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Well….we’re still here.

Today kicked off with songs, lots of patriotic songs. An interesting start to the day. I’m wondering if they were trying to sooth away the rough edges from yesterday.

Today started off with a speech by Pawlenty and as usual his speech was an excellent one, and hopefully started us off on the right foot.

So far it’s just been speeches. Reports from party officers. Dorothy Fleming, in her speech, remarked how the Republicans Party is not the party for “Al Gore wannabes”. I’m not sure if that was a poke at McCain or Coleman or both. Both have revealed their “I wanna be like Gore” stripes in the last few days…much to the disgust of many.

Hopefully today is a calm boring day….but I’m not optimistic. I’ve talked to many delegates who are expecting some of the delegates to try to revoke Pawlenty’s credentials as national delegate again. Reason for this is he never met with the nominating committee as the rules dictate he had to….and which all other candidates had to.

UPDATES :

10:22 - Basically it looks like we’re just doing speeches today….Brian Davis is an AWESOME speaker. He went on about how he rejects Cap-And-Trade and the “global warming religion”. The ENTIRE delegation stood up and applaud. Why Coleman thinks it’s a good idea to support the upcoming Warner-Lieberman “I love Al Gore” bill is beyond me.

10:36 - We took a break from speeches to hear the results on platform resolutions voting yesterday. Basically everything passed with two exceptions…

Item #13 failed to such a large degree that according to the rules it is not subject to further debate. It deleted the following from the platform:

That the lawful definition of a “Human Being” shall be : ‘When the DNA (Deoxyribonucleic Acid) of Mankind is joined’

Item #49 also failed to reach the 70% margin, but barely….it didn’t pass by 0.1% (actually failed by one vote reportedly). But according to our rules, it can be debated. It was briefly debated and then voted on again. It passed. This item reads as follows :

Ending United State participation in the United Nations

Debate was barely necessary as it then passed overwhelmingly.

10:44 - Battery getting low….time to charge.

10:50 - Nevermind, the fine folks at 1280 AM - The Patriot allowing me use of one of their plugins and are letting me just hibernate in their corner of the convention. Yeah for electrons!

10:57 - Barb Davis just spoke….excellent speaker! Her personality and energy always comes across in her speeches. Definitely perked the crowd up.

11:00 - Oh by the way, for those that didn’t know….Karl Rove is our keynote speaker today…due to speak in about one hour.

11:09 - Ron Carey is proposing a potential new agenda for the Republican Party, as he terms it a “Common Sense Agenda”. For the most part it is a fairly good one, and is being well received.

11:10 - Ron Carey is giving out Volunteer of the Year awards.

11:26 - Marty Seifert is here in The Patriot area now….presumably to be on air soon. It’s fun watching Chad and Brian talk on air. Alot of the usual conversational stuff (hand gestures, etc) happens but never makes it on air….slightly amusing.

12:30 - I wasn’t posting because there was a lot of parlimentary shenanigans going on that I wanted to pay attention to. There was an effort to adjourn to head off any attempts to revoke Pawlenty’s national delegate credentials.

It failed….so we had the battle on the floor. And it was quite “interesting”. Ultimately an exemption was granted to Pawlenty. However, in the midst of it a particularly statement was made on the floor that argued for the exemption, both Ron Carey and Tony Sutton stood up from their seats at the front of the room and vigorously applauded. Absolutely classless act by both of them.

Then another attempt to adjourn was made to head off any further shenanigans. It passed and we are now officially adjourned.

Karl Rove is speaking….he’s good….

….lots of red meat for the base. Karl Rove knows all the key points and he hits every single one.

After this is the State Central Committee Meeting….I may pick up this liveblog again there.

4:30 - Eh, nevermind….nothing much happened during the State Central Committee meeting.  The Bylaws were changed to make it more difficult to call an unscheduled State Central Committee meeting.  And the results of the FEC audit were released.  Let’s just say the Executive Committee was unreasonably sensitive about anyone asking questions about the results.  But basically the end results were that there were a couple bookkeeping errors, mostly because the FEC rules are f-ing impossible to comprehend.

The state convention has begun….as usual, very late. It’s 10:30 and we’re just now seating alternates. Although being a delegate, not an alternate, I barely care.

While bloggers did get the shaft this year from the GOP we are definitely in attendance. So far I’ve seen Andy Aplikowski, Derek Brigham, Scott Brooks, Martin Andrade, Jerry Ewing, Chad Elder and Michael Brodkorb. Presumably Andy and Michael will both also be live-blogging.

Ron Paul folks had their rally this morning outside. Ron Paul is still outside shaking babies and kissing hands, because they won’t let him in the door. His supporters tried a reshuffling of the agenda which was roundly defeated. So either they have very little support here or else unlike most of their other actions it wasn’t very well organized.

