Via LP.org blog and email blast:
Get paid $2.50 per signature, or please donate to help pay for signatures, or I’m sorry but we’ll have to shut this drive down permanently in about a week.
Thuggish behavior by police and security in Oklahoma has prevented our petitioners from getting access to public places to collect signatures. Even the Oklahoma A.C.L.U. has been trying, but so far, failing, to help us get the police to stop harassing our petitioners and threatening to arrest them, even when we are petitioning legally on constitutionally protected places like public sidewalks near universities and art fairs.
We had hoped we could get this drive done for $2.00 per signature by early Fall. Winter’s almost here, which makes it harder to petition. We raised our price to $2.50 per signature weeks ago, we need 24,712 valid signatures, and we’re only about 1/3 of the way through.
We postponed starting our Kentucky drive till next year because of problems in Oklahoma. We can’t put things off in other states much longer.
Tempers are flaring: mine, our petitioners in Oklahoma (some stalwart petitioners have left the state it’s so hard), our Libertarian National Committee (who has to decide whether to keep going–or call it quits). We raised $11,400 online over the summer for this. If we reach $20,000 online, that will help make up about half of the shortfall I’m projecting to complete this drive.
Ballot Access expert Richard Winger donated $30,000 for this petition drive. I’m not looking forward to calling him and asking him how upset he’ll be if we cancel the drive and can only return part of his money after failing to get on the ballot. I need your help to go forward.
Wednesday, I personally donated $200 directly to the LP Oklahoma, which will help them with printing costs.
Will you donate $200 to our efforts?
We added another petition organizer last week to help get more petitioners on the street. If you are willing to try petitioning for $2.50 per signature, contact Paulie Frankel (paulie.frankel@lp.org or 205-534-1622) for details. He’s been petitioning for the LP for over 10 years and can help you get started.
Click here to donate, or visit LP.org/oklahoma
Sincerely,
Wes Benedict, Executive Director
“even when we are petitioning legally on constitutionally protected places like public sidewalks near universities and art fairs.”
How long is the LP going to continue rolling over for this shit? Don’t we have lawyers who can get restraining orders? Don’t we have erstwhile presidential candidates who will show up and get arrested if need be? Can’t we sue the crap out of cities and towns who violate our constitutional rights? Does, say, Norman, OK, really want to arrest, say, a former governor of New Mexico for gathering signatures in a constitutionally protected place?
commenting to subscribe
I like the idea of getting Gary Johnson into Oklahoma for the petition drive. At any rate I am in with another contribution.
Steve M
Thank you for the added contribution! It would be great if Gary comes out here. TE Finnegan is supposed to be here soon, so if anyone talks to Gary please tell him we’ll have a great reunion with me, TE and her dogs in her RV, which she is bringing up from Texas. The same one myself, TE, Derrick Broze, Gary and Ben Swann rode around Houston, Austin and San Antonio in a couple of years ago. He’ll know exactly what you mean 🙂
If anyone is up for coming out here to petition it pays 2.50 a signature, you do not have to be from Oklahoma to circulate, but only Oklahoma voters can sign. We need volunteer help and donations as well, and people who are good at going to or calling stores and gas stations to get permission for petitioners to be there. I’m on the ground here to help get people set up 205-534-1622 … forward far and wide.
I’m supposed to have another meeting with the ACLU about this today or tomorrow and the newly retained LP general counsel is working with us on this as well.
Wes Benedict to LNC list:
Thanks to a check in the mail by Daniel Hayes for $500, plus another promised check of $4,000 from another donor, I’m getting renewed hope in the possibility of going forward in Oklahoma. Even if we reach our goal stated below, it’s not going to be easy. But I’m encouraged.
Wes Benedict, Executive Director
Libertarian National Committee, Inc.
New address: 1444 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314
(202) 333-0008 ext. 232, wes.benedict@lp.org
facebook.com/libertarians @LPNational
Join the Libertarian Party at: http://lp.org/membership
THANKS for your efforts out there Paulie! I know you could be making more and easier money elsewhere and all of us owe you a debt of gratitude for your commitment there.
IPR readers can also brainstorm — who do you know in Oklahoma? An old friend from Scouting, or college, or a cousin. Who do they know who owns a business? Are any of your Facebook friends friends with someone in Oklahoma. I have a friend I JUST thought of who moved from Oklahoma 2 years ago, but I’ll give him a call to see who he may still know there.
Sounds like if we knew the owner of ONE shopping mall in even a small city we could get those guys indoors and up to the required number of sigs before Christmas . . .
The harassment from police and security has been worse in OK it sounds like, but in general having to deal with such things is part of petitioning. It happens everywhere. Not because the laws don’t nominally protect us or because there’s some organized conspiracy to prevent our petitions from being successful. Rather, a cop gets called with a complaint, and shows up and deals with it. They don’t know, and rarely care, about the laws protecting petitioners, whom they usually have no experience with. They’re only there to remove the supposed “disturbance” or “trespasser” to satisfy the complaint and, in their mind, solve the problem. At best, we could send them some notice of the law ahead of time when petitioning in their jurisdiction, but if they get a complaint they’re still going to show up. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t push back against it and raise a stink, but there is no silver bullet to “fix” that problem.
B.S. harassment might be part of why OK is in trouble (our professional petitioners feel free to chime in on the details of that), but it really seems to me like the bigger story here is that LNC woefully under-budgeted what it’s actually going to take to get it done. If LNC had been working with an accurate figure to begin with, they might have decided to forgo Oklahoma in favor of racking up easier states, or if they had gone ahead they would have at least known what they were getting into. It sucks to not have 50 states, but at the end of the day if we have 49 it’s not the end of the world, and not necessarily something I’d assign any blame for. If, on the other hand, we lose KY and/or one or two other states because we went after OK and failed, then frankly people are right to be pissed about that. Credibility with donors matters, a lot, and this is just about the most harmful thing we can do to that short of nominating Barr/Root again.
I hope this appeal for support is successful, I want us to succeed in Oklahoma and put our nominee on the ballot in all 50 states. But, if it doesn’t, and even if it does, LNC needs to be asking some tough questions about what went wrong here, in a very thorough post-mortem of this whole fiasco.
The budget projection was overly optimistic, and somewhere lost in translation was my warning that the price we were discussing – if it could be done at all – was contingent on getting started pretty much immediately back in May or June when I discussed that with Bill, not having the LNC try to complete it for that price while starting in mid August. Then, when we ran into more location problems than anticipated, the alarm bells we were sounding were largely ignored for several months until all the professional petitioners left the state one by one – except for me, and transportation and health issues have me in more of an advisory/management role rather than petitioning myself.
However, we have some other local people we are recruiting and others that are coming back or coming in soon, so this is still quite doable, though far from easy or assured. I hope the LNC does not cut us off here.
Andy said the LNC had pretty much screwed the pooch on this one (again!) and it appears he was right.
It is essential that the Oklahoma drive succeed, not only for the sake of the 2016 Libertarian campaign, but for the future beyond as well. A lot of Oklahoma legislators defied the wishes of their party (the Republican Party) to ease ballot access somewhat earlier this year. If we fail, and everyone else fails as well, it is not likely we will get further assistance from the legislature. But if we succeed, and people can register as Libertarians, and we have candidates for other office that get a lot of votes (and they will, because half the legislative seats only normally have one candidate in November), that will create more interest and make it far more likely we can get further legislative relief.
