76 CommentsChris Kulawik, erstwhile president of the Columbia College Conservative Club and subject of a 67-member facebook “fan club,” was elected to the presidency of the College Republicans this evening.
Quoth the Ashcroft acolyte on his tenure as a Spectator columnist: “It’s probably made me the most hated person on campus, but it’s been well worth it to be here today.”
Who will become his Democratic counterpart? Find out tomorrow night at the Dems elections at 9PM in Lerner 569, and let the event planning begin!
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76 Comments
@hmmm so all the out of work socialists better represent GS? – interesting
@Cocchia Oh man what a douche. I think even Ashcroft didn’t like him.
@either way the republicans were pretty inept this year outside of ashcroft-which apparently was only c4 and outside sources
their leadership couldn’t get any decent events otherwise unless they were joint and bored teh hell out of their members at the start of teh year
@wow i wonder what seigel is going to do now…now the heads of each of the clubs are divisive pricks–great
@Dems Nadler beat Siegel for anyone interested. A wide 30 point margin.
@interesting posts I just feel the need to reply to a couple of the posts on here… I wish I had the time to reply to them all, but there are only so many hours in a day.
To hunh? Chris won because he was BY FAR the best person for the job. No offense to the other candidate but Chris truly has the vision, the verve and the wherewithall to truly take the CR’s to the next level. One only needs to look at his work and progress with the C4 this year.
To well…just because a person does not advocate something or condone something does not mean that they hate something. One can not agree with someones choices or ways without hating them. Why does it instantly turn into hate if a Republican does not condone an action or lifestyle.
I see a lot of speculation on Ashcroft, where the money came from, how much he cost, etc. First of all it was through a lot of effort and organization that he came to Columbia and gave a great speech, conducted with the utmost class and respect for everyones opinions. This was a C4 event which is why Chris deserved to be elected pres of the CR’s because he not only will work to ensure that the CRs will be a force on campus, he will also move the CR’s to be ideological…well…Republican, which is far from where they were this year.
@let A couple of important points about Chris Kulawik’s campaign for GOP president:
– He lied in his speech. On a number of things. First of all, Santurom is not confirmed. Second, his “connections” to Coulter haven’t worked all year.
-The College Republicans have many more than 5 people at their regular meetings. Unlike C4, which don’t have general body meetings anymore because they realized that no one shows up.
– CU Republicans annual budget: $1400.
– Victor Cocchia (the annoying guy who introduced Ashcroft and supposedly forked over his own money) isn’t even enrolled at Columbia. And who knows, with all of the fundraising the GOP/C4 did, maybe he even came away with a profit…
– Chris
@Cocchia goes to GS. as sad as that is for GS, it’s still true.
@you mean as sad as going to GS is for him
@not really, no, don’t mean that.
@I would hope not say what you will about him, like him or hate him, but GS is a great school with great students, no need to denegrate the entire school over one guy.
@Is Nadler seriously challenging Siegel. That’s like Michael Moore vs. john Kerry.
@well i guess we’ll see though if santorum ends up being the most widely attended event next semester, one of our posters will have to eat a decent amount of crow and columbia’s speakers will hit a new low w/a gay hating right wing nutjob hitting the campus twice in two years.
And either way, it was either the victor kid or chris who did nearly all the work for ashcroft. More than likely, they can probalby do it again.
@hunh? Clearly you don’t know much; government officals aren’t allowed to accept money for speaking events. Considering he brought Ashcroft, I’d be careful with what you say.
@hunh? He didn’t “bring” Ashcroft, money did, and nothing tells me he can bring Santorum.
How do you win a low turnout election? Call all your friends, and tell a lot of lies.
@don't be dumb Santorum’s not coming in the fall, at least not for free like Kulawik said. Think about it – if you were a senator up for reelection down 10 pts in the polls would you spend a minute outside of your home state – especially to speak to a hostile crowd that can’t or won’t vote for you and which might get you severe negative publicity? No.
Besides, Kulawik’s been talking about Coulter, Buchanon, and Santorum since October. Unbunch your panties boys and girls, if he could pull of bringing one of them he would have by now.
