Editorial submitted by Paul Frankel:
Recently, Libertarian Party state chairs have been discussing on their list why the dues paying membership of the national LP is declining. This decline is happening at the same time that the LP nationwide is growing its voter registration faster than any other national party, had its best presidential ballot access retention following a midterm election in the party’s 43 year history and the best of any alternative party in a century, is on the winning side of most public policy issues as seen by the results of ballot initiative votes all over the country, was the only nationally-organized party to get more votes in 2014 than 2010, got the party’s best numerical results (out of 11 attempts) and a close second in percentage terms for its presidential ticket in the most recent presidential election… a time when record numbers of Americans are telling opinion pollsters that a new major party is needed and that government is way too big.
One of the list participants, and my successor as Region 7 alternate on the Libertarian National Committee, Daniel Hayes, proposed the following explanation:
Maybe Sustaining memberships are down nationally because we have Gary Johnson the person that ran as a Libertarian in 2012, saying he is going to run as a Libertarian in 2016, traveling around to various National talk shows saying things like:
“The ideal political affiliation right now is independent,” Johnson said. “I would be that, but to get on the ballot in all 50 states would be a $10 million endeavor. Running as a Libertarian, with all the volunteers, they cover that base. They make that happen.”
It is my understanding that Mr. Johnson was on Neil Cavuto’s show on Fox just this past Wednesday and said the same thing.
I don’t believe that is why national dues paying membership is down. National LP needs a website that doesn’t suck (I know this is being worked on but results are what count and for now we (LP national) have a website that is terrible, as was discussed at the last LNC meeting. We need updated outreach materials. Again, being worked on, but not here yet. We need training in all the basics of local organizational and campaign management for our candidates and state and county leadership, promoted heavily. Materials exist, but need to be updated and promoted much, much, much more. The database needs a lot better management, as has been discussed at length on past LNCs. We need states and national LP that see their relationship as synergy rather than competition, and which all encourage rather than discourage people to participate at the national, state AND county/parish levels. We need to get with the modern age and how people like to do things these days and push monthly, rather than yearly, donations and push them heavily and constantly. Among other things they are opt out, as opposed to opt in as with the yearly ones, and psychologically less painful for equal annualized amounts of contributions. We need to get a lot better at leveraging our volunteer database, as much or more than our donors. Above all we need prospecting. Passive recruiting does not work. If you don’t ask you don’t get.
Blaming these organizational weaknesses on OAI is just scapegoating pure and simple.
Opinions on the ideal desirability of running as an independent (or of saying so in interviews) vary, and I had my share of comments about it in this comment thread, but here is one less negative way of looking at it proposed by Andy Craig:
1) The point about independent ballot labels is just factually correct. A candidate with that ballot label (in the states that allow it, vs. “nomination by petition” or “no affiliation” etc.) will typically do better, because of the positive connotations the word has vs. the neutral-at-best connotations associated with a Libertarian label among the average voter.
2) In part because of that, I’ve seen many Libertarians also refer to themselves as “independent”, even where they’re clearly LP candidates who have that label. In our little corner of political nerd-world, that’s obviously incorrect and contradictory, but to the vast majority of people who think “independent” means “any non-D, non-R candidate” it lets you tap into those positive associations. Heck, it’s even used that way in the name of this website.
3) It lets him raise the point about ballot access and what a hurdle that is, which is worth raising in its own right but also leads into his point about 270+EV ballot access as a genuine threshold for the debates.
4) Far from putting down the LP, it raises one of our strongest strengths, something which plays heavily into successful candidate recruitment: the established ballot access we have earned in most states, and the capacity to successfully petition onto most if not all of the rest. It’s basically saying “I’d rather start with a half million Libertarians behind me, then all on my own from scratch.” – which isn’t an insult.
In any case, Gary Johnson 2012 campaign manager Ron Nielson has categorically stated in an email:
If Gary runs for President he will run as a Libertarian. […] Regarding help for the LP……Gary has been very helpful with many state party fundraising and recruitment efforts for many years now …..and continues with trips planned throughout the spring at state conventions. OAIPAC is specific[ly] taking on upcoming ballot access projects. OAI is promoting a liberty agenda throughout the country…. see this link: https://www.ouramericainitiative.com/state-projects.html.
Mr. Hayes continues:
How many resources are being misdirected away from National and the states and put into Our America Initiative, which looks like the framework for a new Political Party to me and not just a PAC like some have claimed. I think people need to start asking themselves this question. Also, How many state chairm[e]n or vice-chairm[e]n and other leader[s] are OAI directors? Maybe if people were not putting their energies and efforts of their state organizations into the coffers of OAI and it’s Honorary Chairman Climbing Mountains in Antarctica, living a Rock Star lifestyle building a national movement directed towards one person, things might be better for the National party membership.
It’s pure fantasy with zero relation to any kind of reality that OAI has any plans to become a new political party.
As LPNY chair Mark Axinn wrote in the same thread on the state chairs list,
I strongly doubt that Gary Johnson or Ron Nielson are foolish people. Starting a new political party without the resources of Tom Golisano or Ross Perot or the organizational platform of the LP is foolish.
I do not know many people who have contributed financially to OAI and I actually doubt it has raised much money so far. (Johnson has said that a truly successful Presidential campaign needs $50,000,000. Has OAI raised even 1% of that?)
I do know some people who have contributed some of their time and energy to it, which is fine as the LP does not have an exclusive hold on any of our resources. (If I give money to FEE or IJ, does that take away from my commitment to the LP? Of course not.)
Gary Johnson wants to run for President again. He was not as “pure” a Libertarian as Harry Browne, but I for one was proud to have him as our candidate in 2012. I would be very surprised if he does not seek the same position again in 2016.
I agree. And from what Ron has told me OAI has not raised significant money so far. I’m not sure if he wants me to tell you or not, so I’ll let him tell you if in fact he is spending more money on making it run than it raises from all other donors combined, i.e. if it’s a net loss for him at this point.
Norm Olsen commented to the LNC list:
I take Gary Johnson’s comments, in context, to be a compliment to the
Libertarian party.He is simply expressing a truth; the very basic reality is that:
1> Gary Johnson wants to run for president and needs ballot access, and
2> The LP will most likely want Gary Johnson to be our candidate and all we
have to offer is ballot access.This is simple logic; it’s often called “win-win”.
Gary may not pass the Libertarian test of everyone in our party, but he said
it very well when he said:“Whatever party you run for – Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green –
you’re carrying baggage that, whether you think you’re carrying it or not,
you are, because you are the representative of that party. I always tell
people that running as a Libertarian, I have the least amount of explaining
to do.”Norm
PS> Gary is a self-made man of means and lives the life style he chooses
without cost or expense to others or infringing upon the rights of others to
do likewise. I find this to be very Libertarian. I’m disappointed that a
Libertarian would choose to criticize that.—
Norman T Olsen
Regional Representative, Region 1
Libertarian National Committee
Daniel Hayes again:
When there is an argument in a state between various factions, OAI often seems to be there to take a side and/or fuel the dissent.
That is entirely false. OAI takes absolutely no position whatsoever in any intra-party faction fights in ANY state. It’s true that individuals who have also separately chosen to take OAI leadership roles in a few states are in their other capacities involved in intra-LP faction fights. OAI does not encourage them to do that in any way whatsoever. It’s also none of our business as OAI what they do or do not do in their LP capacities.