I agree!
It’s not over yet. It can very well be rescued, but we do need some more help here.
I am sorry that Nick and Wes as Chair and Director are in this position. With respect to the LNC, though, $38,800 in editing expenses, $30,000+ in lease charges for a $11,000 printer with an unknown buyback charge, interesting bonuses,… Waste not, want not.
Having said that, I hope that my fellow Libertarians will not take it out on the nice Libertarians of Oklahoma.
I’m getting a fair amount of response to the ad, and several people who may be coming in. However it may help if everyone helps me spread the message to more places….post this anywhere and everywhere, as much as you can please and thank you in advance.
Anyone know anything good or bad about this company? Is it worthwhile? Spam or scam? I got this in reply to my craigslist ad:
We do know a few people in Oklahoma, but none that we can think of that own property. Have you tried getting signatures in Cherokee areas? Obviously, they tend to mistrust government.
There’s a casino in Tulsa, and a large university in Tahlequah, which is the head of the Cherokee nation. I really wish we were in a position to help, but I can’t think of anyplace else. The one person we know who owns a business (Murv Jacob, a wonderful artist) is a flaming Democrat. I’ll keep trying to think of someone.
We’ve only worked around the OKC area. The primary problem has not been finding people who are willing to sign the petition, it’s been
1) Finding petitioners who aren’t hired away by better paying petition drives elsewhere and
2) Finding places where we are allowed to petition, or where our right to petition is acknowledged, or where we don’t get chased off, that have good foot traffic.
We have run into quite a few Native people, as you may expect in Oklahoma. Unless they happened to volunteer the information I did not ask which Nation. The reaction has ranged from people who told me they don’t vote in US elections to those who signed eagerly to those who signed tepidly just to allow us to be on the ballot to those who didn’t sign for any number of reasons to those who wouldn’t give me the time of day. I have not noticed any significant difference in the rate of signing between people who appear to be of one “race” or another, nor between those who appear to be likely to or tell me that they are supporting Democrats vs those supporting Republicans. Even among independents, some sign because they want more choices and some don’t because it’s yet another party and they don’t want any party names at all on the ballot. But again, when we have a crowd and are not being chased off, we can find people who are willing to sign. Andy had one day when he had over 500 signatures, and we have all had plenty of days when we got over a hundred signatures, so that’s not our main problem here.
Casinos are pretty hardcore about kicking out petitioners. Unless you have a very good connection at the corporate board or something, maybe.
I haven’t been in that part of the state. We are just starting to get some petitioners working up that way now.
Democrats are just as likely to support our right to have equal voting rights as Republicans are to allow some competition on the ballot. I wouldn’t assume he would or would not let us petition just based on his personal voting or beliefs. The bigger question is how busy the area by his entrance is and whether it is a public sidewalk or part of a mall or shopping plaza of some sort.
I threw a few dollars into the drive. Wish I could have done more!
Readers may note that at the last LNC meeting the LNC cut the ballot access budget significantly.
It’s times like these I wish I had money to donate. So many causes I’d love to fund.
Money is part of what we need here, but only one part.
I have been ringing the alarm bell about the problems on the LP drive in Oklahoma here on IPR and in emails to the LNC and to LNC office staff since September. I also discussed potential problems that would likely happen in Oklahoma with multiple LNC members. My warnings and alarm bells were ignored and look where we are now.
The main reasons the LP drive in Oklahoma are as follows:
1) Delaying the start of the paid petition drive until late August. Paid petitioners should have been put on the ground as soon as a few thousand dollars were available. This should have happened in May or June, or certainly by early July. I offered to go to Oklahoma multiple times during this time period, yet my offer was ignored.
2) The amount of money budgeted for the petition drive was not realistic, especially considering that the paid petition drive started in late August, which is traditionally the time when the petition business starts to go into its busiest season , as there are lots of ballot initiatives & referendums and lots of candidates and political parties trying to qualify for the Presidential election ballot. I know that there are MULTIPLE LNC members and office staffers who know this, so they can’t “play dumb” here and act like they had no idea what was going to happen, at least not with me anyway. They based their budget for Oklahoma on rates from 15 plus years ago. This was not relevant to today’s economy.
3) The access to locations with public foot traffic that are good for signature gathering, and where petition circulators are not going to be run out by the police, security guards, store/venue managers, or government bureaucrats is among the worst I have ever seen, and I have worked on petition drives for over 15 years and in 32 states plus Washington DC.
Should read, “main reasons for the problems in Oklahoma…”
Not being on the ballot in all 50 states plus DC makes the Libertarian Party look like an organization that does not have its act together. Not getting 50 state plus DC ballot access for another election should be considered to be unacceptable.
I agree, which is why I want to focus on preventing a failure while it may still be preventable, even if we have to move heaven and earth to do it, rather than pointing out the problems that got us here. At some point all the I told you sos become counterproductive, especially while we are still trying to turn this thing around and make it a success and may well still have a chance of doing so. Lots of people read these comments including LNC members and donors, so continuously harping on the negative may cause some people to not donate or to donate less or may cause LNC members to be more likely to vote against extending the drive, and we do not need that right now, because like you said failure should not be acceptable and right now it is up to us to prevent it at this very moment.
In addition to the importance of full ballot access to national party status, and the importance for future efforts in Oklahoma as Richard pointed out, there is the 30k that Richard put into it and all the smaller but in many cases significant amounts that other people have contributed. There’s the 10k or so plus interest that I have borrowed to stay here since August while I have lost money every week and the 30 or 40k I could have made by working on more lucrative petition drives in the same time frame. There’s all the work Tina Kelly has put into helping run this drive, and the massive letdown it will be for her and yet another new group of state party activists if it is all for nothing in the end. Failure should not be considered an option right now, and right now is not the time for autopsies and recriminations.
Thank you!
Some other things we need:
1. The biggest thing we need is more petitioners in Oklahoma working on this. More money is important, but unless and until it results in another raise in the street price it does not by itself increase the number of signatures coming in or the chances that the LNC won’t kill the drive. We need help from people coming in here to petition and recruiting other people to petition.
2. We need help spreading this message as many places as possible on social media, local Oklahoma blogs, LP and petitioner boards and discussion forums of every kind, job boards…anywhere you can think of.
3. We need petition locations. If you or someone you know can call convenience stores, gas stations, bars… find someone in Oklahoma who can go around to these places … find people who know people who own or manage these places … we need help with that.
4. Petitioners need housing and in some cases cars/rides. We need more people in Oklahoma who can help with that, and people who can find people who can help with that.
5. As I mentioned we have some help on the legal front, but we need more. If possible a legal team with several people that can help us when problems arise.
The single biggest thing we need is petitioners, so if anyone is in a position to come out here or knows someone who is, we need that to happen as soon as possible.
