Posts Tagged → Tea Party
Feeling vindicated feels good
Like genuine apologies, vindication for having taken an unpopular but principled stand comes all too infrequently. And boy does it feel good.
Ten years ago, after an adulthood spent in politics of some sort or another, I finally became personally engaged in electoral politics.
In 2009, after the first six months of the disastrous Obama presidency AKA The Eight Years War Against The US Constitution, I decided to run against the local and then-incumbent Blue Dog Democrat congressman, Tim Holden. Holden had become a symbol of Obama and how radicalism was overthrowing the Democrat Party of old.
Just a handful of years before that, I had been the keynote speaker at Holden’s first and only debate with then-incumbent George Gekas, a fairly conservative Republican from Harrisburg.
After giving what I heard from many audience members was the best speech they had ever heard (no lie, no brag, and I did it in shorts and sandals), about my experience helping create the Flight 93 memorial, I then sat down next to that conservative Democrat and gave him advice on how to beat Gekas at that debate.
Here I was, an active Republican from a prominent local Republican family, sitting at the dais, next to the Democrat challenger of one of our family’s longest political friends, whom I had just publicly called “a formerly close family friend,” giving advice to Holden, which he effectively employed that day.
Holden went on to beat Gekas that Fall in a Republican-dominated congressional district, with a balance of pro-Life, pro-gun Democrats. It was Gekas’ seat to lose, and he did lose it.
Schuylkill County Sheriff Tim Holden represented the grass roots at that time, and he garnered an overwhelming number of Republican votes. Holden was a staunch pro-business, Second Amendment advocate and he earned his blue collar support in every other way, too. He crushed Gekas.
What had made me turn against a long-time political ally and family friend, Congressman Gekas? Probably the same things that made so many other Republicans vote against him. He had become what today we would identify as an ossified establishment politician, a careerist who would show up to vote and to eat at every free lunch, and who would do very little else.
Gekas and I had met together earlier that year, and I had left his office seething with anger at how selfish and self-serving he had made himself. Where had the patriot gone? Where was the campaigning small-business owner, the Everyman who everyone could identify with, regardless of political party?
In today’s parlance, Gekas had gone DC Swamp, and as a result he had lost my support. Back then I would not have said it in those terms, but the bottom line was that he had made the seat all about him, and not his constituents or the principles that made America great, and which I had seen first-hand were under serious assault in Washington.
Fast forward a handful of years later, and I myself was itching to run against the then-incumbent congressman, Tim Holden, Democrat from Schuylkill County.
By then Holden’s party had become the majority, and Holden was voting with radical Nancy Pelosi 93% of the time. Not the 55/45% he had done previously.
So much for the independent-minded Blue Dog Democrat! Holden had gone DC Swamp, too, and the region was on fire to get rid of him.
In 2009 I declared myself a candidate for US Congress and ended up running in a four-way primary race. At the end of the race our campaign did not win, but we finished very strongly third (with the two top vote-getters within a few hundred votes of one another). A lot of politicos and lobbyists complimented our grass roots campaign. The highlight of that campaign was getting over 50% of the vote in that four-way race in Perry County, one of five counties in that congressional district. Perry County was then, and is now, symbolic of the American heartland, so getting the majority of their votes made me feel all-American forever.
But along the way in that race I had received some harsh words, too. Some from old friends or erstwhile political allies, admonishing me for running against the GOP-picked favorite (he was an elected official and went on to lose to Holden in what many insiders even today are convinced was a thrown race).
I had written to one of them, working as a high level appointee in DC at the time, that the grass roots was “on fire” and there was a sense of “rebellion in the air.” A few more emails exchanged between us, and I don’t think he “got it” or frankly even cared that the grass roots voters were rebelling against the ossified, elitist, self-serving political class.
This was right as what was to become the Tea Party was forming, and it all began right here in Central Pennsylvania. Berks County and Lebanon County, to be precise. We did not know what we were doing then, except that we were challenging that entrenched, deaf, self-serving political elite class that depended upon us for votes, but who would then sell us out when it came to giving in on quintessentially American principles to an increasingly radical Democrat Party.
