Campus club redux

Campus clubs come and go at American River College. Some are never missed, while others leave a prominent mark even in their absence. Then there are those who leave and come back, sometimes even years later. Scott Raab is Vice President of American River College's Young Republicans club. Raab helped re-activate the club as part of what he described as a long history of the club being active and inactive over the years. The reason behind the club's lack of steady activity is due to what Raab calls the transitional period due to bureaucracy, paperwork and club member schedules, making it difficult to keep the club going consistently. The Vice President's motivating force to help start the Young Republicans club was his attraction to the "idea of free thought and conservative principals" and a desire to find a "place that I can share and explore my thoughts with other likeminded students." "Our mission is to work towards growing support and increasing the knowledge on campus about the principles of the Republican Party," said Raab. "Like any other organization there is a lot of mis-information and suppression." He further explained the mission as the desire to "be able to offer interested students with an option to learn about what we stand for as a party and hopefully encourage and help any on their path in the political world." In describing the difference between the Republican and Democrat parties, Raab identified three main issues clearly distinguishing the two heavy-hitters. Abortion and pro-life, judicial choices and theories, and "republicans believe in the free market which has given American prosperity where as democrats believe in a more socialist and extensive government run systems." The election of Barack Obama doesn't seem to have any affect on the Young Republican's recent re-formation. "The recent election had many students blindly following Obama and a message of change, but now that the election has passed, a lot of people are starting to wonder just exactly what they got," said Raab. "Many people seeing him falling short of campaign promises and outright lies." A Democrat Club also used to be present at ARC and student leader, Toni Abney is in the process of trying to initiate paperwork. She says nothing has been officially filed yet and the club is not expected to start until next semester.