Daniel Hayes continues:
Since 2012, Gary Johnson has been CONSISTENTLY been a poor advocate for the National Libertarian Party on the national level. […] We need to stop supporting people that don’t truly support us.
I’m not sure how you mean that exactly. If you mean he should be encouraging people to join the LP in his interviews as Harry Browne did, I agree. But even without doing that, he still gets a lot of mentions of the LP in the media, and that is good for us. If you mean that he should read some Harry Browne and other libertarian authors for some ideas I would also agree, but he’s still easily in the libertarian ballpark of ideology even with the stances he has now. I disagree that Gary Johnson is “not truly supporting us,” although I do wish he would support us even more, as in constantly asking people to join the LP as Harry Browne did, and losing the “ideal way to run would be independent” bit in interviews. However, it’s really looking at the glass as half empty if you only focus on that and ignore all the mention of the LP that press coverage of Gary Johnson creates, his endorsements of downticket LP candidates, his appearances at state and local LP conventions and events helping draw attendance to these events and an opportunity for joint fundraising and for the LP reps there to make membership pitches to people who would not otherwise be there, and so on.
Obviously, we don’t have someone else that can be put out there to counter him,
That’s not obvious to me. Competition is healthy and good and will make us stronger. If you have other candidates you would like to encourage to run, please encourage them to run regardless of what Gov. Johnson does or does not do and regardless of when he does or does not do it. Competition raises the bar and makes whoever wins the nomination at the end (whether it be Gary Johnson or one of these other folks) a better candidate. If Gary beats them for the nomination he’ll be a better candidate as a result, and they will be better candidates in some future race should they run again. And if one of them beats him for the nomination, they will have earned it. If for any reason Gary is not able to or decides not to run, we’ll have better prepared backups. So in other words, I don’t see competition as a bad thing. Make it happen!
but do we really need to have our State Organizations directing their volunteers and members in his direction?
If you mean towards a GJ16 campaign, if there will be one, I am not in favor of our state organizations officially endorsing candidates for the prez nomination before it happens, although I think individual state party officers should be free to do so. If you mean OAI, then OAI is more than just Gary Johnson and we could continue to exist and function as OAI whether or not Gov. Johnson remains involved with OAI. Should state parties steer volunteers and members to OAI? Not necessarily, but individual state party officers should be able to, and IMO there’s nothing wrong with state parties promoting a variety of different nonpartisan libertarian movement organizations (to make their members aware that these organizations exist and could use their help), hopefully on a mutually cooperative basis, and/or letting their members know about a variety of campaigns seeking their support for the presidential nomination on an equitable basis.
It’s also untrue that OAI is all about Gary Johnson. It’s true that he is our honorary chairman, and that we help book appointments for Gov. Johnson and Judge Gray, but we have advisory councils with over a hundred experts on a wide variety of issues whose opinion pieces we help promote throughout traditional and social media, a tax deductible foundation which is working to open up the debate to more than just the two establishment political parties, dozens of state projects pushing lobbying on pro-liberty issues in most of the states in the country and more on the way (including but in no way limited to improving ballot access laws in various states).
OAI is a non-partisan organization; if Gary Johnson runs for president again as many people expect, that will be a legally separate organization. Nothing about participating in OAI means that you have to support the LP (although many of our leaders are also LP activists, others are not) or, if you do, that you have to support Gary Johnson for our nomination. I myself am not committed to doing so – although I consider Gary a friend, I am also friends with Darryl Perry, as far as I know on good terms with Dr. Feldman, and generally want to know what my choices will be before I make up my mind as a delegate. In 2012 I did not make up my mind until the convention, but supported our nominee as state director of his campaign in Alabama post-convention. I may well not make up my mind until the convention in 2016. One of the candidates seeking the nomination this time, Dr. Marc Feldman, was Ohio director of OAI. He resigned that position, but that was his own choice – he would have been welcome to stay on as an OAI state director and seek the LP presidential nomination at the same time had he chosen to do so. Since then, we have asked Darryl Perry, another candidate for the presidential nomination, to become a state director for OAI with the full knowledge that he is running for the nomination. He didn’t accept that offer, but if at any point he wants to take it and if at that point his state does not already have a director, being a candidate for the LP nomination would not prevent him from also being an OAI state director. Supporters of these or other candidates for the LP nomination, as well as small l libertarians who vote for other parties, are all welcome to be involved in OAI, just as those who support Gary Johnson as a political candidate, should he choose to be one again, are.
I hope I’ve answered the questions about OAI diverting resources from the LP. If not, I’ll answer more in the comment thread. There are other questions about the GJ2012 campaign which I have addressed in past threads, and I am sure will need to address in this thread and future threads. I am not addressing those in this article because they are legally separate organizations, despite the obvious substantial overlap in leadership and structure.
Paul “paulie” Frankel
- Southern Region Director, Alabama state director and Eastern region co-deputy director of OAI
- Former LNC Region 7 Alternate 2012-2014
- Volunteer reporter, IPR
Volunteer, LP national social media content teams
- Likely uncommitted delegate to the next LP national convention; past delegate to the 2000, 2004, 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2014 national LP conventions
- Past at large and regional rep, Libertarian Party of Alabama exec comm, several terms on and off since 1998
- Member of the national LP continuously since 1994/1995, Life Member since 2000
- Professional ballot access petitioner, contractor, manager and consultant
205-534-1622 cell * https://www.facebook.com/paulie.cannoli
Looks like comments on this thread may be relevant for context of this:
http://hq.lp.org/pipermail/lnc-business_hq.lp.org/2016/004803.html
And this is significant because…?
Is it possible that OAI learned what the Pennsylvania Party learned about Stevens? That New York learned? That just about everyone on the planet has learned?
Here’s news from our old friend, Tom Stevens:
http://drtomstevens.blogspot.com/2015/03/dr-tom-stevens-resigns-as-new-york.html
I guess the other side doesn’t want to engage. Maybe they are embarrassed and know their innuendo won’t hold up to logical scrutiny.
Sarah is awesome! And I agree:
Still hoping to hear from all sides here. Don’t be scared, the water is fine 🙂
“You may be right. Or maybe if you keep scratching an itch before you know it you’re picking at a scab. Ever have that happen?”
I agree. You should add medication to it so it will heal faster.
I only came here to express my thoughts as someone who has observed the situation longer than most. I was just recently added to the SCC so until now I couldn’t be apart of the healing process. OAI has already been used as a tool to try to fire 2 SCC members. I feel if a reader wants to read a story and make a decision about something adding more facts might be useful.
“Ignoring a problem only make it worse.”
You may be right. Or maybe if you keep scratching an itch before you know it you’re picking at a scab. Ever have that happen?
“Marcel has done a lot of work organizing and creating different ways to reach out in the community as have I. We are both in leadership roles and working hard to correct the issue while grow the community.”
Thank you for all your work!
Rob Banks
February 27, 2015 at 4:13 pm
“Here’s a thought, if your state LP is having problems, concentrate on your county or parish. If that’s having problems too, organize your precinct and just start having hyper-local meetings for your neighbors who live right next to you.
Save the drama for the llamas and their baby mamas.”