And now here we are, mid-2018, and a huge wave of grass roots, stridently anti-establishment, pro-citizen, pro-taxpayer, pro-America-as-founded candidates are winning primary elections all over America.
And the GOPe is reeling.
Sure, they got Mittens Romney as the next US Senator in Utah, and they got a Democrat elected in Alabama over conservative Roy Moore. The GOPe was bound to win one or two. But they are not winning like they used to win ten years ago. A political revolution is taking place.
Having been at the bleeding edge of that movement\ revolution ten years ago and again and again as a state senate candidate nose-to-nose with the state GOP, and having suffered personally for it, and then partially vindicated by the PA Supreme Court in a landmark case that tossed the GOP gerrymandering plan because of my state senate district and restored me and our campaign to my original state senate district, it now feels good to be vindicated by the recent electoral successes of our ideological successors and soul mates across America.
After the past month, it turns out what at one time seemed like a very few of us are not alone in yearning for a return to the basic American values and principles that allowed for the greatest, broadest diversity of success, freedom, and opportunity the planet has ever seen. The American People are largely behind us, and seemingly increasingly so by the week.
Along with thousands of other risk-takers across America who also made sometimes costly and painful personal sacrifices to run on principle against an unprincipled bi-partisan political establishment early on, I know now that I, we, are now all vindicated. Our fellow Americans are proving this by voting for their own true interests (as opposed to the selfish interests of corporations, The Koch Brothers, unions, political parties, illegal immigrants, economic immigrants, violent jihadist immigrants, socialists, etc), and electing good people who best represent those all-America interests and values.
And that feels good.
Sometimes a threesome just sucks
Welp. Primary Election Day is now behind us. Thank God.
Yesterday’s bright moment was Andrew Lewis running and winning against a large part of the GOP establishment in the 105th State House District.
It lies around out through Harrisburg’s eastern suburbs and could easily swing “RINO,” but yesterday it did not. Proving the power of staying positive and of doing door-to-door, Lewis impressed so many voters that many of them eagerly relayed to us volunteer poll workers their happy experiences meeting him at their home’s front door.
That said, much of yesterday’s political outcomes were unfortunate, for those of us who trust and hope in We, The People and who have learned not to trust the GOP establishment.
Woody Allen once quipped “I believe in relationships. Love between two people is a beautiful thing. Between three, it’s fantastic.”
Well, sometimes that truism just doesn’t hold water, and nowhere was this observation more evident than the results from yesterday’s political threesomes in Pennsylvania.
As we political watchers and participants have seen repeatedly, and as I myself have experienced as a candidate for office, three-way races can and often do allow liberal Republicans to prevail. And in fact, it now seems that the threesome approach is a significant strategy for GOPe candidates.
Yesterday, Dan Meuser won the PA 9th congressional district election (he lives in the 8th District) through the benefit of the two grass roots candidates (Halcovage and Uehlinger) each siphoning off sufficient votes to allow the establishment candidate to get the plurality. There is some question out there about whether Uehlinger was, in fact, a conservative, or even a Republican; despite getting in the race first, his campaign seemed the least organized. Halcovage was not terribly organized, either, and did not respond to important questionnaires from interest groups. Firearms Owners Against Crime advised voters to select only Meuser of the three candidates.
Actually, Meuser may have obtained more than 50% of the vote, which is an indication that he might have won on his own merits (e.g. he was the only candidate deemed acceptable on Second Amendment rights to FOAC). All his negatives notwithstanding.
One lesson for sure comes out of that particular three-way race: If you cannot present yourself as an organized, credible candidate, then please spare everyone the drama and do not run.
People who wake up on some Thursday morning and say “What the heck, I am gonna run for office” have every right to do so, but recognize that there are consequences to this. Better to have a one-on-one clear choice for the voters. We will almost always have an establishment candidate, so pick the one best grass roots candidate as The People’s champion, and chase off the rest.
