Tom Long: Don't let a court ruling get in the way of spinning an election

I've got to hand it to our friend, RPV Councilmember Tom Long. He really does persist through his political spin long after he's been proven wrong! He's like the attorney for OJ still arguing the case outside on the courthouse steps, long after they've carried his client away!

Even though our central committee went through the trouble of confirming with legal counsel (through a simple Lexis-Nexis search, by the way) that his partner-in-spin Councilmember Doug Stern was incorrect to state that political party committee are forbidden from participating in non-partisan elections, Long decides to send out a diatribe against my committee as follows:

"I encourage [RPV voters} not to choose candidates based on partisan labels. The California Constitution provides that city council races are non-partisan. True, a federal trial court judge has held that California cannot prevent parties from making endorsements. And in this RPV election one party central committee, led by a San Pedro resident, has done so. But the California Constitution is still on the books and reflects the judgment of our state's residents that partisanship is not valuable on the local level. Given the problems we sometimes see in the state legislature and in Congress, one has to wonder why anyone would want to bring partisanship to the city council. This year, as in past years, I am pleased to endorse candidates from both parties. I simply don't find local issues to be partisan."

Now, that "San Pedro resident" is none other than yours truly, one who was raised, received communion, confirmed by the Catholic church, graduated from high school in, and returned to get married in Rancho Palos Verdes. And oh yea, my parents still live there and own two homes in Rancho Palos Verdes.

Councilmember Long needs to stop deceiving Rancho Palos Verdes voters about the nature of local elections. All elections are partisan when it comes to endorsements. Just ask the unions throughout California. The fact that Tom makes endorsements as well shows that he understands the strength of them. And by the tone of the message he sent out this week, he realizes the renewed strength in the endorsement of this central committee. Thank you, Tom, for validating the awesome work that this committee, a majority of which are RPV residents by the way, is doing! And for most of them, their mutual disdain for both Tom and his cohort Doug Stern has been a unifying factor!

Thanks to the extensive research by these hardworking RPV residents, this committee has enthusiastically endorsed Brian Campbell & Anthony Misetich, two hard-working business men who will being fiscal sanity back to the Rancho Palos Verdes City Council. A third Republican, Planning Commissioner Jeff Lewis, was not granted an extension to the invitation to solicit this committee's endorsement. It is my personal opinion that the close association between Long and Mr. Lewis weighed heavily into the RPV committee majority's decision to move forward.

But ladies and gentlemen, if you think that the Los Angeles Democratic Party is not participating in the Rancho Palos Verdes elections, you're blinder than Long. I have frequent conversations with my Democratic counterparts, the two leads for this district being from San Pedro as well, and I run into them in Rancho Palos Verdes frequently! In addition to their regular attendance at RPV City Council meetings and events like the last candidate forum, they assist with the Palos Verdes Democratic Club that meets every third Sunday at the PV Library, and are enlisting numerous San Pedro high school students to walk precincts for their candidates.

And so are we! I'm sorry that Long does not "find local issues to be partisan". When the wasteful spending called out by the late Dr. Gardiner was ignored and even challenged by Long, was that simply non-partisan? When residents try to defend their property rights at city council meetings, only to have Long call them "stupid" (which I witnessed two years ago in shock!), is that non-partisan?

The Republican Party leadership has decided that one of the biggest reasons why, as Long points out, there are big issues with Sacramento & Congress is that the Democrats have done a much better job building up "the farm team" for these seats when they open. These are your school board members, water board members, and yes, city council members. Look at the rush of candidates competing for the Democratic nominations to the 53rd Assembly seat being vacated by Ted Lieu, and you'll notice something...they're all current or former city councilmembers! When our previous Assemblymember, Betty rnette, was termed out last year, the Democrats had two Long Beach City Councilmembers vying for the seat.

This is what we in the Republican Party are striving for, and the myopic rants of a far-left Democrat afraid of his council swinging back to the Republican majority again isn't going to stop us.

So when you read Tom Long's e-mails about how elections should be non-partisan, I want you all to remember that this was the original position of the Republican Party when this law came about, and that it was the San Francisco Democratic Central Committee that fought and won the battle to have that part of the California Constitution removed.

But, to show Tom I can be bi-partisan as well, I will announce my personal endorsements of Greg Royston, Anthony Collatos and Heather Matson for the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unifed School District. As a graduate of Rolling Hills High School and as a parent of two young children, I am extremely impressed by the courage and commitment of these three individuals to step up as parents of young children in the school district in order to make the system a better one. They're not doing it to continue any connections with the CA Teachers Association or with the "in-crowd of PV Politics". We need more parent involvement in our local school districts, and I believe that these three school district parents will make a real difference.

Oh, and none of them are Republican...they're just great candidates. Just like Brian Campbell and Anthony Misetich.

Thanks again, Tom, for continuing to be the unifying force for all of the Republican and Conservative watchdog groups throughout the Palos Verdes Peninsula! I look forward to returning my hometown of Rancho Palos Verdes back to the Republican majority again in 4 weeks!

Then the fun can really begin! 2010, here we come!

