PARALYZING PARANOIA:
Exactly WHAT has Shirlene Ostrov Got Hidden Deep in the HRP Swamp that it needs to be kept Super-Secret?!?
Aloha, Republicans:
Today's keyword is "secrecy". That's because our state GOP's priority is "secrecy". Second only to the state party's commitment to continue diverting 100% of scarce donor funds away from time-tested campaign strategies into the #1 priority of purchasing an overpriced office space for the Oahu League of RINO Women,secrecy is the highestpriority of the Hawaii GOP under paranoid RINO state chairShirlene Ostrov. With only 5 elected Republicans in a state which has 115 elected Democrats, your Hawaii Republican Party has decided to become a Netflix conspiracy thriller . . . instead of a winning party, that is.
So, what has political neophyte and Hellreich puppet Shirlene Ostrov got to hide? One thing? Several things? Hmmm.
Before HIRA helps to answer that question (below), you must first be told that the secrecy issue has EXPLODED in recent days down at the overpriced Kapiolani headquarters of luxury office suites. In fact, key party volunteers have been instructed in recent days not to bother even showing up for this Saturday's state committee meeting at headquarters unless they sign in advance a draconian new "confidentiality agreement". According to Ostrov herself, "We would like to have this confidentiality agreement fully executed prior to confirmation (that any volunteer district chairs) will be attending the meeting." In other words, that meeting won't start until Ostrov is satisfied that everyone has signed the permanent gag order. Even better, Ostrov suggests, don't even RSVP for the meeting until you have signed the gag order. Thanks to Ostrov's raging paranoia, you can be sure that Saturday's 2-hour meeting will get off to a rocky, delayed start; including a 15-minute roll call followed by a 45-minute discussion of the confidentiality agreement.
Fear by party leaders of being held accountable (not to mention receiving well-deserved criticism) means thatunprecedented confidentiality agreements are suddenly being required of party volunteers if they want to attend party meetings. Whoa, these volunteers didn't have to sign anything before thelast meeting or the meeting before that. These meetings aren't even held in executive session and have always been open to all party members. What the heck changed? And why all of a sudden NOW? Maybe Ostrov's new secrecy contractcontains some clues. [Spoiler Alert: It does contain clues.] HIRA obtained a copy HERE.
Let's start with Ostrov's "No Publicity" clause. Get a load of this severely overloaded provision demanded of party volunteers: "Member agrees not to disclose his/her participation in this undertaking, the existence or terms and conditions of the Agreement, or the fact that discussions are being held with the Hawaii Republican Party." Ostrov apparently believes that the ever-shrinking Hawaii GOP is now a hybrid of the CIA, the KGBand the movie Fight Club ("The first rule of Fight Club is: You do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is: You do not talk about Fight Club.")
This "No Publicity" clause forces each party volunteer to forever DENY they ever signed this stupid agreement, DENY that party meetings ever result in anything ever being discussed, and DENY that they've ever even been to a party meeting. Talk about cloak and dagger. And if you don't keep this gag order on the downlow,the party can sue you in state and/or federal court for damages.
But it gets even more stupid than that.
As Ostrov herself explains, the mandatory and forevergag order "covers any and all information passed along in these critical meetings" for all eternity. For instance, if Ostrov admits that the party has been operating without an approved budget for several months and word gets out, you must agree to let the party sue you in state and/or federal court so that "equitable relief" (such as garnishing your wages) can be obtained by Ostrov's KGB party from your personal checking account, according to the contract's "Governing Law and Equitable Relief" clause.
Question of the Day: What exactly is defined by Ostrov or included as "confidential" information? EVERYTHING IMAGINABLE, even your own "personal email correspondence", "committee meeting discussions", "notes" from meetings, and much, much more. As Ostrov states, "this version confidentiality agreement is much more robust and extends far beyond". It sure does extend 'far beyond'; right into your personal e-mails and so much more . . . forever!
Talk about a recipe for dysfunction. The terms of the bogus agreement will make it impossible for most party officers to carry out their jobs, which includes keeping party members and volunteers informed. District chairs will be forbidden from sharing party-related information with their precinct chairs or to any party members without following the strict procedure concerning information, which the gag order dictates "shall not be disclosed until thirty (30) days after written notice of intent to disclose is given to the Hawaii Republican Party along with the asserted grounds for disclosure." Hawaii's primary election takes place Aug. 11, 2018, and the general election will be held Nov. 6, 2018. This paranoid attitude will grind the already dysfunctional Hawaii GOP to a halt. Let's be sure to let the Democrats know that we might have to postpone the election so that the lawyers can review all disclosures of information among party volunteers, since EVERYTHING discussed is now deemed "confidential". This is a dream scenario for closet Democrats Hellreich and Saiki who have spent DECADES making sure that the Hawaii GOP stays off the political battlefield by refusing to fight Democrats.
