Another note about the 4th of July money bomb

SwordOfShannarah

SwordOfShannarah

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Hi guys, this is Trevor Lyman. I've been looking at some of the threads and I see that there are many misconceptions about me and the projects that I am a part of. In this thread I want to address the concerns raised about the 4th of July money bomb.

For those of you who missed the previous discussions you'll find one of them here.:
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=144528 My thanks to stormcommander for changing his viewpoint and being at least somewhat supportive of the event.

Many of you know that I have joined forces with a great bunch of people over at http://BreakTheMatrix.com. In fact our team is now 11 members strong! This means I am now engaged in a for profit entity that aims to change America's media. It is in my strong opinion that the media is the number one reason Ron Paul did not win the 2008 nomination, and that it is also to blame for our involvement in the war, the allowance of the federal reserve, fractional reserve banking and the list goes on. Truly our nation's media MUST be changed if this country is to be great again and http://BreakTheMatrix.com is one attempt at making this change happen.

As a for profit entity we are legally required by the FEC to charge a fair rate for services for the promotion of the July 4th money bomb at FreedomSlate08.com. We simply cannot get around that fact.

Complying with the law is a great reason for us to charge for our services but it not the only great reason. Charging for a service allows us to continue the service on an ongoing basis. Website creation, promotion, contacting the candidates, conducting radio interviews, editing them into videos and so on all require time and energy. Think of the commission as the fuel that keeps us going so that we can in turn keep promoting these candidates. We intend to keep running money bombs at http://FreedomSlate08.com for many months to come. There are many State level candidates who need help and exposure and there will also be the final list of candidates who will need help again once they have won their primaries. We are here to help them win and with your help we can make that happen.

Another great reason for charging for services is to create a revenue stream for http://BreakTheMatrix.com. A revenue stream makes us attractive to investors. With investment we have a real shot at acquiring the capital that is absolutely essential to creating a self-sustaining freedom media presence to compete with the likes of Fox, CNN, and the other mainstream media outlets.

Remember that http://BreakTheMatrix.com is a team of 11 people. That means that I am not "getting all the money". Not by a long shot. Instead the money is going to fuel the media company that will make true and lasting change a reality in this country (so long as we are successful). So, rather than feeling jilted that a small percentage of the funds are not going to make it to the candidates you should feel empowered. Not only are you helping to put some great candidates into office so that they can make real change in Washington D.C., you are also creating and fueling the media company that will make lasting change throughout the nation. The fee we charge is not a detriment to the fourth of July money bomb but rather it is a wonderful bonus.

I have to tell you I am so proud of what we are doing at http://BreakTheMatrix.com and http://FreedomSlate08.com. And I am so proud of all the wonderful candidates who are standing up and fighting for the principles of this great nation. I hope you will support us all so that we can continue to work towards achieving these important goals now and in the days to come.
 
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Thanks Trevor. I took some concerns into consideration, but the responses from the candidates themselves and the legal aspect of it have eased some of my worries. Many of these candidates would be neglected if it were not for freedomslate. I'll bump my old thread about it with your post.
 
Thanks Trevor. I do hope this thread can be useful and address any issues in a fair and respectful manner (per forum guidelines).

I've got a question- obviously with the Ron Paul campaign it was a no-brainer that he was the person we wanted to donate to, however, with many of the other liberty candidates it's not as easy to determine who is best suited, it really would take a lot of research beyond just considering who has had an official endorsement from Dr. Paul. There are still some issues with that however as my understanding is there are some limitations on that. So there certainly seems to be some value in having some kind of vetting service so our donation money can best be applied without having to do hours and hours of research. The Freedom Slate seems to be a good vehicle for this. So my question is, what is the vetting process for someone to get on the Freedom Slate? I'd guess at this early stage there isn't a crack team leaving no stone unturned but since the Freedom Slate idea can be carried into the future, is there a direction to provide improvements to the vetting? From what I see, if the vetting process is solid then that is a good service worth supporting just on its own. IIRC, Lew Rockwell was pretty critical of someone who called themselves a "Ron Paul Republican" (no one on the FS08) so it's certainly an issue we need to be mindful of.

Thanks again.
 
Bryan said:
So my question is, what is the vetting process for someone to get on the Freedom Slate? I'd guess at this early stage there isn't a crack team leaving no stone unturned but since the Freedom Slate idea can be carried into the future, is there a direction to provide improvements to the vetting? From what I see, if the vetting process is solid then that is a good service worth supporting just on its own.
Click to expand...