State Budget Resentment Electrifies GOP Convention

Thanks to my good friend and 56th AD GOP ex-oficio, Roger Garrett, I was once again able to participate as a delegate at the California Republican Party Convention in Sacramento this past weekend. As expected, the primary topic of discussion, debate, outrage and concern for most delegates was the defeat of Republican principles and values in the approval of the increased tax-and-spend budget bill by the state Legislature. I could spent most of this blog post talking about how angry people were, and I was even quoted in the Contra Costa Times on Saturday about that I called "very confusing times". "We have to figure out what our party stands for if it's not for less of a tax burden for Californians."

(Here's the link to the article: (http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_11752966?source=rss)

Well, friends, I'm writing to say that I was very proud of how unified our party delegates became this weekend. At the previous conventions I've attended, we've spent hours debating what I will now call secondary issues, including illegal immigration, abortion, gay marriage & affordable housing development. I'm not saying those topics are not important; but every delegate I talked to this weekend, whether from the CA Republican Assembly, the Log Cabin Republicans, the CA Congress of Republicans or the CA College Republicans, firmly agreed that our party's number one mission is to protect the California tax-payer. To his credit, Assemblymember Anthony Adams walked across the street from the Assembly hall to the Sacramento Hyatt to talk to delegates and address why he felt that approving this budget was the right choice. Fellow delegate Matt Kauble and I had a solid 20 minutes to ourselves with Adams, and kept it cordial yet engaging, despite the numerous gestures behind his back by delegates passing by us! (You can imagine what they looked like...) Adams talked about Moody ratings, liquidity, and other financial topics to test our knowledge. Matt is a finance controller, so I let Matt lead the engagement and I simply jumped in with inconsistencies. Adams stated that he would be willing to come down to L.A. County to address Republicans regarding this decision and to basically "take his lumps". I give him a lot of credit and respect for walking across the street and talking to whomever approached him. The other five were conveniently too busy to meet with fellow Republicans at their own convention and explain their actions. Of the five, it was to be expected of State Senator Abel Maldonado, who basically negotiated in his own political agenda into the bill in order to get his approval. Delegates throughout the party have reached a boiling point with these sell-outs, and were ready to hold all six accountable.

And they proved it on Sunday...

The only resolution forwarded to the delegates to consider was to withhold any party funding for re-election of the six Republican legislators that made the unfortunate and misguides decision to vote for the budget. As you can imagine, it was overwhelmingly and loudly approved.

At the Sunday general session, Republican Assemblyman, U.S. Senate candidate & my good friend Chuck DeVore regretted that he would not be able to spent his allotted ten minutes talking about how he was ready to defeat and retire Barbara Boxer, but he gave the delegates the details of what happened in the Assembly and his pledge to continue fighting the Democrats and misguided Republicans. State Senator Jeff Denham, who was targeted for a recall defeated by over 73% last year in a district formerly drawn for Democrats because he refused to stop attacking the Democrats on the budget over-spending issue, announced that not only is he not going away, he's running for Lieutenant Governor. (Here's a real opportunity to tell the special interests that they do not control Sacramento!) And Board of Equalization Member Bill Leonard offered an idea to beat the 2-year 1% sales tax hike coming on April 1st: Go out now and purchase two years worth of as many household items as you can! Should be easy for Costco and Sam's Club members!

The budget issue overshadowed the usual drama of the February convention, the election of chairman, vice-chairman and regional chairs for the CRP. However, the strength of the incumbents, including Chairman Ron Nehring and Vice-Chairman Tom Del Baccaro, allowed for delegates to discuss the gubernatorial race between Insurance Commissioner Stave Poizner and "new Republican" and former E-bay CEO Meg Whitman. The only drama for Los Angeles County was at our regional Vice-Chair caucus meeting Saturday morning, where the question was whether former RPLAC chairman, Dr. Carl Davis, was engineering another surprise candidate to oppose incumbent L.A. County Regional Vice-Chair Doug Boyd, like he did at the RPLAC Organizational Meeting last December. One exchange I heard about was new RPLAC Chairman Glen Forsch advising Doug Boyd that he should lead the caucus meeting as the RPLAC Chairman. After advising Glen that not only was this a conflict of interest, that the meeting would be led by CRP National Committeeman Shawn Steel and Republican State Senator George Runner, there was no further word or action from either Glen or his mentor, Carl, and the nomination & election process went fast.

Personally, this effort to exert some political muscle in Los Angeles County is going to start the quick descent of what little influence the current RPLAC Board has. The current RPLAC board has no elected legislative allies, and only a few rumored and undisclosed donors who are "waiting" to see whether this board can deliver. If Glen and his team do not quickly begin the healing process from the gashes caused by their RPLAC take-over, they are going to find re-energized and well-funded opposition to their seats on both the Executive Board and to their re-elections to central committee seats or ex-oficio positions. Republican Central Committee filings begin in just 12 months...

To wrap up the convention highlights, I think every Republican upset with the state budget deal should take heart that your party delegates and internal party leadership is also upset, and is planning to hold every elected legislator, candidate and fellow delegate accountable for the primary principle that binds us all together: Californians are already taxed the highest in the country, and it's time for that to change!

RPLAC: "Change" for the sake of "change"

To begin, I want to be on record that I warned the former Executive Board that moving the Republican Party of Los Angeles County (RPLAC) Organizational Meeting to the same day as the USC-UCLA game, the SEC Championship game and, most importantly, the Army-Navy game would be bad luck! Up until the night before, I was still undecided on whether I was going to attend. I know for sure of at least three newly-elected members who chose the Rose Bowl over the Reagan Building, where the meeting was held. I personally took a lot of flack from fellow Navy alumni, even though we trounced Army 34-0, for choosing politics over tradition.

