Our nation was blessed by the wisdom of three men in the past century. Alfred Sloan was a management genius who built General Motors into a colossus. General George C. Marshall reached past a generation of senior generals to select four younger men to lead our troops against the Nazi’s in World War II, and then developed the plan to rebuild war-torn Europe. Jack Welch became the model of a chief executive and built GE into the most prolific training ground for successful corporate chief executives in the world. Sloan, Marshall and Welch all had something in common. They thought that selecting the leaders for their organizations was one of the most important things they did. They almost always picked the right person, for the right job, that was needed for the next two years.

            The Republican National Committee has the same task before it; to select the right person for the next two years. The future of the party and potentially our country, depend upon the quality of that decision.

            So what do we need for the next two years? Well for one thing, we know it must not be “more of the same”. We cannot afford another election in 2010 like the ones in 2006 and 2008. The change must be significant, not incremental.

We know that we cannot continue to lag behind in our use of technology, especially the internet, and we cannot continue to neglect building the grassroots.  We know that if a candidate for Chairman of the RNC does not have a well thought out plan to strengthen those two elements, then they probably should not be considered. 

But technology and grassroots building are merely tactical issues. What is needed is a strategic approach. We need to realize that for improved technology and grassroots building to work, we must attract, inspire and motivate people. 

Look at what BlueStatesDigital did for Obama. They provided fairly common technology, supported by fairly common technologists, to deliver highly compelling messages two, three, four times per week from the time they collected someone’s email address right through the election. They became a pumping station for volunteers and dollars.

The people who crafted the messages that pulled in people and money were not technologists. BlueStatesDigital gives them the title “strategist”. They know how to communicate with people who have never been interested in politics before, and get them engaged. They know how to appeal to people who would have never considered making a political contribution, and get $5 from them either through Pay-Pal or their Daddy’s credit card. Politics is all about “winning the hearts and minds” of the people. The technology was merely the hammer. The “strategists” were the carpenters.

In order for a strategy to attract, inspire and motivate people to be viable, we need a compelling message. Obama used the themes of “Hope” and “Change”. Our compelling message is the core principles espoused in our Party Platform. We know that the overwhelming majority of Americans agree with those principles. So why did they vote for the other guy? Because they don’t associate the Republican Party with them. We don’t communicate them often enough, or clearly enough, or loudly enough. All too often we apologize for them, or sacrifice them in order to curry favor with the media or to try to get the Democrats to like us because we’re “being nice”, an unconditional and unilateral cease-fire that has never been reciprocated in my memory. 

Actions speak louder than words to our natural majority, and when we abandon our principles we pay for it at the polls, regardless of our excuses.   

I think we have two outstanding choices among the candidates for RNC Chairman who could be that “right person” for the next two years. Both of them appear to “get it” about the hammers of technology and grassroots, but even more so they “get it” about the nails of effectively and continuously voicing and practicing the Republican principles, because that’s what we need to do to win back the hearts and minds of the American people. They are leaders who can attract and develop more leaders to rebuild the party. Let us hope that the RNC picks one of them.

Note: The 168 members of the Republican National Committee are the Chairman, National Committeeman and National Committeewoman of the fifty states, plus Washington, D.C. and five U.S. Territories. They are usually identified on the website of your state Republican Party or equivalent.

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