The battle between social moderates and social conservatives is nothing new in Chester County's Republican Party. But my impression is that party leadership tries to keep this battle below the surface.

Last week the battle broke out into the open. Twelve of 20 Republican Committee seats in Chester County's Area 9 -- which is made up of Malvern Borough and Willistown Township -- were contested in Tuesday's primary. A group of candidates who, for convenience, I refer to as "social moderates," won nine of those seats. The remaining three were won by candidates from a group I call "party uniters." I call them this because they say their goal is to create a Republican Party that is accepting of all Republican ideologies.

I was forced to label both of these slates because neither had a formal name. I couldn't call the slates "Slate 1" and "Slate 2." Would've been too confusing.

In any case, I report on this committee battle in an article I wrote for Sunday's paper.

The article has gotten lots of compliments and has made a few people really upset. This means -- although I try to be humble -- that the article might make for a moderately enjoyable read.

Also worth a read is the newspaper column, written by former Republican Committeeman Henry Briggs, which catapulted this conflict into the public eye. When I get a chance, I'll scan in some of the responses to Briggs's column. They appear to have been removed from the internet. (How this can happen, I don't know.)

One note -- in my Sunday article, I incorrectly reported that Sally Cummings held onto her committee seat. In fact, Cummings lost her seat to Helen Hammerschmidt. I regret this error, but it does not affect the numbers -- "social moderates" still won 9 seats, and "party uniters" still won 3.

I've asked several of the women in my life what they thought about Theresa Atkins' exploits.

They responded: "Good for her!"

Atkins, the wife of Chester County's Emergency Services Director, was recently arrested in a Center City hotel room for offering certain services to an undercover police man.

The odd thing, other than the fact that she's the wife of a well-respected Chesco official, is that Atkins is 49. The other women arrested in the same Philly police department sting were in their 20s.

Also unusual is that Atkins advertised herself as a well-read, well-traveled, sophisticated companion who, for a moderate fee, would spend a couple of adventuresome hours with you.

Atkins, my female friends said, proved that older women can still be desirable. They said that Atkins is yet another woman who's disproved the Hollywood-driven preconception that men only want dumb, young, skinny girls.

That's interesting, but it's even more interesting to think about what life was like in the Atkins' Paoli home. Unfortunately, there's little we'll be able to find out, unless Thresa or her husband feels compelled to give one of the DLN reporters a tell-all interview.