But what happened on December 6th at this normally routine meeting was anything but routine!

The purpose of the Organizational Meeting is to set up the county committees, the district-level officers, and the county executive board officers for the next term, 2008-2010. For the previous six years, Chairwoman Linda Boyd & her husband, California Republican Party Vice-Chair for L.A., Doug Boyd, had been well-prepared to get the full body of central committee members quickly through an agenda of setting up the necessary committees, running the members through each of three sets of district elections (assembly, state senate, and congressional district committees), and then introducing their slate of "endorsed" board officer candidates to be approved by the body. Each of the past three meetings, (2002, 2004 & 2006), there were a small group of disgruntled members, primarily unelected state office nominees, that tried to organize enough to challenge the Boyds for one or more of the board positions. Each time, the Boyds have been far more organized & ensured a strong majority of attendees to the meeting were supportive of their agenda. I have been very impressed with both Linda & Doug, and have been blessed to have learned much about both Republican politics & Los Angeles County from them. They are extremely smart and tuned in to some of the key political issues. Unfortunately, their intelligence was equally matched by their egos, and they far underestimated the amount of change and dissatisfaction those of us on the local levels were seeing within the Republican Party. By choosing to ignore the opportunities to bring in some of these new & younger faces to our team, the Boyds unwittingly gave that opportunity to one of their long-time rivals, Carl Davis, himself a former RPLAC chairmam. Carl Davis and I have talked about key issues, and I also consider him a smart & valuable resource. But his unilateral mission to get back at the Boyds for removing him from power has been a prime mover for him in all he does.

This year, Carl Davis organized some key groups under a common motive to remove Linda and her supporters.

To start, the alliance of opposers included not only more state-level nominees (who are often called "sacrificial lambs" in L.A. County for obvious reasons), but an increased number of new Republicans, including Log Cabin Republicans & supporters from the Ron Paul presidential campaign. Our own local committee has a few new members from this group, and I made it a point to both welcome these new, enthusiastic members and to try and mentor them in the basics of the party structure. All of these groups bring new perspectives, lessons learned from their struggles, as well as some concerns they want to see addressed. Only through open dialogue will we be able to find the common ground opportunities for all of us; the lack of this open dialogue between the June primary electing these new members & the December organizational meeting is what led to what I like to call the "restructuring".

The first thing this group did was ask for help from former RPLAC Second Vice-Chair Al Han to run for the temporary chairman role at the meeting. This is the person who basically runs the restructuring until a new county chairman is officially elected. I have often talked about the reputation of Al Han as being extremely supportive and fair of the democratic process, whatever those results yield. Al does not come to meetings with an agenda, so much as a desire to bring out topics of discussion and see what the democratic process yields. Because the Boyd loyalists had a predetermined agenda that had no room for variety, Al Han's election to the temporary chair role was a serious blow, as well as a warning for the rest of the meeting.

I won't go into every detail of the meeting, but the truly shocking moment came when the Boyd loyalists staged an attempt to have the meeting quorum removed, thereby making the meeting results null and void. Out of the established attendance of 119 members, the Boyds attempted to have 50 members walk out in order to get below the by-laws required quorum of 70 members. Unfortunately for them, only about 35 or so took the hint/bait when they first removed themselves from the board nominations and then walked out. So a new board, led by new chairman Glen Forsch, has taken over the county party and will soon release their agenda for the next term. One of our own members from the 54th AD, Lydia Gutierrez, was elected First Vice Chair. I will post an assessment in January of the new board, after a planned January meeting between them with all of us new AD chairs.

I will also post an update very soon of your new 54th Assembly District members, including your new executive board and some key areas we hope you'll be interested in getting involved in.

I want to finish this posting by stating that fellow committee member Al Han performed his role at the organizational meeting as the temporary chairman the way that most Republican voters would have wanted him to perform. Republicans in both Los Angeles and throughout California are tired of the same agendas and strategies that have made us a permanent minority party. We are not entirely impatient, but we need to see some progress and activism to show us that our elected leaders and representatives have not settled for the status quo. Whether this is what Linda and Doug actually did in Los Angeles County is not relevant; this was, and still is, the perception of the majority of Republicans in Los Angeles, and they need to see a renewed effort to challenge the liberal, union elitists who only represent their special interests while waging dishonest marketing campaigns to dumb down the voting population.

Al Han has been a fighter for re-educating these voters and ensuring they turn out for key elections. If the new county executive board takes on these noble objectives and creates a positive change in Los Angeles County, they can expect a long tenure of both respect and influence within the party. If any of the new board members instead tries to bring in their own personal agendas to "change" the platform of the party, provide support solely for their own chosen candidates, and otherwise engage in physical or verbal conduct that would bring disrepute to the Republican Party of Los Angeles County, they will very soon find themselves in the same or worse position than the Boyds were.

Republicans want positive change, but this time, we're not willing to wait six more years to see it.

What went right, wrong & what's next?

OK, I know! Where the heck have I been?

