Late last night I discovered a video that appeared on YouTube. Two scenarios can be envisioned:

1) Mitt Romney and his staff rigged the 2007 Conservative Political Action Conference Straw Poll with paid College Republican votes
2) A shameless person is attempting to smear the good name of the Mitt Romney and his campaign

This video is suggesting voter fraud, but I will report this as I see it. You the reader should decide for yourself. In this video, Ryan Bilodeau, chairman of the University of Rhode Island College Republicans and organizer for the Romney Campaign, is seen rummaging through of box of materials that look very similar to the bags that were given to official CPAC registrants. Then, Jordan Sekulow, a Romney staffer is seen hurriedly walking though the CPAC Exhibition Hall with a handful of CPAC badges to give volunteers. Sekulow is the son of syndicated radio host, Jay Sekulow, and he is the former Students for Bush Campaign Director from 2004. This concoction makes a poor attempt at linking the actions of Ryan Bilodeau to Jordan Sekulow. Bilodeau and Sekulow appear innocent, but the attempt may hold validity. Watch and decide.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV0Hwqr09n4

It is also alleged that the Mitt Romney for President Campaign spent in the upwards of $20,000 accommodating students for CPAC 2007 with travel, lodging, registration fees, and other expenses in exchange for volunteering for the weekend and a supporter reception. For 24 hours a day, one could see the Romney army of Republican students everywhere from the hotel lobby, exhibition halls, stairwells, local restaurants, and a couple of the local bars hosting College Republican drunk fests. Romney, Romney, Romney everywhere. It seemed that way because, in essence, Mitt Romney for President WAS everywhere.
The Mitt Romney for President Campaign clearly out worked and out paid opponents like Sam Brownback, Jim Gilmore, and Tom Tancredo. This Bostonian was playing hardball like the New York Yankees. The Romney Camp is believed to have used every financial means possible to procure the CPAC 2007 straw poll pennant, a comparatively trifling title on the way to the big show.

Unfortunately, the talk of a Conservative candidate at CPAC was not about Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, or Sam Brownback. The natural buzz among the real Conservatives was about the field of dark horse candidates, primarily the former Governor of Virginia James Gilmore, while secondarily speaking of the former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and Congressman Tom Tancredo. This fact proves that a couple of hundred restless College Republicans will not and should not influence the future of the United States of America in a single straw poll with an artificial murmur of campaign rhetoric. As for me, I do not think that the CPAC 2007 straw poll held, holds, or will hold much water in the 2008 presidential primaries simply because campaign organization will never prevail over the power of ideas and individual investigation.

This video is an example of the culture of corruption that extends far beyond Capitol Hill's Republican Party. This culture of corruption can be seen at all levels of the GOP, even the college campus. First, if the insinuation is true, and the straw poll was rigged, corruption exists. Secondly, corruption might exist from an opposing inner-partisan campaign attempting to smear the good name and reputation of a worthy opponent. Either way, corruption exists in some way, shape, form, or fashion in this exhibition of ill-will. Richard Vigueries CPAC suggestion just might be plausible. Maybe the Republican Party should be as the Old Testament Hebrews in so much as a dormant force wandering in the desert until the corrupt leaders are eradicated.