Ignoring a problem only make it worse.
Marcel has done a lot of work organizing and creating different ways to reach out in the community as have I. We are both in leadership roles and working hard to correct the issue while grow the community.
Here’s a thought, if your state LP is having problems, concentrate on your county or parish. If that’s having problems too, organize your precinct and just start having hyper-local meetings for your neighbors who live right next to you.
Save the drama for the llamas and their baby mamas.
I joined the Libertarian Party of Louisiana a little over a year ago. I have yet to engage a democrat or republican. I’ve been contending with members in my own party. The leadership foundation in Louisiana is non existent and the party is trying to run candidates (badly) and grow membership (even worse1). We are building a huge structure that will crumble (is crumbling) since there is no foundation. Until the SCC in Louisiana get’s its act straight and there is a leadership structure with a true libertarian vision and backbone and is not run from the backseat (Jefferson parish). Unfortunately this will continue until the 2016 convention at the earliest and, depending on the outcome there, may go into perpetuity.
I guess we all do that sometimes. Some more than others….
“Jill Pyeatt
February 25, 2015 at 10:49 pm
My reason for mentioning my remembrance of Daniel Hayes was to point out that perhaps he gets his panties into a bundle fairly frequently, and sometimes before really knowing what’s going on.
Not that we’d ever have such a problem in the LP CA!”
LOL!
“Not that we’d ever have such a problem in the LP CA!”
I’m guessing that would be pretty much every state….
True!
My reason for mentioning my remembrance of Daniel Hayes was to point out that perhaps he gets his panties into a bundle fairly frequently, and sometimes before really knowing what’s going on.
Not that we’d ever have such a problem in the LP CA!
Sure. It is a shame that we find ourselves in these small battles across the country when we have a major war with the government to fight.
Thanks Sarah. I’ve been hearing that from quite a few people (mostly on FB but glad a few have stopped by here). Still haven’t heard from the other side of this though.
After watching this play out for the last 2 years in the LPL, it is my opinion that this isn’t about OAI at all. This is just an attempt to turn some well-meaning, yet new and inexperienced members against our Vice Chair and Secretary. Their relationship (or past relationship) with OAI is justification for trying to fire them. There are good people in OAI and the LPL.
“There is so much work to be done, and so few people are willing to actually do it.”
Unfortunately all too true.
Jen, please note my apology for the depiction. My intention was to not portray bias in the pending Judicial Committee investigation regarding any alleged transgressions. It was not my intention to cast an opinion on your grievances either pro or con.
It was my intention to be brief, and to raise this question: was the alleged OAI conflict of interest raised by Daniel motivated by something other than a legitimate concern?
Reference: “Unfortunate that Guy, the LPL Vice Chair, would write this in that way. I have presented official grievances against Daniel Hayes that have been because of something that he did, not just attacking him out of the blue or as Guy presented working to terminate each other.”
Yep!
The annoying thing about “living through it” is that those episodes always end up pissing off large numbers of members, who often leave and never return.
It’s especially annoying to me, because I spend so much time and energy recruiting people to join. Others always come along to piss them off and send them away, and the worst thing is the perps don’t give a shit about it as long as they “win”. They don’t even care that all they win is a hollow shell of what was there before they infested the organization.
I wish I could put a tax on the idiots who do it.
There is so much work to be done, and so few people are willing to actually do it.
I’ve been through it here in years past, and we survived. Marc tells me VA had it in the past also.
You know, whenever I read stuff like the LA comments above, the OR mess, or a host of other similar soap operas, I feel very lucky to live in VA. Sure, there are some conservatarians that make a stink once in a while. But, for the most part, they just do their thing in their region.
I cannot imagine what it must be like for activists in LA or OR. I imagine that the ones that actually do stuff have to make a real effort to avoid getting caught up in the state party’s drama. Sounds like an incredibly frustrating and demoralizing situation.
I guessed in between your comments, then pulled it when I saw your second one, then you took their location out, so you succeeded except for the few people that saw those comments during that minute or two or had them emailed to them.
Sorry, Paulie, meant to protect the guilty, and failed.
Here’s one of those leaders talking about Reams. Notice how flat-out wrong he is about the willingness of voters to approve reform. Also note the typical R expectation that we can be ideo-ninjas who can get elected on false premises, then implement our reforms magically once we are swept into office:
I agree with you, Mark H. I would add that the only things some Libertarians would have us talk about are “taxes, eminent domain, and guns”. And the Fairtax.
Start talking about repealing Prohibition, or abolishing the state fiction of corporate personhood, private roads, repealing marriage licensure, or any of a host of traditional “leftist”concerns, and those same republicolibertarians start hollering bloody murder.
In 2001, in Virginia, we had two statewide candidates: Bill Redpath running for Governor and Gary Reams running for Lt Governor. I accompanied Gary when he spoke before one of our local groups.
However, instead of a polite “thank you for running”, Gary was subjected to a rather vicious round of yelling by several of the local group’s leadership.
I was shocked at how poorly he was received.
I could understand piling on a Libertarian candidate who stumbled too far off the libertarian reservation and advocated something that was clearly un-libertarian. But Gary’s sin was mentioning a platform position that was part of the LP since its inception: Medicinal Marijuana. Got that? The local LP leaders in question yelled at a Libertarian candidate for taking a libertarian position.
And unfortunately, those leaders are largely still there.
That group had 67 national members in 2000. By 2013, they had 27.
That sort of “all Republicans, all the time” attitude wins us absolutely nothing.
Good points Paulie but we have also seen a big upturn in the media talking about the new libertarians rising, yet all they talk about are republicans.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/10/magazine/has-the-libertarian-moment-finally-arrived.html?_r=0
Mark Hilgenberg
February 24, 2015 at 3:44 pm said: “We never talk about….tort reform,”
I’ve been saying for a long time that Libertarian Party members ought to be far, far more vocal and active about jury nullification of victimless crimes. This ought to be one of the top issues for the party.
Agreed in a general sense, but the latest dues paying membership downturn has taken place over the last few months; there’s no corresponding conservative turn in our rhetoric, so I as far as the short term numbers we would probably need a better explanation.
Part of our problem is we still sound exactly like GOP also rans, sure we make little comments about how the GOP is like the Dems but we keep sounding the the Dems are the problem and the GOP is just not being “conservative” enough (my word).
We use GOP rhetoric, GOP issues and GOP talking points. Why would anyone think they need to join us when the GOP is the new “libertarian” party?
We use the same tired, worn out, abstract conservative rhetoric like “smaller government, end regulations, etc. We never talk about ending liability protections, corporatism or tort reform, or working to limit the scope of government, not just the size.
“You have neither my approval nor my permission to grow or sustain Big Government. Shrink it now.”
Sounds like every GOP raw raw speech. Yawn.
Guy, “Paul, you asked, “Why the beef with OAI”? For anyone familiar with current Louisiana LP politics, it is common knowledge that LPL Jefferson Parish Rep Daniel Hayes and LPL Secretary Jen Werther are proactively working to terminate each other from their respective positions at LPL. Secretary Werther is the Louisiana OAI State Director. Coincidence?”
