Bottom Up Politics

New Elementary School in Shelby ???

2011-11-17T12:25:00.000-08:00

Should Shelby build a new elementary school and or remodel others; there were 3 options presented at a recent forum put on by the schools to get public input. The three options ranged in cost from 18 million to 22 ½ million dollars. Plus they were talking of adding another nearly 2 million to their plans for a couple of extra things.

The main reason given for the need to do this was overcrowding. Well a couple of our Oceana Tea Party members took that argument apart at the meeting.

Bill and Jeanette Marossey brought this issue to the attention of our Oceana Tea Party at our last meeting Nov. 2nd. They went to that forum along with Tom Allison our Co-Chair. The Oceana Herald Journal ran an article about the meeting. In which they quoted Bill as saying- “Every single person I talked to has the same belief that when you closed down Benona and Ferry elementary schools, you created an overcrowded situation, and now you say we need a massive expenditure to correct the problem you created in the first place,” This the article said that Bill read from a prepared statement Bill and Jeanette had with them.

There was a lot more to the “Prepared Statement” Bill read from. They sent it to me and I felt it worth copying for all to see with their permission.

-----Their Statement-----
I. The citizens that are contributing to the school system are paying
11 mills, 6 to the state and 5 mills locally; we still have 13 years
left on an outstanding loan and now you want to pile on a few
More mills and jack that back up to 20 years.
II. Did the thought ever cross your mind about paying the first loan off
Before starting a new one? Every person I talked to has the same
Belief that when you closed the Benona & Ferry Elementary Schools
You created an overcrowded condition and now you say we need
a massive expenditure to correct the problem you created in the
first place.
III. Oceana County has over 80 Bank Foreclosures this year alone & (the
Nation’s foreclosures up 7% in one month), and that’s not counting
land contracts & government loans…all up in smoke.

The U.S. is bankrupt
The State is shutting down (License Bureau’s Closing)
(Mich. Can’t match funds for
Unemployment Insurance)
Police posts are closing
The Road Commission has had financial problems for yrs
Food prices, hospitalization & everything else is going up
(pay more get less)
401 K’s plunged $4,000 overnight
Social Security & Medicare are in trouble
Post Offices are closing
Land values are down (86,000 Homeless in Michigan)
And even the Shelby Dollar Store went out of business!
The guy from Hart was on the news last night, he left
Michigan by wagon train for New Mexico.

NOW THAT’S BADOh, and did I mention the Whole World is in a financial crisis,
First Greece now Italy.

SO WHY ARE WE EVEN HAVING THIS DISCUSSION ? ?“Disconnected from Reality”
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is citizen involvement at it best. My thanks goes to them for standing up for what they believe. Also kudos for the other members who helped research their information.

The Marossey’s did their share and are still following through on this issue. Will we get behind them? They will give us an update at our next Oceana Tea Party meeting Dec. 7th at 7pm at the Heritage Hall within the Hart Historic District on the corner of Lincoln and Union 3 blocks East of downtown Hart.
Jack Hoogendyk will be our guest speaker and will be talking about Freedom to Work in Michigan. We will also be talking about a concerted effort of Michigan Tea Parties to unite behind a Conservative Senate Candidate for the 2012 election. Bill and Jeanette will update us about this school issue.

Our policy is to help citizens get involved in government at all levels. Come to one of our meetings and see for yourself what they are all about. Check us out on
Facebook...Oceana Tea Party.

Way to go Bill and Jeanette and thanks to those who helped them to do this. This is not a done deal yet and if it gets to the ballot we can do plenty to stop this. Signs, lit and door to door, you know the drill.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Dumping Debbie

2011-11-13T17:33:00.000-08:00

I received an email awhile ago asking if I as a leader of a Tea Party group could find another from our group to attend a state wide meeting of other Tea Party leaders. (2 from each group). I asked Tom our Co-Chair to come with me and he said he’d like to come. The meeting was yesterday in DeWitt near Lansing.
The purpose of the meeting was to see if there was enough interest within the Tea Parties in Mi. to unite for a specific purpose. That specific purpose was to defeat Debbie Stabenow. In my terms “Dump Debbie”.

You know I was Going to go.

This effort was to be patterned after what happened with the Tea Parties in Indiana which had banded together for one purpose and that was to de-throne Sen. Luger. It worked. The temporary group they formed was called “Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate”.

The email I mentioned earlier was from Cindy Gamrat who moved to Plainwell Mi. from Indiana where she was a part of that effort. Cindy organized a Tea Party in Plainwell and has set up a group called Michigan for a Conservative Senate. Her goal was to do what they did in Indiana here in Mi. She was bringing some of the leaders from Indiana to help and join with us.

I remember two of the greatest players in basketball; one from Indiana (Larry Bird) and the other from Michigan (Magic Johnson). ---- Can you imagine if they were on the same team ???

Tom and I went and were pleasantly surprised to see well over 100 people there 2 from each Tea Party Group from all over the state, from the East side, West side, South and North. One lady from the UP drove 9 hours to represent her Tea Party. The room was filled with a bunch of Alphas.

Cindy had risen to the occasion with a nice line up of speakers. After her brief outline she introduced two consecutive leaders of the Indiana effort who drove up here from Indiana to cheer us on. They did. It was really interesting/exciting to hear the inside scoop on how they battled the entrenched organization of a fixture in the Senate. They Won. We heard of a lot of little dirty tricks that were played on them and how they combatted them.

With that, the crowd was starting to warm up to the idea. Next a speaker from Freedom Works talked. It had been made clear by all the previous speakers that Freedom Works was there only to help, after we organized. They were not there to tell us what to do or how to do it, only that they were willing to help when it came to crunch time once we got going. They would/could be our allies, not our partners. The help they could provide would be financial and political as far as getting signs made, setting up the infrastructure for boots on the ground efforts (door knocking, lit drops etc), a phone bank system and later advertisements. He said what Freedom Works needed to see from us was unity behind a candidate that had a chance of winning.

The main thrust of the meeting was to see if we as individuals and individual Tea Party groups could unite under one candidate picked by us. We would do that by having our own State convention. This is already in the works and we are thinking of sometime in Jan. The problem of course is that there are 5 Republican candidates and some of us or most of us have already pretty much decided who we would like as a nominee to run against Stabenow and we are anything except united. As it now currently stands, come election we would split the Conservative vote, just as Indiana did previously before they united. We would lose and Debbie Stabenow would win.

The Speakers from Indiana told us they had the same situation in the election previous to the Luger election. There were 5 Republican Candidates and one of those was the Republican Party favorite and pretty middle of the road and the other 4 were Conservative. The result was the Conservatives split their vote and the Republican Party favorite won. The votes of the other Conservative Candidates together however would have easily beaten the Republican Party favorite. The Speakers from Indiana said they learned their lesson. They decided next time around they would, despite their personal preferences unite behind one Conservative Candidate. They did and they won. They were luckier the next time as they only had one candidate who was a Conservative and he was a great Candidate; so it was easier, but they were ready to swallow some pride if need be. They had already tasted a mouthful of humble pie from the last election and were ready to unite.

Our job was to decide if we could swallow our pride and do the same thing.

The meeting was of two parts, the first open to the press and the second a closed door working session. The security was tight. The first part was with all the speakers explaining what Michigan for a Conservative Senate (MI4CS) wanted to accomplish and the outline of how they did it in Indiana.

The second part was to figure out how to set the whole thing up in Michigan in a way that would work here and get it running. The Basic format was to split up according to the 14 Congressional Districts. Each district picked a liaison. Each district was to suggest a plan. The idea of having a Convention of those present in Jan seemed to be a done deal. The “leaders” of each Tea Party needed to go back to their groups and figure out which of the Senate candidates they were in favor of. Before that there was talk of setting up a debate with all the candidates to help us vet the candidates.

Remember it will be up to each Tea Party group to decide what candidate they want, then the 2 reps from each group will vote at the convention. I was told the vote will not be by district. Whoever wins at the convention will be the candidate behind which we will all then get behind. That will be the hard part. At the meeting Cindy asked whether we would be willing to do that even if it wasn’t our favorite candidate and I believe all 100+ raised their hands in support. I’m hopeful but it will probably be a struggle.

The problem will be in the time difference between our MI4Conservative Senate Convention in Jan. and the Republican Primary in Aug. I doubt many of the Senate candidates will drop out after our convention in Jan. and it will be hard for their backers to change allegiance. But at this meeting everyone there seemed to think they could.

They were united in their desire to “Dump Debbie”

Speaking of that, I brought a box of “Dump Debbie” buttons and probably gave away at least 500 of them. Tom and I made some friends there and I’m sure we will make use of those contacts in the future.

Our next Oceana Tea Party meeting is Dec. 7 same times same place. If you want to join us or want to get on our mailing list give me a call. 231-728-3455. Not only will we be talking all about this state wide Tea Party movement to Dump Debbie, but the second half will have former State Rep. and former US Senate Candidate Jack Hoogendyk telling us all about Michigan "Freedom to Work"!

Bring a Friend.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Time to Get Busy

2011-11-10T12:31:00.000-08:00

I voted in my new precinct (Newfield Township) Tues the Nov 8th. I later called the Newfield Clerk and he said I believe, there were 144 votes cast in that election. Wow 144 votes out of well over 2,000 voters. The only things on the ballot were two ballot issues. They were school millage issues and they both passed. I voted against them.

The next day I talked with our County Clerk Becky Griffin and she told me that the Newfield precinct was the only one that had an election in the whole county. That is because the school millage was for the Hesperia schools which are mainly in Newaygo County.

On a sadder note, Paul Scott, state Rep for the 51st from Grand Blanc in Genesee County lost a recall election the unions had put on. He lost by 322 votes which is a really small amount, but seemingly enough because he didn’t call for a recall. I felt bad as I had gone twice to his area to knock on doors for him along with State Rep. Jon Bumstead. Tom Allison from Mears came the second time. We all had skin in the game.

All however is not in vain perhaps. The Republicans seemed to have hardened their stance due to the loss and the idea of forcing a recall. The MEA alone spent $142,000.00 on the election. They were really well organized. The main reason the MEA recall happened was that Paul Scott was head of the election committee. He was the face of the union reform legislation. The unions targeted him for recall due to that. However as Mike Bishop former Majority Chair in the Senate tweeted, the election may have had the opposite effect upon the Education Committee. He tweeted the following.
-----tweet-----
"The MEA spent $150k dollars only to get their nemesis, Representative Tom McMillin, appointed as the chairman of the education committee."
---------------

Tom McMillin is rated the most conservative legislator in the state and supports the privatization of the public schools. So although the message was sent by the voters, it seems that the course for the MEA in the house and the education committee in particular may be rockier than it was before. The MEA’s narrow victory may have been tactical defeat.

In Ohio, Ohioans seemed to have rebuked Gov. Kasich’s efforts at public union reform by voting in favor of proposal two which upturned the legislation passed and signed into law. The good news was that proposition three also passed which was a rebuke against President Obama’s health care. The prop. said that no Ohioan could be forced to buy the Insurance. A friend of mine pointed out to me that Kasich made his mistake on the Union legislation by not doing what they did in Wisconsin which was to exempt Police, Fire and Emergency Providers in their reforms. By not exempt them Kasich gave the opposition too much ammunition to use against the legislation in a public vote.

No matter how I spin it however I didn’t want to see Prop 2 pass in Ohio and Paul Scott recalled. As a member of the Oceana Tea Party and a Tea Partier from the beginning I have seen a slowing down of the momentum of the Tea Party and had predicted a type of backlash. The media sure played it that way and it seems to have started. What this tells me is that I have to along with other conservatives and redouble our efforts. I wrote a longer piece on this in my Live Dangerously blog.

-----link-----
http://tinyurl.com/6q7dptm
---------------

Locally we held our Nov. Tea Party meeting. Our main event was showing the movie “Sick and Sicker” a documentary on ObamaCare and how it plays out in Canada, and we even served Popcorn. Before that however we conducted some business and I kept pushing the group to become Precinct Delegates. Also I told the members that our next Speaker for Dec. would be former State Rep. Jack Hoogendyk who would be telling us all about “Right to Work” in mi. This should be an interesting meeting. Jack ran last against US Senator Carl Levin. He is now based out of Lansing and has his finger on the pulse of what is going on.

Next, locally we celebrated Tues. morning the 52nd consecutive meeting of the Cozy Conservative Corner. It was our 1st year birthday. We had one of our best crowds, Tea Partiers, Republicans, independents. Conservatives all, you know those clingy flyover people with their bibles and guns. We had a snarky good time.

Later that day for lunch the Republicans of Oceana County had their meeting. I was happy to see the Wentzloffs attend as they are filing to run as Precinct Delegates next year. They are from the Tea Party.

All of my efforts have been to bring together various quote “divisions” within the Conservative movement and get more people out to vote in the next election to Dump Debbie and Obfuscate Obama and his agenda. Also at the meeting our Chair Juanita Pierman wasn’t there so John Hendrixon our co-chair was in charge. We talked a lot about the annual bus trip in which we fill a nice Charter bus with school kids to visit the state Capital and get a tour of the place with Sen. Goeff Hansen and probably our Rep. Jon Bumstead. We talked of getting Mason county involved and adding an extra bus so we could take over a hundred kids. Total cost will be over $2,000. Be prepared, the begging will soon start. LOL. Please think about donating something. Dig deep people as this is a good cause.

The next day Juanita and Tom Allison and I went to the Mason County Republican Party Meeting to promote that idea. Juanita made a nice presentation and answered all questions. They seemed more than willing. This is a great way to plant the seed of civic involvement and responsibility in our youth.

On a different note Juanita contacted the person running the Oceana County GOP website and he was supposed to call me but hasn’t yet. I will call him today. Our Oceana GOP site hasn’t been updated since the last election in 2010. I’m dying to get my hands on it and start filling it up with current stuff and all kinds of other things.

It will depend on the format as to what I can do and not to mention my abilities, but we have a big election coming in less than a year now and the need is huge. We all know the Presidential, Senatorial and Congressional races. But we also have our State Rep along with five Township officials from each of our 18(?) Townships -- that is a lot of candidates. I would like to list all of them and give links to anything they may want the public to know along with their pic etc. I would want this to be a one stop website for anyone to get the lowdown for issues and candidates running on the Republican ticket, no matter where in Oceana they live. I hope --- but we’ll see.

This could be another way to push Precinct Delegates which is a pet cause of mine. But mainly we need to get up current info about our Oceana Republican Party, when we meet and what we are doing. I want to get pictures up and make it as interesting as possible to all who view it. If we want to grow then this is a good platform to do it with.

Currently you can find the GOP and Tea Party on Face book under Oceana GOP and Oceana Tea Party.

So much for my schemes. LOL I’ve been working hard on my house outside and now I have a load of lumber to build a shed roof over my burn wood racks next to the house and large enough to cover my tractor and little utility vehicle.

Guess what. As I pulled up next to the pile of lumber with my bags of redi-mix, it started raining and today it is snowing.

It snowed this morning and is still coming down on and off as I’m writing this. It’s 3pm. Nothing is sticking thankfully. Hopefully there will still be a few clear enough days to cement in my posts and build my little tractor/wood port.

So long for now.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Everybody Needs a Vehicle

2011-10-03T08:02:00.000-07:00

Everyone Needs a Vehicle.

The area of expertise a person really knows about is the immediate area around him or her. All the rest is, as they say based on 2nd hand knowledge and hearsay. As I try to figure out people and things outside my sphere of influence I start to get bogged down. Simply stated I begin to look more at what is written than at the person.

Only when I am able to actually talk with or interact with people can I become better able to judge them.

That brings me to the importance of Bottom Up Politics. While I have opinions on the big moral issues of the time and the “big” people of the time, those opinions are based upon hearsay. Bottom Up Politics has been my vehicle that I needed to get out into my neighborhood and interact with real people. Get to know them. The concept of BUP (Bottom Up Politics) is that only by getting to know your local candidates and politicians and then electing those with which you have firsthand knowledge; will we be able to change the course of government. Politics after all is personal.

If you think that by getting to know your county commissioner or Township Clerk you will have no effect upon the “big” issues you are mistaken. I have been looking at local politics for only a few years now and already the effect has been visible to me. It is at this level that politicians are the most accessible and amenable to the people they represent.

It is at this level too that the seeds of freedom can be best planted and nurtured in our elected representatives by individuals like you and me. While we can lobby and try to change a politicians mind to do what we think best, it is hard and at best only fleeting.

It is at this level and through this winnowing process where future leaders work their way up the ranks to positions of ever increasing power. When we reach out to these future leaders at the lowest levels we will have the most impact.

Recently I went to a Candidate Forum in DeWitt Mi. where all the Republican Candidates for the US Senate seat for Mi. were assembled.

-----link to Senate Forum-----
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2456333089842.139245.1297542419&l=cca6b2f2aa&type=1
------------------------------

It was here that I heard Pete Hoekstra say that he liked Herman Cain's economic policy called 9-9-9 and that it was a good step towards a Fair Tax. As I watched and listened it dawned upon me however that all the candidates were Republican of course and that they all pretty much were saying the same thing. The only difference was that those new to politics were tearing apart those who were in politics. Those with experience in politics were saying that was a plus and those without experience they felt were not up to the task. The opposite was said by those without experience.

A case can be made for both sides of the experience issue. Is lack of experience a good thing? Look at President Obama and his lack of experience. Is it a necessity to have experience? Look at Debbie Stabenow. Again it comes down to the honesty and integrity of the person and to know that, we have to get to know the person.

For those running for high office it becomes hard if not impossible to do that. Getting to know the President or Governor is a lot harder than getting to know your County Commissioner or Township Treasurer. Therefore getting back to the BUP idea of seeding the “farm team” of local politicians with honest people as the only way we can hope to influence the future leaders as they make their way up the ladder.

This I realize is also making a case for the importance of experience. However that experience need not come only from the political field; it can come from the business community or anyplace else where the person is tested by “fire” and judged by their peers and the best rise from the bottom up.

I’ve recently moved to a new county and am trying to get to know the people that are my new neighbors. So far I mainly have been getting familiar with those local politicians that will talk with me. I’ve been going to township and county meetings and picking up on the issues and the people championing them that are important to my new area. Those big ideas like green energy and fiscal responsibility are found locally in issues like zoning regs. for wind turbines or the cost of building a new animal shelter vs. remodeling the current one. I can believe that a township official or county commissioner who backs strict zoning regs against Wind Turbines and votes to remodel the animal shelter is the person I would feel comfortable voting for as our next State Rep. Part of that comfortable feeling would also come from seeing that person in action first hand and hopefully talking with them.

In my search for vehicles to get about my new community, I have made contact with the County Party and have set up a County Tea Party. These efforts have made it easier to be in touch with the local leaders. I have found that these local politicians have a good pulse on the public they serve. They know a lot of people in general and the “movers and shakers” in the community.

Locally already I have seen State Reps move to State Senate, and State Reps fighting the good conservative fight. I saw that they had been always fighting that fight through previous government work or in the private sector. The two I’m thinking of each rose in different channels but came through by keeping fiscally conservative.

Their peers had put them where they are. It is up to you and me to keep letting them know that we support them and those efforts, and it is also up to us to help them in whatever way we can to “keep it personal”. The more interaction with them the better chance we will judge them fairly. Here I’m talking about not only financially but the everyday political stuff, the real hands on stuff of politics. Simply walking in a parade with a candidate, or helping one day with a literature drop before elections, or going to or better yet helping them put on one of their events or fundraisers.

Any of these things are important to the candidate and gives you the inside look at the person and how they work. This always helps me to decide whether they are honest and their actions match up with their words.

For example recently I and a few others helped out the County Republican Chair putting on the annual Bratt Fry.

-----link Bratt Fry-----
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2464880623525.139502.1297542419&l=939e2d143e&type=1
------------------------
PS the wood pile is mine, 2 cord done 3 to go and the trukeys are my constant visitors. Both have nothing to do with this post. LOL

It was mainly grunt stuff, putting up banners, and stuff like that. Simply though by volunteering this turned into a great vehicle through which to meet the leaders of the community. I was able to talk with a Circuit Judge, former long time Republican County Leader, plus State Senator and State Rep and our US Congressman, plus other friends from the Tea Party and Republican Party. It was here that I was able to ask Congressman Huizenga what he thought about Pete Hoekstra supporting Herman Caines 9-9-9 policy. As the Congressman said he liked the idea too, you could almost see the wheels turning about how that might sound. How Herman Cain might not be his cup of tea, or how that might fit in with supporting Mitt Romney. He then added that he personally liked the flat tax better. I give this one example to show how interconnected events get as you delve into politics and your community and important it can be to learn to better judge the issues and people around you.

These methods are all vehicles which I use to learn my community. The highest octane gas that fuels these vehicles I have found is to simply ask yourself, “What Can I Do Today” and then ask someone “How Can I Help”. Be sure to ask it humbly and simply as you’re capable, but be prepared for the change in direction within your life. That can become a life changer, a lifelong journey.

Money too is a vehicle. It is simple quick and easy. Everybody from Political Parties to Candidates to the individual Citizens use it. That’s why it’s easier for you to simply give money to someone or something and easier for the organization or candidate to ask for money. What with the digital age and credit cards/paypal etc nobody has to touch anyone or anything.

Which vehicle however do you think is better for our Country? Which vehicle would you rather have driving the economy, Citizen Involvement or Money? People or money?

It’s time to pick a vehicle now while we still have a free choice.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

How Does Bottom Up Politics Work ???

2011-09-26T05:51:00.000-07:00

How does Bottom Up Politics work?

As I’ve preached over the years about Bottom Up Politics the one stumbling block in most people’s mind takes the form of a question. What can one person do to change the country? A corollary to that is what good will come from entering into local politics, what change can I make?

The cornerstone of Bottom Up Politics is that only change that comes from the bottom and works it’s way to the top is the only change that can last. The reason is that through the process of “filtering up” through the smaller branches, the change will have gone through a repeated process of refinement.

Here is a link to an article in Capital Confidential by Ken Braun.

-----Link-----
http://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/15768
---------------

This article shows how one Township has dealt with the overwhelming unfunded debt problem it had, namely with pensions. The Township did what it thought it had to do in order to try to start to get its financial house in order.

This type change at the smallest level of government in Mi. can have a profound change. That change however will be tweaked refined and studied as other Townships wrestle with the same problem. There are 1242 Townships in Mi. When all those Townships create their versions of the same thing, as they feed off the others and make changes as they see fit; an even better and stronger solution to the problem will emerge. From this experimentation the upper levels will draw their own conclusions. As the article above shows the State of Michigan has already taken some of those ideas and introduced legislation that reflects the changes made at a local level.

This is what I call the “Free Enterprise of Ideas” and just as in Free Enterprise, the more input from the Bottom Up, the better and stronger the product or idea will be.

So, next time people tell you not to bother to get involved at a local level because the problems are too big and complicated take the above example to heart. Take to heart also the idea that America is the one shining example in the world where the Federal Government was limited enough to allow for the flourishing of that same “Free Enterprise of Ideas”.

Remember that on Election Day. Remember, your vote matters.

Before Election Day remember too your ideas matter, talk to your friends, talk them and yourself into going to the polls on Election Day.

Get involved; remind the world and the bureaucrats in Washington that in America one person still matters. That Individual Freedom is the cornerstone of Political and Financial Freedom. It is what our country was founded upon.

To end, here is a quote from Barry Goldwater. “Never forget there was only one freedom on which this nation was founded; that was freedom from government.”

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

A Nation of Free People - or a Nation of Regulations?

2011-09-24T13:26:00.000-07:00

Speaker Boehner and his friends have always been fighting against regulation as the #1 job and business killer, not to mention a good source of pork.

http://cfif.org/v/freedom_line_blog/11301/boehner-rides-the-reins/

This gives some background about a bill that may well become critical later this year.

Phil Kerpen of Americans for Prosperity wrote the article “Regulation Nation” in the Weekly Standard here is a link to it.
-----link-----
http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/regulation-nation_593656.html?page=2
--------------
If you believe as I do that over regulation by the Federal Government is at the root of most of our problems in our economy and lately our personal life then you too will understand the importance of this article.

I think it appropriate here to note the back story of this bill now before Congress. Of special note the crucial role Speaker John Boehner and his fellow conservative House members played in getting this up and going in the House. Note also the role of Sen. Jim DeMint in being the tip of the spear in the Senate for this legislation. With the support of Rand Paul the Tea Party is well represented. This was and is a positive step in restoring accountability to those who make law.

The individual back story of Mr. Rogers working his anger into something positive is inspiring for would be activists like myself. I will be putting on my thinking cap on to try and figure out what to do to help pass this one. Already springing to mind is a rally featuring burning the 163,000 pages of new regulations in the Code of Federal Regulations. Maybe a bonfire with a pig roast thrown in. Talk about feasting on Cutting Pork in the Federal Government.

I believe this is a God send for the Tea Party to flex its muscle and unite behind and push it as far as we can. Now is the time before the election to help move this bill and draw a line in the sand over. This would solidify and help define our opposition to the Obama administration’s current policies. All the things Mr. Obama said he was for such as Transparency, Accountability, balancing the budget and especially creating jobs-these are all tied up in this bill.

Well the Pig roast might be a bit much, but a fire or a brush chipper would be great along with a press release about the legislation and Tea Party support. Along with getting signatures to send to Debbie Stabenow to do what’s right.

To argue otherwise would be to say that the voice of the people told through their elected officials is no longer in charge of the government and that bureaucracy is.
It’s downright Anti-Freedom, Anti-Constitutional and Anti-American.

How do you like Them apples?

