Two political earthquakes struck last week: Brown’s victory in Massachusetts; and the Supreme Court’s ruling on campaign finance. Both developments were the result of battles that conservatives have long fought, and our immediate reactions to them were pure joy. However, as euphoric as Brown’s win remains, the Supreme Court’s ruling presents both challenges and opportunities to the Harris County Republican Party.
A wholly new political environment was created. PACs and 527 organizations are now irrelevant--and will probably disappear. Any organization--corporations, unions, chambers of commerce, trade associations, and issue-advocacy groups--now can freely publish endorsements, ads, and documentaries for candidates and issues. Right now this is a mixed-blessing for the GOP, because the left has as many, if not more, groups who are ready to independently spend money to support the Democratic Party and its candidates.
In the meantime, limits on candidates and parties are still in place, including: contribution limits for candidates; allocation restrictions for party organizations; prohibitions on coordinated campaign activities between candidates (and parties) and outside organizations; and the threat of recusal of a judge in any case involving corporations and other entities, whose independent advocacy significantly benefits the judge’s campaign.
The next Chair of the HCRP must address this new reality immediately. If I am elected, I will convene the best political and legal minds to create a strategy to take maximum advantage of this new situation, while helping our candidates and elected officials navigate it. As part of this new strategy, I will re-establish direct relationships with the business community. As evidence of my ability to build this bridge, last week I received the endorsement of the C Club, which is the first time the club has ever made an endorsement in a race for party chair.
We will need to treat the business community, as well as other pro-conservative organizations, as constituents with whom we work to develop our political agenda and support our candidates. I will create a strategy that is legal and ethical, and I will do so while we rebuild our organization to mobilize Republicans to vote in 2010 and 2012.
Old strategies will not be effective in this new environment. For example, our approach to candidate promotion must be more sophisticated than sending an ad-based “Chairman’s Report” by mail on the eve of Election Day. Not only are such late mailings ineffective when 75% of voters now vote early, but the current approach has allowed at least one Democrat to buy ads and has been designed primarily to benefit the incumbent chair’s re-election campaign. This must end.
In fact, let’s stop this practice now. The incumbent has just mailed a solicitation to all candidates on the primary ballot to pay for ads in a new “Chairman’s Report” for the primary. Let’s tell the incumbent that this practice is ineffective and improper, and challenge him to produce a Voter Guide that is even-handed and promotes the party’s candidates—not his campaign.
Let's take control of the new reality and use it to win elections, rather than continue the same, ineffective practices of the past.
Ed Hubbard
Candidate for Chair of the Harris County Republican Party
www.HubbardForHCRP.com
Showing posts with label 2010. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2010. Show all posts
Monday, January 25, 2010
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
A Holiday Greeting
As I begin a few days of celebration with my family, I want to wish all of you a happy and joyous holiday—whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, or another religious or cultural observance, or just enjoy the spirit of the season. I also want to share three reflections.
First, even though we Republicans have had a rough time over the last few years, we each have much to be thankful for in our own lives. Both our shared experiences and our personal experiences—and the good and bad in both—are part of what gives us strength, nurtures our character, and builds wisdom. I believe that from this developing strength, character, and wisdom will come the foundation for seizing opportunities in the coming years.
Second, for me this has been a year of challenge, but also one of promise. It has been a year since I challenged the incumbent Chair of the HCRP to fix the problems with the party organization or step aside to allow new leadership to do so. Since I made that challenge, there have been a lot of days when I, and a few of my closest allies, have felt quite alone in this struggle. However, I recently visited with a group of people in which a precinct chair referred to me as the “acting chair,” because I had been driving the agenda of the party for months. Though I was taken aback by the statement, I appreciated the gracious nod to what we have been trying to accomplish.
Beginning last December, through meetings with young activists and established party leaders, I helped nurture and support young leaders who formed new organizations such as Raging Elephants, Conservador Alliance, and the local Tea Party Society, which are building relationships in our African-American and Latino communities, and providing a voice to a new conservative activism in our community. I also worked to gain support for our strategic vision throughout our party. Our efforts have led to phenomenal results so far:
Not bad for just 12 months of agitating from outside the party organization--and I want to thank everyone who has helped me, and who are joining our ranks daily (I will start posting on this website next week the substantial endorsements I have received already). I think it is fair to ask whether any of this would have happened had I not posted that challenge to the incumbent a year ago. Even if I don’t win this race, we will have accomplished more to improve the party organization in the last year than the incumbent did over his first 7 years—and just think what we could accomplish together if I win.
