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The rumor mill begins…
By punch bowl | November 20, 2008
As the CRNC gathering in Vegas approaches, speculation is beginning about who will run for national chair. At this point, there is no reason to believe that Charlie Smith and Blake Harris will not seek re-election.
Would you vote for a Smith/Harris ticket? Vote in the poll on the left.
Update: Rumor also has it that Ben Johnson is preparing to launch his campaign for national chair. A platform is said to be in the works, and state chairs have begun receiving phone calls from the former Iowa chair / former CRNC regional team leader. Developing…
Update II: A reader from the Natural State writes:
Check out these two videos and tell me who should be leading the CRNC.
Charlie Smith talks about supporting John McCain:
Ben Johnson talks about being a conservative:
Topics: CRNC Elections |
November 20th, 2008 at 12:58 am
I heard Leigh Wolf, CA Co-Chair from San Francisco State is thinking about running.
November 20th, 2008 at 1:19 am
The Illinois chairwoman Meagan Szydlowski was recently heard talking up her bid. She is scheduled to be in Las Vegas for the board meeting.
November 20th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Isn’t Charlie getting married?
November 20th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Everyone knows that gingers aren’t to be trusted.
November 20th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
The only thing worse than Smith/Harris is Ben Johnson….of course if charlie picked a capable co-chair from current and former state chairs that have done a good job but aren’t in the CRNC clique(and aren’t named Blake)…then i think he merits re-election. Charlie is great, he just needs to surround himself with better people
November 20th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Isn’t Ben Johnson homosexual? I have always got that vibe and it’s just me saying it. That gay activist who ousts gay Capitol Hill staffers and congressmen has wrote about him on his blog.
November 20th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
Ben Johnson is incompetent, why do you think he got fired from the CRNC? The guy is all talk and once you really get to know him he is a huge ass. If he wins, the CRNC is going to go down the tube worse then the previous administration. Ben Johnson ran a horrible federation in Iowa; there basically wasn’t anything left…no one liked him.
November 20th, 2008 at 4:58 pm
I hear Karl Rove is running
November 20th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Are you kidding me? First of all, we don’t have any idea if he actually plans on running or not but I hope and pray that he does. Incompetnce doesn’t get you to damn near the top. I think I speak on behalf of the majority of State Chairs when I say that STORM is retarded. The current administration forced fed it to us and then basically said, if you don’t use it, you don’t get any assistance. I think it is safe to say that they were, at the least, ineffective.
November 20th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
If we are going by the two videos above, I’d say Johnson. If we are going by who we want as our Chairman, I’d say Johnson again.
Charlie, God bless him, surrounded himself with an absurd crowd. I think the last post nailed it: ineffective. With Johnson, I’d say you would get someone who is genuine, as well as professional. I think we gain with Johnson and continue to lose with Smith.
For the record, I’d say Johnson is def heterosexual. Just ask the bathroom at the Hawk n Dove.
November 20th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
We need an outsider. Someone who’s never been a chair but has brilliant ideas and a track record of acting upon them. We need a perfectionist. We need a nerd who will simply put forth his best to get the job done. We need a true community organizer type person.
November 20th, 2008 at 8:18 pm
The current administration needs to go!
STORM was an expensive failure that is being kept alive by coercion. The field program got off to a stumbling start with the most ambitious press release of all time, only to result in one of the most embarrassing incidents in the history of the CRNC.
That’s all that has been done the last two years. It’s hard to see anything that has been done well, and new blood is desperately needed.
November 20th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
the above posts are right in that the current group is ineffective, and storm should be trashed or altered greatly…we need someone who can restore credibility, and really someone who can reach out to state chairman in a way that gives them more power rather than vice-versa….i’d like to see Charlie clean house and bring in total unknowns or either a total dark horse run (just not Ben Johnson)
November 20th, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Smith was awful in that video. There was no genuineness there; he sounded like he was reading talking points. It is not a bad thing to read talking points, but he wasn’t even good at it. He was stumbling over his words.
As for Johnson, he just sounds like a homo.
The CRNC right now epitomizes mediocrity and these two potential chair candidates exemplify that.
