Email Database and The Grassroots HQ: Tick,Tock,Tick,Tock......

[isufferfromronpaulfever]

I agree with the OP. Perhaps a formal network that provides an easier means of communication (dedicated IRC server, etc) would be a great start for those that are serious.

 

[Nefertiti]

I'm not sure about centralized control myself, but a centralized database of expertise would be helpful. A database of contacts where one can turn if one needs help with various issues-legal, graphic design, research on issues, copy editing, etc.

 

[goldenequity]

You again?

Lord Xar's Avatar
Lord Xar
LOL................HAHAHAHAHAHA!

 

[Andrew76]

I completely disagree with any kind of "centralized command," and not just because it sounds bad. Sounds wasteful and unnecessary to me.
I'd only suggest that a major next step up would be a link between all the various forums and meetup groups. One giant email list that people could be a part of, in which, in it's ideal form, would contact everyone. There doesn't need to be any forced organization, but at the same time, there are many people in my meetup group, (at least half, I'd bet) who don't know about this forum, even after I mention it in various emails. This is mostly about communication.
The idea of a centralized group of people organizing all the grass roots activity seems like a good idea, but, how exactly would you pull this off? What, exactly, do you mean? We vote on a leader? Pshhh... So far, most of what everyone seems to want, can be and already has been accomplished here: collecting vids, organizing ideas, spreading information. Did we not get a beautiful ad posted in an Iowa paper, stuffed with a thousand pictures of RP supporters? Have DVD's, t-shirts, stickers, flyers, slim jims, posters not been made and shared on here with everyone? FEC regulations have been posted. Campaign contribution information has been posted. The information you need is all here. To suggest that we need a group of folks at the top, who'd be PAID no less, is imo, absurd. Who will pay these people? How much? How would we determine how much to pay? How will you organize the money? Where will the money come from? Why should anyone here be paid and not volunteer their time like the rest of us? What city will this "headquarters" be in. What if I want in my city more than you in yours? How much of our time will be wasted in setting up this unnecessary extra step? How much time could've instead been spent organizing with your local meetup group about the best way to pool your local resources and time so that Ron Paul can get elected? If you do organize some kind of central authority, what if the rest of us want nothing to do with it? How much good will it do to split up the grassroots movement? What assurance do you have that anyone will give a damn?
Ok, I now I'm getting harsh here, but to me, this is a frustratingly unnecessary waste of time and this issue needs to be scrapped. And as always, these are simply my suggestions/observations. In the meantime, donate, donate, donate, donate!!!!

 

[Lord Xar]

Lord Xar's Avatar
Lord Xar
LOL................HAHAHAHAHAHA!

I am not sure I follow... you are making an assumption that "lord" is some title denoting control or authoritarian mindset....... lord xar is just a character out of a book series who I liked....

C'mon goldenequity, is this a slight attempt to discredit me? hahahahahahaahahah....

 

[goldenequity]

I am not sure I follow... you are making an assumption that "lord" is some title denoting control or authoritarian mindset....... lord xar is just a character out of a book series who I liked....

C'mon goldenequity, is this a slight attempt to discredit me? hahahahahahaahahah....

Nothing further from the point!!! I am laughing (yes...out loud) that you (again) show up and put the rubber.....on the road.
You HAVE a (humble) talent friend..... glad to have you "appear" (again!)

 

[Lord Xar]

I completely disagree with any kind of "centralized command," and not just because it sounds bad. Sounds wasteful and unnecessary to me.
I'd only suggest that a major next step up would be a link between all the various forums and meetup groups. One giant email list that people could be a part of, in which, in it's ideal form, would contact everyone. There doesn't need to be any forced organization, but at the same time, there are many people in my meetup group, (at least half, I'd bet) who don't know about this forum, even after I mention it in various emails. This is mostly about communication.
The idea of a centralized group of people organizing all the grass roots activity seems like a good idea, but, how exactly would you pull this off? What, exactly, do you mean? We vote on a leader? Pshhh... So far, most of what everyone seems to want, can be and already has been accomplished here: collecting vids, organizing ideas, spreading information. Did we not get a beautiful ad posted in an Iowa paper, stuffed with a thousand pictures of RP supporters? Have DVD's, t-shirts, stickers, flyers, slim jims, posters not been made and shared on here with everyone? FEC regulations have been posted. Campaign contribution information has been posted. The information you need is all here. To suggest that we need a group of folks at the top, who'd be PAID no less, is imo, absurd. Who will pay these people? How much? How would we determine how much to pay? How will you organize the money? Where will the money come from? Why should anyone here be paid and not volunteer their time like the rest of us? What city will this "headquarters" be in. What if I want in my city more than you in yours? How much of our time will be wasted in setting up this unnecessary extra step? How much time could've instead been spent organizing with your local meetup group about the best way to pool your local resources and time so that Ron Paul can get elected? If you do organize some kind of central authority, what if the rest of us want nothing to do with it? How much good will it do to split up the grassroots movement? What assurance do you have that anyone will give a damn?
Ok, I now I'm getting harsh here, but to me, this is a frustratingly unnecessary waste of time and this issue needs to be scrapped. And as always, these are simply my suggestions/observations. In the meantime, donate, donate, donate, donate!!!!