Finally, I want to leave you with a thought based on my reading of a New-Testament verse that always touches me. In his Epistle to the Galatians, Paul makes the following challenge:
When you read this passage, think about those settlers who came to this continent in the 1600s and established families, churches, schools and neighborhoods based on this challenge; think about Jefferson’s reference to God’s gift of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” and what the words “liberty" and "happiness” meant to our forefathers before the French Revolution; and think about the monumental struggles our ancestors waged to try to meet that challenge here and abroad over the last three centuries. Then, ask yourself: what have I done to meet this challenge? If you find your answer to be like mine, then let’s commit ourselves in the coming years to meet this challenge—in our families, our communities, and in our country—not just to regain the liberty we are losing, but to then use it correctly, so that we can pass on this gift to our children better than we received it.
Happy Holidays to all!
First, even though we Republicans have had a rough time over the last few years, we each have much to be thankful for in our own lives. Both our shared experiences and our personal experiences—and the good and bad in both—are part of what gives us strength, nurtures our character, and builds wisdom. I believe that from this developing strength, character, and wisdom will come the foundation for seizing opportunities in the coming years.
Second, for me this has been a year of challenge, but also one of promise. It has been a year since I challenged the incumbent Chair of the HCRP to fix the problems with the party organization or step aside to allow new leadership to do so. Since I made that challenge, there have been a lot of days when I, and a few of my closest allies, have felt quite alone in this struggle. However, I recently visited with a group of people in which a precinct chair referred to me as the “acting chair,” because I had been driving the agenda of the party for months. Though I was taken aback by the statement, I appreciated the gracious nod to what we have been trying to accomplish.
Beginning last December, through meetings with young activists and established party leaders, I helped nurture and support young leaders who formed new organizations such as Raging Elephants, Conservador Alliance, and the local Tea Party Society, which are building relationships in our African-American and Latino communities, and providing a voice to a new conservative activism in our community. I also worked to gain support for our strategic vision throughout our party. Our efforts have led to phenomenal results so far:
* Raging Elephants successfully placed a billboard promoting the GOP in a traditionally African-American Community, conducted workshops on how to expand the GOP into new communities, and its leader has gained a growing local and national following;
* The leader of Conservador Alliance recently was named by the Republican National Committee, and the Republican Party of Texas to serve as the statewide director of a new party-affiliated organization: Latino National Republican Coalition;
* Two activists, who helped coordinate our early meetings, went on to form and lead the local Tea Party movement;
* At least five county GOP parties across the State of Texas have referenced my proposed strategic plan, and discussed it with me, as they have revised their own written mission statements and strategic plans;
* Our local GOP leadership, after seven years of inaction, responded to our efforts with an aggressive communication blitz that has included emails, social-networking training, townhall meetings, public discussions of its own plan for the future, an audit of its finances and financial reporting, and the re-opening of an East Side satellite office with the purpose of engaging in community activities that we have been proposing all year; and
* Two more candidates have joined the first real competitive race for Chair in almost 15 years, all three of my opponents are discussing issues and goals that we have been discussing all year, and there are now 9 scheduled or proposed debates during the month of January, 2010.
Not bad for just 12 months of agitating from outside the party organization--and I want to thank everyone who has helped me, and who are joining our ranks daily (I will start posting on this website next week the substantial endorsements I have received already). I think it is fair to ask whether any of this would have happened had I not posted that challenge to the incumbent a year ago. Even if I don’t win this race, we will have accomplished more to improve the party organization in the last year than the incumbent did over his first 7 years—and just think what we could accomplish together if I win.
Finally, I want to leave you with a thought based on my reading of a New-Testament verse that always touches me. In his Epistle to the Galatians, Paul makes the following challenge:
For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself’”
When you read this passage, think about those settlers who came to this continent in the 1600s and established families, churches, schools and neighborhoods based on this challenge; think about Jefferson’s reference to God’s gift of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” and what the words “liberty" and "happiness” meant to our forefathers before the French Revolution; and think about the monumental struggles our ancestors waged to try to meet that challenge here and abroad over the last three centuries. Then, ask yourself: what have I done to meet this challenge? If you find your answer to be like mine, then let’s commit ourselves in the coming years to meet this challenge—in our families, our communities, and in our country—not just to regain the liberty we are losing, but to then use it correctly, so that we can pass on this gift to our children better than we received it.
