I friend of mine posted a link to an article about College Republicans:
Swimming with Sharks: In the College Republicans, young GOPers learn to fight hard against Democrats–by practicing on one another.
The article describes the tactics CRs learn and use for the campaigns of the Chairman of the group and how it seems real familiar to those who follow real elections.
It reminded me of my short stint with CR back in the mid 1980’s and I thought I would share my story:
I grew up in a white bread conservative town where most of the city and county leaders were Republicans. Most of my friends in school were sons and daughters of Republicans. Even though the GOP didn’t really do anything for me as someone who was poor, lived in a trailer, and was on welfare from time to time, this was the Reagan Era and everyone was in love with the old coot.
I went to Ohio State in the fall of 1986 and when I made the move I wanted to be more political. Naturally I joined the College Republicans. It included the sons, daughters, nieces, and nephews of the big wigs of the Ohio GOP. The vice president of the group was the son or grandson of a former congressman.
I attended my first meeting and found someone else from Findlay there. In fact Jim was in my class at Findlay High. Not much about the meetings really stick with me other than at the time there was a governor’s race. Jim Rhodes, one of the most famous modern Ohio governors was trying again to be governor. Ohio had term limits and so he had to sit out for 4 years while his Lt. Governor – Democrat Richard Celeste ran the state.
Celeste was the last Lt. Governor from an opposite party as the constitution had changed to allow the Governor to pick their own Lt. Governor rather than the previous lesser vote getter getting the job.
Rhodes picked a youngster (compared to him) named Bob Taft to be his Lt. Governor. Yes, THAT Taft family – President, US Supreme Court Judge, two US Senators.
The OSU College Republicans invited Taft to speak at a meeting.
The day came and people filed into the classroom being used for the meeting and just before the event started a guy wearing an Army jacket and sandals sat in the back of the room. The CR suits were buzzing about this “hippy” in their mists but for the moment they left the guy alone. The meeting was public after all. They didn’t want any bad PR.
So Taft was introduced and began to speak about what he and Jim Rhodes would do to the state if elected. It was the usual “create jobs by cutting taxes.” A couple of minutes into the talk the “hippy” pulls out a sign from under his coat and holds it up. He doesn’t say anything. He just holds the sign up in protest. (I forget what the sign said but it was opposite what the GOP stood for of course.)
CR goons swarmed the guy looking like they were going to beat the crap out of him but Bob Taft told the guys to back off and let him protest – that he wasn’t afraid.
During the rest of the talk there were 3 goons standing near the guy staring at him waiting for him to do anything more than hold the sign. Taft finished with some Q & As then the meeting broke up into small talk. That’s when the “hippy” left.
Most of the chit chat was about the protester. “How dare he disrupt our meeting.” “We need to keep the riff raff out.” “Can you believe it, sandals AFTER labor day.”
It was on that day that I started not to have good vibes about CR or Republicans. I didn’t want to be part of a group that tried to control speech or who had shallow ideas about people. I was a poor person from a trailer – just image what they would say about me if they found out.
The other incident that finally caused me to quit CR was the OSU group sponsored a Reagan Birthday Party event as a fundraiser for CR and way for GOP members to mingle with the CRs. It seemed too much to me like when the Nazis use to celebrate Hitler’s birthday. They would sing songs about the fatherland and have a big cake.
Also being exposed to different viewpoints at Ohio State, I learned how closed minded and insular my hometown had been as I was growing up. It had been that way all along but I really didn’t see until I contrasted it with living in Columbus and meeting so many different people with so many different backgrounds. For example: I was shocked to learn that in other areas of the state there was subsidized housing. We were stuck living in a trailer for years because Hancock county had one apartment complex that was subsidized and the wait list stretched into years.
I didn’t go and join the College Democrats though because of my bad experiences with Political Correctness. That is another story.
My friend Jim stayed in CR and last I heard, after college, he was legal counsel for a state agency under former Governor George Voinovich (now our US Senator). Me, I worked as a security guard for a property management firm.
