Congressman Matt Strawn?
- Wednesday, July 22, 2009, 9:15
- Krusty Konservative
- 962 views
- 2 comments
Now that we’re half the way through 2009, our attention starts to focus on the elections in 2010. We have an active race for the Republican gubernatorial nomination underway, but there are many other key races that have yet to take shape.
At the top of the list are challengers to Democratic incumbents for Congress, and of particular interest to many, the challenger to Congressman Leonard Boswell. Of the three Democratic controlled congressional seats in the Iowa delegation, Iowa’s 3rd District remains the best pickup opportunity.
Chairman Matt Strawn has been very active in the past several months, especially since becoming the RPI’s new Chairman. He’s hired numerous fundraisers, a couple of full timers, a couple of part timers, and handful of vendors. He’s brought on an experienced Executive Director, and added substantial beef to the communications division of the Party with the addition of Danielle Plogmann. He’s tweeting, Facebooking, texting, posting videos on YouTube, and traveling extensively.
But I’ve heard from some sources who tell me that Strawn has his eyes on a congressional seat…and intends to challenge Boswell and make a bid for Iowa’s 3rd congressional seat, which is fine. We need aggressive candidates challenging the status quo, and Boswell typifies the status quo more than anyone.
The question though is when? We need a candidate to step forward now, but he’s the party chair. How would that work? If he waits until 2012 who knows what redistricting will do since Iowa is likely to lose a seat in congress.
If you look back at various Chairmen of the Republican Party, you can see that good things usually happen to them if they do a good job of doing what they promised to do: elect members of their party to seats all over the state. Kayne Robinson, Brian Kennedy, and Chuck Larson all proved that if you do what you were elected to do as RPI Chair, other doors will open. None of them were as bold at self-promotion as Strawn has been.
I think there is little doubt that Strawn has eyes on a congressional seat. But the best course of action for Stawn is to put his head down, honor his commitment to the State Central Committee, and help guide us through the critical elections of 2010.
But what if he doesn’t want to wait? Then what?
About the Author
Krusty Konservative has written 221 stories on this site.
Herschel Krustofski is the pseudonym for the anonymous author of Krusty Konservative, a blog which focuses on Iowa Politics. Created in February of 2006, Krusty Konservative is the undisputed heavyweight champion of the Iowa blogosphere. Since its conception, Krusty Konservative has never shied from tackling controversial issues, and providing insight to the inner workings of Republican politics in Iowa.
2 Comments on “Congressman Matt Strawn?”
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Krusty you pose some good questions. As much as I like Strawn I do hope that he honors his commitments as the honestly elected chair of RPI. If in the near future he wants to run for elected office I would suggest to him that he runs against Harkin for that US Senate seat. But right now we need him leading RPI back into control of the Statehouse.
Al I agree, we cannot afford to change up leadership in the middle of this election cycle. I think Matt is doing a good job, despite what a certain talk host says. I heard Roberts on the radio today and although I agree with a lot of what he said, I’d much rather he stay in the House and concentrate on helping our team effort there.