Without a doubt, the best speech given at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference 2006 was J.C. Watts’ on Saturday afternoon. You can get an idea of its power by reading VOLuntarily Conservative’s post.

I believe Congressman Marsha Blackburn’s speech was second best, even though she was merely acting as Master of Ceremonies for the session and introducing the other speakers. But her delivery was inspired and powerful. I saw a new level of speechifying from Marsha; this effort far exceeded the quality of the other times I’ve seen her. If she keeps this up she could easily be Senator when Alexander retires.

Here is the text of her speech, although the words cannot possibly convey the real experience:

Welcome to Tennessee, it’s great to have you here.

You know, someone asked me to sum up my state for y’all, and do it briefly.

And that’s when it occurred to me that we Tennesseans really are just a bunch of God-fearin’, freedom-lovin’, flag-wavin’, guitar-pickin’, country music-sangin’, nascar fans who just believe that if 10% is good enough for God, then it ought to be good enough for the government.

Continue Reading »

I’m catching up on the speeches made yesterday afternoon at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference.

Notes from the speech by Senator Bill Frist, Senate Majority Leader from Tennessee:

Mitch McConnell came back out to introduce Frist. He was incredibly complementary of Frist, almost over-the-top. Talked about how he had been a highly-successful, cutting edge heart surgeon, literally holding people’s lives in his hands. Then he ran for Senate and in a short time has risen to the top leadership position. He has been at the top of his field in two unrelated professions. Noted that only one person in history became the leader of his Senate colleagues in a shorter time, Lyndon B. Johnson, “and you know where he ended up!“

Frist came out and said that he got involved in politics because he listened to the problems that his patients told him about.

Washington had become a 4-year town focusing on the next election rather than a 20-year town focusing on the next generation!

The role of government is to enhance opportunity, not stand in the way.

Judicial nominations: Every nominee deserves a fair up or down vote. He made it clear that he would use the nuclear option on a specific date and now Roberts and Alito are sitting on the highest court in the land. We are one step closer to keeping activist judges from redefining marriage. By the end of Bush’s second term, 1 of every 3 federal judges will have been appointed by Bush.

Listed some economic gains stats (minority home ownership is at an all time high, 3 years of record growth, etc.) and said that they will make the tax cuts permanent. Promised that this May the Death Tax will end.

The Republican Party is the party of lower spending. Now that the challenges are over it is time to balance the budget. Called for a line item veto so that there would be no more hidden earmarks and no more Bridges to Nowhere.

We must reform Medicare first — it well go bankrupt fifteen years sooner than Social Security.

They are the Party of No.

They want to be on your backs, on your land and in your wallets. Now they want to be in your doctors office, too. The solution is not Hillary care but an account you can take with you no matter where you go.

He finished up with a story about a boy named Tommy that lost his father during a heroic act, whose mother was forced to take in borders to make ends meet, who was taken under the wing by a doctor, who dreamed of becoming a doctor, who worked his way through medical school and ended up impacting the healthcare of millions. Tommy was Bill’s father.

Some comments on the speech: Mitch McConnell was obviously chosen to MC this session because of the build-up that he gave Frist. It was to fire up the crowd and Mitch did a pretty good job, even if it was more than a little obvious.

Frist’s speech was flat, nearly uninspired. The crowd was all warmed up and Frist failed to capitalize. At one point he made a dramatic pause in expectation of furious applause from the crowd, which didn’t materialize even though it had been packed with Frist fans. The story about his father was well told, he even choked up at the appropriate spot. But anyone who has attended a Frist rally before has heard it. It may play well on the campaign trail outside of Tennessee, but it was a rerun here.

If he doesn’t deliver on his promises to make the tax cuts permanent, reduce spending and, this May, eliminate the death tax then he will look very, very bad. But the bottom line, I don’t think Frist has the charisma to mount a successful pesidential campaign. On the other hand, I didn’t think Bush would play well outside of the midwest and deep south.

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Frist,
Bill Frist,
Senator Frist,
Tennessee.

I’m catching up on the speeches made yesterday afternoon at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference.

Notes from the speech by Representative Dennis Hastert, Speaker of the House, from Illinois:

Complemented the job that Senator Frist has done.

History will show that Bush provided leadership in trying times.

He is focused on 2006. He will not be satisfied with hanging on to the majority, we must grow the majority.

The other side of aisle talks about a dependent society and “that’s a fight I’m willing to fight every day!”

The ”Eastern press” [ed: heh]talks down talks down the economy in spite of how well it is doing.

People ask him what the toughest thing he ever did was. He used to be a teacher, and said the toughest thing he ever tried was teaching economics to 15 year old kids — until he came to Congress and tried to teach some members of Congress the basics of economics.