In reviewing Empress Ostrov's rulebreaking, unilaterally imposed secrecy agreement, you can see for yourself that if a party volunteer reads about party information in the newspaper or sees it on TV, he/she cannot even discuss the publicly available information with ANYBODYwithout providing 30 days notice to party leaders and hoping these 'paranoiacs' eventually get around to approving permission (Spoiler Alert: which they won't grant). If Hawaii's Democrats operated this way, they'd still be in a distant 2nd place to the GOP, like they were until 1954.
Welcome to the Twilight Zone. Where Democrats have been kicking Republican okole for 63 years, and the paranoid GOP chair's response is to try putting a lid on the embarrassing reasons why the RINO-controlled state party keeps losing, on purpose, by controlling everyone's thoughts, words, writings, knowledge, and more -- instead of just fixing the real problems.
Ostrov claims to have "business experience" and "military experience", but it doesn't show. Real leaders know that the secret to avoiding embarrassing revelations is to avoid doing things which are embarrassing. Ostrov and her RINO gang, however, continue to make stupid, anti-GOP decisions that defy logic. Democrats already know that the Hawaii GOP won't put up a fight. That's hardly a secret worth protecting.
So WHO is behind all this? The state party's financial info is public, reported on a regular basis and posted on public websites courtesy of state and federal laws. The state party'spolitical strategy is public (with vice chair and chief strategist Pat Saiki saying publicly that the Hawaii GOP will not take positions on issues). Indeed, the state party's total silence is public, as nobody hears or sees the state party doing anything at all. For instance, there's a special session of the legislature scheduled this month to RAISE TAXES and WASTE BILLIONS OF TAX DOLLARS. Ostrov, Saiki, Hellreich, and Blackburn aresaying and doing nothing in opposition. That's crystal clear to the public. But if this issue were to be discussed on Saturday, everyone would be sworn to secrecy or possibly lose their house or most recent paycheck or whatever Ostrov decides is "equitable relief". So, in answer to thewho question, the beneficiaries of this enforced secrecy are the RINO party leaders who are sick of being questioned about their liberal logic, their severely bad judgment, and their politically horrendous record. Do we really need to name names?
Never mind the fact that this whole "confidentiality" rule and contract is a sham which violates party rules. Ostrov is seeking a faux-legitimate way to treat each volunteer differently based onwhether or not he/she signs the permanent gag order, as well as seeking justification to intimidate and purge conservative volunteers who don't sign on the rotten dotted line. What Ostrov isNOT doing is reading the state party's own rules. She haszero authority to enforce the rollout of her Orwellian contract.
Not surprisingly, Paranoid Dictator Ostrov (really the eager and willing puppet of Hellreich, Saiki and Blackburn) has not been advised against this course of action by her Fritz Rohlfingholdover -- the reappointed rules committee chairman Andrew Walden -- that she is breaking the rules by attempting to make up the rules via intimidation and sleight of hand rather than properly proposing a rule change to the state convention in 2019. Nope,she can't wait two years to legally change party rules because a whole bunch of really embarrassing information will soon need to be disclosed to the State Committee -- her target audience for this confidentiality agreement.
Look, party volunteers are notcompany employees who have agreed in advance when they got hired to obeying whatever updated 'rules' get made up as Team Ostrov stumbles along. State rules must be adopted at state conventions. In fact, no vote of any committee has yet approved (or begun to approve) Empress Ostrov's confidentiality agreement as a condition of serving as a party volunteer, such as district chairmen or precinct chairmen. The Walden-run rules committee hasn't even considered the mandating of confidentiality agreements as a proposal. Ergo, there is no foundation in the rules for any mandatory confidentiality agreement which would preclude an officer which refuses to sign from receiving full cooperation from the party. Gosh, if the party really does have a new pro bono lawyer, it's obvious that he or she either had nothing to do with drafting this particular agreement or he/she hasn't read the state party's rules and/or knows anything about volunteer organizations.
This whole thing is a farce which deliberately departs from party rules. Ostrov and her band of RINO sycophants want to get out of their duty to report painful truths to the State Committee by pitting district chairs and other committee members against each other with this gag order diversion. The committee only meets quarterly, hold lots of power, but (like her RINO predecessors) Ostrov plans to waste time andfill the headquarters with the smell of rotting red herrings like this contract to distract from the many problems at hand (a.k.a. the secrets she is afraid will humiliate her like her many broken promises, the lack of a required budget, the failure to report results of a forensic audit, the financial woes, etc.).