Unfortunate that Guy, the LPL Vice Chair, would write this in that way. I have presented official grievances against Daniel Hayes that have been because of something that he did, not just attacking him out of the blue or as Guy presented working to terminate each other. These couple of people and their paranoid plotting has made the LPL a hostile working environment for volunteers. I tried to ignore them through 2014, instead they thought I was scheming against them because they were scheming. They also still attacked me and attacked others. This I call them on.
I do think that recent whistleblower retaliations of trying to fire me is one of the most grave whistleblower retaliations in an organization. There has been many retaliations since presenting the grievances in September 2014. I have even yesterday had an official grievance presented against me for presenting grievances.
I do think that recent facts/evidence have been most damaging to Daniel Hayes for his participation all by himself.
—————————-
In April 2014, the LPL SCC motion that passed was “to keep separate and apart from OAI and not to encourage participation with OAI”. The Chair allowed the Executive Director, who is not an SCC member, to speak against the Vice Chair and Secretary in regards to conflict of interest with OAI instead of presenting her quarterly report. This caused one person to present a motion to get rid of the Vice Chair for malfeasence, then he changed to without cause. After a break, he calmed down and pulled that motion.
This was a dead issue since April 2014, until recently. One person has said that I was in a PAC. I am not in the OAI PAC. There are only a couple of people involved in the leadership of the OAI PAC.
There was a further attack that Guy and I were trying to join OAI and the Libertarian Party of Louisiana. I presented the following set of events that just happened:
“Most recently, Paulie Frankel, active in the Libertarian Party and OAI, was in town for the LP budget meeting. He said that he talked with the Chair of the LPL about giving a second look at working with OAI. OAI is a voted on affiliate organization of the Libertarian Party and the Libertarian Party has no issue with OAI.
When the Chair of the LPL brought this up to me that maybe the LPL could now work with OAI, I told him that the OAI State Director would not want to associate at this time with the LPL because we do not need to muddy the waters of OAI with LPL’s current problems. He said he understood as he feels the same way with LPL working with orgs that he knows. It would be an embarrassment to bring the BS into another organization that is doing just fine without LPL involvement. The Apr 2014 meeting was already an embarrassment to the LPL in the eyes of OAI.
I have no ambition of joining the LPL and OAI.
I have no ambition to plot something nefarious from OAI that would affect the LPL.
I am happy working as Secretary of the LPL. I work for the purposes of the LPL as I’ve presented from the bylaws many times.
The paranoid plotters and control freak narcissists – your actions have affected this org and all of the grievances have stemmed from you. Your attacks on others is a continuum.
If you are just in attack mode, watch how people work together and not against each other. Watch others as they give credit to the people doing the work. Watch others play well together.
When LPL members get together, we do good work. We volunteer because of liberty, not to fight our own azzholes in the party. Our events across Louisiana have been absent of the BS. Not one of our events have been tainted by the azzholery behind the scenes.”
————————————-
Jill, “Do I recall correctly that Daniel Hayes is the one who went bonkers to Wes Wagner right after Mr Hayes was added to the LNC? He’d obviously spent his time with people on the LNC who had an alternate version of who the leadership of the Oregon LP.”
Paulie, “You may be jumping to conclusions about how Daniel spent his time, although I don’t know this for a fact. He did have quite a bit to say about Oregon early on in the term, and took a very strong position, but he may have arrived at it on his own. If I am reading between the lines here correctly his opinion about Oregon may have changed somewhat since then.”
Of course, now in Paulie’s post, we find out that Daniel Hayes, as if he is speaking for our region as Alternate Regional Rep, has been further attacking OAI to the LNC since he has become Alternate Regional Rep. So, now he goes to national and brings this as one of his goals? National is already getting a taste of Daniel Hayes.
—————————————
The Executive Director was on my first OAI State Director meetings for a couple of months voluntarily, even one that I couldn’t make. She sent emails back and forth with Guy about OAI and was excited about upcoming events by OAI.
What could be a personal issue to the Executive Director is her pocketbook. OAI was pushing fundraising at that time. OAI was setting up events in the states, but they didn’t want us to just set up free speaking engagements at colleges, but that we have fundraisers too. These were also fundraisers that were offered to the LPL to take over an evening and do what they wanted. OAI encouraged sharing the fundraising with the state parties and some state parties straight up paid for the events to come to their state. LPL would have had involvement from tabling and talking to the students about the LPL to separate fundraisers. Instead, it was attacked. What was the real threat? The perception that anything else would take money away from the LPL and money to pay the ED? The Executive Director in 2014 had two times where the LPL didn’t make enough money to pay her. LPL paid her late when we did get the money.
Watching, the reportedly one-time lovers, Wendy Adams (the ED in Louisiana) and Daniel Hayes (Jefferson Parish SCC Rep), plot against Libertarian leadership, and manipulate SCC members, members so new to Libertarianism they think NAP is just something toddlers do after lunch, all in a conspiracy to “take over” the LPL. It’s sort of like watching an episode of the cartoon Pinky and the Brain. Well, it would be like watching an episode of Pinky and the Brain except that in the cartoon no one is stupid enough to go along with Brain’s schemes.
Congratulations LPL SCC members, you’ve demonstrated that you are more gullible than an obviously mentally challenged cartoon character, sorry about that Pinky. Stay tuned for the next episode, where in a special meeting, Daniel leads the SCC, through Scott Lewis, his “neuter(ed) Chairman, to renew Wendy’s contract, and half of the Libertarian Party members in Louisiana leave the “party”.
Here’s a trailer of the next episode titled, “Libertarian mob rule takes over LPL”, or “It’s Not Mob Rule If We Control The Mob”.
Daniel Hayes: “what I am talking about effectively removes any overt power the chair has or thinks he has or anybody thinks the chair has and puts the power where it belongs..with the majority”, “I am now at the point..to where..Scott Lewis can stay indefinitely…and we will neuter his ass anytime he doesnt do what most of us what..”
If that show is not available we’ll air the “Rodney King” episode titled, “Now that I’m Caught Can’t We all Just Get Along”. In this episode Daniel and Wendy program the SCC members to repeat the “can’t we just get along” phrase made popular by “Rodney King”, in an attempt to bury all the grievances against them. Of course, according to Daniel and Wendy, this amnesty needs to be granted to them in order to bring peace and prosperity to the Libertarian Party. So yes, they are slightly less believable than the cartoon.
Since this was referenced, I should provide a link:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LouisianaLibertariansuncensored
DP outlined some very interesting points. Daniel has repeatedly shown this behavior and the transcripts of the conversations that went on between him, the tangi rep, the “republican consultant”, ED and a few others are pretty telling as to the nature of their business. It seems clear to me that they seek to boot key members of the SCC for their own gain and care not for the advancement of liberty principles but more for their political advancement and the ED’s paycheck. The support and ignoring of the facts presented show to me that the agenda of ” they will most likely have loyalty to her over the state party” is working. many people look to wendy as the be all, end all of libertarian progression and i find that insulting as someone who has put in time and effort just as she. The recent push back against the OAI members serving on the SCC seem to be just an attempt to give them a “credible” reason to boot them. I personally see no conflict of interest.
Thank you for reading and commenting. I hope to hear from both sides (or all sides) of the Louisiana controversies here.