November 21st, 2008 at 12:38 am
I think many in College Republicans as a whole are far too concerned about their next title. They worry more about who knows them and what those people think about them than they do about actually working to build the movement. Many CRs fail to realize that what we’re a part of if MUCH bigger than College Republicans. We exist to facilitate the implementation of policies that have a direct impact on the lives of every single America. We exist for the farmer struggling to keep up with the tax burden, we exist for the small business person putting in 12 hour days to wade through the bureaucratic nightmare bogging down his productivity and most importantly we exist to offer our unwavering support for the men and women who wear the uniform of our nation. We’re not here to find out who’s gay, we’re not here to bitch about the new CR Facebook and we’re not here to spend our time playing gotcha politics with members of our own organization. Our we not aware that real people are actually suffering in this country because of legislation implemented by Democrats? It is urgent and necessary for us to move past this nonsense and elect someone, ANYONE, who understands what we’re up against. Our party is in the midst of an existential melt down the likes of which we have never seen and all you people seem to be able to discuss is who’s gay, why you think storm sucks and how much fun it’s going to be to get a photo of someone drunk in Vegas. I was planning on going to Vegas for the weekend, but frankly, I really don’t see the point.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:11 am
Leigh makes a good point. Let’s focus on building the future by positive action. Here are a couple of suggestions:
1. Bring in a new team with new ideas that can reinvigorate young conservatives to get involved, and convince other students to become conservatives.
2. Focus more on the fundamentals. Put real, competent people on the ground and build the party. Expand the field rep program.
3. Build from the current administration’s use of technology. Use the web to push ideas pertinent to young people.
The last couple of years haven’t gone well for the party or for the CRNC, but we can change that by taking positive action to move us forward.
November 21st, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Now we know why the RNC axed Charlie Smith’s convention speech, and it wasn’t because of a hurricane. Charlie makes Palin look like Cicero. (How many times did he say “country” in that one sentence, jeez!) The CRNC needs to get rid of the Smith/Harris team that has delivered squat for CRs across the country. A tough election year is no excuse for their piss poor record. Smith and puppetmasters Blake “hick” Harris and Ethan “sketchy poser” Eilon promised the stars and only delivered an expensive web stunt that financially benefited a relative of the exec board and a field rep program that made CRs look like a national embarrassment. Cronyism and incompetence anyone? I am not sure who the alternative is to Smith/Harris, but someone must be better than these “reform” clowns who just want to perpetuate their own mediocre career prospects. CRs and the GOP deserve better.
November 22nd, 2008 at 6:16 pm
il_cr has it wrong….Ms. Syzdlowski has done nothing to enhance the ICRF, if anything she has kept the Chairman’s Seat toasty, failed to lead a sufficient GOTV effort, dumped 2 exec board members and an Exec. Director.
November 23rd, 2008 at 8:22 pm
I’m a CR alum. I know how the CRNC’s opponents will, via anonymous posts, repeat their #1 complaint on the blogs again and again and again and again because that’s the only way they can get anyone to “get” a reason to oppose the sitting chair. I encourage people not to fall for it. If someone presents a compelling agenda and you think theirs is better than Smith’s, that is a reason you should support them. But the complaints about STORM are obsolete. These same people complaining about STORM right now are the same people who would (probably) be proposing a CR social network such as STORM if it did not currently exist today. You need to understand the way an opposition thinks. The fact that Smith has made a run at “big ideas” like STORM shows that he has what it takes to lead the CRs. He has done a very nice job using the blogs and youtube to communicate and that’s more of what we need in a national chair. He has some decent officers working with him (and at least one who shouldn’t even be an officer, but that’s life).
The CRs need an effective field program that reaches as many campuses, fairs, and sustains as many chapters over the long term as possible. That means you need to raise money, and Smith & Swanson should be commended for what they’ve done to keep the program going.
And keep Justin Zatkoff off of the CRNC. He has represented his College Republican organization poorly, almost as badly as his predecessor Dan Carlson, and that’s saying something. The scorn that he has shown at his own campus’s chapter should be more than enough to dissuade any of you from supporting him.
November 26th, 2008 at 12:18 am
Charlie has done a great job for CRNC, and so has Blake and Ethan. Please Anonymous, enlighten us with your real name.