There have already been and still are lots of petition circulators working in Oklahoma. I am talking about Green the Vote. This is an organization that is currently trying to place a Medical Marijuana initiative on the ballot in Oklahoma. The group has little money, so they are using all unpaid volunteer petition circulators, but they have lots of people gathering signatures, probably 100 or more. The LP of Oklahoma offered to pay Green the Vote petition circulators if they also gathered signatures for the LP at the same time (and note that there are Libertarians who have, and probably still are, collecting volunteer signatures for Green the Vote), and the leaders of Green the Vote agreed to make the Libertarian Party petition available to all Green the Vote petition circulators, but Green the Vote has only gathered a small number of signatures for the LP compared to what they gathered on the Medical Marijuana petition (which I think has little chance of qualifying for the ballot). The problems with Green the Vote have been as follows:
1) The Green the Vote leaders want 100% of any money earned by any Green the Vote volunteers from the LP petition to be donated to the Green the Vote campaign. This has taken away personal incentive from Green the Vote petition circulators to work the LP petition, since they are not getting to keep any of the money they earn off of the LP petition, as the Green the Vote campaign is keeping 100% of the money.
2) The Green the Vote leaders have not given the LP petition to every Green the Vote petition circulator, like they said they were going to do. I ran into 8 Green the Vote petition circulators when I was in Oklahoma, and only 2 of them had the LP petition (I did give copies if the LP petition to 5 Green the Vote petitioners, but one did not want it, not because they were against the LP petition, but rather because they did not feel comfortable asking people ti sign more than one petition).
3) Most of the Green the Vote petition circulators are not experienced petition circulators, and they are not good at getting people to sign more than one petition, and to make matters worse fir the LP, Oklahoma minor party ballot access petition page are required to be separated by county, and ballot initiative petition pages do not have to be separated by county, so every register voter in Oklahoma can sign the same petition page for the Medical Marijuana petition, yet on the LP petition, the petition circulator has to fish through a stack of county pages to find the correct county page for registered voters in Oklahoma to sign, as in they have to sign the page which corresponds to the county where they are registered ti vote.
Andy,
Let’s try to focus on solutions, not problems, for right now. There will be plenty of time for rehashing the issues you keep bringing up when the petition either succeeds or fails. In the meantime I want to focus on trying to make it succeed.
Part of finding solutions is identifying the problems, and fixing them.
Yes, but the things you are bringing up are not fixing them right now. At the moment I am looking for immediate solutions to an immediate problem. Identifying what has already been done wrong does not fix it. If you can suggest what can be done right now, other than raising the price, that’s more what I am interested in.
If you can’t identify the problems then you will continue to make the same mistakes that created the problems in the future.
I realize that too, but again, there will be plenty of time for that later.
Here is solution: Go fix the problems with Green the Vote.
This could still bring in thousands more signatures for the LP without having to find or bring in more petition circulators to Oklahoma.
Should read, “Here is a solution…”
OK, fine. How exactly do fix the problems with GTV? Tina is already trying, and she already has credibility with them by working with them closely, going to a bunch of their meetings, marching with them in the parade, giving them a bunch of volunteer signatures herself, and giving their organization a chance to make some money on the LP petition. She knows all the players there and has talked to and met with them a bunch of times. I would love to suggest a better way to address the issues you bring up with them, but maybe it’s not as easy as you are tring to make it sound to solve those problems. Tina now thinks more of them will want to focus on LP when GTV ends. We shall see.
GTV may be part of the solution but I don’t think it will be the whole solution.
Fixing the problems with Green the Vote is only one of the solutions.
What are the others?
Raise more money to spend on the petition drive.
Threaten to file, or better yet, file law suits to break open access to locations for petition signature gathering.
Continue to try to get permission to gather petition signatures at locations where we cannot break open access by going through legal channels.
Print up walk lists of registered voters so petition circulators have the option of gathering signatures by going door-to-door in neighborhoods. Paid petition circulators who do this should get paid a higher pay rate for signatures collected door-to-door off of a walk list of registered voters since signatures collected in this manner generally have a validity rate of 99-100%.
As you can see, Wes is now working on that.
Met with another guy from the local ACLU about that again today, and I believe they are now seriously looking in that direction (finally). More about that in an upcoming email.
Trying to find some help with that. Bob Johnston didn’t have any luck, but maybe someone reading would have more luck if they tried? Or perhaps knows someone who is good at that sort of thing and willing to try?
As of right now a higher pay rate for door to door is not being offered, so that is out of my hands, but just in case that changes I would like to offer that as an option to petitioners. At least one guy that picked up paper already told me his plan is to go door to door, even without the walk lists and higher rates. So what I would like to know is if anyone reading knows a program that would create walk lists out of the SOS database. I know it can be done, since I have seen the walk lists many times, but I don’t know off hand how to make them.
Relying on the ACLU to fight our battles is bullshit. The LP has plenty of attorneys, and a person can threaten to file, or file, lawsuits themselves without an attorney.
I have broken open access myself by simply pointing out what the law and relevant court rulings to city/county attorneys, heads of police departments, government bureaucrats, etc…, and I am not an attorney. Sure, it does not work all of the time, but it works some of the time.
The LP has been conducting ballot access drives for over 40 years, and thr LP has plenty of attorneys in its membership ranks. Getting help from the ACLU is nice if we can get it, but we should not be relying on other people to fight all of our battles for us.
We need local counsel for some things.
The LP has one staff attorney who is new on the job, and has a lot of different things he is working on:
http://www.lp.org/files/20151114_LNC_Meeting_Special_Counsel_Report.pdf
We could certainly use some help from volunteer attorneys at various times, too.
I just made a small donation. Best wishes out there in Oklahoma.
Thank you!
I found out yesterday that there a local initiative petitions going on in a couple of cities in California where petition circulators who go door-to-door with a walk list of registered voters are getting $6 per signature for the local initiatives in these cities (note that there are coordinator overrides on top of this, so the petition proponents are paying out more than $6 for these signatures). There are also two or three statewide initiative petitions that they are carrying as well.
I have suggested multiple times since September that the LP make walk lists of registered voters available in Oklahoma, along with a higher pay rate per signature for signatures collected door-to-door off of the walk list, and if this would have been done the LP would have thousnds more valid signatures in hand in Oklahoma, yet I could not even get a response from any LNC member or office staffer on this issue.
This is yet another example of why the Libertarian Party is not a successful organization.
Thank you to Andy Jacobs for all the signatures you gathered while you were in Oklahoma and all the advice for improving the petition drive.
Why bother thanking people for advice that is not even followed, or even responded to for that matter?
Also, I was to a certain extent screwed out of working in South Dakota, where the LNC handed out a lucrative no bid deal to a non-libertarian mercenary who had little track record with the LP. The crew of non-libertarian mercenaries in South Dakota were carrying a Top Two Primary initiative petition, which if it passes will prevent Libertarian Party candidates (for offices other that President) from appearing on general election ballots, at the same time that they were getting paid to gather signatures for the LP, so these people were quite literally getting people to sign one petition to put Libertarian Party candidates on the ballot, while having them sign another petition to take Libertarian Party candidates off the ballot. THIS WAS DONE WITH THE FULL KNOWLEDGE OF THE LNC AND SOME OF THE LNC OFFICE STAFF.
