Jackie Seal, American hero

Grilled by MSNBC's Norah O'Donnell at a Palin book signing, where 17-year-old Jackie was wearing a T-shirt that said: "The US government handed out $700 billion in Wall Street bailouts and all I got was this lousy T-shirt."

And you've got to love Jackie's description of the core principles: "The Constitution was written so that government would be limited and so that it didn't become out-of-control and was in the hands of the people."

You can bet she didn't learn that in public school.

UPDATE: Wow, I just discovered that Jackie is one of my Twitter friends. I had no idea who she was, but it turns out my hunch was right: She didn't learn that in public school. She attends a Christian academy and has already signed a soccer scholarship for a Christian college.

Oh, yeah, and "progressive" blog-trolls hate her. It's only a matter of time before she's denounced by Rachel Maddow. She may even make Keith Olbermann's "Worst Person In The World" list, which is every young conservative's life-goal nowadays.

UPDATE II: Dude! She's got a blog! (Listen, Jackie, my twin sons are also 17 years old. Both Christian home-schooled kids. They're probably unworthy of you, but just keep them in mind, OK?)

NY23 Farewell: Final deadline in the Buffalo airport; final wisdom to come

The National Desk is about to head south, toward home, where I'm awaited by a wife, six kids, two dogs and innumerable cats who haven't seen me in a week. I just filed 1,400 words for the December print edition of The American Spectator -- subscribe now! -- and three weeks of campaign-trail frenzy are over.

Just another hour or so to decompress and pack up the rented Nissan, and I'll be rolling down the highway, dodging the state police radar traps. Heaven knows what the rental agency will say when they see the (minor, superficial) damage to the Nissan caused by my low-speed collision with a deer when I made the mistake of slowing down in Tupper Lake.

That was six days ago. Seems like forever. Please hit the tip jar. And pray.

UPDATE: OK, I've now sent the photos and the editors are talking about how many pages the article will run in the December issue -- subscribe now! -- but it was impossible to summarize in a mere 1,400 words what has happened in NY23. The people involved in the Hoffman campaign were all aware that they were working to develop a new model for connecting Republican candidates to the conservative grassroots.

As I was lashing together my article, it seemed to me that the tipping-point of the Hoffmania momentum shift was Oct. 16, when the Siena poll showed Hoffman surging while Scozzafava had fallen behind the Democrat. That was the same day Michelle Malkin's column called Scozzafava "An ACORN-Friendly, Big Labor-Backing, Tax-and-Spend Radical in GOP Clothing."

Two weeks later, the final Siena poll confirmed what the Hoffman people had known for some time: Dede was heading for a weak third-place finish. So the RINO quit and repaid the GOP Establishment by endorsing Democrat Bill Owens. Exposing RINOs as untrustworthy creatures was worth whatever damage might be suffered by having Owens in Congress -- until next year, when the freshman Democrat will face a re-energized GOP grassroots in NY23.

Go back and read my "Memo to the Grassroots." I didn't know it at the time, but that Hot Air Green Room post was written the same day that Yates Walker decided to hire on as manager of the Plattsburgh office of the Hoffman campaign. Yates was just one of several people who helped turn the Hoffman campaign into such a stunning dynamo of grassroots energy.

Yesterday morning in Saranac Lake, Hoffman spokesman Rob Ryan -- whose insights appeared here more than once, attributed to a "campaign source" -- told me to make sure to say some kind words about the Hoffman staffers. The campaign managers, Dan Tripp and Matt Moran, were in charge of organizing and directing the campaign.

Pollster John McLaughlin and press aide Sandy Caligiore did important work, as did HQ press man Sean Kennedy and logistics operative Sean Mahoney. Tripp's key aides O'Brien Murray and Jake Menges were important, as was Rick Ahearn, who learned to do advance work with Ronald Reagan. Bob Adney ran the Watertown office, while local Tea Party activists Jill Bernstone and Sil Johnson ran the operations in Madison and Oswego counties.

Just got off the phone with Dan Tripp, who would no doubt laugh at the idiocy of Rachel Maddow:

This wasn't about a bunch of extremists purging a moderate. To begin with, Dede Scozzafava is no "moderate" and the people who made the Hoffman campaign such a dynamo were no more "extremist" than that dangerous right-winger, Ronald Reagan.

Dan Tripp says the basic problem is that the GOP establishment has gotten used to outsourcing campaign work to high-priced consultants, to the neglect of old-fashioned "boots on the ground" volunteer organizing. And who can disagree? The Republican Party has some analogs of perennial Democratic loser Bob Shrum -- the overpaid "expert" who knows everything except how to win elections -- and these professional losers have been collecting fat fees for failure.

Doug Hoffman was willing to stand up and fight, and by doing so, helped awaken the Ordinary American to the possibility of what can be done if people will take on an active role as citizens, becoming involved with the political process and refusing to let the "experts" boss them around.

