This Saturday is the 11th Congressional District Republican Committee Convention. My votes will go to…

Becky Stoeckel for Chairman
Becky gets my vote because of how she works with campaigns. She believes the role of chairman should operate as a complement to our Republican campaigns in the 11th District. Her game plan was Tom Davis’s game plan then it became the Keith Fimian game plan because they were the nominees of the 11th. Becky has stood tall behind our candidates and she will continue to do so. She deserves to be returned to the chair of this district’s committee.

David Ray for State Central
David is a master of the rules of our party. And not just at the State Central level. I saw him at a Reston GOP meeting the night of a vote we were having and asked him what he thought of the procedure. He told me he had read the bylaws and then launched into an intuitive critique of the night’s vote. David is always ready to answer questions about our party, or really anything else, and especially about baseball. David is as conservative as we Rs get nowadays. He is a lock to win and rightfully so. He deserves to be returned to State Central.

Bob Patten for State Central
I have a very simplistic reason for supporting Bob; he lives in Prince William County, which offers a significant amount of real state to the 11th District, those precincts deserve a voice on State Central. Bob is a grassroots worker for PWCRC. I first met him as the contact for party efforts at the famous Occoquan Craft Fair, which is a great event. Bob will be a great addition to State Central.

Lillian Vogl for State Central
Lillian gets my vote because she is a believer in the importance of organization down at the precinct level. She sees our party achieving great success from working bottom-up with everything beginning at the precinct level. She believes in boots on the ground, block captains, precinct events and good fundamental grassroots engagement. Lillian will be a great addition to State Central.

My slate may not car pool to Richmond but they certainly can work together. Becky and David aren’t exactly on the same page and I like that. I believe in the benefits of debate, which strengthen our own arguments by exposing faults and inconsistencies which we often overlook. Group think is no good. Competing ideas exchanged in an open and professional setting is one of the greatest characteristics of democracy. My slate represents a pluralistic composition in a pluralist society. I encourage convention delegates to join me in voting for these outstanding conservatives.

Updating the previous post. Red NoVA has learned more about the rule change in the 11th District GOP Convention. Before the FCRC meeting began last night the members broke off into congressional districts to discuss the upcoming conventions. Sheets of rules were circulated which in passing mentioned that there would be a plurality vote for all races. It curiously did not highlight it as a change from the majority vote which was decided months ago. Questions were asked. The explanation for the rule change was that the discussion and vote for a majority vote should never have been on the call because the decision can’t be decided at the district committee level; it’s for the temporary rules committee to decide, which is consistent with RPV Counsel’s ruling. Several people in the meeting told me that once the call goes out to the public, printed on paper, then it’s legally binding. The damage is that procedural info as significant as this could have persuaded or dissuaded a candidate from seeking any one of these offices, but this argument is weak. The competing viewpoints cast an interesting difference, but if the temporary rules committee reigns supreme then why bother with the call in the first place is because there are certain things that are binding to the convention that can be decided in the call such as pre-filing requirements.  So this is and isn’t so sticky.

The strange thing about all of this is why so late? The majority vote proposal was made months ago. There seems to have been plenty of time to correct any errors and alert the public. Why not let everyone know that the decision for how the vote would be decided, no small thing, has not been finalized. Nobody likes changing the rules after the game begins, it’s just not cool, and making last minute changes, the convention is this Saturday, is even less likeable. But this isn’t really a rule change because the proposed rules from the call are just proposed rules. If you are running for one of these offices then you should know this, but the public should know this too.  These rules are for everyone, candidates and voting delegates.  Delegates don’t know this stuff. This kind of confusion only turns off the mildly involved. So the real damage is that right there; we could lose supporters and volunteers over these perceived games. 

But all of this is not a done deal until the convention begins. The final say is on the convention floor, so amendments can be presented and voted on, but it may not be worthwhile for or appealing to a majority to vote for staying longer.

We’ll leave it to the audience to speculate who benefits from this most. This will make the convention much shorter, so the delegates on the convention floor will probably be ok with it. One ballot means you can still get to the kids baseball game, so expect the plurality vote to stand.

This post was updated at 2:50pm 5-16-12.