@in response to "dems should bring in moderate republicans" dems won’t bring in moderate republicans to speak at columbia because the campus is very polarized politically. most of the republicans on campus, if you talk to them, are pro choice, do not object to gay marriage, etc. their choice to be republican stems from fiscal issues. However, the campus dems are so stubborn and close minded that they refuse to even imagine that republicans can be “liberal.”
@obsession also most of the “republicans” on campus are only passionate when it comes to israel.. on everything else they are moderate/apathetic.
@amazing Considering that President Bush and the GOP Congress have now grown government beyond the wildest dreams of Lyndon B. Johnson and created the biggest deficit in US history, it’s kinda hilarious/sad that anyone still thinks Republican = fiscal conservative.
@ttan A lot of Republicans consider Bush to have betrayed the Old Guard of Republicans, so to speak. Just like a lot of Democrats claim Bill Clinton betrayed the liberal base by doing things like shrinking the government, pushing for the Defense of Marriage Act, and Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
Not all Republicans like Bush, but they stay with the party for two reasons. 1) Party solidarily. One of the key weaknesses of the Democrats is that they are more tolerant of splinter factions and thus run into difficulties in producing a united front – which, while it may contain elements not everyone in the party agrees with, nevertheless is crucial come election time. 2) It’s still better than anything else. While the Republican administration is spending like crazy, the Democrats aren’t exactly fiscal hawks either.
@oh boy time to start a political flame war based upon simplistic rhetoric. please head back to kos. we’re talking about campus politics not trying to redefine perceptions of big spenders while neglectign the fact we’re currently fighting two major wars which account for the majority of our discretionary spending. Then again, if you don’t want to fund our soldier while they’re fighting you might belong on the democratic underground as opposed to kos.
@definitely definitely, definitely all too appropriate that you assume I’m liberal b/c I don’t like crazy government expansion and borrowing money we don’t have…y’know, conservative values. Remember the Republican party that wanted to pass a freakin’ balanced budget amendment? That’s the GOP I was proud to belong to. As for not wanting to fund our soldiers, take that card out of the Instant-Rhetoric deck until the President decides he wants to fund body armor and veterans benefits.
@ttan I don’t think that a balanced budget amendment is the cure-all panacea that fiscal hawks claim that it is. There is a legitimate purpose and a beneficial use of debt financing. However, that debt should be paid down in times of prosperity – and certainly we should watch what we add to it during wartime.
@its hardly the instant rhetoric when somebody reminds you that the deficit youre screeching about is due to the fact we have to fund soldiers in two wars..the truth is vapid idiots like you keep screaming their heads off about a balanced budget amendment when the only way to actually do that t this point during two wars would be to double income taxes (cutting all non defense spending at this point would probably barely do it too adn many of those areas and non discretionary). Maybe you shoudl have taken a minute before you scribble down your retarded polemic about how teh economy actually works right now and how a balanced budget amendment would act as a noose on our ability to wage war. The reason I thought you were liberal is becuase they seem to be most opportunistic about deficits in war time despite the ffact that only the mentally retarded will assert we can fight wars without this type of spending (lets be honest–are you seriously that stupid or did you just want to take a political potshot?)
@yes yes, ashcroft was more c4 than cr. but the c4 budget is less than $500 per year, so most of ashcroft’s money came from other sources.
@c4 True. But for some reason NYC is full of far more rich liberals than rich conservatives, if you need to hold a sponsering dinner to get a speaker.
@was anyone there? the screen behind Ashcroft said College Conservatives, not Republicans. Considering the Dems get something like 5 dollars MORE per person than the CRs, the CC or whatever they’re called, prob gets a lot less
@Hm Seems to me that if the Dems spent as much time fighting the Republican agenda as they do fighting each other and stroking their overinflated egos, we might have some real progress.
@anon Yes, largely. The problem with McCain is that he is conservative and many CU students disagree with his views on a wide array of issues.
@DHI How does that fit into the pattern though? I am very tired and unable to follow things so explain very simply. I am seeing the wrong pattern, the wrong pattern.
@a-ha So the real case for Nadler is that he interned for Scott Stringer and wrote three (three, dammit!) spec op-eds? Now I get it.