As Yates Walker told me over breakfast Wednesday morning at the Blue Moon Cafe on Main Street in Saranac Lake: "I couldn't be prouder." So I'm heading south with my head held high, and with hope in my heart.

The NY23 National Desk is now closed, and the next stop is home. Thanks for your prayers.

HOFFMANIA LIVES!

NY23: Ordinary Americans make miracles happen; start doing what you can

Letter to the editor, Watertown (N.Y.) Daily Times:

It has recently come to my attention that the Republican Party bosses met behind closed doors to select the candidate for the special election to fill the vacancy created by the appointment of John McHugh to the office of Army secretary.
They selected Dede Scozzafava, a liberal member of the state Assembly. She received the same Planned Parenthood award that was awarded to Hillary Clinton. With President Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pushing an anti-life agenda through the House, we do not need another pro-abortion politician in Washington.
Let's send a message: both the Democratic and Republican candidates are pro-abortion, but the Conservative candidate Doug Hoffman is pro-life. On Nov. 3, pull the lever for Doug Hoffman on the Conservative line and cast a vote for life.
Ann Dougherty

To repeat what I wrote in "Memo to the Grassroots":

One of the problems that hinders grassroots activists from making a difference is that they see problems so big that they think to themselves, "What's the point? I'm just one person. I'm not important. Why waste my time? There's nothing I can do anyway." . . .
The reason the GOP national leadership is so out of touch is because too many grassroots conservatives don't know how to fight back against the RINOs and sellouts and self-serving GOP headquarters staffers who collect fat paychecks for screwing up over and over again. . . .

If you haven't read that essay yet, you should do so now. Because if all you're going to do is sit around whining, "What can I do?" you're part of the problem, not part of the solution.

Don't become discouraged and start telling yourself that you can't do anything to fight back. Doing the little things you can do -- like sending short, clear, well-reasoned letters to the editor of your local paper -- is the key to successful grassroots activism. "Steady licks kill the Devil," they say.

Ms. Dougherty's letter boiled down to its essence a key point about the NY23 special election, namely that it was the "lords of the backroom" who picked Scozzafava as the GOP candidate. How many people in the 23rd District are really aware of that dirty little secret? With that one letter, then, Ms. Dougherty may have struck an important blow for Hoffman by helping inform local readers about the real story of this election, namely the battle between the grassroots and the out-of-touch Republican elite.

That's just one example of the difference the Ordinary American can make, if you'll ignore those pessimistic Eeyores who are always spreading negative gloom and doom by telling you there's no point trying, because you're certain to lose. If Doug Hoffman had listened to that kind of advice -- when he was growing up poor, pumping gas at age 14 to earn money -- he never would have become a successful businessman, and he sure wouldn't be running for Congress today.

The Doug Hoffman campaign collected $116,000 online in a single day last week. This morning, I spoke with a campaign source who told me that the overwhelming majority of those donations were in the $20-$50 range.

Think about that. Raising a six-figure sum -- in one day! -- with the average donor contributing less than $35. If you haven't kicked in yet, what are you waiting for? And if you've already given the Hoffman campaign $20 or $50, how about another $10 or $20 just to say, "Keep up the good work?"

HOFFMANIA: CATCH IT!

Our complete coverage of the NY23 special election

(Cross-posted at Hot Air Greenroom and Not One Red Cent.)

Joe the Plumber: Ordinary American

Last year, I started using the term "Ordinary American" to describe people who aren't part of the influential elite class, the kind of people David Brooks sneers at when he uses "populism" as a pejorative. People like Joe Wurzelbacher:

Joe the Plumber is an Ordinary American, someone whose existence is lived outside the world where elite opinion is ubiquitous and omnipotent.
The Ordinary American is not a journalist, a movie producer, an academic or a politician. News media, entertainment, education and politics are endeavors that shape public attitudes, and for this reason the elite have striven for decades to exclude from those fields anyone who might dispute their consensus. . . .
Why doesn’t the Ordinary American endorse the consensus? Or, perhaps more accurately, why does the Ordinary American (whatever his personal opinion on such issues) not become furiously angry when he encounters dissent from the consensus?
Well, if you’re a plumber -- or an accountant or a truck driver or a small business owner -- your ability to fulfill your hopes and ambitions is not dependent on the approval of the elite. For most people in Toledo, Ohio, getting hired or getting promoted has nothing to do with their willingness to parrot the “correct” opinion on tax cuts or foreign policy. . . .
Why do I relate more easily to guys like Joe Wurzelbacher than to the elites who condemn him? Maybe it’s because I spent most of my life far from Washington, D.C., where nobody cared about my opinions. Maybe it’s because my family and friends -- my truck-driving brothers, my childhood buddy the school cafeteria supervisor, my sister-in-law the dental hygienist -- are so much like Joe.
The ironic point is that a guy like Joe the Plumber doesn’t care the least what you or I think of him. He doesn’t care whether we like him or not. He is proudly independent and unafraid to speak his mind. He is that extraordinary individual, the Ordinary American.

Please read the whole thing. And click here to buy a T-shirt: