Keyes to Announce Candidacy at Sunday Rally (Arlington Heights, Illinois)

Illinois Leader ^ | August 6, 2004 | The Leader-Chicago Bureau

[Mini-14]

Keyes' supporters rallied in front of the Union League Club Wednesday afternoon to meet Alan Keyes as he arrived for an interview with the IL GOP.

UPDATE -- IllinoisLeader.com has just confirmed that Alan Keyes will appear in person to announce his candidacy Sunday at the 2:00 p.m. rally for his supporters to be held at the Wellington Restaurant in Arlington Heights.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS -- Republicans from all over the state are expected to converge in Arlington Heights this Sunday to see Ambassador Alan Keyes accept the State Central Committee's tap as their U.S. Senate candidate for the 2004 campaign.

A skeleton campaign staff is being put together now, and arrangement for Keyes to step into the wild world of Illinois politics is in motion.

"Supporters of Ambassador Keyes are encouraged to come to a rally Sunday afternoon at 2:00 PM at the Wellington Restaurant, 2121 South Arlington Heights Road in the northwestern suburb of Arlington Heights," the campaign said on Friday.

While the Chicago media has been speculating that Keyes will not accept the offer to challenge Democratic candidate Barack Obama for the U.S. Senate slot, IL GOP state central committeemen have been saying since Wednesday that Keyes is indeed coming, he only needed a few days to get his campaign staff lined up and get personal details in place before formally accepting the bid.

Editorials condemning the Republican party's choice of Keyes were prominent in Chicago papers on Friday, but Keyes supporters throughout the state say they are planning to welcome their candidate Sunday afternoon, the campaign said today.

One paper ridiculed the number of Keyes supporters that met him at the Union League Club on Wednesday, suggesting that few people support a Keyes' candidacy. Barack Obama has been met by crowds numbering in the hundreds since his national exposure at the Democratic National Convention last week.

But all that doesn't seem to faze those who encouraged Keyes to come to Illinois and run for U.S. Senate.

"The Republican base is energized with this candidacy," State Senator Dave Syverson, the member of the state central committee with the most weighted vote, said this week. "There's less than 90 days until the election. We're counting on the base now."

________

WHAT: Welcoming Rally for Ambassador Alan Keyes

WHERE: Wellington Restaurant, 2121 South Arlington Heights Road, Arlington Heights, IL

WHEN: Sunday, August 8, 2004 at 2:00 PM

UPDATES DAILY ON ILLINOIS' U.S. SENATE CAMPAIGN ON WWW.ILLINOISLEADER.COM

[Luis Gonzalez]

The problem is that you have no choice but to vote for Keyes, and that's the quagmire that your State's GOP has put you into.

[Luis Gonzalez]

I would, and the first thing I would try to do would be to try talking him out of running. I would campaign for him in spite of the fact that I don't believe that he has a snowball's chance in hell, and fully cognizant that my efforts would be wasted insofar as he (Keyes) is not building a constituency in my State to be called upon in the next election cycle, and that would truly turn me off.

I would also vote for him because I am a Republican, but I would be truly dissapointed at the position that my State's GOP put me in where my time campaigning for a candidate would be wasted , along with my vote.

[Kuksool]

Illinois is a hopeless cause for the GOP. There are no 527 ads running in the Chicago media market. Kerry will win by 10+ points. Obama will win regardless who the GOP candidate is. IL is just hopeless. I am seriously considering seeking sanctuary in IN. We should leave Keyes alone. He is all the IL GOP got now, sadly. Luis, you should feel blessed. At least you have the opportunity to Kerry out of the White House and put Mel Martinez into the Senate with your vote.

[quidnunc]

Luis Gonzalez wrote: The problem is that you have no choice but to vote for Keyes, and that's the quagmire that your State's GOP has put you into.

Not so, I could write in Steve Rauschenberger or Jim Oberweiss.

[Kuksool]

{you have the opportunity to Kerry out of the White House}

Should be: you have the opportunity to keep Kerry out of the White House.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Of course you have that choice, and you have the choice of not voting at all, but I don't see it that way.

[Luis Gonzalez]

In Illinois, the GOP shuld have given you the opportunity to build for the future, rather than giving you a candidate who did not live in the State 90 days prior to the election, and who will move out of it hours after he is defeated.

[A.J.Armitage]

Telling us what our language means again, Luis?

It's an idiom. It means he'd rather see the risk of one error than the risk of the other. It doesn't necessarily mean he thinks either error was ever made.

"Err on the side of caution", on Google.

[A.J.Armitage]

Like this.

[A.J.Armitage]

There's no such thing as Republican "party discipline", you know. We're not the commies.

[Luis Gonzalez]

So, then why am I being told to shut up and toe the line on this issue?

[Luis Gonzalez]

"Our language"?

ROTFLMAO!!!

Argue with the dictionary bud.

[Gelato]

Meaning no offense, but do you lack reading comprehension? Or are you just blind with pettiness?

Please read the quote.

". . . even if, let us say for a minute that Iraq was a mistake, as some people are trying to argue. I'd rather have a president who errs on the side of defending this country, and going after our enemies, than somebody like John Kerry who wants to sit on his butt and does nothing while Americans die. And I think that's the key issue here."-- Alan Keyes

He's not saying the war was a mistake! He said OTHERS are trying to argue it is.

And he says that proof that it WASN'T a mistake is that our president showed he would rather err on the side of protecting this country, than to risk destruction by holding back, as Kerry would do, and wait for better intelligence.

