“The Sunday Morning Bray”, by Bray!
And the chief captain answered, with a great sum obtained I this freedom. And Paul said, but I was free born. Acts 22:28
It appears the stranglehold of the Marxists may be loosening from America. Not only was the national election in Florida for David Jolly a major victory, but here in deep blue Oregon we had a special election on Light Rail that Conservatives won. Not only was it a defeat for the crown jewel of liberalism, but we won the election against the Oregon Democrat machine which never loses. This election was in a town that runs pretty much the same mix as the state, but we ran it by focusing on Getting Out The Vote and very little else.
We have spent three years developing our campaign system and specifically using the petition process to go directly to the voters and bypassing the politicians. This particular petition and ballot stated that before Tigard, OR spends any money on a major mass transportation project like Light Rail or Dedicated Buses the people would have to approve it with a vote. This was simply a vote to require a vote of the people before the central designers brought big boondoggle projects to the town and it passed by 200 votes out of 9000 cast.
This may not seem like a large victory, but the opposition had the entire Dem machine behind the defeat of this including Obama’s Organizing America network. The entire city council as well as the Mayor, who we got elected, were united and used the media to scare the citizens into voting this down. They made false accusations this was a Koch brothers, Tea Party group of outsiders to the point of using the old Wolf in Sheep’s clothing cliché. We had no media, were outspent around 4 or 5 to 1 and relied on signs, a couple of mailers and knocking targeted doors and won.
This cannot be minimized as it shows the people are no longer voting automatically the way the liberal establishment wants them to vote. There is no more ingrained liberal establishment in Oregon where people worship the earth and believe in Global Warming making the Light Rail a symbol of that belief and voting against it makes you guilty. You cannot be a good person in Oregon unless you are against the car and for supposedly clean transportation like trains. This was the place where environmentalism and ecotopia began, so most Oregonians have been trained to believe in worshipping the earth. This was a huge hurdle to overcome and took three years to accomplish the turning of that religious belief.
This town has not voted Repub for around twenty years and has been a safe seat for Dems. To win an election on an economic and societal conservative argument was groundbreaking. The Light Rail regional plan has been designed for over twenty years and fifty million dollars to be the most aggressive rail based metropolitan transportation system in the country. When Obama was elected, Portland was described as the model for the rest of the country and we have put a major roadblock in that plan. There is no way to go around this town and it blocks perhaps the most important spoke to the entire plan.
This election does have national implications for two reasons. One it shows that people are not going to vote the Party line because the politicians tell them so. It also showed that the Dems could not get their people out like they expected and may be starting to feel Marxist fatigue. With 25% real unemployment this state is a disaster for Obamacare showcased through the Cover Oregon fiasco designed by the Governor and Dems who were all in building the only website worse than Obama’s. These hardcore socialists spent $60 million on a website that could not allow one person to sign up. Although we did not talk to many Dems, you could tell there was not the usual arrogance you normally find from the ones you encountered in their homes.
The other lesson was to stick to GOTV and do everything you do to make sure to maximize our voters through persuasion and education. We have Fraud by Mail here which means the ballots are mailed a month early and when we began canvassing. We hit all of our Republican doors from the time the ballots dropped, but the same basic effort can and is being repeated throughout the country. The key to our system is to only hit houses that are likely to vote your way and get them to vote. There is no point going to doors you have little or no chance of getting a vote and are wasting time. This is critical for Repubs since there are far fewer Repub volunteers so you have to make the most of the limited time you have. To spend that time with a person who is a 1 in 10 chance of voting your way vs one who is a 1 in 2, you go where you have the best chance.
In addition to not wasting time you are not setting yourself up for longer arguments and more frustration. There is nothing worse than arguing with a Marxist since the first place they will always go is to name-calling. This not only wastes time, but lowers morale as people have to deal with some very angry, argumentative low IQ voters. This turns a difficult chore into pure torture and will turn your limited volunteers into fewer volunteers. Keep it fun and rewarding because the vote is won at the door as we proved in a blue P-Town suburb.
This election and the one on the complete opposite corner of the country proved a couple of things. There is a distrust of the liberal establishment and there is a way Conservatives can fight the liberal voter machine. Even though the inner city vote printing presses exist, we have little reason to complain until we are getting our voters out. We were able to get our voters out in a special election and were able to beat them against the entire machine using all of its tricks. They used every scare tactic in their very thin book and still came up short. We did not equivocate and when they would make certain words off limits we used them specifically in our literature and defended them. This not only worked, but the voters were excited to vote and appreciated their voices being heard and not muted. In the end, if you focus on getting out the vote none of the Democrat tricks work. There is a very good chance the worm is turning and there is a quiet rage across this country from Oregon to Florida.
Pray America wakes up
Note: The above opinion is not necessarily my own, but FReeper Bray’s. If you wish to discuss this, please ping Bray.
Excellent! You did it! Turnout is key, as you say. You ought to be on the Sunday shows, explaining this to the GOP.
She successfully managed to keep her party at home probably disgusted with not getting enough patronage or dough and jolly pulled it out.
It wasn't pretty but a win being a win we shall take it and runaway from that cesspool they all live in over there as fast as legs can carry.
Everywhere we go, we find people disillusioned or fed up with the Marxists running this country into the dirt. ObamaCare is the crown jewel of their folly. I'll bet everyone on this board has the same view because it is widespread.
As in Oregon, the powerful and well funded Democrat-Liberal machine and their lap dog media allies all over America will be desperately out in full force to win the 2014 elections so they can continue to hold on to their ill gotten gains and drive to turn this great country into a tribal landscape of Obamavilles. Your victory is a great example on how to turn things around and beat them.
Listening to the myriads of handsomely paid Washington GOP-e consultants is the sure way to defeat as we have seen so often in the past. But it is the only strategy they know - or at least get richly paid for.
Congratulations, bray!
I love it when a good plan comes together.
Here’s the problem.
Elections are battles not wars. If you win the battle, you automatically EXPECT to get something for your effort.
But—
The young people of the then-Soviet Union won their battle in 1991 as they turned the tanks around and beat back the Gang of Eight and bolshevism with it.
But what did they get with the restoration of Russia? More repression, a police state, bloody elitist rule yet again.
In 2010, the Tea Party routed Demoviks and RINOs across the land. But what did we get? John Boehner—more insider, elitist rule and a government angling us further into a soft police state.
We can win all the “battles” in 2014 and lose anyway.
What was behind the I-5 bridge project getting shot down? I listen to Lars Larson once in awhile and it seems Oregon has run into a roadblock trying to push it through.