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Why Bottom Up Politics is Hard

2011-09-22T06:31:00.000-07:00

Doing things from the Bottom Up is hard.

Our country is like a mighty tree, it grows from the Bottom Up. Stop that flow and what made our country great stops flowing and the tree dies.

People accepting the responsibility of Individual Freedom are those juices. But it’s hard.

If you ever were in a spot and couldn't afford or justify buying something or paying somebody to fix something and decided to do it yourself then you know the meaning of the term; "Trading Time for Money".

Painting ones house comes to mind. Anytime we trade “time for money” we not only learn how hard it is, but we also learn a lot about the real world. In this example we have a new appreciation of painters. The shining truth in my book however is the knowledge we learn about ourselves. Granted we may learn that we don’t want to quit our day job to paint houses, but I find an inner joy in learning what I am capable of in a pinch to take care of myself.

In other words when I exercise my individual freedom, I feel more confident in myself.

Getting around to the point of this blog, I saw the link below about a $35,800 a plate fundraiser for Obama to be put on by Warren Buffett.
-----link-----
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-warrent-buffett-to-host-fundraiser-for-obama-in-chicago-20110921,0,2294.story
---------------
Then I tried to imagine what I’d do in the political arena from the “Bottom Up” with that kind of money. I started drooling about all the things I could do with that money. I thought of huge rallies with guest speakers and great music and food. I would put this on for free to the public.

But if you read what I just wrote count the number of I’s in that paragraph. It sounded like an Obama speech. It also goes against the basic concept of bottom up politics.

That concept is based on individual people doing what they decide is best, with what they have, according to what priority they place on it. The sad thing is that we now need to take back from an over bureaucratized government the freedoms we have lost: and force them to listen to us and as Grover Norquist’s book title says, “Leave Us Alone”.

The Buffett article above reminded me of the benefits of “Bottom Up Politics” and trading my time for money. People learn through the doing, and that gives them skin in the game. But be careful, it can be addicting – this doing things for yourself. You find yourself thinking for yourself more and having more control over what you do.

As you get more self individualized you find yourself more critical of slogans. Remember JFKs “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country”. As a practicing “Free Individual” I now would amend that slogan to fit our country and the freedoms it was based upon, better. “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can and want to do for your own damned self.”
The whole point of Bottom Up Politics is asking each and every day,” What can I do today?”

This is not about money but rather about getting your hands dirty. This is about getting your heart, mind and body involved. This journey to freedom will give you motivation to take it to the next step. From our experiences we will learn what the next step is.

No one accepts a leader until they have fought for it. Until they have made the journey, we call it wisdom. I.e. until they have skin in the game, they have not earned it. Money is a surrogate for that but it is a cheap copy, lacking substance and real value.

When a volunteer from our Oceana Tea Party goes out door to door and hands out a cheaply done 1/3 page black and white flyer on regular paper from their home computer which someone else in our group made and cut themselves; they are getting skin in the game by using what they have and asking what can I do today. When I see this I feel better than when I receive a robo-call.

Bottom Up is people power; Buffett and Obama are about “money Power”, and in Obama’s case “Other People’s Money”.

So I’ll be happy with what I’m doing, if I get some extra money to spend I will keep doing what we are doing only maybe a little easier, or for the flyers we can use card stock and use a paper cutter instead of scissors, If I do otherwise I will become what I fear and I will stop learning.

I will have started abusing my freedom and holding it too cheaply.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Presidential Primary Date and Changes passed in Senate.

2011-09-16T07:53:00.000-07:00

Presidential Primary Date and Changes passed in Senate/the Importance of getting our vote out.

SB 584 passed the State Senate. Below is a link to Michigan Votes

-----link-----
http://www.michiganvotes.org/Legislation.aspx?ID=140727
--------------

Below is a link to the actual bill including amendments in the form as it passed the Senate. Note the Bold faced font indicates the actual changes made to the existing law.

I'm assuming this will pass the House in pretty much the same form.
Then again you know what they say about "assume". Assuming sometimes makes and ass out of u and me. LOL

Note also the date in the link is the 4th Tues of Feb., which would be the 28th.

-----link-----
http://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/2011-2012/billengrossed/Senate/pdf/2011-SEBS-0584.pdf
---------------

I Just received this through email. Below is a link

-----link-----
http://www.ballot-access.org/2011/09/15/michigan-senate-passes-bill-converting-presidential-primary-from-a-secret-open-primary-to-a-public-choice-open-primary/
---------------

The main points clarified in this bill is the date of the primary which is the 28th of Feb. and that all who vote whether in person or by absentee ballot will have to sign a form indicating which major party ballot they want to be given to vote on, and that a record of that will be kept by the SOS for 22 months and will be made available to the public on line.

The new bill simply changes the existing bill to reflect the mechanics necessary to make the change from one multi party ballot to the choice of ballots in the Presidential Primary. This is the stuff that our SOS down through County Clerks through City, Village and Township Clerks will have to deal with to make happen.

As for this bill, any griping of whether we have a closed, open or caucus form of primary is simply sour grapes as the closed primary has already been decided. Again this is more of a mechanical bill correcting the existing bill.

This bill follows the wishes of the State Republican party for a closed primary. This bill defines how through the primary a voter list will be furnished to the public/The Party of those voting Republican in this primary. This list while desired by the Party should also prove a useful tool for anyone or group to use. This does not put up any major roadblock to the much hyped crossover vote. The reality and extent of which can’t be predicted. Personally I doubt that the crossover will be more than minimal.

The vaunted Democrat/Union voting machine seems to not be working well lately. Their ability to get out their vote for things that are truly important to them seems to have gotten rusty. Think Wisconsin and Nevada and the NY9th. I doubt they will put much money into a marginal effort such as crossing over to vote in the Republican primary.

The main point to me is that it still is up to the Party and Candidates to get out their vote and as the special election in NY 9th shows; the more a candidate works to get out the vote the larger the margin of victory and the smaller chance that voter fraud will affect the election.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

My Pledge

2011-09-11T09:33:00.000-07:00

My Pledge

I am willing to compromise on anything that moves us down the line towards more individual freedom through less government.

I will not wallow in my defeats, nor stay over long at the victory celebration.

I will look beyond hatred and see the “shining Hill” towards which I strive.

I will continue to keep on moving on.

I will remember the little engine that could.

In this crowed political issues environment we are sometimes overwhelmed by the sheer volume of “causes” for which people have become ideologues. As a person of either side of the political spectrum we are inundated by “urgent” messages and causes which need immediate attention.

We have become a nation of Chicken Littles.

I am a conservative so I’ll talk about conservative issues. Right to Life, Right to Work, Constitutional Gov., Right to Bear Arms and the list goes on and on. The same holds true I’m sure on the other side of the Left Right Teeter-Totter.

What the Left has come to grips with in the past at least is that compromising on everything except their core belief is OK as long as what they are compromising on takes them a little further down the yellow brick road toward Socialism. Over the course of the last half century their persistence has paid off for them.

Too bad it was and is the rest of us who have had to pay for their success.

Too bad we on the Right don’t start to learn from their successes and our failures.
It is enlightening to see however that the Left too has started to shun compromise. This is apparent with the ideologues on the Left who are calling out Obama as a compromiser in such areas as our wars, and economic problems. In other words for not taking their causes further down the road. Perhaps there is a chance for us on the Right to take up the slack and start our own march down our own Yellow Brick Road.

Here is a link to an article by Quin Hillyer in CFIF called “What the Non-Political World Understands”
-----link-----
http://cfif.org/v/index.php/commentary/54-state-of-affairs/1126-what-the-non-political-world-understands
---------------
When I look back for a time when the economy was booming (excluding war time) I see that divided government run by non-ideologues worked. I’m talking about the Clinton/Gingrich time. It was not only the Republican House that came up with the ideas but it was the Democrat President who worked with them to make it happen.

The difference between now and then lies in the Presidency. President Clinton while leaning pretty far to the Left was no ideologue; he was a governor and knew the art of compromise. Today we have as President Barak Obama whose previous job and claim to fame was as a community organizer. He organized the ideologues, he was the head ideologue.

President Obama is far less capable of compromise than Bill Clinton was.

Bringing it down to our State’s level in Mi. and from the other side of the political divide we have the perfect example of this “small step” method. I’m talking about Right to Work. Randy Richardville the Michigan Senate Majority Leader while not supporting “Right to Work” law across the board did say he is supporting Right to Work for Teachers. The article below explains the Senate leader’s desire for right to work for teachers and how it came about. The article is in Bloomberg Businessweek off the associated press; it is written by Kathy Barks Hoffman.
-----link-----
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9PLA7AG0.htm
--------------
Through this example we start to see the downside of ideologues with the general public. We see how ideologues on one side can create a backlash from those who are not ideologues.(the vast majority of Americans). The Senate Majority Leader I would say is acting out of anger and frustration towards the MEA which has up till now been unwilling to compromise and has “gone to war” with those who see the issues it likes differently. Whether this goes anywhere he has pushed a conservative issues on down the road. Dare I say “He Has Had Enough”?

I can understand the backlash against the bullying tactics of the MEA having seen them first hand in their protesting of my Rep. Jon Bumstead and the recall against Paul Scott on the other side of the state. The MEA and their methods are what got me off my butt and in a car driving across the state with two others to go door to door for Rep. Scott.

Don’t get me wrong, I believe strongly and am willing to do whatever it takes to make smaller government a reality. I just believe that if we get caught up in the ideological one mindedness we will become lost in the forest of our own making. If we take up the same tactics we will create the same type of backlash.

We must continue to hold firm to our core beliefs, yet willing to take progress for what it is. Simply progress. As conservatives we must be willing to let the people judge us by our actions not just by what we say. We must be willing to be persistent in our efforts and willing to always look ahead and not wallow in our defeats, but rather celebrate our victories. Above all we must always be willing to keep moving on.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Politics, Food Fun and Getting Busy

2011-08-10T09:15:00.000-07:00

Politics, Food Fun and Getting Busy

Tuesday as usual we had our weekly breakfast “Cozy Conservative Corner” at La Fiesta in downtown Hart at 8am. Peter Konetchy was a welcome guest. He is running in the Republican Primary to be the nominee for US Senate. This has been our 39th consecutive meeting.

The Oceana County Republican Party held it’s monthly meeting at Walker’s Restaurant in Hart Tues August 11 at noon.

With all the craziness and tension in the news the attendance was good. The Agenda was full along with elected officials and candidates.

US Senate Primary Candidate hoping to “Dump Debbie” Peter D. Konetchy was there also and gave a talk. He is a Constitutional Conservative and has been all across our area. He has been campaigning hard for quite awhile now.

Our State Senator Goeff Hansen and State Rep. Jon Bumstead were there giving us a short update on what they are doing and they also fielded questions. Also at our meeting was Becky Griffin our County Clerk and John Hendrixon our Road Commissioner.
Juanito Pierman our Chair moved things along in a timely manner. We also signed up some more volunteers for the Oceana County Republican Party booth at the County Fair. Juanita also got us thinking about the Annual Brat Fry.

We pretty evenly split as to whether to have Presidential Closed Primary vs a Presidential Caucus. This will be voted on at the state level this coming weekend.
This Thursday I am going to the original “Cozy Conservative Corner” in Muskegon. That group has had 164 consecutive meetings. Since I’ve moved to Oceana Co., I haven’t been going regularly to the one in Muskegon. It’ll be nice to see them again.

Later that day I’m marching with Senator Hansen in the North Muskegon Parade. He has another parade on Sat. in Pentwater which will be huge, the next week the parade is in Grant. Parades are fun and good exercise along with free candy. I find it nice to be able to get up close and personnel with the candidates and have a ring side seat to see all the entrants.

If you would like to join us give me a call; Bob Carr 231-728-3455 and I’ll give you details, or call Goeff at 231-342-3772. For that matter Jon Bumstead also needs people to volunteer for the parades and other openings he may have. He told me to have anyone interested call his cell 231-250-0654.

The State GOP is having a training session in Lansing for activists this Fri. and Tom Allison our Oceana Tea Party vice Chair and I are going. So it looks like a busy week.

PS. At the Oceana County Republican meeting I volunteered to take over the Oceana GOP website so I hope that process moves along and I can get the passwords and start putting up timely info. as the election season gears up.

LET’S GET BUSY

Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative

I Like John Boehner - So Shoot Me

2011-08-07T10:58:00.000-07:00

I like John Boehner-so shoot me.

I worked outside at my new house yesterday in the heat doing some landscaping and I cut down and cut up a tree. After a cool refreshing shower I decided to look and see what was available to watch that evening on TV.

I actually sat down and went through the menu and wrote down what shows I wanted to watch in the little time I had. First on the list was the Tigers Royals baseball game. I also found two others that I wanted to see and figured I could switch back and forth. You know the drill. There was one other however that I saw and thought I “should” see. That is the one of which this post is all about.

C Span was featuring 3 consecutive speeches made at an event hosted by The Young America’s Foundation. These three candidates I had voiced support for and had even helped one with a small donation, but I knew very little about them. So I clicked C Span. Once I started watching I was hooked. The Tigers would have to take care of themselves. Besides Justin Verlander was pitching, I felt safe.

Two of these 3 speakers were leading Conservative Senators. The third was a leading Young-Turk from the US House. All three were young. Two were freshmen and the other was on only his second term. These three are becoming the leaders of the Conservative movement in the Senate and House. One has been talked of as a Presidential Candidate in the near future. Another was elected as Chair of the Republican Study Committee; all three were backed by the Tea Party.

-----link Marco Rubio-----
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALHgCL9I8Dk
--------------------------

-----link Jim Jordan-------
http://www.c-span.org/Events/Rep-Jim-Jordan-R-OH-Remarks-on-the-Debt-Ceiling/10737423335-1/
---------------------------

-----link Mike Lee---------
http://c-spanarchives.org/program/LeeR
---------------------------

As many of you know, I respect and admire Speaker of the House John Boehner. One thing I noticed about the three Conservatives above was that they had little if anything bad to say about Boehner. While they all voted against the Debt Ceiling deal they better than most understood the constraints Mr. Boehner was under and respected the job he was doing so they didn’t have to do it. Even Tea Party favorite Mike Lee gave him respect.

Amongst my Conservative and Tea Party friends I am derided and made fun of on the occasions; when I try to share with them, as I have over the years what Congressman John Boehner has argued for. I am usually not taken seriously. The argument against him is centered around two ideas.

1. He is not conservative enough.
2. He has not accomplished anything.

As to not being conservative enough, let me say he has championed conservative bill after conservative bill since before the new crop of Conservatives was elected. He had been fighting in the trenches in the minority for a long time now. I remember when he threw the actual 2500 page Obama Health Care bill on the floor of the Senate in utter frustration of the unopen, untransparent and uninclusive Obama administration that had promised so much openness. When that hit the floor it made a great big bang.

I remember him also setting up alternative plans in the house. Under his direction a health care alternative was created, an energy plan denying the Cap and Trade Obama plan, and other alternatives including a budget. That was as minority leader as Speaker he has seen the passage of a Cut Cap and Balance as a bill.

A year ago August when he was House Minority Leader and the new batch of “Conservative” Freshmen weren’t elected yet, Congressman Boehner gave a talk to the City Club of Cleveland. You should listen to the speech linked below and see if you still think he is a RINO.

-----link-----
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNFNnl5eOA0
--------------

If you do still think he’s a RINO, I’ll put you in with the people that now think Chris Christie is one too because of his defense of his appointment to the bench of a person who is of the Islamic faith.

I’ll further put forth the case that you did not listen to either the Boehner or the Christie video.

-----link Christie Video-----
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y83z552NJaw
-----------------------------

Just to tweak your bigotry try hating Zuhdi Jasser of the AIFD (American Islamic for Democracy). I know you probably think he is lying and just looking for a sneaky way for Jihadists to sneak into America.

-----link to AIFD-----
http://www.aifdemocracy.org/about/members.php
----------------------

If you still believe that after reading the site, you either didn’t read it or you are one of the “Crazies” Christie talks about.

BTW you can throw Glenn Beck under the bus also because he likes Zuhdi Jasser.

Back to the Tea Party and John Boehner.

ICaucus a Tea Party Action group based upon selecting Conservative candidates to run for office believes as one of its main axioms that the US Congress derives its power by picking and choosing which pressure group gets a tax break. It is their further contention that this is where corruption of our government is let in the door and why we cannot stop the growth of government.

I extract from Boehners speech from one year ago this line when talking about President Obama and his desire to pick and choose tax breaks.

“Once again – putting government in the position of picking winners and losers and pitting tax payer against tax payer. The more the government takes the less you have to invest in yourself, your family, your community and your business.”
Does not this match up with ICaucus’s position???

It is my view that Conservatives need not attack our own and if we do for the most part it is for vanity reasons.

All of the Conservatives in government believe in the Constitution and therefore believe in government, they just believe in smaller government. They realize for the most part that to create real change in the system they need an overwhelming majority that will vote their way. All three of the above realize also that it is a waste of time cannibalizing their party just out of spite that they cannot get their way. They are working within the system to change it just as the Constitution says.

For them to succeed there needs to be a revolution in 2012 as we had in 2010. We Conservatives need to concentrate on the races that matter. We need to concentrate on getting rid of the candidates that are against us 80% of the time; and quit trying to throw under the bus those who agree with us 80% of the time.

We need to finish the job.

We need to increase our members in the House and most important win the Senate and the Presidency. For those out there who say we cannot do either because we lack a “Super” Presidential Candidate, whose coattails will help us win the Senate; I say read the following articles. Think Bottom Up Politics.

This Presidential and Senate race coming up is too important. According to the following article the Republicans and Democrats each have about 190 electoral votes. There are over 150 in toss up states.

-----lilk-----
http://civicforumpac.com/analysis-prediction/road-to-the-white-house-2012/
--------------

This next article makes a case close to my heart about how big a role Bottom Up Politics can play in the election and is indeed needed for a Republican Presidential Candidate to win.

-----link-----
http://dailycaller.com/2011/02/24/2012-u-s-senate-races-could-determine-the-presidency/
--------------

It basically says that to win the Presidential election the candidate needs to win the battleground states listed in the link before. If Republicans run good state candidates and they can win popular support that support will take a less than stellar Republican Presidential Candidate over the top in that particular tossup state.

In other words if the Tea Party gets its act together and stirs up positive support for Senate and House candidates and unleashes its fury at the current Liberal leadership or lack thereof and failed Democrat programs, the voting public will respond and those little coattails when put together will sweep the current President out of office.

We Conservatives need to concentrate on defeating incumbent Democrats. If Conservatives can keep pushing and this happens we will be able to take apart the Liberal legislation before it takes hold. The “Rinos” will then be easier to keep in line due to their smaller number. Then we can jump any conservative legislators who want to become more liberal.

Regards Live Dangerously Be a Conservative

Ps. And as we say in Mi. “Dump Debbie” Senator Debbie Stabenow that is.

PPs. The Tigers won the game and it was closer than expected. The Pennant race is heating up and looking good. Pappa Grande got his 32nd Save.

Senate Race Tightening up.

2011-08-04T09:10:00.000-07:00

US Senate race tightening up.
Heckman in, McCulloch out, Hoekstra in, Steele out, Glenn in and from day one Peter Konetchy has been in.
Click on pic to enlarge

The Ocean Tea Party had it’s monthly meeting last night. (8/3/11) A lot was discussed. Our group is coming together, more of our members are becoming involved in what we are doing; although our Vice Chair Tom Allison was out of town.

The previous Monday (two days before our meeting) Our Secretary Andrew Sebolt, and myself, with Kerry and Laura Krentz had our first “Guerilla Marketing” attempt. This was Andy’s Idea. He set it all up. The four of us in about an hour dropped 1/3rd sheet flyers covering 170 people. The flyers simply said we were having a Tea Party meeting with the when and where and who the guest speaker was. Just to help let people know about us. It was free and simple and took an hour. We did that in the Hart area and next time we’ll do it in another area.

We recently came up with some Oceana Tea Party Gear to sell. We now have 3x5’ flags, hats, T shirts, polo shirts and Buttons to go along with our Dump Debbie Buttons and Tea Party Tea. This meeting was the introduction of our gear.

Members Bill and Jeannette Marossey volunteered to be in charge of that. They did a great job and we took in some extra money. Many thanks to them. Pics below

Ted McKissack reported on his progress in regards to the Census Bureau’s Community Survey. Recommending An act of Civil Disobedience is where we are at so far. We hope to finalize a statement and pass it along to other Tea Parties in West Mi. Also I might suggest we pass it on to the Oceana Herald Journal.

I made up and passed out signup sheets to see if other members wanted to get involved. The suggestions were, “Guerilla Marketing”, "Facebook and Tea Party of West Mi. site Maintenance", "Becoming a Precinct Delegate", "Putting up Event Flyers", "Township/County Watchdog groups". Some people volunteered for some of those. I’ll call and get more before next meeting.

With all the news out there; I am feeling that the people are starting to get interested in politics again. However they are definitely not abiding in the politics as we’ve known it. They with the Tea Party’s help will be ready for the next elections.

Our guest speaker was Peter D. Konetchy who is running in the GOP Primary for US Senate. Mr. Konetchy gave a well thought out talk and proved to most of us that once elected he would be a strict Constitutional Congressman. We had over a half hour of Q+A after and he answered all questions. I think everyone came away knowing who Peter is and what he stands for.

Our State Rep. Jon Bumstead was there also and told us to keep our eyes open when the state legislature reconvenes. Now that they laid the groundwork in the previous session, they will get down to cutting regulations and getting rid of all they can which they feel hinders business from coming here and from the ones here from expanding. In other words opening the door for real private sector job creation. If this works and we can free capitalism in this state again I’ll be happy.

The weekly Cozy Conservative Corner which we Conservatives have every Tues morning at 8 am convened at La Fiesta in Downtown Hart. We had a different crowd with 3 of our regulars not there but Jon Bumstead with his aid came along with a township supervisor and a County Road Commissioner. Hey if you want to come, all are welcome. We are Conservatives, not necessarily Republican or Tea Party just conservative and we do like to eat a good breakfast and get snarky about Liberals. Every Tues 8am at La Fiesta. Reservations not needed lol.

The Oceana County Republicans will hold their monthly meeting this Tues 8/9/11 at Noon at Walker’s Restaurant in Hart; again all are welcome. Volunteers are needed there also to man the Oceana County Fair Booth.

Tempest in a Teapot

2011-08-01T10:34:00.000-07:00

Tempest in a Teapot

With all the 24/7 nonstop crisis like reporting leading up to the consummation of the “Budget Deal” you would have thought that something momentous had happened.
Well it didn’t at least from a Conservative point of view.

Did Speaker John Boehner stand firm and fight hard enough??? Yes he did, though you may argue that he did so reluctantly, remember these facts.

1. There wasn’t even a budget last year or the year before under the Democrat super majority. Just continuing resolutions.
2. Congress failed under Democratic Control to come up with a Budget. They however seemed to find it easier to over spend without one.
3. Now at least we have a Budget Deal.
4. Again perhaps reluctantly the Speaker listened to the “Tea Party” wing of his party and forced the issue and stood firm. Both he and Cantor took turns walking out on the President and his team which would not budge from their “necessity” of raising taxes.
5. Well taxes weren’t raised.
6. Another thing Boehner brought to the dialogue was the idea of actually balancing the Federal Budget. Perhaps again the Tea Party may have forced the issue. But without Boehner, the idea of a Balanced Budget Amendment would not have made it to the table – let alone make it into the bill.
A. All the States except Vermont have a state mandated Balanced Budget. A recent poll showed that 74% of the people in the country think the Federal Government should have a constitutionally mandated balanced budget. http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2011/images/07/21/rel11b.pdf B.
In a Mason Dixon poll May 23-24th even 45% vs 44% of Dems favor BB http://dailycaller.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/balanced-budget-poll.pdfC. The politicians may not be nonpartisan but on this issue the people seem to be.
7. It is a shame that Boehner wasn’t leading the charge on that one, however he did listen and pick up the fight.

The reason this deal isn’t too exciting to Conservatives is that it really doesn’t cut spending not even the small amount it claims too because of the use of the accounting trick called baseline budgeting, which guarantees increases around 7% a year in the budget. As you and I figure our family budgets, this would amount to a need to cut the federal budget by 1 trillion just to break even.

Now the reason this is a good thing and I’m not picking Boehner’s work apart is that it is a step in the right direction. However small that step may be – it is twice as good as a small step in the wrong direction.

As to the title of my piece, “Tempest in a Teapot”; I chose it because the Tea Party ideology is the pot where all this Tempest was debated in. The parameters started out in the liberal court but were soon being led by conservative thoughts such as no new taxes, cutting spending and a balanced budget amendment. I give credit to the synergy that formed between the speaker and the Tea Party Freshmen along with McConnell and his Freshmen in the Senate.

As a true believer in the Tea Party principles, I am happy with that. The reason I'm happy with that is my belief in another core Tea Party belief that it is We the People that need to step forward and drive the debate not the government. The other reason is that I now have something more to get my hands on. I joined yesterday a new group that is fighting for a Balanced Budget Amendment. The President of it is in Texas and a doctor who is spending his own time and money in this effort to lobby for the passage of a balance budget amendment in Congress. He was not interested in politics before this. The name of the group is Americans for a Balanced Budget Amendment. (ABBA)
-----link-----
http://www.balanceourbudget.com/
--------------
I’ve joined, donated and asked to be the Michigan Director of the group I’m waiting to find out. After talking on the phone with this Doctor I found out that you can join for free, of course donations are welcome. He said that at this point they want people more than money. (My kind of guy)

Another reason for hope that the "Budget Deal" has started the ball rolling.
Here is a link to the House Joint Resolution that is up and running in the House.
----link-----
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=hj112-1
-------------
The bottom line is that it is, as it has always been up to us “We the People” to elect good representatives and hold their feet to the fire and force them to do what they told us they’d do.

