Posted on 08/07/2004 7:24:44 PM PDT by Graybeard58
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - At one point during last week's Republican leadership gathering in Chicago, the debate over conservative activist Alan Keyes grew so contentious that journalists standing outside the closed doors heard - and reported - the shouting.
The Illinois Republican State Central Committee later barred reporters from the entire floor where they were meeting to choose their party's new candidate for the U.S. Senate.
But with Keyes' candidacy likely to become official Sunday, it will be much tougher for Republican leaders to hide the internal strife in their divided party.
On Wednesday night the committee formally asked Keyes - a former United Nations ambassador and two-time presidential candidate who has never lived in Illinois - to run against Democratic candidate Barack Obama for Illinois' open Senate seat. All indications are that Keyes will accept, kicking off his campaign Sunday at a Chicago-area rally.
Keyes will replace Jack Ryan, whom Republicans nominated in the primaries for the Senate. Ryan bowed out of the race last month amid embarrassing sexual allegations.
While Keyes' candidacy solves one problem for the GOP, it generates another: His far-right views on most major issues will, once again, highlight the deep fissure in the Illinois GOP between moderates - like former Govs. Jim Edgar and James Thompson - and the more conservative wing, which has been trying for years to move the party rightward.
"The state party is divided in the same way the national party is divided. The difference in Illinois is that the more moderate branch tends to run the board," noted political scientist John S. Jackson of Southern Illinois University Carbondale. "The hard-right decided they wanted this ... but it will magnify the fault lines" with moderates.
Shouts and silence
The first rumblings of that fault line were heard through the cl
(Excerpt) Read more at stltoday.com ...
For clarity, knowledge of the issues,being on the correct side of the issues, Keyes was the hands down winner.
Won't argue that. But he never once went overboard. Which was amazing. Here I believe he may overplay his hand which he has done in the past.
Nope.... no badge or watch and todate not on the solicitation mailing list, thank goodness.
Notwithstanding the headline on this thread, the Republicans in Illinois are now united and are definitely fired up.
Senator Fitzgerald commented on how different this announcement was from his first one. LOL...there were alot more people here today than for his. ;-)
Alan was awesome. The place was rockin'!
Which of U.S. Senate Candidate Alan Keyes' (R-Il) policy positions do you not support?
We're not discussing policy positions; we're discussing ethics.
He'll get some attention by the media both national and statewide in IL I'm sure. I hope he handles it correctly and doesn't aleinate some of the party. He'll need all he can get plus some crossover and independents I believe if he's to win.
Who is running the campaign? The same group from Keyes campaigns in the past or has he brought in others?
Where their a large media group there? National or just local/state?
Can't answer that as yet. Sorry.
Can't answer that as yet. Sorry.
And how are you eligible for such a debate?
There is a press conference going on right now as I type.
Several dozen cameras....real big contingent. Don't know where they're all from, but some are national.
Yup. It's all settling fast though...send $$$$.
That isn't accurate. According to the link provided here by sinkspur, Keyes said (in the metaphorical sense) better the evil you know than the evil you don't.
Now I think Keyes' words will ill-considered and wrong, but they're not the same as what you've claimed above.
Others disagree with your interpretation, including Freepers who were at the dinner where he made those remarks.
I'm just as elgible for that debate as anybody on this forum, yourself included.
Well, here are the direct quotes as provided by sinkspur:
"The evil that you know, the evil that inspires you to fight again is not the worst evil," Keyes said."The worst evil creeps behind your lines and dominates your leadership."
I don't see a "Bush is evil" quote in there. I see a poorly-chosen metaphor.
Now, I think you all have to ask yourselves, when you see somebody agonizing about something that's clear and making a decision they are under no particular pressure to make, where the facts don't bear out your opponents and yet, at the end of the day, they come down with a view that crosses the line between complicity and principle, they didn't do that because they were forced to it. See, my problem is that I sit in front of a decision like that and I say this is a decision where somebody sat down to figure out how much evil they could get away with. Now, I know, my friends, that after many years of Bill Clinton we may have lowered our standards to such an extent that all we care about is this, this evil [we've avoided]. That's not what built this country.
Would you find it flattering if someone referred to you as "the bullet that kills you"?
Many who were there were left with the same impression.
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