Happy Holidays to all!
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Open Letter to Jared Woodfill
To Jared Woodfill: Either Disclose how you plan to win back the county through the 2009 and 2010 elections, or step aside to allow for new leadership
Since the recent election, we have heard from the current leadership of the Harris County Republican Party on at least four occasions. In each instance, these pronouncements have amounted to less than they appear.
First, publicity about the chariman’s reaction to a two-year old email incident was unmasked as a thinly-veiled attempt to force a quick vote of confidence in favor of Chairman Woodfill’s leadership in the aftermath of the election losses. This improper attempt to shore-up political support for the chairman at the expense of the reputation of Republican officeholders was handled appropriately by the precinct chairs when they tabled the resolution indefinitely.
Second, the chairman’s email of December 6th was an escape from reality. The email mischaracterized the outcome of the election; provided misleading figures about how much money the party had raised and what the party had done with that money; made promises about future action that do not address the real problems facing the party; and made financial commitments the party can not, at present, keep. Nowhere in that email did the chairman level with the party faithful as to the actual, dire financial and strategic condition of the local party.
Third, the chairman’s public pronouncements that the party was supporting the Huffman campaign for the run-off election were not completely accurate. In fact, campaign volunteers could not reach the party headquarters by phone or email during most of the campaign period, and when volunteers showed-up to man a phone bank, the office was either closed, or no one was present making calls.
Fourth, the chairman’s new Christmas video blog uses PowerPoint graphics to merely state the obvious. The recited details about the Democrats’ use of the Internet were well-publicized during the primaries and general election campaign, but our current leadership is just now recognizing the need for an updated Internet presence. In the meantime, the chairman says nothing about a plan for how the internet will actually be used to win elections, and nothing about how the party will pay for its new technology plan.
In this post-election period, Republicans have been demanding real leadership and a new strategic plan for winning elections. The real state of the Republican Party in Harris County and across the state is perilous. A recent PowerPoint presentation from the state party provides some startling figures. While Republicans achieved a net gain in offices won across the state, virtually all of the gain came in county and local races in rural counties. Meanwhile we lost ground where most Texans now live. Of the 254 counties in Texas, Republicans gained votes in 140 counties with 2,438,604 registered voters, while Democrats gained votes in 114 counties with 11,136,458 registered voters. The 50 fastest growing Republican counties in Texas have a total of 637,694 registered voters, while the 50 fastest growing Democratic counties have a total of 8,959,881 registered voters. You do the math—if this trend continues, we will not elect Republicans in Harris County and will soon lose our statewide offices.
To date, the actions of Chairman Woodfill fail to respond to Republican demands and electoral reality. Since late November, however, there has been a plan circulating within the local party. It is the plan published on this website, which has become known as “the Hubbard Plan.” At first, those of us promoting this plan had hoped that current leadership would react to it by engaging in a discussion about these ideas, and about how to implement a real plan for winning elections. Instead, we have gotten more of the same from Chairman Woodfill. We now challenge Chairman Woodfill to tell us in detail how the current leadership is going to help us win local elections in 2009, and county elections in 2010, and how it is going to fund its efforts.
While we wait to hear from the chairman, we ask that a discussion about the direction of the party be conducted over the next month, and that, at the next scheduled Executive Committee meeting resolutions be considered related to adoption of the Hubbard Plan. Moreover, if the current leadership does not come forward with its own comprehensive plan, or does not embrace the Hubbard Plan, we ask it to step aside and allow a new team to mobilize the party to be ready to contest the 2009 city and school board elections with conservative candidates and policies (which we discuss more fully in another blog we have posted today). If the chairman does nothing, then we will seek a resolution at the next Executive Committee meeting asking for his resignation.
In the meantime, to foster the discussion, we are posting on “Rebuild the Party.com” a discussion within the Harris County Group, which will begin to discuss an outline for proposed bylaw amendments that would be needed to implement changes discussed in the Hubbard Plan. We urge you to use the link to that site posted on our “Organize” page, to join this discussion group and weigh-in with your ideas. In the meantime, we ask all of you who believe you can help with the leadership of the party to step forward now, so that your fellow Republicans can consider you for leadership positions, including the chairmanship.