For that there is only the blind balance of reality.

The Teapot has started to whistle. Whether we do anything or not is up to us (it is our right). But one thing is certain we will get what we deserve.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Debbie's Doing's

2011-07-09T12:33:00.000-07:00

Debbie’s at it again.
Hat tip to Susan for the photo shop

Karen Confer of the Flint Journal wrote the following piece titled, “Stabenow plans to introduce bill to aid production of batteries like in Chevy Volt”
-----link-----
http://www.mlive.com/business/index.ssf/2011/07/stabenow_plans_to_introduce_bi.html
--------------

What exactly is Debbie doing again???

Spending another 2 $billion of our money and giving it to companies she likes.
On top of that she is as usual promising that this will create jobs.

How has that worked for Mi. in the past??? I’ll tell you. Better yet read the snippet below from the article.
-----snippet------
Jahan Wilcox, a spokesman with the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said Stabenow had said the federal stimulus would create 100,000 jobs in Michigan. Since its passage two years ago, Wilcox said the state has lost 70,000 jobs.
-----------------

What Mr. Wilcox could have added was that in the Stimulus the jobs that were created cost $278,000 each.
-----link-----
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-s-economists-stimulus-has-cost-278000-job_576014.html
--------------

Then there is this from the National Senatorial Committee.
-----link-----
http://www.nrsc.org/2011/07/stabenow-silent-as-another-democrat-comes-out-against-her-tax-hikes/
---------------
Other Liberals have read the writing on the wall and out of fear of not getting re-elected have chosen to get on the side of cut spending movement. W. Virginia Sen. Democrat Joe Mancin had this quote. ” ‘I don’t believe in tax hikes,’ Manchin said. ‘We have to start living within our means in this country.’”

This was after the 111th Congress led by Pelosi Reed et al. Debbie and her buddies had during that Congress spent more than the first 100 Congresses combined. As a direct cause of that runaway spending the 111th “Historic” Congress received the lowest ever approval rating of 13%.

That dismal approval rating in turn is what caused the electoral drubbing the Democrats received in 2010. The population of the new Congress will not forget too soon I hope what got them there. That overwhelming victory for Republicans and 1st time politicians is what is causing people like Manchin and Nelson to rethink their positions.

The NTU (National Taxpayers Union) and CAGW (Citizens Against Government Waste) both list Sen. Stabenow at 7%. In other words she voted 93% against taxpayers and 93% for creating Government Waste. 7% out of 100% !!! That isn’t even close to a D- it is a flat out F.

I recently heard she is on a diet for her weight, if she did the same with her voting record, then she’d be on to something.

It is time to “Dump Debbie”

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

If you want a button let me know
glhotdogs513@gmail.com
If I have to ship it I'll ask for a donation.

What a busy Time.

2011-07-07T14:22:00.000-07:00

Our young Oceana Tea Party took a couple of steps on the road to adulthood this last week.
(click on any pics to enlarge)

First we had an Independence Day Picnic which was free to all. There were about 50 people attending at any given time and perhaps up to 100 total passing through. This was an important step for our Tea Party for two reasons.

The first was that we were out in the community spreading the word and the second was that the whole affair was put on by a volunteer and not by the leadership. This was a "We the People" type of thing. I even got my hand slapped for interfering. Oh well I deserved it. The bottom line is it came off without a hitch and the food and money was donated by local businesses and individuals.

The Chair of the Event Rebecca Wentzloff is pictured in the band below along with her daughter and her husband on base. The drummer was a volunteer also.

Peter J. Konetchy came to our event along with his wife drumming up support for his bid to "Dump Debbie" and take back a US Senate seat. Mr. Konetchy has proven to be a true conservative the few times that I had met him and that day he didn't disappoint.

At the event, we also had a speaker from a Florida Tea Party, and our State Senator Goeff Hansen along with State Rep. Jon Bumstead filled us in on the battles being fought in Lansing.

My battery on my camera died so I didn't take many pics.

That all happened on Saturday July 2nd.

July 4th was a day of parades; I carpooled with our vice Chair Tom Allison and a friend from Muskegon to save some gas as the parades were in Whitehall and then later in Ludington.

The Whitehall parade was nice as usual but when we got to the Ludington parade I was staggered. There must have been 10,000 people. The parade took at least a half hour just to pass by. The route was about a mile long with people constantly lining the sides 5-10 deep and more on the corners. We decided to march with Sen. Hansen and we had quite a nice group in Hansen T shirts as the pictures above show.
Congressman Bill Huizenga and his family and crew were there also. It was a huge parade.

Like I said it was a busy week.

Yesterday the 6th of July was our Oceana Tea Party regular monthly meeting; always on the 1st Wed of the Month at 7pm. This was the first time we held our meeting at our new digs. The Historic Districts "Heritage Hall" bldg. Our members all seemed to like the place due to its size and the tables and chairs. This is a bldg that we can grow into.

This was the second step I was talking about for the Tea Party. Our agenda for the meeting was full. Rebecca gave a quick rundown on her successful efforts for the picnic. Then Ted McKissack gave an update on the limited Census form that he has been tracking down. All thought that this was indeed an encroachment of the federal government into the private lives of its citizens. Going way past its duty as specified in the Constitution. We are forming a committee to look into what action we can take as a group or perhaps a coalition of groups to cut back on the Census.

Our next speaker was Senator Goeff Hansen who gave a run down on the budget battles that have been going on in Lansing and the progress they have been making. Next State Representative Jon Bumstead added to what Goeff Hansen had said and they both answered many questions from our group.

Our last guest speaker was Amy Hawkins, Executive Director of Citizens for Traditional Values out of Lansing. Amy with the energy of youth was able to fire up our group as only a young vital sincere person can. She talked of the importance of networking and of getting involved at the local level.

She talked also of getting the youth involved. She told of the importance of getting people on the school boards. Amy tied in the networking idea with Ted's Census issue and suggested trying to get other Tea Parties involved also. Both Goeff and Amy alluded to the idea the we the people are the ones that need to do the heavy lifting.

These were the themes the Tea Party has been pushing since we started and they all seemed to come together last night through our speakers, membership and our new Hall.

Today the 7th, I went to a fundraiser for Representative Jon Bumstead in Pentwater. There were as many MEA picketers outside as people inside. Actually it was a nice turnout for both sides. I went outside and talked with a couple of the union people. They were nice enough however they didn't like my "Dump Debbie" button. I asked them who printed their nice signs, they didn't answer. Oh well you can't make everyone happy and talking of that. Mary Valentine was there passing around a petition -- ??? Is she running for something? the 91st again? I went to ask her, but she turned around and quickly walked away.

Below are some pictures from inside of the Bumstead fundraiser. The guest speaker was the young Jase Bolger who is the Speaker of the Mi. House. I came away knowing better why he is the speaker at such a young age. The man is sharp and quick on his feet. An asset to be sure and we will see him in the future of the Republican Party.
Senate Candidate Peter Konetchy was there along with his wife also and I had a chance to talk with him some more. Rumor has it that Andy Sebolt our own secretary of the Tea Party has become Mr. Konetchy's interim campaign manager. Good job Andy.

As I say one thing leads to another and the next week will be filled also with a meeting to flesh out what the OTP can do with Ted's Census issue and tomorrow I'm going to a fundraiser for Ray Franz who will have a favorite of mine as a speaker, Lt. Governor Brian Calley.

Then also on the 11th is my Township Meeting (Newfield) . There will be fireworks there I can feel it.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Why "Dump Debbie"

2011-06-27T08:00:00.000-07:00

Why Dump Debbie ???

After the fireworks of the 2010 elections I immediately got to thinking of ways for Republicans to recapture the US Senate. Beyond that I also hoped it was possible to try for a veto proof majority. At the time people didn’t pay much attention or scoffed, but I was used to it. By the middle of 2009 for example, I had a Boehner for speaker bumper sticker on my truck and talking about winning the Mi State House back.

It was last December that I started to think of a slogan to unseat Michigan’s incumbent Senator Debbie Stabenow. “Dump Debbie” was my pick. It is pretty simple and some may think crude; but as a private citizen I can get away with it; besides in the trenches cute doesn’t work. It does catch people’s eye and if they are not into politics they would ask me who was Debbie? thus starting the conversation.

I then had some buttons made up at a local business. So far I’ve had over 100 made and given out. They cost me $1.50 @, I do ask sometimes for donations. I have given some to members of 4 local Tea Parties and to members of 3 different County Republican Parties. Such luminaries as Pete Hoekstra, and Congressman Bill Huizenga have been seen in public wearing them. I also have given them to two of the current primary candidates seeking to replace Debbie.

Therefore it was heartening to see the linked article below from Newsmax about Larry Sabato a political scientist from W. Virginia stating the GOP could win the Senate and he even admitted the possibility of a veto proof majority. Michigan played in his figures for that.
-----link-----
http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/Senate-2012Elections-LarrySabato/2011/06/24/id/401317?s=al&promo_code=C81B-1
--------------
However, just as Republicans are finding out in the Presidential Primary race, the key ingredient for victory is to have a candidate that can put out a message that will resonate with the voters. To achieve that and what most candidates lack is a sense of believable enthusiasm and sincerity along with an unswerving set of core beliefs.

Getting back to picking a candidate to “Dump Debbie” I have seen and talked with three so far and I am not impressed enough to commit to any yet. Don’t get me wrong, they all had part of the equation but as of yet they all lacked the ability to stir the masses, i.e. they lacked that necessary enthusiasm. Of those three Peter Konetchy came the closest and may yet evolve into what I’m looking for.

Getting back to the Presidential Primary analogy, as Ann Coulter recently commented; she would vote for any of the Republicans over Obama. So too would I vote for anybody over Ms Stabenow. But in both what we need to win is a candidate that people WANT to vote and work and donate too. That is the difference between victory and defeat.

Here is a WSJ blog in Capitol Confidential by Peter Brown that buoyed my hopes shortly after I had the “Dump Debbie” buttons made.
-----link-----
http://blogs.wsj.com/capitaljournal/2011/02/23/odds-improve-for-gop-takeover-of-congress-in-2012/
--------------
This article gives better specifics on why the odds are so against the Democrats. As Mr. Brown points out, the Dems have twice as many seats up for grabs as do the Republicans and most of them are in the South or otherwise Republican leaning areas.

The key to the races in general is in my opinion, whether the voters that were responsible for the Conservative Wave of 2010 believe that the people they elected are doing what they put them into office to do. If they do they will be willing to put more of the same stripe into power, if not they won’t. Who are those people?

For all the talk and news of the Tea Party and constitutional fundamentalists, I think the majority of those independents simply saw a system that was falling apart from sheer “bigness” and wanted it fixed. Whether the actions of this current House do anything towards buttressing that thought will be the key.

This debt ceiling is one of the key votes coming up, because the average voter not only wants someone who will stick to his guns, but do it in a convincing manner and actually present something positive and creative. President Reagan did just that with a smile and people believed him – in record numbers.

As with all things, this is speculation and while it might look good on paper what it will take is a lot of hard work by a lot of people in the trenches and a lot of money. It is rumored that Debbie has 4-5 million in the bank. If a candidate can fire up the masses that can be overcome. Think about it, what is the money for? To buy votes in effect with state wide adds on TV and Radio. There are plenty of examples of grass roots activity short circuiting the “big Money” process.

It goes back to the same old two questions. “What am I willing to do today?” and “Why”. If all the people of “We the People” can answer those questions, then we will have the tools necessary to bring America back to the Land of Opportunity and the Shining City on a Hill, President Reagan talked about.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative

Remember ! ! ! !

2011-06-04T05:54:00.000-07:00

“Remember!!!”

As a Star Trek fan, that is what Spock secretly told McCoy as he was dying of radiation poisoning after saving the Star ship Enterprise. Because of that memory, like a phoenix Spock was able to rise again.

Enter Ralph Reed. Remember??? The early 1990’s and the Christian Coalition? Remember Ronald Reagan winning the Presidential nomination and the actual Presidency? That victory for conservatives was made possible through Reed’s efforts at bringing together the different groups of conservatives. In short he built a winning coalition.

Well like the Phoenix Ralph Reed is back and doing some more coalition building which he is so good at. This time he is trying to meld the Christian Evangelicals with the Tea Partiers.

The Tea Party Groups have in the past shied away for the most part from being outright Religious. The Tea Party individual members however for the most part are religious if not “Evangelically” so.

I Remember also the great effect the Tea Party had in influencing the 2008 elections. As a Tea Party member of long standing I also remember how hard it was to even get a small percentage of our groups and members motivated enough to actually get out and do the leg work needed to win elections. This difficulty was due of course to human nature but specifically it was due to the Tea Party’s lack of an overall command structure.

That structure is what Reed provided in the 90’s with the Christian Coalition and is trying to put forth again with his “Faith and Freedom” coalition.

And he is doing it on a grand scale as the link below shows. Ralph Reed is doing what he is good at and that is organizing large events but beyond that he is doing what he loves and that is gathering disparate groups and building a coalition to combat a specific enemy at a specific time. This time it will be to put into office a new President and elect a new Senate.

-----link-----
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/religion/Republican-Candidates-Appeal-to-Religious-Conservatives-123143963.html
--------------

What stood out to me in that article was how Grover Norquist a leader of the Anti-Tax fiscally conservative branch,a decided secularist; praised "Faith and Freedom" and Ralph Reed. He is also a leader in the field of coalition building. (In fact I copied his idea when I started the "Cozy Conservative Corner").

When I see Norquist giving praise to a “rival”, I was impressed. I realize if you read Grover’s quote “between the lines” it may be a little tongue in cheek, but what he realized and knows is one thing. The Conservative movement needs a hard core organized group to gather as many similarly minded voters together to actually vote.

Mr. Norquist would agree as would most that the Conservatives need an organized group to provide direction and foot soldiers to combat what the Liberals have built in their coalition. Namely the organizational strength of the Unions. The Liberals have bribed, cajoled and outright “thugged” the unions (especially the Public Unions) into being a direct arm for the Democrat party providing money and foot soldiers come election time. As Grover Norquist said {“Faith and Freedom is probably the most important one because what it does is it turns out votes,”}.

The Christian Evangelicals represent the closest thing the Conservatives have to fight this. I hope we are wise enough to gather together NOW before the primary to be sure we get a good candidate and either way gather to fight against the current menace.

The Evangelicals unlike other more “sedate” religious groups are unafraid to be politically incorrect. They are organized. In my stint trying to build coalitions with some great Godly Christian groups such as Pregnancy Centers and some church leaders of the major denominations, they are too afraid to alienate the people in charge because they might lose their tax exempt status to outright say what they believe politically. The same is true with most large organizations. Even the Chamber seems to have succumbed to the financial thuggery of the Left. The Evangelicals are not afraid.

That fearlessness alone make them a good fit with Tea Party People. Their organizational history and experience put together with the Tea Party desires and hopes can be a major factor in changing the course of this country.

As Grover Norquist in his book “Leave Us Alone” so eloquently put it; this country was created to keep government intrusion into our lives at a minimum and our individual freedom to choose at a maximum. That includes the freedom to worship.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.

PS More links to the Faith and Freedom event.
-----link-----
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=0&oq=Faith+and+Freedom+&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GGHP_enUS425US425&q=faith+and+freedom+coalition#q=faith+and+freedom+coalition&hl=en&rlz=1T4GGHP_enUS425US425&prmd=ivnsu&source=univ&tbm=nws&tbo=u&sa=X&ei=MhfqTZfmKcLqgQfCvqjXCQ&ved=0CDcQqAI&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=79442dcab0ef0c23&biw=779&bih=330
----------------

Leave us alone
http://www.amazon.com/Leave-Us-Alone-Getting-Governments/dp/B003H4RBIU/ref=tmm_pap_title_popover

One Thing Leads to Another

2011-05-30T11:12:00.000-07:00

(click on all pics to enlarge)
As I get more and more accustomed to a more rural life style, I find a continuing thread in the purpose behind what I’m doing. When I started blogging and getting into politics I wrote at the time that I was meeting neighbors and finding community activities that until then I didn’t even know existed.

I started to go out every day and prowl my neighborhood (Precinct) and one thing would naturally lead to another. Pretty soon I was interviewing for my blog local start up businesses and stopping to talk with neighbors in my precinct. I was coming out of my, self styled cocoon. What I realize better with hindsight is that I was breaking free of the “reality show mentality”.

Let me explain about that term. I’ve moved out to the country and live in the middle of 20 wooded acres. To this day and especially in the beginning I would be out in the yard and always looking up to see who was passing by or who was watching me. There was no one of course but out of habit I would still look around. As I fix my yard and garden etc someplace in those calculations there is the thought, what the neighbors will think. Just to reiterate, I can’t see my neighbors and they can’t see me. I live at the end of a winding 700 foot driveway.

To the point, I still feel sometimes like I’m in a “Reality Show”. I still spend a lot of time in front of a 60” computer monitor doing my blog and putting out a newsletter and a weekly “Cozy Conservative Corner”. On top of that I’m still a Netflix junkie and record at least one movie a day. I admit it I’m still an alternative reality junkie.

I came across the article below about Nicholas Carr (no relation) about how the internet may be causing a lack of concentration in people.
-----link-----
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.92e49cb93f1c7fc4348116d5ec926d79.2f1&show_article=1
--------------
I not only agree but now better understand that how during the last 6 years of my life; I have been trying to prevent just that. Also in my previous blogs I have said that I believed we were not any smarter today than we were as a people than the ancient Greeks – just more factoid filled. I’ve written about time and the relation to us as a person and a people. Before I get all philosophical let me just suffice it to say that Time is not the enemy any more than the fact that we have to breathe is. It is something that just is – something we live with.

Because time is finite, I found that if I used my time on doing one thing instead of 10, I would actually get things done and get them done better and more efficiently. More to the point if I did that in the real world vs. on the internet, things (real things that mattered) would get done.

I would add to Mr. Carr’s book that along with destroying our concentration, the internet world is taking away our sense of righteousness. The righteousness and contentment we feel when we actually do things and not just think them. I still use and extol the virtues of the internet but I do so because of the fantastic communication and research tool it is. I find that when I combine the internet with a hands on project I get a deeper feeling of accomplishment that if I just used the internet.

The sun is shining and spring has sprung. I roto- tilled my garden yesterday and today I need to buy some string and start planting. While I’m in town buying string, I’ll keep checking out my new neighborhood.

Just a side note. As I was looking around for a possible new place to hold our new Oceana Tea Party meetings I ran across the Hart Historic Preservation Group which is a private group building a Historic District. They have several buildings of a historic nature. Some were there others they moved there such as a period Church and a one room school house (see picture above). The main building below has been turned into the museum. Several displays have been created and are pretty well done and interesting.

In my questioning about the cost and the physical aspects of the place for our meetings, I was told they were having a meeting of their board the next day following a work bee that started at 4pm. I showed up and ended up washing the windows inside and out of the one room school house. We then had a pot luck dinner for free and then I made my pitch and answered questions then left.

As I write this I realize how hard it is to say the feeling of accomplishment that effort gave to me by just doing the windows, much less the sense of thankfulness when the board decided we could hold our meetings there at a reduced rate.

I say all this because it is important for me to see that what I do in the internet world is given meaning only if through that help something gets accomplished in the real world. This I feel is good advice for me not only as an individual (it helps me exercise my individual freedom) but for groups like the Tea Party and political parties, as it gives us a chance to put our money where our mouth is.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

PS. While in Hart getting that string I stopped at La Fiesta for a half order of Nachos with beef and shredded cheese. I was astounded by the size of that half order.
(Click on any picture to enlarge)

Also my timing couldn’t have been better. While sitting there eating this Mt. Everest of Nachos along came the Hart Memorial Day Parade. Below are pics. As I said one thing leads to another and on and on. It all start with the question. What Can I Do Today?

As I went in to finish my Nacho, I took this picture out the window which sums the hour up nicely.

Again, Regards - Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

“The Undefeated” -- Palin ??? “You Betcha”

2011-05-25T09:48:00.000-07:00

“The Undefeated” -- Palin ??? “You Betcha”

Real Clear Politics published an article by Scott Conroy reviewing a recent film by film maker Stephen K. Bannon entitled “The Undefeated”. Filmmaker Bannon’s credits include the Ronald Reagan based “In The Face of Evil” and Tea Party bio “Generation Zero”.

-----link-----
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2011/05/25/palins_secret_weapon_new_film_to_premiere_in_june_109949.html
---------------

The film is a done deal and set for release in June.

The making of this film in my eyes should let everyone know that Sarah Palin will be soon joining the cast of contenders for the GOP Presidential nomination frenzy. Conroy’s article in Real Clear Politics points this out as evidence along with the fact that Sarah and Scott bought a house in Arizona plus the factoid that their daughter Bristol also bought one there.

The timing of the release coupled with the fact of it being premiered in Iowa of course seem to leave little doubt of the purpose of this film.

Also of little doubt is the fact that I have always considered Palin to be my first choice for President. In fact in a poll of our local conservative breakfast group 6 months ago I picked a Palin/Christie ticket as my dream pair to beat Obama/Biden.
****

I too agree with the making of movies supporting conservative ideas and candidates. I have been a big proponent of those trying to get conservative thought into main stream media through at first with think tanks and talk radio then blogging then facebook, twitter and websites and later the momentum building through PJTV and Andrew Breitbart’s Big Hollywood then into the more mainstream venues such as music, TV and movies. Now with Fox news giving the process a supercharge, we are off and running. We (conservatives) have made it into the main stream public awareness.

For the Palin movie to be a success it needs to be put out as widely as possible, perhaps even cable but for sure on Netflix etc so the Tea Party along with other Conservative groups can take advantage of it.

The role of the Tea Party is mixed in with the cause and effect of all this conservative ascendency. As was the role of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party in the 2010 elections. The Tea Party was a coalition of the old Reagan “three legged stool”.

I must say here that I when I look at the GOP Primary choices I also see a portrait of the GOP in general. There is a fight within the Party. The Elite represented by Romney and now Huntsman and Giuliani which also included Mitch Daniels until he bowed out leaves the rest of the field in most ways sounding like Tea Party supporters in one way or the other. (Palin, Bachman and the born again Reaganesq Pawlenty, plus all the rest.)

As I look at the GOP County parties, I see the majority of them in Michigan where I live as being heavily influenced by the Tea Party “ethic”. That ethic includes for the most part what the Republican Party used to stand for. Things like smaller government, fiscal responsibility, and traditional values.

What this country needs and what I am doing all I can to accomplish in the national 2012 election is to win back the Presidency and the Senate while keeping the House; in short to win a governing majority.

If the elites win then they will have the mechanism of their party to try to win in 2012 but may lose the ground troops that helped them to such a success in 2010 and run a chance of losing the ground gained in 2010 with the Tea Partiers. If the Tea Party side of this battle wins, then they will have the ground troops but still lack the mechanism of a national party. What we need to do is what Reagan did by constructing the three legs of conservative thought into a stable “three legged stool” upon which he stood to win landslide elections. Douglass V. Gibbs in “Political Pistachio” in critiquing this “stool” struck a truth by pointing out the following.
-----quote-----
Reagan's policies were built on three ideas; free enterprise, strong defense, and pro-family social policies. He chose these three because they, of course, reflected his own values, but he also realized that each of these ideas have enormous appeal on their own. I was attracted to the conservative philosophy as a young Christian and noticed that Reagan's philosophy was very strong when it came to traditional family values. Over the last few decades, economics have become my passion and expertise, but it started with a concern in culture (and this remains important to me)
---------------
Link for the above.
-----link-----
http://politicalpistachio.blogspot.com/2011/02/reagans-three-legged-stool-has-become.html
--------------

The key in the Pistachio quote to me is that free enterprise and strong defense are based and can only be run successfully on family/social policies. For too long we have as a nation been ignoring the moral beliefs of our heartland as we focused on dollars and very little “common” cents.

Without ethics and morals free enterprise lacks roots. You could say free enterprise’s roots are the morals we use to keep it working. Look at the recent breakdown in the cities in restaurants, and stores. (People being beat up and killed because they couldn’t wait in line. You’ve seen the pictures.)

I just feel that the Tea Party is built by people that see this need in our society to get back to the basic ethics of self reliance and individual freedom this country was founded on, where freedom and respect were earned.

As this primary battle continues, the infighting has a chance to become bloody. The biggest chance for damage is within the “conservative” wing of the party. When we throw Ron Paul and Herman Cain into the mix we may see some fireworks. Indeed there have been casualties so far; Gingrich, Huckabee, Barbour, Daniels and of course “The Donald”. At one point there were 15 possibles. Within the Tea Party alone there are still 4-5.

The liberal wing of the GOP however may also see some bloodletting. Rudi Giuliani seems to be going full throttle for an early NH primary win against Mitt Romney.
-----link-----
http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2011/05/24/giuliani-aiming-to-take-down-romney-in-new-hampshire
--------------
Don’t get me wrong. I love primaries even if they are bloody. Primaries are the only chance for new ideas and leaders to come along. The primaries capture the minds and hearts of the bases for the candidates the trick is to keep them fired up and get them united as Reagan did. Whether Sarah Palin or anyone can pull it off is yet to be seen.

