1st District Candidates' Q & A with LCRC

On Monday, both GOP candidates for Arkansas' 1st Congressional District seat addressed members of the Lonoke County Republican Committee. Princella Smith and Rick Crawford were each allotted 15 minutes to address members and answer questions. Because Smith's address took 10 minutes, and Crawford's only 3, the time spent answering questions from members and guests differs. To meet YouTube's maximum video length of 10 minutes, Crawford's Q & A was split into two parts.

Here they are Lonoke County, your GOP candidates for Congress answering questions at this month's LCRC regular meeting.

1st District Candidates Address LCRC

On Monday, 3-8-2010, both GOP candidates for Arkansas' 1st Congressional District seat addressed the Lonoke County Republican Committee's regular monthly meeting. Each was allowed a total of 15 minutes for their speech followed by a question and answer period. A detailed written report on the content of their interaction will follow tomorrow in another post, along with video of each candidates' Q & A with the crowd. The following videos are the candidates' speeches.

Republican Weekly Address 1/30/2010

Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) delivers the weekly address for the GOP. Collins does an excellent job poking holes in the Obama administration's handling of the Christmas day attempted terror attack on US citizens. The failures of that day illuminate the glaring weaknesses in the President's approach to combating terrorism in general.

Weekly Republican Address

This week, Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) explains how the Obama administration's concessions at the Copenhagen climate change (formerly known as Global Warming) conference will wreak havoc on the American economy.

If you have a slow internet connection and would prefer to read Rep. Blackburn's address, the text follows:

“Hi, I’m Congressman Marsha Blackburn, and I have the great honor of representing ennessee’s Seventh District.

“Next week, I and a number of my Republican colleagues in the House of Representatives will head to Copenhagen – Denmark’s capital city – where diplomats and politicians from around the world have gathered in an attempt to try to reach an international, UN-brokered agreement on climate change.

“If President Obama has his way, the Copenhagen conference will produce mandatory emissions limits that would destroy millions of American jobs and damage our economic competitiveness for decades to come.

“To comply with this UN-brokered agreement, Washington Democrats want to impose a ‘cap-and-trade’ national energy tax, a bureaucratic nightmare that would make households, small businesses and family farms pay higher prices for electricity, gasoline, food and virtually every product made in America. This legislation is currently making its way through the Senate after passing the House of Representatives in June.

“President Obama himself has said that as a result of this national energy tax, electricity prices would, and I quote, ‘necessarily skyrocket.’ His own Department of Energy has determined that millions of jobs would be lost.

“Since Democrats in Congress have failed to get a cap and trade bill to the President’s desk ahead of the Copenhagen Summit, President Obama took unilateral action this week to pile more regulation on the backs of families and small businesses in the name of combating global warming. On Monday the President’s EPA administrator, Lisa Jackson, took the first step toward imposing costly new regulations on businesses for emitting carbon. My bill, H.R. 391 would stop the EPA.

“Just think of what will happen to small businesses and manufacturers hit with these skyrocketing energy bills, especially when nations like India and China don’t agree to these mandatory emissions limits. With Americans already facing double-digit unemployment, there could not be a worse time to unilaterally disarm our engines of job creation and economic growth.

“In fact, small businesses are already feeling anxiety and holding off on hiring due to the prospect of this national energy tax, a government takeover of health care, and other costly policies Democrats have in the works. These aren’t issues President Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Democrats in Congress will talk about when they are in Copenhagen, but Republicans will.

“Also absent from the discussion in Copenhagen is the Climategate scandal. Recently leaked e-mails reveal climate scientists have a long track record of manipulating data to hide scientific evidence that contradicts the global warming establishment. And why? To bully citizens and lawmakers into supporting job-killing energy tax schemes. This scandal raises serious questions about Democrats’ climate control plans, questions that deserve a transparent investigation – not a rush to judgment – by the bureaucrats in Copenhagen.

“Republicans are all for clean water, clean air, and clean energy. We just don't think we have to tax people out of house and home to get there. That’s why we have proposed an ‘all of the above’ energy strategy that says, let’s put every clean, responsible energy option on the table so we can create jobs, ease the strain on family budgets, and clean up our environment.

“This is one of a series of common-sense solutions Republicans have proposed to empower families and small businesses while Democrats have continued to rely on more spending, more regulation, and more government to try and solve every problem.

“Nothing sums this up more than the trillion-dollar ‘stimulus’ of borrowing and spending that has failed to create jobs ‘immediately’ and keeps unemployment below eight percent as promised. Instead, more than three million Americans have lost their jobs and unemployment has risen to double-digits.

“Given the opportunity to try a new approach, President Obama has instead proposed more of the same ‘stimulus’ spending paid for by borrowing from our children and grandchildren.

“It’s time for Washington to learn the hard lesson that families already know: growing debt only cripples freedom and spending more money than you have is no plan for prosperity. Only Republicans have provided a fiscally responsible blueprint for helping families and small businesses weather this economic crisis and get back up on their feet.

“Thank you for listening.”

LCRC September Meeting Report

Another month has come and gone, as has the monthly meeting of the LCRC at Grandpa's BBQ in Cabot. Next month, we'll meet again at the same location at 7:00 pm on October 12.