There were multiple petitions paying in South Dakota, and I know petition circulators who made “fat bank” there. One of them told me that his first week there he made $4,000. Another told me that he was averaging $3,000 per week. People I know who worked there described it as “crazy money” and one of the most lucrative petition drives they have worked. One petition circulator told me he left South Dakota with over $20,000 in his pocket after expenses for about two months of work.
So thanks to the LNC, this is what I missed.
I donated $150 to the LNC last year, and I donated $50 to the LNC this, and the way the LNC “thanked” me for thus was to STAB ME IN THE BACK with South Dakota.
I worked in Oklahoma for peanuts while NON-libertarian mercenaries who were carrying a Top Two Primary initiative in South Dakota were making big bucks.
If you are going to CA to work for $6.00 a signature how are you not a mercenary, Andy? I call it “self interest” myself.
ZERO Libertarians have worked on the LP petition drive in South Dakota, in spite of six actual Libertarian petition circulators having expressed an interest in going there.
Thank you to everyone who has donated, gathered signatures, helped manage the drive, helped fundraise, provided advice, and spread the word. This petition drive needs to succeed and it needs all our help in whatever ways we can provide it.
I am NOT going to California. I just said it was happening.
I am not even sure what those local issues that I referred to above in California are. I know that one of the statewide petitions is to increase the minimum wage, and the one or two other statewide petitions are some kind of socialist crap as well.
If a person works for causes they actually believe in they are not really a mercenary.
I almost always work on causes I believe in, or am at least neutral on, so the “mercenary” label could rarely be applied to me.
I have been involved in the petition business for over 15 years, so I know that most of the people in it are pure mercenaries.
There is also a city initiative petition going on in San Diego, CA right now to increase the motel occupancy tax and use the proceeds to build a new football stadium for the Chargers. I believe it is paying $3 per signature (I do not think that anyone is going door-to-door on this one). Also, keep in mind that people working on this are also working on two or three statewide petitions at the same time. I know a mercenary petition circulator who is there now who said that he’s making fat money.
Professional petitioners are those who get paid for petitioning. Mercenary petitioners are those whose only concern is getting paid regardless of whether they agree with the issue or not, if they even care about politics at all, which most of them don’t. I noticed a lot of people don’t understand this difference. Andy J and I are professional, but not mercenary, petitioners. We actually turn down more lucrative work on issues we disagree with on a regular basis, which mercenary petitioners would never do. As I said above, I have consciously passed up a lot of money by working here in Oklahoma as opposed to other places I could have been instead.
I have been a mercenary petitioner at one point, in the early 2000s, but Andy actually helped me get back away from that. I am thankful for that because that mindset was taking me back to some bad places mentally, emotionally and spiritually (and as a consequence, sometimes physically). Thanks to Andy for being a friend over the years and a dedicated fighter for the cause of liberty.
It shows the shortsightedness of mercenary (as opposed to professional) petitioners that they would work on this, given that we are among the working poor (despite the sometimes large short term profits, road expenses are high and it’s a feast and famine existence) who are screwed by motel taxes. It’s easy for politicians and voters to screw the working poor who stay in motels that way because most of us don’t vote and tend to move from one jurisdiction to the next. The tax may be sold as a tax on well off tourists who stay for a day or several in nice hotels, but a lot of it falls on far less well off people who stay for weeks, months and even years and decades in not so nice motels for a variety of reasons such as moving around a lot, not having enough money all at once to pay for an apartment or house rental, and/or not having enough documentation for an apartment or house rental. It’s ironic in this case that petitioners are often in this class. And the particularly pernicious part is that the reverse Robin Hood tax is being proposed on behalf of billionaire sports team owners.
A non-libertarian mercenary who worked in Oklahoma for the first few weeks of the drive turned in horrible validity. I was told their validity rate was 30% by officials in the LP of Oklahoma (this means that 70% of the signatures they collected were no good). They were paid in full for all of the signatures before they left the state for a more lucrative petition drive elsewhere. This is the same individual who received over $140,000 from the LNC in 2012, which was around 40% of the LNC’s ballot access budget for that year, and around 14% of the LNC’s entire budget for 2012. This is also the same person who had all of their signatures thrown out in Illinois in 2014, which means they basically ended up with a validity rate of ZERO PERCENT, which meant that the OVER $10,000 that the LNC paid them for these signatures was for NOTHING.
And some people wonder why after being a dues paying LP member for over 19 years, and a Libertarian ballot access petition circulator for more than 15 years, that I sound pissed off.
Much like Oklahoma, mainland China does not offer its citizens very much in the way of political choice. The authorities in China are also not very accomodating to those who openly voice dissenting views in public places. It seems that these two governments have a lot in common in these respects.
Perhaps some day the LNC will have a Ballto Access committee that actually files reports on ballot access. A committee report is one that the committee has voted to approve.
I agree with George Phillies about the LNC Ballot Access Committee. It is a farce in its present form.
”
NewFederalist
November 26, 2015 at 13:28
If you are going to CA to work for $6.00 a signature how are you not a mercenary, Andy? I call it ‘self interest’ myself.”
There really is not honor in putting self interest over libertarian principles. This is what the typical government employee and politician does, as well as others who feed at the government trough.
Also, if you read what I said, I mentioned that I heard that those petition drives were going on, I never said that I was going there to work on them, and also, like I said above, I don’t even know what the two city petitions are that are paying $6 for door-to-door canvassed signatures off of a walking list of registered voters.
I read what you said.
“NewFederalist
November 26, 2015 at 17:59
I read what you said.”
Then you must not have read very closely, because nowhere above did I say that I was headed off to work on the petition drives that are happening currently in California. I have zero interest in working there right now.
I brought it up for three reasons:
1) I wanted to point out an example of campaigns paying for door-to-door signatures gathered off of a walk list of registered voters.
2) I wanted to point out how much some other petition drives are paying right now in places other than Oklahoma.
3) I wanted to show just one of the states that has paid petition work right now that the LP has to compete against for the services of petition circulators. There are currently paid petition drives going on in multiple states, several of which are offering better deals for petition circulators (which is why the LP is having a hard time finding people to work in Oklahoma).
I think you missed the “If” that began my sentence.
When you asked the question, you indicated that I was interested in working on the petitions that are currently paying in California, which is not something I ever indicated that I had any plan or desire to do.
Some of my relatives in Taiwan, who are not US citizens or residents and have never been to the US, asked if they are allowed to donate to this. Does anyone here know?
I am pretty sure that the LP can only accept donations from American citizens.
Persons admitted for permanent residency in the U.S., but who are not citizens, can also give to federal candidates, and presumably also political parties.
Per the listed restrictions at the URL below Richard Winger seems to be correct.
https://www.lp.org/contribute
Yes, he is.
And Wes Benedict tells me some good progress is being made on the fundraising end, although of course more is needed. We need more help in the other aspects mentioned above.
I had Thanksgiving dinner at Tina’s. She has recruited some additional petitioners, but they are working part time and we haven’t checked their validity yet (I will start on it tonight or tomorrow). We need more. I am continuing to call a list of possible petitioners. One or two that left may be on their way back here soon. Also picked up a cable for the printer. Wes will be here tomorrow night through Wednesday.
