Sunday, September 18, 2011

My Second Week Working on the Hill

Well, I finished up my second week at the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC). It was pretty awesome at some points and pretty boring at others. I’ll focus on the awesome. I also would like to speak to my course and some of the upcoming events that I am looking forward to this week.

Beginning on Tuesday of last week all the interns at the Republican National Committee (RNC), of which I am included, had lunch in the Reagan Room of the RNC. The RNC Communications Director came in and we all got to question him for over an hour. It was very interesting as he is the man behind the scenes of every media appearance the RNC makes and the framing of the RNC’s message whenever they issue a statement to the media.

This upcoming Tuesday, all RNC interns and there are only around 15 of us, get to take a tour of the Daily Caller and then chat with its founder, Tucker Carlson. I realize few if any know who these people are that I have and will be referring to, besides the other political junkies out there, so I’ll try and get a picture to spur your memory, think bowtie.

Mainly this past week I have been stuffing envelopes and making a lot of phone calls back to Oklahoma, the NRCC has an event in Tulsa on the 29th of this month. If anyone wants to attend please let me know, it would really make me look good if I could sell a few tickets. I actually did get one person to RSVP with me over the phone. She paid $1,000 for a general reception ticket to the event. When I told my superiors and gave them her credit card info, they acted like I had done something amazing. I felt like this is what the goal of all these calls had been all along and wondered what the big deal was. If I was in charge I would have been disappointed in my interns only getting one RSVP out of 8 pages of phone calls.

On Thursday of this past week the Director of the Finance Department, who is also from Oklahoma, took me to the Oklahoma State Society Congressional Reception that was held in the Capitol building. All of Oklahoma’s Congressmen, along with Governor Mary Fallin where present at the event and I got to meet them all. I also ran into the President of the Bank of Stillwater who was my father's best man in his wedding and graduated from OSU with him, talk about a small world.

Friday I was able to attend a NRCC PAC meeting where the Director of the Political Department gave an overview of all the seats they were targeting in the up-coming 2012 Congressional election. There were around 20 people there and I assume they were big money donors because he kept talking about them being excited to write checks to the NRCC. The meeting began with a speech from Rob Barker, who recently won the special election in New York 9 and Ahmeday, who won the special election in Nevada. The NRCC feels pretty confident in adding seats to the current Republican Majority in the House in 2012.

Well RSU, I’m getting ready for the Dallas game and have to start on my Political Leadership homework which is due tomorrow. Oh, my wife is visiting this week, so if anyone has any ideas of something romantic I can do for her while she is here please let me know. I have no clue when it comes to things like that. Tomorrow we go to a panel discussion featuring former Senator Trent Lott, and then our guest at the CSPAN class is going to be Jimmy Carters campaign manager. A little birdie told me after last week’s class to have a question ready for President Carter himself, so we’ll see.

1 comment:

  1. Hi Trevor, I'm Aunt Debby's friend! We met long ago. Congratulations on your internship! So glad you are associated with the correct party. Re your wife visiting...Ask her for a "date" for a particular evening, tell her to pack a pretty dress (suggest black as it is always good & you are in the city) & you are taking her out for an elegant evening in Georgetown. Make a reservation (sooner the better) at the landmark restaurant in Georgetown, called 1789. You should make a trial run on getting there before your date night with your wife. You don't want to be fumbling around. It is NOT terribly expensive (see the menu on the website) but it is very special. Look on their website under "about" and then be sure to read "history". You can remember enough to tell your wife about the various rooms. You will wear a jacket and if you were my date (or Aunt Debby's beau) you would wear a tie and look fresh & crisp. To keep the bill down, consider ordering sparkling water instead of drinks or wine. When you go on your trial run to locate your "date venue", look for a comfy place (or ask at 1789) for after dinner drinks. You could then order a bottle of champagne. Have fun!
    Re President Carter, I've always wondered what HE thinks is the point in time that entitlement beneficiaries will get off entitlement and are we (that are more fortunate than some) helping or hindering by not finding a way to get people SELF sufficient rather than government dependent. Good luck!

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