In the PA governor’s race, liberal dark horse Laura Ellsworth knew she had no chance of winning. I mean, with liberal policy positions like hers, she should run as a Democrat (she said she would not accept money from the NRA). But run she did, and though she obtained less than 20% of the vote, she siphoned off sufficient votes (especially in Western PA) from true conservative and US Army veteran Paul Mango to get Scott Wagner the plurality.
Mango is from western PA and would have otherwise obtained most of Ellsworth’s votes.
Yesterday I was a volunteer poll worker from 7:00 AM until 7:35PM in the Harrisburg area.
What I heard from GOP voters (and mostly from women over 50 years old) at several different polls was that they were angry at both Mango and Wagner for all the negative ads. They knew Ellsworth was liberal, but they were voting for her as an alternative to the two boys engaged in distasteful roughhousing.
Wasn’t this a variable we were picking up from women voters weeks ago? Yes.
Did someone pay Ellsworth to run? One asks, because she knew her chances were very low to nil, that her liberal ideas and policy positions are way out of synch with the vast majority of Republican voters.
Ellsworth the Spoiler has now burned her bridges with about 40% of the state’s Republican super voters, which even the most obtuse political nerds would expect as a logical outcome.
So why else was she in it? One cannot help but wonder if she was paid to play the spoiler. It was done in the last race I ran in….by someone involved in the race she ran in…so…
When we look at Idaho’s primary yesterday, a similar scene unfolded. The unlikely liberal GOPe candidate beat the conservative, by way of siphoning of votes by a third candidate who himself had no hope of winning.
Folks, the only way these third candidates can run is if they are independently wealthy and just yee-haw running for office; or, they are willing to sacrifice their name in one race by trying to build it up for a future run at some other office; or, most likely, they have “other” sources of income or promises made to reward them for playing the spoiler in the current race.
So, as we move into a more experienced and savvy grass roots political landscape, begun just ten years ago as the “tea party,” we are learning that our own strength can be used against us judo-like by the same corrupt political establishment we are trying to defeat.
Threesome races may look democratic, and it is true that every American has the right to run for office. But sometimes appearances can be deceiving. Sometimes those threesomes are designed to undermine the conservative grass roots candidate, and to help the plain vanilla milquetoast establishment candidate win.
Sometimes political threesomes just plain suck. And not in a good way. They can be designed to exploit the big-hearted nature of so many grass roots activists, so that their enemy, the GOPe, can win.
Lesson learned.
My take on tonight’s Corbett – Wolf Debate, and Tom Brokaw’s Plea for Control of Our Lives
Like a few thousand other attendees at the Pennsylvania Chamber of Commerce dinner tonight, I sat in the audience and watched Governor Tom Corbett and Democrat nominee Tom Wolf debate each other, with reporter Dennis Owens moderating. Dennis was outstanding. I also stayed for the Tom Brokaw speech afterwards.
Here are the highlights as I see them:
1) Corbett beat Wolf hands-down, in substance, poise, accuracy, and humility. And damned if I am not still surprised. Given how insipid the Corbett campaign has been to date, I expected the worst performance from him tonight. That did not materialize.
2) While overall the debate was Dull vs Duller, and neither man was exciting or inspiring, the amazing fact is that Tom Corbett found his voice tonight. Tom Wolf talked in circles, kept stating that he is a businessman (six, seven times), mis-spoke (“the vast majority of married Pennsylvanians file separate tax reports”), spoke in vague generalities bordering on fluffy clouds and flying unicorns, and addressed none of the substantive issues pegged by moderator Dennis Owens or by Corbett.
3) Wolf seemed to play it safe, venturing nothing new, nothing specific. He did not even respond the to the Delaware Loophole questions posed to him. He simply ignored them. If he persists in this evasiveness, Corbett can catch up and beat him. Voters can now see it, and it ain’t pretty. Corbett may be The Most Boring Man in the World, but Wolf looked completely unprepared to be governor.
4) Wolf’s “I’ll-know-it-when-I-see-it” response to policy and finance questions is not acceptable for a candidate to run a state government.
