Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
SPRING 2011
FEATURES
State Spotlights Pages 2-3
Consider this: Over the next decade, the United States will shell out at least $5.5 trillion in interest on the national debt. Not one penny of principal will be touchedinstead the principal will grow by a further $10 trillion. So what if government had been responsible over the last few decades? What if it had focused on running a balanced budget? Instead of flushing money to pay interest on the debt, with $5.5 trillion back in the private sector we could: Pay the annual tuition cost for 157.2 million Harvard attendees Pay the annual tuition cost for 783.5 million attendees at a 4 year public university Award 1.5 billion Pell Grants to needy students. Pay the annual average cost of textbooks for 6.1 billion students Buy nearly 25 million homes at median price Buy 194 million new Jeep Wranglers Pay for weddings for 229 million couples Buy 5 billion Samsung 50' Plasma Televisions Send 4.6 billion couples on a one week Hawaiian vacation This is just one series of shocking facts, and just one way in which we have sought to contextualize the enormity of the problem. Much remains to be done if we are to win Americas younger generations over to our vision, but with your help, we have made strong progress. Thank you, as always, for your support of our efforts. - Zach !
Communications Director Rob Lockwood discusses our media presence towards 2012 Page 5
PAGE 1
SPRING 2011
SPRING 2011
NEW CHALLENGES FOR GACR WILL SURFACE IN EXPANDING TO SMALL, RURAL CAMPUSES
The Georgia Association of College Republican has had a banner year, and our hard work has brought our organization to new heights. Weve succeeded in accomplishing our two stated missions of electing Republicans and spreading the conservative word on college campuses. We ranked number one in the nation for campaign hours and rank among one of the largest state federations in the United States. So, where does our organization go from here? Whats left to accomplish? I believe the 2011-2012 year will bring about their unique challenges, and fighting complacency will be an important goal for our new executive board in a non-election year. But, the true challenges lie in preparing our organization for the 2012 Presidential elections. Our first mission should be to expand to the many small liberal arts colleges across our state, especially below the gnat-line. Although our organization already has chapters at over 30 colleges and universities around the state, there is still work to be done. Weve set a goal to increase our number to 50 chapters by the 2012 elections, and this cannot be done without the involvement of new chapters at schools with populations of under 2,000 students. These schools are in areas of our state that may not traditionally vote Republican (especially at the local level), but their presence would have a huge impact on their communities. Colleges like Brewton-Parker in Mt. Vernon, South Georgia College in Douglas, or Thomas University in Thomasville. Without new chapters at these schools, our efforts to help elect Republicans in many parts of the state are fruitless. Several smaller historically black colleges will also help our mission of spreading the conservative message on our member campuses. Last year, we welcomed the Savannah State Young Black Conservatives as a member organization. Using their club as a model, we hope to expand to colleges like Fort Valley, Albany State, and Paine College in Augusta, promoting our organization to many students who already identify as conservative. The GACR State Board must play an integral role in helping such smaller schools get off the ground and operating successfully. Schools with small student bodies often present challenges that larger clubs may take for granted. Many students may live off campus, speakers hesitate to travel long distances, and county parties may not be able to provide the same support as in larger cities. This is where we must fill the gaps. Through offering livestream video from other chapters meetings, facilitating multi-chapter events, having statewide events in different parts of the state, and providing recruitment materials and financial support are just a few of the answers to building successful small chapters. Our future lies in our ability to expand into uncharted territory. New challenges at small, untraditional campuses, far from urban centers will test our resolve to fulfill our mission. Weve come a long way in the past year, but this next year will prove if we really are the best of the best. With so much at stake in the 2012 election, this is a mission we cannot fail.
-Andrew Laarhoven is the state chair for the Georgia Association of College Republicans can be reached via email at andrewlaarhoven@gmail.com.
