#ncgop: All in the (dysfunctional) family
This weekend’s NCGOP convention is shaping up to make the WWE (or any episode of Maury) look like a Wednesday night prayer meeting in comparison.
NC $pin: Remember the big fuss about the fees being charged delegates attending the affair? It played a huge part in the ouster of Hasan Harnett from the chairman post. Defenders of the fee hike talked about needing to charge more in order to pay the bill for the venue and to have respectable food and drink for attendees. But I hear that the party has pledged to pay a SWEEEEEET $um of ca$h to Tom Campbell to bring his NC Spin traveling sideshow to, um, “entertain” the delegates. (From what I hear, THAT accounts for a significant chunk of the increase in fees.)
Hasan in tha’ House! Back from his overseas ventures, recently-deposed chairman Hasan Harnett has announced plans to attend the NCGOP convention in Greensboro. Meanwhile, some of his supporters plan to bring motions from the convention floor declaring the April 30 meeting to oust Harnett — and the election of Robin Hayes — to be a violation of party rules, out of order, and therefore invalid. I understand they have some pretty good evidence supporting their claims. Pro-Harnett forces say that 
their take on Harnett’s ouster is in line with a ruling made by NCGOP officials in the Claude Pope regime regarding an attempted 2014 ouster of another NCGOP official. Some also see similarities between the pro-Harnett position and state party officials’s ruling on an attempted ouster of the Haywood County chairman .
And speaking of Haywood County … : Activists there filed a complaint with the state bar against NCGOP counsel Tom Stark over his alleged conduct in the effort to remove Hasan Harnett from his elected chairman’s position. Now comes word, via social media, that Stark has responded with a cease-and-desist order against one of those activists, and a warning that the activist should stay away from NCGOP property and all NCGOP meetings and events.
And those RNC delegates. Lost in the hubbub of last Saturday was a behind-closed doors approval by ExCom members of a slate of delegates to represent the state party in Cleveland. From what I am told, the convention delegates will be presented with the slate and an up-or-down voting option. (The actual details of the names on that slate have been a closely guarded secret — much like most of the party’s internal operations these days.) 
Oh, and Greg Gebhardt IS an employee of David Lewis. His campaign for RNC committeeman is playing up his experience in the military and his “small business” (like Richard Hudson?) background. Lost in the hype is Gebhardt’s role as a paid employee of Lewis on Jones Street and his role as Lewis’s reelection campaign chairman in March. His only other announced opponent in the race is state Rep. Mark Brody — a solid conservative who regularly votes with people like Chris Millis, Larry Pittman, and Mike Speciale. So, a vote for Gebhardt is a vote for MORE DAVID LEWIS.
In spite of Ted Cruz suspending his campaign, I am still hopeful that there will be a Cruz slate offered to have an alternative to the establishment slate of national delegates.
We need to do what Colorado, North Dakota, and other states do, which is allow slates to be nominated, but count each delegate seat separately instead of an up of down vote by slate. Slating is top-down Tammany Hall corrupt politics by its very nature.
Thanks for keeping up with this fiasco and sharing your insight
The bottom line is that the old gusrd of establishment creeps refuses to give way to the energetic and well-inforned new blood that has come into the party. They are holding back progress for the GOP. All they have done, thus far, is alienate the new generation of Republicans. That is not only selfish and self-centered, it is extremely stupid. It basicly insures that the progress which could have come to the party will not. Dirty tricks will never endear the younger generation to the creeps. Doing the same thing (dirty tricks galore) in 2012 blew it for the GOP.
Congratulations Hillary Clinton, the establishment idiots are helping the Democrats again! Don Rufty
Well the money did not go for extra leg room between the rows.
Not sure when your post went up, but the delegate slate is not a guarded secret: http://www.ncgop.org/proposed-2016-national-delegates/
dysfunctional squared
Rumors are that Ada Fisher will run again, and that A. J. Daoud may run for committeeman. Rumors are that there will be three delegates slates, the establishment slate, a Trump slate, and one from Constitutional Conservatives.