Comment by George Phillies on a previous IPR post:
Our Party faces a crisis that threatens its existence. In the last decade we’ve lost more than half our membership. Income is down 70% in real dollars. We can’t even afford a monthly newsletter any more.
That’s despite the real political situation: We had an enormous opportunity after 9/11 — Look at the ACLU; their membership doubled. We had an enormous opportunity with Bush’s War on Iraq — we’re the only antiwar party. We had an enormous opportunity opposing the Bush-Pelosi police state. We had opportunities, but no outcomes.
We must change, or we shall surely fail.
Let’s learn from our opposition, a tale of two National Chairs, Howard Dean and Michael Steele.
Howard Dean was the candidate of the Democratic Netroots. His position was support activism, support volunteers, and go for the 50 state strategy — his party crushed the Republicans in 2006 and 2008, because his strategy was ‘Winning is me helping you’.
Michael Steele was the candidate of ‘Winning is you helping me’. He gives barnburner speeches–the huge fees go in his pocket. He plumps his book — he keeps the royalties. And elections? Steele is the poker player who drew a lucky hand and thinks he’s national champion. His torture-loving Cosmo pinup of a Senate candidate took Massachusetts, because Scott Brown ran against Martha Coakley, who thinks ‘go on vacation in the Cayman Islands’ is a campaign strategy.
So what do you want? A Howard Dean or a Michael Steele?
I’m offering you the Howard Dean model.
See also: Candidates for Libertarian National Committee chair speak at California convention
With respect to my State Party, in the past six months non-renewals have been less than five or ten percent of the membership (in a period of rapid growth, there is a range of choices of denominators), including 0% non-renewals for the last two months.
The renewals include several people who moved out of state or vanished into this air.
Most of the work done by the Executive Director, like most of the iceberg, is below the water line and hard to see. That’s why New Path for the LNC Treasurer candidate James Oaksun is planning on setting up residence in DC for a period to look at the office and spending issues carefully.
We have a very modest budget,.far less than it was a decade ago. The amount of work that can get done by our National Party’s paid staff, as a part of the total work needed, is very limited, and has to be tightly focused on points most appropriate for paid staff to do. There is enormous room for a competent LNC that serves the party by forming working groups composed largely of volunteers to perform important tasks that otherwise will not be done. The opposite of working groups is the ‘governance’ model in which the LNC sits around telling the staff what objectives to follow with no suggestion of how to get there, even though our National Committee and available volunteers have a much wider competence base at the ‘how to’ level than does any staff we can plausibly hire. We have seen that ‘governance’ model in action in the LNC for the last decade, and you can see where it has taken us.
George,
If you don’t mind my asking, what do you think of the job Wes has done so far as ED? Also, what do you see as the role of chair compared to the role of ED?
Libs as the only anti war party ???????????
“Prior to 2009, State Conventions had lost large amounts of money,”
That should be ‘Prior to 2006″.
So, to answer the question, relative to when I started being able to affect the situation, we have created a more prosperous situation. Now that the Potemkin village memberships have run out, our membership is climbing reasonably swiftly, and most members are renewing.
No, I am not happy with how everything has gone. Sometimes progress has been much slower than you would think possible. We have since 2006 had good state committee people, each set to their credit better than the last.
The recent US Senate Special Election has had good and bad sides. Joe Kennedy did 50% better than our 2008 top of ticket, but worse than our 2008 U.S. Senate candidate, who, however, was running in a little-contested race.
On the other hand, the Republicans were so afraid of Joe that he had 2000 emails demanding he withdraw, and six Republican Fascists — I use the term advisedly — sent him death threats against him and his family. That’s far more resistance than we have faced in many other elections.
@9
I must have missed your prior post.
In short: Under my friends and my leadership, since finally hitting bottom: Membership up 75%. LAMA income (including State as well as FEC money) rose 50% from 2007 to 2008, and was up a further 21% from 2008 to 2009. Prior to then, LPMA did the opposite of what I suggested, and its income and membership finally fell precipitously.
I had no say in how LPMA functioned between 1998 and 2006, though I was a minority voice on the State Committee from 2004 to 2006. I would say that it did the opposite of what I suggested, and managed to go through a quarter of a million dollars to no great avail.
