LOCAL REPUBLICANS BECOMING FORCE IN PARTY.

Byline: James Bemis Commentary

Most people know there's a battle going on for the soul of California's Republican Party. What they may not realize is that much of it is being waged by those here in our own back yard.

At last weekend's GOP convention, for instance, county Republican leaders, including local residents Norm Walker, Russ Hopkins, Matt Zurcher, Glen Woodbury, Peggy Sadler, and Paul and Carolyn Leavens, headed to Anaheim to fine-tune the party platform.

As about 1,000 of the GOP faithful gathered, a battle royal loomed between conservatives - who support the Republican Party platform - and a small, dissident group called the California Congress of Republicans, led by Simi Valley businessman Bob Larkin, who don't.

So while the GOP's main convention went on, Larkin and about 140 other members of the CCR held their own shindig across the street. Judging by the generous amount of press coverage given the renegade group, it's fair to say that rarely have so many written so much about so few.

Claiming to represent the mainstream, these so-called ``moderates'' would like the GOP to change its stance as a pro-life, pro-gun rights party. Naturally, it's conservatives who are branded as being divisive for maintaining loyalty to the party's adopted principles.

Make no mistake about it, the real issue in this fight is over abortion. More precisely, it's a battle over the plank in the party platform opposing abortion. In fact, at last year's convention in Long Beach, Larkin led his group off the convention floor during the platform vote, depriving the convention of the necessary two-thirds of delegates needed for a quorum.

But this time, CCR made little headway in pushing for change. Besides hearing from presidential hopefuls Steve Forbes, Elizabeth Dole and Alan Keyes, the convention's substantive actions included lowering the quorum requirement to 50 percent of the delegates plus one, thereby preventing CCR from again staging an effective walkout.

But the rough-and-tumble of party conventions isn't the only place that Ventura County voices are heard within the state GOP: There's intellectual firepower here too.

Camarillo resident John Kurzweil is editor and publisher of California Political Review, a magazine that for years has been a must-read for anyone interested in what the state's conservatives think.

The centerpiece of the September-October issue is a fascinating discussion on the trade-off between political expediency and standing for principle, a subject of burning interest given the GOP's precarious state. This issue features a defense by David Horowitz, an ex-radical leftist turned conservative activist, of his pamphlet ``The Art of Political War.''

In the pamphlet, Horowitz advocates that conservatives fight liberals' fire with fire. For example, when the Democrats leveled trumped-up charges at House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Horowitz claims Republicans should have begun throwing phony charge after phony charge at the opposition's leaders until the lying stopped.

Kurzweil has criticized ``The Art of Political War'' as betraying America's first principles and undermining the GOP cause by sanctioning lying. In his apologia, Horowitz reminds readers that conservatives are in a war against liberalism and, well, sometimes war gets ugly. Democrats don't shrink from unsavory tactics, so why should Republicans?

CPR assembles an all-star cast to debate both sides of the issue, including California GOP chairman John McGraw, GOP co-chair Shawn Steel, State Sen. Ray Haynes, State Assemblyman Steve Baldwin, author Rabbi Daniel Lapin, Republican strategist Arnold Steinberg and others. Kurzweil concludes with an essay in which the title tells all - ``Truth Does Matter.'' (CPR's Web site is www.cppf.org.)

I line up with Kurzweil here, believing there are higher principles - and a higher authority - than political power. (Interestingly, no one mentions the Eighth Commandment's forbidding of bearing false witness.) But the subject is a fascinating one that has occupied great minds since at least the time of Machiavelli. Kudos are due Kurzweil for bringing us such illuminating exchange.

People don't usually think of Ventura County as a breeding ground for Republican leaders, like, say, Orange County. But as the county grows, it follows that its influence will also. Local Republicans, then, are likely to continue becoming a strong force within the GOP - for better or for worse.