The Minnesota Conservative Team, which I mentioned yesterday, is definitely in attendance. They have their banners and fliers all over the place. From the nature of their letter it appears they are mostly an anti-Ron Paul group. And on all the chairs is lots of anti-Ron Paul literature….although none of it has text identifying the person or group that distributed it. I believe that is a big no-no by the rules….even if not, it is definitely a cheap and underhanded ploy….and I say that as someone that is no fan of Ron Paul.

I’ll update if anything exciting happens….but more than likely I would expect this spot to be rather silent for
a couple hours. It’s mostly parlimentary hullabalooh at this point.

UPDATES:

11:38 - A nice rowdy debate happening on the floor now. Basically the delegates are not taking to the State Party’s collective power grab at the expense of the BPOUs. Ron Carey even got booed at one point when he tried to defend the state party.

12:00 - A motion was just made to have all literature that wasn’t endorsed collected from the floor….basically all the anti-Ron Paul stuff. It’s a very good point and very valid. Although I suspect that most of this material had the unofficial approval of the state party.

12:15 - Ok folks are STILL making a shit-storm about the “illegal material” on the floor, asking for those that distributed it are removed from the floor. Problem with that is that the reason the material is illegal is nobody knows who distributed it since it’s not endorsed by anyone.

2:30 - Ok sorry for the gap in time there, but there are no outlets on the floor so I had to recharge my battery. Luckily the fine folks at 1280 AM - The Patriot were kind enough to allow me to plug into one of their outlets and keep an eye on my laptop so I could return to the floor.

Basically things have been rather crazy here on the floor. There has been a great deal of complaining and disagreement. Recently the chair had to go to the mic to remind people that we’re all supposed to be respectful of each other here…..basically a “calm down, same team” speech.

Most of the debate has been on the ability of the Ron Paul people to have their names entered into consideration for nomination as a National Delegate. They’ve been defeated and turned down at every turn, both from rulings from the chair and votes from the floor. I actually kinda admire their spirit and they have gotten pretty creative with their motions…I thought they even had the chair beat on one motion, but a technicality of Robert’s Rules got them. I do have to say though that their delay tactics and repeated complaining is not winning hearts and minds here on the floor. In fact it’s really starting to piss people off.

4:45 - I got sick of the bickering and chaos, so half of my BPOU left to go get a beer (or three) and a bit to eat, as there was no break for lunch. So we did that. If you’re ever in Rochester, I’d like to recommend Newt’s Bar near the corner of 2nd St and 1st St NE. Good burgers, good beer, good atmosphere, good times.

Came back and was met at the door by Chief of Freedom Dogs who let me know that yeah we endorsed Coleman while I was gone but now two delegates are tying things up with a pissing contest about some shenanigans at the CD1 Convention. Why the rest of us care, is beyond me but apparently according to the rules it must be resolved here at the State Convention.

Coleman apparently gave a very impassioned speech and hit on a number of topics. Apparently one of the corner stones of his speech was border enforcement….which is very amusing considered he’s never voted in favor of border enforcement.

5:00 - SHIT! It just started hailing….marble sized….my vehicle is stuck on the top level of a parking ramp. I sense an insurance claim coming on.

5:05 - 1280 AM The Patriot is on the air…I should give them a plug since they’ve been charging my laptop for me. On the plus side though, Chief of Freedom Dogs, Andy of Residual Forces and myself have commandeered the TV camera platform….and there are power outlets up here!!!

5:10 - John Kline just spoke….probably the only uncontested portion of the convention so far.

6:00 - Had to go move my vehicle….parking was scarce down here this morning so I got stuck in a garage that was going to be cleaned and had to get my vehicle moved by 6. Personally I think it was just the union’s way of sticking it to the GOP that the cleaning was rescheduled for this weekend.

6:30 - Yeah! We’re voting on platform resolutions….is it possible that we may get out of here on time???  I don’t believe that!

….at the Minnesota Republican State Convention in Rochester, MN.

Attended the pre-rally and the reception afterwards. Rally was pretty nice…as far as rallies go. I mean one can only put up with so much rah-rah speeches before it gets stale. But it was nice to hear from legislators I’ve seldom heard from, from areas of the state I seldom get to.

Brian Davis was a fairly impressive speaker, as was Ed Matthews. Now normally one would label Ed Matthews as the sacrificial lamb in the 4th District race, since it is pretty safe DFL territory, however, Ed certainly has a plurality of energy.

