I had intended to avoid posting about this further and had hoped that this would be my last post on the matter, but it seems that certain folks have a view of what happened that doesn't match with the facts of what occurred and they seem quite intent on perpetuating a narrative based upon this unique perspective regardless of how different it is from the reality of what transpired.
So I go back to the 9th District caucus one last time to correct the record.
First came this post from Brian Howey last week. I'll quote and correct in detail, as the spin Howey is labeling as reporting is truly at odds with what actually happened.
INDIANAPOLIS - Ninth CD Republican Chairman Larry Shickles was upset in his bid for re-election last Saturday as Erin Houchin of Salem won 22-13. Don Hayes of DuBois County was elected vice chair unanimously.
Sources tell HPI that it a “grassroots uprising” with Houchin using her base with the district Young Republicans while forming a team with Hayes, a veteran of 9th CD politics.
A "grassroots uprising" with a base of district Young Republicans?
This implies some sort of connotation of sweeping change or a broad-based transformation; it is not the case. Of the district's twenty counties, perhaps three (maybe four, depending on how you define it) saw changes in their reorganization, and one of those was a return to an experienced political hand who was responsible for ousting a prior district chairman years ago (and happened to have been the person that nominated Larry Shickles in this caucus).
Other counties saw leadership changes that did not impact their usual caucus voting patterns. There was very little turnover in the county chairs in the district. A grassroots uprising would imply some broad mandate for change coming from the, well, grassroots. That clearly wasn't the case here.
Then we move on to the mythical base of Young Republicans. Most of the counties with active YR organizations voted for Larry Shickles (there aren't a lot of counties in the 9th with active YR organizations, but I digress). Is that a stark and pointed commentary on the leadership--or lack thereof--Houchin provided to the district-level YRs? I don't think so, though it would be very easy to spin it that way if I wanted to be disingenuous. There's enough disingenuous spin coming out from others as it is.
Regardless, this was no "grassroots uprising" and the supposed base of Young Republicans does not exist given where the votes came from and where they went.
Houchin is younger, very hard working Republican activist type who has mastered the nuts and bolts of local campaigns — and served effectively both as 9th District YR Chairman and on the Washington County Republican Central Committee as Vice Chairman.
Erin Houchin served so effectively as head of the Young Republicans in Washington County that they voted her out of office the week before the district caucus. (I'm told that it unfolded along the lines of "Well, I guess I'll run one more year" answered by "Not this year you won't.")
I'm sure that those involved in the McCain and Sodrel campaigns in the 9th District can attest to her hard work leading the district YRs--or rather attest to the shocking absence of it, since so very little was done on the part of the district YRs--and I'm sure that she got all sorts of campaign experience getting her husband elected as Washington County Prosecutor.
I'm also sure that she'll be spending a lot of time and effort in Washington County in 2010 to ensure that he gets reelected (Washington County likes to vote its prosecutors out after only one term, but judges there serve virtually for life). One can't blame her on that score, but one can also wonder what that will mean for her activity in the district at large in such a crucial election.
“So she has paid her dues early, lots of energy, idealism and courage,” the source said. She has particular strength in the central part of the district. Hayes is a very trusted old hand/long-time party guy who is very well-respected and well-known, particularly across the western region of the district.
One person in all of this who has paid his dues is Don Hayes. Had Don wanted to run for district chairman, he probably not only would have won, but he would likely have been unopposed (for a time after the November election, Shickles was considering quitting and was sounding people out about whether anyone wanted to replace him; no one stepped forward until Houchin filed at the last minute).
Instead, Don Hayes told Larry Shickles and Dee Dee Benkie on the Monday before the caucus (at a meeting in Jasper attended by many other witnesses and at which I was present) that he would support them; his word was good until Friday, less than twenty-four hours before the district caucus, when he broke it and decided to support someone else. After that, Hayes spoke frequently about having "given my word to Erin." His word to Larry and Dee Dee apparently didn't count for much in comparison.
Don brought with him the votes of two other counties, Perry and Spencer. Those counties cooperate a lot with Dubois (they hold common fundraisers, such as golf scrambles, for example), and Hayes does much of the organizing and the preparation when they do so. Their county chairs are all experienced hands and good friends who have worked together for many years.
Hayes' decision to break his word and to support someone else caused all three of those counties--six votes in total--to flip from being Solid Shickles to Solid Hayes (they weren't solid for Houchin; those counties voted for Don Hayes). That's the outcome of the caucus right there.
Not some change in the wind "grassroots uprising," for those county chairs have held those posts for a long time. Not some great tide of Young Republicans, for those county chairs (while I wouldn't call them old; Jerriann Burroughs sure doesn't look old) are not young. A caucus outcome predicated on a couple of longtime county chairs switching sides after the dishonorable actions of one "old hand" county chairman, whatever else it might be, is not a movement by Young Republicans (or even young Republicans, for that matter). It's also not a "grassroots uprising."