The LP drive in Oklahoma would be in much better shape right now if my advice had actually been followed.
LNC plans to have a call Monday Dec 7 at 9:30 pm eastern, 8:30 central, to decide whether to continue the drive.
Pearl Harbor Day. How Symbolic.
“The LP drive in Oklahoma would be in much better shape right now if my advice had actually been followed.” – Andy
And just how does this help?
Perhaps we can do better next time?
We aren’t done here yet. Let’s worry about next time after this is over.
It sounds as though another $38,800 might have helped. I can’t imagine where I came up with that number.
Any amount, big or small, will help.
The effort from the LNC to get on the ballot in Oklahoma has been half ass. Throwing in the towel after such a weak effort to save the drive is a bullshit move.
Has that decision been made?
NewFederalist: I gather the decision may be made on December 7. Unless it is postponed. George
George, where did you get the $38,800 figure? Is this from LNC staff bonuses, costs associated with changing the party’s logo, or from something else?
I believe he is referring in part to the equipment lease issue.
Thanks for the clarification about Dec 7th, George.
@14:31 Totally wrong. Learn something about the history of the matter before you pontificate.
@13:44 Fair question. See the Audit Committee report, a cycle or so back, as covered in Liberty for America magazine. It was a payment for editing and related work.
George
George,
==Totally wrong. Learn something about the history of the matter before you pontificate.==
Don’t know why you are so nasty lately, but anyways, you had mentioned something about that before, and it seemed related.
Biting heads off serves no purpose but if that is what you wish to do
George, I assume that you are talking about the $38,800 that the LNC paid to Michael Cloud a few years ago, 2012 I believe, right? If so, was any evidence ever submitted that it was worth it for Cloud to have been paid this sum of money by the LNC, and if so, what is the evidence?
I am still searching for answers as to why one person received $140,184.25 from the LNC for ballot access in 2012, which was about 40% of the LNC’s ballot access budget, and about 14% of the budget for the entire party. This amount was more than triple what the 2nd highest recipient of LNC ballot access money received, and far more than that of other LNC ballot access fund recipients. Questions have been asked, but so far no answers have been given.
Thanks folks. The last few comments have not been helpful suggestions to solve immediate problems with the drive. Please stick to only providing positive, near term solutions on this particular thread. Talking about various things that were done wrong which can’t be corrected at this point, or that could be done better in the future which we can’t implement immediately, is not helpful. I need immediate help to fix an immediate problem by December 7th. This drive is by no means dead yet, but it’s also not assured to succeed yet either. I need help with a lot of aspects of getting this drive on the right track. Only a few of them involve giving money or coming out here to Oklahoma. Some of them involve various volunteer tasks that people could do on their own schedule and from wherever they happen to be. I’m not sure whether I should say what all they are. I probably already said what some of them are above.
Anyway, one thing everyone could do me which would be a HUGE favor would be to take negative talk, second guessing, what ifs, wouldas, shouldas and couldas to other threads. Please, please stick only to positive short term solutions here. I would very much appreciate it.
We are making progress on a number of fronts with various different people’s help so I believe this thing can be turned around and succeed but we can still use your help in any number of ways.
Lots of other threads here for all that other stuff…
I am sick & tired of all of these internal dysfunction problems in the LP continually getting swept under the rug, never getting resolved, and continuing to make the party less effective than it would be otherwise.
I didn’t say sweep under the rug. Just ask take it to a different thread. Trying to get some short term help organized on this one.
I have been giving solutions to the Oklahoma ballot access problem for months, before the drive even started. Heck, for that matter, I was giving solutions to the Oklahoma ballot access problem back in the spring of 2011. I even predicted that if my solutions to the problems were not followed then that the party would fail to get on the ballot in Oklahoma for the 2012 election, and they encountered all of the problems that I anticipated, they ignored any solutions to these problems that I provided them, and they failed as a result.
The problem is not lack of solutions to the problem, the problem is people who hold leadership positions in the party not following those solutions to the problem, and instead marching the party off of a cliff.
We’re looking at short term solutions to a short term issue here for the next week. I agree that there are longer term issues to be addressed, and I ask that they be addressed in other threads. I agree that Andy has suggested solutions all along. Right now, we are interested primarily in solutions that can be implemented in the next week. Please discuss anything and everything else in any other thread except this one.
http://hq.lp.org/pipermail/lnc-business_hq.lp.org/2015/003686.html
Alicia Mattson agmattson at gmail.com
Mon Nov 30 00:57:00 CST 2015
There will be an Executive Committee teleconference on Monday, December 7
on the subject of the Oklahoma ballot access petition drive.
Date: Monday, December 7
Time: 9:30 p.m. Eastern / 6:30 p.m. Pacific
Dial-in: 1 (217) 258-5588
Guest Pin Code: 207730
1. At conference time, dial the Conference Dial-In number above.
2. At the prompt, enter the Access Code followed by the # key.
3. You will hear music until the Moderator enters the call.
To mute your individual phone line, press * 6.
To un-mute your individual phone line, press * 7.
Alicia Mattson
LNC Secretary
http://hq.lp.org/pipermail/lnc-business_hq.lp.org/2015/003685.html
Wes Benedict Wes.Benedict at lp.org
Mon Nov 30 00:06:12 CST 2015
I’m in Oklahoma City working with Paul Frankel and the LPOK to get a
clearer picture of where we stand and what it will take to finish this
drive successfully.
The requirements for signatures are almost 25,000 valid signatures. If
you know people interested in helping, we’re interested in having more
people help.
They can contact Paul Frankel as described here:
http://www.lp.org/blogs/staff/serious-help-needed-for-oklahoma-petition-drive
Or they can contact me.
Thanks,
Wes Benedict, Executive Director
Libertarian National Committee, Inc.
*New address: 1444 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314*
(202) 333-0008 ext. 232, wes.benedict at lp.org
facebook.com/libertarians @LPNational
Join the Libertarian Party at: http://lp.org/membership
Roland Riemers wrote on 11/29/2015 11:35 PM:
> Wes, what is happening in Oklahoma now? What are the requirement
> for signatures there?
> Roland Riemers ND
>
> ————————————————————————
> *From:* Wes Benedict
> *To:* lnc-business at hq.lp.org
> *Sent:* Wednesday, November 25, 2015 3:37 PM
> *Subject:* [Lnc-business] please test new rack cards at LPStore.org –
> secret coupon
>
> I’d like to make sure the store checkout works.
>
> http://lpstore.org/what-is-the-lp-rack-card-4×9/
>
> There is a secret coupon code you can use to avoid the $5 shipping and
> handling fee.
> Secret coupon code: *eddt3st*
>
> Free shipping coupon expires at unknown time. Like maybe days or
> weeks. Haven’t decided.
>
> It is OK if this secret offer leaks to other people, like on Facebook,
> etc. It’s available for everyone. But I don’t have lots of time to
> answer questions about it. I’m heading to Oklahoma Saturday.
>
> Feel free to test our Black Friday new shirt checkout page as well,
> but there are no discounts offered there. It will be mentioned in
> email blast Friday. It’s not part of our store yet.
