Republican candidates --- Tom Allon for Mayor and Bay Ridge Andrew Sullivan for City Council --- headlined Sunday meeting of The Brooklyn Young Republican Club

Glenn Nocera opened a very well-attended meeting of The Brooklyn Young Republican Club with a heartfelt presentation of the club's traditional and storied background to an overcrowded room that was half-filled by candidates, visitors and newcomers. He also told everybody that the organization was the happily self-declared “independent” Brooklyn Republican Club since Brooklyn seems to have two

Glenn Nocera’s Young Republican Club made a point of returning the “Home & Home” hospitality to some members of the Brooklyn Tea Party, while entertaining a large crowd of others at yesterday’s club meeting at the downtown Irish pub, Ceol. Tea Party President Frank Russo did his first public appearance at the BYRC and joined a roster of speakers along with GOP Mayoral Candidate Tom Allon and the prospective Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights Republican nominee for City Council, Andy Sullivan.

At one point or another about fifty people squeezed into the mid-afternoon meeting of The Brooklyn Young Republican Club at The Ceol Irish Pub on Smith Street not far from the Bergen Street stop on the “F” line. Although the largest part of the crowd were existing members of the Brooklyn YR Club, some others obviously came along with the candidates, Tom Allon and Andy Sullivan; still others came as part of the Tea Party contingent tagging along to hear Frank Russo announce his recent election as President of the Brooklyn Tea Party; and there were even a handful of newcomers who were there to see what these Brooklyn Young Republicans and Republican candidates were all about.

Andy Sullivan spoke first because he had another appearance elsewhere. The only announced candidate against Democrat incumbent Vinny Gentile gave his history to the Young Republicans as the man who initiated “The Hard Hat Pledge” and described how he has been prominent on several media outlets. Sullivan emphasized how Republican candidates and the Republican brand had lost their voice and ability to connect with middle-class working Americans. He then spoke out about members of building trades and craft unions who needed a good economy to find work; and how the GOP needed to get passed the union leaders who all had made their deals with th DNC. Based upon the questions and positive feedback from the crowd, he was very well received.

Next up was Frank Russo, who said he was responding to the invitation of Brooklyn Young Republican Club President Glenn Nocera and that he was glad to be given the opportunity to introduce himself to that group of Brooklyn’s Young Republicans. He said that with him at the helm, there would be a more active program of events conducted by the Tea Party, probably starting in April. One of the things he mentioned was that he and a committee including Joe Hayon were in the process of a fundamental reorganization of The Brooklyn Tea Party, including the adoption of a new constitution and by-laws with clearly stated principals, goals and rules. He thought that establishing a formal structure for the Tea Party should be his first order of business, because up until one week before the Brooklyn Tea Party had been run very informally. He then complimented the YRs for what they had done over such a long time. Later on, he was very active in discussing certain Tea Party concerns with mayoral candidate Tom Allon. As a result of that friendly confrontation, Allon publicly stated that he would be glad to address the Brooklyn Tea Party some time in March or April to re-address the same things with the Tea Party membership.

The formal program culminated with the appearance of mayoral candidate Tom Allon, who made a very professional presentation, including having his staff spread around some very impressive looking literature [some of the most glitzy expensive stuff I’ve seen yet].  Allon was  peppered by many questions. And, even though he acknowledged being a recently converted Republican with mostly liberal-leaning social beliefs that he said were more Libertarian than liberal, Allon’s explanation of his lower taxes and fiscally conservative program met with some obvious favor by the largely conservative Republican crowd.