Bryan, your question and statements here mirror my own.

Thanks for the post Trevor, informative and goes far to dispel some of the criticisms.
 
Bryan said:
Thanks Trevor. I do hope this thread can be useful and address any issues in a fair and respectful manner (per forum guidelines).

I've got a question- obviously with the Ron Paul campaign it was a no-brainer that he was the person we wanted to donate to, however, with many of the other liberty candidates it's not as easy to determine who is best suited, it really would take a lot of research beyond just considering who has had an official endorsement from Dr. Paul. There are still some issues with that however as my understanding is there are some limitations on that. So there certainly seems to be some value in having some kind of vetting service so our donation money can best be applied without having to do hours and hours of research. The Freedom Slate seems to be a good vehicle for this. So my question is, what is the vetting process for someone to get on the Freedom Slate? I'd guess at this early stage there isn't a crack team leaving no stone unturned but since the Freedom Slate idea can be carried into the future, is there a direction to provide improvements to the vetting? From what I see, if the vetting process is solid then that is a good service worth supporting just on its own. IIRC, Lew Rockwell was pretty critical of someone who called themselves a "Ron Paul Republican" (no one on the FS08) so it's certainly an issue we need to be mindful of.

Thanks again.
Click to expand...

Bryan,

Vetting process is an interesting and subjective thing to a degree. I am glad you brought it up as I helped with Freedom Slate 08 every step of the way.

I have some questions for you and maybe you could help folks who are trying to determine a criteria to pick 2 or 3 or all 25 candidates to support on July 4th.

Since you have been supporting so many projects on RPF, what is your vetting process for these projects? I noticed you support www.freedomslate08.com candidates on your banner links which is great, how did you determine who to support?

Maybe folks will just have to take time and research the candidates they feel is best rather than taking www.freedomslate08.com or www.ronpaulforums.com word for it.

Just my thought on this subject:

I suggest utilizing Critical Thinking with regard to all candidates on www.freedomslate08.com and pick the ones that make sense and leave the rest.

Cafeteria style if you will...

Don't just support something or someone because its on www.ronpaulforums.com's banner section or on www.freedomslate08.com's candidate list.

Think for yourself folks and trust your heart! Then get behind the projects and candidates YOU feel good about.

Kurt Wallace
Wake Up America Show
mon-fri 9am-11am EST
www.breakthematrix.com
www.freedomslate08.com
 
My issue with the project isn't profiteering, but what seems like deceptive marketing and taking advantage of prior trust with fine print at the bottom of the page. All other money bombs were done pro-bono, why would we think otherwise now?

If you said all this upfront, no one would care.

But you tried to hide it, or at least weren't upfront about it, and now have to deal with the consequences.
 
Trevor, I applaud your efforts. I also do not have a problem with people making money. I do however think it should be very transparent. I also think since much of the work is done pro-bono by grassroots efforts that more thanks and appreciation needs to be put out to the community. Its one thing to take pay, for having the site up and doing the top end orginaization. It however is inappropriate to take all of the credit.
 
Tangoland said:
Vetting process is an interesting and subjective thing to a degree. I am glad you brought it up as I helped with Freedom Slate 08 every step of the way.
Click to expand...

Kurt,

I was involved briefly with an effort to "vet" potential candidates, and yes, you are correct that critical thinking is important to such an effort. However, to be most efficient, it's important to have a team of people with various talents who are not partial to any one person or agenda.

Part of what I came up with as criteria for vetting a candidate is:

1. Political views: how closely do they know and follow the Constitution?

2. Prior political record, if applicable: has the candidate voted Constitutionally? If not, have they changed their views and why?

3. Prior record: Is their background reasonably clean? Do they have skeletons in the closet that could ruin their credibility?

4. District: Is it a pipe dream that a Republican could get elected in their district? What generalizations can you make about their district? Does the candidate have a message that will resonate with those generalizations? (For instance, if it's a very religious area, Chuck Baldwin would be great! Theodore Terbolizard would not.)

5. Personal characteristics: Is the person a good and persuasive speaker? Is his/her appearance professional? Can they write well? Are they loyal to the people, not to the party?

Much of this is subjective, but it's a process that can be formalized, analyzed and fleshed out. In my mind, it's very important to have this process be as professional as possible.

For instance, you have Peter James on the slate. While I have no personal problem with him (sorry Peter, I know you post here sometimes), he has a quote from Hitler on his website, something about eating a sausage one bite at a time. That's not professional, and it waters down your credibility.

