communication issues. How many federations are there? How many national board officers are there? I would think there is a lot more than two. Maybe this is an instance of the silent majoriry - which indicates that maybe the CRNC is doing a poor job communicating. But like I said, I don’t know much about the CRNC. I guess my state doesn’t get contacted much either.
January 21st, 2008 at 9:44 pm
I have never had a problem getting in touch with the CRNC. They always answer or get back with me, although sometimes it takes them several days. However, I get the impression that they don’t want people to know things, so that nobody can “cause problems”. Many times they have given me vague and cripted answers to my questions. I just wish they would give me a straight answer.
Anyone else have this problem?
January 21st, 2008 at 10:59 pm
Hmmm…
Well, I have no problem at all getting in touch with CRNC. In fact, most of my questions I have are answered on the same day. Most of the times that I’ve called the office Ethan is in or someone else there (John Swanson, etc) does a great job of either answering my question or pointing me in the right direction.
Not to mention Charlie is making it to Michigan for our annual convention on Saturday.
On the topic of them responding with vague answers: Most of the time vague answers have come with vague or premature questions, such as “When is Michigan going to get the 32 field reps I requested?”
Keep up the good work, Charlie! Let me know when you hire the first 20 field reps that you’re sending to Michigan!
January 21st, 2008 at 11:20 pm
Just thought I’d chime in.
Former Intern - We do our best to talk to all the officers and National Board members as frequently as we can, and if there are places where we could do better, or someone who would like to hear more from us drop me an email at eeilon@crnc.org. If you were one of my interns then Im especially sorry, because ive done my best to try and reach out to everyone who has come through the office since i started and stay involved in what they’ve been up to (if so feel free to email me and admonish me for it, i clearly owe you a cup of a coffee).
MN CR - We will have a field program, we addressed the issues that stymied the 2007 program, and we feel like we’ve got things on track for our 2008 program, but as always we are looking for quality applicants, so you can help make the program a success by emailing any recommendations to us.
In general, we make a very serious effort to be as communicative and straightforward as we can about things. I dont know what is being referenced by “another state chair” but if you want more info or dont think the answer you got is sufficient just say so, we dont mind.
We really and truly want a dialog, we want to talk about issues and concerns with national board members and cr activists all over the country. There is nothing “we dont want people to know”, Clinton already gave away all our nuclear secrets…
In fact, if you have questions about something and you dont want to ask directly for whatever reason, post them anonymously here or in the comments section on CR voice and I will happily answer you personally as best I can.
Hope everyone has a great night, and I hope to see you all real soon at CPAC.
January 21st, 2008 at 11:49 pm
Ethan, if you are so willing to answer questions, then you won’t mind me asking the below inquiries.
How much money does the CRNC have right now?
How much money have you raised in the last two months? Where has the money raised come from?
What have you been spending money on, since there was a very limited field program last semester and I haven’t yet heard about one this semester in any state?
Speaking of the field program, will there be one this semester?
January 22nd, 2008 at 1:00 am
Not at all
The quarterly reports we make public were distributed to the National Board members at our meeting in November. I’m sure your State Chair would be happy to show you a physical copy. Alternatively, you can look up our most recent report at irs.gov. I’m not going to publish our cash on hand. If i did, you should all tell Charlie to fire me.
We have raised money from donors that Charlie and our finance director John Swanson have reached out to, as well as donors through our phone and mail programs. Contributions are public information and made available by the IRS. Both the IRS and the FEC frown on electronic publication of donor records outside of their program because it opens up the potential for theft when released without the safeguards that they implement.
What money we have spent has gone towards renovation of the website, the development of the STORM network which will launch next month, and office expenses such as legal council, accounting, and rent as well as other line items published in our distributed budget. The majority of our fundraising returns are being put away to pay for the field program in the months ahead. Historically it has been our most costly program, so we want to be prepared.
We are not planning any traditional field program for the Spring, from looking at the records available in 2006, it had a very poor return on investment.
Hope that helps.
January 22nd, 2008 at 1:37 am
MCR-
I’m going to see if I can offer some insight into your questions before anyone from CRNC does:
1) This could be a valid question that is appropriate for a board member to ask (e.g. Beth Dorobiala). However, it is not appropriate for an organization to release funding information before filing deadlines. Name one organization in the world (legitimate organization, that is) that gives information like that out freely to its members. Really, name one.. I’d be shocked.
2) See above. Also, it would be a terrible thing for the CRNC to release the names of its donors to the public, even unacceptable. I mean, hey, when you’re CRNC chair one day you’re going to want to continue to build off that trust that Charlie has previously built. If they start to release that to anyone that asks, it would be quite a breach of trust.
3) The CRNC board passed a budget at the 2007 board meeting in Memphis. See the budget.
4) As discussed at the CRNC board meeting there will be no Spring field program, however, deployment will be bigger and better than ever come fall.
January 22nd, 2008 at 9:58 am
Ethan,
How many field reps are planned? And to what states will the be deployed?
January 22nd, 2008 at 10:55 am
Interested -
We’re currently planning for a range from 45 to 60. What that means is we are budgeting for 60, but we will not dilute the quality of the program with poor applicants to hit an arbitrary number. Hopefully, we will have 60 qualified individuals, but we would rather not put someone in the field, then put out someone who is going to be a detriment to the organization.
It’s still to early to set their deployment schedule. A lot of things will change between now and when staff goes out, so too will the value of resources. But we intend to have a very transparent system to show the position and activity of field reps. Including regular updates of their activities and so forth on our blog.
January 22nd, 2008 at 11:29 am
Why doesn’t Charlie ever comment? I mean, I like your answers Ethan, but we want Charlie!
January 22nd, 2008 at 3:34 pm
What I want to know is why Charlie is going to Michigan for their convention. Is he using CRNC monet to do so? How is that justifiable? What gains for the CRNC or College Republians nationwide come from having Charlie in Michigan?
If the CRNC is paying, this seems more like politics over policy.
When the president flys somewhere on Air Force One to give a campaign speech he reimburses the taxpayer. When Charlie flys out to Michigan to make a “maintaing good relations with Federation chairs so that I can pick the next CRNC chair when I leave” speech, will he reimburse?
Like the comment immediately above, I would like Charlie to comment some. I would love to hear that answer.
January 22nd, 2008 at 5:23 pm
First of all, the antagonistic tone is unnecessary. We can have a conversation without bickering, we are adults. I’ll let Charlie know you’re interested to hear his thoughts, but since I’m the one who invited questions in this post, I’m going to answer yours.
He is going to the Michigan convention to present the national programs, recruit field reps and meet with donors: thats a big part of the job.
Further, a major tenant of the New CRNC platform was advocating for more communication between the national and local levels of the organization and this is part of how we do that. Similarly, a good state chair should attend as many of their states chapter meetings as possible to talk about the functions of the state fed.
If you don’t think the the Chairman should be meeting with donors, recruiting field reps and promoting national programs like the storm network, then you have a fundamentally different interpretation of how a grassroots organization functions. While you are welcome to that view, we think its important, and as such are giving up the vast majority of our weekends over the coming months to make sure that every college republican activist knows that they matter to the CRNC.
On that note, I will be in IL speaking at their convention this weekend, hope to see some of you there.
January 22nd, 2008 at 5:28 pm
What I want to Know -
Was that a serious question? Of course the Chairman should attend state conventions….