This is an outstanding argument. It diffuses the Michael Moores and Howard Deans, who want a timid leader who acts only on "perfect" intelligence. It says, "It doesn't matter if the intelligence data was correct or not. It matters that the president believed it was true, and acted appropriately to the perceived threats."

At least the Washington Times appreciates Keyes' argument, even if you don't.

Inside the Beltway

By John McCaslin
The Washington Times

April 6, 2004

Time to stand

Ambassador Alan Keyes, who was impressive in his challenge to George W. Bush for the 2000 Republican presidential nomination, will be on Capitol Hill this evening as Black America's Political Action Committee (BAMPAC) celebrates its 10th anniversary.

We happened to be tuning in last week when Mr. Keyes, co-founder and board chairman of BAMPAC — the largest minority political action committee in the country — was asked by syndicated radio host Sean Hannity how he felt about President Bush's performance in the White House.

"I am a conservative," Mr. Keyes replied. "I'm part of that group of conservatives in the party who is not altogether happy with George W. Bush. I see lots of reasons to find fault with steps that he has taken in various areas. But I'll tell you one thing: I think it's time that everybody in this country understand that when we are faced with a threat to our very survival, we put aside other things.

"Even if, let us say for a minute that Iraq was a mistake, as some people are trying to argue," he continued, "I'd rather have a president who errs on the side of defending this country, and going after our enemies, than somebody like [Democratic presidential contender] John Kerry, who wants to sit on his butt and does nothing while Americans die. And I think that's the key issue here."

That reminds this columnist of Edmund Burke's admonition: "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

© 2004 News World Communications, Inc., WashingtonTimes.com http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040405-110950-7910r.htm

[Gelato]

If that's not good enough for you, here's another.

HANNITY: Well, we're always glad to have you back. It's been a while. Good to see you, my friend.

I think, at the end of the day, beyond getting into "he's a Massachusetts liberal" and his extensive Ted Kennedy-like liberal voting record, I think there are two questions here that John Kerry's going to have to answer: will you continue to seek out terrorists where they are, and track them down, and go after states that harbor them--and how many months a year should Americans pay taxes? How much should we give them, four months of our income, five months?

Don't you think those are the two issues this campaign?

KEYES: Well, I think that the first one is going to be the most critical. I find it hard to believe that the American people will easily trust a Democrat with our national security, in the midst of a war on terror that, after all, was partly the result of the vulnerabilities that we were left with after the Clinton years. I think that they have a president who has shown himself to have the fortitude, the resolve, to make head[way] against our enemies--and I'm not sure they're going to turn the reins over to a party that has, to be quite frank about it, a record that is pretty well anti-security. They're [the Democrats are] uncomfortable with these issues, and they're especially uncomfortable with the necessity of fighting back against an insidious enemy like this.

http://renewamerica.us/archives/media/interviews/04_02_04hc.htm

[Luis Gonzalez]

Alan Keyes has been critical of the Bush administration in many areas, Iraq being only one of them. He's been critical of Bush's stance on stem cell research, called it the Bush administration's "tar baby" as a matter of fact, he's been highly critical of Bush's spending, and a few other areas as well.

Alan Keyes, the private citizen, has written articles and given speeches criticizing President Bush's policies, and the actions of his administration. It's been argued by his supporters in FR, that as a citizen, he had that right, and I fully agreed.

Now, Keyes has injected himself into the political arena once again, and I will now claim MY right as a private citizen to be critical of his attacks on the Bush administration.

By the way, I don't lack reading comprehension, YOU were unable to make your case, and along the way, you inadvertently made mine.

Perhaps, you would better understand me if I paraphrased Keyes:

""I am a conservative Republican, I'm part of that group of conservatives Republicans in the party U.S. who is not altogether happy with George W. Bush Alan Keyes."

[Luis Gonzalez]

By the way, and in case you had any doubts in your mind, I AM telling you what our language means, I do it because I am well-suited for the task, and able to do so with ease and incisiveness.

[Gelato]

I know you're not a troll or a liberal plant, but I think you should realize your petty nay-saying makes you a "useful idiot" to the Democrats.

Decide here and now which side you are on. Obama, Keyes, or third-party. Take your pick.

Do you lack the ability to set aside your differences and support the Republican nominee, as Alan Keyes is doing?

Or would you prefer to lose this Senate seat to the Democrats, knowing all that is at stake?

[Gelato]

KEYES: Well, see, I think it is, though. He [Kerry] dares to suggest that as an individual G. W. Bush was AWOL, when we are dealing with a record and a party that have been AWOL on the issues of American national security (for, what, two decades now?), helped to gut our national intelligence, helped to put us in a situation where we didn't even have the interpreters needed to deal with the situation in the Islamic world? You've got to be kidding that they would come forward now and suggest that they should replace G. W. Bush.

http://renewamerica.us/archives/media/interviews/04_02_04hc.htm

VOTE BUSH! GO KEYES! Let's get big GOP wins!

[Gelato]

More:

KEYES: I would have to say I think that the most effective thing that can be done is not much to focus on the question of whether this man's [John Kerry] going to be president of the United States. I, frankly, believe at this time that someone like this is not qualified--not just because of his liberalism, but because he comes from a party, from background, with a record that does not have the kind of mindset that will pursue our national security aggressively during this time when our very survival is at stake.

And I think that his liberalism, of course, on economic and fiscal issues will certainly help to consolidate the core Republicans in support of the effort against him.

But overriding everything, I think, is going to be the concern not to change horses in the middle of the stream when we're in the midst of a war.

http://renewamerica.us/archives/media/interviews/04_02_04hc.htm