Author: Fritz Pettyjohn

They’ve got the $, but we’ve heard they have some misguided naifs who fear a runaway.  DC attorney Mike Stern and others made a run at them, and says we’ve got a shot, but need to get to head honcho Demint.  In Charleston I heard that the I am American crew has gotten a commitment from retiring Sen. Coburn to do a function in Oklahoma.  If true, this means we can use him to make a run at Demint.  A ten second Coburn-Demint google revealed that the two of them worked hand in glove on eliminating earmarks when Demint was still in the Senate.  They were tight, and Demint would listen to Coburn.  Stern will try to talk to some of Coburn’s staff about all this.  If Coburn is doing an event for us, I’m tempted to fly to Oklahoma just for a chance to make a personal pitch to him.  I doubt very much he has any clue about the Task Force or where we’re at.

Supposedly the Republican State Leadership Foundation has $20 million to spend on state legislative races.  The way it looks, to me, is that we need to pick up Kentucky and at least one other state — Maine, Washington, Oregon, or, least likely, West Virginia.  We need to do all we can to get those guys to concentrate on those targets.  They claim an Article V BBA is their top concern, so they should listen.  I feel real good about Kentucky, where we already have the Senate, and need only 5 pickups in a 99 seat House.  Rand Paul wants to run simultaneously for reelection to the Senate and for the Presidency in  2016, and he needs the KY legislature to pass a law to let him do it.  So he’s working on it.  If we can’t pick up KY and at least one other state, my whole theory of a 2014 wave goes up in smoke, and I’m n ot sure we pull this off.

Herman Cain turned out to be a pretty good guy.  I got a chance to make the pitch to him about the political implications for 2016 of a successful Article V effort.  He says he’s totally on board, and claims to have 5 million listeners to his talk show, which he will use to spread the word.  I hear he’s pretty big in North Carolina, which just went into session.  Last year the House passed a bill rescinding all previous Article V resolutions.  We don’t think we’ll have too much trouble killing it in the Senate, but will ask Herman to rile up his NC audience if need be.  Our first step is to sick the NFIB guy in NC on the case, and see what he says.

When he was running for President in 1979 CA Gov. Jerry Brown endorsed an Article V BBA.  What this means I haven’t figured out — probably nothing.  But it would be interesting to get a reporter to ask him about it now.

The right is resurgent around the English-speaking world.  Australia, Canada, and now — most exciting of all– INDIA!  Even sclerotic Olde England is showing signs of life, with the rise of UKIP.  If this is a trend, then —————

we get the wave.

Pledge letters out to OK, SD, ND and MT.

Met John and Robin Steinberger in Charleston.  He’s the county GOP chair, and pretty hard core.  Cruz spent an hour with them recently, making his pitch.  They were surprised when I told them Cruz has not endorsed Article V.  I told them about Rand Paul testifying before the Kentucky Senate for our Article V BBA.  I think Cruz is going to lose support in places like South Carolina (#3, after Iowa and NH)  if he won’t endorse us, which means he will, and soon.  I want all GOP presidential contenders to endorse us.  I want this to be part of the GOP platform.

Son Darren in Bozeman is seeing if he can get a few local businessmen to meet me in a few weeks, try and get a little organization going in Montana. 

Herman Cain has jumped aboard, big time.  I’m going to try and get on his radio show.  He claims he’s got 5 million listeners, which is a stretch.

Lots of talk about $, no action.  The worst case scenario, we only get MT, WY, ND, WI, SC and KY 2015.  We can do that with little or no money.  That gets us to 30.  At that point, with the presidential campaign well under way, the Turd Blossom* and his buddies will have to realize the positive political implications of a successful Article V BBA, and we’ll get our dough, and the states we need in 2016.

*W’s name for Karl Rove

 

 

That’s Dave Biddulph”s name for the organizations pushing Article V.  The Task Force, CoS, The State Government Leadership Foundation, NFIB, and maybe others are supposed to have a cc today to talk about our problem with Sen. Pres. Biggs in AZ.  I think Constantin Querard is the ticket to Biggs.  We’ll see what happens.  I will also be suggesting that ND, WY and MT are the prime ficus of effort, both this year and next.  We need them all, and we only get one shot — 2015.

I’m om a three week tour of the south with my wife; spent the last four days in Savannah.  Great place.  The other night we were on a park bench overlooking the Savannah River when Keith and Tracy asked to join us — they needed to get off their feet.  Keith mentioned he was in the peanut business, that he “biled” them.  We didn’t understand how you “biled” peanuts.  He spelled it out — he boils them for two and a half days, 75 pounds at a time, with seven pounds of salt, and sells them at a roadside stand in Macon.  He can make $300 a day, cash money. 

We talked with them for over an hour.  Nice people, though a tad heavy.  Keith weighs in at 245, while Tracy was 260.  They weren’t proud of their weight, and were on a strict diet.  Tracy has lost 60 pounds, and Keith almost as much. 

Keith is a big second amendment man, so we got along just fine.

I like the South.

So when I send the pledge letter in Montana I get Dean Folkvold to co-sign it as Chairman of Montana for a Balanced Budget, a PAC I’ll form for him.  Being as how everybody in the state knows Dean, and he’s such a cool dude, this should help.

I need to find guys like Dean in the other states which will get pledge letters:UT, SD, ND, OK, AZ and WY.  Oregon, Washington and Minnesota may get one too.

I thought it was dead, because of Senate Pres. Andy Biggs.  Today Micah, of SGLP, after speaking with the AZ Speaker, says if we can get 70 year old freshman Senator Judy Burges to “concur’ we can still get Arizona.  We’ve got about two weeks left in the session.  Somehow, some way, we’ve got to get to her.  That campaign begins today.

Dave led today’s cc.  Scott, our executive director, has chest pains.  This is not good.  We need Scott.  Losing him would be a major setback.

I’ve got a plan for next year in North Dakota, Wyoming and Montana.  This would work in ID (Crapo), OK (Coburn), UT (Lee), SD (Thune), KY (Paul), WS (Johnson), and SC (Scott) as well.  Take Wyoming.  Right after New Years 2015 Sen. Barasso cuts a 60 second radio spot asking listeners to support an Article V BBA in the upcoming session of the Wyoming legislature.  It airs on talk radio in Wyoming for 10 days or so leading up to the session.  Air time on Wyoming radio is dirt cheap.  Barasso is the heavyweight in the Wyoming Republican delegation.The local talk show hosts would pick up on it, probably climb aboard.  I could maybe get on to push it.  I very much doubt this has been done in Wyoming.

This is so cheap, and could be so effective, that it just has to happen.