Marion County GOP Chairman Tom John's Press Release Rewritten to Tell The Truth

While viewing the Advance Indiana blog, I got a chuckle reading Marion County GOP Chairman Tom John's press release announcing his resignation. The release included a lot of tall tales, including these

Since we won the Mayor's office and Council in 2007, it has been with great pride as I have watched Mayor Ballard and the Republican Council lead our city forward. The previous administration had plagued our city with wasteful spending, ethical clouds, and spiraling taxes. But Mayor Ballard and the Republican Council wasted no time in addressing these issues. They have ushered in a new era of balanced budgets, lower property taxes, unprecedented transparency in government, and much needed infrastructure investments.

Our city cannot afford to stop this progress now. It is critical that we all rally together behind these great leaders in the coming year. They have proven to be wise stewards with our tax dollars, effective managers of our city, and offer the kind of creative and thoughtful leadership the City of Indianapolis deserves.

...

This does not mean that I intend to walk away from our party or the fight facing our city. Quite to the contrary, I intend to stay actively involved and continue to help Mayor Ballard and our Council in every way that I can and to be an advocate for our city at every opportunity. I believe now more than ever that the Republican leadership of our community is essential and we must all give as much as we can in time, treasure and effort, to ensure that the visionary leadership of people like Mayors Ballard and Ricketts and Council President Vaughn, along with his tremendous caucus, continues to guide our city. I just believe it's time that I move to a different role and that someone ready to fulfill the chairman role, in a different way, step up.

In the coming days, there will no doubt be conversations about who is the best person to succeed me. This decision is that of the PCs alone and is one of the most important duties they carry as organization members. I do not presume to tell anyone who you should pick. I offer the following thoughts, however, as you examine those who may step up to be reviewed for the task.

Let me apply a rewrite to these paragraphs so Tom John is telling the truth:

Because of the work of tea partiers, fiscally conservative Republicans and Mayor Bart Peterson's suicide move of raising taxes before the election, the Marion County GOP was able to win the the Mayor's office and Council in 2007. This is despite the fact that I, as chairman didn't support Greg Ballard's election and only supported one of the four Republican at-large candidates. Nonetheless,it has been with great pride that I have watched Mayor Ballard and the Republican Council lead our city passing tax/fee increases and insider deals, many of which I have personally lobbied for. The previous administration had plagued our city with wasteful spending, ethical clouds, and spiraling taxes. But Mayor Ballard and the Republican Council wasted no time in besting the Democrats on these issues. In three short years, the Republicans have ushered in a new era of reckless spending, insider deals, and ethical conflicts that the Democrats can only dream of matching as they take the reins of government in 2012.

Our city cannot afford to stop this progress now. It is critical that we all rally together behind these leaders in the remaining year they will be in power. These Republicans have proven to be proliferate spenders of our tax dollars and never afraid to raise taxes and fees whenever the Mayor asks that they be raised. They have proven themselves to be effective managers of our city, people who provide kind of creative and thoughtful leadership that wealthy insiders deserve to make themselves even richer.
...

This does not mean that I intend to walk away from our party or the fight facing our city. Quite to the contrary, I intend to stay actively involved and continue to help Mayor Ballard and our Council in every way that I can to ensure they lose the 2011 election. I also intend to advocate for my law firm's clients with the city at every opportunity. I believe now more than ever that the current Republican leadership of our community is essential to ensure that our future is mortgaged to the hilt and taxes and fees are raised even higher. We must give as much as we can in time, treasure and effort, to ensure that useful tools like Mayor Ballard and Council President Vaughn, along with his rubber-stamp caucus, continue to sell out our city's future.

In the coming days, there will no doubt be conversations about who is the best person to succeed me. Let me assure you that decision has already been made. This decision, however, will be have to be formally ratified by the PCs I appointed to do exactly what I told them to do. I do not presume to tell anyone who those PCs pick, as long it is my hand-picked candidate, i.e. Kyle Walker.

At the end of the letter, Tom John encourages people to get out and work for Mayor Ballard's re-election. Uh, Tom, do you not know the chairman is supposed to be neutral until AFTER slating? There has been no slating for Mayor. This gaffe shows exactly what has been wrong with John's leadership. As he leaves office, he still thinks the job of the PCs is simply to ratify the candidates he and other insiders select for them.