Hopefully Obama and his followers will see it as an excuse not to organize and work as hard as last time. (BUT I Doubt it)

What we need to do is never lose sight of is how bad it is now and why. Whoever wins the GOP nomination we will be far better off than what we have now.

Palin’s quote from Thomas Pain seems apropos here.
“If there be trouble, let it be in my day that my child may have peace,…”We will see if it still resonates.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Dump Debbie

2011-05-08T08:25:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday 5/5/11 Terri Lynn Land made it public that she is not going to run against Debbie Stabenow in 2012. Her reason was that she felt the GOP from the top down wasn’t energized enough to help her win.
-----link-----
http://www.mlive.com/newsflash/index.ssf/story/land-chides-gop-inaction-against-us-sen/3b1fbc66bac241089481eaa9a055faf7
--------------
I agree with her on that assumption.

We need to focus on one thing.

In the last presidential election before the advent of the Tea Party, (2008) it was clear beyond a shadow of a doubt that the GOP had become a thoroughly top heavy institution made up of political consultants and graph makers who had no idea what was on the minds of the electorate. I for example volunteered at a Fix Mi. center (40 hours a week) and was inundated with memos that were never followed through on. These memos and the people who wrote them had no idea of how to get people involved beyond the corporate hierarchy. The main goal of these pencil pushers was how to get the most money out of the voters they had left.

The 2006 elections should have been a warning to them; but it wasn’t as they merrily went their way to nearly total self annihilation in the 2008 election.

Previously the Dems realized their mistake in 2004 and before and finally remembered the voters. Their biggest drive became rebuilding their base. I remember in the 2008 election I served as a poll challenger, I lived in Muskegon then. I had virtually no training and definitely no material. In my precinct in Muskegon I sat next to a Dem poll challenger who had a one inch thick manual for what to do in a given situation. She was young and also a lawyer, she was from Grand Rapids. She kept in touch through her cell phone with the Democrat HQ as to what was going on how the totals were going etc.

While I understand that the role of the poll challenger may not be all that important in the individual case, in the big picture it helps illustrates the differing approaches the two parties took towards the election.

With the advent of the Tea Party and a lot of GOPers “defecting” to them; the State GOP Party started making overtures to the Tea Party. By this time however the Tea Party was off and running with or without the GOP. They were willing to vote the candidate not necessarily the party. I remember bringing some new recruits to a County Republican meeting and after they asked me why I brought them. There was minimal effort to welcome them and absolutely no effort to get them involved. The Tea Party was built from those people.

At first the GOP tried to sweet talk then take over the Tea Party, but they failed. The autonomous bottom up nature of the local Tea Parties made sure of that. Luckily for the GOP their stated positions were closer to the Tea Party than the positions of the Dems, so most of the Tea Partiers voted Republican in 2010.
That is the help that Terri Lynn was looking for. She perhaps was looking in the wrong place.

The problem with the GOP was that the chart makers and graphic doodlers took the 2010election to mean that the Tea Party people were theirs. The GOP leadership assumed that since the 2010 election went overwhelmingly Republican, there was no need for reaching out further to, and more importantly changing their positions because of the Tea Party. They in effect took all the credit for the 2010 election. They believed it was because of their use of the same old same old tactics.

Here I have to give credit to some of the new class of legislators who are trying to stand tall on their principles. It seems it is still the GOP Leadership and not the newly elected officials trying to distance themselves from the Tea Party.

This attitude was carried on by the local GOP as well with some exceptions. Very few of the GOP local county parties didn’t have to be dragged to a more bottom up approach to politics. The ones that were the worst ironically were the ones who were closest to the inner cities. They were overwhelmed by the opposition and perhaps out of self defense they had become insulated against popular newer views. What they had forgotten was that the Republican Party was founded on freeing the slaves. They forgot that President Lincoln was the first Republican President. They forgot their party was founded upon new ideas and the conflict that entails. They forgot that real freedom comes from less government. They forgot that to create freedom you have to teach people how to fish – not give them fishes.

Sure the GOPer leadership knew the above clichés, they would spout them out when talking to the masses, but they didn’t mean it, that's not where the money went. To borrow another cliché, they didn’t walk the walk. The masses figured it out and after giving them all the mechanics of government in the nineties, the voters took away the GOP majorities. The Dems took advantage of this by waking up and shifting their emphasis towards their base and the independent voters. They did this by getting them involved. Simply by making sure that if people wanted to get involved they would have something to do.

How did they do that? They came up with seemingly inconsequential things that got people involved such as the poll challenger programs, neighborhood BBQs, block parties. As their new President would later say, People need some skin in the game. They actually funded these things. They did and funded petition drives and actually paid people by how many signatures they got. They had registration drives again paying per sign up. Sure they paid consultants and the majority of the money came from big donors; but still the emphasis was always towards the little guy, the voter.

Sure the GOP leadership went after the big donors too, they just forgot to get us "We the People" involved.

Think about it. What is all the money for? --- Buying ways to get votes.

The voters are people.

Think about it.

What will sway your vote? A 30 second radio add county wide or 4or5 BBQs the same money will buy? I realize that both are needed; but we need to shift the focus back to the people and just use the pencil pushers to facilitate our efforts not to direct them. The leadership has to do it.

Now about Debbie and doing something about her. In the middle of November shortly after the election, I realized what needed doing next. Dump Debbie! I knew the GOP wouldn’t be so bold so I took it upon myself and had some Dump Debbie buttons made up locally.

A friend and local Tea Partier and GOPer came up with this pic. Hat tip To Susie

This was done by two people without funding. I’m not asking for anything either I’m just asking why isn’t the Party having more local generic local stuff. Give all the possible candidates a chance and a forum to interact with the voters. What about a Dump Debbie picnic. Or a Dump Debbie forum/dinner. With funding we could entice people other than the same old base and candidate workers that usually show up.

I remember the Precicnt Delegate meeting the GOP had that was also promoted through the Tea Party and an overflow of people showed up. Normally we never fill the slots, we still didn’t but we did need to have a ballot for the slots we did fill. That was the first time in memory. That is what I’m talking about. People wanted to do something, here it was and they flocked to it. This was something the State and local Party put on. It worked. The funding was small and the results were huge. The same thing happened at the state convention. This time however the State Party was not prepared. Now they seem again to have forgotten how that last election was won.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Let Us Keep a Difference between Them and Us

2011-05-03T09:51:00.000-07:00

Yesterday A piece of Evil was removed from the world.

We all know what that was, everyone and his brother is commenting on it, I won’t add to that cacophony of noise.

I will only echo Mayor Guillianie’s sentiment when confronted by Sean Hannity’s criticism of how we buried Osama Bin Laden at sea in a manner reflecting his religion. I agree with the Mayor that there is a difference between us and them. We stood tall in full view and will be judged by the mentally coherent by our deeds not our rhetoric.

I will also not take heed of those who are mentally incoherent in my decision making process.

So it goes with politics, the Conservatives have always tried to win the arguments and for the most part have; therefore the Liberals have usually tried to co/opt our slogans and manipulated them for their own purposes. Those purposes are usually diametrically opposed to what they are actually attempting to do.

The Conservatives have changed the dialogue of the upcoming political struggle about individual freedom. The Left has tried to co/opt the freedom issue. Their idea of freedom however has to do with the freedom of groups (such as unions) and their members instead of the freedom of the individual irrespective of what group he or she is in.

For those of you in Rio Linda, I want the freedom to live my life whatever race, color or creed I belong to. I want that individual freedom whether I belong to a union or not, whether I live in a rural area or the city, whether I make $5,000 a year or $500,000.

In a shameful display of Liberal rhetoric, Democrat Sen. Ben Nelson tried to frame the killing of Osama Bin Laden as an example of somehow dovetailing into his opposition to voter ID in Florida.

David Catanese writing for Politico wrote about it.
-----link-----
http://www.politico.com/blogs/davidcatanese/0511/Nelson_ties_bin_Laden_operation_to_voting_bill.html?showall
--------------

The shameless use of Bin Laden’s death by this Liberal makes me wonder to what extremes they would have gone if for example Pres. Bush had sent an assassination team into Pakistan to do what Pres. Obama just did.

Well I’ll leave that to your imagination. I’m surprised the Left hasn’t been up in arms about this yet. After the many things Pres. Obama has done contrary to what he said he’d do and contrary to what his extreme Left thought he’d do, I’m surprised they aren’t burning him in effigy as they so happily did to then Pres. Bush.

Here is my point. I think the Right is different than the Left. I refuse to hang anyone if effigy, if it needs doing then it will get done, and let people judge by my actions. I will refuse to use such a brutally necessary thing for such shallow political ends.

That end such as the “Right to Vote” argument Sen. Nelson is using is a pretty big reach even on the face of it without the whole Bin Laden tie in.

In Mi. for example the Sec. of State, Ruth Johnson has reported Mi voters registered in record numbers. In fact 102% of the eligible voters registered.

This is where the real “Right to Vote” battle is being fought. That is where Ruth Johnson is trying to close the loopholes that keep out multiple votes being cast by the same person, denying my right to vote.

This is where Conservatives like Ruth Johnson are different from Ben Nelson.

I’m happy with that difference.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Vote Run Get Involved, Get Informed -- It's our Job - We (are) The People

2011-04-27T09:23:00.000-07:00

Voter info on local elections,
School boards to County Commissioners.

1. Be sure you are registered for the upcoming elections.
Upcoming May 3rd school Elections from SOS Mi. Ruth Johnson http://www.michigan.gov/documents/sos/May_3-11_Elec_Jurisdictions2_348976_7.pdf May 3rd elections in Oceana County. If you are not registered for this election it is too late, the deadlines to register are usually 30 days before the elections. BE SURE TO VOTE if you are registered. Get registered NOW for the next elections.

Get info. to register here. http://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,1607,7-127-1633_8716_8726_47669---,00.html
Get registered on-line here. http://www.michigan.gov/documents/MIVoterRegistration_97046_7.pdf

Oceana County
a. Hart City
b. Hart Public Schools
c. Hesperia Community Schools
d. Holton Public Schools
e. Mason County Central Schools
f. Montague Area Public Schools
g. Pentwater Public Schools
h. Shelby Public Schools
i. Walkerville Public Schools
j. West Shore Community College

Below is a link to the above elections with candidates provided by The Oceana County Clerk Rebecca J. Griffin at the Oceana County Clerk’s website.

http://www.oceana.mi.us/clerk/viewelections.php

To find out where you vote (your precinct polling place) and if you are registered use this link from the Sec. of State Website. This will tell you what the next election in your precinct is for and show you a sample ballot specific to you and where you live.
https://webapps.sos.state.mi.us/mivote/

2. Upcoming election dates and deadlines by which you must be registered in order to vote. Here is a link to the info below. http://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,1607,7-127-1633_8716-184977--,00.html

July 5, 2011: Last day to register for August 2, 2011 Election
August 15, 2011: Last day to register for September 13, 2011 village election
October 11, 2011: Last day to register for November 8, 2011 election

Do You want to run for office? Here’s How.

General information.
First you should pick a race you would like to enter.

Every person lives in a certain precinct which is the smallest political geographic area. Each “district” is made up of at least one Precinct. You can choose to run for the School board, Township board, County Board, and a host of other elected offices as long as you live in that “District”.

The best thing to do is to get to know your County or Township Clerk, they will help you the most. If for whatever reason one doesn’t the other will. For the most part they will guide you through the process.

Another thing to keep in mind is that elections and the whole process of becoming a candidate has specific things to do and they are all time sensitive. There is a strict time line to accomplish each task along the way.

The first thing to do after choosing which office you feel you would be best at is to file an “Affidavit of Identity and receipt of Filing”. http://www.mi.gov/documents/ED104_Aff_ID_Fil_Rec_Vendor_83725_7.pdf

There are a couple of specific Affidavits of Identity I’ll list below but for most of the elected offices the above affidavit is what you want.

PRECINCT DELEGATE
AFFIDAVIT OF IDENTITY AND RECEIPT OF FILING
http://www.mi.gov/documents/Aff-ID_Precnt_139901_7.pdf

SCHOOL BOARD CANDIDATE
AFFIDAVIT OF IDENTITY AND RECEIPT OF FILING
http://www.mi.gov/documents/Aff_ID_Filing_Recpt_School_151435_7.pdf

Keep in mind that there are campaign finance laws. However there are exemptions see link below. Once you click on this link the exemptions are listed near the bottom of the page. They include Precinct Delegates also School Boards if enrollment is less than 2,400. However neither candidate if they spend over $1,000 for their campaign will qualify for that exemption.
http://www.mi.gov/documents/Aff_ID_Filing_Recpt_School_151435_7.pdf

Also you must file a petition with the required amount of signatures. Not to worry however, the numbers are small. For all the local races the # is between 6 and 20 signatures. If you want you can pay a non refundable charge of $100 in lieu of the signatures. Here is the link http://www.michigan.gov/documents/sos/Pet_Sig_Req_Chart_2012_Population_346127_7.pdf

All of these filing actions have deadlines. Next is a link that shows you the deadlines. This link has two information boxes; the first has the affidavits and the second has the deadlines. http://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,1607,7-127-1633_8721_11839---,00.html

There are more elections than you may think. Village elections for example are coming up this Sept. See link below for all the deadlines for and dates of the 2011 elections.
http://www.michigan.gov/sos/0,1607,7-127-1633_48760---,00.html

I will post later about actually running for one of the hundred odd township,village,city and county boards.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Army of Davids or How the Mighty Fall

2011-04-24T07:25:00.000-07:00

The Tea Party needs to focus. As always that focus is elections and it is through education that The Tea Party has effected elections. It has made use of the new media and has served as a platform through which conservatives can share and spread knowledge and through which action can be taken.

The Movement is not funded by Big Labor or Big Oil or Big Business or even Big Political Parties; at least not where I hang out. In my neck of the woods for example, we are trying to move our monthly meeting from a place that charges $25 to one where we can assemble for free; nor do we charge for membership or attendance. As “self-organizing” organizations each individual Tea Party group is free to go its own way. With this in mind, the effect we had on the last election was all the more outrageously incomprehensible in its extent when compared to all the high paid pencil pushers and graph makers of normal politics.

Why or how is this, possible? The answer is simple. We gather the people first then organize a plan around their desires. We put the People first. That is the common sense approach we use and the “Political Consultants” don’t, but it’s harder. Implementing a plan is always harder than putting one down on paper. To do that, one has to leave the cubicle in an office building in DC and go to a rotary meeting in some out of the way place nobody ever heard of.

The people that make up the Tea Party are already there at the Rotary, they are its members. The same is true in politics

I’m trying to get our group in Oceana County Mi. to go the way of getting involved in local governments. Others in the Tea Party Movement whom I know and communicate with always give this involvement lip service but for the most part fail to follow up with anything concrete to make it happen. Again, -- it is hard work.

This is a simple common sense attitude, absolutely necessary to have in place if you expect any endeavor to be successful. Rudely put; it’s the People Stupid.

No plan works without recruiting the people to carry it out. As one of my favorite quotes go. “Unless a decision has “degenerated into work” it is not a decision; it is at best a good intention” Peter F Drucker, “The Effective Executive” pp114 Harper Collins paperback edition, 2006.

What caught my attention in that quote was the ironic use of the phrase “Degenerated into work”. Drucker captured the disdain in which planners hold for the actual act of making one of their plans work. Especially implied is the disdain for those doing the work. (Lesser mortals). All planners (myself included) fall into that trap. Simply put the plan becomes more important than those working the plan.

The Tea Parties work when that is understood. When it isn’t they just become another bureaucratic organization. We must beever vigilant in this.

I once sat in on a “strategic planning session” of a large Tea Party trying to become a regional affair covering a larger area and made up of several individual groups. The plan was well thought out and very impressive. There were over 150 positions and volunteer slots that needed to be filled. The meeting lasted a few hours with power point and all. I drove 50 miles to attend. At one point I simply asked how many people actually attended their meetings and they claimed about 50. I didn’t say anymore. But I bemoaned the wasted effort.

I did think and reflect however that the behemoth which we call “the government” got that way out of the best of intentions and was thought out by planners with impeccable credentials.

On paper it was all great. In reality, just like any Ponzi plan they always fail. That is precisely what most of those who gravitate to the Tea Party understand instinctively and the thing they want to change. That is what fires our engines-that is something we need always to keep in mind.

Part of our local group’s mission statement states; “To influence policy and effect the election of government officials…”

I think it time to start to influence local elections. That is where people feel the effects first from the people they elect. The land owner first feels it in the property taxes they pay or the condition of the roads they drive on or the many other services their tax dollars pay for. I will be trying to do this at our next Tea Party meeting. We missed the May 3rd school boards but we could do a lot to get ready for the next ones. This is a trickle up type of thing. As we continually see in the news, real power exerted from the many on the bottom prevails over the dictates from a few at the top.

Some will say that this is the wrong way that we should concentrate on the “Big Races”. I say we can do both, but the system will not be really changed until it is demanded from the Bottom Up. For example the Michigan Secretary of State is more likely to listen to her county clerks who will listen to all their (township, village and city) clerks than they are likely to read a bunch of emails.

George Will wrote the following snippet in the Jewish World Review April 21st. He was talking about local school boards.
Unfortunately, the stubborn fact is that local control means control by the teachers unions. Most school boards are elected, often in stand-alone elections in which turnout is low and the unions' organization prevails. This, Kline says, "is exactly the conversation I'm having with my new members." He notes that in Minnesota, since school board elections were moved to regular election days, some people not supported by the unions have won.
-----link-----
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will042111.php3
--------------

Two keys in Mr. Will’s quote.

One is that by having school board elections in an off year “stand alone” setting there is a low turnout and that the school unions have (at least in the past) easily carried the day. That logic has proved true; however that was before the Tea Party. If the local Tea Partiers can focus and put their full weight behind each individual school board election and run some “good” candidates this perceived negative could be turned into an opportunity.

The second key within the quote also suggests this flaw can be changed by moving the elections to “regular” election days. Before that is tried however we should try to take advantage of this hidden opportunity. We would have the advantage of surprise on our side. If we started to prove successful, the unions might want to move them back to the regular election times for us.

This is something we can do now and at a cost we can afford. Neither is this something school board specific. In the 2012 election there will be a multitude of local positions (township, city, village and county offices) up for grabs.

The time is now, the job is focus.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

A Cold Wind With a Warm Heart

2011-04-17T05:46:00.000-07:00

(Click on pictures to enlarge)
It was cold and the wind blowing off Hart Lake gusting onto Veteran's Park made it a bitter cold. A group of Oceana citizens braved the elements and marched from the Courthouse "carrying flags and carrying signs which mostly said hooray for our side." (Forgive me Bob Dylan).

Those citizens of course were members or friends of the Oceana Tea Party and they brought warmth to each other’s hearts in this March and this Rally. They braved the elements to show their strength of resolve in their beliefs in American exceptionalism. The speakers reminded us all that America and it's free people are what made America the envy of the world. It is simply up to us to keep it so.

We had some bright spots. Rebecca Wentzloff made a banner for us. Not just any banner either. This was a handmade quilt. A lot of work and love went into that, I should keep that in mind. I wish we had a better picture of it but this will have to do. We will proudly have this banner at our meetings to come.

BTW LOL Our next meeting is May 4th at the Golden Township Hall 5527 Fox Rd. Mears. 7pm.

At the Rally I gave a few words then Andrew Sebolt talked of Honor and other virtues which need to be behind all we do as a country. Larry Loree our guest speaker and Vietnam Veteran brought Honor front and center in his speech. As a Vietnam vet he knew well what honor meant and how without it men and women fail to do courageous things. His talk reminded us that courageous things need yet to be done.

State Representative Jon Bumstead ended the speach making part of the program. Mr. Bumstead tied it all together by speaking of citizen involvement and how that effort needs to be made and will help hasten change.

By then we were all freezing and ready to take off but we hung around for the last part of the event. Just as in the old tales, we threw a box of Tea into the lake. To keep the over zealous EPA off our backs, we tied a rope to it and the Box was empty. Oh well the life we live in.

Then we all skedaddled for the warmth and fellowship and gooe eats at Hart Pizza just across the Lake.

All told everyone seemed pleased with the results. Lots of things were talked of over Pizza such as Windmills, Booths in the County Fair, floats in the Asparagus Parade, Debbie Stabenow and some possible opponents to dethrone her like Peter Konetchy or Rob Steele. Pete we learned has bowed out.

Life goes on. But I was reminded by this day that life is indeed what we chose to make it.

And I was warmed.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Big Fun in Lansing

2011-04-15T04:09:00.000-07:00

Five of us from the Oceana Tea Party carpooled yesterday to the "Keep Them Honest"/Tea Party Rally in Lansing. We had a great time and were energized for our Tax Day Tea Party Rally in Hart later today.(4:30 Fri. at Court House then a march to Veterns Park).

Luckily Senator Goeff Hansen and Representative Jon Bumstead were also getting out of session and were able to give us a guided tour of the Senate and House Chambers, before the rally started. Representative Holly Hughes from Muskegon's 91st district made an appearance also.

The speakers were all good. Ruth Johnson, Bill Schuete, Rev.Yulie, Herman Cain, Dick Morris, Kyle Olson, and Scott Haggerstrom. As far as I know, Herman Cain broke the news that he was forming an exploratory committee for his candidacy for the President of the US.

After the rally look who we saw walking down the street. As I was a "Ruth Captain" and Andy Sebolt who was with me was the Secretary of States "Secret Shopper"
We had a nice chat. Barb VanderVeen, Ruth's assistant was with her. It was nice to see Barb again.

This is a pic of a Mother and Daughter and their signs. I doesn't get any better than this.

Not to forget, below is a pic from our last Tues. Cozy Conservative Corner weekly breakfast we have every week Tuesday at 8am at LaFiesta in Hart.

Finally I took this at my old haunt in Muskegon. Morning Bear (sitting down)along with some others has started getting the raised garden beds ready for planting at our Community Garden.

Some things and people I do miss in Muskegon.
But then again I'm happy visiting. LOL

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Mother Nature

2011-04-05T09:43:00.000-07:00

What a Difference a Day makes.

Mother Nature proved she was in charge the last couple of weeks. I had been marking the disappearance of the Ice/snow cover every morning as I woke up. Finally Sunday morning the basic cover was gone. Just a few spots remained in the heavily shaded places.

I sat at my console and as I did my daily computer stuff, all of a sudden out of my window I noticed some light snow. Within 5 minutes there was a heavy snow and 10 minutes after that it was nearly a “white out”. I must say sitting in my lazy boy it was a beautiful “white out”. The flakes were huge and I noticed the trees were all getting covered. Within an hour we had at least 2 inches on everything.

The pics below show how in my neck of the woods Mother Nature can take a beautiful spring day without snow cover and send us straight back to the dead of winter within an hour’s time.

Let us not forget a week and a half earlier Mother Nature laid a one inch coating of ice then more snow on what was previously a snow free land. The Ice as you remember was on everything including the roads.

After the pics above Mother Nature must have thought better of her belated April Fools joke and rose up in her might and gave us a 40 degree night through which she blew up a terrifying nonstop, continuous spate of lighting and thunder. I had never heard such nonstop thunder. I guess in Mother Nature’s defense she needed that cacophony of light and sound to unleash the torrential downpour and later the steady rain that eventually negated her previous snowy tantrum.

As I drove to Hart this morning for the 22nd meeting of the Cozy Conservative Corner, I was happy to see the snow was gone, the sun pop back out and the nicer face of Mother Nature revealed. It looked and felt terrific.

At our Conservative breakfast at LaFiesta Greg Van Woerkom representing Congressman Huizenga was there along with the regular crew. However I did miss Al Doctor and Barb V; she rescheduled for May 3rd.

After the breakfast Andy Sebolt and I picked up some extra chairs he had for our Oceana Tea Party meeting coming up Wed. night 7pm. Last night State Representative Jon Bumstead called and confirmed that he would come and speak at this our 2nd Tea Party meeting. I was happy; the other Tea Party folk who were at the breakfast thought it was good news too.

Andy then introduced me around at the Pink Elephant restaurant just up the street from LaFiesta where some Republicans gather. Earlier Juanita Pierman, at the Conservative breakfast told us of an organizational meeting talking place later today in Shelby at the Brown Bear to set up a fundraiser for Goeff Hansen’s son Collin’s son’s education. I plan on going.

Then as Andy and I settled into the Pink Elephant, in walked Goeff and his wife Tammy. Geoff asked if I wanted to ride along to a Right to Life event in Ludington with him as Tammy just wasn’t up to it. I said sure so after I’m done blogging, I’m off to Hart to get some copies made for our Tea Party meeting then to the Shelby meeting and then to Goeff’s.

It is easy to get involved if you just make the effort and are willing to do things on other people’s terms and not always yours. All it takes is asking “What can I do?” I’ll try to blog some more later and for sure after the Tea Party meeting.

One good thing today also that came about happened as I visited the County Clerk Rebecca Griffin about whether or not the County had anything I needed to comply with if our Tea Party decided to have a Tax Day Tea Party Rally in downtown Hart on the 15th. She said that would be covered under the City rules. The good thing here was that I was able to meet the Vice President of the Municipal Township Association for Oceana County. The good in this was I was given a chance to explain what the Tea Party was and the reasons I was making all the effort. They both seemed sympathetic.

Well all for now.
Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Catching Up

2011-03-30T17:07:00.000-07:00

New Beginnings

With winter losing its grip on my new home, I am getting more time to get into my community. Before our last ice storm and the ground snow was mostly gone I walked my property and met another neighbor. A nice young couple with a very young child living my idea of the American dream. I actually found I owned more land than I thought.

