When former Chairman Mike Schroeder, decided that serving for only two years was not enough, he changed the Bylaws allowing the Chair man to extend their term another two years, if approved by the delegates. Duf Sundheim was the first Chairman to serve 4 continuous years. As we know it’s a full time job that offers no salary.

Ron Nehring was just elected as Chairman to his first term without opposition. He did this before when he was elected as Vice Chairman. No opposition. In the CRP, it is rare for a someone to reach the top spot with out having a contest, for Vice Chairman or for Chairman. Ron is someone to watch.

Tom Del Beccaro won his Vice Chairmanship spending relatively little money. Usually such contests have gone for over $100,000 per candidate. Del Beccaro instead made over 250 speaking appearances last year and earned a huge grass roots following.

The moderate vs conservative factions had very few contests. Tom Bordonaro and Tom Del Beccaro are both good guys and movement… Read More

The Board of Trustees of the Capistrano Unified School District has agendized for tonight consideration of a potential settlement in Lackey v. Kochendorfer, a Brown Act open meeting law enforcement case brought by private citizen Ron Lackey. Claims in the Lackey case stem from actions of the Board alleged to violate the open meeting law during the troubled administration of former Superintendent James Fleming.… Read More

Here’s the SDUT coverage this morning of the CRP convention:

S.D.’s GOP leader elected state chief

SACRAMENTO – Ron Nehring, a conservative from San Diego County, was elected chairman of the California Republican Party yesterday at the close of its state convention in Sacramento.

Nehring, who works with the national conservative activist Grover Norquist, succeeds chairman George Sundheim, a Silicon Valley attorney. Tom Del Beccaro, a conservative attorney from Contra Costa County, was elected vice chairman. That’s not an excerpt, that’s all of it. A guy searched out for quotes regularly in the local media as SD GOP chairman gets elevated to state chair, and it warrants a couple of sentences.

Exactly why we need to read the blogs.

Oh….and congratulations to Ron, and Tom!… Read More

Ode to Fleischman… I mistakenly believed that at some point in life I would become old enough (perhaps even responsible enough) to actually pass a night at a Republican Party convention with a good night’s sleep. Some things never change.

It is with firsthand experience that I can now tell you the down-side of staying in Jon Fleischman’s hotel suite at a California Republican Party convention. Not that Jon will always have a suite of rooms, but in this case he did, so I accepted his gracious offer to stake a claim. The disadvantage is that regardless of the hour in the morning I had planned to arise by my own volition via a front desk wake up call, I instead was awakened at 5 a.m. by the soft but persistent tap-tap-tap of the notebook keyboard as Saturday’s FlashReport was being compiled. The show, apparently, must go on…regardless of my needs.

As has already been posted, a big congratulations to Jon for handily winning the California Republican Party’s vice chairman south position… Read More

At the CRP Convention, I gave a 90 minute session on the title of this commentary. My background in environmental issues stems from my concern as a mother of three about the condition of the world I leave my children. In 2002, I wrote the Go Green Initiative, a conservative conservation program requiring no taxes, nor legislation, which is now the largest and fastest growing comprehensive environmental education program in the nation- operating in 30 states, the UK, and in Cameroon, Africa. For more information, see: www.gogreeninitiative.org.

I am also proud to be a lifelong Republican, and Republicans have historically led the environmental movement. President Theodore Roosevelt partnered with John Muir to create our National Parks system. President Nixon signed the Clean Air, Endangered Species, and National Environmental Protection Acts, and he created the federal EPA. When Ronald Reagan was our Governor, he signed CEQA into law. And when Christie Todd Whitman was Secretary of the Interior she created a model of voluntary and creative solutions programs that allowed businesses in all sectors to determine the most… Read More

All-but-formally-declared Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani addressed hundreds of California Republican activists yesterday. This was Rudy Giuliani’s first major speech since he announced the establishment of his presidential exploratory committee last week, and initial indications among the party faithful in attendance suggest there is real momentum behind the leader to whom many Americans rallied behind in the aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks.

Introduced by California conservative hero Bill Simon, Rudy Giuliani discussed many issues relevant to the presidential race in his 44-minute long speech – health care, immigration, the War on Terror and his love and admiration for President Reagan. In fact, Giuliani included no fewer than 18 references to Ronald Reagan, which included lines like “I worked for Ronald Reagan,” and Ronald Reagan is one of my heroes,” and “Ronald Reagan embodied optimism.” Giuliani’s numerous references to President Reagan – which at Republican… Read More

For those following such things, congratulations to Tom Del Becarro on being elected Vice Chairman of the California Republican Party. He bested his opponent, former Assemblyman Tom Bordonaro, Jr., by a couple hundred votes.

He will lead the Party with Ron Nehring, who was unanimously elected Chairman.… Read More

When I met Duf Sundheim in the fall of 2002, it was not a difficult decision to endorse him for Chairman in the upcoming GOP organizing election. I knew I would be a major conservative "defection" and would enable him to more easily seek conservative support, and am pleased to this day with my decision, and proud to have been a small part of his victory in 2003.

All Chairman, whether they serve two or four years, draw the ire of at least 40% of the Party delegates at some point or another. Every Chairman I have ever observed has been accused by somebody of being a liar, game player, weak, untrustworthy or some other name. Everyone has a story about being "screwed" by the Chair. Duf himself has not been immune from these criticisms.

Very few people understand the sacrifice a Party Chairman makes. It is essentially a full time position and in California, where it is nearly impossible to achieve statewide victories, thankless at best.

In his organizational process, he immediately enlisted a fair mix of moderate and conservative leaders to select Party Committees – the best process I have ever seen. As a result, these… Read More