When I started this blog in January, I was committed to doing an update at least weekly, and was doing a pretty decent job of meeting that recurrence up until about mid-September. Then...life got a bit hectic. Now, I'm not going to blame any particular change, whether it was the birth of my 2nd child, Violet, some urgent matters at work that took me away from California, or just a simple burn-out of issues. Now that the results are in, we should be able to look back at some things that went right, things that went wrong, and what we should be looking at now.

Despite the defeat of our presidential nominee, Senator John McCain, we had may efforts succeed that we can take pride in. To start, we defeated an attempt by the Democrats to remove one of our stalwart warriors, Congressmember Dana Rohrabacher. Many of you contributed many hours to making phone calls, walking your neighborhood, and getting the word out about Dana, and you should feel proud of your success. This was achieved despite a 2% decrease in Republican voter registration in the L.A. portion of the 46th CD. Your efforts ensured that the registration decrease was countered by a higher voter turnout. This turnout was also a key factor in the passage of Propositions 8 and 11.

As many of you know, the opponents of Proposition 8 have been less than accepting of their defeat, despite the wide spectrum of support it had. They are trying to label it a "racist" measure, but how do you do this with a 70% support among African-American voters & over 55% support from Hispanic voters. I have my own theories regarding why these two groups supported Proposition 8, but the focus here is on the efforts many of you made to ensure it's passage.

Proposition 11 should be seen as a covert victory for the California Republican Party. We will know for sure after the 2010 census when the districts are re-established under the requirements of this measure. But with the districts gerry-mandered as they are now, I think it's safe to say that we in Los Angeles County have no where to go but up. My only caution for those ecstatic about Proposition 11 passing and "can't wait for the new districts" should step aside while the rest of us try to work on improving the party in this environment. The earliest we'll see improvements is 2012, and even then, the Democrats will already be working to mitigate those effects. We need to work now to ensure that the effects of Proposition 11 are both improvements and are long-lasting.

These are not all of the things that were successes, but I want to make an observation about what I believe is a fundamental operational problem with the Republican Party. I state this as a holder of a Certification in Marketing Communications, among other degrees, when I say that the Democrats are far better at marketing their messages to voters than Republicans. This is true not just locally or in California, but across the nation. The Democratic message that resonated among voters this year was actually begun in 2005, and Republicans not only did not counter it quickly and strongly, but did not even see what destruction it was doing to our party. We saw a glimpse of it in 2006 when we lost both Houses of Congress, but by then the slide was in full force. I also have a more detailed theory about this, but I'll focus on the point - Republicans need to get better at delivering a message that the average voter can quickly absorb. We teach Dale Carnegie students that the initial message has to be a complete, powerful statement that takes seven (7) seconds or less; otherwise the audience will likely tune out for the rest of the discussion. Democratic campaign managers know this well, as well as another important fact - the brain takes much more convincing than the heart. (Ever hear of "Knowledge at First Sight"? Me neither!)

Take an example - Proposition 2 passing. The Democratic message behind Proposition 2 was simple - Fight Animal Cruelty! If you vote against Prop 2, you hate animals! What was the "logical, conservative" response? Draw a 30-second connection between the financial effects of the measure with the eventual increase in meat & poultry products from Mexico, and hence an increase in salmonella. The problem with this tactic - most viewers of the ads had already tuned out. The initial message needed to be quick, sustaining - how about a "Kentucky Fried Tofu" billboard, just to lure the audience in, and then quickly state that this is the agenda of the Prop 2 supporters? Voters like animals, but they also like their KFC, McDonald's, and Taco Bell.

So what's next? How do we take what we learned this year and in 2006 and start the road to improvement? The primary thing we do is we keep the momentum, the passion, and the desire to see tings through. How do we do that? We get involved. This past week, I was extremely impressed with the enthusiasm and interest at two key meetings. The first was the local Central Committee meeting in San Pedro, in which the newest members of your local Republican Party got together to talk about many of the things I mentioned above, as well as strategies to start building back our foundation. The second, even more inspiring, was the tremendous turnout at the Beach Cities Republican Club event in Torrance on Thursday. I've never seen the level of turnout, over 120 people, who all wanted to learn more about what they can do. Club President, Pete Kesterson, and Southern California Republican Coalition Chairman, James Crean, both laid out opportunities for these motivated individuals to get more involved in taking action. My recommendation to all of you, if you were not at the Thursday meeting and did not sign up, is to join one of these great Republican Clubs. We will all be working together to rebuild, strengthen, and take back both what was lost and what should rightfully be done.

Please take a look at the list of clubs and their associated links in the left column. Please send me an email at stammiam@yahoo.com if you need some recommendations on which club(s) you should check out. Regardless of which you get involved with, you'll learn more about what you can do to be a part of the Republican revival! I hope to see you at these meetings soon!

Calm before the Storm

I hope I haven't woken up any one's e-mail as I've sent this out. No doubt most of us have been either on vacation or otherwise pre-occupied the past two months since the June primary to think about the political scene, whether it's Senator McCain's consecutive weeks closing the opinion poll gap or Gabriella Holt's repeated appearances at local Long Beach events to raise key issues within the "safe" Democratic forums. Today's posting is both a status check and an announcement of events in each of the three main 54th AD cities to get all of us excited and optimistic about the fall campaign season.