I agree with you and yet I don't. I am not big on "command" either, but many of us are complaining that RON PAUL's command is flagging etc... in other words, we critique the actual idea of a control center, yet complain about someone elses as being ineffective.

To me, ron paul's message isn't about anarchy, its about personal freedom -- and I don't know why personal freedom means a dislodging of a cohesive campaign on a grassroots level.

To me, you just look at each meetup in and of itself. They coordinate, they get together, and they rally or promote.. okay, so if it works on a very small local level, why not a regional one?

I personally think that you can 'either' be involved or not, and promote in your own way. Which is cool.

this is an "opt-in" sort of thing. You become involved IF you want to involved.

Also, how can it be a waste of time pushing out useful information?

To me it seems like this "local" level involvement is a HUGE benefit and what is proposed does not infringe on that at all! It just adds to it. I think part of the "oppositions" plan and want is to keep the meetups seperate and ineffectual as a group level. There IS a meetup for group leaders, but I do not think it touches all meetups and so far, besides the diebold issue, I have not seen anything roll thru it that would denote an effective regional campaign of promotion.

 

[constituent]

libertyeagle... what a weak post... clearly several people have come down against your show me the money scheme in this thread alone, so no it's not just me.

and that's just this thread. there are several others, nearly identical, that amount to nothing more than the same people pushing for some centralized "grassroots" hq/authority. a little assault on the board every week or two... failing of course to see that having a "grassroots hq" destroys the whole "grassroots" aspect... all you have left is "hq." get off it.

 

[constituent]

i've said it here before...

if you want a job at the campaign... apply.

 

[goldenequity]

Thread Update No.1

roxic27

"Here’s the gist of it. The FEC (Federal Election Commission) has a code of rules and regulations that apparently makes the IRS codebook look like nursery rhymes. And, because other groups are not, shall we say, encouraging our campaign it is especially important that we follow the code to perfection. The code mostly deals with money - how it is received by the campaign, how it is used, etc. The tricky part for grassroots campaigns is that our activities must clearly be separate (in general) from the National campaign or someone is gonna end up in a little prison cell with a roommate named Bubba.

What they explained to us is this: They hate it, but they have to live by it. They want, they need for us to do what we’re doing and do more of it.

Do you see what this means? It means we don’t have to wait on the national organization to make decisions. We don’t have to feel stymied because we don’t know what they want. The truth is this: they can’t tell us! It’s not that they don’t want to, it’s just that they aren’t allowed to. So, you and I can promote Dr. Paul with our best efforts. We can coordinate with each other and help each other as we have been doing. And we can do more of it.

That’s the only direction we really need. In the end, there are two campaigns - national and grassroots."​

cujothekitten Moderator

"This should probably be done. One massive mailing list would make communication a lot easier."​

robatsu

"Ultimately, there may have to be some sort of gatekeeper, or digg mechanism, etc, to keep such a network from becoming overloaded with random half baked ideas."

"You see this in, for example, in Apache, where certain ideas have to get enough traction before they become official projects."

"develop enough support for their idea to prove that it was worthy. Without this impedance, filtering, a nationwide network with unlimited access would just become spam, and with it, you get things that you know have some traction already."

"The way to get most meetups informed: First, publicize it on this forum, probably most meetups have at least one member who reads this, publicize that we're setting up a grass roots comm network and looking for points of contact in local meetups that would be relay points for info."

"There are two pieces to this......The first is just some giant mail list, or distribution mechanism, the second is a piece that moderates what would get distributed."
​

tmg19103

"I for one would be happy ot be part of a communications team to help get ideas out to all the MeetUps and any other grassroots."