@the case for nadler: 1. he’s the son of a congressman.
2. um…he’s the son of a congressman?
3. he totally belongs to a frat.
@A real case for nadler http://www.columbiaspectator.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/03/06/440bf3eab5ac4?in_archive=1
Also, the following are some op-eds he wrote: http://www.columbiaspectator.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/04/12/443c81d506dbc?in_archive=1
http://www.columbiaspectator.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/03/24/4423a5cb67c27?in_archive=1
http://www.columbiaspectator.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/02/17/43f574c7c5eb4?in_archive=1
And why, exactly, is his father’s job an issue? Rather than living off his dad’s laurels, he’s worked to establish his own credentials.
FYI, Siegel is also the son of a a new york politician. His father was an assemblyman, before moving to florida.
@anon Michael Nadler is another member of the democrats’ exec board, though I dont remember what his position is.
Hes a junior and is very involved in local politics. (It also helps to have his last name in NY politics)
@to be fair ashcroft seemed pretty moderate at his event and mccain is the next prominent republican speaker at this campus. prior to that they had tammy bruce and horowitz come (they’re both nutballs but it allowed the repubs to list lesbian speaker on their posters)…however, if the santorum, coulter, buchanan thing is true, i agree it’d be nice to contrast the crazies
@nadler wishes he had seigel’s persona and image
@mainstream democrats are pretty moderate–harry reid is pro-life, evan bayh and hillary are both centrists and a lot of democrats are pretty issues based. we don’t need blue dogs.
@why doesn't the university partially pick up some of the tab? lakoff is a prof. and there are definitely other political figures who double as professors. personally my dream would be a jon stewart speech
@Wouldn't it be great if... What if the Democrats here brought in some big name moderate Republicans that everyone can be proud of? There are some out there I know, even if their names don’t occur to me at the moment. But wouldn’t that be an interesting contrast if the Republicans here brought in crazy nuts and the Democrats brought respectable policymakers from the other party.
@the dems should try to get in on soros’ campus project hting. supposedly they’re going to have an operating budget of like a million bucks. how bout ny based follks then, there definitely have to be a bunch of interesting speakers who live in nyc.
didn’t know nadler was running. who is he?
@anon A) Siegel is going to get his ass handed to him tomorow night by Nadler
B) I dont know about all of them, but some of those names would still cost alot of money. People like George Lakoff, Al Franken, Jon Stewart, Michael Moore, etc. might not charge as much per speech as John Ashcroft, but they still charge thousands of dollars. The college dems dont have that kind of money.
@i hope siegel does bring in speakers. Forget big names, can we just get some of the interesting movement figures or intellectually challenging folks like a franken, moore, sheehan, lakoff, dionne. They shouldn’t cost that much.
@i'm sorry but a half assed trip in a gotv effort for a governor and a lost 2004 election don’t make electing candidates. my brothers lacrosse team volunteered to go to new orleans (as admirable as that is), what the f— is lobbying outside of either group circle jerks and abramoff type schist and who the heck gives to craps abou teh CDNY board–more resume fodder..
the truth is the right has at least provoked controversy since that 2001 big speech series that was moved outside–things like the bake sale, ashcroft, bloomberg, pataki, and now possibly santorum/coulter/buchannan are a big deal. i’m not saying the eboard of teh dems is lazy–i’m saying liberals on this campus are too complacent in bringing in big time speakers. as for teh dinner and private donors, the little repubs who organized that obviously had to go out there and set this up. that wasn’t set up by outside groups because it was open to columbia students, some of whom bought seats and attended teh dinner. by the way, there are liberal donors who have donated far more than scaife and olin, only its usually not to the college level. As for bang for buck, what exactly is the college dems budget? anybody can send themselves on ‘lobbying’ trips and campaing gotv efforts (they’re commendable but not really intellectual endeavors). the only thing that has impressed me was the roosevelt institution thing, but that needs to be more publicized…the truth is we need more liberal ashcrofts (why the heck do teh republicans have bbq’s?) and just reflexively going republicans are bad and stupid and we are actually getting candidates elected (lets get in touch w/the real world and lose that pompous sense of importance) is not a defense for why we can’t bring big names…evan bayh, russ feingold, joe biden and others all can use all the dems they can get in the primaries
@oops, almost forgot and again – siegel.
