Romney Camp Removing Rules Committee Members

FreedomWorks.org ^ | August 28, 2012 | Michael Duncan

[CedarDave]

I just got off the phone with a concerned Florida activist, Laura Noble, who informed me that both of Florida's Rules Committee members, Peter Feaman and Kathleen King, have been removed from the Rules committee and replaced with Romney-appointed delegates.

Clearly anticipating a grassroots backlash against the "compromise" on Rule 15 and the changes on Rule 12 has caused the Romney camp to preemptively replace delegates to ensure they have support on the Rules Committee.

It's enough to make your blood boil. Please call your state's Rules Committee delegates here and ask that they oppose the "compromise" on Rule 15, oppose the changes to Rule 12, and support the full Minority Reports on the Rules.

UPDATE: Delegations we should be focusing on include the following states: North Carolina, Oregon, Indiana, Ohio, Nebraska, Kansas, Arkansas, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

[Tennessee Nana]

both of Florida’s Rules Committee members, Peter Feaman and Kathleen King, have been removed from the Rules committee and replaced with Romney-appointed delegates.
_________________________________________

I hope no FReeper will say they are surprised by this treason...

[CedarDave]

From Michelle Malkin:

Update 2:50pm Eastern…The Rules Committee just voted 78-14 to accept the Romney-approved deal on Rules 15(16) and 12. There is now an effort to gather enough signatures to force a floor vote on the minority report. 25 percent of committee members are needed.

Apparently, the Virginia delegation was stuck on a bus and didn’t make it in time for the vote.

http://michellemalkin.com/ (scroll down to the bottom)

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

In essence, it is this: in 2016 Romney would be able to choose what delegates are seated at the convention. The states would no longer do that. If Romney doesn’t like the delegates the people of a state choose i.e. they choose to vote for someone other than Romney, then he can replace them with those that are for Romney.

I'm sorry, but that doesn't sound right to me as it pertains to 2016. I think you must be misreading/exaggerating those claims. Is there a link to the specific rules/proposals anywhere?

[cotton1706]

Here’s one link. There was an ititial compromise that resolved a dispute but then they tried to do an end run around that by allowing rules changes between conventions. That’s what the 2:00 vote was about. There has since been another compromise.

http://michellemalkin.com/2012/08/27/floor-fight-grass-roots-activists-battle-attempt-to-rig-gop-convention-delegate-rules/

[penelopesire]

I will call them next...on a roll here. And as luck would have it...I just received a fundraising call from the RNC....lol....boy did I unload on that woman!!! I had already called them this morning. But was so glad when they called me just now. Told them they would not get another dime out of me EVER AGAIN...if they went through with these rule changes. It felt good to give them a piece of my mind.

LET’S ROLL!!

[LS]

As I understand it, anything still must be approved by the floor. Good luck.

I just called OH GOP HQ and the lady said that by noon she personally had already processed 180 calls and that the office had 300 calls on this, and she herself was hopping mad. Don't think this is gonna fly for the elites.

[RummyChick]

The last one term President was a Republican. It’s now the Democrat’s turn with Obama.

The powers-that-be want Romney. We will get him for two terms. He is more controllable than Obama who is a nut.

Conservatives won’t like Romney but we are stuck with him for two terms.

Then maybe Ryan.

Hillary is out of the equation. But look at for her spawn to come up the ranks.

[onyx]

Woo-Hoo!

Mad as He// and not giving another dime!

[ejonesie22]

Like this is a suprise. Everyone sing Kymbaya, Mitt is the One!

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

Well, let me see if I understand this right. Are we talking about the candidates who run in the primaries getting to choose the people who will be their delegates, as opposed to lower level party functionaries choosing who those delegates will be? Because if that's the case, then I'm siding with the candidate. When I go to the polls during a primary, I figure I'm voting for the candidate. I'm not voting for some low level party committeeman, or for anyone else. I'm not expecting that person to have their own agenda. I figure I'm getting someone who that candidate wants as their delegate, because there's no way I'm going to be familiar with all these faceless local party types.

Now, if that's not correct, then fine. But there are parts of this that sound like state and local level party people trying to maintain some independent authority and discretion at the convention, when they're not the people I voted for. I don't know who they are, nor do I care. I voted for a candidate, not a grassroots flunky.

[Wuli]

email mu delegate

he hangs up right after answering his phone

sounds like it’s his cell phone and he’s inside the convention

guess he sees he does not recognize the number calling him

I imagine the NJ team is in the Romney camp to start with

[CedarDave]

It's over.

