The Republican Club of Sun City NEWSLETTER

January 2012 Everett Schmidt, Editor Sun City Texas

CANDIDATES FOR COUNTY ATTORNEY TO PARTICIPATE IN FORUM The First in a Series of “Candidate Forums”

A “Candidates’ Forum,” featuring the three announced candidates for the position of County Attorney in the coming Republican primary election will take place during the club’s meeting scheduled for Thursday, January 19 in the ballroom of the Social Center in Sun City. The three announced candidates are: Dee Hobbs, Rick Kennon and Jeff Maurice. The position of County Attorney is currently held by Jana Duty who, having chosen to run for the position of District Attorney, will not seek re-election. The date of the primary has been rescheduled for April 3.

The usual format of such forums calls for each candidate to make a statement about his or her qualifications and then respond to questions submitted on index cards by members of the audience. A moderator will preside over the event.

The Social Period, Food and Program. The first meeting of the new year will utilize a new format having differences from that used during previous meetings. The main differences are that “heavy” hors d’oeuvres will be served in place of a dinner, and that theatre seating, rather that seating around tables, will be utilized.

There will be a social period from 6:00 PM to 6:30 PM when the hors d’oeuvres will be served. To facilitate the setting up of the ballroom for the new format, doors will remain closed until 6:00 PM. The meeting will be called to order at 6:30 PM when the program will begin.

The “heavy” hors d’oeuvres will consist of sandwiches (roast beef, ham, turkey and chicken salad), gourmet wraps (BLT, honey mesquite, turkey club), veggie platters, fruits, cheeses and other light snacks.
(Some of the objectives of the new format are explained in the “Other Club News” section” below)

Cost. There is a $7.50 per person fee for food and drinks. Checks made out to The Republican Club of Sun City should be mailed to The Republican Club of Sun City, Attention: Treasurer, 1530 Sun City Blvd., Suite 120, Box 227, Georgetown, TX 78633 by no later than Friday, January 13. Club treasurer Dorothy Carlyle has also set up a special collection box on her front porch at 173 Whispering Wind for individuals wishing to hand-deliver their payments. For information about reservations, contact Dorothy at 864-0353 or dcarlyle@suddenlink.net

Visitors – regardless of party affiliation – are welcome!

OTHER CANDIDATE FORUMS ANNOUNCED

Throughout the history of the club, “Candidate Forums” have stimulated the most interest in the programs of club meetings and have brought about the highest number of attendees. Accordingly, in addition to the January forum, the Executive Committee has arranged for two additional “Candidate Forums,” as follows:

• Thursday, February 9, in the ballroom of the Social Center, candidates for District Attorney.
• Thursday, March 15, in the ballroom of the Social Center, candidates for a position to be announced.

  OTHER CLUB NEWS

  The Changed Format of the January Meeting. The new format to be utilized at the January meeting is to be conceptualized as an experiment to determine if future meetings will use that format on either a limited or an extensive basis. One option is to rotate that format with traditional meetings. The new format could provide the club with more flexibility in dealing with scheduling problems.

  The new format could, somewhere down the line, provide relief from the present situation which finds in regard to the ballroom that monthly dinner meetings are not always held on the same Thursday night of the month. Sometimes they are scheduled only 3 weeks apart, and sometimes on a Wednesday or a Saturday. And possibly some relief could be provided from the unfortunate situation which finds meetings of our club only one

day from meetings of the Georgetown Area Republican Women (GARW).
Members of the Executive Committee invite comments from the membership on the new format.

Club Elects Officers for 2012. During its November dinner meeting, the club elected the following slate of officers for 2012:

President:
1st Vice President (programs): 2nd Vice President (membership): Treasurer:
Secretary:

Harlow Fisher 635-2130 Robert Fears 868-9306 Brenda Leisey 868-6552 Dorothy Carlyle 864-0353 Barbara Wood 931-9998

hdjkfisher@aol.com robertfears@earthlink.net havenspt@suddenlink.net dcarlyle@suddenlink.net woodbjw@aol.com

Membership Drive Now Underway. Attached to this newsletter is a membership form which renewing and prospective new members may use when submitting the $15 per person membership fee to secure club membership for the year 2012. (Membership dues for renewing members become delinquent on February 28) According to the club bylaws, individuals who believe “in the philosophy of the Republican Party and in the objectives of this organization” are eligible for membership.

