Marco Rubio campaign appearance in Hallandale Beach
Tuesday June 23rd
6:00pm - 9:00 p.m.
Hallandale Beach Culture Center
400 South Federal Highway
-west of HB City Hall
-main entrance via S.E. 3rd Street
|
Confirmed Speakers:
RNC Secretary Sharon Day,
Broward GOP Chairman Chip LaMarca,
Marco Rubio, Candidate for US Senate,
Lt. Col. Allen West, Candidate for
U.S. Congress,
Joyce Kaufman 850 AM Radio Host,
and a special video presentation from
Michael Steele.
National Anthem by National Vocalist Lou Galterio.
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South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Conservative Republicans meet to plot course
By Anthony ManJune 21, 2009
HALLANDALE BEACH
After losing control of Congress in 2006 and taking a drubbing in the 2008 presidential election, Republican activists have been looking inward.
Moderates and conservatives are struggling over which direction is best for their party.
"The big thing in the Republican Party is everyone wants to know what we stand for and where we are," said Ed Napolitano, organizer of a Conservative Conference for Broward Republians on Tuesday.
Napolitano, a Hallandale Beach contractor, is membership chairman of the Broward Republican Party and president of the Southeast [Broward] Republican Club. The club is the event's sponsor.
President Barack Obama's administration is a powerful motivating force for conservatives.
"Everything this president does influences me. Every day I wake up and am horrified at the things this guy is doing," he said. "I'm completely against I think 90 percent of the things this guy is doing."
Chip LaMarca, chairman of the Broward Republican Party, plans to attend the conference. But his priority is bridging differences and unifying the party.
"You need to come together with a common message that all the different members of the Republican Party have in common. That's how you win elections," he said. "If someone votes with our issues most of the time, that's the person we want to get elected."
Although the Republican divide is getting lots of attention, LaMarca said the Democrats have a similar internal division.
In Congress, liberal Democrats are pulling in one direction and so called Blue Dog Democrats are pulling toward the center. The health care debate is an example; moderate Democrats are balking at some of what their liberal colleagues want.
Broward Democratic Chairman Mitch Ceasar welcomed the conservative gathering. "It'll make my job in election years much easier."
"The conservative conference seems to be at odds with political reality. Broward County, Florida, and the United States has indicated clearly that the populace is moderate. Most folks are somewhere philosophically in the middle. So I welcome and encourage their conservative conference," he said.
Speakers for the event include Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio, who's the more conservative candidate in the 2010 Republican primary for U.S. Senate against the more moderate Gov. Charlie Crist.
Napolitano said he isn't taking sides in the primary and invited Crist to the event.
And regardless of who wins the Senate primary, Napolitano said he'll support the winner. "As far as I'm concerned any of these Republicans are better than any of these Democrats."
Anthony Man can be reached at aman@sunsentinel.com or 954-356-4550. More on the conservative conference on the Broward Politics blog at SunSentinel.com/browardpolitics
Moderates and conservatives are struggling over which direction is best for their party.
"The big thing in the Republican Party is everyone wants to know what we stand for and where we are," said Ed Napolitano, organizer of a Conservative Conference for Broward Republians on Tuesday.
Napolitano, a Hallandale Beach contractor, is membership chairman of the Broward Republican Party and president of the Southeast [Broward] Republican Club. The club is the event's sponsor.
President Barack Obama's administration is a powerful motivating force for conservatives.
"Everything this president does influences me. Every day I wake up and am horrified at the things this guy is doing," he said. "I'm completely against I think 90 percent of the things this guy is doing."
Chip LaMarca, chairman of the Broward Republican Party, plans to attend the conference. But his priority is bridging differences and unifying the party.
"You need to come together with a common message that all the different members of the Republican Party have in common. That's how you win elections," he said. "If someone votes with our issues most of the time, that's the person we want to get elected."
Although the Republican divide is getting lots of attention, LaMarca said the Democrats have a similar internal division.
In Congress, liberal Democrats are pulling in one direction and so called Blue Dog Democrats are pulling toward the center. The health care debate is an example; moderate Democrats are balking at some of what their liberal colleagues want.
Broward Democratic Chairman Mitch Ceasar welcomed the conservative gathering. "It'll make my job in election years much easier."
"The conservative conference seems to be at odds with political reality. Broward County, Florida, and the United States has indicated clearly that the populace is moderate. Most folks are somewhere philosophically in the middle. So I welcome and encourage their conservative conference," he said.
Speakers for the event include Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio, who's the more conservative candidate in the 2010 Republican primary for U.S. Senate against the more moderate Gov. Charlie Crist.
Napolitano said he isn't taking sides in the primary and invited Crist to the event.
And regardless of who wins the Senate primary, Napolitano said he'll support the winner. "As far as I'm concerned any of these Republicans are better than any of these Democrats."
Anthony Man can be reached at aman@sunsentinel.com or 954-356-4550. More on the conservative conference on the Broward Politics blog at SunSentinel.com/browardpolitics
Reader comments at:
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In the near future I may(?) also post some comments about the clueless Beth Reinhard column on Rubio from Saturday's Herald that was one of the worst of the many bad columns
she's penned since I returned to South Florida:
Where's the insight or originality?
She's truly the personification of
South Florida conventional wisdom.
But by embracing DeMint, Rubio risks moving too far to the right. DeMintadvocates sending illegal immigrants back to their home countries andmaking English the official language of the United States, which couldmean that Rubio's Spanish-speaking constituents would not be able toget ballots and other government documents in their first language.
Having already written a few things
already, I may be compelled to turn it
into a blog post picking that column
of her's apart, as it is full not only of
intellectual laziness, but factual errors,
not the least of which is the comments
about the language of the ballots,
since the DOJ has oversight over
certain states because of the federal
Voting Rights Act, and that includes
Florida.
You know, where we live?
Plus, because South Florida's county
officials have decided that it's good
public policy that ballots also appear
in Spanish (and Creole), and that is
supported by the majority of the
local populace, Reinhard's
argument is a straw man.
A good reporter would already
know that.
That Beth Reinhard doesn't,
or acts like she doesn't, in
order that she can write something
that's pandering to local Hispanic
sensibilities, gives you some true
sense of her profound political
ignorance.
Not that this is exactly Breaking
News to me or most of you.
See also:
Justices Let Stand a Central Provision of Voting Rights Act
Frankly, I almost always groan after reading
something that Reinhard's written.
In fact, it was after reading some
real nonsense she'd written about
DWS, while I was having breakfast
at a Denny's, that I decided that I
needed to finally listen to my friends
back in D.C., who'd been urging
me for years to start a blog when
I was still living there, and all my
media and political connections
close at hand, and finally start
one.
Though I'm a moderate Democrat,
I'll try to swing by the event
and hear what's what and snap
some photos.
