Oh! Those Republicans And Their Empty Chairs!

Photo Courtesy of RNC

John Sigler steps down and the race is on for the new Delaware Republican Chair. Most have dropped out but two: An officially declared candidate, and one unofficial one.

At stake is the future of Delaware’s GOP.

Those two are Charlie Copeland and Jeff Cragg.. To most readers, this would be considered a battle between losers, sort of like a Sunday fall afternoon football game to determine which team will lose to get the first NFL draft pick in spring. But I would like to inform you, that is not true.

It is a battle between good and evil. At stake is the future of the Republican Party.

When one speaks of the future, one can look at one thing. Getting votes. For that is what the Republican Party is bad at. The other things, money, organization, fervor, dedicated partisans, blocs of ad time, connections to the “right” people, they have plenty of.

The thing they ardently lack, is people who will even want to vote for them.

The biggest deflection away from the Delaware GOP occurred between 2004 and 2008. During that time, one person, speaker of the Republican House, controlled the entire republican agenda. As you may have guessed, that is the present candidate Charlie Copeland.

The other candidate recently lost a statewide election to an incumbant governor.   If anyone knows what it takes to get a good Republican candidate elected to a statewide office, it is him.  He’s been there.  He’s tried.

The odds are on that Copeland will probably take it for all the wrong reasons.   One, he works on the principal that if you support Copeland he’ll support you.  With him as the future chairman, every Republican will be watching their backs to swivel in the last second. to dodge the stick of the knife.  One must remember all the past double crosses attached to the Copeland name.  There were many times when promises went unfulfilled.

Some who think back, may remember better times when Copeland was the principle mover of the Republican caucus.  They envision him again returning their party to glory.  They remember  the press releases, the interviews,  the photo ops; they look to no longer having their party appear the loser that it is.  They forget how it got that way.

It got that way because the Republican Party fell in love with itself.  Better to masturbate than go out and get votes it thought.  They talked of how great they were, and ignored the problems real people were having.  They talked of doubling down, being resolutely determined, and smashing down all who stood in their way, when it was real genuine hurting people, who found themselves standing where the Republican Party wanted to go.  Take more money from the middle class, get rid of more unions which are only there to make sure people were treated fairly, cut more services needed by everyday people so the rich could get richer.

Instead of results, Copeland gave us blame.  First blame the Democrats, then as the election results went sour, blame Bill Lee, blame Tim Ross, blame everyone but the real culprit.

Now let’s look at Jeff Cragg.  When no one wanted to run, Jeff said,… “If Republican Party goes into the “General” with a blank spot for governor, our party is finished. ”  When Copeland said, “Who me?  Run for Governor?  And lose to Markell?  Are you effin crazy?”   Jeff  did just that,. for the good of the party; it is still intact.  Whereas Copeland made a decision based on personal ambition, Jeff took the opposite tack.  Jeff came to the aid of his party suffering a stunning defeat, because it needed him.

Copeland ran the party in better times.  But that party was shattered, broken in part because all the personal connections built up over lifetimes, were split, shunned, double-crossed, and poked fun of, leaving very few pieces standing; so few pieces still upright they couldn’t save Mike Castle….  Jeff put pieces together and ran.

The question before the Republican Party is this.  Of the two who can get more people to vote Republican… A builder?   Or a Tearer-Down?

Who makes the better preacher?  The one who can convert more sinners into saints?  Or which of these two has a better shot of success?  A person responsible for the previous collapse, or a person experienced in building something out of nothing?..

We all have a gut and mine says the latter:  the person who built something out of nothing.  Not the rich son who squandered his Father’s wealth.

All the money in the world won’t help Delawarean Republicans one bit, if no one wants to cast their vote because of what your party stands  for……