Governor Schwarzenegger Lends Star Power to Britain's Conservatives

Governor Schwarzenegger this weekend addressed the 124th Conservative Party conference in Britain via satellite, lending his support and advice to the party once led by Margaret Thatcher, and today led by David Cameron.

One wire service report put it this way:

Calling Cameron a dynamic leader, Schwarzenegger said: "Our job is to recognise the issues that matter to the people the most and to solve them.

"Issues like health care, balanced budgets, economic development, education reform, public safety, infrastructure and of course global warming and protecting the environment.

Governor Schwarzenegger continues to demonstrate a strong commitment to lead on issues that matter to people, regardless of whether those issues are traditionally identified with the Republican Party or that other party.

In 2001, President Bush led a similar effort specifically in the area of education, pushing for a major rewrite of federal education law (later known as No Child Left Behind), and his leadership led to a majority of Americans identifying the Republican Party as better capable of improving education than the other party.

As a broad based party, Republicans are offering an array of solutions to today's public policy challenges. The Governor and our Republican legislators are continuing to offer solutions to the pressing issues of health care, education, infrastructure (water storage) and political reform.

The New Democrat Majority: Same Liberals As Ever

In case anyone needs a reminder as to how far off the liberal deep end the Nancy Pelosi Congress is going, here are a few votes the Democrats have taken since they took control of the House.

January 5. The Democrats vote 232-0 to strip the two-thirds margin for a
tax increase out of the House rules. (Roll Call #10)

January 10. The Democrats vote 233-0 against coupling their minimum
wage hike with association health plans and small business tax relief. (Roll Call #17)

January 12. The Democrats vote 231-0 to impose price controls on
Medicare prescription drugs, which even their own CBO said would lead to rationing. (Roll Call #23)

January 18. The Democrats vote 228-4 to raise income taxes (on energy)
for the first time since 1993. (Roll Call #40)

March 1. The Democrats vote 228-2 to strip workers of their right to a
federally-supervised, private ballot election when deciding on union membership. (Roll Call #118)

May 17. The Democrats vote 214-13 to pass a budget resolution which
calls for hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending, paid for by letting the Bush tax
cuts expire. (Roll Call #377)

July 17. Democrats vote 221-8 to gut the Department of Labor's Office of Labor Management Standards, the federal watchdog for corruption in labor unions. (Roll Call #642)

July 27. For the second time this year, Democrats vote to raise income
taxes. This tax increase on companies creating jobs in the U.S. was
agreed to 212-14 by Democrats. (Roll Call #756)

Western States Leadership Conference a Success

Congratulations to everyone who helped to make the Republican Western States Leadership Conference a success. Several hundred Republican activists were treated to a busy schedule of briefings, training and social events at the San Diego Marriott hotel over the course of the three day event.

Hillary Calls the Vice President "Darth Vader"

Hillary Clinton called Vice President Cheney "Darth Vader" today...probably in the name of tolerance.

Report From the Field: Local Candidates Advance Republican Agenda

The CRP effort to elect fiscally responsible Republican candidates in local office continues to pay dividends. Aaron Klein and Scott Leslie were elected to the Sierra Joint Community College District in 2004 on a reform platform. The college district apparently had a strong "spending mindset," with four straight years of operating budget deficits.

After the election of Klein and Leslie, the board began a new direction. Taking decisive action, a board majority indicated that their highest priority was a balanced budget. The result was a spending freeze, and the achievement of the college’s first balanced budget in four years, without raising taxes. Every year since, the budget has been balanced and the college has grown its reserves to be prepared for the next economic downturn. Republican ideas work in local government!

State Party Platform Under Development

The California Republican Party's current platform was last revised four years ago under my predecessor. It runs about 12 pages, and outlines where the state Republican Party stands on an array of issues. The national party platform is about 81 pages, single spaced.

The process for adopting a state party platform is designed so all segments of the party are heard during its development. It's quite rigorous: the members of the party elect the platform committee from different segments within the party. The platform committee then elects a drafting committee, also with various segments of the party represented. The drafting committee held two field hearings, one in the North and one in the South, and will meet for the first time on Friday of the convention to consider options for presenting a draft to the full platform committee, which will meet the next day.

During this process, different people have raised different issues. Some focus on length and style, while others focus on content. By definition, the process is designed to produce the kind of debate and discussion we see now, which is good and healthly for a large, democratically governed body like the California Republican Party.

Some will cast differences as "division," a charactierization I see as short sighted. Instead, the disucssion reflects the diversity and strength of the California Republican Party as a broad-based, major party. "Diversity" is a word often invoked by the political left, but it applies to our party in every sense. We are the party of Northern Califronia ranchers, and Southern California city dwellers. We represent suburbia and the Central Valley. Whether it's San Francisco's East Bay, or San Diego's East County, Republicans are there. Naturally, such a broad party will have people with an array of opinions on our platform's style and substance.

My responsibility as chairman is to ensure the deliberative process moves forward, fairly and evenhandedly, and that we arrive at a result that meets with the approval of the party's members. Within that, there is a consensus on both style and substance -- our challenge is to identify where that is, and drive to that end.

The principles at the core of our party are right both for America, and for California. We can be boldly confident in those principles because of their success when applied at home, and the failures of the big-government model that we have witnessed around the world. How we choose to articulate those principles and their application in the form of a platform is up to the members of our party to determine in the days ahead.