In these pages, we have repeatedly invited Lew to dial it down and engage in a real, rational dialog. We have asked pointed, pertinent questions designed to initiate and encourage said dialog. But we've also held firm that any misrepresentation on the part of Mr. Waters will be refuted - He no longer enjoys the luxury of pontificating in a one-way echo chamber.
So here is the essence of Lew's problem neatly boiled down. We're going to - to use Lew's favorite new term - "fillet it like a carp" to show that our dear good friend and conservative advocate has completely jumped the rails and gone cross country with no regard to who he mows down in his rampage.
Okay, point by point. . .
"Ron Paul Republican Liberty Caucus" This is a slander, an epithet in Lew-speak. There is no lower form of life than a Ron Paul supporter in Lew's world. Ron Paul is Satan's spawn, and nothing a Ron Paul supporter says or believes can possibly have any merit whatsoever.
Never mind that Lew has been repeatedly reminded that the Ron Paul supporters are a minority in the Republican Liberty Caucus. Never mind that Lew has been advised that those of us responsible for holding his feet to the fire in the interest of intellectual honesty are most assuredly NOT Ron Paul supporters. Never mind that Ron Paul is so 2012, and that as a person and a candidate he's become more or less irrelevant in modern politics, although his ideas live on. Never mind that Ron Paul's crazier ideas have no relevance to local politics, and that his supporters are effectively staunch conservatives who believe in fiscal responsibility and bottom-up governance - just the sort of people Lew tries to style himself to be.
No, facts have no relevance in Lew's world. He feels better chanting Ron Paul's crimes against humanity. It gives him a convenient excuse to avoid actually engaging.
"I catch them secretly attempting to stack PCO slots" Lew insists that something was done in secret, I guess because we didn't call him and get his permission to proceed. There was nothing done in secret. The "Establishment" stalwarts were perfectly aware of what was happening, and in fact they were mounting a similar effort to stack PCO slots in their favor, just as they did in 2012. I know several people who were approached by them in 2012 to try to backstop PCO's who threatened their sovereignty. The New Clark County Conservatives were aware of their efforts this cycle as well, and took it as a matter of course.
For the record, here's how this evil, underhanded, secret nefarious deed was done.
"Hello?"
"Hello, may I speak to Mr/Mrs Citizen?"
"Speaking."
"Hi, Mr/Mrs Citizen, my name is Sparky Dogwalker, and I'm the Precinct committee officer for precinct 123, and I'm calling on behalf of the Republican committee for the <take your pick> legislative district. Don't worry, I'm not calling to ask for money. Do you still live at 456 Easy Street?"
"Yes. . . ."
"The reason I'm calling is that your precinct does not currently have a precinct committee officer, and we're looking for someone who's tired of the business as usual establishment Republicans telling us how to run our county, who wants to get involved and try to turn this county around and give control back to the people. Is this something you would be interested in?"
"Well, I'm not sure. what does a precinct committee officer do?"
This was followed by a short synopsis of the role and responsibility of a PCO, including the perks, like being an automatic delegate to the county convention and getting a vote on Committee officer selections.
"Wow! You mean I actually have a chance to get my voice heard?" And this was normally followed by a five to ten minute diatribe on how frustrated this person was with how the party has been run all these years. Refreshing, but ultimately frustrating for the recruiter, because they have a lot of calls to make, and only a short period of the evening in which people are amenable to being called like this. Once their batteries run down, the call would be ended with,
"That's excellent! You're just the sort of person we need to help us push back on the Republican Establishment and start steering this party back to the people." And then the caller would give them instructions on how to register their candidacy.
Evil. Nefarious. Unethical. Immoral. Underhanded. Un-American. Criminal. Why, there ought to be a law! Imagine, CONTACTING a conservative citizen and inviting them to join the political process! Why, it's enough to make one's head want to explode!
Here are some basic facts that Lew's chanting is intended to drown out:
- Precincts are divided up geographically. To be a PCO for a district, you must be a resident of that district.
- Any registered voter in a precinct is eligible to run for PCO for any party.
- One does not to be a member of the party to run for PCO for that party.
- There are 248 precincts in Clark County.
And somehow we're supposed to believe that the evil, satanic "Liberty alliance" managed to have the foresight to seed the population with an even distribution of crypto-conservative operatives who were just waiting to be activated in order to stage a putsch against the honorable and noble old-guard Republican party. Next thing we'll hear is that it's all Bush's fault.
I'll tell you, the surprising thing about the PCO recruitment drive is how many people were sympathetic to the message, even if they didn't want to commit the time to running as a PCO. There was no stacking of the deck, and no secrecy about what was being done. What you need to wake up to understand, Lew, is that the deck didn't need to be stacked. All that had to be done is tell the average Clark County Conservative that we wanted them to have a voice in the party.
Instead of condemning this, you should be asking why the old guard Republicans are fearful of an increased participation by the people? Could it be because they can no longer control the message? Could it be because the new by-laws undermine the localization of power in the central committee and give more power to the PCOs?
and finally. . . .
"to cover it up, they have launched an all out assault on me." After enduring your barbs, insinuations and outright falsehoods for two years and doing our best to be reasonable about it, some of us decided to see if the troll could stand being trolled in the same fashion. It appears you can't. We've offered you repeatedly a chance to take the high road, to dial it down and return the dialog to one of civility. You keep chanting and waving your hysterical, factually challenged, allegations around like they came to you carved in stone from on high. We have repeatedly expressed our desire to go to your public offerings and find no falsehoods worthy of challenging you on. You're a bully, Lew. You're a bully and finally someone is standing up to you and calling you out, and you can't take it.
You want this blog to shut down, to go away? So do we. Here's all you have to do:
- Be polite
- Be factually accurate
- Quit inventing conspiracies where none exist
- Get your facts straight before you start maligning people who are on your side
- Accept that people can disagree with you on some things and still agree with you on the majority of issues. It doesn't make them evil, it doesn't make them stupid, and it doesn't make them "Paul-bots."
You have positioned yourself over the years as the reasoned, reliable and trustworthy source of conservative opinion in Clark County and we have all appreciated that. All we're trying to do is to get you to keep living up to that standard. The choice is yours, but we have just as many pixels of virtual ink and as much spare time as we need to give you a reality check if you continue to go off the rails.
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