Paul Frankel,
Thanks for the well-written article, as it seems to have captured the essence of Daniel Hayes’ apparent paranoid personality. It always amazes me to witness how those that seemingly live to scheme and plot, while continuously fling accusations against all leadership, are always paranoid that leadership is plotting against them.
Those of us down South, so cursed with the misfortune of having had dealing with Mr. Hayes, through the Libertarian Party of Louisiana, know all too well the ethical depths of which he’s willing to stoop down to, and the intensity of his concocted plots that have emerged out of his paranoia. Couple all of that with his willingness to frequent fling false accusations against anyone he “perceives” as a threat to his plans, and you have Daniel the political operative.
Perhaps Mr. Hayes’ best attributes are that he’s not shy, and he’s perfectly willing to make a fool of himself, which it appears he demonstrated during your conversation with him. Yet, not surprisingly, Mr. Hayes failed to mention a few facts about himself that might shed some light on his “suspicions” regarding OAI.
First of all, Mr. Hayes presently appears to be involved in a battle for his own political survival with the LPL Recently disclosed documents apparently revealed that Mr. Hayes and the LPL contracted Executive Director were plotting to oust LPL leadership and take control of the LPL SCC with the assistance of at least one Republican advisor, who is rumored to have been an advisor to the Republican Party Chairman of Louisiana.
It’s been said by more than a few close to the situation, that Mr. Hayes, who reportedly was romantically involved with the Executive Director at some point in all this, “perceived” OAI as a possible threat to Louisiana state donations, of which all went to pay the ED’s salary. Being that PEC Chairs have accused Mr. Hayes of coercing those donations, in violation of NAP, it’s highly possible that he considered the donations to the LPL to be his personal property, and as such he was simply guarding them for his love interest.
Please don’t just take my word on Mr. Hayes schemes, read the documents for yourself, as they are all posted in the “Files” section of the Facebook group “Louisiana Libertarians- Uncensored”. The following is a part of a conversation Mr. Hayes had with one of the SCC representatives, the same SCC member that revealed these communications recently. A quote from Mr. Hayes, “…they (meaning new SCC members) will most likely have loyalty to her (the ED / his love interest) over the state party for the obvious reasons (the ED attended the PEC formations and handpicked the SCC reps that would be loyal to her)…and we go into the next SCC meeting, we put this matter (the matter of possibly spending money on anything, such as advertising, other than the ED’s contract and pay) to rest. I figure they (members of the LPL SCC) and think that by spending money on advertising, that may gain us Libertarians, that have a loyalty to the party and not to Wendy.”
Thanks again for the article and straightening out the confusion with OAI, an organization that is helping to further the cause of liberty for all of us and for future generations.
Jill,
You may be jumping to conclusions about how Daniel spent his time, although I don’t know this for a fact. He did have quite a bit to say about Oregon early on in the term, and took a very strong position, but he may have arrived at it on his own. If I am reading between the lines here correctly his opinion about Oregon may have changed somewhat since then.
Do I recall correctly that Daniel Hayes is the one who went bonkers to Wes Wagner right after Mr Hayes was added to the LNC? He’d obviously spent his time with people on the LNC who had an alternate version of who the leadership of the Oregon LP.
Thanks Guy. On a different group, Daniel Hayes says your JC complaints are about him “questioning” your involvement with OAI. I don’t think this is true, but perhaps you could shed some light?
Paul, you asked, “Why the beef with OAI”? For anyone familiar with current Louisiana LP politics, it is common knowledge that LPL Jefferson Parish Rep Daniel Hayes and LPL Secretary Jen Werther are proactively working to terminate each other from their respective positions at LPL. Secretary Werther is the Louisiana OAI State Director. Coincidence?
Mr. Hayes & an associate or two have made many phone calls to convince our State Central Committee (SCC) members that holding official positions with OAI is somehow a GENERAL conflict of interest for ANY LPL officer. You gotta love the overkill, and wonder at the purpose. Their approach selectively ignores other organizations that, exactly like OAI, are also some combination of 501C3 and/or 501C4. If the arguments of Mr. Hayes are taken at face value, his team appears to be oblivious to the fact that the LP of Louisiana has operational limits due to being constrained by being an IRS 527; and that other libertarian organizations need to function inside Louisiana in order to perform functions that are most effectively provided by 501C3s and 501C4s. A general policy to waive usage of 501C3 and 501C4 is akin to a Roman gladiator running into the Coliseum wielding a sword [527] while voluntarily choosing to leave behind his helmet [501C3] and shield [501C4].
The only other person who had been an OAI executive level official and a LPL Officer is me. Partly as a result of what I allege to be workplace harassment, I’ve recently resigned my own position as OAI South Region Director. During the coming LPL State Central Committee meetings, certain persons will no longer be able to badger me regarding my position with OAI, and thereby prevent me from performing my duties as LPL Vice-Chair.
Please note that I’ve filed several Louisiana LP Judicial Committee complaints against Mr. Hayes and two additional persons. My complaints are under review.
Thanks!
Tell your friends and help spread it around 🙂
It’s also spawned some conversations on FB. Too bad we don’t get to see them here, and vice versa.
Great article. Great comments.
As I understand it, there’s still plenty of cooperation by LPL with groups that are not LPL, including Tea Party groups and YAL, correct? Why the beef with OAI?
Anyone in Louisiana remotely familiar with Mr. Hayes, his tactics, and his previously voiced plans to ‘take over the LP’ (while he was still a Republican) would find massive irony in his statements and with his distrust of people not “purely libertarian.”
“Mark Herd – VeniceBeachPress.com
February 22, 2015 at 10:29 am said: “Good article Paulie. Recruiting is the most important thing. I played Rugby on the 3rd ranked AZ Wildcats in college. As team players one of our responsibilities was to constantly recruit new players no matter what their abilities were. We needed bodies because bodies were flying off the field with injuries. Same thing here, were always losing bodies but we have to replace them aggressively.”
I totally agree. Libertarian Party members need to constantly work on recruiting new members. The fact that we, as a party, are failing to do this, it one of the big reasons as to why the party is not more successful.
“Marc Montoni
February 22, 2015 at 5:00 pm
‘I’ve got 5 guys waiting to pay dues in Los Angeles but some guy wants me to shut up on fb and is holding up my 5 recruits.’
So you stuck a membership form or link in front of these 5 recruits, but a FB warrior who processes membership dues in CA refuses to process them?
I find that hard to believe.
I can’t count how many people I have recruited into paying dues, and people blocking me and unfriending me on FB made absolutaely no difference to me.”
I totally agree with this as well. Somebody in a state party blocking somebody from posting on Facebook is not a good reason to not join or recruit members for the party. Plenty of LP members do not even go on Facebook.
I also fail to see how sending the minimum $25 dues to join the national Libertarian Party has anything to do with some local squabble where somebody gets banned from posting on a Facebook page.
Meh… I would tend to think of all six as vaporware who will never materialize even if the FB block is removed.
And not doing something important because of Zuckerberg’s data-harvesting operation?
That’s just dumb.
I believe Mark Herd was talking about county memberships. He says he and his friends won’t join the LP until he’s allowed back on the Libertarian Party of California’s FB page Apparently an administrator blocked him.
Yes, I use all three of those delivery methods as well.
I license all of my works under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.
So, steal away under those terms.
I **always** solicit people to join both.