With a great many thoughtful citizens, it is not hyperbole to say that the coming elections will determine whether our Constitutional form of government will be sustained or destroyed, to be replaced by some socialist form of government.

What can the individual citizen do to protect our form of government? Donations of money, energy and time are, of course, one answer. But it should also be recognized that a sizable membership, alone, gives this club and the Republican Party a presence in the community which can provide dividends during the coming elections. An easy way for the reader to promote membership is to simply transmit a copy of this newsletter and its attached membership form – possibly with a personal note – to a prospective member.

Vice President Leisey reports that as of the end of 2011 club membership was 282.

THE CURRENT STATUS OF TEXAS’ REDISTRICTING EFFORTS

Foreword. The reader, even after having read various reports on the subject of the status of the state’s redistricting efforts, may still lack a clear understanding of what has transpired – legally, and what is yet to transpire – legally with respect to that matter. A review of the various rulings of the involved courts may help provide some understanding of a complex matter. That is the objective of this report.

The Washington, D.C. Federal Court. The present situation began when the three maps drawn up by the Legislature for State House, State Senate and Congressional seats were not, after review, approved by either the Justice Department or a federal court as is required under the federal Voting Rights Act. The Justice Department, which first considered the issue, did not approve the maps so the matter went before a federal court – specifically the one in Washington, DC. That court, earlier in 2011, did consider – but did not approve – Texas’ political maps. Instead, it set a trial date for January 17, 2012 to consider the matter in a trial setting. This meant that, absent the intervention of another court, Texas’ election processes, not having what is termed “pre- clearance,” were held in limbo at the very time when candidates were beginning to file for districts having disputed boundaries.

The Federal Court in San Antonio. But another court did intervene. This time it was a three-judge federal panel meeting in San Antonio; however, instead of ruling on the legality of the three maps drawn up by the legislature, that panel, by a 2-1 vote, imposed what is termed “interim” maps on the state along with various mandates related thereto.

Two of the three judges were Republican appointees; one was a Democrat appointee. Judges Orlando Garcia and Xavier Rodriguez were the majority vote; Judge Jerry Smith dissented and issued a minority report contending that “federal courts may not order the creation of majority-minority districts unless necessary to remedy a violation of federal law.” (emphasis added) The minority report is based on a legal precedent (Upshaw, et al v. Seamon, et al), and suggests the majority opinion was not based on the applicable rule of law.

Attorney General Greg Abbot was critical of the majority opinion, stating in his appeal to the U. S Supreme Court: “Today’s appeal [Abbot’s appeal asking the majority opinion be vacated] emphasizes that no court has, at any time, found anything unlawfaul about the redistricting maps passed by the Texas Legislature…”

In addition to the responses of Judge Smith and Attorney General Abbot, the State Party Chairman, Steve Munisteri, stated: “The Court also seems to fail to take into account the fact that more Hispanics have been elected statewide on the Republican ticket than on the Democratic ticket.”

The Intervention of the U. S. Supreme Court. Attorney General Abbot’s efforts to get relief from the U. S. Supreme Court were successful in that the court-drawn maps were placed on hold and that on January 9, 2012, that court will hear argument from civil rights groups, who believe the state’s maps don’t adequately represent Hispanics, and from Texas Attorney General Abbot, who has argued against altering maps created by the state law makers.

According to a press account, after the January 9 hearing, the U. S. Supreme Court will (1) approve the state’s original map, or (2) approve the replacement maps drawn by the federal court in San Antonio, or (3) order the creation of new maps that reach a compromise.

The Possible Impact of a Supreme Court Ruling. In view of the impending ruling by the U. S. Supreme Court resulting from its January 7 hearing, there is now question about what role the Washington, DC court will play in resolving the maps dispute. The DC court had jurisdiction to determine compliance with the Voting Rights Act and had already scheduled a hearing for that purpose on January 17.

According to Bill Fairbrother “the Supreme Court [will] not technically address the pre-clearance case [scheduled to be heard by the DC court] which is proceeding on its own course. . . However, the ruling likely will impact argument about what benchmarks should be used at trial in that case . . .”

