Chairman Luke Esser needs to learn the law of unintended consequences.

And language has consequences ....

Today, the Chairman spoke on Kirby Wilbur's radio program, saying at one time that the Party remains officially neutral regarding the delegates the candidates gained, then immediately reinforced his use of the "winner" language, certainly not neutral rhetoric.

The unintended consequence the Chairman risks is the formation of a delegate bloc alliance against his declared "winner", as backlash to his imprudent and unnecessary use of biased language.

So, if the delegate count continues to favor, by a small margin, John McCain and the Chair persists in referring to this as a "win", enough Huckabee-Paul-Romney delegates might bloc together to lock out the presumptive McCain delegate "winners". Or the same bloc alignment against any other candidate who is crowned "winner" by the Chairman.

Is this really the divisive result the Chairman wants to stimulate?

Is the media value of his "winner" rhetoric worth that risk?

Another unintended consequence is the alienation of the non-"winner" delegates failing to transition as volunteers down-ticket to support Dino Rossi - why should they help an R campaign when they were rhetorically dismissed, by the head of the Party, as volunteer delegates for "loser" candidates?

Chairman Esser is playing a risky game of rhetorical brinkmanship with a population of novice volunteers who might be confused and insulted by the double-speak of "Party neutrality" and the declaration of a "winner."

What is the gain the Chair imagines from his "winner" language, when he could celebrate the precinct turnout, congratulate all the candidates and delegates for a job well done, and wish them well to the next District/County Conventions, without parsing them into "winners" and "losers"??

There is a very good reason the Party should remain neutral, something the Chair does not master in his "winner" rhetoric - positive feedback is the tool that builds the "big tent" Party necessary to harvest useful worker bees for other campaigns.

Divisive feedback only builds a "big rent" in the volunteer fabric of the Party.

The Chair needs to withdraw his "winner" statement, as premature, and create a unifying message that will reaffirm the positive actions of the volunteer delegates on behalf of all their candidates, without the media nonsense of "winners" and "losers".