My membership forms offer a combo national + state option as the main membership option, and at least 90% of people who accept, do indeed join both.
The other 10% are almost always people who, say, know they already joined national, but also know they just need to bring their Virginia membership current.
LPVA’s paper membership form is here.
LPVA’s online membership form is here.
I will add that my direct experience with a thousand or more recruited members since about 1997 or so indicates all these excuses about UMP and why “no one wants to join national” are just that — excuses.
Marc–
I love your membership recruitment letter. Like you, I have sent literally thousands of state LP membership forms to people, but I do it with snail mail letters, emails and personal contacts. (I never used Facebook and cannot comprehend how being blocked on it would prevent anyone from getting memberships.)
But I have never put anything together as comprehensive as your document.
So, now that I’ve sucked up to you, can I steal it and send to my chapter chairs to adapt and adopt as appropriate?
Thanks!
Are these state or national memberships that were recruited.
So you stuck a membership form or link in front of these 5 recruits, but a FB warrior who processes membership dues in CA refuses to process them?
I find that hard to believe.
I can’t count how many people I have recruited into paying dues, and people blocking me and unfriending me on FB made absolutaely no difference to me.
No one in the LP became known because of FB, so being locked out of a few pages shouldn’t make a difference, Mark. Make some friends in the party who can let you know about events in the community you can join in, and you can make a name for yourself that way. Do some “boots on the ground” activism. First and foremost, you need to act like a Libertarian and show you understand what we stand for, and when/if that happens, the LP will gladly accept you.
Good article Paulie. Recruiting is the most important thing. I played Rugby on the 3rd ranked AZ Wildcats in college. As team players one of our responsibilities was to constantly recruit new players no matter what their abilities were. We needed bodies because bodies were flying off the field with injuries. Same thing here, were always losing bodies but we have to replace them aggressively. I’ve got 5 guys waiting to pay dues in Los Angeles but some guy wants me to shut up on fb and is holding up my 5 recruits. I wont go there but like Paulie says, recruitment isn’t the only problem, paranoid control freaks might be another. Either way I’m still going to recruit, build better websites (www.lplac.info) and run for Federal Office (already working on websites and team building for next races.
https://sites.google.com/site/electmarkmatthewherd/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy
why does the idea that my donations belong to Group A and that if I give money to Group B that Group B has robed Group A…. sound a lot like what Republicans say when talking about Voters voting for a Libertarian Candidate?
It’s a bottomless pit of dazed semi-awareness where people get sucked in and lost…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0k93bfzBl10
What’s a Facebook?
Funny how well that can work in states like yours and ours.
Asking people to do anything on facebook is generally a way to get a bunch of facebook likes, maybe a few comments and shares, and little else. The best way to recruit people to do stuff in person, at least in my experience, is still to ask them in person, or failing that, on the phone.
Marc (spelled the wrong way) wrote in part:
>I think the problem is LP members are convinced that “activism” means making comments on Facebook. Very few realize that politics requires a lot more than Facebook. It requires money. It requires petitioning. It requires showing up at local government meetings and speaking. It requires ACTIVITY.
I could not agree more. Here in New York, we are taking that position seriously, mostly at the local level, with more protests and in your face antics (our last two in Manhattan were to hand out free losseys in Time Square and to raise money, albeit only four cents, for the Sheldon Silver Legal Defense Fund). My chapters upstate are equally devoted to real activism.
Anyone with a keyboard or telephone can bullshit until the cows come home. We are devoted to making things happen.
Oh, BTW, the OAI people, most of whom are already LPNY activists, are in lockstep with us. Surprise! We don’t work at cross-purposes at all.
Mr. Montoni has a lot of interesting comments above, many of which I agree with, but I have a few comments to add on them. First, I 100% agree about “slacktivism” – too much activism today consists of clicking “like.” In my last campaign, I asked the 100 members of our activist email list (we keep a separate list for philosophical conversations) for help. I needed people willing to come and drive for a few hours, my car or theirs, to speed up the door to door work – or to split a block with me and let people know that I was there if they wanted. No one came – but a few liberty-minded Republicans helped me campaign door to door against a Republican incumbent. I did receive offers of financial donations, but I was running a cheap, labor-based campaign. In retrospect, I wouldn’t do that again: I wouldn’t commit to a labor-based campaign beyond the labor I can provide myself, because people don’t show up.
But, whose fault is that? I am state chair – it is my fault. I am the candidate – it is my fault. In both roles, I have not gotten people sufficiently fired up, and have not sufficiently educated people as to what activism requires. When a campaign doesn’t get volunteers in my state, I am responsible. So I prefer not to take the tack of “the people don’t understand what is required” but rather “I have not gotten them fired up for liberty enough for them to do what is required.”
Regarding the Republicans, again, it’s on us. If someone prefers the Republican fight over joining us, it’s because we haven’t sufficiently convinced them, not because LibertarianGirl brainwashed them. Why haven’t we sufficiently convinced them? I’d suggest that one reason is a lack of success. Let’s double the number of officials we have in office – which can be done in the next 2 years if we’re smart nation-wide – then see how many give up the GOP wars to come to us.
I have suggested a national effort to get appointments. Many federal committees have vacancies all the time because no one applies for them. I suggested building a database of interested and qualified people, then having staff go and lobby for them with the appointing officials. If anyone thinks this is a good idea, consider writing to your rep about it. I will not take the time to build the database unless my colleagues give me an indication that they’ll give the directions to staff that would make it work.
The same can be done at the state level. If state leadership finds some way (and it isn’t easy) to locate vacancies in elected office, and get members to apply for vacancy appointments, a lot of progress can be made. Of course, the best way to gather that data would be volunteers in the various areas…
Even if we grant Marc’s point it still wouldn’t make the accusations against OAI any more accurate.
For the most part I agree — most of the problem is internal.
However, I do agree there is a component of the Lib-R’s that is siphoning off libertarians and getting them into the Republican fever swamp.
I view most of the “Liberty Republicans” to be lazy about their libertarianism. They want to win without the decades-long, tough slog of building an alternative political party. Too many are ideologically weak; they end up voting for more and more statist Republicans over time.
But even beyond that, while some of them make airs about putting up a good fight in the primary, their candidates most often lose — and then most of them vote for the STATIST mainstream Republicans in the general elections.
In other words, while they talk liberty, they are active participants in building Leviathan.
I would say little about them if they would just do their own Leviathan-building thing without disparaging those of us who choose to remain active in the LP and trying to co-opt LP members. They should be concentrating their efforts on educating the life-long Republicans with whom they’ve hopped into bed.
But they won’t do that because it’s not the lazy man’s way — it’s easier to let the LP do all the work of finding more libertarians, and then fool them into thinking they have a chance to implement their agenda by building Leviathan.
“I think the one of the main causes is actually celebrit-arians on YouTube like LibertarianGirl and Julie Borowski. They are openly involved in the GOP, and are considered by many people Libertarian voices. That maybe moving some Libertarian-minded people away from the LP and towards the GOP, especially with those blinded by Rand Paul’s “greatness.””
Meh. The problems with the LP’s dues paying membership numbers are not external. There are easily enough libertarians who would be willing to join if asked, but won’t go out of their way.
Sounds like one side in the Louisiana LP food fight decided to take its proxy war with OAI to a national stage.