Now that fall is officially only days away, our mission is becoming evermore critical, especially with the happenings in our nation's capital. Since January, the US National debt has quadrupled, our money supply has increased at such a rapid, unprecedented pace that many economists foresee hyper-inflation in the near future, the Democrat controlled legislative and executive branches are on the verge of passing the largest energy tax in our country's history and forcing a government takeover of our health care system. And that's not all.

President Obama has appointed dozens of "Czars" with dubious backgrounds, including one who believes animals should have the right to sue their owners and another who believes international gun laws should supersede our 2nd Amendment. With both houses of Congress in the hands of the party of the President, radical Democrats have near total control of the future of our country.

It's important all Lonoke County Republicans, Indpendents, and even Democrats taken aback by the radical moves of their party, know this county committee is working hard to bring Arkansas' and our County's conservative values back to all levels of government. The 2010 campaign season will soon be kicking into gear and we'll do our best to help you sort it out.

In the past several months, speakers at the committee members have included candidates for county, state, and federal offices. This month we were pleased to welcome two of the [many] Republican candidates for Democrat Blanche Lincoln's US Senate seat, Fred Ramey and Curtis Coleman.

Neither Ramey nor Coleman is a professional politician. Ramey lives in Searcy and works for FedEx, and Coleman lives in Little Rock and runs Safe Foods, a business he built from the ground up. It's really heartening to see regular folks like Ramey and Coleman stepping up to the plate to take on the incumbent Lincoln, especially when you look back and realize the Republican Party didn't even field a candidate against Arkansas' other Democratic Senator Mark Pryor in last year's election.

Ramey told us he decided to run to fight against the radical changes being forced on us by the Democrats in the Capitol and the White House. He sees Obama's push to put our health care system in the hands of government bureaucrats and the huge energy tax Democrats refer to as "Cap & Trade" as symptoms of an increasingly intrusive federal government. The Democrats' runaway spending is another factor that persuaded him to throw his hat in the ring. Ramey says of his 4 young daughters, "They're going to get the bill!"

He says of the crowded field vying for the coveted spot on the Senate floor, "There are a lot of good people in this race and a conservative message won't set us apart." But Ramey does believe he has an advantage that makes him a better candidate to defeat Lincoln next November. His explanation included a reference to a recent John Brummett column titled "Farmer's Daughter" in which the left-leaning columnist argues that Arkansan's would be foolish to vote against the Senator who recently called many of them "un-American."

Ramey claims he has what it takes to neutralize Lincoln's ties to agriculture. He, too, is the child of a farmer and says, "I'm a farmer's son and farmed myself, rice and soybeans, for 5 years before going to work for FedEx." Ramey says he's always believed next year's general election will come down to Arkansas' agricultural areas, and he says "I speak the language of East Arkansas." Of the race with Lincoln, Ramey states emphatically "I'm going to compete with her, rice levee to rice levee."

Coleman spoke next and told members of the committee his wife "prayed that God would show him he was crazy" when he first informed her he was thinking of entering the race. It didn't take long after the Democrats took control of DC and began implementing their radical agenda, before she saw the need for good people to run, and agreed to support his decision to run.

He decided to enter the race because we're "facing the most egregious erosion of our liberties in history." Coleman worries that his 7 grandchildren "don't have a ghost of a chance of growing up with the same liberties" he had. He says he wants to go to Washington to slow down the Democrats' high speed march to dismantle our capitalist, free-market system. "The next 3 years will be as critical as any period in our history," he said.

Like Ramey, Coleman was also complimentary of his adversary for the Republican nomination. He told the committee he and Ramey had attended several of the same events and have become good friends. Also like Ramey, Coleman believes he has the best chance to beat Lincoln.

He points to a recent Public Policy poll that showed him beating Lincoln 41%-40% at this early stage in the campaign. Another poll he pointed out was conducted by Democrats that showed him trailing the Arkansas Senator 45%-37%. Coleman believes at this juncture in the campaign, for a poll commissioned by Democrats to show him within an 8 point margin and Lincoln unable to break above the 50% level, these numbers bode well for his shot in the general election next year.

Coleman went on to admonish Lincoln for bragging that she returns to Arkansas 10 times a year. He also made the point "she had to be forced to hold town hall meetings" during last month's congressional recess. He promised, if he is elected, he'll hold a town hall meeting in every county at least once per year.

Thanks to Mr. Coleman and Mr. Ramey for taking the time to address the committee and letting us get to know you. We wish you both the best of luck in your campaigns.

After the candidates spoke and fielded questions from attendees, the discussion turned to local affairs. For the past several months, the committee has been working to restore partisan elections in Cabot. This battle is ongoing, but we believe voters want to know the party affiliation of candidates on the ballot, even in local elections. Next Monday, September 21 at 7:00, the Cabot City Council will meet. We're not certain yet if this issue is on the agenda, but the committee plans to make a good showing in case it is. We encourage everyone who wants to know the party affiliation of those running for local office to attend this meeting.

Again, next month's meeting will take place October 12 at 7:00 pm at Grandpa's BBQ in Cabot. Hope to see you there!