The attitudes of some of the members of the Supreme Court about gerrymandering were revealed in earlier cases. In a 2004 ruling on a Pennsylvania redistricting case, the Supreme Court reveals a deep division on that subject. As reported in the Houston Chronicle, four of the Justices ruled that “courts have no business trying to decide whether partisan gerrymandering has gone too far. They said ‘fairness’ is not a judicially manageable standard…” But the New York Times reports that four other Justices said “the court was obligated to step in when the district maps were drawn for no other reason than to put one party at an advantage over the other.”

Some Loose Ends. There remains uncertainty about the future of the state’s election process, including the following:

• A Reopened Filing Period. The three-judge panel of San Antonio, in a ruling apparently not impacted (at least for now) by other court rulings, has indicated that it will reopen a filing period sometime before February 1 during which period candidates for all offices have opportunity to amend, withdraw or file a new application for the ballot.
• Boundaries of Local Entities. The Georgetown Sun reports that “as long as the state’s maps are uncertain, so too are the maps created by local officials.”
• Dates of the County Convention. In accordance with the recommendations made by the leaders of the two major political parties, the San Antonio court indicated that the date of the County Convention will be on April 14 or April 21, as determined by the state chair of each party.
  Conclusion: Chaos may continue.

  WHAT IF GOP PRIMARIES ARE INCONCLUSIVE?

  Foreword. Columnist Tony Blankley, noting the political discontent in the country, suggests the possibility that, “The GOP presidential primaries may well prove inconclusive, with the nominee actually being chosen at the [national] convention in Tampa, Fla., in the fourth week of August [in 2012]”.

  Selecting a presidential nominee at a national convention – rather than having the selection made in advance by primary or caucus votes – hasn’t happened since 1948, when Thomas Dewey was chosen on the third ballot. In fact, only one convention has been seriously contested at all – the Republican Convention of 1976 when Gerald Ford barely beat Ronald Reagan on the first ballot. It should be noted that candidate selections can be resolved in advance of the convention. Author Pat Buchanan notes that in 1952 there was great uncertainty in the presidential race not unlike the present situation. He reports there was a titanic struggle between the Eastern Establishment’s Gen. Dwight Eisenhower and “Mr. Republican,” Ohio Sen. Robert Taft. The contest was settled not by a vote of the convention, but by the seating of delegates. “Splitting the primaries between them, Ike and Taft fought all the way to the convention where Ike’s Texas delegates were seated and Boy Taft’s booted.” That settled the issue by convention time, but, reports Blankley, “the intraparty brawling that preceded the Eisenhower victory appalled thousands who watched it on TV.” Does that sound familiar?

  Some Reasons for Inconclusiveness. One reason Blankley cites for the present inconclusiveness is that, while GOP primary voters desperately want to defeat Obama, they find themselves in a dilemma because of a need to chose an electable candidate while at the same time to chose a candidate who also has the

conviction and capacity to lead the nation back to traditional conservative values. Perhaps an impossible task. Another reason for the inconclusiveness is that a great many Americans are simply “fed up” with high taxes, a dysfunctional federal government which reached an all-time low approval rating of 11%, some 47% of Americans paying no federal income tax while receiving benefits provided by hard working Americans, and on and on. And perhaps most importantly, they believe there is no relief in sight from the current political apparatus.

They don’t know who they can trust, hence the inconclusiveness.
Some political observers claim the discontent on the part of the electorate is so intense that a third party

is now more and more to be a viable option. A Wall Street Journal writer reports that 7 in 10 think the country is on the wrong track, and that “over half of voters now tell Gallup that a third party is needed. That’s up from 40% in 2003.”

That writer also reports that Ross Perot, who became the most successful independent candidate in modern presidential politics, ran for office in 1992 when 39% of Americans said they were dissatisfied with how the nation was being governed. That dissatisfaction rate now stands at 81%, having more than doubled.

Already, a nonpartisan group, American Elect, is now on 13 state ballots, including some in swing states. Ron Paul told radio host Sean Hannity that he has “no intention” of making an independent run, but wouldn’t rule out such bid.