I do not, in any way, want to hurt Freedom's Slate, as I think it can do a lot of good, but it's important for you to maintain credibility with those of us who do analyze the candidates on our own.
Amy
 
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Paul.Bearer.of.Injustice said:
My issue with the project isn't profiteering, but what seems like deceptive marketing and taking advantage of prior trust with fine print at the bottom of the page. All other money bombs were done pro-bono, why would we think otherwise now?

If you said all this upfront, no one would care.

But you tried to hide it, or at least weren't upfront about it, and now have to deal with the consequences.
Click to expand...

Hi Paul Bearer,

I don't think we have been deceptive in our marketing. The disclosure notice at the bottom of the page is exactly where it should be and it is in normal sized print. We're not and never have been hiding anything. If we wanted to deceive we wouldn't have put up a disclosure notice at all.

The consequences should (and I think will) be that people get behind these candidates and join us at http://FreedomSlate08.com.
 
Bryan said:
Thanks Trevor. I do hope this thread can be useful and address any issues in a fair and respectful manner (per forum guidelines).

I've got a question- obviously with the Ron Paul campaign it was a no-brainer that he was the person we wanted to donate to, however, with many of the other liberty candidates it's not as easy to determine who is best suited, it really would take a lot of research beyond just considering who has had an official endorsement from Dr. Paul. There are still some issues with that however as my understanding is there are some limitations on that. So there certainly seems to be some value in having some kind of vetting service so our donation money can best be applied without having to do hours and hours of research. The Freedom Slate seems to be a good vehicle for this. So my question is, what is the vetting process for someone to get on the Freedom Slate? I'd guess at this early stage there isn't a crack team leaving no stone unturned but since the Freedom Slate idea can be carried into the future, is there a direction to provide improvements to the vetting? From what I see, if the vetting process is solid then that is a good service worth supporting just on its own. IIRC, Lew Rockwell was pretty critical of someone who called themselves a "Ron Paul Republican" (no one on the FS08) so it's certainly an issue we need to be mindful of.

Thanks again.
Click to expand...

Hi Bryan,

This is a great question. Kurt has pretty much covered our stance but I will chime in a bit as well. We chose candidates who fell in line with the four major positions we believe Ron Paul stands for (and that we at BreakTheMatrix.com stand for). They are:

(1) End the overseas empire; and bring the troops home;
(2) End the Federal Reserve; break the debt money culture and the stranglehold of our bankers;
(3) Limit our federal government to its proper Constitutional framework; end the income tax (and so much more;
(4) Dismantle the police state; and free the American people.

(for more on this visit: http://www.breakthematrix.com/Business/What-Is-BreakTheMatrix ).

After determining a candidate has the correct stance on these issues we feel it is enough for them to then be listed so that we as potential donors can look into the candidates and make come to our own conclusions. In effect, the candidates at FreedomSlate08.com are not endorsed by us (we don't feel we are in the position to give endorsements) rather the candidates listed are a collection of qualified leads brought together for purposes of information and for everyone's convenience.
 
Quite a few of us also have Dr. Paul's official endorsement... So that helps you all know where we stand.

I know that on that list, myself, b.j., and Steven Vasquez are all endorsed. I've hear Delia Lopez has also, in effect, been promised a forthcoming endorsement.

Our races all have different dynamics, but we're all standing up for peace abroad and expanded freedom at home.

My suggestion is for everyone to make donations to as many candidates as possible from the freedomslate list. This way we all have an equal chance to fund our campaigns and continue this revolution.

Thanks Everyone!

-David Gay

www.davidgay2008.com
 
Tangoland said:
Bryan,

Vetting process is an interesting and subjective thing to a degree. I am glad you brought it up as I helped with Freedom Slate 08 every step of the way.

I have some questions for you and maybe you could help folks who are trying to determine a criteria to pick 2 or 3 or all 25 candidates to support on July 4th.

Since you have been supporting so many projects on RPF, what is your vetting process for these projects? I noticed you support www.freedomslate08.com candidates on your banner links which is great, how did you determine who to support?

Maybe folks will just have to take time and research the candidates they feel is best rather than taking www.freedomslate08.com or www.ronpaulforums.com word for it.

Just my thought on this subject:

I suggest utilizing Critical Thinking with regard to all candidates on www.freedomslate08.com and pick the ones that make sense and leave the rest.

Cafeteria style if you will...

Don't just support something or someone because its on www.ronpaulforums.com's banner section or on www.freedomslate08.com's candidate list.