"I think where we need a "command and control" is for sharing ideas. We have some great ideas on this board, but how to easily get them to 30,000 plus MeetUp groups?"

"THEN let the MeetUp groups (and their 30,000 members) decide how to use the info/ideas they are sent. "

"what we need is better communication and ways to share info with 30,000 (and growing daily) people FAST."

"let ALL the MeetUp groups know at the same time and let it happen spontaneously. That is the key to grassroots - it has to be a groundswell of people WANTING to do something as opposed to being told to do something."​

ghemminger

"HQ set me an email list of 400+RP leaders I have available"
​

pwnsey

"I'm willing to get some money together to run a sever capable of handling this if someone gets the database and scripts together."​

DjLoTi

"I think this is a good idea. If I could, I'd like to make my radio station a part of such effort."

"The 'Grassroots' HQ has much more freedom and flexibility. This will require a team."​

Andrew76

"I'd only suggest that a major next step up would be a link between all the various forums and meetup groups. One giant email list that people could be a part of, in which, in it's ideal form, would contact everyone. There doesn't need to be any forced organization, but at the same time, there are many people in my meetup group, (at least half, I'd bet) who don't know about this forum, even after I mention it in various emails. This is mostly about communication."​

isufferfromronpaulfever

"Perhaps a formal network that provides an easier means of communication (dedicated IRC server, etc) would be a great start"​

LibertyEagle

"how about when Jennifer was trying to do the same with her University idea? I couldn't even assist her, because I was maxed out. I think she finally found the people, but it was an ALL DAY EFFORT to do so and I mean, ALL DAY."

"What about a repository for high resolution video? How many times have we heard people on here griping that the only video they could get was from YouTube and the quality was horrible?"​

Lord Xar

"You divide the united states into regions."
"I can set up the site and get the hosting, that is not a big deal, what we need is representatives. Also, lets talk about how to divide the regions."

"let me set this up tonight.. I will set up the site to maintain this.. "​

 

[LibertyEagle]

libertyeagle... what a weak post... clearly several people have come down against your show me the money scheme in this thread alone, so no it's not just me.

and that's just this thread. there are several others, nearly identical, that amount to nothing more than the same people pushing for some centralized "grassroots" hq/authority. a little assault on the board every week or two... failing of course to see that having a "grassroots hq" destroys the whole "grassroots" aspect... all you have left is "hq." get off it.

Nope. I see a lot of people agreeing we need some sort of coordination. It isn't determined what that will look like yet, but I see a lot of people with the same type of thoughts.

No one is asking you to be involved, constituent. Keep doing your own thing, whatever that is and power to you. But, don't be a wet blanket on those of us who want to have some sort of coordinated effort.

 

[Lord Xar]

Nope. I see a lot of people agreeing we need some sort of coordination. It isn't determined what that will look like yet, but I see a lot of people with the same type of thoughts.

No one is asking you to be involved, constituent. Keep doing your own thing, whatever that is and power to you. But, don't be a wet blanket on those of us who want to have some sort of coordinated effort.

I agree. If this doens't work, then the proof is in the pudding.

Right now, people don't know the voting rules in any particular straw poll. They don't know about the GOP meetings going. They don't know how to put ads in papers and radio spots.

Constituent, if you want to NOT participate, that is cool. Like LibertyEagle said - why not just do your own thing. Why are you sooo against this? You keep saying "ron paul supporters won't like this central command idea" but I find it odd that you are using keywords to enflame and get others on board. Like you said, if this happens a couple times a week (people posting wanting this...) then perhaps that is a wakeup call that perhaps it is needed.

NOBODY is saying you can be involved, but you are saying for NOBODY to be involved.... Why not just give best wishes.

 

[happyphilter]

I think many of you are confused about what this idea really means...
It is NOT something you have to do or be part of.
It is NOT something that controles you.

It would be a resource for us. I mean look at just now, why do we have 2 ron paul forums, do you guys REALLY think that helps? If we have an opportunity to reach a larger group of Ron Paul supporters on the internet lets do it!

Many of us are uncoordinated doing our own thing, half of us dont even know where to focus our efforts. If we have some leadership and someone in charge we would be able to go to one place and say "hey this is where I can be" or "OH this is how I do this" You guys understand yet?

Nobody wants to control you, so settle down and dont be so defensive. The more organized we are the more effective we will become.

 

[robatsu]

It would be a resource for us. I mean look at just now, why do we have 2 ron paul forums, do you guys REALLY think that helps?