PAGE 3
SPRING 2011
Take Medicares hospital insurance program as an example. The House Ways and Means Committee estimated that it would cost $9 billion annually by 1990. It actually cost $67 billion. In fact, the entire Medicare program was supposed to cost just $12 billion in 1990. The true pricetag was nearly 10 times that amount $110 billion. Or take the case of Medicaid. In 1987, the Medicaid budget for relief payments to hospitals was scheduled to cost less than $1 billion in 1992. In reality it cost $17 billion, a 1,700 percent increase. When Congress guesses wrong on things like that, it throws the entire budget out of whack. Since Washington is loathe to pinch any pennies, spending every dollar and more before it even comes in the door, any cost overruns immediately get tacked on to the deficit. Today, the Congressional Budget Office called out President Obama for his too-rosy assumptions about the growth of our deficit. In a detailed analysis of his 2012 budget proposal the CBO found that 10 year deficit would likely total $2.3 trillion more than White House predictions. The CBO also said that debt held by the public would equal a staggering 87% of GDP by 2021, a full 10% higher than Obamas predictions. Senate Finance Committee member Orrin Hatch (R-UT) said it best, Even using their own estimates, the Administration couldnt hide how bad our nations deficit and debt are, but today the CBO has 100 percent proven that Presidents budget is nothing but an air ball. In the NCAA tournament an air ball earns you some serious scorn from the crown who is all too happy to remind you of your poor shot for the rest of the game. But in the world of politics, will Obamas $2.3 trillion air ball be forgotten? Lets hope not. After all, even liberal blogger Ezra Klein notes that doing nothing yes, nothing would do more to cut the deficit than anything that the Obama White House proposed. We are not in a position to do nothing. Democrats recent spending binge has made sure of that. In fact, a few Democrats who have removed their head from the sand are willing to admit we have a problem. Democratic Senator Joe Manchin said today, We cannot ignore the fiscal Titanic of our national debt and deficit. . . There are some in Washington who believe we can simply ignore the fiscal peril we face as a nation. They are wrong.
PAGE 4
SPRING 2011
Hopefully, the tide is beginning to turn and well stop simply rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. There are some hopeful signs. A letter written by Sens. Michael Bennet, Mike Johanns, and 62 colleagues from both sides of the aisle to President Obama asking him to support a broad approach to solving the problem of [deficit reduction.] that includes discretionary spending cuts, entitlement changes and tax reform. The question is, will Obama listen? His top lieutenant in the House, Nancy Pelosi, isnt showing encouraging signs. Just today she was spouting patently false statistics about how health insurance reform creates 4 million jobs and reduces the deficit more than $1 trillion. Statistics, which the Washington Post pointed out as bogus Its time for President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid to admit that neither their budget nor their healthcare bill will live up to their lofty predictions. In reality its more of the spending and deficit denial that got us into this mess. My NCAA tournament predictions were terrible, but harmless. Obamas spending and deficit predictions are worse, and disastrous. Ive thrown my bracket away so I can enjoy the tournament from a fresh perspective. President Obama should scrap his plans and start over with a !fresh approach to spending cuts. -Brandon can be reached via email at bgreife@crnc.org.
The College Republican National Committee currently stands as strong as it ever has thanks to our loyal donors, outstanding state chairs, record-breaking Operation Red November recruitment effort, and the resurgence of conservatism in response to the policies of the Obama Agenda. With President Obama as unpopular as he as ever been amongst my generation, the time is now to re-up our message that its cool to be a College Republican again. Starting in April, we will be using television and social media as the vehicles to drive and define the debate about our generation: the debt payers. We will be using the Dont Put It On Our Tab campaign to educate our members about the national debt, and pose questions to our partys nominees about what their plan would be to fix the debt. We are proud to say that visibility of our message has increased significantly over the past year. From appearances on major television shows, front-page stories in the New York Times, and syndicated columns in prominent conservative publications, we have a formula for media attention that has worked- and will be utilized to generate attention to our 2011 and 2012 efforts.
The increased visibility has allowed us to expand the volume of our message via social networking. With the click of a button, we are able to hit more than 100,000 fans of the College Republican National Committee instantly.! We are approaching nearly 1,400 individual fan pages for local College Republican chapters across the nation. !With this technical apparatus and our national membership eclipsing 300,000, we have built and secured a strong foundation to promote our vision. -Rob can be reached via email at rlockwood@crnc.org.
PAGE 5
SPRING 2011
NORTHEAST UPDATE
This is an exciting time to be a Republican in the Northeast, and its throughout campuses all across the region and country. From Augusta to Annapolis, College Republicans are getting involved in the legislative process at our state capitals. It is time to hold our elected officials accountable to stick to conservative principles of decreasing the debt seen across this country. Many states including Vermont, Connecticut and Massachusetts have days planned within the upcoming weeks to speak with their legislators and testify in front of many different legislative committees. These activities in civic engagement are being put together by individual chapters, and state leaders within the College Republicans and its truly incredible to see. Hearing from the youth of our states will be a powerful message for these legislators, and Im excited to see the results. Students will be focused on creating jobs and economic opportunities, which hopefully will translate into some movement within various state legislatures.