> http://www.lp.org/blackfriday
>
> I like to test things on a small scale before we broadcast them
> nationwide to everyone.
>
> Thanks,
> —
> Wes Benedict, Executive Director
Caryn, I am sorry if I hurt your feelings. Your analysis of the Oregon issue went in a wrong direction.
With respect to Oklahoma, the LNC has when last I read about a hundred Gs in the bank — $96204 at the end of October — which appears adequate to cover things.
The long term issue, whether Paulie is interested or not, which may yet impact Oklahoma if that $96,000 is not enough — is the rate at which the LNC spends money in odd ways, such as the $38,800 for editing, etc., , various bonuses, a staff bonus contract that apparently gave bonuses for money raised before the employee came on board, $30,000+ for a $11,000 printer that the LNC could not be bothered to discuss, etc.
Ignoring finances and membership this year, so that we are sailing into an election year without a huge cash reserve, is not good. The folks with hoods from years back preparing to rise from the dead are not good.
A national Committee that spent time arguing about which names they should use to call the two Oregon groups is symbolic of the broader problems.
It’s not that I am not interested, it’s that I am trying to maintain a space to maintain focus and help me solve a short term, very important, very serious, but eminently solvable problem in this one particular thread. There are many other threads on which to discuss the issues you are bringing up. I am asking that people please take the tangential issues to those other threads.
It seems that a part of the problem is harassment by local law enforcement. I wonder if it would be helpful if Oklahoma LP officials contacted county sheriffs for help. According to the OK sheriffs association website:
Duties of Oklahoma Sheriffs
The office of Sheriff is the only law enforcement office directly accountable to the people, the ultimate authority in a democracy. It is an elected position this makes them unique among other law enforcement.
It should be no surprise that police officials who are appointed by Dem or GOP elected officials are less than helpful. Maybe Sheriffs who are directly elected by the people would be willing to help.
https://www.oklahomasheriffs.org/office-of-the-sheriff/duties/
Pingback: Libertarian Party: Serious help needed for Oklahoma petition drive | American Third Party Report
“Marc Allan Feldman
November 30, 2015 at 12:23
It seems that a part of the problem is harassment by local law enforcement. I wonder if it would be helpful if Oklahoma LP officials contacted county sheriffs for help. According to the OK sheriffs association website:”
Marc, this is the right line of thinking, and this is something that I have been saying for a long time, including right here on IPR. However, my experience is that you rarely get very far when you talk to the police. Sure, every once in a while you’ll find a reasonable person in a leadership position among the ranks of the police, but more often than not, it is usually not that productive talking to law enforcement. The better route to go is to go above their heads. Police departments are more likely to listen to city attorneys and county attorneys, so this is a good place to start. Sometimes you find city attorneys and county attorneys that are real jackasses too, so then you need to go above their heads by calling up the Secretary of State’s office or the Attorney General’s office, or you need to file a law suit.
This is an example of why I have said over and over for several years, including here on IPR, that before the Libertarian Party (or any other group) starts a petition drive, somebody from the party needs to get in touch with the local “authorities” in whatever jurisdiction that petition drive is being held in and get them to clarify where we have a right to collect petition signatures. Get it from them in writing if possible. If they will not tell us, or if they claim that we can’t do it in places where the courts have already ruled that we can, then the next step should be to file a law suit.
Shouldn’t Andy J be over in the PSL thread arguing 9/11 truth with Jim? LOL
A suggestion vis a vis law enforcement:
For big drives in areas where law enforcement seems to be a problem, why not try the following:
Ask LP members in the area “do you know any retired cops?” and/or approach the local police union to let them know that you’re looking for retired cops who’d like to make some money for work they’re probably well-suited for (standing in public areas talking to people).
Hire some former cops as petitioners. Maybe pair them up with experience non-former-cop petitioners. Make sure these former cops are briefed on the law and their rights. When an on-the-job cop comes around on a complaint, etc., if the conversation starts with them knowing each other or at least with the petitioner being able to say “hey, you must be knew — I retired from [city] PD last year,” and so forth.
Cops are a tribe. Get some of the tribe’s members involved and the rest of the tribe is more likely to lighten up.
Just a thought.
Thanks for the suggestions everyone! We may not be able to use all of them, but we will do our best. We are starting to make some good progress on the petitioner recruitment and legal fronts. I am pretty optimistic at this point.
I bumped the timestamp on this article a few times to keep it on the front page and noticed one or two other people did also (thank you). I’m going to stop doing that now and keep it in November. Wes and I are going to work on a new update that will be a separate blast to the national email list, LP.org blog post, post here etc with an update and more positive spin. Bumping the month on an article changes its URL and causes any previous links from social media accounts, email, other websites etc to go to an error page, so I am trying to avoid bumping articles into different months.
Thanks again everyone for all help with this past, present and future whether financial, advice, or whatever form.
Thomas Knapp said: “A suggestion vis a vis law enforcement:
For big drives in areas where law enforcement seems to be a problem, why not try the following:
Ask LP members in the area ‘do you know any retired cops?’ and/or approach the local police union to let them know that you’re looking for retired cops who’d like to make some money for work they’re probably well-suited for (standing in public areas talking to people).
Hire some former cops as petitioners.”
Creative suggestion, Tom, but I don’t think that it would stand much of a chance of working in most cases.
Why?
1) Most cops are hardcore statists. Sure, there are exceptions to this, but many cops would not want to gather signatures for the Libertarian Party, even if you offered them money.
2) Cops make good money. A lot of them make $70,000-$80,000 per year, and some make more. They also have a benefits package (healthcare, vacation days, etc..), plus they can also earn extra money by moonlighting as security guards, which some of them do. They also have lucrative retirement packages, so most of them are not so hard up for money that they’d want to go out and work as petition circulators, even if the petitions were paying well.
3) A lot of cops do not have the personality to work as petition circulators. They are used to bossing people around, and their job does not require them to sell anything, as in they are used to working on a salary, and they are not used to working on a commission basis, where you don’t get paid if you don’t entice people to voluntarily buy your product. Getting signatures on petitions is not exactly the same thing as sales, since no money or product is changing hands, but it is very similar to a sales job, as in your are “selling” people on the idea of signing your petition.
I have actually witnessed, and even worked on a few petitions that were supported by the police. Now somebody may say, “Well how is it that this guy who proclaims himself to be a hardcore libertarian ended up working on a few petitions that were supported by the police? Did he sell out his principles? This must make him a hypocrite.”
Sometimes politics make strange bedfellows.
Here are a few for instances:
1) I worked on a couple of ballot initiatives in California that were to keep local tax revenue in the local area where it was collected. Apparently, the state government was taking certain tax money away from the cities and/or counties, and these initiatives were to prevent the state government from doing that. While certainly not a solid libertarian initiative, it was for decentralization, which is generally a good thing. Basically, if people in a locality are having money extorted from them in local taxes, then shouldn’t the money at least be spent in the area where it was being collected, rather than having it go to the state government? These initiatives were supported by the local government employee unions, which included the local police. It was kind of funny hearing the local government employee unions complain about how the state government was taking away “their” money. Anyway, I actually saw some local government fire fighters out collecting signatures on these petitions, but I never saw any cops collecting signatures on it. The reason I worked on it twice was because I think that it made the ballot the first time, but it did not pass, so they tried it again a few years later. I am not sure if it passed or not the second time.