WHAT HAVE THEY GOT TO HIDE?
HERE ARE SOME WORRISOME "SECRETS"
THAT ARE ALL PUBLIC INFORMATION:
- The State Campaign Spending Commission says that Ostrov and Blackburn have only raised a pittance of money fromTWO DONORS during her first six weeks as state chair. That's it!! So much for all the "big donors" we were assured had been lined up, waiting in the wings, and ready to invest once the Kauai state convention back in May got around to coronating Queen Shirlene. Party finances are even more of a disgrace now than they were when Fritz Rohlfing and Jack James were running the state party into the ground.
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More public info -- You know that super-expensive "Lincoln Day Dinner starring Jason Chaffetz" event organized by 'Fritzy Boy' Rohlfing and his extremely loyal henchman Jack James (pictured) which gotcanceled at the last minute in May. Here are two funny notes about that . . .
○ First, Fritz Rohlfing henchman Steve Yoder paid $3,092.00 for food for the canceled Lincoln Day Dinner. Yes, he must have been really in bed with Rohlfing if hewillingly forked over all that $$ to a lost cause in what appeared to be a zero-interest loan. Don't worry, Rohlfing reimbursed Yoder with donor funds back in March. Still, nobody got to eat that three thousand dollars worth of food. Donor funds apparently went down the garbage disposal. Better keep that secret!!
○ The second funny story about the Jason Chaffetz event is that the 1,000 people projected to come to the Jason Chaffetz fundraiser only turned out to be 24 people; mostly full-blown RINO hangers-on like Djou, Felix, Hellreich, Thomason, Marumoto, Ward, Smart, Frenzel, etc. Some of these were undoubtedly seat-fillers who came for free to avoid embarrassment to party leaders and the keynote speaker himself. Theoriginal plan was to sell 1,000 tickets to see Jason Chaffetz at the Honolulu Convention Center. So it turns out that only 24 people showed up for an event so small that the party had to move it to a tiny room at a hotel. And it was such a tiny turnout of only 2.4% of the projected attendance, that all 24 guests were all able to pose for a photo with the resigned Utah congressman. Yep, after all the Ostrov HYPE, that's all the people that the self-discrediting Ostrov was able to get to attend this big fundraiser. From 1,000 down to just 24. The party is really in the dumps under the Hellreich RINO gang. And, if they ever get their hands on any money, history teaches us one thing over and over and over: RINO party leaders only ever spend $$$$ on bloated administrative overhead. For this, Democrats are grateful.
- Speaking of non-secret information, Ostrov has probably NOT kept the state committee apprised of the $60,000+ balloon payment on the commercial mortgage for the party's headquarters -- the payment due in a few months just as the 2018 election is getting underway. RINO's will have yet another built-in excuse to hold a fundraiser and keep diverting 100% of donor funds to "the mortgage" rather than to helping educate, persuade and organize voters, lobby the legislature and the the county councils, or even win elections. The balloon payment presents perfect timing for yet another reason for the state party to everything it can to provide the Oahu League of RINO Women with a free office space, while party donors get stuck with a permanent, lifetime payment of $3,000 per month for the maintenance fee. No wonder we keep losing!
- Here's another poorly-kept "secret" - Ostrov has gone nearly three months without even presenting an approved budget. If her predecessors have any advice for her, it would be to do exactly as they've done -- (1) REFUSE to solicit input for the party budget from state committee members in advance of presenting it; (2) when the meeting happens,SANDBAG members by showing it to them and insisting they vote right away after it's been presented; and (3) play theBLAME GAME to make it seem like any delay is their fault for daring to question the judgment and hasty budgeting of the state chair. This might sound crazy, but this 3-step plan has been used repeatedly in recent years exactly as described. No wonder Ostrov wants these people to sign confidentiality agreements.
- The worst-kept "secret" of all: That the state Republican party is now the pro-tax, pro-spending, pro-rail, totally-quiet-about-everything-Democrats-do party. It's now just 3 weeks until the Democrat's special session in late August (this month!!) to hike taxes and waste billion$. Neither Ostrov, Saiki, Ward, Hellreich, Blackburn, minority leader Tupola, nor Rohlfing are doing anything to identify the Hawaii GOP with the majority of Hawaii voters who oppose this scam. Here's the actual justification: "If RINO Lingle is responsible for the rail tax, RINO Djou is responsible for creating HART, and RINO McDermott (the party's gubernatorial candidate in 2018) supports the rail tax and rail spending, then the state party needs to stay out of it and let Democrats get their tax hike and pay for their rail project."
