“My name is Michael Knudsen. I’m a recent UCSD College Republican alumni.

Here’s what I see, as an alumni.

The CCR Executive Board has given me, and every single solitary UCSD CR alumni, the finger.

You have told us that a 23 year old organization…does not matter.

Nor does anyone now or previously involved in that organization.

http://tinyurl.com/cdscog

For the record, that again is the (now former) UCSD College Republican official response to the board vote.

Of course, in politics, one can’t always be certain what the meaning of the word “is” is.

So, apparently, one side’s de-chartering is another side’s misunderstanding from “disenfranchised opportunists.”

(Just as an aside, I thought, as Republicans, disenfranchising people wasn’t our thing?)

http://tinyurl.com/d2nudo

“No chapters were un-chartered, and no one removed from the organization. The vote was simply to determine which club was the rightful owner of the original UCSD charter based on the facts presented and the actions of those involved.”

Ok…So, if one club is deemed to be the rightful owner of the original UCSD Charter, which the Exec Board said now belongs to the Triton College Republicans (with their proud 50 day old history)…just where, pray tell, does that leave the original UCSD CRs?

The original UCSD Charter, which once belonged to them, now, does not.

“Oh, you weren’t un-chartered, guys. You just don’t have your charter anymore. Get it?”

And how, pray tell, are alumni supposed to feel about this?

Taking a step back from the entire sorry affair that got us here, what has happened?

Based on the events with ONE class, the Executive Board has summarily dismissed ALL twenty plus years that came before.

By all means, explain to me why this should not be a big deal to alumni. You know, the people who built and made UCSD CRs into an active and successful chapter for two decades.

Explain to me why one of my best friends, Mark Mendoza, who had a fantastic year as UCSD CR Chair, should not care about the Executive Board’s vote. Explain to me how this in no way negates his work, and the work of all the other UCSD CR Chairs. Explain to me why Inez shouldn’t care about this.

For that matter, tell me what you have to say to those 500+ individuals who are on the UCSD CR mailing list.

Explain to me how your statement to them does NOT go something like this: “Hey, thanks for your involvement and interest in the College Republicans.

Now piss off. You don’t matter.”

Two plus two is easy math.

In that same vein, it sure looks like there just might have been just a teeny tiny conflict of interest with this board vote.

I mean, what do I know, right? I’m just a dumb UCSD alumni who doesn’t matter, and I just don’t know what I’m talking about, right?

This decision couldn’t possibly have had anything to do with eliminating opposition votes, and anyone who disagrees is obviously listening to that “sniveling weasel” Alec Weisman.

As an alumni, and more importantly, as a friend of Alec’s, how the hell am I supposed to take that?

How do you, Mr. Wolf, think that comes across not just to alumni, but to outside observers of this matter?

How are they supposed to take this: “Yes Matt Schenk it is a threat.”

You know, when you say that something IS a THREAT, you might not want to act surprised when it is taken as such. Even if you follow with saying that you will “only” embarrass someone, it’s pretty hard not to fixate on the acknowledgment that what you just said was INTENDED to be threatening.

And I’m just wondering, is all this honestly your idea of a mature, reasonable way to resolve this matter?

So you’re pissed that Alec and the UCSD CRs aired out dirty laundry in front of visitors.

Issuing publicly viewable slurs, harassment, and threats is OBVIOUSLY the best way to show that you know how to resolve a crisis. Way to be a better man. Way to show the world how CCR solves its problems. Threats, insults, and intimidation. Truly, that’s an inspiration to the Republican Party.

But I digress.

Back to what I see.

I see a good friend of mine threatened and degraded. Friends of mine, really, including all the current UCSD CRs.

I see an Executive Board flipping off anyone who has ever been involved in UCSD CRs. I see them deciding that an upstart “club” that doesn’t even meet matters more than a 23 year old organization.

I see them siding with individuals who, it seems pretty damned clear, tried to manipulate matters within UCSD CRs to get their way. Worse, they lied to UCSD CR members to try and force the issue on Dejah’s impeachment.

Last I checked, there was a word for that. Starts with “C”, rhymes with “eruption.”

I see my friends and former CR mates trying to exist as a club and move past the strife of this past year, only to be greeted with more threats, intimidation (they’ll never work in politics again), and now, disbarment, because these “Triton Republicans” who didn’t get what they wanted before, through outright lies and deceit, have some friends in high places.

The “Triton Republicans” didn’t get Dejah Stanley kicked out as Chair before, so now, they’re taking the ball home, making their own club…and you just gave them our charter. MY charter.

So really, aside from reminding us that we’re all stupid friends of the sniveling weasel Alex “Wiseman,” do you have anything else to tell CR Alumni? Care to explain how proud CCR is of its actions? I sure as hell hope you are.

I know this much.

If this action is not reversed, and the original charter is not returned to the UCSD CRs, I will make sure to tell my children not to ever bother becoming California College Republicans.

I will tell them that the organization is a waste of their time. I will tell them that it not only tolerates infighting, it picks sides when it suits those in power.

I will tell my children that there is no point in them devoting their passion and their energy to such an outfit. It will only bring them disillusionment and despair. They won’t spend their time actually fighting for what they believe in.

