This article originally appeared in the May 2016 issue of LP News.
By Alicia Mattson, LNC Secretary
For those of you who will be first-time delegates to our national convention, we use a “token” procedure that is likely different from what you’ve encountered at a state convention. As you’ll read below, these tokens play very important roles.
When you arrive, check in first at the registration desk and then at the credentials desk, to get your badge and delegate materials. One of the items you will receive at the credentials desk is a packet with seven tokens in it. Treat your tokens like cash. They are valuable and cannot be replaced if lost.
According to LP bylaws, to be nominated for president or vice president, a candidate must have collected the signatures of at least 30 registered delegates. You will receive one token for the presidential nomination and one for the vice-presidential nomination. To help nominate your favorite candidate, fill in all the blanks on your token, including the candidate’s name, your printed name, and your signature, and place it in a designated ballot box. Very important: To protect your intentions, do not hand your signed token to someone else with the candidate’s name left blank — not even to the candidate or the candidate’s volunteer.
The very same presidential signature tokens are used to determine the participants in the presidential candidates debate. To be included in the debate, a candidate must receive tokens equal to at least 10 percent of the number of registered delegates.
Your other five tokens are used for platform plank retention. Essentially, you can use each token to express a desire to delete a particular platform plank. You may cast all five tokens against the same plank, if you wish. On each token, clearly mark one — and only one — plank that you wish to delete, sign the token, and place the tokens in the designated ballot box. For any plank receiving more tokens than 20 percent of the registered delegates, the convention will have a yes–no vote on whether to delete that plank. In theory, as few as 4 percent of delegates could bring a plank to a deletion vote by casting all five of their tokens against that one plank.
This is a pretty disgusting attempt to reduce the number of candidates allowed to participate in both the LP’s nomination process and its presidential debate. In fact, it eliminates, AT A MINIMUM, nearly half the declared candidates from the official debate. More than that if one or more campaigns continue to solicit token votes after they know they’ve passed the 10% threshold (IIRC, that is 10% of delegates registered as of the Saturday morning credentials report).
Libertarian Party Campaign Tour
Greetings Libertarians!
I wish to thank you all for the gracious hospitality felt throughout my campaign tour. Libertarians are truly wonderful folks. Thank you all for a life time memory, to be cherished always. I love you guys!
Here is brief video on the 2015-2016 LP campaign tour. Enjoy.
http://www.totalitariandemocracy.com/lectures/td-lectures/totalitarian-democracy-034
I will make my final stand in Florida, remaining absolutely confident that the LP banner will be planted on the White House if nominated.
The LP Victory Formula:
http://www.totalitariandemocracy.com/home/lpvictory
A powerful and compelling set of campaign lecture videos have been created for the Libertarian Party delegates, so as to demonstrate clearly why Derrick Michael Reid is the only choice for the Libertarian Party for president, if a national victory is actually sought, raising the LP to a viable competitive third party, for increasing our liberties and freedoms from government, as a necessary liberty counterbalance to the totalitarian socialistic fascist DC implemented by the two pandering political machines, enslaving all Americans as tax mules, perpetual debtors, and state dependents. It is incumbent upon any serious libertarian to fully understand the presidential candidates, for making the right choice, as less would tend to stagnate the LP even more than it already is. This campaign lecture series, in total, is accurate and powerful for understanding of the state of the country, the state of the LP and the 2016 presidential election cycle.
http://www.totalitariandemocracy.com/lectures/td-lectures
Peace and love be with you all.
Very Truly Yours, in Liberty and Freedom,
Derrick Michael Reid B.S.E.E., J.D.,
2016 Presidential Candidate, Libertarian Party,
Engineer, Patent Lawyer, Military Scientist,
Market Analyst, and Geopolitical Analyst.
PO Box 1584, Laguna Beach, CA 92652
Contact Email: Libereens@yahoo.com
Skype Account Name: derrickmichaelreid
http://www.totalitariandemocracy.com/
Any predictions for who makes the debates? My guess is that there will be some token hoarding, so maybe 5 candidates per debate or so?
Presidential debate: Probably Johnson, McAfee, Petersen, Perry, and maybe Feldman and/or Vermin Supreme. McCormick, Robinson, and Sterling are more distant maybes. I don’t see Smith, Reid, Sloan, or any others making it.
VP debate: Obviously, some Presidential candidates could switch to VP candidates (I think Petersen in particular said maybe to that question.) But barring a slew of late entries, I would expect Bentivolio, Coley, Dearn, and Weiss to all make it.
(These predictions are, of course, from a casual observer who isn’t planning on attending in person.)
Do delegates turn presidential nomination tokens over to the campaigns themselves, or do delegates turn them in at some central point like the plank retention tokens are? I remember the former method being used in the past, but not sure if that’s how it’s continuing.
If not, then the hoarding question becomes moot. But if that is the method, it gives campaigns an opportunity to say “enough” that they wouldn’t have otherwise.
As a prerequisite for nomination, 30 isn’t that bad a deal. If you can’t get that many nominators, you aren’t long for the race anyway. 10% as a threshold for the debate seems fine. I suspect we’ll see no less than 4 up on stage. (Johnson, McAfee, Petersen, and Perry), with a few extras getting nominated, but not enough for the debate.
I will probably offer my token to Darryl Perry, or maybe Marc Feldman.
Johnson, McAfee and Petersen are likely all locks for debate inclusion. I hope undecided delegates use their tokens on other candidates to have a more inclusive and vibrant debate.
Not a fan of the token system. I would like to think minds stronger than mine could come up with a better system for setting up the convention debate.
For those worried about debate exclusion, there is an unofficial debate happening on Thursday, May 26th in Orlando. All candidates listed on LP.org are invited to participate. Details are posted online here: http://www.mu-net.org/2016_Debate_Format.pdf … Also sponsorships in the program are still available.