“Nicholas Sarwark
February 20, 2015 at 12:37 am
‘I’d like to point out that its 2015, and the LPUS still has no literature en Espanol. I’ve talked about this before. As I’m writing this comment, I’ve realized that I just need to handle the problem myself. So, I’m gonna try to do something about that right now……’
Matt,
Talk to Robert Butler in Texas. He had a project to do Spanish language literature.”
The LP of California used to have some outreach material in Spanish. I don’t know if it still does, but it did when I helped hand it out about 12 years ago.
How about put some downloadable flyers and/or pamphlets in Spanish on the http://www.LP.org website?
Matt,
Talk to Robert Butler in Texas. He had a project to do Spanish language literature.
“Marc Montoni
February 19, 2015 at 10:08 pm
‘I was talking about since the LP hit its peak of dues paying membership in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s.’
If you’re speaking of that long a term, yes.
All-time peak was November 1999 as I recall.”
I thought that the all time peak was in November of 2000.
Well said Paulie
If you’re speaking of that long a term, yes.
All-time peak was November 1999 as I recall.
Yeah, that much I understood.
What I’m saying is it seems to me like the right thing to do was not to split off a chunk of the county party, but rather to just set up independent committees for the cities and raise money for them separately, so as to not set up fight over whatever was in the common pot.
“Marc Montoni
February 19, 2015 at 9:43 pm
‘Libertarian Party membership has been in an overall decline since well before Gary Johnson and OAI came around.’
Well, actually, not really. Membership has been bumping around between 12k and 15k for almost a decade.”
I was talking about since the LP hit its peak of dues paying membership in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s.
It is a valid point to say the Libertarian National Committee has fallen short by not producing promotional and issue oriented brochures in Spanish. I would also say that the LNC needs to produce more outreach literature in English as well. When the LP started, it produced issue papers on a variety of topics, and we need more of that today.
I still support the Libertarian Party and its candidates, and I have paid my dues up to date to the Libertarian Party of California. I hope to promote Gary Johnson in 2016 as I did in 2012, when he received more votes in Riverside County than any previous Libertarian candidate for President.
Marc – in California, dues paid to the Libertarian Party of California are divided between the LPC and the county LP organization that the member affiliates with. In the past, some larger counties had parts of the county split off, and function as affiliates for the purpose of sharing dues.
Prior to the Riverside County split in 2003, this was handled as the local group separating from the county organization, which continued to function in the remaining part of the county. For example, in the 1990s, there was a San Bernardino County LP and a north county group that functioned as a separate affiliate, and received a share of due.
When we proposed allowing Desert Area Libertarians to split, Aaron Starr ruled that to do this, we would have to declare the county organization inactive, and split the existing treasury between two new groups – DAL and a Western Riverside County group. The treasury included not only dues kick backs, but significant contributions that had been made over many years, when there was no group in the eastern desert; and the group in the eastern desert had never contributed to the county organization any funds.
So what Aaron Starr demanded included deactivating an active county LP committee, and looting its treasury. I hope you can now understand what happened.
Well, actually, not really. Membership has been bumping around between 12k and 15k for almost a decade.
However, for a couple of years — right up to November 2014 — membership was largely fairly stable, and slowly increasing. It began to tank late last year and a clear decline has been in place since then.
OAI seemed to ramp up late last year. I’m not sure it’s related to the LP’s membership decline, but to say the timing isn’t suspicious… well…
Our decline is disturbing to me.
I think the problem is LP members are convinced that “activism” means making comments on Facebook. Very few realize that politics requires a lot more than Facebook. It requires money. It requires petitioning. It requires showing up at local government meetings and speaking. It requires ACTIVITY. The groups that are active are having little trouble getting and keeping members. Our affiliate in Powhatan VA started 2014 with 3 dues-paid members; they now have 11. The neighboring Chesterfield group started 2014 with 21; they now have 33. Other areas of Virginia, where the local party is not soliciting people to attend and participate — and actually join — are following the general national decline.
The way to members, fundraising, and success is clear. I think what is tripping us is our collective unwillingness to step away from the computer (and Facebook) and actually commit a political act.
Wait a minute. Why does the setup of a sub-unit require any action from either the state or county party?
There are 28 city governments within Riverside County. Each of these jurisdictions is begging for a Libertarian committee to focus on contesting the city-level elections. Local activities should be mostly funded with donations from their own local donor base.
Why did there need to be a competing group to lop off a chunk of the existing county party?
I’m not sure I understand.
I’m not a fan of Mr Starr (as many can attest). He schemes too much, attempts to monopolize discussions too much, and is flat-out wrong about way too much. But I don’t really see why what happened in Riverside must be laid at his feet.
“Matt Cholko
February 19, 2015 at 8:56 pm
I can’t believe that anybody would seriously make the argument that OAI, or GJ are the cause of membership decline. That is so totally ridiculous….. I don’t even know how to respond.”
I agree. This is one of the most absurd things that I’ve heard. Libertarian Party membership has been in an overall decline since well before Gary Johnson and OAI came around.
I can’t believe that anybody would seriously make the argument that OAI, or GJ are the cause of membership decline. That is so totally ridiculous….. I don’t even know how to respond.
I agree with the needs that you highlighted in your editorial, Paulie. I also agree with Shane (not that I have much direst expertise in this area) that membership is all about prospecting. I don’t think the two are mutually exclusive.
I’d like to point out that its 2015, and the LPUS still has no literature en Espanol. I’ve talked about this before. As I’m writing this comment, I’ve realized that I just need to handle the problem myself. So, I’m gonna try to do something about that right now……
Does that extend to the national party as well?
In 2003, some members in the eastern part of Riverside County wanted to have their group -Desert Area Libertarians – recognized as an affiliate of the LPC so that they could get a share of LPC membership dues to fund their activities. Nobody opposed this, assuming it would work as past separations had worked – a group could secede from the county organization and set up their own organization, while the county organization continued as it was.
Aaron Starr as state chair of LPC ruled that in order to set up DAL as an affiliate, we would have to declare the county organization inactive, and set up a new group in the western part of the county. I opposed this because we had worked for 20 years to build up the Riverside County LP organization; declaring it inactive and splitting the treasury – money we raised – with DAL would have set us back years. The split was voted for over my objection, then the people who supported the split largely became inactive.
Later, the LPC leadership decided that splitting counties violated the McCain-Feingold act, but it took 8 months to get the Riverside County group reorganized and recognized by the LPC Ex Comm. Our momentum was stopped, and most active people in RCLP dropped out over time. At least one of the organizers of the split now regularly smears the Libertarian Party on Facebook and other online venues.
I don’t wish to dwell on the past, but I don’t want to be part of an organization that can take such destructive action in regard to local affiliates.
What happened in 2003?
Dues paying membership is down in California because our current state leadership is doing nothing to keep the Libertarian Party visible. In Riverside County I have stopped trying to convince people to become dues paid members of the LPC because of the way that the LPC under Aaron Starr destroyed my local organization in 2003.
I hope to create a local Libertarian organization that is not affiliated with the LPC so that state leadership cannot interfere in how it runs. Figuring out an organizational model that can legally raise money is the issue right now.
In any case, there are a number of reasons that the LP organizations have not been able to take advantage of the growing affiliation with the Libertarian Party through voter registration.
