The Usual Suspects
Liberal blogger John Deeth (he of the raspberry beret) has an excellent post on Saturday's fundraiser for flood relief in Cedar Rapids. I also meet blogger Lynda Waddington of Iowa Independent. The event was keynoted by Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. Jindal was considered by many to be a possible VP pick for John McCain this summer. Jindal went on to Des Moines to keynote the Iowa Family Policy Center's fall fundraiser.
Jindal gave a good speech. He is certainly a rising star in our party. As governor of Louisiana, he had to stay at home to deal with Hurricane Gustav during the Republican National Convention. He didn't get his Obama moment but keep an eye on him — he is going places.
While this was a non-partisan flood relief effort, Deeth is right when he says that "you wouldn't know it from the crowd." It was a Who's Who of Eastern Iowa Republicans.
From the podium, Peter Teahen, who lost the 2nd District congressional primary, spoke about flood relief and the ubiquitous Bob VanderPlaats introduced Governor Jindal. In the audience was 2nd District Congressional candidate Marianette Miller-Meeks.
The head tables had Ag Secretary Bill Northey, GOP Supervisor-elect (doesn't it sound great saying that!!!) Brent Oleson, HD 29 candidate Emma Nemecek, Linn County CC member Jason Besler and Billboard Bob Klaus.
I sat at a table of Republicans including another National Convention Delegate. I spoke with Johnson County CC Chair Bill Kietel and Bob Anderson from the McCain campaign. I saw Clayton County chair Gwen Eilers (who ran a write-in campaign for Steve Rathje) and I spoke briefly with Steve Rathje and Party Co-Chair Leon Mosely.
Muscatine county GOP secretary Carolyn Williams introduced herself. I also saw former Linn County CC chairman Eric Rosenthal and from Fayette County, former State Central Committee member David Hansen. There were also several of my friends from the Linn County Central Committee in attendance.
We may be a dysfunctial family, but we are a family just the same. Governor Jindal's parents are Indian but he was born and raised in Louisiana. So as he would put it with his southern drawl:
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