Exactly. For instance, when ronpaulforums when down the other day, wouldn't it have been nice for people to say where the distributed discussions were being resumed?

 

[constituent]

i guess it's an issue of symantics... i think that calling yourself the HQ would be wrong and actually discourage people... i also think that organized, coordinated efforts are a good thing.. hence, meetup groups and this message board.

why are there two ron paul forums? because some people like the way things work over here, others like that one. it is not very difficult to point your browser from one to the other, developing a whole centralized structure to do just that seems like the redundancy to me. but i guess that's just me whining.

I applaud your efforts, just think that you should consider calling yourself something other than Headquarters or anything that suggests.. "we're in charge here." because no one is in charge, nor should they be... that's the key to success here and in the future.

 

[happyphilter]

I don't think "HQ" would be the name.

And about the forums, I don't think its a matter of how they look for the reason people being there. For me it was because I found this one first.

So if we call it something different, how many of you would be okay with that? We could have a website to all the information, contacts, event places/dates, and discussion.I think that would benafit just about everyone.

 

[mtmedlin]

Ive read multiple threads and for the most part held my tongue but since I am not known for being quiet, here is my take. there are those anarchist styled individuals who are so fearful of being controlled that they wish not to participate in a collaboration of meetup groups. Whether their mother didn't hug them enough or what their problem is, I simply don't know. What I do know is I have worked on a Governors, Mayors, and County Commissioners campaign (this is in Florida) and all had two common things. They had grassroots supporters, and the grass roots were effective. Why were they effective? They were organized. Ive tried working with several Libertarian groups and they all say the same damn thing. "We don't need more control, we already have too much of that in government." Only thing is then they go on to do what most Libertarian candidates do...lose and before the bashing gets started, yes, I am a DUES PAYING member of the Libertarian party since 1996. I can be a member and critique.
Look how effective we were when people like Lord Zar stepped up and LEAD the ad campaigns. When the ad came out great I didn't hear any bitching. Now think if we had some people LEADING on a much larger scale then just the 2000+ members we have. Ron Paul's grassroots support is not getting anywhere not because of the media, or 1 of about a million conspiracies but because for the most part we have people with very little political experience trying to lead several small groups who communicate to each other very ineffectively.
What I would suggest. Do we need paid leaders...NO! Do we need one national leader....NO! What we could use is for each state to have one (or a few for larger states) state leader. In Florida we have 67 counties. Therefore I think each county that has a RP meetup group should select a leader. We could use this forum as a place for the 50 state leaders to talk in a Private password protected login area. Each state can make a forum for what is going on in their state and make suggestions on action points for the states. The state leaders can discuss these with the other state leaders and pass on recommendations to the groups. No one person would have all the power and with there only being 50 state leaders, information could be passed to them quickly. In return, the state leader could contact a handful of the most active county leaders, who would in tern use a telephone/ e-mail tree to pass on the information.
This system gives nobody extraordinary power but gives a clear chain that can be utilized for coordinating purposes. If a group decides to opt out of what all the county leaders have decided, then we wish them well and hope they come on board on the next idea.
It also wouldn't be a bad idea for at least the first five primary states to form their own PAC. With this organizational system in place along with the PACs we could begin targeting nationwide efforts to win those first primary state. I am glad that everybody in all fifty states are doing what they can for their own state but to be honest, if we don't win a few of those first five states (I like NH, Nevada and S. Carolina), the RP campaign will be over with by super Tuesday. Organization is the key to effectiveness. There are two old sayings that I use all the time. "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail." and "You plan your work and you work the plan."
My 2 cents.

 

[constituent]

An authoritative website containing as (I don't remember who) someone brought up that has links to only high quality video [i keep thinking of the meet the candidates KMUR interview example], and state by state up to date info on important approaching events. it seems like we've got all of that already w/ ronpaulforums.com and freeme.tv, perhaps some of the folks in here would be well served by contacting

the good people over at ronpaulnation.com

they have a great site.

 

[constituent]

"so fearful of being controlled... maybe their mothers..."

save it for sean hannity.

 

[mtmedlin]

Truth hurts. I dont have time to be nice, I want to see RP win. We need coordination and colaberation. If we keep running around like chickens with our heads cutoff we the meetup groups will continue to be ineffective and well all end up with more of the same. I see people all over this forumn and elswhere wanting to do too many things and most wont make an impact on the election. We dont need all fifty states right now, we need three in the beginning and the rest will fall into place.