Alan Keyes has more class in his left toenail than Mr. Phillips portrays even in the above post, let alone the so-called “issues” speech he gave at the convention.

The Keyes supporters were almost entirely unable to grasp that someone could actually disagree with their man. But the problems we had with Keyes were always primarily about the issues and nothing else.

Thanks for the polite nature of your post above. Many of the Keyes supporters at his website are acting like a bunch of whiny babies. The only reason Alan Keyes was ever considered a serious contender is because the other hopefuls weren’t coming forward as hoped. The election was over the instant Chuck Baldwin said he would accept the nomination. There is nothing Keyes or his team could have done.

And now they are vilifying Howard Phillips for his speech and talking bad about the Party and where it stands on the issues. But I think some finally get what I have been saying all along, the foreign policy issues were just not negotiable.

I wish you would tell the Keyes supporters to chill with their rhetoric. It was never personal. It was always about the issues. Always. We just fundamentally disagree. It is time for the Keyes supporters to quit questioning people’s motives and come to terms with that. Please pass that on to them.

I listened to Howard Phillips’ speech at the convention and found him to be as wrong on the facts as that Miami paper was. For example, he claimed that the national sales tax proposed by Keyes would ruin the auto industry. That’ seems like utter pap to me. Keyes’ claim that the abolition of the federal income tax would unleash a productivity boom like we have never seen seems much more reasonable a take on the subject.

I talked with a lot of delegates in Kansas City about Keyes’ positions, and there were a wide variety of disagreements. If there had been more time for discussion, maybe Keyes would have been able to change more minds. One of the delegates, for example, said that he had a video at home of Keyes calling for reparations to blacks for slavery. Now, I’ve seen the press reports from the 2004 Illinois race that claimed Keyes did indeed make such a call. Heck, I remember when the wire services picked that story up—I wondered at the time what in the world had happened to Alan Keyes. When some folks at FreeRepublic reminded me a few months ago of those stories, I took the opportunity to ask Keyes about it during one of those conference calls. His explanation was clear, thorough and persuasive. He is not in favor of any such reparations. He agrees with Abraham Lincoln’s conclusion that the blood spilled by those on both sides of that war between the states forever precludes any calls for further recompense for the evils of slavery. Yet, folks still think he has called for reparations. I’ve never heard anybody else claim they had a video of Keyes making such a proposal, so I asked the fellow if he would please send me the video. He graciously called this evening and said he couldn’t find the video, but that he was sending me an MSNBC story. I told him I knew the article he was talking about, and repeated Keyes’ explanation of what he actually said that day versus what was reported. He said that if Keyes had explained the story the way I did, he would not have been hot about the reparations issue any longer. In all fairness, this delegate and his wife did go up to Keyes’ “open door” room and did ask him about reparations. Keyes apparently only gave them part of the answer that he gave me, and they weren’t satisfied. So, maybe with more time, things would have worked out differently.

The week before he came to Kansas City, Alan Keyes held several of those conference calls expressly for delegates. A couple of dozen, maybe even a few dozen, out of the hundreds participated. Many were not informed by their state chair that the calls were being held. I listened in on all of them, and I wish that all the delegates could have done the same. Keyes thoroughly and repeatedly discussed such issues as why it would be a really bad move to withdraw from the UN, why it would be a really bad move to insist that Congress declare war before the President could command the military to engage an enemy, and why folks not privy to the same classified information as the President’s national security team should not be so adamant in claiming that decisions were wrong. All three of these well-reasoned conclusions of Alan Keyes put him at odds with the strongly-held opinions of many of the delegates I met.

I’m one of those folks who joined the Constitution Party last month because of Alan Keyes. Constitution Party Chairman Jim Clymer came on one of the Keyes conference calls and invited us to do so. So did Constitution Party Communications Director Mary Starrett. And so did Constitution Party National Field Director Gary Odom, twice. I sincerely wanted to help the party, and used the phone and email info on the party’s state webpage to volunteer. It turns out that the only contact for my state was pretty much fully occupied by other stuff in his life, 18 days after joining the party, a web domain I set up was listed by national as the state contact URL, and an email forwarding address I provided was being used to have all new queries sent to both the original contact and to me. I was involved day-to-day with some of the national party staff on getting ballot access process rolling here in my state. I came to help, and help was sorely needed. I stayed at the convention and cast my states’ votes for VP. I dropped in at the ball that night and talked again with some folks. Keyes held a conference call that night and indicated that he became a candidate this year because none of the other candidates substantially represented his views, and the nomination of Chuck Baldwin did not change that.

I sent the following email this morning to the CP chairman and the folks with whom I had worked most closely:

Dear Jim and all:

I thought Alan Keyes and the Constitution Party would be a good match. I continue to think that this election is very important for the future of our nation, and that Alan will make a great President. It is my understanding that he will continue his candidacy. I support him in that decision, and will enthusiastically do what I can to help get him elected. I won’t be further pursuing efforts to grow Constitution Party affiliate in Maryland, and expect to promptly remove the Constitution Party affiliation shown on my voter registration here.

