Author: marionvermazen

I am a traveler, hiker, avid reader, Sun alumnus, computer geek, Spanish and French language student, knitter and genealogist. I am retired after working for almost 30 years in the Computer Industry. I live in Reno, Nevada with my husband Duke.

Nevada Republican Executive Committee will Pick Delegates to National Convention

If you have been reading my posts about the Nevada Republican state convention or if you have been following the story in the news you know that the original Republican State Convention was adjourned after the Ron Paul delegates staged a coup. The party elite said that they would schedule a reconvened convention soon. The original convention was April 27. They finally got around to scheduling a part 2 convention for this Saturday July 26. The Reno Gazette Journal ran a story Friday saying the new convention has been canceled and the party central committee will pick state delegates to the national convention. I think this was what the party elite wanted all along after the Ron Paul supporters took over the first convention and it was clear that if the convention elected delegates they would be Ron Paul delegates not John McCain delegates. I'm a John McCain supporter but his back room politics makes me question whether I want to be a loyal Republican in the Fall!

The next chapter of this cliff hanger drama will be when the national Republican party credentials committee meets to decide whether they should seat the delegates picked by the central committee or the delegates picked by the Ron Paul supporters at the alternate part 2 convention they staged on June 28. I wonder if the meeting is open to the public. It would be very entertaining to listen to the arguments.

Update 8/8/08: I emailed the party and asked them whenthe Credentials committee meets and whether it is open to the public. Here is the answer:
Hello and thank you for your interest in the 2008 Republican National Convention.
The Convention Committees that meet the week prior to the convention are not open to the pubic.
Thank you for your questions.

The New Road from Interstate 80 into Sierra Canyon is Open

Anyone who has ever visited us has experienced the 6 roundabouts that you have to go through to get to our house in Sierra Canyon. If you were coming from California this meant going to exit 9 and then essentially doing a u-turn after getting off the freeway and going five or so miles back to the west.

As long as we have lived here they have been working on a new road which  comes into the back side of Sierra Canyon. The long awaited road opened last Friday. If you are coming to our house from the west you exit 80 at the first exit in Nevada (exit 2) and drive through Verdi to the new road Somersett Ridge Parkway. If you are coming from the east you get off 80 at exit 5 and essentially do a U-turn at the new roundabout to get on Somersett Ridge Parkway.

It is very exciting. The new road makes a huge improvement to our drive into Reno. It will be interesting to see when the new road get on to the mapping sites.

Crag Lake Hike 026

Updating my Blog Roll with some Local Reno Blogs

I'm adding some Reno blogs to my list of blogs I always read in the side bar.

  • Local So-and-So – Be Interesting is the golden rule of blogging. Ron is a new blogger who is writing an interesting blog from the start. We both attended the Nevada Republican conventions and have enjoyed comparing notes on the circus that is Nevada Republican Politics. His post about the alternate convention gives a different perspective than mine.
  • Reno Realty Blog – We moved into our house in Reno exactly one year ago. It has been fun to explore Reno and learn about what is going on. This blog about Reno real Estate is always interesting and I've picked up lots of interesting tid bits about neighborhoods, prices, and Reno by reading it. The latest post about a Real estate auction in Somersett (our development) has interesting comments about real estate auctions and whether they are real.
  • Downtown Reno News – Downtown Reno is Great!  The guy who writes this blog lives downtown. He walks his dog through downtown every day and chronicles what is happening as Reno continues to improve the downtown area. In his side bar he comments how downtown Reno was a dump 7 years ago and now in his words Reno has:

"a thriving community downtown. New retail businesses are popping
up every month, there are actually neighborhoods and districts forming
in the downtown Reno area, and the river park draws a huge number of
people in the summer. This winter, the ice rink has been packed every
single night it is open."

Nevada Republican State Convention Alternate Group Tries to Reconvene

Last April the Nevada Republican party held the state convention to elect delegates to the national convention. The convention didn’t go as scripted by the party bosses and the Ron Paul faction of the party was able to pass a rules change that said all nominated delegate candidates should be voted on. Soon after that the convention chairman abruptly recessed the convention, saying it would be reconvened at a later date.

I am a  state Republican delegate and since the April convention I have received announcements about two different attempts to reconvene the convention. The official party date to reconvene the convention is Saturday July 26.

Yesterday a splinter group of Republicans who feel that the state party is trying to disenfranchise them reconvened the convention on their own. Most, if not all, of them are Ron Raul supporters who feel that the Nevada Republican bosses are trying every trick in the book to make sure that the Nevada delegates to the national convention are McCain supporters.

Republican convention part 2 004

I received the announcements about the alternate convention. I didn’t want to contribute to their numbers and to their ability to get a quorum but I was curious about  the convention so yesterday I went to it, got a visitor badge and listened for a while.

It certainly wasn’t a diverse cross section of Republicans. There was unanimous support to nominate and elect Mike Weber as chairman. I called Weber a jerk in an earlier post. I’m sorry about that. You have to admire someone who cares so passionately about politics and who is wiling to work so hard for what he believes in.

It was very clear that Weber and his friends had scripted this convention to take the steps that they believe will allow them to make a case for their delegates being recognized by the national Republican Party. Weber said that to make the case for yesterday’s convention being official they have “a small hole to get through”.

They made a big deal of the fact that a list of the delegates to the April convention was never released. They announced that delegates not present at yesterday’s continuation of the April convention are in dereliction of their duty and therefore the 352 delegates present yesterday constituted a quorum. I left before they elected delegates but Local So-and-So another Republican blogger who attended yesterday wrote a good post about the convention .

While I was there I did get interviewed by the Associated Press reporter, Martin Griffith and I got quoted in this mornings paper.  As I said to Griffith it doesn’t bode well for McCain’s chances in Nevada that 352 Nevada Republicans were willing to go through all that was necessary to make this alternate convention happen.

On the other hand, there were 1,347 delegates at the April convention. If the 352 delegates present yesterday were enough to reconvene then wouldn’t 5 also have been enough to reconvene. It doesn’t seem to me that the delegates elected yesterday should be seated at the national convention. I wonder how many people  will attend the ‘official ‘ state convention at the end of July. This saga will be continued.


Mike Weber being interviewed by AP reporter Martin Griffith. Republican convention part 2 013
Republican convention part 2 007

The rest of my pictures from the convention are on Flickr  here.