On the political side of things, our Cozy Conservative Corner is running well and has a core of five people who show up regularly every Tuesday 8am at LaFiesta in downtown Hart at the light. BTW all are welcome to our breakfast. At our last one we had a visitor from Muskegon who was one of the originals at our group there. He had a motion to file at the Court House in Hart and he read my Cozy Conservative Corner email and came for breakfast. If you want to get on the email list let me know at glhotdogs513@gmail.com.

After the breakfast some of us went to the Hesperia where Andy brought us up to speed on how facebook works.

I recently talked with Rob Lemille who was one of the 4 people who came to the first CCCorner in Hart. He said he would be coming home from Florida and he will be attending our Cozy Conservative Corners at LaFiesta in Hart plus hopefully he will be home in time for our 2nd Oceana Tea Party. Let me now catch you up on our First one.

March 23rd we held our first Oceana Tea Party meeting at the Golden Township Hall at 7pm. The weather was truly awful and a lot of organizations cancelled out. We didn’t and still twelve people showed up including a reporter from the Oceana Herald Journal. After the meeting he said that he was going to write a story and would put the date of our next meeting in it. Good news for us, we need all the free publicity we can get.

I was impressed with the people that came. There obviously is enough interest in a Conservative message to justify a Tea Party in Oceana County. We did little advertising and had short notice – I was happy with the turnout.

At the meeting we sketched out the idea of the Tea Party and what we thought it could do. Our mission statement was passed around. It was a casual and friendly meeting. We also set the date for our next meeting for April 6th, and Tom just confirmed that we can use the same location. The meeting room holds only 40-50, but Tom also got the ok that we could use the gym if we had more than that. Our only problem would be chairs. I any one has access to a bunch of chairs let me know. I would like to have an extra 50 or so just in case. I remember the very first Tea Party meeting in Manistee and they had over 130 and had to turn people away. Call me Bob Carr at 231-728-3455. I placed an ad with the Journal to run on the 31st March. Tom paid for the last ad I’ll pay for this one.

Also at the meeting we decided that at the next meeting we would elect the leadership. We already have people who volunteered for Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary and Treasurer. All will be welcome to run.

Our next meeting will have some reports from Township meetings. Andy said he’d report from Elbridge and about their wind turbine ordinance. I went to my first Newfield Township meeting and will report on that as well. Along those lines I and Tom plan on going to the County meeting and will talk about that. Below is the link to the Oceana County website.
-----link-----
http://www.oceana.mi.us/
--------------
I picked up the remaining County Directories that list all the contact info and meeting times for all the county and township meetings plus a world of other info. The County Clerk Rebecca Griffin let me have them for free as they are last year’s and out of date. There were about 15 which I’ll hand out at the meeting. The new ones are coming out within a month and I put an order in for either 50 or 100 depending on the cost. The old cost was $1 but now the counties cost is $1.60. I can only afford to buy a limited amount and will give them out mainly to people who lack computers.

Andy also will be presenting the idea of getting some people to car pool to Lansing for a “Keeping Them Honest Rally” being put on by AFP (Americans For Prosperity) and a bunch of Tea Party Groups April 14th.

-----link------
http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1296924135/efblike
---------------
I’m going, The speaker list is impressive with Dick Morris leading the list with a lot of state wide dignitaries including Ruth Johnson, Bill Shuette , Bob Young and many more. Also please note in the link that the candidates hoping to replace Debbie Stabenow will be there also including Pete Hoekstra among others, I didn’t see Terri Lynn Land’s name, and hopefully she will be there as well. This will be an all day affair.

A lot of Tea Party groups are helping to put this on so I’ll enjoy seeing some old friends. This is on the 14th and I would like to bring up at the meeting the idea of Oceana having a Tea Party Rally in Hart the next day, the 15th. I’m sure I could get a speaker or two if we decide we want to have one. By the way when I placed the ad, the reporter who covered our last meeting was there and said that the Journal would cover it if we had it. So let’s get busy and figure this out. This could be a great chance to recruit new members and let people know the Tea Party at least in Oceana County is alive and well and growing.

We would need a few things to make this work.
Advertising
Guest Speakers
Sound system
Venue or Place hopefully with covered stage or platform.
An OK to do it.
And most important, volunteers to help make it happen; to man a sign in table and give out our flyers and information etc., also to invite all their friends to the rally.

Below is a pic of one we had in Muskegon. There we marched down the street to the park.

*********
All that aside, I had a great time at the Newfield Township meeting and when I asked if there was anything I could volunteer for I was warmly welcomed. The treasurer Tammy wanted me to become the alternate to sit on the Property Review Board. I talked with her today and the idea seems to be a good fit for me. I’ll meet with her later and get some info to study to make sure I’m capable then I’ll sign up. I also asked if I could become a poll worker and they were agreeable but I think the slots are filled but they wanted me to “tag along” to get broken into the job so I could fill any vacancies as they arise.

I was impressed with the openness of the meeting, all the leaders were accessible also there was a group of around 14 people in the audience which seemed like a large group for a township meeting and later when I talked with the Tammy the Treasurer she said that the audience was larger than normal.

I would suggest for anyone interested in watching your government at the local work to attend your township meeting.

That’s all for now,
Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative

Census Figures In -- Oceana's 1st Tea Party

2011-03-23T09:32:00.000-07:00

First to the Census and Reapportionment

The 2010 Census figures are now in at the Mi. Secretary of State website

-----link-----
http://www.michigan.gov/cgi/0,1607,7-158-54534-252541--,00.html
--------------

These figures are what determines the political district lines throughout the state.

Reapportionment at all levels is gearing up for the battles to come.

First, Mi has lost population overall as you can see by the link above we in Michigan will lose one seat and voice in the US House of Representatives.

Our Michigan State House and Senate district lines will be redrawn.

So will our County Commission lines. The County lines are what I'm interested in. Here is the set up.

1. Each county in the state forms a five person reapportionment committee made up of the County Treasurer, Clerk, and Prosecuting Attorney; along with the County Chairs of each of the political parties. This has been done.

2. Depending upon the County Committees, there may be some “informational” public meetings to get input from the public on how the people feel the lines should be drawn.

3. Once the Census figures come out then a complicated set of timelines is started. What they boil down to is setting a time limit to study the figures and come up with a plan. BTW, anyone can submit a plan, not just the members, however the members are the ones that decide.

4. All of this information should be made public with ample time for the public to look at the information and submit a plan.
Here is my information on this.

I went to a public meeting in Ravenna of the Muskegon County Reapportionment Board, this was one of many previously held across the county. A resident of Ravenna labored long and hard to make that meeting happen. She wanted to make sure that the more rural areas of the County would be at least heard. This is what I learned from that meeting.

1. Though it hasn’t been decided my guess is that Muskegon County will lower the number of Commissioners by 4 from 11 to 7. There happens to currently only be 4 Republican Commissioners. Of the Reapportionment Board, 4 of the 5 are Democrats. You do the math.

2. About the mechanics I learned the following;

a.The number of districts is variable from 5 – 25 (it may be 5-23) ; regardless of the population of the County.
b.The one man one vote proviso only demands that the districts are roughly equal. Kay Punter said the exact figures as far as deviation from the average t was roughly 5% either way or 10% total. Example if the county has a population of 20,000 and they want 5 commissioners their districts will each have 4,000 plus or minus 200 (5% of 4,000).

The main thing I understand is that the more representatives there are for let us say a County of 20,000 the more weight my voice will carry. Example if there are 5 commissioners I am one voice of 4,000 for my commissioner to hear. If there are 10 commissioners for the same 20,000 then I am one voice of 2,000 for my commissioner to hear. My voice would be twice as loud. The latter was seems the best way for me or anyone’s voice to be heard.

I just found out that the Oceana Reapportionment Board will meet March 31st Thurs. 2pm at the county bldg in Hart.

Overall it seems people are moving out of the cities to the more rural areas. My conclusions from briefly looking at the figures is that they are not moving to be away from the amenities as much as they are moving to get away from the "Big Government" mentality of their elected officials. They seem to be moving from the cities to the subburbs that still have the amenieties like TV and highspeed internet, large supermarkets and seem willing to give some of each for larger yards and smaller government. This seems to go across racial lines.

People in the "Primitive" areas lacking most amenities and miles from "civilization" are also losing population.

I hope this is a trend towards self "governance" which by the way is the title of a great short pithy and stimulating book by Scott Rasmussion. Time will tell.

Now some great news. Oceana County will be having its first Tea Party meeting 3/23/11 at the Golden Township hall. 5537 Fox Rd. Mears Mi.

-----google map-----
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=5537+W+Fox+Rd,+Mears,+MI+49436&aq=0&sll=36.949892,-95.800781&sspn=17.311977,46.318359&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=5537+W+Fox+Rd,+Mears,+Michigan+49436&ll=43.685998,-86.405067&spn=0.015331,0.045233&z=14
---------------------

We couldn’t have picked a worse day weather wise (careful driving) – well just think of Washington crossing the Delaware river in the dead of winter and it won’t seem so bad.

This will be an organizational and get together meeting, I’m sure we will have another real soon to get officers etc elected and the show on the road.

If you are interested in doing something to change the mess we are in come on down

All are welcome

Political Correctness gone Amuck

2011-03-20T11:19:00.000-07:00

Political Correctness Gone Amuck.

President Obama has sanctioned a no-fly zone in Libya. Apparently the "Anti Government" forces lacked the aircraft that the government of Libya was using to defend itself from the "Anti Government" protesters. As the media portrayed this effort to impose a no-fly zone; we were told that this effort would level the playing field.

Obama figured as he always seems to do, that if as he said it, so it shall be written and so it shall be done. After all he did warn Gaddafi that he should abdicate and leave the country.

So it is with the latte sipping coffee house crowd; they seem to think that simply by saying something the problem will be solved through their superior intellect. The reality is now coming to light. As we are seeing the "no-fly" zone also means "no-tank-no big artillery, no command- centers or no anything that would hinder the anti government forces from winning. Of course to enforce that we are using military technology that Gaddafi and his military never dreamed of. ------ So much for a level playing field.

I guess this is a Politically Correct way to get your way. But I ask you to stop and think. Let's put our feet into that shoe..... World opinion has been against the US. for quite awhile. How would we feel if Iran led strikes against what they and seemingly the rest of the Islamic world felt was an unfair advantage capitalism in America was using against them. The perfect symbol of that would be the World Trade Towers in NY. Then let us say that we retaliated with weapons and technology the Islamic world lacked, should they have the right to balance the playing field? Should we first not arm and train them in the tools we would use against them??

As the Tea Party people would say “Common Sense” is dearly lacking in our current administration

Let us just say now that in a backlash of his own making, our President has seemed to have stepped in it.

From Drudge I find all sorts of backlash.

First Anti-War protesters;
-----link-----
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_WAR_PROTEST?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-03-19-18-32-15
---------------

Anti-war protesters are dusting off their old signs and shaking the bugs out of their beards to try and reinvigorate the anti war protest movement of the 60’s, which as you remember started under the watch of President Kennedy and later President Johnson and then if you really want to talk about inheriting a mess, that is what President Nixon inherited.

Next Nation of Islam leader.
-----link-----
http://www.hapblog.com/2011/03/who-hell-do-you-think-your-are.html
--------------

First Louis Farrakhan gives Obama a dire warning to “watch out Brother”.
Then anti-war protesters are making their feeling known about Obama’s “2nd War”. His first was of course Afghanistan.

Then there is the First Couple’s vacation in Rio.
-----link-----
http://blogs.forbes.com/kenrapoza/2011/03/18/rubber-bullets-fly-at-anti-obama-protest-in-rio-o-globo-reports/
---------------

The President’s upcoming visit to Brazil was already causing riots and protests that have had to be broken up with the use of rubber bullets and some good old fashioned skull cracking by the government forces. Perhaps President Obama and his coalition at the UN should enforce a “no-rubber bullet and no-club zone” at least for his visit. After all the poor protesters have no such fancy things as rubber bullets although they do have access to clubs. -------Yes even in America clubs are available-----

Read further in Drudge and you’ll see that the President had to cancel a speech and a press conference due to this “backlash”.

I think perhaps he is better at picking basketball winners or playing golf than he is at actually doing something in the foreign policy field other than talking---and as far as taking responsibility for what he says – well forget about it.

Nobody seems to see the writing on the wall so let me decipher it for you.
The Dems need for 2012 a leader of the Anti-war movement to step forward, some one similar to George McGovern. Remember the glory days of the Dem. Convention and Liberal Peace movement??? The shouting and protesting?

The Uber Left has to regain controll of the Democrat party to lead us into the future and protect us from ourselves. I remember what that led to with the McGovernites.

They started in 1968 when the anti-war protests were at their height but failed to gain any of their leaders the nomination. The next election cycle (1972) saw George McGovern emerge as the nominee of the Democrat party and the Uber Left. They lost the election in the most lopsided manner ever. Looking at the comparison closer, I doubt that like Lyndon Johnson, Obama will decide not to run again. But remember that Johnson handpicked his successor who in 68 beat down the anti-war crowd through the help of the Democrat machine and Mayor Daley. That same machine will do what it can to stop any insurgents from toppling Obama.

-----link-----
http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1996/conventions/chicago/facts/chicago68/index.shtml
---------------

BTW If anyone needed a hand and weapons etc to level the playing field it was the poor Uber Left during the battle in the streets of Chicago. Talk about tyrants quelching the will of their people. Lol

Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative

Postscript --- Remember all you Union organizers and thugs, the busses that brought you to the protest will be the same busses that your leadership will throw you under once you’re not necessary.

I'm Back

2011-02-11T18:14:00.000-08:00

I got the keys on Dec. 20th to my new my cabin in the woods, and before you start thinking of myself and the "unibomber" in the same thought --- Well mr. Ted could only wish he had such a nice "cabin". lol

I am secluded, as the next picture shows. This is my new used car sitting at the start of my 700 foot driveway, which is off a dirt road off another dirt road. The house needs to be finished inside and I've started but the bones are new and well put together.

I moved in the week of Christmas and with the wood heat and no ready wood, I've been scrambling to keep building up my stash of cut and split wood while keeping the house warm, not to mention keeping the driveway and other areas snowblowed. We have had a hard winter so far. Soooo please forgive my just now getting on line.

I have had a hard time just getting my cell phone to work up here. Now with the purchase of cell boosters and hotspots and wireless adaptors and "air cards" not to mention hours on the phone and making friends of the Geek squad at best buy, I today have broken through the gate and am on the information super highway.
\
My house is much easier to keep warm than the one I had in the city and although everyroom in the place needs something from major to minor finishing, it is finishing and not rebuilding. The main floor doesn't have a bath room so I'm building a 1/2 bath. I'm not complaining, I'm really having a ball.

As a previous post stated, I've started a "Carmen's" type of breakfast up here in Hart at the La Fiesta which is at the corner at the only stop signal in all of Oceana County.and we have been having a meeting every Tues Morning 8am since the 10th of November. As always all are welcome to stop in and get "Snarky". So far we've had some politicians like our State Rep. and Senator plus the Pentwater Mayor. We are still small and finding our way but I think it is taking root.

I will get back to posting about my new area and precinct with all the political ins and outs as I find them. But I will have to break into it slowly as there is a constant set of chores I have to do just to keep the heat on and the driveway clear.

Did somebody mention a blizzard? Forget about it.

As Always,
Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.

2010-11-19T09:31:00.000-08:00

Thursday’s Carmen Group was great fun.

This group is working out well and turning into what I envisioned; a place where coalitions can be formed and maintained to further the conservative cause.

Present were people in leadership in the Republican Party, the Tea Party, County Commissioners, Center Right Bloggers, and just general citizens interested in getting information on all sorts of topics.

This meeting has no agenda rather those who have the most to say get heard. Kind of a “free enterprise” competition of ideas.

If anyone has some idea to push they are free to do so. However speeches are shunned. I’ve started with the help of Susie Hughes a “Dump Debbie” campaign, I passed out buttons and Susie made up some flyers. My idea is to get Debbie Stabenow’s face out there to become the face conservatives love to dislike; kind of like Michigan’s version of Nancy Pelosi.

Later too I passed around a sheet for the Carmenites to hazard a guess as to who the Republicans will nominate for Pres,and Vice Pres. In 2012. Lots of names and interesting combinations popped up. Palin and Romney in either slot appeared the most times however it was nice to see Christie, DeMint, Jindal and others in the mix.

All of the above was just a small part of the talk as 3 or 4 different conversations were being carried on depending where you sat at the table.

With a city commissioner here and the wife of another plus Jim Riley an avid watcher of the commission’s goings on there were some lively and in-depth discussions.

I can only hope The new Conservative Breakfast group I just started up in Hart will evolve into such a thing.

Also myself and three others have started laying the ground work for an Oceana Tea Party. We had our first sit down at a residence in Mears. This may take awhile to get off the ground due to the fact that a lot of people in Oceana take off and go to Florida or whatever in the Winter, but we exchanged emails and Phone #s to keep in touch. Already yesterday I got a call with a prospective member, a dentist who said he and some of his staff would be interested. I’ll call them. Who knows we may start having some preliminary meetings.

If you are reading this and live in Oceana County and wish to get in on the ground floor please call me
Bob Carr
231-728-3455

Catch ups

2010-11-17T03:57:00.000-08:00

My “Limbo” I talked about last post may be coming to an end.

Let me first catch you up.

Tuesday morning we held our first “Carmen Like” Conservative Breakfast in Oceana County. It was held at Morat’s Bakery on State Street (the main drag) in Hart. For a first meeting, it went well. There were four of us at this beginning event. See pic below.

I had hoped for more but compared to the start of the Muskegon Conservative Breakfast we had an auspicious start. I’ll be working on getting more people to attend; I already have more who have committed to coming.

Our venue will change from Morat’s to a fine Mexican Café across and just down the street called La Fiesta, downtown Hart. (231) 873-4345.

The campaign I’ve labeled “Dump Debbie” is off and running. I had made up 10 buttons (see below) at Shirts n Stuff. I’ve given out 6 already.

The point of the campaign is to start planting the seed that in the next election a US Senator from Michigan is up for election. Her name is Debbie Stabenow. The Dump Debbie idea is to get people to ask Debbie who? So far it’s working.

I was really happy when Susie Hughes showed up at our latest Musk. GOP meeting with the flyer below. Susan put a lot of work into the research and as she told me by the time she was finished she was really steaming at all the pork Ms. Stabenow was responsible for. Susan made up a bunch of copies later and we passed them out at the Muskegon Tea Party meeting last night.

Click on image to enlarge

I was asked at that meeting if I would help set up a Tea Party in Oceana County. I’m going up there this morning to meet with a couple people.

Getting back to the limbo thing, after the Conservative Breakfast I stopped at my new house and the previous owners were moving out. We talked and I’ll be getting the keys this Friday. I already changed the electrical service into my name starting then. Looks like I will start to “unlimbo”. (LOL)

Our Musk. GOP meeting was short but well attended and after we had our poll challenger wrap up. Barb VanderVeen from the state was there. We learned a lot and will be even better next time around. I am upbeat about the process. Precinct Delegates have found a true friend in Barb. Susie Hughes Chaired our meeting as the Chair was busy elsewhere.

Our Musk. Tea Party had about 30 people and we talked mainly about the election and put out some ideas about what to do now that the election is over, as I’m moving I didn’t volunteer much.

That’s it for now. As always more will follow.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

PS, I'm starting to get my Website Bottom Up Politics back up and up to date.
Here is a link to the calendar of events. http://bottomuppolitics.com/calendar2_34.html

Limbo

2010-11-12T09:48:00.000-08:00

Life Goes On

My life in particular is caught in a state of limbo.

I’m suspended between Muskegon and Oceana Counties.

35 days ago I bought a house in Oceana Co. I gave the sellers 45 days to move out. They said they hoped they would move out sooner. They haven’t. Winter is coming on. My new house needs a lot of work inside and out. As I sit in my old house typing this I don’t know what to do next.

The internet out there is dial up or Hughes net. Hughes Net is a satellite feed, while the speed is almost compatible to my current DSL from Frontier, I will be limited to 200 – 300 megabytes daily, depending on whether I want the $60 or the $70 plan. Ouch. I have Netflix and get movies in the mail that won’t change, but Netflix offers older movies and tv shows for free on demand. I use that a lot, with Hughes net I won’t be able to do that. Bummer. As far as the limits, movies have up to 2000 megabytes each.

I’m wondering if I can still put pictures into my blogs or if I’ll have to post them 1 or 2 a day?

Maybe my next campaign will be to get high speed internet out to the boonies. High Speed without the limits.

The limbo I’m talking about is well illustrated in political terms. Last Monday I went to the Muskegon County GOP Caucus Lunch. Tues I drove up to Hart for the Oceana County GOP Business meeting. After that meeting Oceana held it’s County Convention and elected it’s new leadership. Muskegon will hold theirs later.

Here is the new Republican leadership for Oceana County

Juanita Pierman , County Chair
John Hendrixson, Co Chair
Al Docter Treasurer
Andy Sebolt Secretary

All had previously served in their positions except for one new face.
John Hendrixson was also elected to the Oceana County Road Commission. Congrats to John and all the other members.

I also brought up the idea of ringing the Salvation Army Bell for Christmas as we do in Muskegon. Juanita took charge of that.
Here are a couple pics of the meeting.
click on any pic to enlarge

Another limbo thing is Carmen’s. I went to our 126th consecutive breakfast last Thursday. Rob LaMielle from Oceana came also. He and I finally decided that at least the two of us will have our first “Carmen’s” in Oceana County in Hart at the Moratz Bakery on Main St. katty corner from the County building at 8am Tues. I don’t think this will be our permanent home but it will be a start. We are inviting others.

There are also social things which I’m turning down. One is being a chaperone for a bunch of kids on a bus that Morning Bear and our Love Community Garden is organizing to go to Fruitport’s Old Fashioned Christmas Days Dec 15th and 16th. Bill Cooper’s Dad Ron will be driving the bus. I would here like to thank Marve Engle as being the one who came up with the idea for the Old Fashioned Christmas and has had it on his property since it’s inception. Due to some nasty politics in Fruitport he was squeezed out. I hope the Supervisor of Fruitport doesn’t ruin it.

Hey a little Snark here and a little Snark there and pretty soon we’re talking politics.

I’ll miss this stuff. Where I live there is only 1 precinct in the entire township. Completely rural, a complete set of new community problems I will have to learn.

As far as Carmen’s in Muskegon (my pride and joy), our group is increasing. I counted 15 all together Thurs. Sen. Elect Goeff Hansen came very late as a few of us were walking out the door, but it was good to see him.

Goeff had just returned from Lansing that morning. Wed. was a heavy working day for him as the transition is taking place. The Freshman Senators are all getting assignments and Goeff was pleased that he got to be assistant President Pro Tempore. While not perhaps the most important of positions, it gives him a seat at the leadership table, Sen. Hansen seemed pleased with it.

As I looked through the rest of the leadership Linked below I see some familiar faces that I’ve met through Goeff recent campaign such as Mr. Meekoff and Mr. Booher to name a couple. Goeff should fit right in. Right now Sen. Elect Hansen with his wife and they are preparing for a well deserved and much needed vacation. When asked where they were going, he only said they were headed West and that no one will know where they are going.

-----link-----
http://www.senate.michigan.gov/gop/readarticle.asp?id=3477&District=99
--------------

Well done Goeff.

Mr. Hansen seemed quite tired, yet as we stood outside Carmen’s it became apparent he was excited about the prospects of getting things done. If you remember he was a member of the state house and in the minority with a Democrat Governor, and the Republicans only had a simple majority in the Senate. Today he has a leadership role in the Senate which has a Super majority and with a House of Reps controlled by the Republicans backed up by the weight of a Republican Governor.

Like I said in my previous post Wowdeedowdee.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

PS did I mention what my new kick will be? You know how I love political buttons. Well I coined a new one and will be getting it made at Shirts n Stuff in Cloverville. It’ll simply say “Dump Debbie”. As we get closer to 2012 more people will understand Who Debbie is. LOL.

Wowdeedowdee

2010-11-06T08:45:00.000-07:00

Election stuff.

WOW

US House Majority,

Michigan House and Super Majority in the MI Senate

The Governor, SOS, AG, Majority in the State Supreme Court.

Only one Democrat State Senator out of the box West of Lansing and North of Saginaw.

Muskegon however retains its “Sister City to Detroit” image.

However cracks are appearing even in this urban Mecca we call Muskegon.

The cream on top of this avalanche, the unexpected upset of all time -- Alan Jager is our new Muskegon County commissioner. Wowdedowdie what a nail biter, if I remember correctly Alan won by a scant 51 votes.

Across the board Republicans gathered more votes than in the past.
Holly Hughes resurrected herself with a win after losing the same race in 2008. She has to feel pretty good about that.
Marve Engle and Bob Scolnik won easily with greater margins of victory than last time.

I would like to give a tip of the hat to John McNally who ran for the 92nd state rep seat even though he lost, and I’ll tell you why.
Mr. McNally received the highest % of votes that anyone has ever gotten out of the 92nd. Before that Bob Cutler in 2004 had 34%; Marianne Darnell-Harris in 2006 garnered 29% and Jim McCormick had only 26% two years ago in 2008.

John McNally, a strict conservative with ties to the Tea Party stepped forward when no one else would and ran to win. He started late in the cycle but once he decided to run he RAN. More correctly he walked and walked and walked up and down the precincts. He worked hard and his message resonated with more people than before in this predominately Blue district.