Overall, the Northeast continues to lead in style and hard work. Im encouraged and ready for the next several months to be filled with state conventions from all over the region. This will usher in new leadership and fresh ideas that will take the College Republicans in the Northeast to the Next Level. We are ready to take back the White House in 2012 and bring with it true reform and real change that we as College Republicans can believe in. -John can be reached via email at jkleinhans@crnc.org
PAGE 6
SPRING 2011
In addition to expanding the College Republicans to new campuses, many federations have launched speakers programs to inspire the College Republicans that already exist. In Arizona, the state CR federation has launched an aggressive speakers program to bring conservative speakers from across the ideological spectrum to inspire College Republicans. Past speakers included now Congressman Ben Quayle and Congressman Ron Paul. Some CR Federations are spending the off cycle focused on implementing new media into their state federations. In Colorado the CRs launched one of the most innovative new media campaigns in the country. This campaign included extensive use of basic social communication sites such as Facebook and Twitter along with pioneering other new media devices as well. Other Federations are working on ultraistic causes to better their communities. In Alaska, the statewide executive board raised over $5,000 to help fund a shelter for female victims of domestic abuse. In California statewide CRs have given out monetary grants to help promote the projects and activism of local CR chapters. Lastly, we are proud to welcome back the Hawaii State Federation of College Republicans. Under the leadership of Chairman Nash Roehr, the Hawaii CRs are excited to make a difference! They are actively seeking out new members on all their campuses and even plan to attend the CRNCs biennial convention this summer in Washington, DC. We are happy to welcome them back into the organization and cant wait to see them turn Hawaii red! Western CR Federations are proud of their accomplishments, and look forward to keeping busy building their federations and spreading the GOPs message to our campuses! -Michael can be reached via email at anton@crnc.org. He also is the Chairman of the California College Republicans.
PAGE 7
SPRING 2011
PAGE 8
SPRING 2011
Since the new unrest in the Middle East, and particularly in Libya, gas prices have gone up for the past 7 days straight. !Currently, the average price for a gallon of gasoline is $3.375, up 0.7 cents from last week. Compare those numbers to where we were last year, when in February 2010 the average gallon of gas was only $2.65. Times are already tight for the average American, where most people are spending wisely on essential goods only. The rise in gas prices has a domino effect on all aspects of our lives and our wallets. !Not only does it cost more to fill up our cars, but to heat our house, to buy food at the grocery store, and taking that long awaited and well deserved spring break trip.
The Obama administration has done nothing to secure future oil and energy supplies for the U.S., but instead has only slowed down American production. Libya is the 15th largest oil exporter in the world, and the U.S. does not even import from them. They export almost exclusively to European markets and emerging Asian markets such as China.! So with a large spike in prices due to the unrest in Libya, what were to happen if the current unrest in the Middle East spread to other countries such as Saudi Arabia, which exports 20% of its resources to the United States? We can only assume that oil prices would simply spike even more, possibly reaching levels higher then what we saw in July 2008 when a gallon of gas averaged $4.11. I applaud Secretary of the Interior Salazar for reopening the Gulf of Mexico to deep water drilling again by rewarding its first new contract yesterday. This will hopefully get the ball rolling on additional wells being opened, maintained, and operated by American companies and workers. For far too long oil, rig workers were left without jobs because of the ban, hurting the fragile Gulf Coast economy even more. But what the President needs to do is expand our energy production here within the United States. It will add needed jobs to an industry that is already down on its knees, and will help our national economy grow as well by securing safe and reliable oil resources here at home. There is no need to rely on foreign oil sources when we have the people, the technology, and the resources to enjoy something that is made here in the U.S.A. Many across the country already believe in energy independence such as Governor Bob McDonnell (R) of Virginia. Gov. McDonnell has proposed to open vast areas of the ocean off Virginias coast to offshore drilling.! McDonnell conservatively projects that 130 million barrels of oil and 1.14 trillion cubic feet of natural gas could be located off Virginias coast.! Lets not forget the thousands of new jobs the industry would create, as well as revenue produced from the oil leases to cash strapped states. !The fact of the matter is, as Gov. McDonnell and many across the county already agree with, using energy resources that are already found here in America is a win-win situation. It provides us with more energy independence so we no longer have to rely on sometimes-volatile foreign producers; it creates more jobs here in the U.S., and it will keep gas prices down so that our struggling economy can continue to grow. - Peter Benton-Sullivan is a college republican from University of Colorado-Boulder and currently interns for the College Republican National Committee in Washington, DC.