5) Corbett actually ate some humble pie, admitting that he is not a good communicator. Understatement, yes, but he is not a guy who likes to admit he’s wrong. So that was big. Again, expectations for Corbett were super low, and he started out looking and sounding defeated. But even he recognized that he was beating Wolf, and his performance picked up as the debate went on.
Brokaw:
1) Ancient establishment reporter Tom Brokaw has a great voice, and lots of stage presence. He’s good looking for a guy that old. He wrote a book about The Greatest Generation, so he must be a pretty great guy. That is the marketing, anyhow. His ideas run the gamut from standard liberal to downright contradictory and mutually-exclusive confused, to pathetic control freak.
2) Although Brokaw started talking about the Tea Party, and he complimented its members for getting involved in the political process (which he said is necessary), he never said or recognized the American Constitution as core to tea party’s goals, values, principles, or guiding role. So although he talked about it, it didn’t seem evident that he understands or has thought about the Tea Party much.
3) Brokaw said “I leave it to you determine if the Tea Party is good for America. I’m just a reporter, I just report the facts. You have to come to your own conclusions.” As if he was not passing judgment on the Tea Party. Yet, he asked the question and obviously thinks the Tea Party is bad for America; that is his hint. Given that Brokaw is a liberal at war with America, this is a big cue to conservative activists: Keep it up, the liberal media establishment is scared of you.
4) He called for “filtration” and a “filter” of the internet, and talked about the “simple people” who manage his Montana ranch and get news from the Internet, which he disavowed and sees as unworthy. This is the kind of intellectual region where Brokaw makes no sense. On the one hand, the big establishment media is all over the Internet, so if people get their news from the Internet, and not TV chatterheads or fishwrap newspapers, then there’s no real problem with the Internet as a news source. What Brokaw seemed to be challenged by is the fact that Breitbart and citizen reporters (think Watchdogwire, or my own blog) are circumventing the establishment media. He does not understand or care that the ‘simple’ masses are hungry for unfiltered news, for real news, for facts and not liberal agenda. How his imagined filters jibe, square, or conflict with the First Amendment was not mentioned; I am unsure it even occurred to Brokaw that purposefully filtering information is censorship. But he is a guy who believes in sixty years of past liberal censorship, so I guess he has to stay consistent today.
5) Brokaw implied that the establishment media are the source of accurate information and “big ideas,” and that alternative news and opinion sources are not. He said he doesn’t believe what he reads on the internet. He is clearly bothered there’s now no difference between establishment media and bloggers and citizen reporters in terms of equal accessibility. He’s having a tough time letting go of controlling the message Americans receive, which is really his objection: Liberal media elites are losing the propaganda war because they no longer have a choke hold on the information flow; ergo, the Internet is full of bad information.
An indication of just how undeveloped his thinking is: Richard Nixon, Richard Nixon, Richard Nixon…for Liberals, Nixon was the High Priest of Done Bad in Government. It does not seem to occur to Brokaw that Nixon’s crimes pale in comparison to the lawless tyranny Obama has inflicted upon American citizens. E.g. NSA spying and IRS crushing of political dissent.
6) On the other hand, he’s into high tech and the future of technology. Very impressed by Google staff and all of the “big minds” gathered at tech conventions. Brokaw doesn’t reconcile his adulation with his view of information flow on the net. I am guessing here that he’d be OK if Google ran all the news on the Internet, because Google is made of liberals who share his political agenda. “Good” liberals and “bad” conservatives is what he is after.
7) Annoyingly, Brokaw dropped names all over the place, as if to impress us with how important he is: Jon Stewart, the NFL commissioner, et al. “I was emailing with ____ _____, and he says ‘Tom..’.” “My books.” “I’m on the board of…..” This seemed self-conscious and actually undermined his standing, because truly great people never look at themselves this way. They simply Are Great.
8) Finally, he called for a new form of foreign service corps, some hybrid of the Peace Corps, Americorps, and the military. It was terribly confused, but it was also the kind of Big Idea he admires others for having, so evidently he must have one, too, even of it makes no practical sense.