Here is the Muskegon County Clerks link for the 2010 Election.

http://co.muskegon.mi.us/election/allresults.stm

Here are the results from 2006 to compare.

http://www.co.muskegon.mi.us/clerk/elections/archiveresults/elections_2006g.stm

Notice for example that in the race for the 34th state senate race Goeff Hansen won Muskegon County by 1,800 votes and carried the district easily. Note also how in 2006 Gerald VanWoerkom lost Muskegon by 5,000 but hung on to still carry the district.

I helped Hansen so I’m prejudiced, but I saw all the work Goeff has put into this campaign. From 2 years ago when no one in Muskegon hardly knew his name, he and his staff led by Pete Wills ran hard and never let up. Two other contenders dropped out leaving Rep. Hansen an unopposed primary. The mark of his campaign was that they did not slow up because of that. Like all winners, the Hansen Team took that early victory and worked all the harder to keep the ground they had gained.

While I’ve had some disagreements with the campaign, the mantle of managing this victory sits squarely upon Pete Wills head. As with Goeff, Mr. Wills never quit, never stopped pushing and always kept their eyes on the goal.

But I digress.

The county clerks site is fun to roam around in, see for example how your precinct voted.

http://co.muskegon.mi.us/election/municip_viewer.asp

Simply click on the township where you live and find your precinct.

Here is a link to the State Secretary of State website, same thing but for the entire state.

http://miboecfr.nictusa.com/election/results/10GEN/

One last thing before some pictures.

Since the beginning of the Tea Party the name of Ray Franz has been on my radar. As I travelled up and down West Mi on the Tea Party circuit, I kept running into Ray at Tea Party meetings and rallies. Rep Franz had lost to Democrat Scripps in 2008 and had started running for 2010 shortly after his loss. Ray’s natural conservative tendencies were a perfect fit for the Tea Party.

What I liked about Ray compared to the other “Johnny come Lately” Tea Party candidates was that he was there as a member not so much as a politician. He has been part of the Ludington, Manistee and Benzie groups. Through the likes of Ray, the Northern West Michigan Tea Parties have pretty seamlessly merged with the Republican County Parties.

Back when winning back the Mi. State house was just a whispered dream, Ray Franz and the 101st district was usually mentioned as a bell weather as to whether we could actually do that. For me it was a natural fit. I did what I could to help his campaign. And a :-) to Jennifer his Campaign Manager both times, victory must feel sweet to her as she caught the brunt of the fallout from Ray’s previous defeat from all the second guessing arm chair pundits.

Through my five county website and through helping Senator Elect Hansen (boy that sounds nice), I became acquainted with Jon Bumstead who ran for Goeff Hansen’s current 100th State House Seat. What a victory he had. Nearly 2 to 1. Jon even won Lake County a heavily Blue county. Kudos to him, the Runnels and their foot soldiers one of whom comes to mind, Andy Sebolt who knocked on a lot of doors.

Appreciation for the work the North Counties contributed to the Hansen and Bumstead campaings is in order. Three cheers.

As some of you know, I’m moving up to Oceana County. This was not a political decision but I found the perfect house for me and my finances. However I have previously gotten to know some of the players up there and I’m hoping I can fit in. The county chair and mayor of Pentwater has taken me under her wing a little and has introduced me around. This lady has a Chicago background; gee I guess if she fit in I have a chance. Lol.

Once I move finally move in which will be around the end of November, I will get to working again on my five county web site, and start setting the stage for the 2012 elections. Wow lots to think about there, for example who will run for the US Senate against Stabenow? I imagine it will be a crowded field and fun to watch. All the township and county races will be coming up also.

Well enough for now and I apologize for not blogging more as the election took up the majority of my time.

Below are some pics from the Hansen Team Victory party in Hart.

Regards Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Parity in Elections ???

2010-10-27T07:58:00.000-07:00

Parity in Elections ???

The Republicans have finally closed the funding gap with the Democrats in this cycle of elections on the national level.

In 2006 the Dems raised over $200 million more than the Republicans.

This year according to the latest figures the Republicans have spent nearly $90 million more than the Dems.

We all have heard on the news the recent flurry of complaints from leading Dems about how they are being outspent.

In 2006 the Republicans relied on their party war chests and not the “Will of the People” while this year there has been a plethora of funds being raised by third party groups on behalf of Republican Candidates through yup you guessed it, the “Will of the People”. Lest you think I’m too naïve - read on.

Politico in its article by Jeanne Cummings entitled, “Dems Getting Outspent? Not so fast.”, points out how this cycle there seems to be a pretty level financial playing field compared to recent elections where the Dems out spent the Republicans by a wider margin.

-----link-----
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/44216.html
---------------

The Republicans in the past whined and cried just as loudly as the Dems are crying now. That’s human nature I guess. The important point in this all is to understand that the “Will of the People” is driving this difference.

Of course the big unions and big business will put in huge amounts, they always have one way or another; it is the donations from the “Will of the People” that has tipped the scale in the last few elections.

If you think that’s not the case Remember -- http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Massachusetts-The-Scott-Brown-moneybomb-keeps-exploding-81539122.html
In a sense that Money bomb as the article presciently reminds us, is still exploding across the country. This was a Tea Party fueled event. It is my contention that the Tea Party is the driving force behind this recent Popular Uprising on behalf of Republicans and the recent fullness of their war chests, and the rise of third party groups backing the Republican/Conservative cause.

You may call me naïve; however it seems the ultimate in naiveté to think that this popular uprising nationwide has not had any effect upon business. Do remember the way the Liberals have blackmailed and coerced business into a position where business has been afraid to show support of anti liberal causes. This popular uprising has allowed the business community to come out of the “Conservative/ Free Market Closet” and stand up for what it believes in nearly as openly a way as the Liberal/socialist groups have been fighting for theirs.

Think not? Think that Liberals don’t want to take over and control all business?
As Spock would say! Remember.

Remember Maxine Waters and her slip of the tongue as she was haranguing oil execs? This was before the 08 election, as the video explains and asks what will happen if the Dems gain control. Again a case of prescience, or simply a correct reading of the writing on the wall?

Following through with this Maxine Moment and the idea of Socializing and “taking over all your businesses” not to mention of small business and minority businesses having to come and kow tow to the government to get loans, I am reminded of Hyek’s great book The Road to Serfdom.

http://www.amazon.com/Road-Serfdom-Documents---Definitive-Collected/dp/0226320553/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1288189235&sr=1-1

The “Will of the People” is rising again as in 1776 or 73 (snicker) when the partying began. We fought for our right to govern ourselves and not have a King do it through his feudal lords in front of which we would have to grovel and ask to do what we wanted. Now we are being put in the same predicament, a group is trying to rule our lives through onerous legislation and regulation. Instead of calling themselves Lords the bureaucracy is now calling them Czars.

For example on a personal scale where I live I have to grovel in front of a government employee if I want to change the color of my house and guess what? I also have to pay a fee to this feudal lord to help protect the system. If I find a good used toilet and want to install it, I again have to grovel and pay $45 for the privilege in my own house. Recently my grass was too long and the city charged me $135 to cut it. I live on a 50’x35’ sized lot and my house is roughly 35x 30’ – not much to mow. The list goes on and in Mi. the government is trying to take over control of our own personal well water from which we drink. But I digress. lol

The 2010 election lays the groundwork to Take America Back but the 2012 election is when the real work of repealing this mess can truly start. We have two years to do all we can to make that happen. To prevent the election fraud we need to apply to become poll workers in all contested polling precincts and also poll challengers/watchers. We need to find and back good conservative candidates willing to do the hard work and make the tough political decisions necessary to Take America Back.

Warning if you think the 2010 election is getting nasty, wait until the Liberals lose this one and they see their power being actually taken away --- Well I wouldn’t be surprised to see what we are seeing in France erupt here.

Thank God, the Tea Party has usurped that anger for now at least. But after this election and the Left in 2012 facing a loss of power, their antics up till now will seem like child’s play. If the conservatives have the ability to keep the “Will of the People” on their side by sticking to their principles and making things better, we will be able to ride it out if not???

I for one will do what I can to help keep the political Conservatives in line with the “Will of the People” through The Tea Party or any other vehicle I can come up with. I am ever hopeful and remain ever vigilant.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Second Chances

2010-09-15T07:35:00.000-07:00

Second Chances

As a Conservative I’ve always believed in the doing of things as directly as possible. I believe for example in donating my time and money directly to a candidate and not some nebulous National Campaign Committee.

This method not only gives the candidate the full use of my time and money without it being filtered and siphoned off by some bureaucratic apparatus; but it gives me more leverage with the candidate in question and helps me to get involved with all my senses and not just those required to write a check.

Having said that however; as a Conservative I believe in the Constitution, which is after all a blueprint for the formation of some nebulous government. So, as did our Founding Fathers I understand the benefit of a national organization, albeit strictly limited to certain concrete purposes. I also understand the efficiencies of scale that a larger group can offer.

I write this as a preamble to making a plea to donate to the Senate Conservatives Fund (SCF).

----link-----
https://senateconservatives.com/takeamericaback .
-------------

For further information on the SCF, go to

-----link-----
https://senateconservatives.com/site .
--------------

I have a system to my donating to political things. Roughly I split it up 50/50. Half of the money goes to local candidates and the rest to the big boys. Before I would donate almost all my efforts to local candidates; however this time due to the historic nature of this election, I’ve decided to give to some national causes. As to the Historic nature, I’m talking about not only having the Republicans win back the House and hopefully the Senate, but to have Conservative Principles at the core of that resurgence. To have insurgent Conservatives elected in large enough numbers to force a debate on changing how this Nation will be run. In fact I believe that resurgence can’t happen without those coalescing Conservative Principles.

We need the Why before the How.
This is paraphrasing Paul Chaney's marketing blog

-----link-----
http://www.mpdailyfix.com/know-the-why-before-the-how-of-social-media/
--------------

Again prarphrasing, "Unless you understand why you’re doing something, it makes little sense to learn how." What I'm talking about is politics and politics is all about people. We can't get lost in the consultants spreadsheets or we will lose track of the Why people need to hear to make the effort to get out and vote. Politicians forget this as they get lost in the How of elections.

Conservatives are all about the Why. If we keep focused on that we will not find ourselves in front of the cart.

As a Conservative I have learned that donating to the National Republican Campaign Committee (NRCC) does not guarantee that my donation will go to conservative causes. The opposite in fact appears to be the case a lot of the time. That is why I was intrigued by Sen. Jim DeMint and his efforts to set up a PAC exclusively for the purpose of electing Conservatives to the Senate – not just Republicans in name only, but those who believe and are willing to fight for Conservative principles.

I first donated when Sen. DeMint got behind Marco Rubio in Florida. I hoped this would grow and it has. SCF is now backing around 10 Conservative Candidates. There have been many upsets of the Political Class along the way and as we just learned with the two victories in Alaska and Delaware, we are on the crest of a wave. These Primary victories are what I’m calling our first chance and by and large we did well.

Our second chance comes with the general elections in November. The damage inflicted so far has been within the Republican Party. The paradigm the Mass Media, the Democrats and establishment Republicans state is that we were able to win some of the primaries but we will lose the general election because the voters en mass do not support Conservative Ideals.

Now we have our second chance to prove them wrong. In order to do that however we need to find ways to donate our time and money to honest Conservative Candidates. If we think we can overcome the wealth and manpower of the Unions, trial lawyers etc with a check for $10 – Forget about it.

This anger at Big Government and all the meddling they do in our lives has given rise to the Tea Party movement and other Conservative groups. These groups have made a huge difference in the primaries; however they carry with them the danger of becoming too large and too orientated on growing the group vs. the hard work of enacting the causes they believe in. One is way easier than the other. Promoting the group involves a keyboard, and endless planning committee meetings, the actual work of enacting causes takes time and money and arguing on street corners and in the local restaurants etc.

We as Conservative need to concentrate our energies on principle based policies then back candidates who will enact those policies. On a national scale the Senate Conservatives Fund above does just that. Senator DeMint has set up a PAC with one goal in mind. Elect Conservative Senators by raising money and giving it directly to their campaigns. I’m in – Hope you are too.

Six weeks till November and the time we’ll Remember.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

PS. Locally, don’t forget your candidates from State offices on down to County Commissioners. They all would welcome your help in time and or money.
Give them a call.

*** Caution Alert ***
We must be careful not to get complacent and work smart and together.

-----link-----
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703466704575490043018544042.html
--------------

In this excellent Wall Street Journal article Steve Malenga writes about the “Why” of Chris Christie’s election in NJ and how it is resonating wherever else it is used as in Califorinia. The warning not to be complacent comes with the dollar amount that the unions are going to put into this election - $100 million and all the boots on the ground that will buy.

-----quote from article-----
Of course even with its influence waning, labor can be a powerful electoral force. The AFL-CIO, SEIU and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees have announced plans to spend about $100 million on the November elections. While that's less than 2008, when unions gave $73 million in direct contributions to candidates and spent another $80 million independently on campaigns, the money represents a formidable commitment that could be a factor in close races.
Still, what we are seeing this year may mark a historic shift in American politics. If candidates around the country can repeat Mr. Christie's strategy of winning office by taking on public unions, we could be witnessing a change akin to what happened in the late 1970s, when tax revolts in a handful of states created a nationwide momentum that eventually elected Ronald Reagan.
---------------------------

Bottom line we now have a wedge into the union vote led by the Christie model, we need to use it.

Again Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

The Human Factor.

2010-09-13T10:05:00.001-07:00

The Human Factor.

What is the common thread that runs through the social unease that we see today in almost all aspects of our life? I’ll give you a hint; that “thread” was there since Moses led his people on their long desert outing so many ages ago. Here is another hint. Americans tried to codify it in our Constitution with the words “We The People”.

I’m sure most of your answers are right although the terminology might vary. “The Human Factor” is what I call it. Better yet, the disregard for the “Human Factor”. If you called it “Individual Liberty” you are nearly there.
Remember also that the phrase “We the People” was not an afterthought or a phrase thrown in somewhere in the Constitution to embellish another point. “We the People” was the first phrase written extra large in the Preamble – it was the whole point of the Constitution.

----- preamble US Constitution -------
We the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
--------------------------------------

I am not a Libertarian, I realize as did our Founding Fathers that there is a place for government, that there has to be laws and police and military and roads; however, I also understand that we need these things for one purpose and that is to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity,…” All else limits the People’s liberty.

So the answer of “Individual Liberty or Freedom” is almost there. However, don’t forget the “We” in “We the People”. We, understanding the need for a government for the reasons stated in the preamble also understand the need to limit that government which is what “We” did in the body of the Constitution.

In using the phrase “The Human Factor” I am trying to expand the scope of “We the People” to include all of society not just government.

For example, yesterday I hooked up to Direct TV after a self imposed exile from TV for over two years. After the flush of watching the Lions and the Tigers live and the Crimson Tide put down Joe Pa; I managed to watch a type of reality show I think the name of was “Undercover Boss”. The story was about the head of a Waste Management co. going undercover and doing the actual work of his lowest employees. He rode the back of the garbage truck, he sucked up and cleaned out their porta potties, he picked up loose garbage from the garbage disposal sites (at which he was fired), worked at the weigh in station for the garbage trucks etc.

Though it was fun to see a “Suit” cleaning out the porta potty, the main thing I (and the COO) took away was the disconnect there was between the boardroom and those who have to carry out their edicts. The built up and institutionalized disconnect from the “Human Factor”. Several examples come to mind.

The woman (think some one’s mother/grandmother) having to carry around a can to go to bathroom in so she wouldn’t have to break the route on her garbage truck and fall behind. Another example was the middle management guy who took advantage of an employee by having her do the jobs of 3 people so he could look good. The COO also realized his responsibility for going along with and rewarding these practices.
That all shows how “Big Business” tries to stifle the “Human Factor”

I see this disregard however all around me. “Big Labor” is equally at fault for disregarding the “Human Factor” the workers. Perhaps it is morally even more disgusting in that they claim to be the sole guardians of the workers or in my terms, “The Human Factor”.

“Big” government, business, labor, media and Political Parties all make up this ever-increasing hostility to the “Human Factor”. We all sense it as we talk to machines over the telephone; get the runaround from city hall or tech support person at Verizon. As the COO from Waste Management found out, every company disregards the “Human Factor” and the bigger the company, government, union, media or party the more layers there are to help disregard it.

As you probably know, I’m involved in local politics. Even at the local level, the Politicos seem to think of the voters as pretty stupid and unable to grasp basic concepts. I too catch myself falling into that trap. The trap is they (me) think of our basic concepts are the only ones and those of the others as not worthy of our efforts.

With the advent of the new media myself and the public is learning to put up a defense to this trashing of the “Human Factor”. The Tea Party movement is the current face of that (self) defense. This movement however carries its own seeds of destruction with it. The Tea Party needs to listen to its own credo about limited government; in this case “de-centralized” power. The Tea Party needs to also pay attention to the “Human Factor”, it must never grow out of its grass roots.
Politico writers JAMES HOHMANN & KENNETH P. VOGEL wrote the below linked article about the problems consolidation of Tea Party groups is causing.

-----link-----
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0910/42043.html
---------------

From my personal perspective I agree with the following 3 paragraphs lifted from the politico article.

------politico article quote-----
Activists insisted the energy level in the decentralized movement remains high, but it is manifesting itself in countless local tea party group’s efforts to sway elections.
“It’s stronger. It’s just disbursed,” said Roger Wood, 58, who owns a small printing business in Pittsburg, Ks. “It’s hard to count the number of organizations now.”
Wood himself cofounded the Southeast Kansas Conservative Group, which will host a Constitution Day barbecue to support a candidate running for state legislature next week.
----------------------------------

I’ve been to DC rallys and to Lansing Tea Party rallies and local events as well. I didn’t go this year because I was too busy and I went to the State GOP convention where I could put into practice what I’ve learned in the Tea Party. I partied last year now I’m getting to work.

“Big” business and labor must pay attention to their workers, “Big” government and the Parties must pay attention to it voters and Precinct Delegates. “Big” Tea Party needs to pay attention to the local Tea Parties. “Big” media needs to pay attention to the alternative media. All the “Bigs” if they want to stay big need to allow the grass roots to rule from the Bottom Up.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.

The "Year of the Elephant"

2010-09-07T08:13:00.001-07:00

For the “Year of the Elephant” to become a reality Republicans have to pick up a net gain of 39 seats in the US House. That is a lot of races to try to follow. Our National Committeeman from Michigan Saul Anuzis puts out a newsletter that is really good and to the point. In that newsletter he highlighted a map of the districts nationwide that we need to win.

http://www.40seats.com/

That started me thinking and researching. I wanted to find a way to tell how the effort to win back the US House was progressing and maybe a cheat sheet for the upcoming Nov. elections.

Then I came across the site below.

http://www.keyhouseraces.com/content/master-list-ranking-races

This site is great.

As far as you or me helping out these candidates; any of the tight races across the Republic could use our help. Since my site is called “Bottom Up Politics” I will focus on the Michigan races. From the site above I find there are three races that are winnable. Three Michigan races needed to win the US House back.

They are the 1st district (the UP) with (Rep) Dr. Daniel Benishek vs. (Dem) McDowell, the 7th district with (Rep) Tim Walburg vs. incumbent (Dem) Mark Schauer and lastly the 9th with (Rep) Andrew (Rcoky) Raczkowski vs. incumbent (Dem) Gary Peters.

As the article states, the most winnable is the 1st district followed by the 7th and lastly the 9th which if it ends up in the Republican column may well signal not only control of the House but a landslide across the board.

Below is Benishek’s ranking from the website above.

http://www.keyhouseraces.com/content/spotlight-mi-1st-congressional-district-1

Next is Walburg’s.

http://www.keyhouseraces.com/content/spotlight-mi-7th-congressional-district-0

Lastly Rocky’s.

http://www.keyhouseraces.com/content/spotlight-mi-9th-congressional-district

This sight is pretty awesome. Take some time and look through it.

The “Year of the Elephant” is upon us and with our help it may come to pass, which could set up a winning coalition for the 2012 elections.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.

The Convention Part II

2010-08-30T07:48:00.000-07:00

The Convention Part II

As I sit and try to figure out what to write about the Mi GOP State Convention, there are two over-riding premises I want to keep in mind about the details I’m writing.

1. The Michigan GOP leadership tried through manipulating the process to get their candidates nominated, through last minute rule changes.

2. That process was not entirely successful due to the efforts of the Tea Party. The Tea Party came out on the high moral ground.

As I said in Part I of this article (see previous post), the Tea Party Caucus was the political ticket to get. That platform was an opportunity for the Tea Party to pick who they supported and bring a substantial voting block to the convention floor. That did not happen except in the case of SOS candidate Ruth Johnson. AG candidate Mike Bishop did get a leg up also and I believe that helped him come close in his attempt to get nominated.

The Tea Party Caucus was taken over and driven by the Tea Party Alliance of which Tea Party of West Michigan is a member. They turned what could have been a unifying moment/ a defining moment into a quagmire of conflicting messages and broken down procedures. More on that later.

Fred and I along with the Uriartes luckily arrived early because we wanted to sit in on the Rules Committee meeting. We only had about a 20 min. wait to get into the Breslin Center and get our credentials. { Later I found out that they ran out of credentials due to the large number of PDs coming. After people had been waiting up to 2 hours outside to get in they decided to let everyone in and not worry about the credentials. !!!! This meant that the credentials were meaningless as a way to count votes on the floor. }

This all happened unbeknownst to us because we went our separate ways. Fred and I went to the Rules meeting. Lots of confusing things went on there and I won’t bore you with the details.

I was lucky to take pictures as this was closed to the press.
The overall summary I will say about this meeting is that time constraints were the overriding justification for all of the decision. To explain. When the subject was brought up about whether they could have additional paper ballot votes from the floor, it was pointed out that this would cause an undue delay because they would have to have 2500 ballots printed up while everyone waited. Mainly because of that it was then voted to have a “show of hands” vote instead if the situation arose. It did and I’ll explain later. This whole concept proved a fallacy as I will explain later.

This was a long Rules meeting and went until the leaders left to gavel the convention to order.

Here is where it started getting interesting.

Bill Cooper announced his candidacy for Lieutenant Governor at the Tea Party Caucus the night before as I posted in Part I. Convention day, Don Jaekel was trying to get Bill on the agenda. I knew this because Fred was in contact with him right along. Before the Rules Meeting came to order I talked to the vice parliamentarian about Bill getting on the agenda and he said that he would let me know by the end of the Rules meeting. I followed through and met the Chief Parliamentarian for the party who gave me the specifics of who what and when. I relayed this to Don through Fred but by then Don was in a secure room waiting for someone from the party. The bottom line was they knew we were serious and would not let this be brushed aside so there was a frantic rush to get Fred, Don and Bill up front in the staging area to get our final instructions. It was at this point where the pressure was put on us to not do this.

{The only example of which I took part was “behind the busses” with the Grassroots chair. He was telling us how much he believed in the Tea Party etc and that this was not the time to do this. I asked him then what was the last time he went to a meeting of a Tea Party. I then told him that he of all people should understand that this is about recognition about respect. That seemed to take the wind out of his sails. Don and Fred were obviously not changing their minds at this point.
To Don’s credit he didn’t buckle. Bill was standing apart from that part of the discussion.

To the Party’s credit the nomination of Bill Cooper went forward. At the time I was down in front taking pictures up close but to give out credit where it is due, I heard that David Farhat during this time called for and got a near unanimous vote (30-1) from the Muskegon Delegation for Bill Cooper.

Don Jakel giving the nominating speech for Bill Cooper

Fred Bertsch giving the seconding speech.

Don Jaekel gave a great nominating speech and Fred Bertsch gave a resounding seconding speech. Bill Cooper then gave a speech which was heartfelt. {To background -Remember that we all were told that Bill wasn’t going to be given a chance to speak until/if he was nominated (elected). What Bill said must have been pretty much off the cuff, I assume mostly from his talk at the Tea Party Caucus the night before.} His speech had everybody listening, he made a statement that fell on receptive ears.

Then the fun began. The Speaker then called for a show of hands in favor of Brian Calley. It happened so fast that this reporter didn’t think the audience really had grasped what was going on. At this point Kevin Heine was trying to get recognized by the Chair and he soon took to pounding on the stage and talking from the microphone. Finally he was recognized and Kevin called for a paper ballot. Then the whole thing broke down.

{As background please remember they ran out of credentials and let anybody in who wanted, there was no way to tell from the floor whether who raised their hand was a Credentialed PD or not.} The flaw of the voting system became apparent to all. Whether the rules committee was convened for that purpose at this point is conjecture. The Rules meeting called at such short notice is suspect. For example Justin Amash had not had enough notice to physically make the journey to get to vote in the committee.

After and during another failed attempt to get a vote by show of hands from the floor for Calley there was hasty discussions on stage between the leadership and Bill Cooper. Ron Wiser the State Chair and the legal counsel along with the parliamentarian were the main discussers.

While this was going on there was a growing uproar from the front of the stage where Kevin had made his motion and Don Jakel also ended up there and began being bombarded by the party and by Calley supporters. It was my opinion that the Calley supporters were also soundly in support of paper ballots. They were afraid that the un-documented (aliens – oops I couldn’t pass that up) the un-credentialed would be strongly in favor of the Tea Party Candidate; and in my opinion the independent anti politician crowd would swing that way also. I believe Bill Cooper actually had a chance to win a hand count of the approx. 4,000 in attendance, only half of whom were legally entitled to vote. By now the crowd had become pretty upset with the powers that be for all the delays and other faults in that convention.

I applaud Kevin for calling for the Point of Order but it could have worked against Cooper. However this is all academic as they could not get a legal hand vote and Kevin was right, a paper ballot was the only way to get a legal vote.

