Jonathan Bydlak says:
Well, I don't know who on our campaign staff attacked you. But then again, perhaps you might want to start by explaining your involvement with DC ballot access.
Have you told people on these forums that you asked the campaign for $10,000 to obtain just 600 signatures?
Have you explained how you left the campaign high and dry when your request was declined?
Are you aware of the fact that some of the few signatures you did acquire single-handedly almost resulted in Ron Paul's name not being on the ballot in DC?
Do you know how much official staff time was needed to rectify that situation, rather than working on other things?
While I do not believe publicly attacking anyone (either HQ --> grassroots or grassroots --> HQ) really is appropriate, you may not be the best example here, because this seems to me like behavior that is far more inappropriate than many of the things you have criticized other people for.
Bradley in DC replies:
Since you bring it up, you do know of what HQ was saying about me (eg., being fired from the Congressional office despite the Congressional office repeatedly refuting the lies that HQ would then continue to repeat knowing they're lies), etc.
Go back and read my posts about my exchange with McHugh and HQ sabotaging the DC grassroots effort.
I was a VOLUNTEER DC ballot access coordinator. I was doing the job for free without asking for any money but would not take the blame for HQ's incompetence and hostility to the DC grassroots activists if we didn't get on the ballot for pennies.
And yes, if I were going to be treated the way McHugh was treating me (and for which Becker apologized on behalf on the campaign) as a volunteer, it would have taken a lot of money for me to put up with that to work for him--and the money requested was to do a GOTV project to win DC that HQ refused to discuss (or do, for that matter).
Did I explain leaving HQ high and dry? I believe I used "F*ck you" to explain it repeatedly here (what? six weeks before the deadline after HQ wouldn't let us contact the DC supporters in their database for more weeks than that AFTER the ballot petitioning started!).
Please explain this as it makes no sense at all to me:
"Are you aware of the fact that some of the few signatures you did acquire single-handedly almost resulted in Ron Paul's name not being on the ballot in DC?"
After it became crystal clear McHugh and HQ have no clue about the delegate process (the RP website still gets wrong nearly all of the states since they don't even understand the RNC summary file) and incorporating GOTV into it, I've done all I could to publicly warn other grassroots activists not to delay deferring to HQ and do the job themselves (for which I've been thanked by grassroots supporters in Ohio and other places). For that, I make no apologies. I'm in this to support Dr. Paul.
Welcome Jonathan.
I really didn't want to publicly "go here" but since it was brought up, I can't keep my mouth shut any longer.
Bradley's experience with ballot access and signature gathering mirrors my own experience in Virginia. IMO, HQ, specifically the paid Ballot Access Coordinator, Mike McHugh, did everything he could to destroy the volunteer effort to collect signatures for Ron Paul in Virginia. I will omit some details but basically:
Virginia requires 10,000 signatures statewide and 400 signatures per district. We were asked to collect roughly double that to insure there were plenty of valid signatures. Beginning in July, we had no instructions and no information. Finally, the volunteer state coordinator (who, by the way, sold his home and everything he had to volunteer for RP) and several others took the bull by the horns and figured out what we needed to do. The deadline for signatures was Dec. 14th.
We were going along just fine when Mike hired someone to gather signatures because "the grassroots wasn't producing" which was total BS. He didn't even bother to find out what we had gathered at that point. This destroyed our momentum and many people just stopped collecting, figuring the paid person or persons were going to take care of it.
Next, we find out that the paid guy wasn't getting enough signatures, surprise, surprise!!!! It isn't easy to gather signatures, in fact, it was downright difficult. So we had to try to ramp it up again. We'd then hear panic here and there about how we had to have them before the deadline and so on. Seemed it was about a controversy a week and always conflicting information.
Several of us from the Tidewater area went to the Republican Advance and Straw Poll in Arlington in early December, clipboards in hand. That was my first encounter with McHugh and several other staffers.
We, the grassroots were treated as though we'd just fallen off the turnip truck, most especially by McHugh. None of them introduced themselves, none of them were collecting signatures (but they ordered us around as though we didn't know what we were doing) and they lurked in the background while we grassroots people manned our gorgeous booth, set up and paid for by the state coordinator and a few others.
I was totally appalled by McHugh's behavior. He was boorish and rude, arrogant and downright hateful to some of us. He walked up and sprayed one gal who was handing out slim jims in the mouth with breath spray, without warning because, according to him, "people were complaining about her breath". She spent the rest of the evening in her hotel room crying. He was lucky her boyfriend didn't kick his a$$.
The behaviour of the staffers really turned some of the grassroots people off and many of them stated then and there, "I will never send another dime to the campaign if this is what they hire to run it".
We managed to collect 20K+ signatures by the deadline. The night before they were to be turned in to repub HQ, we got an emergency call that McHugh couldn't be there to witness the counting and that the petitions had to be sorted by district and could we PLEASE come to Richmond. So 13 of us showed up to help.
When the door was opened, we were told that only two of us could go in. We decided on the state coordinator and an attorney. A full 45 minutes late, McHugh shows up, young lady in tow (turns out to be his daughter) barrels through the door without speaking to any of us and begins threatening the receptionist because he wouldn't let McHugh in. Finally, McHugh got his way and the other two came out.
I was appalled that this is what was representing Ron Paul in an official capacity and I just shook my head in disgust and said out loud, "they're going to kill this". (for saying this out loud, I was told that McHugh said that I threatened
him).
And by the way, the petitions were not organized in any way, shape or form and I think the people at republican HQ finally just gave up and decided that we had enough signatures.
We were promised prizes for those who collected the most signatures. We received nothing.
I was promised reimbursement for obtaining my notary commission and for gas for the trip to Richmond. Nothing.
The state coordinator asked for a small stipend to cover his expenses, I also asked on his behalf, and not only did he receive nothing but HQ refused to let him continue with his position right after the signature collection and when we were entering the GOTV phase. Instead, the grassroots were fractured statewide at a very critical time.
We BEGGED for lists so we could contact known supporters and by the time we finally did get them, it was waaaaay too late to make effective use of them. Keep in mind, most all of us have jobs and family aside from devoting every spare moment of our lives (and then some!) to The Cause.
Finally, I read repeatedly where other states, such as Rhode Island and Ohio were in danger of not getting Ron Paul's name on the ballot and there was all kinds of last-minute angst on the 'net about getting it done. One would think that the Ballot Access Coordinator would spend his time educating himself on each state's ballot access rules, prioritizing the dates, educating the grassroots and following through on the process. He had plenty of people more than eager to help in Virginia. But maybe it's just me for making the mistaken assumption that the people in HQ knew what they were doing.