I agree about prospecting but I think the other things I mentioned are also important. Since the article is kind of long I will repeat that paragraph here:
…. National LP needs a website that doesn’t suck (I know this is being worked on but results are what count and for now we (LP national) have a website that is terrible, as was discussed at the last LNC meeting. We need updated outreach materials. Again, being worked on, but not here yet. We need training in all the basics of local organizational and campaign management for our candidates and state and county leadership, promoted heavily. Materials exist, but need to be updated and promoted much, much, much more. The database needs a lot better management, as has been discussed at length on past LNCs. We need states and national LP that see their relationship as synergy rather than competition, and which all encourage rather than discourage people to participate at the national, state AND county/parish levels. We need to get with the modern age and how people like to do things these days and push monthly, rather than yearly, donations and push them heavily and constantly. Among other things they are opt out, as opposed to opt in as with the yearly ones, and psychologically less painful for equal annualized amounts of contributions. We need to get a lot better at leveraging our volunteer database, as much or more than our donors. Above all we need prospecting. Passive recruiting does not work. If you don’t ask you don’t get.
Shane is absolutely right. I’ve been pushing prospecting for years too. I’m glad Virginia is looking into it.
mm: Capozzi has been pitching his sales angle for at least since 2004 that I am aware of, but yet he keeps pitching almost daily. Yet I bet he has still not bothered to doorhang his neighborhood.
me: No, I’m not selling anything in terms of services or fundraising approaches. Mostly I share ideas and ask radical, provocative questions on IPR. I trust you don’t have a problem with that.
And, no, I don’t doorhang for many reasons, in part because I am not a member and I wonder whether the LP on balance is a positive force for enhancing our liberties or a detriment to the cause. That’s just me, though. Like they say: “I’m gonna do me, y’all do y’all.” 😉
No worries. Given the history of people looking to profit off of the LP, all offers should be vetted.
While there’s nothing wrong with paying people for good work, the LP (and actually most orgs I deal with) attract con men looking to line pockets with BS pitches. I see it all of the time — and we saw it recently with a pay per word board member (if I recall correctly).
I’m very excited to work with Marc and I’ll let him deliver results when we finish up — already have a great issue that will selfishly save me some tax dollars after we win. Stay tuned!
“We need states and national LP that see their relationship as synergy rather than competition…”
Setting the bar even lower, we could start with a national LP that respects its state affiliates and doesn’t screw with their convention delegations. I, for one, will not become a national LP member until they apologize to Oregon.
Shane, OK then.
Perhaps I overreacted.
My apologies….
As often the case, Marc is correct.
I would place Johnson as partially to blame. Johnson saying “the ideal political affiliation right now is independent” doesn’t give off positive vibes and may deter some people from joining the LP. Also, from my experience (just talking about mine, so if maybe different from others) dealing with OAI is that they provide little help promoting the Libertarian agenda and are just focused on Johnson’s agenda. But I don’t think their entirely to blame.
I think the one of the main causes is actually celebrit-arians on YouTube like LibertarianGirl and Julie Borowski. They are openly involved in the GOP, and are considered by many people Libertarian voices. That maybe moving some Libertarian-minded people away from the LP and towards the GOP, especially with those blinded by Rand Paul’s “greatness.”
Marc, done. Glad it’s VA. Will email you today.
And, Robert, it hasn’t been six months that I’ve been pushing this, it’s been six years. Six years of stagnation and decline.
Since my last little rant a few weeks ago, I’ve helped clients acquire 1.3 million supporters on an array of topics.
So you can imagine my frustration when I’m doing this for other groups and the leaders of the party I hopelessly cling to sit around and argue over pocket lint and TPS reports.
They’re not even willing to try.
BTW, I was asked for a proposal by HQ. It was a ridiculous request and I gave them a ridiculous response.
Capozzi has been pitching his sales angle for at least since 2004 that I am aware of, but yet he keeps pitching almost daily. Yet I bet he has still not bothered to doorhang his neighborhood.
Shane, the Virginia LP has a state filing component which can accept corporate contributions.
Email me offline when you have a moment and and explain to me what you have in mind.
I somewhat disagree about your dismissal of databases. They are essential. If you get a donation from someone one year but you can’t figure out how to contact him again in six weeks, then there’s a problem. If the database ain’t working, no matter how good you are at recruitment, you will be atrocious at retention.
I’m selling them to prospect and add new members but not through my company — I can’t take on smaller clients, I’d get crushed with work.
I’ll teach how to fish — the whole point of the exersize.
Shane, this is now starting to feel like a sales pitch. Nothing wrong with that, but you’ve been pitching this for at least 6 months by now.
I take it the LNC took a pass on your services…just guessing….
Paulie, I was just about to lay into you until you added the “above all.”
Absolutely correct. Prospecting is it.
All of the other stuff is just busy work people do when they don’t know how to really grow the party. Databases, outreach material, whateves. They don’t matter and large organizations do fine without hyper focusing on them. Heck, the NRA was still on FoxPro the last time I checked.
There are massive opportunities out there and unless the LP is willing to get in front of people and solicit with an acqusition program, they might as well give up now, sell the building and box up their party keepsakes for attic storage.
Now if the LP were to get its act together — huge. The RNC and NRCC are struggling to find new donors because they cannot be honest in their packages — they can only attack dems and never admit their failures.
The conservative ghetto, with a few exceptions is dipping into the same pool of 1.4 million people (online) to fund all of the pacs, candidates, and orgs, email prospecting programs.
Other groups are wasting their time on social — which is an absolute waste with a horrible ROI. Just look at the correlation of the LP’s social trends compared to the membership drop. That alone is convincing proof.
The LNC needs to stop ignoring the glaring hole in their plan for political progress. They can debate policy manuals and database dumps until their jaws fall off — but that won’t bring in a single member. They need to budget and ORDER prospecting to take place with set acqusition goals each month.
If they don’t have the people who can make that happen then they need to find them.
Even if the donor acqusition cost is $100+ per (which even a dimwit but real marketer could pull), the 12 month value exceeds the acqusition costs.
Simple math. Spend the money and get it done.
Focusing on any other administrative issue is wasting time. Any LNC member that doesn’t make this a priority isn’t qualified to serve.
It’s comparable to having a board of directors for a sandwich shop that has great food and the promise of expansion — but the board refuses to put a sign outside that says, “hey we have great freaking sandwiches!”
Instead they debate bread to meat ratios in between looking for new, high tech cash registers that can handle the flood of customers that never materialize.
Hey LNC members, do you get it? You’re as relevent and generate less revenue than a single, low producing McDonald’s franchise.
Step up your game or admit that most of you have sat around as LNC “leaders” for far too long without having a clue how to run an organization.
Want to see how it’s done? I have $10k in media I’ll donate to the first state chair who contacts me and is willing to put in some work — just be sure you can accept a corporate in-kind contribution and be non-FEC filing and I retain veto rights over dick heads.
I’ll also walk the chair through the entire process of how they can convert that gift into at least 5,000 new supporters and 100 new donors within 30 days. They can walk away and replicate.
Paulie can share my email with any chair who wants to step up and take the $10k — and is willing to put in the time and effort to produce their own marketing campaign with my guidance.