2007 Tri-County Lincoln Day Dinner
Before I get too far I have to say this:
www.monoblogue.us
A proud Ronald Reagan Sponsor
2007 Tri-County Lincoln Day Dinner
Yes, I placed myself and my website on the sponsoring page. So if any of those reading are among the 100 or so who attended last night's festivities, welcome to monoblogue. I think its reputation may precede it now. Among those who sat at my table was Delegate Addie Eckardt and her husband, which led me to state that I got to sit with a Delegate I agreed with 100% of the time! And I think she's one of a growing number of monoblogue fans.
During the dinner, we had a number of speakers. We heard from all of our local GOP Delegates and Senators, plus State Senator Andrew Harris (District 7) who came down to join us for our event. We also had brief remarks from our National Committeeman Louis Pope and from John Flynn, representing the state party. We even had a nice short video presentation from Governor Ehrlich, who sent his sincere regrets on not being able to attend. But I wanted to focus on two speakers: our National RNC Committeewoman Joyce Lyons Terhes and our Congressman, Wayne Gilchrest.
To open her remarks, Terhes told us that "the time for discouragement is over" and we need to begin to fight again. Her take on the losses in 2006 was pretty simple: many of the Republicans who ran had lost their principles and were beginning to sound too much like the Democrats.
As a way of recifying the situation, Terhes suggested a number of ideas, which to me fall under the category of common sense. It's no secret that Republicans have a set of principles, a platform that they need to follow to keep their base and attract the average voter.
She called upon some of those who lost close races (particularly District 38B candidate Michael James) to run again and for us to search out other quality candidates.
Having lost the prior elections, it was time to "think outside the box" and try some new ideas. Included among them was taking advantage of new technologies. (Hey, I know a reinventionist Republican blogger...)
Be involved in the community. Somewhere along the line I think I've said this too, but this does get a person's name out in a not necessarily political context.
Put principles first. We all received cards that stated Republican principles. Perhaps they should've went out to those in Congress who failed to follow them; regardless it served as a timely reminder.
Finally, we have to earn the right to govern again. In my eyes, we have to use our current minority position both in Maryland and nationally to deliver an alternative message where we can, and occasionally work with the Democrats when they stumble onto something that's helpful (for example, the Jessica's Law legislation that was passed in the last GA session.)
The other speaker I wanted to mention was Congressman Gilchrest. The bulk of what he talked about was our involvement in Iraq. Regular readers know I have my disagreements with him on the subject; however, to be fair, I'm going to pass along two books that he suggested to us as reading on the subject.
First among these is a book he claimed to have used when he taught history about the Vietnam War. It's called Why Viet Nam?: Prelude to America's Albatross by Archimedes Patti. The book is apparently in limited supply (written in the early 1980's), but I'm guessing most libraries own it.
The other book is more recent, called Fiasco: The American Military Adventure In Iraq by Thomas E. Ricks. This is more available so that may be the first one I read. (You can also check for them on Amazon, I keep a link to there from monoblogue. Help me make my server fee!)
But I'm going to reserve a right at a later date to request he read a couple books. Personally, I think the parallels he tries to draw between Iraq and Viet Nam play right into the hands of our enemy. As I look at the situation, unlike Viet Nam, our enemy isn't driven by a political cause, but a religious one. Unfortunately, our enemies have learned the lessons of Ho Chi Minh better than we did and they've taken the upper hand in the propaganda war.
As for his dinner remarks, it wasn't surprising that they drew probably the most tepid applause of any of our speakers. But despite the events that have shaken our party since our last get-together in June of 2006, we seemed to be in good spirits and plenty optimistic about our chances in 2008.
So the Maryland GOP, or at least the one in our corner of the state, is nowhere near buried as Mike Miller prophecized. It's people like the ones in our tri-county area that are building the ladder to climb our way out of the hole the Democrats thought they had dug for us. Can anyone say Martin O'Malley, one term governor? Sure you can.