Editorial: Going McCain

(This is the first official rant posted here at Red State Rampage. For your definition purposes, a rant is when I get so fired up about something that my head teeters on the verge of explosion, and I forget all logical line of argument and begin to randomly curse. Enjoy!)

The latest phenomenon within College Republicans has been to endorse John McCain for President. Excuse me, I meant to say, join Straight Talk America and praise McCain endlessly. It has all of the benefits and requirements of an actual endorsement, but you apparently can go back to your fellow College Republicans and say that you have not actually sold your soul to him yet. We now have four state chairmen who have "gone McCain" in the last couple of months, and there will undoubtedly be more to follow on the heels of Dan Carlson, Michael Miltenberger, Vic Bailey, and Blake Harris, along with the vast majority of their state CR leadership.

I have many problems with endorsing in a primary, so let me get right down to it here. First of all, in South Carolina (and this was the only blatant case), CR chapters were given $1000 checks upon signing up for Straight Talk. No one has answered a damn question about why they took the money and what is expected in return. For anyone who has ever done any fundraising, you will know that there are always strings attached to money. Always. Paying off a volunteer organization for their support is just not kosher in my opinion.

Secondly, these College Republicans have stated that their organizations are not making any endorsement, yet they are using the organization names and their elected titles to give weight to the pledge. This is absolutely ludicrous to see take place. If the organization is not backing the guy, then leave the damn titles out of it.

This primary election is still a full year away, so what effect is your pithy little endorsement going to have in the end anyway? If you want a job with John McCain, go and ask for one damnit! John McCain still is going to be hiring staffers by the boatloads, so your endorsement is not going to magically give you a job that is not readily available to someone else who did not endorse him. Contact the campaign, tell them that you are interested in helping the guy out, and do it like all of the other rank and file CRs have to do!

Come next fall, and then in the spring, I better not see any of your freaking states working solely for McCain unless your ENTIRE state fed has decided to do so. There had better be no exclusion of Rudy, Mitt, Sam, or Newt from recruiting their own CR volunteers because you got a cute little title or a nice check from Mr. McCain. We need this primary as a party more now than ever, and you had better not work behind the scenes to exclude the other candidates. So help me, if I find out about this, I will personally call you out and wreak a Sherman-esque path of destruction in my wake.

And by the way, to the gentleman from Massachusetts: how exactly do you have the audacity to form a one-man committee? How exactly does that work? Now I am going to go duct-tape the fragments of my skull back together and try to prevent another coronary from coming on! Damnit!