Since the end of 2006, when good people including me finally gained control of the state organization, we have done much better. LAMA FEC (Federal) and OCPF (State Equivalent of FEC) income rose 50% from 2007 to 2008, and *a further 21% from 2008 to 2009*. That’s right, from the election year to the next year, *our income went up*.
At the end of 2006, we inherited a large membership list of people who had no interest in the organization. In fact, large numbers of them were actually National Party Members who under UMP had been involuntarily forced to join the state organization whether they wanted to join or not. Nonetheless, we honored the membership expiration dates of these people, until finally the ones who had never been interested let their memberships run out. Honoring the last of those commitments took until Summer 2009. Since then, our membership has increased 75%.
In 2006, the Massachusetts Libertarian organization was in sufficient straits that its regular yearly convention, which should have been called for April, did not occur. The State
Committee had not met for three-quarters of a year. Finally, in May the outbound State Chair to his great credit asked Carol McMahon and I to organize and hold the next State Convention, which due to Bylaws constraints could be held no earlier than September. We held it, an almost entirely new State Committee being elected. Carol and I were re-elected.
There then followed a prolonged period of trying to sort out all sorts of issues. Many of these took quite some time to fix, in some cases much longer than you would think necessary. Welcome to reality!
There are some useful lessons here. For example, in an all-volunteer organization, sometimes you can replace your procedures. Sometimes you have to replace the people instead. Also, fixing our National Committee will not happen overnight.
Money: In 2006, LPMA had had no fund raising drives since mid-2002. The State Party was substantially dependent on Unified Membership Plan income, meaning internal fundraising had atrophied and member feedback had largely vanished. UMP money ended in late 2006. The last monthly donor had stopped giving. Under new leadership, regular fundraising efforts were instituted. Several unused objects having significant monthly costs and no benefits were terminated. Prior to 2009, State Conventions had lost large amounts of money, losses being covered by using money donated for candidate support to cover the conventions as ‘fundraising expenses’. Since then, every state convention has broken even or generated positive income via fundraisers.
From January 2009 to now, our FEC account has had a 50% increase. Our total funds on hand have increased 2.5 times. If the national party were doing as well as we are today, given USA has more population, it would have $360,000 cash on hand. More important, income is consistently increasing. LAMA income rose 50% from 2007 to 2008, and a further 21% from 2008 to 2009.
Membership: The new State Committee inherited a large number of people who had via the LNC paid state party dues, but who had never received anything for their money. We gave them all an automatic year forwards membership; that appeared to be the ethical solution. We also had other groups of people who were on the membership rolls, were apparently not Life Members (in some cases, we could ask directly), and who had not paid us anything in years. Disentangling all this in ways that would not lead to anyone claiming we had cheated them took some time. However, in late 2006, we had a very small number of real members, and a very large number of people with no attachment to the organization whose entirely nominal memberships had to be run out.
In addition, membership rules needed to be brought into the 21st century. There were in 2006 no provisions for electronic memberships (newsletter via PDF), family memberships, or donation or renewal via the web. There were no meetup groups. Under the new committee all these things were added; about a third of our members now receive Mass Liberty electronically. We also greatly upgraded our renewal letters. The process took until Summer 2009, when the last nominal memberships expired and membership bottomed. Since then, membership is up 75%.
Newsletter: The newsletter had not come out regularly in years. We resumed monthly publication, first under my editorship and then under the Editorship of first David Blau and later Steve Greffenius. There was a major effort to cut costs and improve results. The cost of printing and mailing the newsletter was cut 60%. With a couple of one-month drop-outs, mailing has continued monthly ever since.
Volunteer contact: In 2006, there was no volunteer contact effort. A program of contacting volunteers was instituted, first with a volunteer newsletter and now with telephone and email messaging.
Web pages: In 2006, the web site had not been updated in a very long time. The former State Committee had not secured ownership of its own URL; the former webmaster, Muni Savyon,
refused to turn the URL over to the new State Committee, and he is *still* refusing to do so. We registered alternative URLs, and thanks to the hard work of first Bill Hees, then Mary-Anne Wolf, and most recently Bob Underwood got a web site up. I recently found large amounts of old web site material; you can now read our old State Committee minutes and Newsletters on the web site. Bill Hees most excellently managed to get a forwarder to LPMAss dot org placed from the old LPMA dot org address. Art Torrey attached a forum device; more recently, we installed a SoapBlox object GoldMassGroup dot com, which is closing on 400 readers.
