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Posted on 01/25/2004 2:28:32 PM PST by Spiff
Top-down communication without the inclusions of lateral and bottom-up communication is a sure recipe for organizational failure.
Organizations that value communication from management, subordinates, customers and a wide range of publics are more likely to be vibrant, successful entities.
What are we seeing in the Republican Party, regarding the border invasion? Paternalistic, top-down communication. We talk; you listen.
We are seeing a disconnect between the grassroots level and the upper levels of the party. The words of the people, precinct committeemen and district chairmen have for several months gone unheeded. Opinion polls strongly favoring PAN have been ignored by the party. The White House, the Republican National Committee and Arizona GOP are trying to force unpopular policy down the throats of the party base.
The upper brass favors a guest worker program that many people believe amounts to nothing more than amnesty for lawbreakers. ''Trust us,'' say the big boys. ''Protect our citizens and our sovereignty,'' say the common folks. This is a classic disconnect.
It is no wonder then that this volatile situation boiled over at the AZ GOP executive board meeting Saturday. AZ GOP Chairman Bob Fannin has been calling for unity and support for the president.
Some of the state's district chairmen had had enough, and they read Fannin the riot act. Instead of forcing an unpopular policy down the people's throats, they said, Fannin should use his position to relay to the White House the strong disapproval for amnesty on the grassroots level.
Fannin's days are numbered as AZ GOP chairman. It is likely that former Gov. Fife Symington will be approached -- if he hasn't already -- about running for election as AZ GOP chairman next year. That's when Fannin's two-year term runs out. Fannin had also placed himself on thin ice for trying to mainstream the pro-abortion WISH List into the pro-life GOP. As a result, there are now 500 anti-WISH List lapel stickers in circulation at party meetings.
The lesson to the story is that the Republican Party needs to take in opinions and information from below and give rank and file Republicans legitimate consideration -- as opposed to dictating unpopular policy on an unwilling constituency. The White House had better start listening to the people and re-thinking its position, because a lot of Republicans are saying Bush will not get their vote as things currently stand. The White House can choose this day whom it will serve. If the White House gets behind PAN, Arizona is in the bag for the president's re-election chances. It's that simple.
Notes
The two state representatives who serve as senior advisors to the Protect Arizona Now (PAN) initiative are both thinking about running for Congress.
Rep. Randy Graf, of D30 and Green Valley, may decide to oppose Cong. Jim Kolbe in Congressional District 8. Kolbe, Sen. John McCain and Cong. Jeff Flake are co-sponsoring a guest worker program that has greatly angered conservatives. Incidentally, the District 8 precinct captains attending the state GOP convention in Mesa Saturday, voted by a margin of 54-20 to support the PAN initiative -- a direct rebuke of Cong. Kolbe.
Rep. Russell Pearce, of D18 and Mesa, has been urged to oppose Cong. Flake in this year's election. Stan Barnes has already declared for the same race. Pearce believes that if he enters the race, the non-Flake vote may get diluted in a two-way battle with Barnes. Pearce is much more popular than Barnes and may be able to mount a serious challenge to Flake.
Candidacies by Graf and Pearce would undoubtedly be opposed with all the weight and financial resources of the White House and the RNC. Which takes us back to the disconnect subject we started with. We saw how ruthless the president's senior advisor, Karl Rove, can be when he made deeply disturbing threats against Republican congressmen who opposed the president's Medicare bill a couple months ago.
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Sen. Jon Kyl told me Saturday he is hoping for more recess appointments by President Bush. The senator said any future appointments would have to involve judges who are not opposed to going through the confirmation process again after the recess appointment expires.
Fannin sounds like a few freepers I know.
I question the term "RINO" is the right one to describe these folks. I think the real Republican Party is showing its ugly head about right now. In my opinion, they never cared about us white working stiffs or what we thought. They have just wanted our votes and to shut up.
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Vote for Ross Perot.
The resentment toward strong-arm politics from the White House appears to be spreading. Some stinging lines of a (current print edition) National Review editorial about the President's immigration initiative, appropriately titled "Temporary Insanity:"
Will Bush and his aides be willing to learn from the criticisms or to debate them in a civil manner? Margaret Spellings, a top White House aide, told an audience at the Cato Institute recently that one of the leading critics, Congressman Tom Tancredo, was “out on the far right of the spectrum on this.” That doesn’t sound encouraging. But the critics should not give up. By the White House’s standards, the American public is “far right” too.
An issue that ciuts strongly against Bush with Arizona Republicans is drug reimportation. The retirees who are the backbone of this state's GOP are incensed that Bush would rather add $400 billion to Medicare taxes than allow them to buy their prescriptions from Mexico and other low-cost providers on the open market.
Come on. We didn't accept sleazy word-parsing from the previous President, let's not do it now.
Exactly! The vast majority of these poster aren't looking at the big picture. Its 8 million people that need to be deported and they are not just Mexicans! The Republican party would have to get rid of the majority of "An's" in this counrty, like Mexicans, Hatians, Jamacans, Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Guatomalians, etc. You think Republicans look bad when compared to the Klan? Lets see what happens to Bush when 8 million MINORITY people are paraded out in front of media cameras being deported.
Sounds like the outcry when an city newspayer (Philadelphia?) printed a list of names and photos of the 20 most wanted on the front page. Nearly all were black - the cries of racism were rampant. Idiocy. We should not tolerate it.
Just because the majority of carjackers are minorities, should we then stop enforcing the law against stealing cars at gunpoint? Should the carjackers be allowed to keep the cars they have stolen just because they are a member of a "minority group"?
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