They cut the capital gains tax to encourage investing in the economy. They helped families by eliminating the marriage penalty and increasing child tax credit.

Said that he and Hillary have a basic difference of philosophy. Told a story about trying to work with her on Hillarycare to illustrate this. Said that people can make decisions for themselves and spend money better than the government.

He said that they were going to make the tax cuts permanent this year. Said that we can actually change how the IRS operates.

Talked about Reagan. Said he confronted our enemy and when he started using the phrase “Evil Empire” everyone called stupid and a cowboy.

Said that we can make a difference, and that more people walk in freedom because of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush.

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Hastert,
Dennis Hastert,
Representative Hastert,
Tennessee.

I’m catching up on the speeches made yesterday afternoon at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference.

Notes from the speech by Senator Mitch McConnell, Majority Whip, from Kentucky:

There are only 4 Democrat Senators from the South, and that is 4 too many.

Pointed out where Hillary wants to give ex-cons the vote. Joked that this is so Clinton cronies can vote for her in the next election.

Noted that A&E is going to make a movie about Hillary and they have approached Sharon Stone to play the lead. When he found out, Bill volunteered to play himself.

Went over the economic challenges since 9/11 and noted that the economy is strong. Said that the president had liberated Afghanistan and Iraq and now 33 million people have gone from tyranny to freedom. And most importantly, we haven’t been attacked.

George W. Bush is one of the great presidents of our history.

[standing ovation]

The Supreme Court nominations:

Will you ever forget the image of Ted Kennedy reading questions one by one to Sam Alito and John Roberts? It was no contest!

Talked about stopping the judicial filibuster and how judges like Owens and Brown were approved. Noted that when Alito and Roberts came up for a vote the Democrats couldn’t mount a filibuster.

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
McConnell,
Mitch McConnell,
Senator McConnell,
Tennessee.

Congratulations to Nancy French for copping an interview with MSNBC. Nancy was a member of the grassroots Mitt Romney contingent at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference. (She also recently started a new blog, Tennesseans for Mitt.)

Nancy French, who said she writes political humor for a living and organized the Romney volunteer effort in Tennessee, told reporters that she and other volunteers had spent three weeks preparing for the Memphis event. “If we had twice that, we could have taken the whole thing,” an exuberant French told reporters.

Asked if she – like Romney – was a Mormon, French said, “No, I’m a Presbyterian. Everybody keeps coming over to me and saying, ‘Way to go, Sister French,’ and I’m – like – ‘thanks.’ I feel like I don’t know what to say.”

She said the Romney campaign had not called her to work on the Memphis event and that she and her husband had organized their own pro-Romney volunteer effort.

I met Nancy at the convention a few hours ago. I found her to be delightful, sincere and very very pumped about Mitt. And that was before the straw poll results were announced.

From left to right, Rob from VOLuntarily Conservative,
Nancy of Nancy’s Niche, and Rob’s wife Angela

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Mitt Romney,
Straw Poll,
Hotline,
Hotline Straw Poll,
Blogs,
Tennessee.

While straw polls are rarely meaningful, especially ones that take place 20 months before an election, Mitt Romney must be feeling pretty good right now.

Consider this: a Yankee governor from the state that saddled America with Ted Kennedy, with little name recognition, comes to the South and Midwest and wowed everyone to the point where he took second in a straw poll. Further, he bested popular candidates that have high name recognition in the South and Midwest: Arizona Sen. John McCain and Virginia Sen. George Allen.

Impressive.

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Mitt Romney,
Straw Poll,
Hotline,
Hotline Straw Poll,
Tennessee.

Results of the Southern Republican Leadership Conference Straw Poll, which every candidate is trying to assure everyone that it is not at all important:

A McCain spokesman came into the press room and issued this statement:

We are gratified at the result of a lot of hard work. The leader is focused on ’06 and our party is focused on a strong, positive vision for ’08.
     — Eric Ueland, McCain Chief of Staff

A few observations:

• Even with McCain’s “write in George Bush” campaign, he garnered less than 15% of the vote, and way less than half of what Frist pulled in.
• Everyone can say that Frist “packed the vote” by bussing people in (I talked to one blogger that was bussed in by what she said was the Frist organization), but there is no way he bussed in that many people. The Frist vote shows home state advantage, but this is a staggeringly high result.