Is our intraparty war “Mars vs. Earth”?
Scott Wagner’s crushing defeat of PA State Rep. Ron Miller (a very nice man, for those who do not know him) last week is just one more political race in a string of races over the past few years that have seen the Republican grass roots increasingly stand up to or defeat Republican establishment insiders armed with faux endorsements and tons of party cash (that should be used to defeat liberalism, not defeat conservative Republican candidates).
Here is an article from this week, in which Josh First is quoted about this sad phenomenon:
(Although I am conservative, I don’t know how I became a “hardline conservative,” but in the context of the grass roots vs. the GOP establishment, I’ll take it, as I am passionate about politics being an open, accountable, and transparent process)
This present situation (hopefully to be ended soon) reminds me of this scene from the movie Mars Attacks!, where Jack Nicholson is the grass roots activist and the Martians are the GOP establishment insiders…
Josh to speak at Tea Party Patriots gathering
Josh will be speaking at the Tea Party Patriots gathering next Monday night at 6006 Old Jonestown Road, in Lower Paxton Township, at 7:00 PM. The venue is accessed through an entrance around the back of the old church, in an auditorium. Parking is right there. The subject will be the Second Amendment. Josh will be speaking with local attorney Marc Scaringi, who in 2012 ran in the Republican primary for US Senator from Pennsylvania while Josh was running for PA State Senate.
Republican Reconciliation or Irrelevance?
Reconcile the Republican Party & Republican Voters
By Josh First
December 11, 2012
Things are not all good here in Republican land. Mitt Romney received fewer votes than John McCain received in 2008, even as attack dog Obama also received far fewer votes than his all-positive 2008 campaign. Despite Obama’s catastrophic economy, foreign policy failures (Benghazi), gaffes (“You didn’t build that”), corruption (Solyndra), and bizarre running mate (Biden), Republican enthusiasm for Romney was actually lower than Republican enthusiasm of four years ago. So even with all that was on the line, Republican voters were unwilling to go to the polls.
Recriminations abound about what caused Mitt Romney to lose: Incompetent staffers, inaccurate polling, a prolonged primary, poor ground game by complacent Republicans, uninspiring and flaccid moderate Republican, etc. Rather than re-hashing excuses and assigning blame, here’s one thing we can change for the next big race: Fixing the increasingly broken relationship between many Republican voters and the Republican Party establishment that is becoming an open contest.
The Republican Party ‘establishment’ includes the careerist elected officials, party bureaucrats, pollsters, financers, lobbyists, apparatchiks, consultants, and other functionaries and rock star groupies whose often low-risk, insulated careers and financial interests comprise the don’t-rock-the-boat wing. Registered Republican voters and principle-driven tea party activists, the “grass roots,” are not necessarily included in this group.
Because the Republican Party here is run as an enterprise, this contest has been cast as profit vs. principle. The Tea Party emerged from Central Pennsylvania, as fiscally conservative voters increasingly demanded responsible habits by the Republicans they had volunteered for, contributed to, and voted for, and across Pennsylvania and the nation it’s rapidly becoming a battle between them and the Party establishment, forget the Democrats.
Hitting the nail on the head back in February, Lehigh University professor Frank Davis said “There seems to be a struggle within the Republican Party between the traditional leadership and the conservative grass roots individuals and groups that are probably more mobilized now than they were a few years ago….the Republican Party has used these grass roots individuals to further the party establishment’s interests, and I think these people may want to [now] choose their own representatives, rather than rely on the leadership.”
Running a gazillionaire for president during the worst economy in 70 years, where his wealth contrasted with citizens’ daily reality, made sense early to the Party establishment, which was long ago greasing the skids for Romney staffers into county Party offices well before the primaries ended. Sure, I like Romney, admire his business acumen, donated to his campaign, went door to door for him, blogged for him, and voted for him. But someone more blue collar, more authentic is going to be more believable, more welcomed by Middle America.