Michelle Malkin ‏@michellemalkin
Thanks to Boehner's deaf ears, minority reports squashed. Floor fight squashed. Mission accomplished, party bosses. #RNCpowergrab
https://twitter.com/MichelleMalkin

[BlackElk]

Whom do you suppose “we” will nominate in 2088???

[CedarDave]

Mark Levin devoted most of the second half-hour to this treachery including an interview with a long-term member of the RNC Rules Committee who said it set a dangerous precedent when the RNC chairman (who also controls candidate purse strings) can change the rules in between conventions.

[RaisingCain]

“The Texas delegates have been fighting mad about these rule changes and fighting hard against them.

I’m trying to get an update from one now about the 2:00 meeting.”

---

I thought this was settled the other day. Didn’t the compromise already get agreed upon and delegates would not be messed with provided they do not switch their initial vote to someone other than Mittens? I’m not understanding the timeline of these articles.

[muawiyah]

Romney and his running dog lackeys undoubtedly think two rather strange things ~ (1) Black voters will swarm to the Republican standard, and (2) Their boy can win with nothing but negative advertising on broadcast television.

Reminds me of the Truman vs. Dewey race in 1948!

This is just giving it away to Obama ~ and apparently quite consciously.

[CedarDave]

There was a compromise on one rule, but another that pretty much gives the RNC carte blanche to change the rules between conventions was approved.

A couple of links:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2923728/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/2923818/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2923908/posts

[muawiyah]

No, you have your federalist principles backwards. The state parties are not subject to the jurisdiction of the RNC which handles nothing but the Presidential nominating convention. Theoretically your state party, if it wants their delegates recognized will need to abide by RNC rules. In recent times discipline has been lax in that regard.

Your state committees manage Senatorial and Gubernatorial, et al, races. You also have district committees handling House races, etc.

The parties work through a build up from the bottom. If it weren't that way nobody would show up to campaign for their candidates.

The Whig party, when it went down, fell because their national structure just went to pieces. The replacement was a small party formed by Abolitionists, and they simply absorbed the former Whig voters and candidates, and set up something pretty similar to today's party structure.

Later during the period of the Solid South the RNC set up rump party structures for Republican purposes in Southern states ~ these were usually not very active, mostly because the Democrats were murdering Republican candidates, but the structure was there and it was subsidized by the RNC. They had only a token vote at the RNC.

The way I see it is we can simply create a replacement structure, filter existing state and local structures into it, with a new national committee, and step out away from the GOP-e leaving it a hollow shell.

[ejonesie22]

There is going to be a lot of “I told you sos” around here to those who cheer-leaded Mitt.

Wait until a sitting Republican congress, not wanting to go against a sitting Republican president and with the joyful help of the Democrats passes national Romneycare...

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

No, you have your federalist principles backwards. The state parties are not subject to the jurisdiction of the RNC which handles nothing but the Presidential nominating convention. Theoretically your state party, if it wants their delegates recognized will need to abide by RNC rules.

I don't have anything backwards. You're describing the way the rules are, and I'm telling you why I don't care, and don't want my state people as intermediaries doing something with my vote that I did not intend.

When I vote in a primary, I'm expressing my opinion regarding which candidate I prefer. I don't want my vote to be filtered through some state party functionary/appointee about whose views I may be completely unaware. I voted for Newt, and dammit, and view my vote as giving Newt my proxy, not some "grassroots" committeman I've never met, and wouldn't know from Adam.

So if I'm understanding this right, these grassroots activists -- whose votes should not be worth anything more than mind -- want to act as though they got my proxy, and then use their own individual judgment and discretion regarding what they're going to support with the vote I cast. I think that's b.s. by little lord wannabes. I voted for Newt. So, the best way to ensure that my vote is accurately represented is to have that delegate selected by Newt.

Your state committees manage Senatorial and Gubernatorial, et al, races. You also have district committees handling House races, etc.

Good for them, but that's not who I'm thinking about when I vote in a Presidential primary. If the current mechanism essentially gives my proxy to them, then I'd prefer to see that system changed, because I don't know them, and they don't publicly campaign regarding their views.

Look, everyone is getting all enraged about this because it is supposedly conservatives getting shut out. But the mechanism is ideologically neutral. It could just as easily be a bunch of wishy-washy party functionaries wanting to go to the convention and fight against a conservative nominee. And if that was the case, we'd all be going nuts.