Alabama Cheerleader Takes on the GRA Over the Alex Johnson Rule
And I am popping corn.
We have written and spoken about the Georgia Republican Assembly’s insane attempt at changing the rules of the party that would allow a relatively tiny handful of people to decide who would be eligible to run for office as a Republican. The short of it is, if they don’t like you for any reason, they take your elephant away. Nevermind that the two leading candidates for the chief spot in the Georgia Republican Party recently criticized the proposed rule during a debate hosted by Peach Pundit the Podcast™. Nevertheless, they persist.
For purposes of Peach Pundit, we are going to begin referring to the rule as the Alex Johnson Rule. We think it is fair that he always be associated with it and should it pass, the absolute devastation it will wreak on the party. If it fails, it will remain in legacy as one of his attempts to wield absolute control over those who dare disagree with him.
It now looks like the proponents of the rule have decided to spend some cash in the effort to convince delegates to obliterate the party’s dwindling prospects of remaining relevant, creating a website to tout the wrong-headed justification for the proposal. The site heavily quotes GRA Big Wig, Nathaniel Darnell, and links to a video wherein he describes the proposed rule in great detail.
Take note of that last point because it’s going to come back in a second.
The AJC had one of their most accurate portrayals of anything, ever, yesterday in their jolt chronicling the rift the party is seeing because of the proposal. Georgia GRA President, Alex Johnson, miffed that many elected Republicans continue to ignore his existence, won’t stop pushing for the rule and is likely to try to force it onto the floor for a vote on Saturday at the GAGOP Convention.
Enter the Alabama Cheerleader (The ALC) and Ultra-MAGA-everything-all-the-time-self-described-America-First-Tea-Partier, who sent an email of her own condemning the proposed rule. In her typical style, she didn’t hold back, saying the Alex Johnson Rule should be called the, “Destroy the Grassroots Control of the Georgia GOP and MAGA Candidates Rule.”
She ain’t wrong (this time).
If it was this easy to keep Trump, or candidates like him, off the ballot as a Republican you don’t think people with money would take over the convention process to keep them from continuing to damage the cause of genuine conservatism? In the words of the Alabama Cheerleader, “if you think [they] wouldn’t use it to try to stop Trump next year, I have some ocean front property in Ellijay to sell you.”
Further down the email she details a conversation she had over the phone with someone who is making campaign calls to GAGOP delegates to build support for Johnson’s Folly (okay, maybe we will refer to it as that too). The caller tried to imply that Trump supports it, which set the ALC off. She used words like, “appalled, ” and, “liar,” to describe the campaign to support Johnson’s Folly.
Now is the moment to recall the point I asked you to remember above. In an earlier email, the ALC had linked Darnell to the previously mentioned website. This prompted Darnell to reach out to the ALC to clarify he didn’t create the website. As if that matters. The content of the site is a regurgitation of his public writings and statements. He might as well have been its author and creator.
This one small example is symptom of a much larger problem. The people who want to make the determination of who has the right to run for office as a Republican are incapable of seeing the impact of what they say and do. They have no accountability within their own ranks, and no self awareness to realize just how destructive they are to the causes they love and cherish.
When I was in the House, the GRA loved me. I was one of their highest scoring legislators every year I was there. And every year I pleaded with them to stop doing the things they do because it made my job, to advocate for policies they wanted to see, infinitely harder. And you would have thought they would want a legislator like me to be successful, but that wasn’t what mattered to them. No. What mattered was that they felt like they had control. That they could bully someone into taking their preferred path.
And that’s not how you win friends or influence people. And therefore it is why they continue to fail to move the ball on policy. Influence is greater than power, but the GRA still wants power.
I know now that no amount of criticism, no matter how valid or logical it may seem, will convince the GRA that their tactics are self destructive. Like a viciously abused spouse of a hopelessly drug addicted partner, I gave up on them a long time ago. They are going to need to hit rock bottom before they will, if ever, see the error of their ways. Until then, I am going to stick around the GAGOP and support people who are willing to rebuild it when the GRA have finished ransacking the place.
Will there come a point they’re finished ransacking the place?
That is a fair question. On a recent podcast Buzz posited that that moment may not come until they get tired of losing. There isn’t much more for them to lose, frankly. I think it is sooner rather than later.
I appreciate your podcast and commentary.
As a side note has anyone seen Beth Merleson hanging around the GRA proceedings. Her last emails indicated she was their kind of gal. Who knows, she may be part of their brain trust.
Has anyone heard how her mother is doing?
Thank you for the kind comments.
Regarding Beth, it is our understanding that she went on to have a storied career in higher education. No word on the fate of her beloved mother, however.
Do you mean “Beth Merkelson”….of Cecil Staton fame?
https://www.piratemedia1.com/theeastcarolinian/article_3f9d340c-c4a0-11ea-89f6-6b1758e564db.html
You’re right on the posture of GRA crowd – legislative or electoral success isn’t what matters to them. “What mattered was that they felt like they had control. That they could bully someone into taking their preferred path.”
It needs to be noted that’s also true of all the folks named in the Jolt article opposing the Johnson Rule. Every one of them and their associates have spent years running scams, theater and worse to drive anyone not them away from local and state GOP chapters.
They’re right about the consequences – codifying into official GOP rules what they’ve only done unofficially would be disastrous for them.
“Every one of them and their associates have spent years running scams, theater and worse to drive anyone not them away from local and state GOP chapters.”
The goal of the GRA/Nathaniel Darnell Party is to only allow (wherever possible) candidates for political office whose position on abortion is ZERO exceptions.
Sooo…if the GRA gets their way, they will become the Democrat Party of Georgia’s “Russia” in WW II: And wipe-out Republican rule for many years with Darnell’s bat-krap craziness.
I have not had time to look….but, someone far more learned than I in the elections realm told me that IF someone wants to run as a Republican/Democrat for a county-based office (county commission, school board and the like), they do not have to register through the county political party apparatus.
All they supposedly need to do is go to the Elections Superintendent’s office, state they want to be put on the ballot as an R/D, and ta-da! That is what they will run as, and that letter is what will appear next to their name.
And, if they qualify in that manner, guess what? The county political party does NOT get 50% of their qualifying fees. They get zero. ZIP. Nada.
So..essentially, the AJ Rule might only apply to the legislature and constitutional offices. Or so my learned source told me.