2) I worked a petition in Washington that was for firefighters and the police to have representation on the Board of Trustees that managed their pension. This was not any issue about which I really cared, but I did have three other initiatives that I worked on during the same time that were pro-liberty, two were for tax cuts and the other one was for spending limits, and since I did not see the firefighter and police petition as being THAT bad, I worked on it as well. I prefer to work on things with which I agree, but I will also work on things where I am neutral. There have been very few instances where I have worked on anything with which I did not agree. I am not a fan of government employees, or government employee pensions (government employee pensions have a huge influence on the stock market and corporations, and this does not get anywhere near the amount of attention that it should), but these government jobs already exist, so what do I care who is on their Board of Trustees? The petitions in Washington are on paper that is larger than what most states use, and unlike most states, Washington petitions can use different colors and they can add graphics to petitions. The petition was for firefighters and police, but the campaign must have realized that firefighters are way more popular among the public than the police, because they put firefighter graphics on the petition, but they did not put any police graphics on the petition. This petition also really showed me that an even higher percentage of the population than I realized prior to this that has a negative view of the police, because I encountered more people than I expected who would not sign this petition because it benefitted the police. These people would say things like, “I’d sign if it was just for firefighters, BUT FUCK THE POLICE!” Anyway, I don’t recall seeing any cops out collecting signatures on this petition.
3) I worked on a petition in Florida to have an election to see who was going to be the union that represented the Florida corrections officers (ie-prison guards). The petition was sponsored by a police union that wanted to replace the existing union that represented the Florida corrections officers. The election would have had three options, a) Stay with the union they already had, b) Switch to this union that was sponsoring the petition, or c) Not have any union. Option c was not likely to pass, so it was basically going to be option a or option b. This was not an issue that I cared about at all, but I did not think it would make much of a difference which union they had. I was in southern California at the time (Los Angeles County), but this was during a time when the weather was unusually bad in this part of California. I checked the weather in Florida, and the weather in Florida was actually nicer during this time period. This campaign was paying expenses, which included round trip flights, motel, rental car, gas, and tolls. I had not been in Florida in 7 years prior to this, and I wanted to go there, plus, the work in California was not paying much at the time. This was not a cause about which I cared, but it was not really anything that I thought would make things worse than they already are. So I went to Florida and worked on it. It was actually pretty difficult, because the existing union for the Florida corrections officers came out in uniform and acted as blockers, that is that they would show up when we were gathering signatures and shout and try to intimidate people into not signing our petitions. Some guys from the union that was the proponent of the petition drive came out and gathered signatures with us. I asked them why they did not have more people from their union collecting signatures, and they told me it was because most cops did not have the personality for it. They said that they were used to bossing people around and could not handle the rejection when people do not want to sign. The petition drive was so difficult with the blockers that the union guys who were working with us felt bad for us so they decided to pay for all of our meals, which was nice. Anyway, the blocking got so bad that they ended up calling the petition drive off. After I got back to California I got a call from an attorney for the union that was the proponent of the petition and they asked me some questions about the tactics used by the blockers because they were in the process of filing a law suit against the other union. I don’t know what ended up happening after this.
The bottom line here is that I think that we’d have a hard time finding any retired cops who’d want to work on petition drives for the Libertarian Party. A lot of them are ideologically opposed to us, plus most of them would have little financial incentive to do it.
I do know one guy in the petition business who is a former cop, I’m pretty sure he retired from it. This person has primarily worked in states that already have good access for petition circulators (I am not sure if they ever worked outside of those states), but even in the few states where petition circulators have good access to locations with public foot traffic, these rights are constantly under attack. I have heard about this guy calling up police departments and other government officials to try to get them to uphold the rights of petition circulators, but I am not sure how much his status as a former cop has helped.
The real solution to the problem of petition circulators being run out of location with public foot traffic is to file lawsuits. Having petition circulators wearing body cameras so they obtain footage of being run out of locations would be of help in these lawsuits, plus the footage could be posted online to make the people who prevent our petition circulators from gathering signatures look bad.
The lack of access to locations with good public foot traffic where petition circulators are not going to be run out by the police, security guards, venue managers, or government bureaucrats, factored in with the lower than average validity rates for petitions in Oklahoma, is why I have been saying since September that walking lists of registered voters need to be made available to petition circulators, and that a higher pay rate per signature for any signatures collected off of the walk lists of registered voters should be offered as well. Door-to-door with a walk list of registered voters should be paying at least $5-$6 per signature, and at this point I’d say at least $6. If the LP had taken my advice on this the party would have thousands more valid signatures in hand right now.
Wes did mention your advice quite a bit in his latest report:
http://hq.lp.org/pipermail/lnc-business_hq.lp.org/2015/003687.html
“paulie Post author
December 4, 2015 at 00:06
Wes did mention your advice quite a bit in his latest report:”
It is nice to finally get some recognition. Hopefully the advice will be acted upon.
Ken Moellman has offered to put together walk lists and additional database queries and Tina has said OK to letting him have access to the database and data. I don’t know if it was followed up on yet but I asked.
Did anyone listen to the LNC executive committee conference call tonight? If so, what was the result (will the Oklahoma drive continue or be shut down)?
Chuck, I am listening now. Paulie is here as well.
It is extended.
6-1 … Mattson was the only no vote.
Secretary Mattson seriously frustrated me in this issue.
They invited gallery comments, but I couldn’t get my phone un-muted fast enough
I’m very pleased it was extended!
As far as Alicia, I don’t think Lieberman was voting for OK to be extended, either. Could it be that they want money available for ballot access in Oregon?
Follow up comment in reference to my comment above where I responded to Tom Knapp’s suggestion of hiring former cops to work as LP ballot access petition circulators, with the thinking that former cops might be able to get current cops in places where the LP is gathering petition signatures for ballot access to stop harassing and running LP petition circulators out of places that carry public foot traffic.
I am still skeptical about the concept working, or being something on which the party could usually rely on to ease the petition signature collection process. One of the reasons I listed above for being skeptical about this working was because most cops are ideologically opposed to the Libertarian Party. I still think that this is true, however, there are three organizations that are sympathetic to our plight. The ones I am thinking of are as follows:
1) Oath Keepers
2) LEAP (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition)
3) Police & Military Against the New World Order
If we contacted these organizations, perhaps we could find some former, or maybe even current, cops who’d be willing to help us out.
The question is, how much would they really be able to do?
If they are former cops (as in retired, or people who quit for some reason before reaching retirement), this MIGHT be able to talk whoever is in charge of a police department, be it a Sheriff, or a Chief, or a Captain, into instructing their officers to recognize our right to gather petition signatures in places where the public has access. The problem that I see with this is that unless the Oath Keeper or LEAP or Police & Military Against the New World Order cop is a current cop who is in a high level position in the police department in whatever jurisdiction where we are conducting the petition drive, I could easily see them just ignoring him/her, just like they ignore us.