@disturbing pattern ashcroft, mccain, santorum, buchannan, coulter? who’s next–falwell and robertson?
@DHI What exactly is your problem with McCain? That he’s conservative? You can’t really not expect a conservative to be at least somewhat conservative. Not saying McCain represents ideal political views but this whole “John McCain is not a moderate” seems to really be “John McCain is not a democrat.” Just because he breaks from the party line of the party he’s not in as often as he breaks from the line of the party he actually is in doesn’t mean he fits into this “disturbing pattern” with fucking nutjobs like Coulter and Buchannan.
@heckler Your mother gave me a “fucking nutjob”* and she did have help from Coulter and Buchannan. I think that if McCain joined in it would be fair to classify this as a “disturbing pattern”
*Nutjob in this case refers to oral stimulation of the testicles.
@does it matter what the source of this is. honestly, if i’m an incoming freshman and the first big event on campus is a rick santorum speech i woudl wonder if i was really at columbia
@no evil bwahahaha laugh? As for proselytizing the converted, the GOP realized shortly after Goldwater the value of pumping up a political base, but whatever. Still, pretty amazing that after years of stressing that “we’re the good, non-bigoted kind of Republicans,” they’re planning on directly inviting and anti-semite and islamophobe.
@john ashcroft was made out to be a fascist but seemed to decide on the moderate course when he spoke here–even the spec picked up on that. don’t be surprised if buchanan does that too. Coulter is just crazy. I think she’s more of an asulyum escapee than a repub representative. most of my republican friends back home are embarrassed by her. then again..if she had a kid, i imagine it would turn out like kulawik
@fools the big name democrats realize they don’t have to go around proselytizing the converted. why bother speaking at columbia when there’s much more traction to be made elsewhere? for a buchannan though, this is virgin territory, and for a coulter, it’s guaranteed to generate protests that will make the next day’s press cycle.
@way more complex Yeah, they generally don’t accept money, but they often simply don’t grasp that the repubs take building a youth movement totally seriously and view it as a not particularly worthy speaking engagement. in regards to 19, othen than the fact that open society institute and rockridge don’t generally sponsor student speakers, iaf and caf are the same and rarely sponsor student speakers, ips is in Dennis-Kucinich-land, pfaw only sponsors when it planned the event itself, center for american progress literally just started and acs has maybe 1/10 the resources/cache of fed society, you’re totally right.
@give me a break so maybe the establishment should realize building a youth movement is important..as for all the other groups..while they may only occasionally sponsor speakers (and yet we still get none of those sponsor ships apparently) and that may be symptomatic of how few speakers we get the truth is its largely due to laziness…that ashcroft event also had private donors and had a dinner which had over 30 attendees…the truth is this campus needs to get its act together and stop expecting to get fed things into its lap. It’s incredible how columbians are so ambitious in their academics and exploring nyc, but don’t give a rats ass about politics out side of resume padding or a hillary internship. of course the common republican argument for the supposed difference in funding is that universities like ourselves already act like a huge interest group (the acs and the law school has gotten pretty good liberal speakers in teh past). also press is always going to make speaking here attractive. if al gore is getting so much attention for speaking 50 blocks downtown or rousing speeches elsewhere he should do it here. not to mention we should be going after possible dem 08 nominees. john edwards came here so lets get the other folks as well.
@again One last comment, then back to work – your proof of laziness (which anyone who’s at all familiar with the dems board knows simply ain’t true) is that the Ashcroft event had private donors and a dinner with over 30 attendees…which is only kinda my entire point. There is a seriousness on the side of the potential sugar-daddies of the right, the big-name examples being Richard Melon Scaife and John M. Olin, which is only now (and very slowly and partially) being sorta kinda matched by folks like George Soros…and if the big-name circuit is that behind, you can imagine the disparity on the level of liberal rich cu alumni vs. conservative cu alumni. Consider that both the dems site and the repubs site had ‘conribute’ buttons for years, but only conservative alumni actually, y’know, act as private donors and provide ultra-special dinners for John fucking Ashcroft. The cultural seriousness in building a movement is there on one side and not on the other, and it’s going to take years to catch up. That being said, I’d say that Dems at CU are still getting more bang for their buck, considering that they actually, on the real-world non-campus side, (A) elected candidates, (B) had volunteer trips to New Orleans, (C) an extensive lobbying trip and (D) changed college democrats of new york’s executive board. The repubs? Ashcroft and soggy barbecues.