STILL NOT ANSWERED FROM PRIOR POST – I ASK GEORGE AND ALL CHAIR SEEKERS TO POST YOUR REPLY HERE NOW!
George
Please present to us all the wonderful things you’ve done over the last decade in terms of MALP Membership?
Is MALP growth better or worse than National?
Just curious since your one campaign slogan appears to be “LP National Membership in Decline and I Can Do Better!” – You have told us what the LP should do, but the best way to judge your actions is to see what results those methods have accomplished in MA. Did the MALP grow under your terms or declined? Did you create a bigger better more prosperous tent or a smaller more exclusive one? And these questions are not just for you but anyone running for Chair or the LNC in general.
Hinkle, Root and others running for Chair too – feel free to drop in with what your approach to membership growth will be and what you’ve done in the past to grow your organizations?
Thank you and look forward to the chair debates where you all will have to answer these questions one way or another!
PS – I am a likely gold package delegate for my state and even though my chair is willing to purchase basic packages for us, I have declined but like my chair offered to buy one for another delegate who can’t afford it themselves.
Ok, George (#7). Why is the Lib party the only antiwar party? I’m pretty sure the Greens, Socialists, PSL, Constitutions, and a plethora of others are antiwar. The only prowar parties are the Dems and Reps. Even the neo-nazi parties are antiwar (sort of)!
@4
Bush proposed the National Surveillance State, and Pelosi and her doormat Democrats had no resistance before or after they became the Congressional majority.
@6
I have made a number of substantial proposals, including those mailed last Monday to every state chair.
For another model of Libertarian politics, note the following news I just received from New Hampshire:
George,
Thank you for opposing the mandatory convention registration fee.
On Saturday, at the LPNH executive committee meeting, a motion was made to boycott the convention if the fee is approved. The motion was tabled for later consideration.
Subsequently, a motion was passed directing Dan Karlan to oppose the fee.
George Phillies should try to make the Massachusetts Libertarian Party more successful. I don’t think he has the resources or leadership ability to make the National Libertarian Party into a real force.
Anyway, after Howard Dean was elected Chair of the DNC, he put alot of resources into aiding the statewide organizations of the Democratic Party, and neither Phillies nor Root has explained how they will raise large amounts of money needed to make the Libertarian Party an influence in American politics.
Phillies, the Artful Dodger, possibly the worst PhD on the planet.
[This guy has a ‘terminal degree’ ????? ]
[Chiropractor Donald J. Grundmann has a ‘terminal degree’ ?????? Condi Rice, another dysfunctional PhD! ]
Do we even stand a ‘glance of a chance’ ……….
George Phillies,
“We had an enormous opportunity opposing the Bush-Pelosi police state.”
Were do you get “Bush-Pelosi Police State” from? She Wasn’t elected Speaker till November 2006, well after the Patriot Act and other major anti-civil liberties laws were past.
The only antiwar party? Try again.
Steele and Dean were/are 24/7 chairs. Redpath has a real world job. Which candidates for LNC Chair pledge to do this full-time for nothing?
As a non Lib whom literally HATES the Democans and the Republicrats [since Nixon – Kennedy 1960] let me give one other perspective.
The Ghandi Model:
I am so sorry that the Libs have not progressed in the 21st Century. I see it as a lack of ethics. The major minors, including LP, claim to be Number Three. None can substantiate the claim for any give period.
Dean verses Steele ???????? MUCH too simplistic!
We are the ONLY ANTI WAR PARTY! Quit smoking that stuff! Every one was anti war out side of the DC Belt Neocoms.
ONLY ANTI WAR PARTY ?????????? Out and out lie!
“……… activism, support volunteers, and go for the 50 state strategy — his party crushed the Republicans in 2006 and 2008, because his strategy was ‘Winning is me helping you’ ……. ”
Oh, two terms of the worst President and the worst Vice President in history does not count for any thing ??????? A one armed wall paper hanger could have walked through the Oval Office in 2009! [Just another Lib Lie!]
From my experiences with Tessiler, Rider and other dishonest Sand Paper pols in Sandy Ego; the horrible reputation of Libs [Bruce Cohen and Company on the West Coast] from state to state, and the lack of sweat and effort as one ball, one opportunity after another is baubbled!
All that general talk of smaller government and nothing on the specifics such as dysfunctional veterans programs. The bigs hint at privatization of Social Security! The Lib response? The silence was deafening!