A street cop will listen to whoever it is in the police/Sheriff’s department that is over them in the chain of command, be it a Sheriff, a Chief, a Captain, or a Watch Commander, but they do not care much what anyone else says about anything. The people who run the department will usually do what a city attorney, county attorney, Attorney General, or US Attorney says though. They will also generally abide by what a judge says as well.
So I think the best way to solve the problem is to go to the attorneys for the cities/counties/states where we are going to be conducting ballot access petition drives, and talking to them beforehand to get them to clarify where we have a right to gather signatures, and to get them to tell the police to not harass or threaten or run out our petition circulators. If we cannot get them to reply, or if they reply and say that we cannot collect signatures in places that carry public foot traffic, then our next response should be to file a law suit.
Like I said above, I only know of one person in the petition business who is a former cop, and I only know of this person working in a couple of the few states that already have pretty good access rights for petition circulators. Even though these two states already have pretty good access for petition circulators, these rights are always under attack. I know that this person has talked to cops and other government officials in regard to petition circulators being able to collect signatures in places that are open to the public, but I do not know how much their status as a former cop has helped.
I think that the most effective thing that we can do to solve, or at least greatly reduce this problem, is for petition circulators to wear body cameras which automatically upload footage to the cloud, so we can obtain slam dunk evidence of harassment and of being prevented from gathering signatures, and then follow this up with law suits. If we get some court victories I think that the thugs who interfere with our signature gathering efforts will start to back down.
Posting the footage of petition signature gatherers being harassed and prevented from gathering signatures online, and also sending the footage to news outlets, would shine more light on the problem and could also embarrass the thugs into backing down as well.
Check out this list of Orders that Oath Keepers will not obey.
Declaration of Orders We Will NOT Obey
https://www.oathkeepers.org/declaration-of-orders-we-will-not-obey/
#10 on this list should be very interesting to anyone who gathers signatures on petitions, or who has an interest in seeing any ballot access petitions qualify for the ballot.
“10. We will NOT obey any orders which infringe on the right of the people to free speech, to peaceably assemble, and to petition their government for a redress of grievances.
There would have been no American Revolution without fiery speakers and writers such as James Otis, Patrick Henry, Thomas Paine, and Sam Adams ‘setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.'”
No, NO Andy. We mustn’t say anything that would scare soccer moms in Peoria.
Libertarianism is way too hot to handle.
We don’t need strong speeches today on Freedom.
Andy,
Sorry I missed your initial response — for some reason I didn’t notice my email telling me there were commments in this thread.
Your thoughts on my idea seem pretty spot-on and persuasive. It was just an idea I had and thought I’d throw out there. You’re one of the people with the actual experience and expertise to know whether or not it might work.
Things are looking up here. More people have come in or come back to petition, and they are bringing friends and relatives who are bringing in more friends etc. A bunch of people have told me they are looking at coming in after the holidays. Right now we are probably about half way in signatures needed with about 20,000 done.
Yesterday, we discovered that validity checking by the counties is more lenient than we thought. For some of us it takes reading it carefully a few times to understand what they are really saying here: http://oklahomalp.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/petition_verification.pdf Yesterday, I finally got it, and I believe this explains most of the discrepancy between what we found so far with our spot-checking and what I have been told was the case on past petition drives in Oklahoma.
TE, Carla Howell, Tina and myself made a discovery in reading over the validation instructions from the state more carefully and parsing the words and implications. It seems that they are much more lenient with checking signatures than the methods we were using – they will count even if the address is wrong (although maybe only if it remains in the same county), even if a lot of the information is missing or illegible, etc. Although we haven’t had a chance to recheck the validity using this new understanding, my expectation is it will improve the percentages significantly.
Ken Moellman reports he is making some good progress with improving the database we are working with for validation, possibly provide a faster server, additional query tools etc to speed things up when we check signatures. He will also be working on walk lists for anyone who wants to go door to door. Unfortunately, Andy’s idea of paying a higher rates for signatures gathered door to door with walk lists was not discussed on the call, although it was included in Wes Benedict’s report. But we may have some people that want to go door to door anyway, because they are more comfortable doing that than with trying to find petition locations or because in winter weather it is warmer when you are moving than when standing or sitting in one place and because the potential signers are not running to get back indoors as fast as possible and aren’t worried about the petitioners knowing their address since they obviously already do.
I am getting offers of assistance from the various candidates seeking the presidential nomination. Austin Petersen sent out a blast to his lists to get us petitioners and donations: http://us7.campaign-archive2.com/?u=642172a20d573043d9af6fe4e&id=591048de34
Steve Kerbel knows some people around Tulsa and is trying to get them to get volunteer signatures from their employees and social networks.
Darryl Perry donated to the petition drive here.
I also talked to Gary Johnson of NM and Ron Nielson and they are favorable towards the idea of doing a campus tour of Oklahoma as the first campaign swing when Gary declares in January. If we can have any of the other candidates coincide their schedules to be here at the same time we can perhaps schedule some joint appearances/debates.
Here’s my first draft for a follow up letter to the one in the article we are commenting on. I don’t know if it will be used and if it is used I don’t know if it will be revised or sent out as is.
Two weeks ago Wes Benedict wrote to inform you all that we need your urgent help in Oklahoma. We’re not out of the woods yet but I am happy to report that since then we have raised $11,500 to help cover the expenses of the petition drive that ran over our projections. Thank you to those of you who contributed! We are also starting to make some good progress on replacing the petitioners that left Oklahoma, with several new petitioners recruited, on their way, considering coming, and in one case already back with reinforcements. And, we are starting to make some progress on the legal front to address the harassment at public places where we have a Constitutional right to petition.
The weather has been unusually nice so far, but winter is coming, so we can’t relax just yet. We’re looking for more people who are willing to come to Oklahoma (if you aren’t here already) and help us petition. We would certainly love to have more volunteers, but we recognize that most people can’t afford to take a week or several out of their lives and pay for travel, hotels, food, gas and bills back home with no pay. The current rate we are offering is $2.50 per signature; you do not have to be from Oklahoma to petition here. Unfortunately, there are no additional travel expenses, so it’s at your own risk.
If the idea of hitting the road and asking strangers for signatures sounds too daunting to you, or you just don’t have the money to live on on such a trip until you get paid or the luxury of taking the time off from a long term job or other situation you are in, we are also looking for help with things like calling stores to help get permission for locations for petitioners, pro bono legal help, media publicity, temporary housing for petitioners (for anyone reading who lives in Oklahoma and is willing to put up our road crew), and other things I haven’t thought of yet. Please feel free to give me a call or text at 205-534-1622, email me at paulie.frankel@lp.org or hit me up on facebook, https://www.facebook.com/paulie.cannoli
Oh yeah, Wes wants me to remind you that if you haven’t donated to Oklahoma ballot access yet or if you can afford to help us out again, we still need some help on that front too.
Thanks again, and hope to see and hear from some of you soon
Paul Frankel
Ballot Access Committee
On the ground in Oklahoma City
205-534-1622
paulie.frankel@lp.org
https://www.facebook.com/paulie.cannoli
Ken Moellman
to me, Carla