{ To background this was done later in the voting process for the different offices—Two hours tops to settle this affair. Please keep in mind I state this in hindsight. – The reality was that this idea would have taken at least 2 hours to get put in place and another two hours to happen. I would guess that the rules committee would claim they needed to meet separately but the whole convention would have been broken up over this. Would that be wise? Better and louder bloggers and talkers will be arguing this for months to come.}

On other issues, Mike Bishop had the closet race and lost to Bill Schuette by about 100 votes. Again in my opinion this Convention was stacked in favor of Schuette and for Mike to get within 100 votes goes to him as a candidate and I believe to the Tea Party which brought a lot of votes his way. {To background on the Tea Party, the Friday Caucus was split between the two with the edge going to Bishop, if Clem and Joan would have thrown their support towards Bishop he may well have carried the day.}

At the Caucus the night before Ruth Johnson won an overwhelming victory over her contenders. This was carried over to the State Convention the next day and she won the nomination for Secretary of State.

My conclusion on what needs to be done to straighten both the Tea Party and the GOP Party out. Hey I have a right!!! If you disagree, feel free to comment or start your own blog. Lol

1. As time was the deciding factor (excuse), let’s go back to a two day convention where floor fights add to the strength of the convention and not detract from it/not used as an excuse to Rahm Emmanual things through.

2. The Tea Party apparatus (leadership) in Michigan would be better represented through the Tea Party of West Michigan and not the Tea Party Alliance. I believe from the Friday Tea Party Caucus they put on they showed they lacked the leadership skills to run the event, plus the TPof WMI brings more membership to the table. Either that or the West Mi. group should break away from the Alliance.

3. The main thing – my main issue I fight for – is to change the party from within, to take over the party from within. Two words encapsulate it all. Precinct Delegates. We have another election coming up at the end of November. This is where we vote and decide on who runs our individual county parties. From there the next state convention will decide on the leadership of the District leadership. {To background, the Rules committee is made up of the leadership of the Districts}. If we as a Tea Party are serious about taking over this party we need to first take over the County then the District apparatus. That is a lot of work. BUT we have a great start.

My conclusion on the Bill Cooper Insurection, or as Jeff Roys told me excitedly after the “hand vote” fiasco. This is the stuff of legends. About what Mr. Cooper did

1. Bill did the only and the right thing by withdrawing his candidacy.

2. The only way he could have legally won was from a paper ballot vote and he could not have won that in my opinion.

3. If it would have come to that as he later told me he and the Tea Party would have become “Toxic” to the party.

4. I believe the main thing is to defeat the enemy and the enemy is the Democrat Party especially when it will be represented by the likes of Binero and his crew of socialists.

5. Bill Cooper by this effort brought some well deserved respect for what the Tea Party has accomplished so far in bringing change to the Republican Party. {To Background, I was happy to see and hear both Bill Cooper’s name and compliments coming from both Calley and Snyder on center stage. The pic below shows a look by Ron Wiser that to me says it all.

By this step The Tea Party has come of age as a recognized voting group in general and within the Republican Party as well. If we are not given our due – well, we will let them figure it out.}

6. For those of you who think more should have been done. Well we and you have an infinity called the future ahead of us in which we can put to practice all of our theoretical ideas. For that which we bitch about to happen as Rucker says It “needs to degenerate into work” and plenty of it. Or as Bill Cooper said simply
“Sticks and Stones”.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Now for the pics of the winners. After all was said and done they got the victory crew on stage and let the balloons fall. Everybody was happy and shaking everyones hands, below are the pics I took. If you can't tell my favorite is Justice Young, Mary Beth hopefully will work well with him. And I'll say this now and with truth, I will do what I can to help the whole ticket whether they are true conservtives or not. I mean I helped McCain knowing what he was because I realized what the other choice was. I ask others to think about doing the same.
Any way to the pics

Now for the local talent Remember to click pics to enlarge.

Now all that is left is cleaning out the left behinds for a new Republican Party

Three Days of August. Part I

2010-08-29T10:30:00.000-07:00

Click on any pics to enlarge

Three days of August. Part I

I have found that if I am serious about politics, there is always something to do and at times hard choices have to be made as to which events to go to and which ones not. These three days of August are THE prime example.

Thursday started out with the 115th regular meeting of our Carmen Group. Along with the regular group Pat and Frank Uriarte were there and later Goeff Hansen dropped by.

After that I checked on my garden plot at Love Community Garden and picked some cherry tomatoes to munch on. Caught up on precinct happenings from Morning Bear, and kept up my search for a home to buy in the precinct. Thursday was a nice peaceful day without a conflict on the schedule.

Friday was when the hard choices had to be made.

For those of you who don’t know me, I’ve been helping out the Goeff Hansen campaign for the 34th state senate seat for around 20 months. I also have been in the Tea Party movement since its inception, recently serving as the Chair of the Muskegon Tea Party.

Conflict #1. Goeff Hansen had one of his major fundraisers; a “Corn Boil” up in Hart starting at 6pm. At the same time there was a caucus for the Tea Party Precinct Delegates in Lansing that night, the night before the State Republican convention. I had been active in promoting Precinct Delegates since before the Tea Party started and as I was a PD I felt my loyalty must be for the Caucus, and the upcoming convention.

Fred Bertsch picked me up around 6pm and off we went to Holt just outside of Lansing. As we pulled up I was happy to see the busses from the “Spending Revolt Tour” run by Americans for Prosperity. I was also glad that Scott Hagerstrom was there. We had become friends on the trip to the Defending the American Dream Summit in DC last year. I signed my name on the bus.

As we came up to the entrance of the building there was a gauntlet formed by candidates and their staffers which we had to run to gain entrance. Everyone was reaching to shake hands and trying to slap campaign stickers on you, it was kind of strange.

Once inside we signed up and old friend Rod Merrill was at our sign in spot. Then we were able to mingle, take pictures and talk with old friends. For those of you in doubt, The Tea Party has grown and kept together to the point that all the candidates were enticed to show up. Rick Synder didn’t show, but as far as I could see all the other ones were there. At the last minute Calley, Rick Synder’s pick for Lt. Governor showed up. This event became the pre convention “ticket to get” in Lansing.

There were over 700 people there all the seats were filled and the walls were covered with the standing room only. The organization of the event however was pretty poor at least in execution; however everyone seemed to put up with it. The sheer numbers that showed up caused some of the problems. That problem of overcrowding as you will see in Part II of this blog foreshadowed the same problems the next day at the State Republican Convention. The Republicans have been around for over 100 years and the Tea Party for 2. They did good.

There was a straw poll taken and that is where the disorganization reared its head highest. Of the 700 there were over 200 voting Precinct Delegates to the State convention. Those were the ones who were allowed to vote in the straw poll. In the straw poll for AG the Tea Party picked Mike Bishop in a tight vote over Bill Shutie . For Secretary of State Ruth Johnson was the overwhelming vote over the 2nd and 3rd place finishers Anne Norlander and Cameron Brown.

Of all the candidates present, Secretary of State candidate Ruth Johnson was the darling of the Tea Party and as you will see at the Convention this translated into a hard fought victory for her. Bob Young the incumbent Supreme Court Judge was not present but he also was the darling of the Tea Party Movement. He has appeared at many Tea Party meetings and his “Rule of Law Court” platform based on the Constitution found loud and overwhelming support within the Tea Party as well as the Republican Party.

The candidate who wasn't a candidate yet, who is also a favorite of the Conservatives and who the following day will take another step along his path in a Reaganesq moment at the State Republican Convention.

Bill Cooper

The pictures I took are with a new SLR camera and I am still learning to use it.

The voting was long and the whole thing took a lot longer than the planners and I thought. Fred dropped me off around 1:30 and I didn’t get to bed until after 2am. I set my alarm for 4am so Fred could pick me up again this time at the Kmart parking lot at 5am. Pat and Frank Uriarte were going with us to the State Convention also.

Hope you enjoy the pics. I’ll be posting Part II which will be about the convention. Lots of insights into the Cooper affair and all else and lots of pics.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

2010-08-13T10:19:00.000-07:00

I first became interested in precinct delegates during the run-up to the 2008 elections. Shortly after that election, I could only find one PD workshop and that was on the other side of Lansing. The event was run by Marlene Chockley a retired vice chair of the State Party. She felt a need to get the whole idea of Precinct Delegates going again and she put together a great power point presentation and coupled with her knowledge from previous elections, she was infectious. I got excited about the idea.

I came back enthused and brimming with ideas for my County party.

There wasn’t much interest and I blamed the Party. In hind sight it was more my fault. As with other things, for an idea to become reality a lot of work (one on one work) is involved. One of my favorite quotes comes from a book titled “The Effective Executive” by Peter F. Drucker, which I heard Newt Gingrich highly recommend in one of his speeches. The following quote sums up the differences between talking and doing; or perhaps the symbiotic nature of the two.

“Unless a decision has “degenerated into work” it is not a decision; it is at best a good intention” Peter F Drucker, “The Effective Executive” pp114 Harper Collins paper back edition, 2006.

I am nothing if I am not stubborn. I get an idea and will keep plugging away at it like a dog does an old bone. That is what I did with the Precinct Delegate thing. My advice to anyone else with a “great” idea who wants a group to get behind it; don’t expect anyone else to be as excited about that idea as you are. Just keep showing your excitement in deed and others will take note and eventually come your way.

While they may come around to your level of excitement it will take some time and a lot of one on one effort. Even then you will have to do the majority of the work. Also if you are planting the seed don’t expect to be the one to harvest the plant. Once the seed takes root others will be fighting to do the harvesting. Just keep plugging away and take what you can get knowing what you did and realizing that you can still keep planting other seeds that will help grow the garden to your liking. Learn to thank them for helping, at the least it will baffle them; then move on.

I’m smiling after last night. We had our Muskegon County Republican Party Precinct Delegate Convention.

David Farhat was the Temp. Chair and did a remarkable job as we covered lots of new territory. Rules had to be checked, and decisions made on the fly and he handled himself well. In fact Susan Hughes co-chair and Stu Peterson the Secretary all were up to the task. I do pity Stu as he will have to put all this down into readable minutes LOL.

There were around 100 people there. The purpose of that convention was to get all the newly elected PDs together to elect 31 delegates to go to and represent us at the State Republican Convention. At that convention the Party nominees for SOS and AG and Supreme Court justices are picked by the PDs state wide among other duties.

I’m smiling because there were about twice as many PDs there who wanted to fill those 31 slots as there were two years ago. The seeds have taken root. The garden seems to be growing well.

There will be those who will say it should have been organized better, but they aren’t the gardeners. I felt a real sense of democracy in action that night. It took a long time, it wasn’t effiecient ballots had to be printed up and tallied. There was a lot of downtime in which to make new acquaintences and cement some previous ones. It took a long time and yet there weren’t any arguments or bad feelings that I saw. I felt we learned and grew through the doing.

What I saw was a group of people trying to overcome some obstacles and doing so in a democratic way. We had one overriding idea; we had had enough and were committing ourselves to doing something about it in a systematic way. For the first time in a while, I was proud of the Republican Party.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

PS I'd like to thank the state party for unleashing Barb Vander Veen who at the end spread the glories of Precinct Delegates far and wide and to whom much is owed.

Sadness in my Heart

2010-08-04T05:34:00.000-07:00

Last night I went to bed with the knowledge Pete Hoekstra lost his bid to be our next Governor. My compliments to his crew, they triumphed over what they thought would be his chief opponent Mike Cox. His consultants just forgot to enter Rick Snyder into their computer models and that his strength was his grass roots until it was too late.

Last night too I went to bed with the hope that Ken Punter could rally from the returns of the perpetually late Norton Shores. At 1pm he was only behind some 500 votes. Well I see that Holly Hughes swept the 11 precincts of Norton Shores leaving Ken Punter around 2500 votes short.

I was also caught with a lump in my throat when I saw Bill Cooper had finished 4th in the 2nd Congressional. When I saw the effort and vitality he and his crew brought to campaigning in West Michigan Bill Huizenga as Holly pulled it out representing the old school politician.

I am saddened to see this fountain of new ideas shut off. Especially with Cooper I’m saddened by my very late entry into his race. I hope both these candidates don’t disappear from politics. They bring a needed freshness to politics.

I don’t have time to analyze any of these races now as there are a million yard signs that need pulling; but at first glance the paradigms are in flux. People in the more local races seemed to pick the experienced operatives, but the larger less personal races like the governorship for example they picked a newcomer, an unknown.

On that race they were more willing to pick a newcomer.

In the next rank down, the US House, there was a battle between the political operative Bill Huizenga that people had known as a politician for a long time and the non-politician/football player Jay Riemersma. It was close but the familiar won.

In the Hughes vote, she won more easily.

At my level to my utter disappointment Marcia H. Wright won. The local conservative battles in my neighborhood will increase ---

It will be more dangerous to be a conservative.

Change is always harder to do yourself than to think others should.

I’m still addled after this election and have signs to pick up. Then there is the question of which state do I want to move to.

Maybe Wyoming. ?????

LOL

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Never fear, hope abounds and the next place we have an ability to change the party from the inside is on the Precinct Delegate front. We as PDs can try to pick conservative nominees at the state convention then come back and pick our local party leadership. If that fails then we start recruiting new PDs now.
Never fear I ain't leaving.

Arrogance

2010-08-02T08:30:00.000-07:00

Arrogance

Many, many months ago, nearly a year ago Ken Punter announced that he was running for the 91st State House Seat, I became excited about his candidacy. Shortly afterward I wrote the following in his support.
---------------
During these perilous economic and moral times in Michigan and our Country; I find it reassuring to find a citizen leader of Ken Punter’s character willing to pick up the gauntlet of political leadership. Ken Punter, ex marine, long time husband, father and resident of Ravenna calls this desire to enter into public service - “servant leadership”.

Ken Punter is not arrogant.

Ken's website http://votepunter.com

For too long we have had representing our districts, professional politicians who seem more interested in re-election than serving their constituents. Ken has the strength to stand for what he believes over what is politically expedient.

That strength of character is founded in his faith, and I feel that faith will guide his heart and soul when making the hard decisions of a State Representative. His experience in the Marines, and in helping, along with his wife Kay to raise their beautiful family, has left him with a can do mentality and the self control to see a job through to its conclusion.

Ken has the vision and the practical experience to stand tall when necessary and be that “Servant Leader” upon which this country was founded. Along with his other civic volunteer efforts Ken has been on the Ravenna School Board for 15 years.

He knows how to say yes to common sense and no to non sense.

I am happy and proud to endorse Ken Punter as the next State Representative for the 91st District.

Bob Carr
Precinct Delegate, Precinct #6, Ward #2, City of Muskegon

-----------

At the time I wrote that, Ken was the only Republican Candidate for the seat. At the time Holly Hughes was telling people that she was running for the State Senate Seat. Well - as she was telling everyone that she was Senate bound, State Rep. Goeff Hansen from Hart jumped in with both feet and started running. He let Holly do the talking but he started walking – door to door that is. Mr. Hansen was a seasoned Rep. and knew what it takes to win elections - people. He understood it was people who won elections and money was just a tool. As he became relentlessly active in Muskegon County, he started getting endorsements from the big shots some of whom Holly was relying on. With all of the door to door, he was also getting known to the people that matter just as much, the voters – you and I.

Soon Ms. Hughes felt the pressure from those in the know to take her money and influence to try something else. She had run in 2008 and lost the race for the 91st. She probably figured that this new guy, lacking her political knowledge and contacts would be a push over, plus she already had all of her signs from her previous race. She also figured she could twist some arms for endorsements of the political establishment she knew and had donated money to so well in the past.

This is the arrogance I’m talking about. The arrogance bred of money and power. Even Goeff Hansen ended up supporting her. Up and down the political line she got the political endorsements. She does have guts, recently she put her sticker on Pete Hoekstra at an event I had. On top of that when the owner and Pete wanted a picture taken together she jumped behind the counter and wedged herself between the two. Bob Scolnik who was also taking the picture because he was a friend of the owners had to ask Holly to uninsert herself. LOL

Another recent example of the Arrogance of monied candidates occurred at the County Fair. We Republicans have a booth there. Ken and Kay Punter have been selflessly making sure our booth is up and staffed during the 5 day affair. (Election Year or No) Kay gathers the candidate signs and literature from the HQ and sends out letters to all to make sure they have lit at the booth and to come on down and meet the people. This booth was for the Republican Party to gather new members and let people know what we stand for along with helping our candidates. For example Bill Cooper called ahead and sent a couple of his volunteers to watch the tent for a few hours one day. Punters each day open and each night closed the booth when no one is there. They weren’t politicking; they were doing what they had done the last few years, trying to promote the Republican Party.

The Punters broke the 5 day fair down into about 30 one hour time slots for the busiest times during those five days. Filling those slots as always is a tough thing to do. Getting back to the arrogance thing. Unlike Bill Cooper calling ahead and putting his crew into the time slots needed, Holly’s crew arrived on the scene with 6 or 7 people when we had two people already there and they took over.

If they would have coordinated with us we could have taken the others volunteer and filled an empty slot.

On top of that, the Hughes bunch broke some of the rules and stretched another.

No cars or trucks are allowed once the Fair starts, Holly’s crew drove up and kept the truck there while they were there. The next day the gates were closed.

The rule book said No political signs allowed outside of booths, Hughes signs soon starting popping up.

Then a 4’x4’ large sign was put up where the kids collected the prizes they won and people were taking pictures. My sources told me it cost her $200 for that photo opp. That was her standard campaign sign where only smaller sponsorship signs normally go.

Then there is the pig auction. We know from the last election that Holly loves pork as she bought the prize pig in 2008, which incidentally got her picture in the Ravenna newspaper. I guess they had plenty to eat from that pig because the next year (a non election year) she didn’t buy one.

Well this election year she bought two. If she had at least common sense you would think she would have a pig roast for a fundraiser.

Ken Punter has been putting out some pretty good literature.
I know this because the old saying imitation is best form of flattery.
I say that because as in the picture below. Ken came up with the theme for one brochure of Ken is a Pro. Then listing all the things he is pro about.
Shortly after that Holly does the same sort of thing.

Next Ken’s brochure tells of his experiences in the marines and his leadership skills etc. Well Holly’s whole back of the pamphlet would make one think that she won a medal.

Then again as with the pig auction thing the next Holly imitation has her standing in a corn field in non work clothes, showing what? – that she knows how to walk between the rows of corn without getting her clothes dirty. Compare that to Ken’s pics.

We have the choice between the imitation and the real thing.

We have the responsibility as Citizens in our Free Country to elect those who will do the job we entrust them to do.

I think Ken Punter will do that, I’m voting for him. You decide for yourself, I just ask you to think about which one once elected will spend the time, read the bills and do the research keeping in mind his constituents at home. Which candidate will put “People over Politics”?

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Integrity and the Rule of Law

2010-07-29T03:47:00.000-07:00

When I was first asked to become a Precinct Delegate (PD), I asked what I had to do. I was told not to worry about it; I didn’t have to do anything if I didn’t want to. Since then I have been on a quest to find out what a Precinct Delegate is and what can they do. I wanted to answer my question of “why become a PD”

There is a big story breaking in the news concerning the Tea Party and the Tea "PARTY" in Michigan.

Let me explain.

First the Tea Party

If you ask anyone, they know what the Tea Party is; they have seen it on TV, read about it in their newspapers and seen it plastered all over the internet news services both good and bad.

Fair warning I am the Chair of our local Tea Party; believe me we fall somewhere in-between “good and bad”. Speaking from experience the Tea Parties throughout the state have been committed to not forming a 3rd party because as we have seen in the past (Ross Perot comes to mind) a 3rd party only divides the Conservative vote.

Now the Tea "PARTY".

The big news story is the attempt of someone or some group not connected with any known Tea Party group has claimed the name Tea Party as its own and is setting up a political Party, a 3rd party. They have gathered enough signatures to get put on the Michigan ballot this November. Those signatures are now in front of the State Board of Canvassers. They will probably ok it.

Next they held the required state party convention to nominate candidates for their party.

In that same document they also usurped along with our name the Icon of our Tea Party movement. Below is a picture of our coiled snake with the caption Don’t Tread on Me. If this fraudulent effort is allowed to stand; your ballot this November will have along with the Democrat name and Logo of a Donkey and the Republican name and logo of an Elephant, the name Tea PARTY and the logo of the coiled snake.

If you watch the news you would more than likely know what that symbol means to those in the original Tea Party movement. It is one of the Icons of the Tea Party movement from the beginning. I remember buying my first “coiled snake” flag in Grand Rapids. It proudly graces our regular Tea Party monthly group meetings now.

Why is all this important?

All this activity to start a 3rd party in Michigan is shrouded in secrecy. The person filing the signatures is an unknown union worker who contributed to two different places last year for a combined total less than $100 dollars. The Consulting firm was paid over $100,000 to collect signatures. Nothing else is known. His address is a PO box and repeated tries have received no answer.

The recent “Convention” they claimed to have had was also shrouded in secrecy. No publicity, no location, and no exact time. In all reality probably just some phone calls were made. However over 20 candidates were nominated including those for Secretary of State, Attorney General and all the State House and State Senate races which are considered a tossup for this coming election.

The Mackinaw Center’s article below points out how the Political Director of the Oakland Co. Democrat Party notarized almost half of the Candidates that the “Tea PARTY” nominated.

The Mackinaw Center’s publication, Capitol Confidential just ran an article by Tom Gantert claiming a “smoking gun” has been found linking this “Tea PARTY” to the Michigan Democrat Party Oakland branch.

-----link-----
http://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/13260
--------------

So – what does this have to do with my being a Precinct Delegate? After reading the article above and having met Mr. Gillman through the Tea Party circuit; I realized that because I had become a PD I knew the terminology behind the method through which Mr. Gillman ferreted out the smoking gun.

The article quotes Mr. Gillman as saying "I couldn't get hold of these people (candidates)," said Gillman, who then said he knew that they had to file affidavits of identity with the state when running for political office. "Otherwise, it's like these people don't exist."

As I read the article I knew what the “affidavit of identity” was because I had to fill out one myself and get it notarized when I ran for PD. Just the background and information I picked up to become a PD helped explain the article and gave me a clearer picture of this whole mess and the way the political process is being corrupted.

This goes to the sanctity of the individual vote.

For all the candidates for Secretary of State who are reading this and have been hounding me for my vote because I’m a PD; if you take a strong stand right now on this issue, it will mean more to me than all the emails, snail mails and robocalls touting your integrity.

That is one of the answers to my question – “why become a PD”

The other answer to that question comes in the knowledge I have found out about the political process and how as a PD I can make a difference. As a PD I have a direct say in who becomes the nominee for my party for SOS and AG among others at the State Convention. I found out they weren’t nominated on the primary ballot but rather at convention of which I as a PD have a voter.

The bottom line is that words and symbols mean something and should be protected. When words and symbols can be corrupted and fraudulently used to corrupt the vote of honest Americans – Well - That Should Be Illegal.

The honesty and integrity of the rule of law is what my version of the Tea Party movement stands for, the integrity of my voting rights is what I’ll fight for.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Sunday Morning Thoughts

2010-07-25T08:07:00.000-07:00

Sunday Reflections – The Day Of

Today as I reflect on the things I’ve done the last couple of years and the mish mash of eclectic things I have tried to accomplish; one thing kept coming to mind.

Nothing I did made headlines and while I admit that headlines would have made me feel good; it would have been in the end counterproductive.

What I realized was that big events or stories that erupt into banner headlines are made up of all sorts of smaller events of every type. I realized also that these small efforts can build upon each other and create the ground swell for the type of events that garner headlines. Knowing that I was a part of the smaller events brought me comfort this day - this Sunday.

This reverie brought to my mind the whole idea of blogging, and some of my old internet haunts. One of which was Libertas which had closed down last summer.

-----link-----
http://www.libertasfilmmagazine.com/
--------------

I had followed and blogged about this site a couple of years ago as being part of the effort to take the conservative message and introduce it back into the main stream "pop" culture. In this case the movie industry. Libertas tried to provide a platform for conservative actors producers and directors to give vent to being black balled from the news outlets and the movie industry itself. Libertas would highlight those efforts and try to help sell them once produced. I, in my little local way highlighted them at the time and their movie selections.

Libertas struggled, shut down for awhile. They, as I did must have felt they had little effect. I see now they have reemerged in a sharper, brighter, and glossier format. The link above tells of the new movie Salt staring Angela Jolie. Below that is an article about the movie being made based on the classic Ayn Rand book “Atlas Shrugged”.

Also different actors have come out of the closet and proclaimed their “Conservativeness”. What was responsible for this? Not one thing, but as a friend always reminds me about the book Glenn Reynolds wrote called an Army of Davids, a lot of people and ideas and events are making it possible.

The point I’m trying to get to here is that small steps matter. The plethora of small ideas and efforts put forth by an "Army of Davids" against the Goliath that is Government has had huge effect. Through the Alternative Media of the internet these small steps by different people are exposed to the “Free Market Place of Ideas” and through the free choice of the public the best ideas survive and have a chance to flourish.

Conservative always seem to win the argument on paper. We have enough reams of paper devoted to the conservative message to repopulate six Brazilian rain forests. The problem is, nobody reads that anymore.

Andrew Breitbart was the first person I heard actually talk of taking the conservative message and putting it into the Pop Culture. Andrew took the old saying “a picture’s worth a thousand words mixed it with the internet and video and started making headway in the pop culture of the news media. People had for years written lengthy exposes about the corruption in non profits and nobody listened. When Breitbart built his platform “Big Government” for people to tell the same story with video; everyone took notice.

