This weekend Brett Farley made national news by resigning from the OKGOP leadership team over his rejection of Donald Trump as the standard bearer. Today he unveiled his plan for overhauling how the party selects it's nominees. It's far to say Farley is not a Tea Party darling or Liberty Caucus orchestrator.
His solutions seem more like a return to the smoke-filled rooms where enlightened party fathers conduct litmus tests and pump white smoke up the chimney when they have a nominee.
The effort is called "The 1966 Project". Those who worked had for the Barry Goldwater campaign of 1964 will not see this title as a welcome sign.
The Rockefeller Republicans of 1966 worked hard to rid the party leadership of any allies of Goldwater. Among Nelson Rockefeller's allies were US Senator Prescott Bush and Michigan Governor George Romney. Their great concern was that Ronald Reagan may try to build on the Goldwater movement.Their offspring are treating the Trump insurgeancy in much the same way Rockefeller treated Goldwater.
His solutions seem more like a return to the smoke-filled rooms where enlightened party fathers conduct litmus tests and pump white smoke up the chimney when they have a nominee.
The effort is called "The 1966 Project". Those who worked had for the Barry Goldwater campaign of 1964 will not see this title as a welcome sign.
The Rockefeller Republicans of 1966 worked hard to rid the party leadership of any allies of Goldwater. Among Nelson Rockefeller's allies were US Senator Prescott Bush and Michigan Governor George Romney. Their great concern was that Ronald Reagan may try to build on the Goldwater movement.Their offspring are treating the Trump insurgeancy in much the same way Rockefeller treated Goldwater.
The 1966 Project
by Brett Farley
| Folks, yesterday I teased an announcement concerning the question I’ve been asked repeatedly over the last 48 hours: “What’s next for you?” So, here it is. For far too long the Republican Party nationally and more particularly in the state of Oklahoma has been unable to properly vet candidates for public office. That Donald Trump ascended to the top of our ticket is the rotten fruit of that reality. But there are others. If the party of Lincoln is to rise from our present situation in the depths of political despair, it will only happen by actively seeking out qualified, principled candidates in whom we can place our full trust as delegates for the commonweal. That we have elected officials proposing legislation which cannot even pass the smell test of legal scrutiny; that bills are filed routinely aimed at poking a finger in the collective eye of the federal government while ignoring crises at home; that we have allowed ourselves to shrink to the status as perpetual opposition party in spite of a governing majority all demand a higher standard. That our party apparatus cannot solve this problem, not least because of developments in campaign finance laws, demands another solution. As of today, I have begun the necessary steps, along with colleagues, of forming the 1966 Project. The Project will have political action committees with federal and state components designed to recruit, train and fund candidates who present the sort of character and ability that befit the party of Lincoln and its founding vision. The Project will specifically target primaries in order to better ensure our best candidates are put to the fore of the electoral process. To be sure, we have such principled elected leaders already serving our state, colleagues who take seriously that standard. The Project aims to build on their example and send more leaders to join them. We’ve already identified our first few candidates, and we’ll have plenty more to announce in the coming weeks and months as we continue to build in preparation for 2018. We invite you to join us in our effort to rebuild and modernize the party of Lincoln, Roosevelt and Eisenhower, advancing a vision of positive, forward-looking leadership for our state and our nation. |