First, if you haven't heard about Senator McCain's stomping of Senator Obama at last Saturday's Saddleback Forum, then I definitely want to welcome you back from your overseas vacation. I have co-workers from Boston to Long Beach, including a lot of non-Republicans, who were talking about how poorly Obama did and how well McCain answered each question. The media has "acknowledged" McCain's victory through their non-existent coverage of the forum. Did anyone else notice the TINY article in the Daily Breeze about the forum? Our central committee got more coverage about our local TALB resolution last May than the nationwide Saddleback Forum received! The network news sources and CNN have all foregone doing ANY analysis of the forum, except to state that it happened and that Pastor Peter Warren should be commended for holding it. Pastor Warren should moderate ALL of the upcoming forums! He asked each candidate the same hard questions we would have asked each candidate, and the results were apparent. But, if you haven't seen the forum, the best site for viewing the forum is http://trevinwax.com/2008/08/17/obama-mccain-with-rick-warren-at-saddleback-forum-video/. This site breaks out every 10-15 minutes, and also has the complete transcript.

(As a side note, if you haven't read Pastor Warren's book, The Purpose-Driven Life, it is phenomenal!)

Locally, fellow activists like you have been asking me how our Republican Assembly Nominee, Gabriella Holt, is doing. I have not been as plugged in as I was prior to the June primary due to both county political activities and personal events. (In addition to my responsibilities to GOTV for Republicans across the county, I'm actually on a "Ready 5" status to welcome my 2nd daughter, Violet, to the world! So if I cut this posting short....). Gabriella has been running across the district, especially throughout Long Beach, in order to shore up local support and give Bonnie a challenge in her own backyard. And Gabriella's support has not been limited to "McCain-supporting" Republicans. Gabriella has met with voters across the spectrum, from dis-enfranchised Democrats who want change in Sacramento, Independent voters who want a representative that is not beholden to their party's agenda without exception, to other Republicans who are demanding more accountability from their current leaders. We have a candidate who appeals to them all, and her volunteer list has been growing recently with members from all of these groups.

A special recognition has to go out to her newest campaign manager, JoAnn Funch, who has temporarily relocated from the Northern Mid-West for the fall campaign to dedicate 100% of her time to getting Gabriella elected! JoAnn is working hard to coordinate Gabriella's appearances, including tomorrow evening's Long Beach Meet & Greet at 6132 Corsica Circle from 6pm-8pm. If you have some time tomorrow evening, please come out and let Gabriella know you're back from vacation and are ready to join the fall campaign!

Another surge of Republican Activism in Long Beach is the set of Long Beach Townhalls hosted by LBARP both this week and next. If you were not able to get to any of them this week, they are holding them at the same locations next week, Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday. (Please visit the LBARP website at http://www.longbeachrepublicans.org/ for the three locations). The LBARP team, led by Long Beach City Prosecutor Tom Reeves, has been working hard to set up these opportunities for the conservative voice on the proposed tax increases and lack of civic accountability by many of the Democratic City Council members to be voiced, and for Republicans to learn how they can get plugged into Getting Out The Vote for their neighborhoods. Thanks in part to both the influence from our hard-fighting LB Chamber of Commerce and local conservative activists, Long Beach has been a much more business-friendly environment than it's sister-city across the bridges, San Pedro. It's no wonder all of the newer restaurants and retail predominantly open in Long Beach. (Meanwhile, San Pedro JUST got their first downtown Starbucks! Amazing!)

In San Pedro, however, all is not lost. We recently held our San Pedro GOTV event in conjunction with the McCain Nation event, and now have a great venue available for another event this fall to energize Republicans from San Pedro and East RPV. Thanks goes out to Golden State Campaigns and central committee member-elect John Cozza for helping me set up this event. Though the attendance did not match the 50+ RSVP response, it was a good event to have as a predecessor to others once our fellow Republicans return from summer vacations.

And on the Palos Verdes Peninsula, the persistence and hard work of central committee members Nancy Comaford and James Crean have borne fruit in the securing of the former Marie Callendar's at the Promenade as our Republican campaign headquarters for the 2008 fall campaign season! We are making arrangements to get the furniture into it, and I will post operating hours as soon as I learn them. This will serve as an energizing venue for all of our fall Republican campaigns, including McCain, Holt, Gutierrez & Rohrabacher. So stand by for upcoming news about when to visit and get involved!

So from Long Beach, with the Holt Campaign & LBARP stirring up activism, to the Palos Verdes Peninsula setting up a new temporary campaign headquarters, I hope all of those reading this will set aside any large non-political projects to help us this season as we battle for both the future of our nation and the future of our state. All of our candidates will need your help!

June 3rd: Thank you so much...

Now that the dust has settled on the June 3rd Primary Election, it's time for the dust to settle and for us to get to the real tasks at hand: Winning back the 54th AD & securing the White house for another 4 years. But first, I have to thank you all for your phenomenal support and turnout.

Many of you not only voted for me and my slate of "Can-do" candidates, you spread the word extremely well. And the results show it. The "Can-do" slate of seven candidates finished in the top seven, sweeping the central committee election and ensuring a solid team of operationally-minded members for the 2008-2010 term. This new group takes over in November, and I am extremely excited for our local campaign strategy for 2009 and 2010. It takes more than just a few members to make a difference, and the next committee will be committed toward helping local Republicans running for city councils, school boards and other local seats get the support they need to start making gains in the 54th Assembly District.

The list at the top of the left column will be your new central committee. First and foremost are the two legislative nominees, Gabriella Holt & Lydia Gutierrez, that we must now dedicate our local resources and efforts to get elected. They are both phenomenal candidates that bring us a new opportunity to take key seats that previous nominees did not, and not just because they represent the significant trend of Republican women taking control. Each has unique traits and skills that they bring to our Party that will enable us to openly discuss the most important issues with Democrats, Independents and fellow Republicans alike.

Lydia Gutierrez will compete well against Democratic nominee Rod Wright for the 25th Senate District seat. Her upbringing and experience as a LBUSD school teacher, plus her activism for children and stronger family values will make many Democrats and Independents consider whether their current parties have represented their values and concerns like Lydia will if given the opportunity to be their state senator.

Gabriella Holt, our Republican nominee for the 54th Assembly District, brings a solid background of experience in the fields of health care, business and education, the three big issues Democrats are hoping to use against our party. Unlike the campaign events prior to the Democratic Primary, the Democratic nominee, Bonnie Lowenthal, will not be able to simply give short, pithy answers and watch her opponent talk herself into a liberal frenzy, like former Democratic candidate Tonia Reyes Uranga did. Gabriella will force Bonnie to either campaign on the issues, or watch as Long Beach figures out what most of us in San Pedro know: It takes more than podium speeches to win the public. This committee will be dedicated foremost to its pledged mission to win elections in the 54th AD, and its primary one has always been and will continue to be this one.

For information on their campaigns, please see my website list in the left column or e-mail me at stammiam@yahoo.com. Your continued support and involvement will be essential in helping our two 2008 nominees win their campaigns.

Thank you again, for your wonderful support. I pledge to continue representing you in the Republican Party and listening to your concerns, locally, in the state and nationally. We have a lot of work to do after a horrible 2006 performance. But this is when we see who has the strength and persistence to rise again and fight for our principles and values.

I look forward to working with all of you this summer and fall to elect our great candidates: Holt, Gutierrez, and McCain!

Why the Central Committee elections matter...

Until I moved to San Pedro and got more involved with the County Party, I had never heard of County Central Committees. When I worked campaigns for gubernatorial candidate Dan Lungren, Bush 2000, and congressional candidate Tim Escobar in 2002 and 2004, I never once heard of the central committee structure or how they were "supposed" to be working to get out the Republican vote. I have some theories why, but I think more importantly than why past committees have been pretty much irrelevant in the campaigns I have worked over the past 10 years, I want to instill in everyone that reads this why we need stronger and more effective central committees.

I was introduced to the central committee organization in 2006 working for Michael A. Jackson's campaign. My first impression was that the central committee's purpose was to give seven people plus ex-officios a status as being the "Republican authority" of their respective district. They were supposed to meet once a month and discuss opportunities to recruit more Republicans for office. What I saw throughout Los Angeles County were a few members in each district trying to do just that; but I also noticed those that ran for central committee strictly for their own agendas. They assumed that a position on the committee meant coffers of money would open up, and that they were "entitled" to support from every Republican in their district, if not through donations at least every Republican vote in the district. What they failed to do was reach out and ask voters and locally-elected leaders HOW they could earn their support.

My biggest priority for my first term was to learn HOW to earn the support of the local leaders and learn from them how to win elections in their parts of the district. The biggest lesson I have learned is that voters do NOT want activists as legislators, so much as they want leaders that have shown action in their activism. They also want intelligent legislators who work their way up through their local councils, school boards and community organizations. If you look at the Democratic leaders who have been successful, they all came from local elections; so have most of the Republican elected legislators. So it makes sense that we need to get more active in electing more Republicans to our local offices in the district.

So long as we play the Democrats game of "non-partisan" elections, they will continue to win majorities on our city councils. No where is this more evident than in our three primary parts of the 54th Assembly District. In Long Beach, the Democratic Party has engaged in a 12-year effort to maintain an ultra-high majority. They have done this through the unions & special interest organizations, and I have to commend one of my counterparts, Sergio Carrillo, for keeping the "non-partisan" message resonating well. Not only have local Democratic candidates been able to hide behind this, they've even been able to convince Republican voters that local elections are somehow non-partisan. So let me ask a few questions about "local issues" to see if we could afford a little partisanship:

1) Do you like paying MORE property taxes or LESS property taxes?
2) Do you prefer MORE social welfare programs or LESS programs?
3) Do you prefer MORE local government regulations on small businesses, or LESS?
4) Do you prefer MORE crime (through ignoring increasing crime trends), or LESS crime by getting tougher on criminals and gangs (think City of Los Angeles vs. City of Torrance)
5) Do you prefer MORE local government spending or LESS government spending?

I hope now you can see why promoting Republican principles and values in local races is essential. But who should be taking on the responsibility to promote these by finding and supporting local Republicans throughout each district? THIS is the official mission of your local Republican Central Committee, and one that I take very seriously.

So long as I am chairman of the 54th AD Republican Central Committee, local Republicans who seek to make a difference in their city, be it Long Beach, Signal Hill, Avalon, Los Angeles, Rolling Hills Estates or Rancho Palos Verdes, will have a group of Republican leaders behind them. This is why I am running for another term on the committee; because we have work to do in 2009 & 2010.

To close, I have learned of an effort by a few candidates to divide Long Beach (& Avalon) Republicans from those in Palos Verdes & San Pedro by marginalizing the importance of a cross-district level of support. These "Greater Long Beach" candidates are missing a key component in their campaign: Support from ANY Long Beach elected Republican. Meanwhile, I am pleased to state that two of our best Long Beach Republican leaders, Long Beach Councilman Gary DeLong and LBUSD Board member Jon Meyer, have endorsed me, as well as my friend Davina Keiser, for election on June 3rd. I have received numerous other endorsements from across the district, and I have posted them at the top of the left column. Many of these leaders have expressed a desire for our central committee members to work together across the district and help each other when each local race comes up. Those I have endorsed understand this purpose, and voting for these seven will increase the strength of our committee to seek out good Republican candidates and give them the necessary volunteer and operational support to win local election.

I hope you will make sure to vote on June 3rd for myself and my six friends, and spread the word to all of your Republican friends in Long Beach, Avalon, Signal Hill, San Pedro and the Palos Verdes Peninsula. We have a lot of work to do, and a divided committee will have the same problems in 2 years that past committees did. A united committee will be able to effectively take on the unions and special interests battling to take over our local governments and our local schools.

Your vote matters on June 3rd!

Central Committee Endorsements...and WHY

In my earlier post on central committees, I laid out the basics of its mission and objectives. Today, I will lay out for you the six other candidates you NEED to vote for (along with me, of course) this June in order to maintain the momentum of involvement and support for electeds and future electeds throughout the 54th Assembly District. (I have listed them at the top left, and will maintain this list through the June Election.)

Prior to my election to the central committee, the level of involvement by both this district's committee and others throughout Los Angeles County was sporadic at best. Personally, I had worked two congressional campaigns in Los Angeles County and had never HEARD of the central committees. To this, I give due credit to Mr. Jackson, who promoted the need for increased involvement by the district committees. At the time (February 2006), we were primarily concerned about his own race for Assembly, but he was correct to call out the lack of participation by these committees. In my opinion, the primary reason for the lack of involvement by these committees was the primary reason most people ran for these committees: Their own personal agendas.

I decided to be a candidate that was going to engage differently. It was time for a committee of members that had no specific campaign or candidate in mind, but wanted to get more Republicans elected throughout the district. Others that filed shared this vision, including James Crean (who is taking time away next term to focus more on family & business). James has been a phenomenal mentor of mine, and I hope I can continue working with him in future years to further the principles and values throughout the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

We have some great candidates who are eager to get involved from Palos Verdes to Long Beach, and I'll talk about each one now.

First, I hope that my fellow board member Davina Keiser is elected to the next central committee. Davina has been serving as an alternate, and also stepped up to serve as our committee Secretary. Employed as a teacher in LBUSD, Davina has been this committee's best resource for providing information about the political scene throughout Long Beach. While we have members from Long Beach, Davina has dove deeper into both the LBUSD races and the City Council races, and been a positive point-of-contact for Republican electeds there. I expect Davina to continue building her network within Long Beach, and make this committee's networking event stronger.

Two central committee members that have weathered the storms of the past and I hope will continue to be appreciated and supported throughout the district are Nancy Comaford and Al Han. Both are veterans of past AD campaigns, as well as critical races throughout Los Angeles County. Nancy has been a positive role-model for fellow Republican Women's Federated (RWF) groups throughout the county, and I have benefited much from her knowledge & experiences during meaningful telephone conversations. I very much hope I will continue to benefit from this, and the district will reap those benefits as well. Al has been a critical member of key election campaigns throughout the county, including the LA Community College District race last year and the Victory '06 campaign. Serving as the 2nd Vice-Chair to the County Party, Al has been able to bring increased attention to our district and continues to work hard to get campaign donations to key candidates. Al has also been a critical resource for me as I continue building relationships throughout the county in the best interests of this district.

For new members, I am endorsing a candidate from each of the three primary cities in this district: Chuck Michel from Palos Verdes, John Cozza from San Pedro, and Kevin Kunkle from Long Beach. Each brings a unique background and set of experiences that should help this committee take advantage of lessons learned from a diverse group. Chuck Michel is an attorney who brings contacts and connections throughout the district, including his representation of the American Flag flying at Trump National Golf Course. John Cozza has been involved in both local San Pedran business issues and those within the City of Los Angeles. He was the Legislative Analyst for Former Council member Rudy Svorinich, and has a deep understanding of the 15th Council District of Los Angeles, which is primarily located within the 54th AD. Kevin Kunkle was recently on the local leadership team for Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul, and brings with him experiences and lessons from his campaign. Kevin was very active in Get-Out-The-Vote efforts throughout Long Beach, and brings a lot of operational experience and motivation to this committee. Though I worked for a different candidate in the primary, I have a deep level of both respect and admiration for fellow Republicans that supported Ron Paul's high-energy campaign, and I hope we can take some valuable advice from Kevin and others on how to energize our other 2008 races.