James O’Keefe and Hanna Giles took advantage of that platform and were able to take down ACORN with some video on YouTube.

-----link-----
http://biggovernment.com/tag/acorn-prostitution/
--------------

So as I relax finally and get a chance to blog this Sunday morning, I’ll give thanks that I am able to do those small things which added to everyone else’s may do some good in the world. Although I wonder how buying the remaining 400 prizes for a flag giveaway or transplanting a tomato plant will change the world – I will continue to believe it will therefore I’ll do it.

Besides, some things are just worth doing. And as John Wayne might say about reflections and that already it's almost noon -- "We’re burning daylight."

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

David and Goliath (local American style)

2010-07-23T20:48:00.000-07:00

David and Goliath (American Political Style)

There is a primary race in my neck of the woods that is shaping up to be a classic David and Goliath story out of the Bible. That race is for the 91st district State House seat.

If you remember from the Bible, Goliath was a giant standing over 9 feet tall and clad in name brand armor. He represented the Philistine army as they faced off against King Saul and the army of Israel. Due to the immense size and strength of the mightily armored Goliath, King Saul’s army was intimidated and frightened into not attacking.

That came to an end when David, a teenager who had been sent by his father to get news of the battle heard the taunts and insults of Goliath. With only the simple faith of his beliefs he stepped onto the field and won a victory over the Philistines.

We all know the story, though everything was against David, the simple faith in his beliefs led him unswervingly to attack and defeat the mighty Goliath. Ever since; that story has come to symbolize the triumph of the underdog over seemingly insurmountable odds.

In this current reenactment the role of David is being played by Ken Punter and Goliath by Holly Hughes. The seeming strength of Holly Hughes lies in the size of her bank account and her armor is made up of all the National Republican contacts and offices she holds. She knows all the right people personally from John McCain to Michael Steel. On down the food chain to Ron Weiser the Republican State Chair.

On top of this she is the National Republican Committee Woman; a highly influential position in National Party Politics. She was instrumental in electing Michael Steel to the National Republican Chair.

On the National Republican Party stage she is a key player.

Combined with the armor of her name dropping and the towering height of her financial stature she is indeed daunting to lesser mortals. Now to the specifics.

Both of the Republican Candidates have submitted their pre-election financial reports for the primary. A recap of the information which is available on the Secretary of State website is as follows:

Holly Hughes: Contributions - $25,896.41; Expenditures - $119,780.23; Cash Loans from Candidate (this election cycle) - $80,000.00; Account Balance - $7,340.39

Punter: Contributions - $10,960.33; Expenditures - $14,475.57; Cash Loans from Candidate (this election cycle) - $5,000.00; Account Balance - $1,373.43

Goliath is out spending David by 8/1 !!!!!Most people would gasp and say Ken Punter is outmatched and sure to lose.
I simply wonder why Holly Hughes thought she needed to spend so much against a rival spending so little in the primary.

I also start to wonder if Ms. Hughes spends her own money so freely how will she spend the taxpayer’s money.

Ken Punter is not easily intimidated; I guess that is what comes from retiring from the Marines as a Lieutenant.Colonel. In the same vein he knows how to stay focused and follow through what he starts. His 15 years on the school board attests to that.

He brings to the field in his sling a simple but deadly weapon --

People Over Politics

As with the stone in the Bible; Ken Punter’s simple faith in that slogan may indeed bring down a modern day Goliath.

If that happens; as with the Army of Israel the Republican base will then have time to think and realize it was really inevitable.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Chetly Zarko is Dead, but not forgotten

2010-07-21T08:26:00.000-07:00

Chetly Zarko has passed away at the age of 39.

Our condolences go out to Eric Rothoff the Co Chair of the Muskegon Tea Party who was a friend and fellow co worker of Mr. Zarko.

The Muskegon Tea Party had its Executive Board meeting 8am Tues. Eric with the rest of our board was there talking the business of our Tea Party group. We were discussing putting out a press release regarding the fake Tea Party which just announced it had filed the necessary petition signatures to put their name on the ballot.

Because Eric was intimately involved with Chetly Zarko and his efforts since last May to expose the “Tea Party Party” as a fake; our co chair was able to give us some needed insight into who was probably behind the effort to deflect the popularity of the Tea Party Movement and its influence on the elections.

Here is a link to a radio station site which gives Wendy Days opinion.

-----link-----
http://www.whmi.com/news/article/10540
--------------

Here is a link to the Mackinaw Center’s RIP article. It has some good links about Chetly Zarko.

-----link-----
http://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/13212
--------------

I only met him a few times and then only in passing, usually at Conservative meetings or conventions in and around Lansing where he was based. One example was a Center Right Meeting in Lansing hosted by Jack Hoogendyk.

I can only empathize with Eric on his loss, and tell him to keep involved in all the work he and Zarko have been doing to keep the fight for freedom alive. Keep immersed in the effort to allay your sorrow and know that by doing so your boss would be proud.

Again our condolences go out to his family friends and co workers of which Eric our co chair is included.

>>>>>Breaking<<<<<<<

Just talked with Eric and he told me he was he the one who found Chet at around 11 Tues. He also said Chet was in his chair and Fox was on. Eric believed that he was the last one to talk with Chet on the phone and it was (if I remember the conversation correctly) Sat. Eric found Chet Tues. Chet's parents had called Eric to check on Chetly. An autopsy will be performed today; which will determe cause and time of death.

One side effect of this is that Eric was going to be the MC at the Young Republican sponsered 2nd Congressional Debate at MCC, now he will not be able to do it. A suitable replacement will be found he assured me.

We will all miss Chetly's due dilligence in bringing to light that which has been in the dark too long. The burden upon us to try to make up the difference in this fight for transparancy and freedom has indeed increased with his passing.

Bill Cooper Sues Jay Riemersma.

Here is the link to an MLive article. The news came out last night.

As if there wasn't enough sizzle in the frying pan which is the Republican Primary race for the 2nd Congressional Seat. Now we learn that Bill Cooper is filing a lawsuit against Jay Riemersma.

-----link-----
http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2010/07/jay_riemersma_sued_by_fellow_r.html
--------------

The debate in Muskegon should be interesting. Think the media will perk up their ears at this. Get there early.

In a phone conversation today with Meghan Cooper I learned some things she ok'd for publication.

1. This lawsuit was filed three weeks ago. (Like I said this news just came out)
2. Meghan claims the Cooper camp did not make the news public.
3. When I asked the motivation for the lawsuit as it would not be settled before the August primary, she told me the Bill Cooper did it to stand up for himself and to do what was right.
4. Bill Coioper will attend the MCC debate mentioned above Thurs as scheduled.

I asked for some specifics as to what was alleged and what they had proof of.
She told me they were accusing the Riemersma camp when going door to door of stating falsehoods about Bill Cooper. She listed a few.

1. That Bill Cooper wasn't a Christian.
2. That Bill Cooper moved from Arizona to Michigan just to run for office
3. That a business of Bill Coopers was foreclosed on for failure to pay taxes.

Meghan then explained the truth to these accusations.

Bill Cooper belongs to a Church in Fruitport for 25 years, his children attend a Christian School.

Bill Cooper never had residence in Arizona.

While he paid the taxes late he did pay them and it wasn't done to avoid paying but rather a not uncommon business tactic.

I also talked with Lia who was covering for Jane Jelgerhuis Jay's campaign manager. I was sorry to here that Jane was in the Hospital for some serious surgery. The prognosis was positive but she was in no position to comment at this time. Lia said she would contact me Monday.

Lia did confirm however that Jay Riemersma will attend the debate Thurs at MCC.

That's is except for some hard real stuff from my precinct. (Precinct 6, Ward 2 city of Muskegon)

Wow what a bash at Love Community Garden. The Picnic was put on by the Garden under the direction of Morning Bear and The Love Fellowship Baptist Church and Pastor Phillips. BBQ@ chicken, Pulled pork and Hotdogs and Hamburgers. The rides for the kids were fantastic, we had face painting and even a petting zoo. The ladies of the Church made some great dishes to go along with the meat. Big fun and plenty of kids having a ball and well behaved.

This is a perfect example how people can get together and learn again how to be self sufficient and create the neighborhood feeling of old. In My Opinion this is a perfect example of Church injecting moral values back into the community.

Also the Republicans had a road clean up with Stu as always setting it up. Along with Stu Peterson in the pic is Jim Riley in the middle and on the Right Ken Punter candidate for the 91st State house seat.

Also not in the pic was Jon Koens and State Rep. Goeff Hansen candidate for the 34th state Senate seat.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

In the Conservative Trenches We Look to Leaders

2010-06-29T14:56:00.000-07:00

What can I say.

When change is needed we need leaders

Chris Christie governor of New Jersey has through his leadership and vision prodded the State Legislature into passing a balanced budget.

Chris Christie has proven himself to be a leader.

What makes this so striking is that out of a 21 billion dollar budget they were short 11 billion. That they made up a 33% budget short fall is improbable enough. To do that by not raising taxes and mainly from cutting spending is a feat not seen in recent memory.

The video below makes clear that they were able to do that only with some bi-partisan support. The unions in the state were running nonstop terror ads about people and children who would be dying if this were to happen.

Guess what, the citizens of the state told their Legislators that they didn't believe the politicians any more and they wouldn't accept more taxes. As Chris Christie in the video said "the system is flawed", and everyone knew it.

The majority of the politicians had for decades bowed to those special interests that benefited when taxes were raised, to cover the short falls in budgets. Mainly unions, mainly public sector unions. The citizens said enough is enough.

In the videeo it was a shock to the commentators to hear the Governor explain how hard it was to get the unions to pay 1 1/2% for their health care when the rest of the workers were paying up to 20%.

The really shocking part to me wsas that I and the citizens in NJ knew that the public union workers were making a good deal more than private sector workers doing the same thing, and yet they whined about 1 1/2 %.

The first 1 1/2 minute is Clinton babbling like he so cutely does then the rest is Christie.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

If we want this to happen in Michigan, we have to get off our butts and help elect Conservative candidates in the primary and then see it through the general election. Then on top of that keep the pressure on them to do what they say. Heck you might want to join a Tea Party or something. (LOL)

We need as conservatives to see to it that Republicans gain in the Senate and win the House back. The near dictatorial powers of the Speaker (Mr. Dillon) needs to be changed. Then of course we need a new Governor.

I've posted before asking if we have any gubenatorial candidate with the chuptza to pull this off. I'm putting my money on Hoekstra - does he have the guts of a Christie?

?????? """????? One thing I'll tell you is that if a new crop of conservatives are elected to the state house to watch his back, Pete may be more inclined to take the really big chances necessary to really change things.

In the 91st (Muskegon) state house we need to electKen Punter in the primary.

If you feel like you’re at war with Lansing (thanks jDawg) the primary is the chance you have to elect someone who knows how to fight back – a Marine --- vote in the primary for Ken Punter.

Think about it.

If you want a change -- the Primary is all important.

Think about it.

Tired of the same old wishy washy candidates?
Tired of them giving in to special interests, just to get elected?
How about 22 years a Marine, 15 years on the school board ???
You can say Ken Punter knows how to say no to attacks on our Freedoms
Both Foreign and Domestic.

Ken Punter is beholding to no special interests or political lobby, he would not be waiting on the sidelines while a "Chris Christie" type Michigan Governor battled. Punter would be there digging in with the Governor.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Who Needs This Kind of Help ???

2010-06-27T16:07:00.000-07:00

The poor governor of Arizona went to Washington to get help from the President about strengthing the border to stop illegal aliens from overwhelming her state. The President said he would help.

Wow Some help. LOL or should I say

As time went by and nothing was being done to fullfill that promise. Something was done and seemingly the Arizona Governor rues the day she asked for help from this Predident.

I mean it's like going to the police after someone broke into your house, had a drug orgy and you asked them to help. Wow how would you feel if all they did was put up signs all around your neighbor hood advising people not to go to your house as it is unsafe.

Big Help that is. Really Takes the load off, or should I say What a Load.

Weeeeell

The Governor seemingly thought the same thing.

Sleep tight tonight America as we know how the One is protecting us.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Incentivize Spending Cuts ???

2010-05-12T08:21:00.000-07:00

We need a mechanism to incentivize spending less.

I see it all the time. Money allocated to a program takes some creative action some times to be completely spent. When asked why not just give it back or not spend it, I’m told a couple of things.

1. If we do the money will just be spent on something else and at least this way we’ll know how it’s spent.

2. If we show a surplus then we will be docked that amount next time they give us money and we can’t have that.

Has anyone ever seriously tried to come up with a way to promote departments saving money? Incentivize the process? I’ve blogged before about the need for such a plan but couldn’t come up with one.

I just got an email about a Mackinac Center blog on state employee pay growing 25% over inflation. The interesting thing that brought this idea of mine up was that while the government was paying out 25% more to the employees overall, the state employee work force had shrunk.

-----link-----
http://www.mackinac.org/12568
--------------

To me that meant that employees were getting cut while budgets were getting bigger. That told me that cutting services does not cut spending by the government. It told me that no matter what, the job of the bureaucracy was to get more money regardless of need. See # 2 above.

The sub headline of the Mac Center article read; Total Payroll Up $1.5 Billion Despite Fewer Workers.

That sub headline told me also that if the government unions were worried about hiring more people they would of found a way of doing so with that extra five Billion instead of whatever they did with it. I’m sure some of that was due to hopefully efficiencies of processes making some jobs obsolete but it makes me wonder.

I called up Ted O’Neil at the Mac Center to see if they had done any thinking along those lines. They hadn’t, however Ted brought up the idea that when government makes the rules for giving out money to private industry, he offered roads as an example; they put in rewards for being ahead of schedule and penalties for coming in behind schedule. I also assume that employees that helped made that happen stood a chance in sharing in that reward. He did think that it was odd that government didn’t do the same for itself.

I was thinking maybe he was catching my point. He did say that he would bring it up when they did their brainstorming thing. (“thing” being my word as it is much too trite for a think tank LOL)

Privatizing government functions is not a panacea only a useful tool.
Let me flush out what I’m thinking of doing. It has to do with embarrassment. Hopefully not mine – but you can be the judge.

It seems to me that any plan in order to work will have to come from the Bottom Up. What if I was to set up a bank account strictly for the national debt? Then each week I would put in a dollar. In one year I would have collected $52. Ok, pretty stupid huh?

What about if this idea went viral? What if others started putting in $1 cash a week then gathered at a local spot to collect the cash and have a big shot count and put it in another bank account? So far not much traction except some people might start to feel like they have some skin in the game. (The Big Shot would or at least he would tell everyone he or she did – and that’s fine in fact that’s the idea).
That “skin” is the key. If I commit to $50 a year to pay down the debt especially with cash that people can touch see and feel combined with a public display; well some politicians might get on board. With enough public pressure perhaps the bureaucracies could be embarrassed enough to donate some.

I know -- I’m the one feeling embarrassed. Oh well what’s new? I want people to get involved in government and get some skin in the game. However that can happen I’m for. If the citizenry is willing to bite the bullet to get spending under control, they will probably find it rewarding to vote out people who think otherwise or try to tell them they’re “skin” is stupid.

Here is another idea. What about using the same citizen savings idea and get the politicians to pass a law that the government will match dollar for dollar the private contributions. By the way I would make this collection a private thing and hopefully talk the banks into setting it up pro bono. God knows they could use the good pr.

Get some really big names at whatever level to oversee the process again on a pro bono, good publicity or public image basis. The trick would be to have this law somehow make sure the matching government money would have to come from reductions in funding or spending. Taxes could not be raised to offset the cost. I would envision an across the board type of cut to minimize the threat of service suspensions to thwart the plan.

This even if and when it started would not amount to a lot when compared to the national debt. The biggest benefit would be to give the people putting in their “skin” a perfect object lesson in how large a million or a billion or a trillion really is and how massive the problem really is so they might get mobilized to put into office people more willing to cut government.

Kinda of a back door grassroots driven spending cut.

The real key is that something like this can show in black and white how basically simple the solution to this complex problem could be.

I know this is embryonic in nature. Or you might think, not well thought out. I agree, but that is the point. I’m not in a think tank. What say you Mac Center? Let me know how crazy I really am. Work with me on this.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Ladies of the Lake

2010-04-25T04:28:00.000-07:00

Waldo was found Wandering far afield from Muskegon.

Click on any pics to enlarge
Click again to get bigger yet!

Friday I wanted to go to Lake County specifically to Peacock Mi to attend the always fun and filling Lake County Lincoln Day Dinner. I saved gas because I only had to drive to Hart where Goeff and Tammy Hansen gave me a ride the rest of the way. I and my old truck thank them. On the way we picked up the Chair of Oceana Co. Juanita Pierman. I was in my element, lots of good political talk on the way.
As we made the last turn on 4th st. after miles of driving through the National Forest seemingly in the middle of nowhere --- There was Waldo bravely exclaiming that even way out there, they "HAVE HAD ENOUGH".

Then to my extra delight there were more Waldo's at the site of the Lake Lincoln Day Dinner. I was happy to see Mama Waldo there. She is the "Join the Lake County Republicans" sign. That sign gave birth to the "Had Enough" sign. The Runnels were the brains behind that.

Inside, there were around 50 people and plenty of great smelling food. Here is a picture of the Ladies of the Lake who were responsible for the meal and the work that went into it.

I'm getting to know some of these people and my hats off to the Runnels who are the driving force behind this growing enclave of Republican support in an otherwise Democrat Blue county. As in my Muskegon environment the Runnels too know what I mean when I say "Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.

Goeff Hansen was the master of ceremonies and kept things moving along through a packed agenda with wit and humor.

Lots of candidates up and down the line and a lot of auctioning of donated items which fetched high prices due to the generosity of the bidders ably egged on by Tammy Hansen among others. Darwin Booher among others found themselves more generous than they thought they were.

Darwin Booher and Jay Riemersma were the guest speakers who each gave good talks. I was especially happy when Rep. Booher started his speech by saying he was heartened and knew he was at the right place when he saw a sign proclaiming “Had Enough !! Vote Republican” I and Waldo were smiling.

The clear winners of a straw poll were Pete Hoekstra for Governor, Bill Huizenga for the 2nd Congressional, Darwin Booher for the 35th state senate seat, Marc Libants for the 100th state house seat, Michael McManus for Secretary of State and Mike Bishop for attorney general. Here are some general pictures of the crowd etc. plus one of Tammy doing her Vanna impersonation.

It ended up being a long evening due to the ride back to Hart then Muskegon but the time was spent talking politics on the ride back to Hartm which is like mother’s milk to me.

Next morning (Sat) and I was up early blogging and doing a lot of stuff on the Muskegon Patriot site. Our meeting is coming up this Tues the 27th at Whitlow’s banquet room at 7:00. A busy agenda is in store. This is the meeting to get candidates up for an election to be held at our following meeting May 11th, at the same time and place. The meeting this Tues is to continue our process of organizing activities and groups.

We are becoming a group, so far we're working through our growing pains.

Sat afternoon was dedicated to helping the Punter campaign in starting up an ambitious door to door campaign. Fred Bertsch on his way down from Whitehall picked me up at 12:30 and off we went to Ravenna.

Ken and Kay kicked off this drive in Ravenna as it is their home turf. This was just a start in this effort to cover the whole county. This was a test run to see if the system worked. Door to door is actually knocking on doors and talking with the people about Ken and asking for their support while handing them some literature. We also if appropriate ask if they’d be interested in putting a Punter sign in their yard when the time comes.

I’m pretty new to this but seemed to have caught on pretty quickly. Kay had a script for us, to help us get over the nervousness, but the people were so friendly that I soon didn’t need the script. I was happy to see the large number of signs people wanted.

Ken bought our lunch at Ravenna Round Table LLC, 12396 Stafford Street, Ravenna - (231) 853-2106; a nice clean family owned restaurant with a touch of class.

Afterwards, it was back to Ken and Kay’s home where we plotted some strategy and tweaked our door to door and lit drop plans. Fred and I got our marching orders for lit drops in our respective areas. I have to say here that Kay, acting as her husband’s campaign manager is pretty awesome in what she has accomplished with limited resources. She is doing what another campaign would hire 1 or 2 extra staff to do.

This isn’t hit or miss or slipshod either. She has gone to several campaign training events across the state. She has learned and is networked throughout the district. She spends all day on the campaign. She knew nothing about campaigns to start and now is, well a professional, without the pay of course.

She has had Ken attending every chicken fry or public gathering throughout the district on a daily basis. It is starting to work. I saw when we were going door to door that Ken is in his element just plain talking with the voters. His honesty and integrity are coming to the fore.

They are raising money and dipping into their own pocket. They are dedicated. I am impressed with how frugal both Kay and Ken have been and what they have accomplished with so little letting their war chest keep ahead of their spending.

I wouldn't mind seeing more of that in Lansing.

At this point I’d like to make a plea for volunteers to help their efforts. Money is always nice LOL. What we need now however is “boots on the ground”. The Primary is coming up. Ken Punter and Holly Hughes are the two Republicans in the race for the 91st House Seat. Go to my Candidate page and look for their websites.

-----link-----
http://bottomuppolitics.com/candidates_12.html
--------------

Make up your own mind.

I’ve made up mine obviously. Ken Punter’s motto is “People over Politics”. He brings a fresh alternative to “politics as usual” to this race. There is a clear choice.

I’ve learned in my short time blogging and playing around the edges of politics that helping a campaign is rewarding in a character building type of way. This is how I get to put my words into practice. This is how I try to keep myself honest.
Candidates in general are always needing volunteers, full or part time. Look through my Candidate page linked above and pick on you like and volunteer. They will take any kind of offer to help seriously. If you want to help once for an event or if you want to become their constant companion (LOL) they will welcome you.

In a campaign every minute of a Candidates time is valuable and called for. Candidates understand how valuable your time is and will thank you for donating it to them.

It’s a personal thing.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Chutzpah

2010-04-23T09:49:00.000-07:00

Does Hoekstra have the chutzpah?

Michigan is in dire financial straits. There is lots of waste and duplication of effort in a lot of areas plus outright fraud. Reforms along these lines are nice but where the real money lies is in the Land of the Unions. All up and down the system.

Unions aren’t bad, Big Unions like Big Business or Big Government is.

Chris Christie knew that and he had the chutzpa to say it.

He pulled off a major upset by winning the New Jersey special election for governor. He had campaigned as a conservative. Boy do I hear a lot of that these days coming from politicians all up and down the campaign trail.

Unlike 95% of those talkers, once Chris Christie became Governor he not only kept right on talking like a conservative, which is rare enough but starting trying as hard as he could to effect change.

The state is heavily Democrat. He shouldn’t have won on party lines. The new Governor is a Republican. Unlike Scott Brown Christie did not immediately swerve to the middle once elected.

Michigan is a lot like New Jersey as far debt ridden and the majority of the voters being fed up with failed Democrat policies. In New Jersey they were willing to give full measures a chance.

His first speech to the legislature was absolutely so politically incorrect that I found myself cheering at my computer. Of course I blogged about it at the time. Once at the link scroll down for the actual speech.

-----link-----
http://conservativeinmuskegon.blogspot.com/2010/02/cats-out-of-bag.html
--------------

New Jersey had a budget deficit over $10 billion: wow. Makes Michigan’s short fall seem a lot easier to handle.

But with that $10 Billion to make up the new Governor went to work, he attacked things all the paid consultants I’m sure told him were untouchable. He was honest with the people in what he planned to do as a candidate and he is trying to keep the promises he made. Some of the smaller more member orientated are joining him! His promise was simple, namely to balance the budget and live within their means. By doing whatever was necessary.

To do that he is fighting back against the unions and the war they are waging against him.

Below is a link to the nastiness of the union using their teachers to use their students to fight against Christie.

-----link-----
http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/03/nj_gov_chris_christie_budget_c.html
---------------

Hat tip to Muskegon Pundit for this.

-----link-----
http://muskegonpundit.blogspot.com/2010/04/george-f-will-bringing-thunder-ous.html#links
-------------

Muskegon Pundit’s post brought Christie’s efforts back onto my radar when he linked a George Will article in the Washington Post.

Christie is definitely on George’s radar.

-----link-----
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/21/AR2010042104451.html
--------------

Some of the politicians I know around here tell me that the voters while they like the rhetoric will not stand for it if you actually try to cut government.
The rest of them seem to think they can’t get elected it they stray from the political middle.

The middle of what is what I’m asking. Inbetween a Democrat and a Republican? The voters are fed up with both. They want someone to do their job period and New Jersey so far has that.

That need to find that safe middle ground might be so here,(I Doubt It) but it seems to be proving false in New Jersey, that dark blue state. Voters at the school board level have just rejected well over half of the proposed budgets for the schools, forcing renegotiations. Part of Christie’s original message was that he was going to create tools to help districts negotiate with Unions; he is making this happen.

-----link-----
http://jammiewearingfool.blogspot.com/2010/04/earthquake-in-new-jersey-majority-of.html
---------------

So far the voters are watching Christie’s back instead of sticking a knife there.
If Chris Christie would have tried some half measures I doubt he would have won in the first place or have the continued trust of the voters.

So the question remains in my mind. Does Pete Hoekstra have the chutzpah to actually make these fundamental changes in Michigan?

If he does, he is keeping it close to the vest as far as particulars. That maybe good until the general election; but I’m hoping to see some of that New Jersey Hell Fire in Michigan. Of all the candidates for Governor I think Pete has the tools, hopes he uses them.

The voters I’m betting would like to be trusted and willing to trust and vote for someone who does.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative