Audra Shay, a 38-year-old Army veteran, mother, and event planner from Louisiana who has been endorsed by her governor, Bobby Jindal, is the current vice chairman of the Young Republicans and the leading candidate to be elected its chairman on Saturday, July 11,2009. Postings she made on her now-deleted Facebook page give insight into this favored candidate and tells us who is considered by Republicans to be worthy of a leadership role. Here’s what she had to say to her friends on Facebook:
On a thread where she initiated a political conversation by posting “WalMart just signed a death warrant” by “endorsing Obama’s healthcare plan,” a friend listed as Eric S. Piker, wrote “It’s the government making us commies… can’t even smoke in my damn car… whats next they going to issue toilet paper once a month… tell us how to wipe our asses…”
Two minutes later, Piker posted again saying “Obama Bin Lauden [sic] is the new terrorist… Muslim is on there side [sic]… need to take this country back from all of these mad coons… and illegals.” Shay responds eight minutes later with: “You tell em Eric! lol.”
In October 2008, in the wake of news that an effigy of Sarah Palin was being hung outside an affluent Hollywood home as an offensive Halloween decoration, Shay replied, returning to the “LOL” style that she employed after the “coons” comment: “What no ‘Obama in a noose? Come on now, its just freedome [sic] of speech, no one in Atlanta would take that wrong! Lol.”
She picked up the thread again the next morning with a clarification and a new insight. “Apparently I could not spell last night. I am wondering if the guys with the Palin noose would care if we had a bunch of homosexuals in a noose.”
Numerous posts in which Shay says that President Obama is “anti-American” and has “disdain of this country.”
She reacted with extreme displeasure with Obama’s cautious stance on the Honduran crisis. “This is an outrage and I CAN NOT believe this nation has him as our leader! It makes me sick!” She posted a few minutes later: “My disdain for Obama is directly proportionate for his disdain of this country.”
A friend of Shay’s named Derick Moss soon weighed in, writing: “Here’s what I am getting tired of: If you call Obama a socialist, terrorist, anti-American, whatever, then you’re kinda calling me that, too, cause I voted for him and support him (for the most part). Or, you can claim that I didn’t really know what I voted for, and in doing so you’re kinda saying I’m ignorant and questioning my intelligence…”
Three minutes later, in response to Moss’ suggestion for rational discourse, Shay replied: “I think that you are ignorant if you believe this man is anything but anti american. He freely rights [sic] about Marxist philosophies. I never called him a terrorist, but if his policies are socialist (which they are) then what would you call him? His actions speak very loudly and his actions are very anti american. You just can not get past it. You might not like it but the truth is what it is.”
Read more at two op-ed pieces written by John Avlon at The Daily Beast.
Is a semi-illerate, middle-aged, snarky Southerner the best person to represent Young Republicans? If she is elected tomorrow as chairman of the Young Republicans, what does this say?
fnord
PrairiePopulistsAndProgressives.net 
A THIRTY-EIGHT year old as leader of young Republicans??
I read in one of the two linked articles that her closest competitor believes the party stance on gay marriage needs to change. It was speculated that meant it wouldn’t even be a race. They aren’t having any of that tolerance stuff!
Official website of the 2009 Young Republican National Federation Convention.
“Is a semi-illerate, middle-aged, snarky Southerner the best person to represent Young Republicans? If she is elected tomorrow as chairman of the Young Republicans, what does this say?”
Whigs.
My guess is her acceptance speech will include the words, “I just to make the world a better place.” What is known is her thoughts will be, “blahblahblahblahblondblond.”
From her picture, the only comment to be made by Republican men will be – she’s hot!
And, really, at the end of the day isn’t that the only thing Republican men really care about?
What bothers me the most is the fact that the GOP’s racial hatred keeps raising its ugly head. And what part of the demographics of the American voters turning more minorities – not less – do the Republicans not get?
At a time when they should be opening their doors to that big tent – they have sewn it shut with the outright hatred towards anyone who looks, sounds or thinks different than they do.
These people should be pitied – if they weren’t so rabid.
“And what part of the demographics of the American voters turning more minorities – not less – do the Republicans not get?”