Calling it those things isn't even spin; those things have no relationship at all with what actually happened.
Sources tell HPI that Shickles was vulnerable because of a lack of ties to the southern and eastern parts of the sprawling 9th CD.
This isn't the case, either. There were counties in the eastern part of the district that were quite supportive of Shickles. He was nominated by someone from Switzerland County, and Dee Dee Benkie is from Ripley County. Ohio County never even sends anyone to district meetings or caucuses.
It's misleading and simply untrue to say that he didn't have ties to the southern and eastern parts of the district (I'd consider Harrison County to be from the southern part of the district, and Shickles is from here, after all).
All analyses of the caucus vote go back to Don Hayes and to the counties in the western part of the district that flipped when he broke his word.
“This was neither ideological or personal, just time for change, fresh blood, new energy, openness and better internal communication,” one source told HPI. “The new leadership was not a stalking horse for anyone and the campaign was classic bottom-up and not planned in advance by any central authority. Erin stepped up to the plate at the 11th hour when no one else did and made some very smart moves, including asking Hayes to join her.”
Boy, this is a load. Who talks like this, except when they want to try and misdirect from those very things being precisely the case?
Houchin, who Republican sources said had a baby two days later, could represent a new tide in the 9th CD. She is reportedly friends with Paoli attorney Todd Young, who is preparing a challenge in 2010 against Rep. Hill. Sources say that a number of the Young Republicans did not have close ties to former congressman Sodrel, who has run against Hill four times, winning one term in 2002.
First, we're told that Houchin is not a stalking horse for anyone. Then, in the next paragraph, her ties to Todd Young are touted. I'd say that those two statements would seem to be at odds with each other (though Todd Young insists he had no involvement at all in the caucus).
And, again, one has to wonder who these "Young Republicans" that made all of the difference are. There's a line being sold here about the supposed youthful grassroots uprising of YRs simply doesn't bear out when compared to the facts of what actually transpired. It's all well and good to say that Houchin is a young, fresh face that won. It's not accurate to say that she won as a part of some youthful uprising or even that she won because of having a young, fresh face.
And last comes
this, from this week's Howey report:
Sodrel made an appeal on behalf of Shickles, who limited Houchin to a two-minute presentation before the caucus, then spoke about 15 minutes himself before he was defeated.
Mike Sodrel was not present at the caucus; he was out of state (on business or vacation, I'm not certain which). I have been told that he tried to call Don Hayes (who was a staffer for Sodrel when Mike was in Congress) on the Friday before the caucus to speak with him, and that Hayes never returned his calls.
Second, Erin Houchin was not limited in the amount of time that she spoke. She did only speak for two minutes and Shickles did speak for fifteen, but that was not because Shickles limited her or cut her off.
Mark Wynn of Jefferson County, who seconded Houchin's nomination, asked for the ability to make a rebuttal; that request was denied (though I personally think that a spirited debate between the two candidates, while it would have taken additional time, would have been useful given the brevity of the "campaign" involved). Her nomination speech (read like a resume recital from a prepared text) was faltering and nervous, and I doubt that she would have done better with an unprepared rebuttal (let alone an extended debate between the two). I would have gladly spent another hour there to see the two of them have that back-and-forth.
Anyhow, the party rules (which are freely available online to anyone that wants to read
them; PDF warning) provide no time limitations on these caucus presentations (though some committees adopt such limitations separately). The only time there is a two minute rule is in nomination speeches to the convention. If Erin Houchin was running for district chairman, presumably she would have known this had she read the rules that would be governing her election.
If Shickles had really been committed to a sort of ram-down befitting of Seth Denbo, the rules created an opening for that possibility. Houchin filed via email (a filing was mailed later, but did not arrive in Indianapolis before the deadline). Under the rules, archaic as they are, such filings do not stand if they are disputed. Had Shickles disputed Houchin's filing, the rules provide that there would have been no choice but to toss out her candidacy entirely. Larry Shickles would have then been unopposed.
One thing that can be said about Larry Shickles is that he knows the rules (both in the lack of limitation on speaking and in the matter of disputing filings), so the fact that he provided no limitation on speaking times (and utilized it) hardly says anywhere near as much about the caucus as his decision not to dispute Houchin's filing and get it thrown out.
Again, the reality of what actually happened tells a very different story from what actually gets reported. But when people go out with agendas to peddle and spins to perpetrate, they deserve to be answered (since apparently very little independent verification work is being done in these cases by the reporter himself).
Hopefully, this will be the last time I have to talk about this whole affair and the sad sacks that are peddling this fanciful storyline so at odds with reality, but don't think for a minute that I won't come back to it if necessary.
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