Conservative grassroots shocks Team Cantor in his own district with surprise intra-party victory

Conservative activists caught political operatives working for House Majority Leader Eric Cantor by surprise on his own front porch on Monday evening, storming their way to victory against the GOP establishment in Virginia at a local party meeting.

Around 5:45 p.m. Monday, March 24 swaths of conservatives marched into the Henrico Board of Supervisors Meeting Room in Henrico, Virginia—inside Cantor’s congressional district. They were there for the Henrico Republican Mass Meeting, something both Cantor and his conservative primary challenger Dave Brat, an economics professor at Randolph-Macon College, had been pushing their respective supporters to attend.

The meeting, Virginia activists say, had morphed into a surprise proxy battle because of a series of recent incidents in which GOP party officials departed from tradition and excluded dozens of conservative activists from attending local party conventions. The practice has been named “slating” and has come up in other states' GOP party chapters sought to exclude acolytes of Rep. Ron Paul.

Party officials, including top Cantor hands, were accused of slating at a March 10 meeting in Virginia Beach where 32 moderate, hand-selected Republicans were chosen for an upcoming convention instead of hundreds who had been eligible in years past.

“They ramrodded through votes to replace the list of 1000+ with a list of 32 moderates to carry the entire vote to the convention to ensure Eric Cantor’s ally State Senator Frank Wagner would be elected 2nd District chairman instead [of conservative Curtis Colgate],” said Brat campaign adviser John Pudner.

GOP State Party Chairman Pat Mullins even criticized slating in a Facebook post in late March, saying “it’s time to quit excluding and slating Republicans and time to start beating Democrats!” he wrote.

This excerpt from lessgovisbestgov.com gives an account of the lousy treatment of conservatives at the ‘12 invention and how it will ensure no conservative will be nominated in 2016:

“It’s a tad complicated but there were several changes to the Rules that were being considered on the very first day of the Convention while the chief organizer of the opposition to these rules changes, the senior delegate from Virginia and longtime Republican conservative activist Morton Blackwell, and the entire Virginia delegation were being driven around in circles by a bus at the very same time that the vote was being taken on the floor. Finally when delegates on the bus noticed that they were passing the same scenery over and over again they demanded that the bus driver stop the bus and let them off. Then they walked to the Convention Center! Unfortunately for them however they arrived late and the Rules Changes had already been adopted.

The general gist of the idea as it was portrayed by the people who were behind the proposed rules changes was to prevent a hostile takeover of the Republican Party and the National Convention by members of the Ron Paul contingent, the Ron Paul Revolution and the Campaign for Liberty. And without Mr. Blackwell present who is by no means a Ron Paul supporter and the members of the Virginia delegation present, the resistance to the proposed rules changes just faded away.

So what are the rules that were at issue and how were they changed? The two rules that were at stake were Rule #12 and Rule #15. Generally the changes in the rules shift power from the State and County Republican Parties to the National Party and the RNC, and to the Party’s Presidential nominee. That would be Mitt Romney. The changes in the rules are already being referred to as “The Romney Rules.” They effectively disenfranchise conservative activists of all kinds all across America. They disenfranchise TEA Party Activists, and not just Ron Paul supporters! Both the TEA Party Movement and the Ron Paul supporters sprung up as a result of the intransigence of the old school, old paradigm politicians, but instead of listening to the growing cries from the grassroots, the Establishment essentially muted the volume and turned them flat down!”

Any candidate looking for conservative votes in this year’s elections should pledge opposition to these outrageous, conniving rules changes.

“Dave Brat is great. He’s fighting a tough battle, against a well-funded, powerful incumbent. But Brat is taking it to him!”

In my view, Cantor is only considered powerful because he’s the majority leader. He’s no political or intellectual powerhouse (like say, a Chuck Schumer or Newt Gingrich or Dick Armey or Tom Delay). He’s only been in the Congress since 2001 and was pushed up the ladder by Roy Blunt, who was in the House leadership and is now a senator (proving the old like that when a House member moves to the senate, it increases the intelligence of both bodies).

Cantor can be beaten! Or at most, weakened, so he doesn’t become Speaker.

I’m no longer of the opinion that our votes matter outside of very local offices.

I believe that we have gone full Soviet and most Americans are sadly blind, or deliberately and willfully refusing to accept the fact and truth that we have suffered a velvet Marxist coup. Everything that is done now, is to create an illusion to placate the masses as they dig in deeper and entrench themselves into permanent positions of power.

For such is the history of every single Socialist person, group and party that has ever achieved national power.

Why should we assume we can vote out a coup? You’re seeing their efforts to ensure that there is no way We The People can revert us back to a Constitutional Republic.

We have to be thinking beyond elections if you want to hold onto what is left of your liberty.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.