Republican grass roots candidates lost several recent US Senate races, which establishment candidates would have had no greater chance of winning, but the establishment demanded they step aside. Here in Pennsylvania, candidates hand-picked by Republican Party leaders were also disastrous failures, from the primary to last month’s general election. These candidates made perfect sense to insiders. But when trotted out into the public venue, voters shot these perfect candidates down in flames. Does either camp have a corner on the market?
The onus for reconciling the two groups is fully on the Republican Party establishment; the “professionals.” Many Republican Party leaders have engaged in high-handed, controlling behavior that has alienated a growing number of registered Republicans, even the most dedicated. Republican voters and volunteers have been treated as wind-up toy soldiers, turned in a direction and told to march. Party intervention in primary races is one of the worst abuses. No matter how much the establishment may want Yes men to support the establishment’s intertwined political and business interests, the cost of alienating the base is too high. If the Party stays out of primaries and gives the people a voice, they’ll be rewarded with more inspired voters, more volunteers on the ground, more elections won.
The professional class of Republicans say they know what they are doing and everyone just needs to move out of their way and let them do their job. Maybe it’s true that the new grass roots activists lack credentials, but the professional class suffers from an inspiration gap, often pushing bland, plain vanilla, pre-fabricated, cookie cutter candidates who are “supposed” to win, but who fail after spectacularly expensive investments. The Republican Party does actually need Republican voters to get their candidates across the goal line, so will the Party leaders listen to the Party voters? For good reason, Democrat analyst Patrick Caddell recently asked “Can the Republican Party Avoid the Fate of the Whigs?”
Let us get an honest answer here: Is there sufficient humility among our Party leaders to learn from these mistakes, to look inside themselves, and take the necessary steps to reconcile?
If Republicans want to win elections, they need to be the Party of Opportunity, allowing the more conservative, independent-minded members to have a shot at full participation. If we are all in this together, then let’s start acting like it. Otherwise, factionalism and political irrelevance are staring us in the face.
Stay in the conversation at www.joshfirst.com and on our political Facebook page
Party Endorsements Damage Freedom
Party endorsements are common practice in Pennsylvania. A vestige of the bad old days of smoke filled back rooms, where party bosses selected candidates to receive party support and favors, endorsements have come under fire in recent years.
The most compelling reason is that voters feel disenfranchised. Another reason is that endorsement processes appear to favor weak, moderate, wishy-washy candidates who do not stand on their own merits or strong personal character, but rather people who will do and say what they are told.
Feeling fed up with milquetoast candidates who seem to stand for nothing but being everything to everyone, increasing numbers of Republican voters are rejecting the party endorsement process.
Pennsylvania is one of the last states to do endorsements, and the effort to end it is from the ground-up, led by grass roots candidates as well as former elected officials now on the outside of the party. Rick Santorum and Sam Rohrer are two examples. Santorum is running for president, and Rohrer for US senate.
Governor Tom Corbett recently endorsed Steve Welch for the US senate nomination, but it may boomerang. Welch was recently a registered Democrat who apparently voted for Barack Hussein Obama. I met Welch, and he publicly denied voting for Obama, but like others in the room at the time, his disavowal seemed untrue to me and was met with great skepticism by the conservative activists in the room.
It’s likely that Welch will come under fire for this as well as his unclear positions on important policy positions. He does come across as a heck of a nice guy. But more and more conservatives want gritty leaders who will stick to their guns, and they reject endorsements that promote candidates like Welch.
My own wish is that the Republican Party not make any endorsements.
UPDATED: Tea Vs. Establishment Battle comes to Dauphin County
Aside from the epic power struggle over Lebanon County’s Republican Committee, and a smaller but equally strenuous 2010 battle in York County between 912 Patriots and entrenched Republicans, which ended in the summer of 2011 in favor of the Tea Party insurgents, Central Pennsylvania, and Dauphin County specifically, has not seen such a contest.
Until now.
Now, that open competition has fully arrived, and it may become open warfare. Oh sure, there have been some past skirmishes. The first skirmish involved former Dauphin County commissioner Lowman Henry being dumped in 2002 by the party in favor of a candidate the inner circle liked more; that planted a seed of factionalism.
