Chairman Steele’s self-defense over Scozzafavagate was that he would not be a Chairman that dictates to the grassroots.  This was the correct answer to communicate to the party at large, except for the fact that the candidate in NY-23 was not selected by the grassroots.  Regardless, Steele appeared to support the leadership style of Ronald Reagan, not Ed Gillespie, which is exactly the change our party requires at the senior level. 

On the heels of this statement by Chairman Steele, word spread through out the party that a 1994-style agenda or set of principles would be developed prior to the 2010 elections.  1994 proved that a unified slate of candidates with a pragmatic agenda developed from the grassroots, focused on reforming government and raising the ethical standards of elected officials can lead to a mid-term election victory.  The Contract with America succeeded for two reasons. 

1. It was not only focused on policy, but also on the institutions and politicians that provide oversight on policy and legislation;
2. The CWA was developed based on reaching out to the grassroots within the party and electorate at large.

As information began to leak out about set of principals (purity resolutions) that our Chairman Steele and our leadership was developing, I was surprised at the lack of analysis from the rightosphere.  This initiative was in fact not another Contract with America, but appeared to have more to do with avoiding further embarrassment for our Chairman, by ending the internal party civil war that is mostly fought during primary contests. 

1) It will allow the leadership in D.C. to control the nomination processes, by interpreting and rejecting the ideological positions of candidates, not through free votes at the district level.  A potential candidate can be falsely flagged as being ideologically impure, if an insider opposed to the candidate has a vendetta or is only looking to bring allies to D.C.

2) The resolutions say nothing about the expectations of conduct we should demand from our elected officials once they enter office.  Unlike the CWA, the 2010 purity resolutions fail to demand that new Congressmen and Congresswoman remain loyal to voters, not the institutions they govern or the lobbyists who snake around their private clubs and dinner parties. 

The soon-to-be approved resolutions will lead to a shift of power from the grassroots to the GOP’s central authority in Washington.  Since Chairman Steele has been so willing to capitulate to the public rants of another insider, Erick Erickson, I could not help but wonder if these resolutions were developed by Erickson himself?  Anti-grassroots, draconian and ideologically in line with the typical voter….IN BIBB COUNTY, who else other than EE would suggest developing resolutions that will be used by Washington insiders to determine who is a candidate for our party. 

Since EE and Chairman Steele are such huge supporters of Sarah Palin, I should remind them the a majority of elected Republican officials who represented the State of Alaska (in D.C. and in Juneau) in the early 2000′s once used an unofficial purity test against Sarah Palin, before and after her election as Governor.  Palin was called a socialist (because she favored competition instead of a monopolies), anti-corporate (because she would not go along with the criminal GOP establishment and the lobbyists who paid them off) and pro-homosexual (because she refused to sign a bill that would have stripped health care benefits from gays, lesbians and transgender folk).

My only guess is that the resolutions are a knee-jerk reaction to the joke that was the nominating process in NY-23.  This of course happens all over the country in dozens of districts (I’ve seen it first hand), with NY-23 only bringing the issue to the forefront, when the local party bosses waved their corrupt hands over a candidate with ties to ACORN (these party bosses obviously do not watch Fox news or read conservative blogs).  

Would a more appropriate solution not be to redirect the power away from local party bosses to the grassroots, not Washington?   

To jump start on my New Years resolution of balancing out my criticism of others with constructive feedback, I decided to do what EE (possibly) did and offer my own suggestions to Chairman Steele for the purity resolutions, not in order of priority;

1. We agree to serve only two term limits, unless we represent Vermont, where Republicans win elections once every generation;
2. We agree not to engage in sexual relations (including sexting) with interns, lobbyists, our Congressional staff, Argentinian nationals and members of the SEIU;
3. We agree to not grow the size of government to ____% as a share of G.D.P.;
4. We agree to never bow to foreign nationals;
5. We agree to never accept campaign donations in exchange for political favors, especially if our district is in Louisiana;
6. We agree to never vote for a budget that is not deficit neutral;
7. We agree to never go to a dance hall with Tom DeLay or share prescription drugs with Patrick Kennedy;
8. We agree to support legislation that promote States’ rights;
9. We agree that all committee meetings are to be conducted in public and do not include Rahm Emanuel; and
10. We agree to never switch party registration without facing a primary, no matter how politically expedient it is.

Do you have any suggestions for our leadership?    

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Kristofer Lorelli can be contacted at lorville@rogers.com, on Facebook and Twitter/Kris_Lorelli