COEUR d'ALENE - Kootenai County Republican Central Committeeman Bjorn Handeen held his first Precinct 52 meeting Thursday with KCRCC Chairman Neil Oliver as the keynote speaker.

Handeen opened the meeting, which attracted 22 people and handful of children, with a plea for all Republicans to unite.

"I see many friends in the crowd, and I see many people who might not yet want to be described by me as a friend," he said. "But I am hoping today that we can look at each other with new eyes and set aside our differences."

He told the group that it is time for party members to try and discover issues they can work together on with the same "resolve and single-mindedness" that they used to exploit their differences in the past.

The way Handeen sees it, the party only has two paths it could follow. He explained the path they are on now, and the direction in which he believes the party should focus.

"Political campaigns are getting more and more savage, and less and less capable people are choosing to pursue leadership roles in our community," Handeen said, adding if the party continues down that path, it is only going to get worse in the next five to 10 years.

"As public discourse focuses more on personalities than on ideas, our community will fracture more and more significantly," he said. "Trust is what holds a community together. Without trust we don't even have a community - we have a sewer."

Handeen said if the lack of trust and infighting continues, all Republicans will have to hand down to their children is "poisoned discourse."

"Our only consolation will be that on our tombstones they can write: 'At least I stopped the moderates,' 'at least I fought the Ron Paulers,' 'at least I stuck it to the downtown power elite,' 'at least we held back the CAVERs (citizens against virtually everything),'" he said. "Well good for you. At least there is another path."

He said that path will require Republicans to show vulnerability and listen to the those groups to find what common goals they can pursue.

"I'll have to eat my words about cocktail conservatives," he said. "We'll have to accept the moderates, accept the Ron Paulers, accept the CAVERs and accept the downtowners.

"We don't have to vote for them in the primaries, but we do have to recognize their right to exist."

He said Republicans can still disagree with ideas, but the only way he sees the party healing is if all members start actively listening and engage each other as people and fellow Republicans.

"It is only our communities that we are hurting," he said. "By listening and understanding, there is a way forward - stronger and more united."

In order to do that, Handeen said the party needs to examine where it stands right now, and take inventory of what it has.

"That's why I invited Neil Oliver to explain where we are as a party today," he said, introducing the KCRCC chairman.

Oliver said he wanted to explain what the party's central committee is and what it is not. He started with what it is not.

"We don't jump in the middle of primaries and try to pick candidates for the people," he said. "We don't do that."

He explained that selecting candidates in the primary election is the responsibility of Republican voters in Kootenai County. After that occurs, Oliver said the central committee's job is to get behind those candidates and support them.

While the central committee has been contentious for years, Oliver said it has been his goal since becoming chairman to keep debate focused on the issues in a cordial way.

"Not yelling and screaming at each other and taking videos to post on the Internet to embarrass them," he said. "If you disagree with something within the party, that is fine, but you have to be cordial. That's one thing I have really pushed hard for."

The central committee has both legislative and party rules to follow, and it is his job as chairman to make sure they follow them while he also tries to keep things civil.

"The Republican Party should be about the individual Republicans who make it up," Oliver said. "We need to listen to the individual Republicans in Kootenai County.

"We need to show that we have respect for our fellow members within the Kootenai County Republican Central Committee."

By attacking members outside the central committee structure, it is damaging the party as a whole, he said.

"If you have a problem with someone's idea - not with who they are, but with their idea - you attack the idea in the body at that time," he said. "You don't go to the press and you don't go to the forums and attack people.

"When you do that, you think you are getting one over on them, but actually you are demolishing the Republican Party from the inside."

He echoed Handeen in saying the central committee members need to recognize that Republicans come with many different views and beliefs.

"When we forget that, we are going to have problems," he said, adding that it does nobody any good to go out and "skewer" other Republicans - especially with the primary election season on the horizon.

"During the primaries things can get ugly. The candidates are fighting for the positions they want," he said. "But to drag the media into it - which is a Democrat instrument, not a Republican instrument - when you drag the press into something, you've gone too far."

He said the central committee is the place to air differences on political ideas, and by engaging the press, members are simply engaging in gossip.

"I am not press-friendly because they will twist anything you say," Oliver said. "I don't do much with the press, but I do speak with them when they call me.

"I could put forth something in the press but quite honestly most people don't read the press that are Republican, and most people don't read the press that aren't Republican," he continued. "They are dead. Their brand is completely dead. The press is just burning time. They are fire starters for people with woodstoves."

The next Precinct 52 meeting will be held at noon at the IHOP restaurant on Feb. 13. The keynote speaker will be Kootenai County Clerk Jim Brannon.