And there is the impact of new GOP rules. Blankley reports on a new GOP rule which can impede a “snowball” effect which had previously existed. That rule provides that any state that holds a primary or a caucus before April 1 must award their delegates on a proportional basis, rather than a winner-take-all method. This means that a front runner with, say, a 38% plurality in a six-way split will get only 38% of the delegates instead of 100 percent. (There are several exceptions to this rule) Contends Blankley: “This will keep second tier candidates in the hunt and deny the front runners the steamroller effect that usually delivers a de facto winner in the GOP by February.”

Blankley also suggests a far more dramatic possibility: “If we go into the August convention with no candidate holding a majority of delegates, then the door is open to non-primary candidates being nominated. . . “ This situation, plus the threat of a third party movement, means that delegates and the entire party will

be under intense pressure to respond to voter discontent lest Obama is given a victory by default.

The National Convention. A total of 2,286 delegates are slated to attend the Republican National Convention in August, and 1,144 will be needed to claim the nomination. While delegates are initially obligated to vote in accordance with primary results of the state they represent, if no candidate receives the majority vote by say, the second ballot, they may then vote their conscience.

Virtually all delegates are selected by states using either the primary or the caucus method. (A few are selected by the party leadership) The state legislatures and state parties establish rules for their respective states. Following is an outline of the procedure used in Texas to provide delegates to the National Convention.

Primary Election,April 3. Voters are voting to determine which presidential candidate will receive the majority vote in the state. That candidate will then, under party rules, receive the votes of the state’s delegates to the National Convention for at least two ballots.

County Convention, April 14 or 21. Delegates to the State Convention are chosen; platform is passed.

State Convention, June 7-9. Delegates to this convention are those selected at the County Convention. They do not vote on a presidential candidate, but they do (1) elect delegates to the National Convention, and (2) elect “electors” (as provided in the Constitution) who meet in December to cast electoral college votes for president in accordance with the popular vote of the state.

National Convention, August. The delegates at this convention were selected at the State Convention. They elect a GOP presidential candidate. For at least the first two ballots, they must vote in accordance with the primary vote in the state, but thereafter may vote their conscience.

Electoral College Members Meet, December. Electors to the Electoral College selected at the State Convention meet to cast electoral votes consistent with the vote at the state primary and applicable laws. The total number of electoral votes needed to elect a president is 270.

According to the New York Times:
DEMOCRATS WILL EXPLICITLY ABANDON WHITE WORKING CLASS

Readers of the New York Times, the unofficial news organ of the Democrats, were a bit stunned by a November news article written by Thomas Edsall who stated that, “preparations by Democratic operatives for the 2012 election make it clear for the first time that the party will explicitly abandon the white working class.” The writer then explains:

All pretense of trying to win a majority of the white working class has been effectively jettisoned in favor of cementing a center-left coalition made up, on the one hand, of voters who have gotten ahead on the basis of educational attainment – [professors, human resource managers, social workers, etc] – and a second, substantial constituency of lower-income voters who are disproportionately African-American and Hispanic.

Rush Limbaugh stated, “The headline to the New York Times story could just as well be: Obama to White Workers: Drop Dead!” “I am not surprised that this is their coalition,” he said, “I’m just stunned that they’re so publicly admitting it.” It is generally acknowledged, however, that the left has more latitude, particularly with regard to racial matters, than the right has.

Columnist Michael Barone observes that the new coalition does seem to reflect the voting patterns of Obama’s 2008 race:

…he did it without capturing the vast middle of the electorate. He won with a top-and-bottom coalition, carrying voters with incomes over $200,000 and under $50,000, and losing those in between. He carried voters with graduate-school degrees and those with no high school diplomas, and ran only even with the others . . . Obama lost among noncollege whites by a 58 percent to 40 percent margin.

So maybe it makes sense for Obama to write off the white working class.

It is easy to see how the Democrats can gain a loyal constituency from what Edsall describes as “lower- income voters who are disproportionately African-American and Hispanic.” He notes that 45.8 million people, nearly 15 percent of the population, depend on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to meet their needs. Columnist Phyllis Schlafley reports that this type of program is the fastest growing component of government, and does not even include Social Security or Medicare payments. “The total of these . . .handouts is greater than what we are paying for our entire public school system and greater than what we spend on national defense.”