If I get reply from the state Board of Elections to the letter I wrote (with questions posed by Alison), I’ll send that reply along to her. I’ll leave the email forwarding to John Wagner in place at the address currently shown on state contact page, but I do not intend to renew the domain registrations for constitutionpartymd.org/.net/.info/.us. I will happily transfer those registrations to another upon request.

Jim, my decision does not change the personal pleasure in meeting you and your wife and many others in Kansas City. I was especially touched by your comments from the podium after Mr. Phillips’ speech on Friday afternoon.

Yours truly,

Steve Schulin
—- END OF EMAIL —-

I got very cordial replies from the chairman and one of the others. The email link on state contact page has been changed back to the original, but they left my website listed.

So that’s my story.

I do agree that they should not have dropped Keyes’ name if they knew he wouldn’t be a good nominee.

Larry Breazeale, Msgt. (ret.) USAF
National Veterans Coalition of the
Constitution party…www.nvets.org

He scored better in ALL of his Senate races….

Yes it would have been nice to have a national figure like Alan Keyes be the CP nominee but not at price of the party’s rationale of being. Howard Phillips understands this as well as anyone. Now maybe he could used more tact and not given such a nasty speech, but he is correct in stating why many members of the party could not support a Keyes candidacy.

I would like the Keyes folks to stay in the party as well, but unfortunately it seems, they are as welded to him personally as Jim Jones followers were to Jonestown. Any objective person would realize Alan Keyes day in the sun has come and gone given all his election defeats, all the bridges he’s burnt, all the problems he’s had with the FEC and any organized party he’s been in. Maybe being a true independent is his calling since he seemingly can’t get along with anyone else. Maybe this time he knows what he’s doing. Even so, the future for those conservatives who don’t want to vote for GOP that’s abandoned them is the Constitution Party. There’s no other conservative party that is as organized and established across the country and hopefull Chuck Baldwin will allow to grow and strengthen further.

Good points all. Keyes just didnt come in there to win.

For the record, I supported Keyes in 2000, and came in to CP as a former Duncan Hunter supporter. I was open minded about Keyes, but also knew from talking with Howard Phillips that there was concern about Keyes just jumping in. It isn’t exactly fair to say he was just jumping in, as Keyes rightfully points out that he has stumped at CP conventions and for their causes many times.

However, Keyes was not wise in his approach. In part because 1) the person he has selected as his National Campaign Director, who was rude (and seemed bitter—but can’t be sure of his motive, just his actions!), and seems to view Keyes from a more messianic view than I am comfortable with (I didn’t like it with some of Paul’s supporters, and I don’t like it w/ Keyes supporters either!) His NCD kept referencing his media contacts and interviews, how there were all these donations waiting to come in if Keyes was the nominee, etc, and was also told by him that God would judge us for turning down Keyes. Another candidate kept referencing his ability to drum up lots of money, etc… and that was the eccentric and uncommitted Daniel Imperato (who also didn’t stay for VP nominees). 2) He stated outright in his candidate speech that he wouldn’t commit to getting out of the UN (basically throwing the guantlet down to an important issue)—but my mother talked with him for an hour, and said that ultimately Keyes admitted he was willing to do so, but the process was so involved that it couldn’t happen instantly. Keyes, if he were wise and able to do everything his NCD asserted would have realized that he should have said that. People wanted to give Keyes a fair shake, but he at the front of it refused to compromise (or show openness) on a number of important issues in public (but was willing 1-on-1). EVERYONE I talked to hoped that Keyes would be their VP nominee. But the NCD said that was an insult and that it was a dishonor. A friend of mine wisely said: “There is no dishonor in service.” I wish Keyes had stuck around. 3) many of Keyes supporters came in as a conquering army, were rude, disrespectful, showed no long term commitment to the party, and revealed their lack of commitment by leaving when Keyes was not the Nominee, even though the convention wasn’t done. Some of the rude people (very bad in the Platform committee) I didn’t even realize were Keyes supporters until they vanished after the presidential decision was known. [That said, I met some WONDERFUL Keyes supporters, they are kind, honorable, and my heart goes out to them.] 4) Keyes didn’t show up to the Platform debates, but referenced what happened in them. He apparently was told (I believe through a very biased filter) of railroading and killing of all their proposed amendments. There is only partial truth in that—Howard Phillips did a parliamentarian maneuver to preserve the Preamble, but ALL other proposed amendments that I saw (I missed 2 or so hours out of 12 or so to attend the Rules committee which by the way went out of its way to make it so no candidate could be disqualified because his state didn’t have an affiliate, like Keyes with Maryland) were handled with vigorous and wise debate (I learned a LOT), and Keyes’ motions failed on up/down votes.

And lose.

I have more respect for the CP now that they’ve nominated Chuck.