My opinion
WARNING: This is my livejournal...in it is my space to post my opinions on whatever I choose to...therefore if you have a problem with it...dont read it. It is my opinion and I have every right to post it here.
OK..with the disclaimer out of the way today I am posting my opinion on what is going on in the College Republicans at UT-San Antonio. I must say that it troubles me. Fall of 2004 I was very excited to have joined because it was my thought that this organization was a group of people who were simply wanting to get Republicans elected in our area (that being Bexar County and San Antonio). What I got was a group of power-hungry individuals. That fall semester we were told a story about how our chapter chairman lost an unfair election. True it was not the most democratic of elections but with what the Texas Federation of College Republicans constitution said at the time it was fair and just.
OK...so the TFCR constitution provided for something called the Nominations Committee...this committee would meet and be comprised of chairs from 5 different schools. This committee would decide who they felt was best qualified for the positions of Chairman, Vice Chair, etc. Each university had delegates to our state convention and unless there was 2 dissenting votes on the comittee the nominations committee would be able to elect a slate of officers (thus the delegates from each university wouldnt get the chance to vote). now yes while this is unfair and while I too thought it needed changed our chairman had 1 year to do so before he chose to run for state chairman, but he didnt.
At the 2005 TFCR State Convention he lost his bid for state chairman and then the theatrics took over. We walked out of the convention and a few weeks later our chapter seceeded from the state federation. Now I didnt support leaving the federation but I dont think that there was any secret of that but once we did i decided to stick behind my chapter and did so.
Now up until recently I believed that our credentials information was right and that we had 507 members...howeber recently I was informed that there were a number of duplications and people on the membership list that had never paid dues and never attended one single meeting. However, our chairman emeritus has something different to say about this ..."the year I was elected chairman of the University of Texas at San Antonio College Republicans. ... We had membership drives every week and eventually grew our membership list to one of the largest in the US. But more than that, active involvement in the UTSA College Republicans grew to the point where we routinely had nearly a hundred people showing up to meetings, volunteering for events, holding pro-Bush rallies." But if you were there you would know that there was never anywhere near 100 people at meetings or events. Except for maybe the first couple or so.
Marc Cavazos (chairman emeritus) also says that others "have accused me of being a sore loser and a “failed candidate” for office; they both know this is not true. We never had an election. I am confident that had there been an election, I would have prevailed. I can assure you that if I had lost, I would have accepted it and that would be that. I’ve lost before, I’ll lose again. That’s the way it goes, it’s not that big a deal." Yet, while there was no election the process of the way our officers are chosen in the TFCR was set and Marc agreed to go by the provisions in the constitution (which has been changed to allow for a more democratic selection of state officers) and when he didnt get his way he was like a little kid and decided to 'pick up his toys and go home.' Thats fine for him but he has ruined the credibility of our chapter and has left us with no higher ups to help us in state wide campaigns. We couldnt even get a Republican mayor elected in San Antonio...I mean you have to get more than 8 people to work on a campaign to make it work...more on that another day...Im done for now
Andres Bocanegra
Texas Republican