Illegitimate births are a major factor in the growth of the welfare state and of the Democrat constituency, and it is growing. Schlafley reports that illegitimate births for all Americans have risen 26 percent in 1990 to 41 percent today. Among Hispanics, illegitimacy is 53 percent, among blacks, its 73 percent, and among whites, 29 percent. The left is content to let this shocking problem persist because 70 percent of unmarried women voted for Obama for president.

Then there are immigration laws which tend to increase the “lower-income” voters to which Edsall referred.

The Immigration and Naturalization of 1965, an act passed largely through the efforts of Sen. Ted Kennedy, abolished a policy which had been in effect since at least 1890 when those admitted to America were members of ethnic groups already represented here. That policy was replaced in 1965 by one of “family reunification,” which, contends Georgie Ann Geyer, “in effect, gave control over immigration to new immigrants who then brought their relatives here in high numbers.” By the 1980s, more than 80% came from Asia and Latin America.

But more is at stake than mere partisan advantage. At stake is Obama’s philosophy of government which is described as follows by Matthew Spalding of the Heritage Foundation: “What he is actually doing is abandoning the average, middle-class voter and his middle-class values and cobbling together an alliance of state dependents, government hangers-on, and political elites who claim the capacity to run things. Obama’s program is fundamentally about the rise of a new governing class that insists on enforcing political and economic “fairness” rather than letting us govern ourselves. . . His objective as president is to complete the progressive transformation of America, and define its next phase as assuring not equal opportunity, but “fair” outcomes. . . “

“The 2012 election will be a referendum on the governing philosophy of this nation. Let us hope that voters understand the stakes.”

MODERN DEMOCRAT PARTY BETRAYS ITS FOUNDING

It was Thomas Jefferson, considered the founder of the Democrat Party, who stated, “The government is best which governs least.” It was Jefferson who led the Anti-Federalist movement against the ratification of the Constitution because he feared those elected to lead our nation would become pawns for special interests, using those constituencies to perpetuate their offices and further centralize government power.

Columnist Mark Alexander, noting the proclivity of Democrats to engage in the practices noted above, poses this profound thought:

Conservatives and liberals can argue various policy points ad nauseum, but the real question is this: Are we a nation of laws or a nation of men? The terminus of nations that are governed by men rather than laws has, for the entirety of recorded history, been tyranny. In the last century alone, the plight of hundred of millions under dictators such as Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, Saddam and who would be next?. . . Jefferson understood this, as once did his Democratic Party.

President John F. Kennedy also understood the gravity of the question posed above – but he may have been the last Democrat president to do so. His admiration of the insights of Thomas Jefferson were revealed during his presidency when he welcomed 49 Nobel Prize recipients to the White House and made the following statement: “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent and human knowledge that has ever been gathered together at the White House – with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”

The San Diego Union Tribune wonders “What happened to the Democrat Party? Just a few generations ago, the party of Franklin Roosevelt went to bat for the little guy, the common man, the everyday Joe the plumber. Not any more.” Edsall contends Democrats “have laid to rest all considerations of a coalition nurtured and cultivated by FDR.”

The matters discussed above are far larger than those affecting Democrats alone; they affect an entire nation contends Alexander who describes the problem thus:

Obama is not the problem, just its manifestation. The problem is that we are a nation with a collapsing foundation of broken families, where the faith of our founders has been replaced with the real “opiate of the masses,” the mass media, and where ignorance has been institutionalized through our “public education apparatchiks.”

NOTES ON THE PASSING SCENE
(Some Random Observations on This Crazy World in Which we Live)

Understanding the National Debt. The general public has difficulty understanding the seriousness of the national debt because it has difficulty grasping the significance of figures such as the following:

U. S. Tax Revenue: Federal Budget: New Debt:
National Debt: Recent Budget Cut:

2.15 trillion dollars 3.8 trillion dollars 1.65 trillion dollars 15 trillion dollars 38 billion dollars

But if you remove some zeros, like Chuck Bentley suggests, and then pretend you were looking at your family budget, the numbers, still in the same ration as above, would look like this:

Your annual income:
Your household spending: New debt this year:
Your credit card debt: Recent budget cut:

$21,500 $38,000 $16,500 $150,000

385
Your annual income is $21,500. Your household spending is $38,000. That means your new debt this

year is $16,500. And your credit card debt is $150,000. Finally, your recent budget cut is $385.