Party representatives speak to RHA
Representatives from the MU College Democrats, College Libertarians and College Republicans attended a Residence Halls Association meeting to discuss their parties’ platforms.
When speakers were asked what they consider their presidential candidate's greatest weakness to be, they answered as follows:
"Our party's greatest weakness is the influence of the people in our party that are flat-out insane." – Libertarian Carl Werner.
"Our party is content at being right, but not voting." – Democrat Brian Roach.
"Well, I believe the question was about our candidate, so I'll address both the party and candidate weaknesses. We are seen as an elitist group, but that's not true. McCain's greatest weakness right now is getting out of the shadow of George Bush." – Republican Brett Dinkins.
No official Republican representative came to the meeting; instead, Dinkins, who originally came to watch, decided to stand in and describe the platforms.
Roach is the Vice President of the MU College Presidents.
Werner, who is the Missouri youth coordinator of the Bob Barr campaign, passed out copies of “Discover Liberty,” a Libertarian newspaper-style publication.
RHA President Bobby Wood said he wanted to expose members to members to think about leadership on a national scale. Also, as promised weeks ago when the meeting was first discussed, this was not a debate – the representative presented their platforms and answered questions but did not engage one another.
Each political party member summed up their party's platforms and pointed out areas of agreement on topics including economics, healthcare and education.