They’ll spend time fighting amongst themselves, and the Executive Board will pick who wins. They won’t actually be mature adults and solve the problem. Oh, and if my kids are on the wrong side, they’ll all be a bunch of sniveling weasels.

My kids deserve better. “

The stress that they have put on this club and the hurt they have done to our ability to further conservative values on campus by undercutting our membership and funds is beyond deplorable, it is quite literally criminal. Their actions leave little room for them to protest to altruistic motives. It is they, and those members of the standing CCR board who have sided with them, whose behavior has been “disgusting.” Not the people who are trying to pick up the pieces.

I did everything possible that I could think of to resolve this in a private and reasonable way. I called everyone involved. I appealed to Cheyenne early on to mediate. I went to the University mediation. Even as late as February, I begged Megan, through Donnellan (because he would still talk to me), to sit down and actually talk to me and work this out. I do not hate Megan. I do not hate Leigh. Their, and others’, principal beef with me seems to be that I will not allow my club members to be threatened and pushed around according what is most politically expedient.

Statement from Matthew Dobler: http://www.collegegop.org/

That’s what prompted my email to him in the first place, since he listed himself as the contact for questions about the meeting or decision. I asked him for concrete evidence that the decision was, in fact, made “without prejudice or personal interest”, and gave him flexibility in choosing the form of this evidence. Again, he did not reply to this email.

As far as argument 4, I thought the following meeting had nominations for replacement Chair, because there is not automatic replacement. Was that before or after the officers who supported impeachment were removed from your club site? If you look at argument 4 and accept the impeachment as true than Inez should have been more worried about why an impeached officer was removing legitimate officers as principle members and holding an election meeting the next week, rather than waiting the weeks in limbo to hold mock impeachments.

An entire month passed between the vote on Dejah’s impeachment and the vote on Megan and Ronsen’s impeachments. Explain to me what could possibly justify Megan not talking to Inez during that period, assuming Dejah’s impeachment was valid. I personally saw Inez try to contact Megan.

Chris, How do you have any idea how much these clubs represent of the state? 10% total and 20% for RSR also implies mathematically that RSR is looming around 50% of the vote, so if we are guessing numbers here I’d guess that RSR would have achieved less than 18.63% of the total vote, even with Inez’s UCSD votes, depending on turnout.

First of all, my ~20% figure was conditional on “a close vote”. If, instead, RSR is instead hopelessly behind, 10% of the whole would actually represent a lot MORE than 20% of the opposition, though this point would be academic.

The “10% of the whole” estimate is based on what I know about recent CCR elections and the expected size of this year’s “College Republicans at UCSD” delegation.

I have no idea what hat you’re pulling the “18.63%” number out of. The inclusion of digits after the decimal point, when there is no precedent for polls achieving that degree of reliability, suggests total ignorance of statistics and the concept of “significant figures”.

Statement from Matthew Dobler: http://www.collegegop.org/

Your statement about the bank account seems to prove that point. Was Megan ever listed on the account? Did she ever have access to it? On some blogs your fellow members admit that someone else was responsible for the discrepancy with the account (with removals, etc). I was told that Inez was questioned on the ExComm call about the claims of voter fraud after stating that Megan committed this fraud in an email, but stumbled after being questioned about whether or not someone else actually sent the email she was being blamed for. The definition of control I was using was the one from the dictionary.

As far as argument 4, I thought the following meeting had nominations for replacement Chair, because there is not automatic replacement. Was that before or after the officers who supported impeachment were removed from your club site? If you look at argument 4 and accept the impeachment as true than Inez should have been more worried about why an impeached officer was removing legitimate officers as principle members and holding an election meeting the next week, rather than waiting the weeks in limbo to hold mock impeachments.

Where do the UCSD CRs “admit she never had control over any of these”? (Unless you’re using a uselessly narrow definition of “control”.) There is an ongoing police investigation regarding the bank accounts, with an associated paper trail. And the claim that everything hinges on the impeachment vote is false — see UCSD Argument #4.

I have yet to see any valid counter to Argument #4. Combine this with the failure of Matthew Dobler to reply to my request for information about the decision (sent on Friday), and I at least have to conclude that our current Executive Committee is not behaving responsibly.

While all of the background who-did-what-to-who and who’s right y’all is interesting and debatable, what does this have to do with CCR? It looks like the executive board was forced to make an uncomfortable decision in choosing one club to charter, and from all of the discussion I’ve read, it looks like they chose triton in good faith. The bickering just makes everyone angry. Move on!

All my firsthand observation indicates that “College Republicans at UCSD” has a far larger active membership than “Triton College Republicans”. Also, the “Triton College Republicans” constitution does not allow members to freely transfer to it from “College Republicans at UCSD” to get their vote counted at CCR. Combine these two, and you don’t have an “uncomfortable decision”, you have straight out disenfranchisement of roughly 10% of the total CCR vote. ~20% of the opposition, in a close vote. So this has everything to do with CCR.

http://gop.ucsd.edu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=44:constitutionality-and-legitimacy&catid=18:constitutional-legitimacy-by-inez-feltscher&Itemid=20