- Another poorly kept secret is that RINO Linda "massive tax hiker" Lingle appears to be trying to worm her way back into Hawaii politics while helping Miriam Hellreich and Pat Saiki (and their new accolyte Mark Blackburn) to enforce liberalism at the Hawaii GOP. Fake conservative Ostrov is desperate enough to go along for the ride. Keep watching for developments on this.
Finally, no amount of enforced secrecy can disguise the steady drop in the number of elected Republicans or thatOstrov has deliberately surrounded herself with the very RINO's responsible for that plunge. It was inevitable that Ostrov would place a high priority on secrecy and then plot to commit the murder of all remaining transparency and accountability at the Hawaii GOP.
Members of the State Committee and other campaign volunteers like the 51 district chairs across the state are being fooled THIS WEEK into a fake obligation to sign their lives away and, thus, allow party leaders to treat them differently based on which ones allowed themselves to be badgered into signing this agreement versus those who recognize a dangerous scam when they see one.
What the state party needs is not a gag order but a checklist ofDON'Ts for Ostrov and her adopted gang of RINO's who've hijacked the state party for decades now:
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Don't include fake Republicans like Miriam Hellreich, closet Democrats like Gene Ward, liberals likePat Saiki and Boyd Ready, and desperate wannabes likeMark Blackburn in the leadership of the Republican Party. Man, these liberal cronies sure know how to fly through money and waste decades of missed political opportunities resulting in zero return on investment for party donors and volunteers. That's a big DON'T.
- Don't keep letting Democrats get away with murder by perennially diverting 100% of GOP donor funds to bloated administrative overhead while not investing a penny into campaigning, lobbying, messaging, organizing, etc. [Otherwise, it will remain obvious that RINO's are only pretending to run a party when they are merely using donor funds to purchase a pricey office in perpetuity for the Oahu League of RINO Women.]
- Don't keep dipping into the mortgage fund to stay afloatwhile keeping it as secret that there's a massive balloon payment due in less than a year; right in the middle of the 2018 campaign season. Holy moly, how many fundraisers have already been held for the mortgage; already raising more than enough money to pay it off 100% years ago? Something's really fishy here. No wonder they want to keep all this secret.
- Don't keep doing dumb things which only benefit the Democrat Party and its candidates and expect to prevent justified embarrassment. Everyone knows that Ostrov is the puppet of Hellreich and Saiki. Even the 'biggest', 'tallest' and most sycophantic and delusional supporters of newbie Ostrov will eventually recognize the same patterns and same obfuscations and the same shibai pulled in previous years. If Ostrov doesn't push the above-named RINO's out of party leadership soon, 2018 will turn out just like 2016 and 2014 and 2012 and 2010 all over again. Auwe!!
Finally, please be advised that HIRA is not obsessed with secrecy like the thin-skinned RINO control freaks at our dysfunctional state party. Please accept this e-mail from HIRA as official notification and permission so that you can feel free to forward this e-mail and all its contents (as well as past and future e-mails) to whomever you like. HIRA will not sue you for sharing this information. Unlike, Queen Shirlene Ostrov and her liberal puppetmasters, HIRA will not make you sign something and pretend that you are required to sign it and threaten to treat you differently for not signing it.
HIRA simply wants to drain the swamp so that the Republican Party of Hawaii is finally run for the benefit of real Republican policies, solutions, reforms, and candidates. The GOP could become the majority party in Democrat-run Hawaii if we got our act together. All the arguments are on our side. But we need to remember that openness and transparency and learning from mistakes are true Republican values. Let the phony Republicans on Kapiolani Blvd. demand complete silence from those who are gullible enough to confuse defending the GOP with defending RINO corruption and incompetence. Meanwhile, let the sun shine in and kill off all the germs.
Mahalo,
Member, Hawaii Republican Party (HRP)
President, Hawaii Republican Assembly (HIRA)
Chairman, HIRA Action SuperPAC
P.S. HIRA continues to speak for conservatives and Republicans in Hawaii while the RINO's at the state party remain silent and neutral. Mahalo to Hawaii Public Radio for allowing HIRA to shine sunlight on RINO corruption and incompetence in its recent story about the Hawaii's GOP's many troubles. Click HERE for the story.
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HAWAII REPUBLICAN ASSEMBLY (HIRA)
The Hawaii Republican Assembly (HIRA), an affiliated chapter of
the National Federation of Republican Assemblies
is the conservative standard-bearer of the Republican Party of Hawaii
and the leading advocate for conservative solutions in the islands.
We are not an official arm of the Republican Party of Hawaii (RPH).
We are the conservative base of the Republican Party.
Hawaii Republican Assembly | P.O. Box 2567 | Ewa Beach, HI 96706
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