To which I responded:
“I absolutely applaud the actions of identifying candidates for the upcoming state elections, for too many years that was a very under appreciated need. It is not too early at all to be starting such a plan”

Good try, though!

I am still waiting for you to even grudgingly post something that could be taken as positive about the State Party under Pullen. When proof is presented showing that for the last reporting period he has raised almost double of his predecessor during the same time period with one fourth the expenditures, you never post that this is a good thing. You never post anything that says you may question whether the State Party should be run by Randy and Sean, but that this particular performance should be praised.

For you to complain about someone else not praising someone is ironic. Lets say that you are in disagreement about the State Party. You charge me with being passionate in my defense of it and that is true. I charge you with being passionate in criticizing it, and you deny it. That is the difference. I admit my bias in this area and have clearly written on the events in the past as to why I approach the discussion with that bias, while you refuse to admit your bias or why you have it.

If your bias stems from the fact that some of the supporters of the Chairman have used the term RINO in the public domain – not on this blogsite – which insults you and therefore you are predisposed to oppose the Chairman, so be it.

I am biased because I have labored in the Party under many administrations that were selected and controlled by our US Senators where I found their blatant disregard for the grass roots abominable and the openness of this administration to the input of the grass roots is admirable.

Did you wake up grumpy or what?

“You were invited to talk with Sean, did you ask him any of these questions? If not, why not?”

I did speak with Sean previously; my post on this thread was relative to the interview with CQ. The conversation I had with Sean was about another subject and while we did discuss upcoming election strategy briefly such details as presented in this interview were not known to me at the time. This is new stuff, at least as far as I know of it, and must be to others also, or why post it now?

“Why do you come to this blogsite to sow seeds of discontent instead of talking with the Party leadership, whom you know all too well.”

Help me to understand where and how you see my post as sowing seeds of discontent? Did I not offer appreciation to the effort? Did I not say it had been missing for too long? Did I bring up the past; law suits, illegal operations, bad judgment, losing candidates, or the like? Now that it has been referenced I will ask you, if my intent was to go negative why did I not use such things, which are public record, if not to try and let the past stay there? Or did I, without knowing, offer questions that to answer would be detrimental to the facade of unity and the stated goal? Is your post a pre-emptive strike?

Or, are you speaking in general terms? I do not believe anyone, least of all you, would ever begin to establish a practice of McCain-Feingoldish limits on what can or should be asked, within the limits of public decency. Certainly it should be expected that if information is not given, in an open forum like this, it will be requested. I did not originate the topic. My questions are not of a hateful or negative nature, merely a request from a person with a vested interest as to the workings of the process.

After 33 posts you decide to go negative. But, then that is your MO. Your frequent “protesteth too much” action indicates an effort to squelch any idea but your own. The obvious strategy is to attack individuals and get personal hoping they will go away. Your sarcasm and negativity only serves to bolster the perception and exemplify the attitudes within the most vocal, but not the majority, members of the Arizona GOP for what they are… angry, smoldering, bitter and without perspective.

As to the previous post, again with the smoldering, angry retort to a thread from days before where my final response to your last entry was, “Understood.” You just couldn’t stand for me to be pleasant and leave you with nothing to bite on. So you chewed and stewed until you come up with this weak attempt to distort and twist in order to portray me as contrary to “the cause”.

This is about the Party, about the state, not an organization. The state GOP as an organization may be controlled by a certain group. But, no matter how hard you try, no matter how many different blogsites are created to sing the praises and spread the gospel according to Pullen et al, no matter how mean and sarcastic you get, you cannot and will not ever control the minds of freethinking and independent Arizonan Republicans who know the difference between such rhetoric and reality. Do not be deceived, sowing and reaping applies to all.

Those of us who have been involved deeply in the Party don’t have to google CQ, we have been in the process and experienced the difference between the news articles that were skewed to the McStain/Liddy establishment press releases and the story as it unfolded.

If you call CQ’s background shady, call NS’s background inky black – and CQ has less internal power now than NS has had for the last decade+. You should be happy about that, unless you support the dark side of things.

Mainstream in the Republican is defined as the Party Platform since it defines the position of the Party on the major issues and has been consistent for over two generations now. If you don’t like it, change it – accept it – or choose another affiliation. Those are your choices. Unify behind the Platform and we will see unparallelled success. Criticize the very tenets of the Party and we will lose.

UNITY behind the Platform!

Ann –

You were invited to talk with Sean, did you ask him any of these questions? If not, why not? Why do you come to this blogsite to sow seeds of discontent instead of talking with the Party leadership, whom you know all too well.

As to a previous post, if your LD Chairman does not have the integrity to vote on the EGC as he feels he should, he needs more backbone.

The conservatives that you seem to revile took the risks when in the minority on the EGC or on the State Executive Committee to voice and vote their conscience. Your chairman would have more respect from all if he would do the same.

Slade Mead.

That situation in 2004 was not even a typical case of a conservative trying to replace a RINO. Mead was clearly still a Dem, regardless of how he registered/ran, and it was entirely appropriate for the party (I think it was Maricopa, though, not the state) to weigh in. A case of never say “never.”

While I haven’t discussed this specific issue with CQ or Pullen, I would be very surprised (and concerned) if these committees got involved in a run-of-the-mill conservative vs. moderate primary. There is more than one PAC out there that is the more appropriate avenue for such activity if it must happen in the first place.

I’m just glad that the state party is finally placing the appropriate amount of focus on what I believe is their primary job – recruiting quality candidates for and trying to win state-level races. For too long it has been almost exclusively focused on federal races (plus the governor’s race) while we have lost many state-level races we could have easily won with some effort.

Maybe what Marcy is afraid of is that the State Party surprised us all by finding more than 100 liberals so that they could train them on how to divide the party?

After all, if the attendees were all conservative or even center-right, they would represent the overwhelming majority of the party and there wouldn’t be anything divisive about them at all! After all, how can mainstream be divisive within a party?

But Marcy might be right to be concerned. Randy Pullen training liberal Republicans so that they can go out and be divisive? Gives me chills too Marcy! Brr…

From all indications the party is raising money, recruiting activists and candidates, training them, and getting the table set for 2008. That’s their job and kudos for getting it done so much better than those who came before.

I found the NRCC ad supporting Steve Huffman (Not attacking Randy Graf) as well as articles written about the mailers and video and the $$ spent in CD-8. The DCCC didn’t attack Randy Graf because their polling showed that Gabby could easily beat him. Where they became shaky was seeing the polls that Huffman could beat Gabby in a matchup thus they sought to shut him down.

Read/Watch for yourself. I hope this ends this discussion.

as the Skinny says” The GOP primary got even more interesting over the Labor Day weekend, when the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee waded in with TV ads busting on Huffman for his weak voting record on border issues. We hear they’re spending $185,000 to soften Huffman up between now and Sept. 12.

The DCCC ads brought an observation from Hellon: “I’m not in the habit of agreeing with Democrats, but I think they nailed him pretty good.”

http://thedataport.blogspot.com/2006_09_01_archive.html (scroll to bottom)

http://www.tucsonweekly.com/gbase/Currents/Content?oid=86106

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtkvwKWS3Sw

But your point is more than right. NRC choosing sides with dough in a primary…withholding is one thing…funding another.

I live in CD 8 and saw and heard the ads. I also received several mailers. Plus I received the pathetic call from past state chairman Salmon standing up for poor Stevie. By the time Salmon made the call Huffman had been attacking Graf with slime ball tactics for quite some time.

I am trying to be more diplomatic but on this matter but you are simply WRONG. I can get over the past but I can not move on from the truth!