My best-old-ex-friend Jon Ralston is in high dudgeon over a story by Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist Steve Sebelius about a letter I recently sent to Secretary of State Ross Miller inquiring about a possible recall of Nevada State Sen. Michael Roberson (R-Henderson).
My letter of inquiry was, in fact, sent to the SoS on behalf of a client who wishes to remain anonymous despite Ralston’s insinuation – “if there is one” – to the contrary. You can read the letter by clicking here.
Now, let me be clear here: THERE IS NO RECALL EFFORT UNDERWAY AT THIS TIME AGAINST SEN. ROBERSON. NONE. NADA. ZIP.
That said, some conservatives, myself included, are pretty unhappy with Sen. Roberson’s flip-flop on Gov. Sandoval’s proposal to re-impose $620 million worth of tax hikes on Nevada’s families and small businesses next year.
As such, the recall inquiry has been made since the district Sen. Roberson was elected to represent has changed dramatically due to redistricting last year. At the very least, depending upon how the SoS rules, the number of signatures required to even qualify for a recall election could be either 7,411 signatures or 19,839…far from an insignificant difference.
So ALL I’ve asked for is an official ruling from the chief elections officer so that everyone will know exactly what the rules would be in the event some of those unhappy folks DO want to move forward with this.
Nevertheless, despite the fact that no recall effort is actually underway, Ralston, as is his wont, decided to crap all over such a notion in his Flash e-newsletter anyway:
“Did I mention that there is not one scintilla of evidence that conservatives are outraged by the governor’s tax plan, only that Muth and a handful of other wannabes have made noise about it. Mark my words: There will be no recall and what this is about is Muth trying to shake up/down the GOP establishment that now considers him a mere nuisance.”
In a companion tweet, Jon called the notion of a possible recall “ridiculous.”
Whatever.
The thing about Jon is that while he’s a smart guy and a talented writer, he’s also a liberal who doesn’t know doodley-squat about conservatives. He doesn’t understand what drives the tea party movement, nor does he get the Ron Paul/liberty movement. They are a philosophical foreign language to him.
Jon’s also not a player in the political arena; he’s an employee of a newspaper who does color commentary from the announcers’ booth well above the field. To the best of my knowledge, he has never donned the uniform himself.
He’s never run for public office. Never held a political party leadership position. Never ran a grassroots organization. Never had to raise contributions. Never had to fill out an FEC report. Never had to recruit, organize and manage volunteers. Never put together a voter registration drive. Never organized a voter ID or get-out-the-vote program. Never designed a voter contact mailer. And never produced a campaign radio or TV ad.
Indeed, Jon’s never done any of the stuff he regularly pontificates about with such unearned authority. In fact, Jon would appear to be the modern-day political embodiment of the “critic” Teddy Roosevelt talked about in his infamous “Citizenship In A Republic” speech:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
So you’ll pardon me if I don’t give a rat’s arse what Jon Ralston thinks about the efficacy of a grassroots effort to possibly attempt a recall of a Republican elected official who sold out his base and who no longer dances with the ones who brung him.
Now, as someone who actually DOES have a little bit of experience in the political arena, let me concede that any effort to recall Sen. Roberson would be, at best, a longshot. A serious longshot.
Even if a sufficient number of signatures were obtained to qualify for a recall election, Sen. Roberson would have a ton of lobbyist and other special interest money to fight back…money that a rag-tag team of grassroots volunteers would be hard-pressed to match.
But does that mean the effort itself would serve no purpose? That it would be “ridiculous”?
Only to people who really don’t understand the conservative/liberty movement and who have never actually participated and competed in the political arena. In fact, there are at least two good reasons for conservatives to embark on such a recall effort, regardless of how difficult it would be:
1.) Practice makes perfect. A mid-summer door-to-door grassroots recall effort would help “tune up” activists for the fall campaign. Consider it the “pre-season.”
2.) A recall effort would serve notice to others that turning your back on your base and breaking your word has consequences.
A thief who doesn’t get caught or punished is only emboldened to keep stealing. Worse, other thieves are encouraged to follow his example.
Similarly, if there are no penalties for politicians who break their word, they’ll just keep breaking their word. And they’ll be a source of encouragement for other politicians to similarly break their word.
All of that said, let me reiterate: There is NO recall effort targeting Sen. Roberson underway. And any such recall effort may never even materialize. All I’ve done is reserve the www.RecallRoberson.com domain name just in case my client, or someone else, does decide to move forward.
So let’s not get everybody’s panties in a wad until we hear back from Secretary Miller, OK?