PAGE 9
SPRING 2011
OP ED: SOLVING OUR LONG TERM BUDGET PROBLEMS REQUIRES REWORKING ENTITLEMENTS
Whenever Im driving along a beaten down highway, zone out and go on autopilot, I end up at home; right back where I started.! This is what is going to happen if the only measures taken to reduce the deficit are putting on a five-year freeze on discretionary spending and reducing the federal budget to 2008 levels.! If I remember correctly, 2008 was not exactly rainbows and butterflies. Unless we pursue further measures to reduce spending, the US will hit the deficit ceiling at 75mph without an airbag and end up submerged in a ditch on the side of the road. According to the Former Republican Senator Alan Simpson in the article Leaving Entitlements on Auto Pilot Will Crush the U.S. Economy, getting rid of the healthcare law, voting to end taxpayer funding of presidential campaigns, cutting the congressional Christine Sawyer budget and earmark process and proposing billions in spending cuts for the remainder of the fiscal year, are not sufficient to make a dent in the current $14 trillion dollar deficit. All of these proposed cuts are nothing but a drop in a very large bucket.! In order for the deficit to truly be reduced the band aid needs to be ripped off quickly. The pain will be short and intense, but the problem will have been addressed. This will mean the implementation of targeted reductions in programs once viewed as sacred cows.! We have no choice if we want to avoid the crap hitting the debt-ceiling fan. One of the suggestions being made by Former Republican Senator Alan Simpson is to increase the retirement age to receive Social Security to 68 by the year 2050.! Thats 40 years away.! By that time current college aged Americans and twenty-somethings will be nearing retirement age. The idea of raising the retirement age will surely not be popular, it means members of our generation will have to work longer to receive the same benefits, but the alternative is infinitely worse. If you dont do anything with Social Security when you waddle up to get your check in the year 2037, youll get 22 percent less, Simpson said.! After 2037 the programs finances get even worse, running deficits to the point where the program may not be able to exist at all. Better to have benefits start at 68 than the program go bankrupt and we receive no benefits at all. Making the necessary changes now will allow us to start planning our retirement earlier. It makes a lot more sense to plan for your own future than to play Russian Roulette on a program that may not even exist by the time we retire. Social Security is not the only entitlement in dire need of reform.!America was not built on a foundation of entitlement. We were founded upon the ideal of freedom, and an essential facet of freedom is individual responsibility. Unlike the social welfare states of Europe that have attempted to equalize results bringing down the successful and raising up the failures we have allowed individuals to succeed and fail based upon their own merits. The resultant prosperity has allowed us to create a safety net to ensure that those who fall through the cracks of society, through no fault of their own, can be provided with a means of support. But our safety net has expanded to the point where it threatens to not only catch those who fall, but to ensnare everyone beneath its crushing weight. The bottom line is that Republicans are definitely making strides in the right direction with concerns to reducing the deficit. !However, the Pledge to America document that aided Republicans in the recent election season, promised $100 billion to be slashed from government spending.! Of the $100 billion only $74 billion has been slashed, leaving another $26 billion out in limbo land.! The GOP leaders have, as Rep. Paul Ryan said, made a down payment on a more fiscally responsible Washington. Now is not the time to go on auto-pilot. Now is the time to get behind the wheel and make the hard cuts our nation needs for future generations to prosper.
- Christine Sawyer is a college republican graduate student at American University and currently interns for the College Republican National Committee in Washington, DC. ! PAGE 10
SPRING 2011
We saw with the 2010 elections that voters were fed up with this mind set and elected a new Republican U.S. House Majority, six new Republican Senators, five new Republican Governors, and hundreds of new local GOP state legislators. College Republicans played an integral role in helping those Republican candidates win in the 2010 elections. Our field representatives and state leaders recruited 71,526 NEW college students into college republican clubs across the country. We gained the support of the Republican Governors Association. In tandem with them this past Fall, our field reps and state membership were integral parts of Republican victories in the 29 out of the 37 gubernatorial races. We contributed to the 47 Senate Republican victories along with the 242 Republican victories in the House. Our membership invested over 80,000 man-hours volunteering for these races. We have proven, time and time again, College Republicans ARE the boots on the ground. Our membership saw what the Democrats reckless spending was causing. Youth unemployment teetered around 20% and the national debt soared over 13 trillion. The message was clear, it was time for the Democrats to go. One of the first campaign lessons I learned was that elections arent won on Election Day but in the critical months before when key organizing and voter education takes place. While TV and radio ads can be produced quickly, building the ground game take months to put into place. That is why I need to know that 100% of our supporters stand with us. We are asking you for $500, $1000, $2,000, $5,000 or whatever you can afford, to put towards the programs outlined in the previous pages. It is necessary to invest in the youth of our party more than we ever have before if we want to continue winning in 2011 and 2012. 100% of the money you donate goes directly into our programs that make the dedicated efforts to target youth voters. Close races are won or lost by the intensity of local get-out-the-vote programs and thats what we do. We recruit, train and put foot soldiers in the field to help candidates get their voters to the polls. In 2010, our sophisticated grassroots field operations, online messaging, and campus activism proved successful in our field mobilization efforts. Lets continue that momentum in 2011. Thank you in advance for your support. -Tierra Tierra is the Finance Director for the College Republican National Committee and can be reached via email at twarren@crnc.org. ! PAGE 11
600 Pennsylvania Ave SE Ste. 215 Washington, DC 20003 Oce: 202.608.1411 Fax: 202.608.1429 Email: team@crnc.org