Finally, I (John Stammreich) sincerely hope that I have proven to be a valuable player in the local politics throughout the 54th AD. From my neighborhood council election in San Pedro to chairing this committee (when no one else wanted to), I have worked hard to grow this committee back into a viable & credible committee that our Republican leadership has recognized as a key political force in the district again. Knowledgeable local candidates used to skip this committee and proceed directly to the county meetings when seeking endorsements, and many local candidates did not know about the capabilities and support that this committee can offer. Since December 2006, I have risen both the visibility and credibility of our committee, with the help of some great supporters mentioned earlier, and I ask for your vote for myself and the six candidates I have endorsed for the June 2008 Central Committee elections.

Please e-mail me at stammiam@yahoo.com if you have any questions about myself or those I look forward to serving with for the next 2 years.

Central Committee...what the heck is that?

So the first question I get from friends when I tell them my position is "what the heck is a central committee?" Each assembly district in California has a Republican Central committee comprised of seven elected members plus ex-oficios who are either partisan elected officials or party nominees for legislative offices and reside within the district. The primary purpose of these committees is to win elections for Republicans within the district. In the case of our district, it is our job to work within the cities of Long Beach, San Pedro, Avalon, Signal Hill & the cities of the Palos Verdes Peninsula to increase Republican representation on city councils, school boards & other local positions.

Elections are held every two years in conjunction with the June primaries. Many who run for this committee do so because they somehow feels that being on this committee will help them in their follow-on campaigns for other positions. My personal opinion is that these types of members have contributed to the lack of satisfactory performance & activity of this committee prior to my election to this committee. How can a committee member dedicate time, resources & motivation to local races throughout the district when they're focused solely on their own? I'll talk more about my issues with these types of members in future posts.

Membership in the Central Committee should be for those who are Republican activists/political junkies who are willing to continuosly be working on political campaigns. For example, in 2007, we started in January supporting Nancy Long for Signal Hill City Council, then some of us worked on Dick Vladovic for LAUSD between February & May, as well as the Republican slate for LA Community College Board. With the special elections this year, we spent time this summer on COL John Kanaley's campaign for the 37th CD, and then had to quickly prepare for the Palos Verdes elections for RPV City Council and the PVPUSD board for November. Finally, we're already researching the candidates who have filed for the Long Beach elections in early 2008. And oh yea, all of us have presidential candidates we're supporting and participating with. (I'm the 46th CD Chair for Rudy Guiliani!)

Now, not every member is as politically active as that; a few are even more active than that. My point here is that those considering being a member, an alternate or otherwise participating need to understand the expectations. They will definitely be this high (or higher) for 2008 and I will be seeking out and working to get six other future members for the 2008-2010 term that feel as passionate as I am & are going to put in the amount of time needed.

My golf game has suffered, but it's for a greater good.

More to follow on the central committee and political events going on in San Pedro & Long Beach this month.

Kick-off of the 54th AD Republican Blog

Welcome to the first posting of my New Year's resolution - communicating as openly as possible to the many dedicated Republicans working hard throughout the 54th Assembly District to get our local candidates elected. I look forward to continuing the great strides we made in 2007 to begin implementing the state-wide strategy of getting our party central committee involved in local races and local issues. Many will question this "amking partisan what has been non-partisan", but my simple answer is that the Democratic Party has been doing it for over 25 years. It's about time they had some true political competition, and we plan to take it to the next level here in this assembly district.

From election to the local neighborhood council to involvement in numerous campaigns over the past ten years, I look forward to continuing my proactive approach to community involvement and conservative activism through the 54th Republican Central Committee. I believe in getting past closed-minded positions and getting to the real issues of the district's concerns. Bad attitudes, false impressions and closed minds have no place in our communities or our party, and often result in special interests and our local officials ignoring the will of its citizens when creating their plans.

For example, I believe in good, smart development that contributes to and provides benefits for the surrounding community. Long Beach, Palos Verdes & San Pedro are ripe with opportunities for new business & new residences, but these should not add unnecessary burdens to those that came to this great district first. I'm also unsatisfied with the performance of our public schools in preparing our children for both college and their future careers. A pet peeve of mine is long-time residents of a community telling me "that's the way it's always been" about an issue or concern. I refuse to believe that when good neighbors like you believe issues impacting our community need to be addressed, and I want to make sure they are addressed.

In Los Angeles, the Mayor of Los Angeles discussed the fiscal dilemma of property tax revenues going down and the "need" to continue the illegally-created Telephone User's Tax. With a lack of fiscal discipline by most Los Angeles City Councilmembers, it's no wonder why. How many feel-good programs can be placed on the backs of Los Angeles taxpayers? Instead, our misguided City Council has taken a position to continue increasing taxes on the current tax base (and pray, I guess, that the existing base of taxpayers won't migrate their businesses and residential spending to neighboring cities.) Regardless of your political affiliation, are you more prone to buy your gas, groceries & clothing where you can save money? Don't you think this will extend to telephone and internet users as well? Why aren'y elected city council members required to complete an economics course that truly studies the affects of localized taxation?
I wanted to kick off this blog with some rantings on my mind, and to let you know that I look forward to flowing out information about opportunities to get politically involved & make a difference in 2008. Let me know if there are specific issues in our district that I need to focus on. It's all about bringing to light issues that the current group of "career politicians" hope we'll ignore. With your help, we'll continue to make them address these issues or ensure they are voted out of office!

Stamm I Am