  Update: The Hotline has released some interesting statistics. Among them, 82% of Frist’s votes came from Tennessee delegates with only 97 votes of his 526 votes coming from other states. And while he took 58% of the Tennessee vote, that only shows that he plays well in his home state. Unless my math is very bad, he only took 17% of the 569 non-Tennessee votes. This is the Senate Majority Leader’s standing among the party faithful. In one fell swoop the Frist landslide victory is made virtually meaningless, but don’t expect the press to mention it.

• Mitt Romney is a surprisingly high second, a tribute to the grassroots volunteers at the convention as well as the impressive speech that he made yesterday.

  Update: Mitt Romney also took second in the 2nd choice of Frist voters.

• Condi did very poorly, in spite of a contingent of Draft Rice volunteers. Rumor had it that her name was originally on the ballot but that it was removed by the mysterious “they”, but even so this is a poor showing.

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Bill Frist,
Mitt Romney,
George Allen,
George W. Bush,
John McCain,
Mike Huckabee,
George Pataki,
Condi Rice,
Sam Brownback,
Rudy Giuliani,
Newt Gingrich,
Chuck Hagel,
Straw Poll,
Hotline,
Hotline Straw Poll,
Tennessee.

Gov. Rick Perry from Texas:

Acknowledged the debt that Texas owes the hosting state (Tennessee) by saying that there wouldn’t be a Texas without Tennessee.

Talked about Reagan and said that we cannot say that all is well with the Republican Party.

Now that we have built a Republican majority, we must build a conservative majority.

We must return to our Ronald Reagan roots of controlling spending. It’s easy to raise taxes. The editorial boards will call you ”courageous”. When talking about cuts, the people who take the money get all the ink, the people who struggle to pay taxes are forgotten.

We must control the border.

We must control entitlements or they will grow until they stifle the economy.

Medicaid will bankrupt every state in the nation. Entitlement reform must be at the top of the agenda .

We must protect our borders. Drug runners and terrorists see the Texas border as an opportunity.

If you are an OTM (other than Mexican) picked up by the border patrol, you are dropped off 100 to 150 miles inland, given a piece of paper with a court date on it and told that you are to show up to so that we can decide whether to deport you or not.

When they do that, they should play the soundtrack from the Southwest commercial: Ding! You are free to more about the country!

There should be performance pay for teachers. If you reward excellence the same as mediocrity then mediocrity becomes the standard.

Must give parents choices (vouchers):

Our children deserve better. It’s not about getting more money in our education; it’s about getting better education for our money — and that is what choice is all about.

Ended with:

We need to reclaim our ground and let the Republican Revolution begin again!

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Perry,
Rick Perry,
Governor Perry,
Tennessee.

Sen. Trent Lott from Mississippi:

The Republican Revolution began in the South. We made more and more gains until we took Congress in 1994 and the White House in 2000, and Republicans have made a difference. Mentioned the war and the economy.

We started winning when we got with the people.

Health care must be made affordable and available the Republican way, not with “Hillary Care”.

Supports education reform. Said that he has discovered that if we get people an education, they become a Republican.

We can secure our borders.

If we can do those 3 things (health care, education, border security) in the next 6 months then we can take the Senate and House in 2006.

Ended with:

As for me, I’m voting with George W. Bush all to way to 2008!

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Lott,
Trent Lott,
Senator Lott,
Tennessee.

I was late so I missed the first couple of speakers. Just after I got there Sen. Brownback started speaking and I jotted down some notes:

Talked about Reagan’s concept of ”American Exceptionalism”. (Why is it that almost every speaker invokes Reagan?)

Said that the party believed in the separation of Church and State but not the removal of Church from State.

The core battle of our time today is to protect the dignity of every person, no matter what their age or station.

He was the second speaker so far to quote Bono, saying “Where you live should not dictate whether they live.“

Marriage is one man and one woman. Many marriages end in divorce and too many children are born out of wedlock. There is nothing wrong with being a single parent but it is harder to do it on your own. Talked about the ”crises of marriage”.

We should support the commitment to marriage instead of giving additional benefits only if they are single.

Africa is a center of great suffering. We must help, but in a way that builds dignity and not build dependency. And there has been far too much waste in the aid.

Uncontrolled spending in Washington must be stopped. He is sponsoring a bill that alters the system (sorry, didn’t get the details).

He supports the flat tax. He knows that we can’t get rid of the current system so he recommends putting them both in place and let the taxpayer choose which one to pay under.

Republicans are the Party of Life. He told a story about a Chinese woman who chose to have a baby rather than submit to pressure to get a state abortion and because of that his daughter will have her 8th birthday tomorrow.

Technorati Tags: SRLC,
Southern Republican Leadership Conference,
Political Conventions,
Republican Politics,
Memphis,
Brownback,
Senator Brownback,
Sam Brownback,
Tennessee.