“Surprise” speaker of the night was Tom Coburn, the Republican stalwart of Oklahoma….whose young granddaughter apparently thought that Minnesota was a type of soda. He’s one of the good guys in the US Senate and it was a pleasure to hear him speak. He repeated his appeal for Republicans to behave like Republicans. Although this mesage was somewhat muted since he then talked about how great McCain was.

Marty Seifert was the final speaker of the evening. For those of you that have never had a chance to hear Marty speak it’s always a treat. And it helps that his words have always been backed by action.

But for the most part it was a relatively dull evening. Probably the most exciting moment was when a Ronulan briefly interjected Ron Paul’s name into Coburn’s speech which was met with spotty applause. However, Coburn’s later rebuttal was met with overwhelming applause. This was just the opening rally so it’s hard to determine what the breakdown will be but things may get interesting tomorrow.

I have a feeling that the anonymous anti-Ron Paul letter that was sent out to delegates/alternates earlier this week did more harm that good….at least from a unity perspective. There was much talk about the fact that Ron Paul will not be speaking at the state convention, although he will be speaking at a rally outside the state convention tomorrow morning. Personally I would support just letting Ron Paul speak at the convention because honestly….what’s the harm?? It’s not like any of the delegates doesn’t already know what he’s about.

In any case, so far the state convention is off to a relatively uneventful start. It may or may not continue that way. I’ll liveblog anything exciting but otherwise I’ll do my best to keep awake by catching up on political computer work.

Another daily dose of STP for you, and me…..well, I’m still stuck at the GOP state convention, so I’ll treat you to one of a thousand things I’d rather watch…Lady Picture Show

Another dose of your daily STP…and since I go on the road today to travel to the GOP state convention, I figured “Interstate Love Song” was fairly appropriate.

Forgive the start of this video….I haven’t a frigging clue what they were thinking either…

It’s no surprise that conservatives are less than impressed with the Republican Party’s presumptive presidential candidate. Conservatives have come up with some rather creative T-Shirts and bumper stickers expressing their distaste. However, in the end the argument is usually the same….not supporting McCain is essentially helping to elect a Democrat. And since McCain is the least repulsive Democrat running, we should support him.

Ok….I’m not overly impressed with that sort of argument but I can sorta understand the rather pathetic and depressing logic behind it. I certainly understand the sentiment behind not wanting to support him because….well, he’s not conservative and therefore why should I support him? But when it comes down to it he’s the best of several horrible options.

Or is he?

Certainly, despite his claims of a Straight Talk Express, McCain certainly does have a problem with sticking to one point of view.

Now despite his repeated claims that he no longer supports comprehensive immigration reform (aka amnesty), he has returned to his old roots of advocating amnesty and demonstrates he’s more than willing to lie through his teeth to potential supporters about a major issue if it furthers his political goals.

McCain has drank the Gorebull warming kool-aid and seems determined to pursue any hippy green BS regardless of whether it’s effective or it’s consequences for our economy.

And while he’s been fairly well committed to reducing pork spending, he has also demonstrated he can’t be trusted on tax increases vs tax cuts.

He claims he will support constructionist judges, but he has done nothing to support that claim. And true constructionist judges would likely overturn one of the legislative achievements of which is most proud, campaign finance reform.

And as Andy McCarthy points out, McCain has pledged to only fill one term….which on it’s face makes sense, since he’s only about 742 years old. However, it also takes away any ability of conservatives to hold McCain accountable, since he will have no concern about re-election. If he’s willing to lie, betray, mislead and abandon conservatives when he’s just running for office, what is likely to do when he’s in an office of nearly limitless power without accountability for four full years?

Are we still sure that McCain is the lessor of two evils?? Or simply a giant red question mark surrounded by mostly negatives? If there is one thing Carter taught us, it’s that this country is strong enough to survive even an incredibly inept and incompetent President. And if there is a second thing Carter taught us, it’s that sometimes it takes an incredibly inept and incompetent President to bring out the best in the opposition.

Another daily dose of STP, this is one that was one of the first songs that featured their evolving sound…

Con : Nine years later, the music video for this song still scares the hell out of me. Watch it yourself. I mean seriously, what the hell are those bunny things anyway!??!?

Pro : Sarah Michelle Gellar…

The MN Militia held their annual retreat in honor of Memorial Day.  It was well attended and considered a success.  It also means I’m exhausted and from a quick glance at the news it appears it was a busy weekend both nationally and locally.  Unfortunately, I just don’t have the time or energy to do any serious thinking at the moment.

Go enjoy some of the previous STP posts instead….but I’m back so yeah….

In honor of Memorial Day I didn’t offer a daily STP yesterday.  Since you got a break, I figure you’re well enough to handle Sex Type Thing…one of their originals and one of my favorites

Another daily dose of STP….and you’re right, there is “No Way Out”…