We can not wait until the primary of 2010 to make the needed changes in direction and leadership. The time to act is now.
Since the recent election, we have heard from the current leadership of the Harris County Republican Party on at least four occasions. In each instance, these pronouncements have amounted to less than they appear.
First, publicity about the chariman’s reaction to a two-year old email incident was unmasked as a thinly-veiled attempt to force a quick vote of confidence in favor of Chairman Woodfill’s leadership in the aftermath of the election losses. This improper attempt to shore-up political support for the chairman at the expense of the reputation of Republican officeholders was handled appropriately by the precinct chairs when they tabled the resolution indefinitely.
Second, the chairman’s email of December 6th was an escape from reality. The email mischaracterized the outcome of the election; provided misleading figures about how much money the party had raised and what the party had done with that money; made promises about future action that do not address the real problems facing the party; and made financial commitments the party can not, at present, keep. Nowhere in that email did the chairman level with the party faithful as to the actual, dire financial and strategic condition of the local party.
Third, the chairman’s public pronouncements that the party was supporting the Huffman campaign for the run-off election were not completely accurate. In fact, campaign volunteers could not reach the party headquarters by phone or email during most of the campaign period, and when volunteers showed-up to man a phone bank, the office was either closed, or no one was present making calls.
Fourth, the chairman’s new Christmas video blog uses PowerPoint graphics to merely state the obvious. The recited details about the Democrats’ use of the Internet were well-publicized during the primaries and general election campaign, but our current leadership is just now recognizing the need for an updated Internet presence. In the meantime, the chairman says nothing about a plan for how the internet will actually be used to win elections, and nothing about how the party will pay for its new technology plan.
In this post-election period, Republicans have been demanding real leadership and a new strategic plan for winning elections. The real state of the Republican Party in Harris County and across the state is perilous. A recent PowerPoint presentation from the state party provides some startling figures. While Republicans achieved a net gain in offices won across the state, virtually all of the gain came in county and local races in rural counties. Meanwhile we lost ground where most Texans now live. Of the 254 counties in Texas, Republicans gained votes in 140 counties with 2,438,604 registered voters, while Democrats gained votes in 114 counties with 11,136,458 registered voters. The 50 fastest growing Republican counties in Texas have a total of 637,694 registered voters, while the 50 fastest growing Democratic counties have a total of 8,959,881 registered voters. You do the math—if this trend continues, we will not elect Republicans in Harris County and will soon lose our statewide offices.
To date, the actions of Chairman Woodfill fail to respond to Republican demands and electoral reality. Since late November, however, there has been a plan circulating within the local party. It is the plan published on this website, which has become known as “the Hubbard Plan.” At first, those of us promoting this plan had hoped that current leadership would react to it by engaging in a discussion about these ideas, and about how to implement a real plan for winning elections. Instead, we have gotten more of the same from Chairman Woodfill. We now challenge Chairman Woodfill to tell us in detail how the current leadership is going to help us win local elections in 2009, and county elections in 2010, and how it is going to fund its efforts.
While we wait to hear from the chairman, we ask that a discussion about the direction of the party be conducted over the next month, and that, at the next scheduled Executive Committee meeting resolutions be considered related to adoption of the Hubbard Plan. Moreover, if the current leadership does not come forward with its own comprehensive plan, or does not embrace the Hubbard Plan, we ask it to step aside and allow a new team to mobilize the party to be ready to contest the 2009 city and school board elections with conservative candidates and policies (which we discuss more fully in another blog we have posted today). If the chairman does nothing, then we will seek a resolution at the next Executive Committee meeting asking for his resignation.
In the meantime, to foster the discussion, we are posting on “Rebuild the Party.com” a discussion within the Harris County Group, which will begin to discuss an outline for proposed bylaw amendments that would be needed to implement changes discussed in the Hubbard Plan. We urge you to use the link to that site posted on our “Organize” page, to join this discussion group and weigh-in with your ideas. In the meantime, we ask all of you who believe you can help with the leadership of the party to step forward now, so that your fellow Republicans can consider you for leadership positions, including the chairmanship.
We can not wait until the primary of 2010 to make the needed changes in direction and leadership. The time to act is now.
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