Two years ago those rumblings erupted forcefully during the PA-17th Congressional District Republican Primary race, when traditionalists advocated party endorsements and the outsiders wanted an open primary, in the American spirit of “May the best person win.” That is, may the highest merit be rewarded with the highest accolades and well-earned support. No more skulduggery to edge out unwanted candidates and strong leaders by insiders whose interest is perceived by some to be retaining power and control.
In 2010, the outsiders prevailed in one way, with only one GOP Dauphin County group doing an endorsement (the Susquehanna Township GOP Committee). The other challenge came from a committee member, Alan, who unsuccessfully challenged party chairman John McNally for that chairmanship. Challenges are uncommon, and it was a second seed planted next to the Lowman Henry tree, or maybe it was fruit from that tree.
Soon after in 2010, those outsiders became identified with and then known as “Tea Party” activists. Their view was that they were merely seeking to return America’s conservative movement and Republican party to essential American traditions and principles. The way they were viewed by the established, inner-circle GOPers was with disquiet.
When the open insurrections began, no one thought they were more than disagreements between liberal and conservative Republicans.
Now, an open power struggle has erupted for the heart and soul of the Dauphin County Republican Party.
On the one hand are more conservative Republicans, feeling shunted aside and unappreciated, despite their significant sacrifices and hard work for the party. Some others had declared their interest in or intentions to run for certain seats, only to then find themselves carefully dissected from those seats in the new redistricting. Their own party did that dissecting.
Dauphin County GOP Chairman John McNally has declared his candidacy for the newly created and open state senate seat carved out of retiring senator Jeff Piccola’s district. York County businessman Steve Johnson has indicated his interest in the same senate seat. Johnson ran for lieutenant governor in 2010 among a slate of eight candidates.
UPDATE: Bill Seeds, a long time supervisor of Lower Paxton Township, is declaring his intention to run for the same senate seat, as is the York County Clerk of Courts. Each group is using the tried and useful divide-and-conquer method, as they cultivate new candidates from the opposing candidate’s county.
McNally has temporarily handed his chairmanship to Dauphin County commissioner Jeff Haste, with the expectation that McNally will re-occupy it if he loses to Johnson. However, long-time GOP activist and congressional candidate Toni Gilhooley has stated that she will seek the Dauphin County GOP chairmanship.
State representative Sue Helm is now challenged by a 26-year-old attorney, Jenna Lewis, who is endorsed by the GOP establishment, including much-liked Dauphin County District Attorney Ed Marsico and her own father, Judge Lewis.
Susquehanna Township is a changing political landscape, where Helm, a well-known businesswoman, barely held onto her seat two years ago against Democrat activist Gene Stilp, of The Pink Pig fame.
Conservatives unhappy with Helms’ past performance now find themselves having to choose between Helm or the very young, inexperienced, and untested Lewis. Given that Lewis has the establishment wagons circling around her, the outsiders are quietly rallying to Helm.
What intrigues me is how the Tea Party began in Lebanon and Berks counties, when then-senator Arlen Spector spoke a lot of hogwash to fed-up American Joes. The Tea Party spread to Virginia, New Jersey, New York, and Massachussettes, where Republicans swarmed rickety barricades manned by corpulent, unprepared Democrats.
Now what? With the Lebanon County Republican Party firmly in the hands of the pluralistic Tea Party, will Dauphin County go the same way? And if it does, will Perry County and Centre County follow suit?
Centre County is, after all, the home turf of state senator Jake Corman, known to many as the “Silver Spoon Senator” for having casually inherited his father’s former senate seat. Corman voted for the legislative pay raise and remains one of the very few elected officials upon whom rural Pennsylvania taxpayers have not yet sought revenge.
Like Perry County, Centre County is a deeply conservative region ripe for the same frustration and political dynamic that changed Lebanon County and has now landed squarely in Dauphin County.
Corman’s presence could be the spark that lights those other Tea Party fires.
Stay tuned.