Think for yourself folks and trust your heart! Then get behind the projects and candidates YOU feel good about.

Kurt Wallace
Wake Up America Show
mon-fri 9am-11am EST
www.breakthematrix.com
www.freedomslate08.com
Click to expand...

Thanks for the post Kurt, you're absolutely correct about people needing to do their own critical thinking-- placing too much trust in another source is part of what got us into the mess we are in.


Since you have been supporting so many projects on RPF, what is your vetting process for these projects?
Click to expand...
From a high level view, there are three things:
- I have the resources to contribute.
- I have some context of a relevant and appropriate sized track record of who needs to be trusted. For example, if I have seen someone put in 300 thankless hours towards some good endeavor and I was asked by them to put in 3, it would be considered. Conversely, if someone had put in 3 hours and asked me to put in 300, that's a different story. In a real situation, if Larry Lepard ask me to do a favor I would- and I have and will continue to do so.
- I foresee the project as being cost effective with a good "return on investment" (with the return being winning hearts and minds).


I noticed you support www.freedomslate08.com candidates on your banner links which is great, how did you determine who to support?
Click to expand...
Josh would have to provide a complete answer, but for what I personally put up there it was dependent upon both objective and subjective elements. The main objective criteria was an endorsement from Dr. Paul-- which of course isn't infallible. Subjectively it is dependent upon the pulse of the overall established and credible grassroots on the forum that have built up a good deal of capital by doing great things for the movement.

Amy does a pretty good job of explaining it here (but pay no attention to DrYongrel :)):
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=135694


I've given some good thought to the overall vetting process for candidates- I think a great service would collect and summarize objective information and then provide some subjective ratings on various key points that can also be summarized. For example, an important aspect of a candidate to me is their past grassroots activism (as it's an indicators to their commitment to the issues)- that could be objectively listed (and somewhat verified with the verification included in the evaluation) and then also subjectively graded. Any subjective formula however shouldn't be public to prevent gaming of the system. Granted, it does cut both ways since, some sort of corrupt vetting service could do damage, so it would be important to have a vetting service with more credibility then what they could afford to lose. One thing that could help too is to have the subjective ratings done in a blind manner in that the grader(s) don't know who the candidate is when possible- they only get generic data.

In the end is it a balance of risk (of doing the wrong thing), spending time making sure you do the right thing vs. the problems of doing nothing (bad idea). So this is why I see it useful to leverage trusted work from others.

Please let me know if this doesn't answer all of your questions.
 
SwordOfShannarah said:
Hi Bryan,

This is a great question. Kurt has pretty much covered our stance but I will chime in a bit as well. We chose candidates who fell in line with the four major positions we believe Ron Paul stands for (and that we at BreakTheMatrix.com stand for). They are:

(1) End the overseas empire; and bring the troops home;
(2) End the Federal Reserve; break the debt money culture and the stranglehold of our bankers;
(3) Limit our federal government to its proper Constitutional framework; end the income tax (and so much more;
(4) Dismantle the police state; and free the American people.

(for more on this visit: http://www.breakthematrix.com/Business/What-Is-BreakTheMatrix ).

After determining a candidate has the correct stance on these issues we feel it is enough for them to then be listed so that we as potential donors can look into the candidates and make come to our own conclusions. In effect, the candidates at FreedomSlate08.com are not endorsed by us (we don't feel we are in the position to give endorsements) rather the candidates listed are a collection of qualified leads brought together for purposes of information and for everyone's convenience.
Click to expand...
Thanks Trevor- this makes sense. I guess I didn't understand the entire mechanics of how the Freedom Slate process works-- this thread has helped.
 
Hey Trevor, I am hoping you consider using the www.ThisNovember5th.com site for the anniversary of the November 5th Mass Donation for the CFL. I think this could be a great way to start getting new support from people that are discovering Dr. Paul. This will also help the other grassroots projects in the aspect it could potentially inspire more people to join our movement as the first donation did.

Please take this into consideration. I got a video that is almost finished it could go viral.

Kind Regards,

James
 
My biggest problem with freedom slate is that out of the 23 candidates on the slate, maybe 2 or 3 or them can win. Take Peter James for instance, he's on the slate, yet he got drilled in the special election a week ago (the winner got 81%). I like Peter, but why give money him when he has no chance. We should consolidate our money into 1 or 2 candidates that have the best shot, not 23, whom most of have very little or no shot of winning the seat.
 
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