@a lot of politicians like hillary, obama and the sort wouldn’t cost anything becuase they cna’t accept money…isn’t schumers duaghter at columbia…at least we could have him
@ditto ditto on the duh for siegel…although what exact groups/tanks do ppl expect the dems to call upon? those who funded ashcroft, like young america’s foundation, federalist society, etc….the equivalents aren’t exactly plentiful on the dems side, and the equivalents that do exist aren’t nearly as student-supportive
@well there is the american constitution society, which is supposed to be the answer to the fed soc. Otherwise, we should be pestering the open society institute, center for american progress, pfaw, rockridge institute, institute for america’s future, campaign for america’s future and insititute for policy studies. We’ve had way to much apologism and when our big event (a guy who hasn’t even been elected governor) gets cancelled last minute, its kind of silly. what’s the point of being on a liberal campus if the only really interesting liberal giants come in university sponsored packed and overcrowded settings
@duh jon seigel is the next dems president.
@you've got to be joking i know the sgb adn the dems get waaay more money then the repubs..its just that the little abramoffs in teh college gop pester their interest groups/think tanks for funding…why can’t the dems do that…in terms of pure budget the dems are probably teh best funded partisan political group by far…we need less apologism and more work
@anon its alot easier to get a big speaker when you can offer them tens of thousands of dollars.
If the dems had that kind of money, they could pay for events with lots of former politicians who make a living now by giving speeches. Unfortunately, the republicans have a bit more cash
@anon The Republicans get nothing compared to the Dems’ budget from SGB. The fact that the Dems can’t fundraise to bring speakers is the fault of their leaders, not the republicans.
And, the university is willing to give money to big dems who come to speak, like former President Clinton and VP Gore. Too bad the Dems haven’t been as successful as Chris in getting them to come and getting the university to help pay.
@honestly though, our dems need to get their shiite together to get big speakers–the university inviting chomsky or clinton doesn’t count…we have a great huge group of liberals and liberal thought on this campus and the dems should at least be able to bring in hillary/jimmy carter/al gore/barack obama/al franken or even intellectuals like cockburn
@ashcroft reportedly costs 25-50k for a speaking event. the repub eboard from there website is like 15 folks big. so much for small gov
@anon Ashcroft’s speaking fee is 70k per event.
@that would be William F. Buckley
@william f buckley is in the photo.
and also, bwog, it doesn’t become you to so obsessively follow the happenings of the young kulawik. so he has a column in the spec that has more readership than your site or magazine ever will.
get over it
@um who’s in the photo? because it doesn’t really look like chris kulawik.
@re: "these people are going to come" the republican meeting had record attendance tonight: 32 students. usually, only 8 or so students turn up. membership is 600.
@read Ashcroft was brought to campus for way more than 10K. 10K was dropped by one student, though.
@re: 10k ashcroft was brought to campus with 10k that was largely paid by just one student.
@... what?
@Doubting Thomas Come on… he’s a conservative at an Ivy school and he’s whipping the college Dems. Of course all of these people are going to come. Especially if individual students are willing to drop 10k of their own to see these people come here. When the incentive is this good, you should doubt the impetus comes from crafty diplomacy.
@he seems good at what he does i have a hard time being real excited, though
@i'm just the messenger..i agree w/you thought
@the real interesting thing is that he does seem to be good at charging up the right and instigating debate and from what my friend at teh meeting told me reportedly already has senator santorum as a confirmed speaker for next year and is in the works for buchannan and coulter
@good Amen. I’m looking forward to a CRs chapter that can now support things like eliminating capital gains taxes in addition to israel.