Must be above their limited intellect to understand. They also don’t seem to grasp the reality that theirs is a really small political party that just keeps shrinking and only represents a small region of our country.
But she is a good looking woman, just like Palin is a very good looking woman! Isn’t this the party of old white men who know a woman’s place?
It’s also obvious a party of any white men (old or otherwise) who think they can ‘cross those lines’ with women and then if they get caught – confess to be the sinner that has strayed from the righteous path.
Sanford was bad enough but now we learn Ensign’s parents condoned his adulterous behavior by giving ‘gifts’ to his mistress’s children.
I wonder, does God ever just want to vomit when he hears his name even uttered by these hypocrits?
I had to laugh when the polling stated 71% of the Republicans would vote for Sarah Palin after she announced her resignation as governor.
At last count, wasn’t the Republicans polling at 22% of the population even willing to claim themselves to be Republican?
And exactly how much power does 71% of 22% of the population really have?
But I don’t take Sarah Palin lightly – I take her as a genuine threat.
She is the worst type of threat – that of appealing to the basic mentality of a society that like to be told they are superior to ‘that one over there’.
After all, Republicans are not to blame for this ruined economy or our rotten foreign relations with our allies, as well as our enemies.
If you don’t believe that – then in the words of Sarah Palin to Andrea Mitchell during her interview this week -‘you’re not listening’.
Yeah, it’s our fault for not listening to the rhetoric Republicans are trying to palm off as facts.
Did anybody print out her “friends” from FB? I wonder how many of them were Jindal’s inner circle? So he can’t say he wasn’t aware of her comments. We always suspected they talked like this, but now we know for sure…
Joie de vivre!
Welcome.
I’m not sure about a copy of her friends list, but The Daily Beast has screen shots of her Facebook pages, so I’d guess they got more info too. If she is elected tomorrow they’ll do more stories on her.
I should have started by saying hello Cajungirl and welcome! Sorry, I just went straight to your question and forgot my manners.
I got to wondering if The Democratic Party had a Young Democrats group and went looking. I’m barely into the looking, but did want to share that the president of this group is David Hardt, a gay man living in a conservative state. More about David here.
It appears the YDA (young Democrats of America) is a strong organization, and had quite a part in electing President Obama. My original reason for going looking was to find out if they had an equivalent position to this one the Young Republicans will elect tomorrow, and if so, how old was the Democrats leader of YOUNG? ‘Cause although an old woman like me thinks of 38 as young, is it really young to young people?
National Officers: There are nine people elected every two years by the delegates at YDA’s National Convention. The Officers hold calls regularly and guide decisions for the organization. These are distinguished positions which take dedication to building the sustainability of YDA. The nine elected officers currently serving YDA are:
* David Hardt, President
* Chris Anderson, Executive Vice President
* Francisco Domenech, DNC Committeeman
* Crystal Strait, DNC Committeewoman
* A’shanti Fayshel Gholar, Vice President
* Josh Blevins, Vice President of Programs
* Omar Khan, Vice President
* Amy Lewis, Treasurer
* Stephanie Hausner, Secretary
Young Meghan McCain (daughter of John McCain) impresses me! She seems to have more common sense than most twice her age. She wrote an op-ed piece on the upcoming election of Chairman of the Young Republicans.
— snip —
“The definition of insanity is repeating the same actions over and over again and expecting different results. What exactly do the Young Republicans expect to achieve by electing a 38-year-old woman who thinks racial epithets are acceptable? Also, did I mention that she’s 38? And she’s going to be the leader of an organization with the word “young” in the title? Is it so implausible that people in their twenties (or even early thirties) could join the Republican Party–or have we just completely given up on their vote? Are we expecting “young” people in the Republican Party to soon be entering their forties?”
Seems to me that John McCain had the wrong people running his campaign – it should have been his daughter Meghan!
Young GOP Chooses Hate
Audra Shay, the Young Republican leader accused of endorsing racism on Facebook, was elected head of the group for GOP members under 40 this afternoon.
And the GOP wonders why it has a hard time courting and convincing minorities that its the political party with their best interests in mind? Hmmmmm…maybe this Young Republican fiasco along with a long laundry list of historically similar and even worse ocurrences might explain it.